Page 45 of Chasing the Past

He laughed at her humor despite the seriousness of the situation.

“Sure, let me see what I can come up with.” He retrieved his cell again and typed in Kunduz prior to the Taliban’s control. It brought up several hits.

“This is the downtown district.” He turned the phone and she stepped closer. “Right here is the building.”

She took it from him searching desperately for something that would spark a memory.

“Nothing. I have nothing. I don’t recognize it,” she said with obvious frustration.

“Okay. Well, it makes sense since you may have not visited Sashi in Kunduz and we don’t know if you two were close or estranged for some reason.”

“We were twins. I can’t imagine a scenario where we would be estranged. What about Sashi’s apartment there? Maybe I visited it.”

He searched through the photos he’d kept of his life with Sashi. He’d visited her at her apartment many times. Eli pulled up one photo. “Here. If you swipe left, there are more.”

She stared at the photo, her brow screwed up into a frown. “It looks familiar.” She scrolled through the rest of the photos of the apartment. “I’ve definitely been there before.”

Eli felt a surge of hope. If they could get her to the point of that traumatic moment in time when she was injured and her memory wiped clean perhaps he could help her get it back.

“I have an idea.” He found some inside photos of the building and showed them to her.

Asal’s hand shot to cover her mouth. “I’ve been there before.” Her gaze lifted to his. “Eli, I’ve been there.”

Eli’s thoughts flew in a dozen different directions. “This is good news.” A theory began to formulate in his mind. “What if you were in Kunduz before the Taliban took over and Rafiq found out about you and used you to lure Sashi to the building.” But why wouldn’t Sashi tell him Asal was there? Why hadn’t she mentioned having a twin at all?

“You think I was being held in the building?” she asked in surprise.

“It’s possible.”

Why wouldn’t Asal have died in the explosion? Rafiq hadn’t, though. Maybe she’d almost escaped, and he went after her and she was seriously injured.

“So, he used me to lure Sashi into the building. But why kill her? He needed to know what she had on him.”

“That doesn’t make sense . . . Unless the explosion wasn’t supposed to happen until after he’d gotten the information out of Sashi.” Eli blew out a sigh. “I’d like to call my doctor friend if you don’t mind. I’ll need to send him a photo of your injury.” He hated asking her to reveal the scar she’d tried so hard to conceal.

“If you think it will help,” she said reluctantly.

“I do.”

She pulled back her dark hair to reveal the extent of the scar. Eli clicked a couple of photos and then sent them to Blake Cosgrove. Eli typed a quick message explaining briefly what he needed. In a matter of minutes, Blake was calling.

“Sounds like you’re working on something interesting as usual.”

Eli had first met Blake several years back when he’d broken his arm while snowmobiling. Blake had been working in the emergency room at the time and had set Eli’s arm. Eli later learned Blake’s wife Sienna was a nurse at the hospital as well.

“I’m here with Asal Noor, she has the scar in question.”

“Hello, Asal. Nice to meet you. Sorry, it’s under these circumstances.”

“Thank you. Nice to meet you too,” Asal told him.

“Anyway, I realize it’s difficult to determine the age of an injury or what might have caused it, but can you give us your professional opinion?”

“Hold on. Let me send the photos to my laptop so I can blow them up bigger.” Eli could hear Blake speaking to his wife. After a few more seconds of rustling sounds, Blake came back onto the call. “Okay, I’m looking at them now . . . Wow, that’s a serious injury. I can understand why it might have resulted in memory loss.”

Eli kept his attention on Asal. He was worried that once she realized what happened to her and the memories returned, she’d be filled with guilt and blame herself for what happened to Sashi.

“I’m guessing this was due to an injury to theprefrontal cortex, seeing where the scar is located.”

---