Page 132 of Enemy of My Enemy
“I’ll have someone waiting for you.Allah yusallmak, Mr. Reichenbach. May Allah protect you on your travels.”
“Thank you, Your Highness.”
The phone clicked off.
In the kitchen, the ice machine stopped. He frowned and slowly stood, heading for the workroom.
“Whoa!” Doc veered by him, standing in front of the door, holding the handle closed. In one hand, he dragged the black plastic bag, full of ice, across the marble floor. “You don’t wanna go in there, lover boy.”
Faisal arched one eyebrow. “I may enter any room of my house that I wish.”
“Yeah, sure, youcan,” Doc said, emphasizing his words. “But you really don’twantto.”
“Doc! Anytime!” Adam shouted.
Faisal gently pushed Doc aside. He exhaled and sighed and guffawed all in one, an undignified kind of huffing squawk. Faisal turned the handle and pushed his head into the workroom.
“Hurry up with the ice! Oh—” Adam froze, wide eyes staring at Faisal.
Across the room, Adam had a bloody body laid out on a tarp in front of his air conditioner, near the chilling unit. The corpse's skin had gone pale, except for the side of his face, turning a mottled plum and green.
“What isthis?” He stepped in, staring at the body, arms thrown wide, jaw dropping. “What did youdo?”
“He shot himself!”
“And you brought him backhere?”
“Doc, the ice! Now!” Adam looked away, grabbing the bag of ice when Doc hefted it around Faisal. He traded with Doc, throwing another plastic bag his way, and Doc disappeared back to the kitchen. The ice machine started up again. “We couldn’t leave him on the street in Ma’an. Someone—the Jordanians, Madigan, hell, anyone—could have found him, and we’d be in serious trouble. And there’s something weird about this whole thing, Faisal. Ihadhim. I was trying to talk to him. And he shot himself.”
“What did he say?”
“Nothing.” Adam packed the ice around Noah’s body, under his arms and over his heart and around his head. “Not a damn thing.”
“And your solution was to bring acorpseinto myhome?”
Adam sighed, hanging his head. “What else could I do, Faisal?”
What else could he do, indeed? Shaking his head, Faisal crossed his arms. “Why keep the body,habibi?” He jerked his chin to the ice, and to Doc, filling another bag in the kitchen. “Why pack him with ice and preserve him?”
“Just a feeling I have.”
“You think he’ll pop back to life like a zombie?”
Adam sent him a dry glare and hollered for Doc again.
“And where are your shoes?”
Doc came back, hauling another bag of ice. Adam packed more around the body until it was completely covered. He wrapped the tarp tight and duct-taped it closed.
He didn’t look at Faisal. “I was tracking him in a mosque.”
Faisal’s eyebrows arched high as his lips pursed. “Forthis, you’d go to a mosque?Wallah…”
Adam cringed. Finally looked up. “YourIslam I like,” he breathed. “Whatyoubelieve. But I can’t listen to people saying they hate us.”
Faisal finally spotted the blood splattering Adam’s clothes and smeared across his skin. “Is that yours?” His throat clenched.
“Some of it. Not most, though.” He rubbed at his ear. “Hey, who called? Did the rest of the team check in?”
