Page 164 of Whisper
Graduation day, four months after training began, was a simple affair… for everyone else. Director Edwards shook every graduate’s hand, congratulated them on joining the CIA family.
Kris was told not to participate and was given his graduation certificate and new orders the night before. He was instructed to report to the SAD office at Langley directly and bypass the graduation. Like a leper, the director wouldn’t touch him, wouldn’t be seen with him.
Dan, of course, was there. He smiled for Kris and pulled him in for a hug, then took him to dinner at one of DC’s best steakhouses. For two hours, over Martinis with Dan as he recounted the foibles of his training, Kris almost felt normal.
Except for the hole in his heart and the void in his soul, and the ring he still wore on his left hand.
They shared a bottle of champagne after dinner. “To new beginnings,” Dan toasted.
“To the dead.”
“To never letting anyone else tell you what to do.
“To vengeance.”
“To those poor bastards at SAD. They don’t know what they’re getting.” Dan clinked his glass with Kris’s for the fifth time. And, for the fifth time, Kris downed his champagne like it was a shot. “They have no fucking idea what I’m capable of. Not now. Not yet.”
Pakistan Northwestern Frontier
Bajaur Province
Federally Administered Tribal Areas
June 2009
Somehow, he survived.
He rode his fever in waves and crashes, burning up until Abu Adnan packed snow around his head and under his arms, and then trembled, shivering while every blanket Abu Adnan owned was piled on top of him. The goats slept by his side, trying to warm him up.
Eventually, his fever broke. His eyes opened.
“Allahu Akbar,” Abu Adnan prayed. He smiled down at David. “You will live,in shaa Allah. Allahu Akbar.”
“Where am I?” he croaked. His voice, weary from disuse, cracked, split in two.
Abu Adnan named a town David had never heard of, on a mountain David didn’t know. “What tribal area?”
“Bajaur.”
He swallowed hard. He was a million miles from nowhere, inside the mountainous, unreachable Bajaur Province. The Pakistanis didn’t venture into Bajaur, and neither did the US. It was a land untouched by time, locked away from the world thanks to the sky-piercing mountains, a former ocean’s canyon floor now scraping the stars. “Do you have a cell phone?”
Abu Adnan shook his head. “No one here has cellulars. There is no way to use those devices here.”
“How far is the nearest town?”
“Yallah, very far. Very far.”
“I know your son told you to keep me here as a hostage.” David’s voice trembled. He sniffed. “But please. Ihaveto go. I have to get back to my people.”
“Astaghfirullah, I am sorry, brother—”
“Your son wants to kill me. Please, please.”
“My son, my Adnan, is dead,” Abu Adnan said softly. “He was killed months ago.”
David froze. “Months?”
“You have been unconscious for some time, brother. But Allah is merciful. He has brought you back to health.Allahu Akbar!”
