Page 43 of Casualties of War
“You mean, how I dropped you into the middle of a civil war and got you plastered across newspapers, buck naked?”
“You gave my life meaning,Nick, after I had all but given up.”
His smile faded. “Then I will make sure it continues to do so.”
Calli heard the iron in his voice. Nick had recovered.El Leopardowas back.
He glanced at his watch again. “I’m late for the next briefing.”
“Go. I’ll be here when you get back.”
He nodded but didn’t reach to end the call. His gaze met hers.
Calli knew why he was hesitating. “No goodbyes,remember?”
“Only hello, yes.” He nodded. “I’ll text when I get a break.” He reached up and snapped off the camera with a quick motion.
The screen turned black, and the little broken connection icon blinked.
Back to work, Calli told herself. She picked up the phone and tapped the intercom button. “Chloe, how is the cleanup coming along? Has the guest room been cleared out and made up, yet? Oh,and my suit needs a brush-down…”
* * * * *
The skinny mattress Téra used as her bed was one of two dozen in the warm attic room. The women who slept here had rigged sheets and coats and other scraps of fabric between the mattresses for a bare minimum privacy. It made Téra’s tight quarters a dark corner of solitude.
Sometimes, the solitude was a good thing. Most times, it was not. This morning,though, it made no difference.
Téra blinked at the rays of bright sun blasting through the horizontal slats of the vent, high up by the peak of the roof. Dust motes danced in the light. She processed what the blast of light meant.
It was late. Much later than usual. The attic was silent. No one was shuffling between the mattresses. The only sound was a soft, slow breathing, behind her.
Startled,Téra rolled over to glance at the wall.
Rubén Rey sat with his back against the wall, his legs stretched out along the narrow strip of floor between Téra’s mattress and the adjoining wall. His head tilted back and his lips were parted. He was asleep. He still wore his glasses.
What was the time? How late was she? Had Calli been looking for her? Téra didn’t have a phone or a watch to tell her.She levered herself up on one elbow and leaned over Rubén’s lap to glance at his watch, on his left wrist. The face was turned toward the wall, though.
“A little after nine,” Rubén said, his voice soft with sleep.
Téra pulled back and sat up on the mattress, bringing the sheet with her. She put her back against the wall, not to sit as he was but because she liked to have something solid behindher.
Rubén yawned and rubbed his eyes under the glasses. “I fell asleep.”
“I noticed,” Téra said.
“I didn’t mean too. Not here, anyway.” He glanced around the room. “They must have tiptoed out.”
“Probably didn’t want to wake you,” Téra said. The other women, who all had tasks and responsibilities about the house, as she did, had grown used to Rubén’s presence, last thing at night. They weren’tused to seeing him here in the morning, though, because he always left right after Téra had fallen asleep.
The first night everyone had returned to the big house on the beach after the cyclone had swept across Mexico, Téra had settled on her lumpy mattress with a tight knot in her chest. The twelve hours the cyclone had battered them in the run-down deserted motel they had sheltered in had been,contrariwise, hours of peace. She had slept for the first time since…well, for a long time.
Even in the back of her mind she didn’t want to acknowledge she had slept because Rubén had been sitting beside her. He had not said he would guard her, yet his presence was enough for her to sleep without worry. Despite the gale-force, destructive wind, the torrential rain and hail and the creaking ofthe motel building over them, Téra had slept soundly.
Now she had returned to her lonely mattress. She knew the dream would return. She would wake in the middle of the night with her heart pounding and her throat tight, feeling as though some great calamity was about to land upon her with both feet. She would lie in the dark, her eyes wide, trying to see the first hint of disaster approachingher.
There was a flutter of sound from the women who slept closest to the top of the attic stairs. Téra pulled aside the old tablecloth that separated her mattress from her neighbor’s. A gauze curtain hung between her and the stairs. Despite the curtain, she recognized the shape of the visitor at the top of the stairs from his height and the quiet voice.
A softer female voice answered Rubén,while Téra’s heart leapt again, this time not with the panic that gripped her in the middle of the night.
