“We don’t know where he is, and I can’t tell you for sure that someone is out to get your film crew, but I’m here to find out.”
“A Navy SEAL operating in the US? Isn’t that illegal or something?”
“Not exactly, but it is top secret. I’m not really here.” He pressed a finger to his lips. “I am sorry about the loss of your friends.”
“Thanks.” Her chest rose and fell as the corner of her mouth twitched. “Giles’s mother called to tell me about the accident. At the time, I figured it was just that—an accident. Then a few weeks ago, I started hearing rumors that Lars had killed himself. That’s about the time I started feeling watched. I put it down to paranoia at first, but the feelings got stronger. Then I verified Lars’s death last night with his brother and seriously freaked out, especially since I saw you lurking across the street at two in the morning.”
“Sorry about that. What were you doing up at two o’clock?”
“Working.”
“Did you ever release that documentary? I looked for it but never saw anything about the movie.”
Her eyes widened. “We never finished the film. We were all shaken up after the kidnapping and moved on to other projects—with other people.”
“The film was about Somali women, right?”
“About Somali women and the underground feminist movement there—dangerous stuff.”
He scratched the stubble on his chin. “That might be enough to get you killed.”
“Maybe, but why now? We never finished the film, never discussed finishing it. I never even got my hands on the footage.” She swirled her glass, and the ice tinkled against the side. “Are you here to figure out what’s going on?”
“I’m here to...make sure it doesn’t happen again.”
“To me.”
“To you.”
“I have no idea why someone would be after us now. Why weren’t we killed in Somalia if someone wanted to stop the film?”
“Our team of snipers stopped that from happening.”
“Do you think that’s why the pirates kidnapped us? I thought they were going for ransom. That’s what they told us, anyway.”
“The pirates patrolling those waters are usually working for someone else. They could’ve been hired to stop you and then once they were successful decided to go rogue and trade you for ransom money instead.”
She waved her arms out to her sides. “We’re in the middle of New York City. Do you know how crazy that sounds?”
“As crazy as it sounds in the middle of some Scottish highland road or in some posh district of Copenhagen.”
“Do you have people looking for Dahir?”
“We do, but there’s also the possibility that Dahir is working with the other side.”
She landed a fist on the granite. “Never. I tried to get him and his family out of Somalia. His life wasn’t going to be worth much there after that rescue on the high seas. He’d become a target in Mogadishu even before Giles and Lars died.”
“Tell me more about your feelings of being followed. Do you have any proof? Any evidence?” He watched her over the edge of his glass as he drained it.
Her instincts had been right about him following her, so she could be onto something. She might be a pampered rich girl, but she’d spent time in some of the most dangerous places in the world—and had survived.
“No hard evidence—a man on the subway who seemed to be following me, a persistent guy at a club one night, a jogger who kept turning up on the same trails in the park.”
He studied her face with its high cheekbones, patrician nose and full lips and found it hard to believe she hadn’t experienced persistent guys in clubs before. “These were all different men?”
“All different. I can’t explain it. It’s a general creep factor. I know you think because I come from a privileged background I don’t have any street smarts, but I’ve been in some rough areas around the world. We do have to keep our wits about us or wind up in hot water.”
“I believe you. I looked you up online.” He wouldn’t tell her that he’d researched Nicole Hastings long before he’d gotten this unusual assignment. She might start feeling a general creep factor about him.
“Who sent you here? The Navy?”
“I’m reporting directly to my superior officer in the Navy, but it goes beyond that. I’m also reporting to someone from the intelligence community—someone named Ariel.”
“Why would the intelligence community be interested in a couple of documentary filmmakers getting into trouble with some Somali pirates?”
“I doubt a bunch of ragtag pirates have the reach and connections to commit two murders in Europe and make them look like accidents.”
“So, the CIA or the FBI or whoever thinks our situation is linked to something or someone else?”
“Could be.”
She tapped a manicured fingernail on his glass. “Do you want more water?”
“No, thanks.”
As she tipped a bit more in her own glass, she said, “What did you hope to find in my mail, anyway?”
“I’m not sure. I’m a sniper, not a spook. I was just checking out what I could.”
“And what did you discover other than a request from Harvard?” She moved out of the kitchen with the grace of a gazelle and swept the mail from a table where she’d dropped it.
Hunching forward on his stool, he said, “Nothing. I wasn’t lying when I told you I didn’t have a chance to look through it all.”
She returned, shuffling through the large stack of envelopes and mailers. “Bills, junk, junk, bills, postcard from my mom, who’s the only one I know who still sends them instead of texting pictures. More bills...”
Her face paled as she plucked an envelope from the fanned-out pieces of mail.
“What is it?”
“It’s a letter from Lars—from beyond the grave.”
Nicole held the thin envelope between two fingers, fear pulsing through every fiber of her being, her mouth suddenly dry.
Slade launched from his stool and hovered over her shoulder. “How do you know it’s from Lars? There’s no return address, and it definitely wasn’t sent from Denmark.”
“I’d recognize his chicken scratch anywhere.” She flicked the postmark with her fingernail. “New York, not Denmark.”
“Was he in the city?”
“Not that I know of, but then, I haven’t even been here a month.”
“Are you going to open it or stare at it for a while?”
He was practically breathing down her neck, so she took a few steps to her left. She ripped into the envelope, and a single sheet of white paper fluttered to the counter.
As Slade reached for it, she snatched it up and squinted at it. “His handwriting always was atrocious.”
“Do you want me to try?”
“It