Page 4 of The Stowaway
“Follow me.” I lowered my flashlight and went over to pick up my backpack. “It’s safer to talk inside.” I wanted to inspect her passport more too.
She must’ve made contact with someone at home if she knew her coworkers were missing.
“You have a house here?”
A house was a stretch.
I didn’t respond.
Fucking hell. Now what? I wasn’t breaking protocol for her; I had a job to do. But it went without saying that I was bringing her home eventually, so I didn’t see any choice other than letting her stay.
“Are we in Pakistan?” she asked next.
“No.”
“Uz… Um.” She was doing the math, wasn’t she? We hadn’t been in the air long enough to make it to Uzbekistan. “We’re still in Afghanistan.”
“You’re sharp.” I shone the light on the trail down the ridge until we arrived at the tiny dwelling.
The inside was roughly ten-by-ten feet, and I could only hope the last operator who’d been here had left the place the way he’d found it. As in, always with a few hours’ worth of firewood and a closed chimney.
“How old are you?” I asked, yanking the door open. Sand fine as dust was kicked up in the beam of light, and I ducked my head to enter.
Sweet luxury, the last operator had left two foldable lawn chairs against the wall too.
“Thirty-two,” she answered.
So she was one step above from still being a damn baby.
Maybe it was because of how I’d lived my life, and all the suffering I’d seen, that I felt ancient these days. Anyone under thirty-five was a kid in my eyes, so don’t get me started on the twentysomething-year-old recruits at work. It was the one downside of the private military agency I’d dedicated much of my life to. They brought in a dozen or so former service members every year. I’d once been one of them.
“And you’re from Texas,” I stated. Thank fuck, we had firewood.
“Um, yes, but I haven’t lived there in ages. I’m in Annapolis now. Well…I was. It’s not like my apartment is waiting for me.”
Annapolis, the land of squids.
“How did you know? I don’t have an accent.”
I glanced back at her. “All right. I figured it out by the accent you don’t have.” Then I aimed the flashlight at the makeshift bed. It was elevated and put together with rocks. “You sleep there. I sleep on the ground.”
She eyed the bed and pursed her lips. They were…on the pouty side. “Okay.”
Attagirl. Don’t fucking complain.
If anyone should complain, it was me. Because I had to give her my fucking mattress.
In my seasoned years, I had succumbed to the engineering brilliance of a self-inflating air mattress. People with bad backs and shrapnel in their hip understood me.
First things first. I hung my flashlight on the hook on the door, opened the chimney, then started a fire in the woodstove, leaving the smaller hatch open to spread warmth and light. In the meantime, I asked Kiera how she knew her coworkers were still missing, to which she admitted to having reached out to her dad three months ago. He had apparently told her that the news had, in fact, reached the US.
After that, the girl went on a tangent. She rambled, a little emotional, about how worried her dad had been—and still was.
I remained in my position, squatting in front of the stove, gaze glued to the rising flames within the oven, and wondered how many of these tales I’d heard over the years. I’d witnessed plenty of reunions too. They kind of made my work worth it.
If nothing else, the happy endings at least prevented me from jumping off a cliff.
Eventually, I rose to my feet again and checked her passport. The age matched what she’d said. Issued in Maryland. It expired in two years.
