Standing in the doorway was the mentally challenged man who had been feeding her. In his hands he held the cardboard box he always carried. Slung over his shoulder was a rifle, its barrel covered with tape. On his feet was a pair of new basketball shoes.

Upon seeing the boys in the room, the man set down his box and unslung his rifle.

He pointed it at the boys, but it had no effect. They weren’t scared.

The man repeated a Pashtu phrase Julia was familiar with. “Lar sha. Lar sha!” Go away.

The boy gripping Julia’s breasts called the man over to the bed. He approached slowly and looked confused.

The boy let go of one of Julia’s breasts and motioned for the man to put his hand in its place. The man shuffled forward and Julia resigned herself to the fact that what was about to happen might turn out to be worse than she had imagined. Fighting back the nausea rising in her throat, she prepared her mind to return to the south of France.

The man studied the situation as the boy and the others behind him egged him on. The chant of whore, whore, whore in Pashtu was taken up again, and he looked at Julia with an emotion she couldn’t quite decipher. Then he lowered his rifle, and she closed her eyes for what would happen next.

But it didn’t happen. With amazing force, the man snapped his rifle straight up. There was a crack as the butt of the weapon connected with the boy’s jaw.

Spinning, the man raised the weapon as high as he could and began beating the other boys. They shouted curses at him and he shouted right back, but none of them raised a hand to strike him.

He hit them repeatedly against their backs and shoulders as they dragged their dazed friend from the room and ran.

Once they had gone, the man slung his rifle, reached down, and helped Julia up. He was incredibly strong for his small size. He helped her to the bed and took her chin in one of his rough hands.

He turned her face from side to side, examining her split lip, and then let her go.

Returning to his cardboard box, he unpacked her paltry meal and muttered to himself repeatedly the Pashtu word for bad.

Julia had never spoken to the man. Each time he had entered to bring her food, she had kept her eyes cast toward the floor. She had remained quiet, her goal to appear meek and unthreatening. The last thing she wanted was to draw the ire of her kidnappers.

But now that the local boys had made their intentions clear, she needed to make sure she was protected from them.

While far from the stereotypical knight in shining armor, the mentally challenged man had come to her rescue once. Would he do so again?

The man appeared to take his job very seriously-unceremoniously kicking her door in at all hours in some form of surprise inspection. She had no idea if the kicking was necessitated by a sticking door or if it was designed to keep her on edge. If it was the latter, it was working. Every time the door crashed open, Julia’s heart raced into the red zone. She never had any idea who was on the other side or what their intentions were. Were they coming to kill her? Beat her? Rape her? The not knowing had frayed the nerves of the normally cool and collected doctor right to their bitter ends.

“Stan a shukria,” she said. Thank you.

The man in the basketball shoes acted as if he didn’t hear her.

“Sta noom tse dai?” she asked. What’s your name? “My name is Julia,” she said. “I’m a doctor.”

Doctors were revered in Afghanistan and she hoped that if her kidnappers could see her as someone who could provide value to them, they might think twice about killing her. Though her Pashtu was limited, it was passable.

But despite her attempt to communicate, the man continued to mutter to himself.

After laying everything out, he gathered up his box, tucked it under his arm, and headed for the door.

“Stan a shukria,” Julia repeated.

As he reached the door, the man stopped. He then spun so quickly that he startled Julia, and she shrank into the corner.

He stepped quickly, almost violently across the room and shoved his hand into his pocket.

When he pulled it out, he held two Afghan sweets known as dashlama in his upturned palm. Suddenly very timid, like a little boy feeding an animal at a petting zoo, he offered them to Julia.

Slowly, she crept forward and reached her hand out to take the sweets.

The man watched and then motioned with his fingers to place them in her mouth.

Julia placed one of the candies on her tongue. The man smiled, but as soon as the smile appeared it was replaced by a frown.

He returned to muttering the Pashtu word for bad and left the room, slamming the door on the way out.

CHAPTER 13

KABUL

Baba G’s Afghan National Police contact, Inspector Ahmad Rashid, had picked a small restaurant in an obscure part of the city that rarely, if ever, saw any white people.

Based on how violent things had become in Kabul, Gallagher advised that they go native. They wore the salwar kameez-the baggy cotton trousers and loose-fitting tunics-as well as the pakol hats upon their heads and patoo blankets over their shoulders to combat the intense cold that would build in the late afternoon as soon as the sun started to dip behind the mountains.

After changing into his Afghan clothes, Harvath stopped in Hoyt’s room to access his “safety deposit box” and then stepped out into the courtyard. Gallagher looked him up and down and reminded him to leave his sunglasses behind. Few things in Afghanistan screamed, “I’m a Westerner, shoot me,” louder than a pair of shades, and that went double if they were Oakleys.

“Thanks, Greg,” said Harvath. “But this isn’t my first rodeo.”

Gallagher laughed. “I’m so used to carting civilians around that it just becomes second nature to tick off all the boxes. Let me see your walk.”

“My Afghan walk?”

Baba G nodded.

“Then what? A bathing suit contest and the talent portion of the show?” remarked Harvath. “I’ve got it. Don’t worry about it.”

Gallagher wasn’t giving in. “We’re not driving into downtown Detroit, buddy. TIA, remember?”

Harvath shook his head. He was as detail-minded as the next guy, but Gallagher took things to a whole new level. He had learned long ago not to argue with him. They’d get on the road a lot faster if he simply gave the man what he wanted.

Harvath tucked his hands behind his back beneath the patoo, leaned forward, and began the slow, shambling Afghan walk. At the edge of the small courtyard, he turned and came back. “Are we good?”

“I’ll make sure to park as close to the restaurant as possible,” he replied.

“Up yours,” said Harvath.

Once they were in the Land Cruiser and Baba G had it started, Harvath cracked another can of Red Bull and cranked the heater up as far as it would go. His jet lag had made him extra susceptible to the cold.

“You can monkey with that all you want,” admonished Gallagher. “It won’t do any good until the engine heats up.”

“Really?” Harvath replied as he took another sip of Red Bull.

Baba G was about to explain when he realized that Harvath was being facetious. For a moment, he had forgotten who he was with. Harvath had used humor to deal with good situations and bad for as long as he had known him. He decided to change the subject. “How’s Tracy doing?”

Harvath had been so exhausted, he honestly hadn’t thought much about her since he’d landed in Kabul. He’d learned a long time ago that one of the keys to being successful and staying alive in his line of work was the ability to compartmentalize. If you couldn’t put the rest of your life in a box and keep a lid on it while you were in the field, this wasn’t the career for you.