The Prisoner's Wife by Gerard Macdonald Page A

didn’t know what happened. He was much bigger, much heavier, than Darius. Stronger, too. He stood up and went for him, he was hitting out like this”—she punched the air, a feint more masculine than feminine—“then, bof, he is on the floor again.” She laughed. “Lamar, down on the floor, looking up. Not knowing how it happened. Three times he went down, and I was hurt a little—he had hurt me, bruised me—but I was laughing. At the same time laughing, I couldn’t help it. Lamar was so angry—he was humiliated—he ran out the door. Except he misses the doorway. Hit his head on, what do you call? The doorpost.”
    Shawn went into a sharp bend, accelerating: the way he’d been taught in the SEALs. “Guess you missed out on your fee.”
    â€œOf course—but I sent round an e-mail to the galleries, saying La Grenade was almost certainly a fake. When Lamar tries to sell, that will cost him, I don’t know, twenty million? Something like that. Just then, I was thinking of Darius. Strange—it must have been erotic, in a way, what Lamar did. What he tried to do. Or what I imagined my father did. Who knows? Of course I don’t want rape but I was, you know, so hot just then. You’ll laugh. I wanted to bear his children. Darius’s children. Five, six—more maybe.”
    â€œSo?”
    â€œWell, that evening I seduced him. Really, I couldn’t help myself. Darius, he took my breath away.” She looked at Shawn. “You don’t expect great sex. Usually I don’t come. Not the first time with a guy.”
    He was constantly surprised by the things she said, and didn’t say. “It was? You did?”
    She nodded.
    â€œThen you married him? Bore his kids?”
    â€œNo kids. He didn’t want. Marriage? Two years, that took. Great sex is not a reason to marry. You know? I have to feel I trust a man.”
    He turned directly toward her, looking away from the road. “Do you trust me?”
    â€œI’m not sure,” she said. “Right now, this moment, with you here, no. Please, just watch the road. I am not sure why I said I will come to England.”
    â€œYour husband,” Shawn said. “Tell me, was he ever in Waziristan?”
    For a moment Danielle was silent, her mouth half open. “Salaud,” she said. “You son of a bitch. You do think he is a terrorist.”
    â€œIt crossed my mind.”
    Turning off the highway, he drove up the half-paved lane to Felbourne village. The hamlet. She was silent, looking around her; shifting in her seat, uncomfortable, or uneasy.
    â€œYou live here?”
    He said, “I do now. It’s where my wife bought a house. Why’d she buy this place, you ask? My question, too. She had a grandmother, born here. Left for Ellis Island, hundred years back.”
    â€œStop a moment.” Danielle was looking from side to side, seeing trees and fields. “Okay, you live here, but why should I come to this place? You said we would look for Darius.”
    Shawn pulled the Mercedes onto a grass verge in front of Felbourne Grange, the manorial pile that bordered his own property.
    â€œThis country,” he told her, “they have a saying about needles and haystacks. Where in hell do we start looking? Last time I was copied in on classified mail, we had twenty-some black prisons. Seventeen countries, Poland to Pakistan. Your guy could be in any one of those jails. What do you want me to do, Danielle? Toss a coin?”
    She leaned back against the door of the car, away from him. “So? What will you do?”
    â€œOnly thing I can,” he said. “I’ll talk to the lady you heard about in Paris. Ashley Caburn.”
    â€œWhy her?”
    â€œTwo reasons,” Shawn said. “Number one, she has high-level security clearance. Likely she knows what we want to know. Second reason, she still talks to me. Not so many people