Chapter 3—Sightseeing

The woman is nearly hysterical, tears rolling down her cheeks in rivers and her face red. The corner of her eyebrow is bleeding slightly and she holds her arm up to protect herself against her attacker with the switchblade in his hand.

I jump next to him, grabbing the switchblade then jumping away. I close the blade and stuff it into my back pocket, the mugger's eyes wild with confusion. I jump again next to him and grab a handful of his dirty hair. I jump about ten feet in the air at an angle, letting go of the mugger, jumping away, so he falls hard into the wall, rolling down to the garbage cans. Trash falls everywhere with a great crash as he landed.

I hold the woman's hand as she stares with wide eyes. The mugger is unconscious on the trash, not even moaning anymore. The woman flinches away from me and I suddenly regret that I wore a teal scarf around my nose and mouth, displaying only my eyes.

"Hey!"

I look over my shoulder and see two men dressed for football breaking into a run down the alleyway. I look back at the woman and nod to her. I stand and run down the alley. One of the men reaches the woman, another observes the mugger while the last chases after me. I turn the corner, the man hot on my heels and jump to Casablanca.

The marketplace is as bustling as Grand Central Station in the morning but in a different way. The people are calmer while they sell and when they buy. They seem to have less purpose and more freedom despite the fact Grand Central is in the land of the free and the marketplace is in West Africa. Though it was just past noon in New York, it was the dusky evening in Casablanca.

I pull the scarf that covers my mouth and nose down and rearrange it around my neck. I'm wearing black jeans and brown leather jacket zipped over my body. Because my hair had been up and in the scarf when I saved the woman, I could have been a man. I go to Amine's booth of various trinkets and go behind it while he's bartering with an old man in Arabic.

"Where'd you go off to?" Amine pulls away from his customer to yell to the back to me. He turns back to the man and continues in Arabic. They seem to agree on something and Amine takes the money from the man while handing him the bronze tea kettle.

"New York," I tell him truthfully.

He laughs and shakes his head. "You Americans," he says shaking his head. He is a young, handsome man with curly black hair, smooth copper skin and kind light hazel eyes. He and his wife Ayat have helped me since I saved their baby Azhar from a curious woman wish stars in her eyes. Ayat find me curious but never asks questions and Amine thinks I'm some sort of American spy. I let them think what they want and Ayat scolds her husband if he asks me too many questions.

I open my rucksack and pull off my jacket. I take off my jeans behind the curtain and pull on denim capri pants. I put on tennis shoes and a white tank top. Wrapping the teal scarf around my neck I put the clothes too hot for summer in both New York and Morocco into my rucksack.

Shaking my hair out I come from behind the curtain and smile at Amine. "Healthy business day?"

Amine shrugs. "Better than usual," he says. He learned his English when his mother worked as a maid for a rich Brit with a house on the beach, but he still has a slight accent.

I pick up my rucksack. "Give Azhar a kiss for me."
"You're going?"

"I have homework," I say truthfully.

Amine laughs again. "Homework," he says. "They never use that code in the films."

I laugh then and squeeze his arm as I leave. "Later, Amine."

I walk down the marketplace toward the alcove where I can jump without being noticed. I feel strange; like someone is following me. I look over my shoulder—no one that seems out of place.

I shrug and go to the alcove and jump. Lights flicker in the lanterns that light the fishing boats on the water. The little village in Vietnam was quiet, tired and sleeping. I sigh in the humid air and walk out to the water. Ha Long slept while I sat on the beach, my arms rested easily on my knees while I looked out to the quiet, smooth ocean.

I smile when I realize something suddenly, while I look out to Ha Long Bay, Vietnam, after coming from Casablanca, Morocco and spending half the day in New York and the other half in Paris, France to research the Louvre for my art history class.

I smile while I remember that I don't have a passport.

—I tap my pen on my notebook, thinking hard and biting my lip. I blink with sudden inspiration and write rapidly my thoughts. When I finish, I drop my pen and crack my knuckles. I look over what I wrote, suddenly understand what Van Gogh was trying to covey.

"Lila Cross."

I look up suddenly. I hadn't noticed the door to the classroom had opened. There were two men there wearing suits, looking rather official and police-like. I closed my notebook with my eyes not leaving them and stood at my professor's call.

I stuffed my notebook into my bag and rose, walking down the aisle to pass either sleeping, involved or bored fellow students. My expression is blank and hard when I reach the two men and my tiny, bulbous professor.

"Miss Cross," Professor Langdon says looking up at me with his tiny spectacles. "These gentlemen would like a word with you for a moment."

I try to swallow but my throat is thick. I keep my eyes on the two men and nod. "We can go outside, officers," I say. They are surprised that I realize they are policemen.

Once outside I cross turn on my heel and raise my brow to them in the hallway. "Can I help you with something, officers?"

The taller one blinks. "Miss Cross, I am Detective Dan Smith and this is Detective Richard Walsh. We're with NYPD."

"Have I done anything wrong?" I ask sharply.

Walsh blinks rapidly then narrows his eyes. "No," he says. "Actually, we had some news for you."

"In regards to?"

Smith clenches his jaw and pulls a manila folder out from behind his back. "Miss Cross, we believe we've found your brother's killer."

My heart freezes and I hold out my hand sharply. "Let me see."
He hands me the folder hesitantly and I opened it. A black and white photo with a scene that looks like it was seen through night vision goggles is glossy in the faint light of the hallway. The man wears a long trench coat, shiny leather boots and a black turtleneck. He is in his late thirties to mid-forties with a sad expression as he puts away a strange weapon into his coat. He looks like he's in a subway tunnel.

"Why didn't you get this before?" I ask sharply as I stare at the man's face.

"We…weren't allowed access to it."

I look up sharply at them.

"Miss Cross, was your brother involved in—"

"No," I say angrily. "My brother was a good man. He was not involved with drugs, arms dealing or any other sort of possibilities that have been running in that little head of yours. I am not saying it because I refuse to speak ill of my dead brother—I am saying this because he wouldn't ever become involved in something he didn't fully understand."

I shut the manila folder and nod to them. "I'll keep this, if you don't mind," I say. "Do you know who this man is?"

The detectives look at each other. "We weren't given the photo until yesterday," Smith says. "We think the man is FBI or some equivalent."

"Then why hasn't he been arrested?"

"Because we can't find him," Walsh says. "He's our only suspect so far and the only way to go from there is up."
"The case if getting colder, gentlemen," I say acidly. "My brother's been dead for nearly six months now and the longer it takes for you to get permission the harder it will be to catch this son of a bitch. As if you need reminding."

I nod to them as they glare at me. "I'm sure you'll contact me if you have any more information."

When I'm out of their sight I jump to my apartment and punch at my own personal bag for an hour.

—"They do not come home until after three o'clock," the kindly young neighbor of the apartment building says when she sees me knocking, her bright white teeth contrasting against her dark skin. Her accent is crisp and interesting.

"Thank you," I say. "But I have a key."

She smiles and nods before going into her own apartment. Once the door is shut, I smile and jump into the apartment. It's partly tidy, partly messy and I know the tidy part is Warren's doing. I put my bag on the couch and jump to New York, stop at Gray's Papaya and return to Warren's apartment in South Africa with a hot dog.

I jump to my apartment in New York to throw away the trash and lie on Warren's couch with my arms behind my head lazily, my feet drawn up on the arm of the couch. I hear mumbled voices outside not long after, both familiar and accented unfamiliar, and a key in the door.

Warren and his Dutch roommate are laughing at something when the blond man I don't recognize pauses with confusion. Warren shuts the door, back to me.

"You know, I'm liking the décor, Warren, but you don't have enough light," I say. Warren spins on his heel, utterly surprise and happy all at once as he saw me. I shrug at him as if it is the most normal thing for me to be in South Africa on his couch. "Honestly, Warren, you're in South Africa—shed some light through the windows. What are you worried about peeping Toms?"

Warren laughs and puts his keys on the table next to the door. "Peeping Toms are the least of my worries," he says. "I have a problem with Americans breaking and entering."

I shrug and swing my legs so I'm sitting on his couch rather than lying down. "You really should take care of that."

Warren laughs and goes over to me as I stand. He hugs me and I linger on his shoulder, wanting to tell him everything—what the detectives told me yesterday about Mark, but mostly about my newfound ability.

"But seriously—how did you get in?" he asks, bewildered. I shrug and smile at the confused Dutch roommate still at the doorway.

"You pick up a lot when you're living in New York," I lie.

"Yes, that was your scholarship benefactor's intention—to turn you into a criminal."

"My benefactor wanted me to learn," I say patting his chest twice before walking toward his roommate. "And so I have."

My phone rings then before I can introduce myself to the Dutch roommate. I look at the number, frown and answer.

"Hello?"
"Lila? Lila?" Amine's voice sounds frantic.

"Amine, what's the matter?"

"They—they came to ask questions about you," he cries. "They—they wanted to know how we knew you and—and where you were from and when you come over and—"

"Who, Amine?" I say turning my back to Warren and pressing my palm to my open ear to hear better through the scratchy reception.

"I didn't give them your phone number," he says, his voice shaking now. "I—I told them I didn't know your last name, but I was going to when they threatened—" Amine cuts off, his voice shaking and sobs escaping his lips. "I said I would tell them, but they wanted to make—make an impression they said. They took them, Lila—they took my daughter and my Ayat. They took them—" He continues in sobs.

"I'll be right there."
I hang up and grab my bag from the couch frantically. My heart beating hard against my chest I pull out the switch blade I stole from the mugger and shoved it into my back pocket.

"Lila, what the hell's going on?" Warren says, face distorted.

I take Warren's shoulders and look at him seriously. "Stay at a friend's house tonight—stay close to the American embassy and do not tell your university representative where you are."

"What is going on?" Warren demands angrily, his face turning red from his fury of not knowing.

I kiss his cheek quickly and go around him and his roommate to leave. He goes after me, grabbing my arm but I twist away and around the corner so I can jump without him seeing.

I land behind the curtain in the back of Amine's booth. It's quiet despite the market outside, grimly so.

"Amine," I say sharply, my hand wrapped around the switchblade in my back pocket, my bag secure across my body and my heart beating hard against my chest. "Amine."

I let out a scream and shudder as my bones shake inside me. I fall backward and crawl away from the awful electricity. When I do I see Amine's blank hazel eyes next to me, blood running hot from his mouth and stomach. I shudder, my body jerking from the remaining electricity. I try to jump and I feel myself shutter mid-jump like a camera. When I realize that I'm not in my Greenwich apartment, I turn to look up at my attacker.

A man and a woman dressed very wrong for Casablanca stand over me, one with a familiar rod-like weapon where a faint buzzing could be heard. I kick backward away from them as the woman jerks for me, her own weapon out from her tan trench coat.

I moan as I sweep my leg across the floor, knocking the woman off her feet. I kick myself backward and find my hand wrapped around the handle of the electric baton. I strike my heel down onto the inside of the man's knee, knocking him to his knees and reach up to bang my head hard into his. Ignoring the pain in my skull I take the baton from the man as he falls unconscious and move it to electrocute the woman.

She seizes but it seems as though the electrocution affected her less than it did me. She glares at me as she pushes my baton away and presses the end of hers to my chest. I scream as I shake from the electricity grinding my bones. I try to jump and shutter instead. I feel hot tears rolling down my face as she stands over me, pressing the end of the baton on my chest. As I shake, I press my left cheek onto the floor. I see the switchblade I stole and reach my hand out quickly. I stab the blade into the baton.

It seems to sizzle as it the blade breaks into the metallic crunch of the broken weapon. Still, the electricity continues in both me and my attacker in the trench coat. I try to jump again, shuttering instead, and my eyes roll when I begin to give up.

I blink the tears away from my blurry eyes when I see something appear behind the woman. The figure bashes an arm against the woman's head, knocking her over and away from me.

I gasp and jerk wildly with the remaining electricity when I feel a gloved hand wrap around both my arms. I jerk slightly when I'm picked up and cradled into the arms of my savior. My head falls back from tiredness and tears run down my forehead and into my hair. I feel my body jump, but it isn't my doing.