"Condiments?" Dean sounded incredulous.
It had been a long night, but she didn't really feel like she merited that level of skepticism. She didn't protest when Dean took the bottle from her fumbling fingers and opened it for her, returning it to her without comment.
They were sitting in the kitchen of the sprawling town house that their little outfit had been using as a base of operations. Well, Dean was sitting. Jonny was leaning indolently against a countertop, looking like he was ready for a photoshoot. She had started out sitting, perched on a little stool in a quiet, dark corner, but as the adrenaline wore off she was slumping further and further down the tiled wall she'd propped herself against.
She shifted slightly on the rickety wooden stool. Behind Dean, she saw Jonny hop up onto a counter and snag a beverage from a stack of cases pushed under a counter. He leaned back, radiating insouciance, as though he always showed up in a full tuxedo to rescue the girl. It had been a full tuxedo, anyway, but he'd lost the jacket at some point. And the shirt. His undershirt was damp with sweat, and it clung lovingly to his torso. It wasn't a bad look.
"Ketchup, or the local variant, yes. I think I also saw a few napkins with the name, too," Drew said tiredly, trying to focus. She took a swig of her drink, and grimaced. The only English word on the bottle was "bitter" and it was true to its name. It was also - despite being warm and a little flat - incredibly refreshing. She hadn't had anything to drink or eat in almost 24 hours.
"You think that they're holding the Bangalori agents in Mosul because of ketchup and napkins?" Jonny asked. He didn't sound like he thought she was crazy, which she could almost appreciate, but she suspected that was because he mostly sounded tired, and dehydrated.
"Well, that, and I found this in the electrical building," she mumbled around a yawn.
Dean paused, looking up from the duffel bag he was rummaging through. Drew smiled sweetly at him - well, as sweetly as she could manage, covered in dust and blood, her rumpled curls windblown and tousled - and tossed a large, black brick at him.
Dean caught the phone, looking nonplussed. He flipped it open and frowned. "I'm going to take this to Keith. Take care of her."
He tossed the duffel bag at Jonny, who caught it with a muffled grunt. It was heavier than it looked, and it was obviously a first aid kit. Jonny rifled through it hastily. It was considerably more extensive than the standard-issue kit.
Dean didn't wait for a response from Jonny, sweeping through a set of swinging double doors that presumably led to the rest of the house. The doors would have been at home in any kitchen in any restaurant around the world - except for the bullet holes. There was no glass left in the porthole windows.
He looked around, taking in the chaos around him. Dean ran his operation out of one of many of Saddam's old houses - mansions or palaces would be a better term, easlly. His operational cover was the Society for Preservation of Mesopotamian Antiquities, an organization (supposedly) affiliated with a number of prominent archaeology departments. This particular architectural gem was one of Saddam's town houses, a creaking, extravagant affair with more bedrooms than most hotels and a kitchen that Jonny suspected would make most chefs green with envy - or would have, anyway, before Nasiriyah had been shelled and occupied. Miles of white marble topped hand hewn hardwood cabinets, and the kitchen sported not one, not two, but three fireplaces. One wall was devoted to a bank of stainless steel refrigerators that were dented but looked more or less functional. There was a stack of culinary equipment - mixers, toasters, blenders, and other, more exotic tools - heaped in a corner, spilling carelessly over from the counters to the floor. Mrs. Evans would have given her left arm for some of the beautiful hammered copper pots and pans, even in their current battered state. Instead of mixers and knife blocks, the countertops now held enough technology to launch the space shuttle, haphazardly strewn around. Jonny suspected that the layout had been dictated as much by proximity to electrical outlets as by any real overarching sense of order.
Jonny hopped off the counter, suppressing a wince as his feet struck the stone floor a little harder than he'd intended. The blisters he'd picked up from running and climbing in dress shoes were bothersome, but they were near the bottom of the list of aches and pains that fatigue was amplifying. He'd been pushing it hard for a few months, now, and his body was beginning to push back.
He hefted the duffle bag, reeling a bit from the unexpected weight, and made his way across the room to Drew. He tripped twice over a tangle of cables and electrical cords.
Drew's wrists looked bad. Raw, angry welts were coated in layers of blood, some of it fresh, some of it dried and crusty with sand and dirt. It looked like she'd cut herself loose with a rusty lawn mower, and one of the wounds was still slowly pumping out dark, arterial blood.
"I lost a bet on this one," she said drowsily.
Jonny wasn't sure what to say, but she didn't seem to need any input from him.
"I'm not good at … I mean, I always get my man … or woman … that's not what I meant to say." Drew looked frustrated. "I mean, the plan was for me to be kidnapped, but I didn't pick the right group, and it wasn't even a sure thing, and I can't think of a single mystery I've ever solved without being kidnapped first!"
Something she said rang a bell, neurons connecting and firing in a distant, dusty corner of his brain. He'd thought she looked familiar, but he'd chalked it up to a fairly superficial resemblance to another redhead he'd once known. Her hair was longer, and curly, and somewhere under the dust and tear stains she was wearing makeup that subtly altered her features, but … he knew her. Not personally, but he'd seen her picture enough times. She was practically famous - at least, she had been when she was younger.
"This is going to hurt a bit," he said, changing the subject as he began scrubbing at the mess on her wrists with an alcohol wipe. It was pitifully inadequate to the task, and it probably hurt like nobody's business, but it was better than the local water.
"You need to work on your bedside manner," she said, closing her eyes. "You don't say 'hurt'. It's always 'pressure' or 'stinging'."
"You're on a stool," he pointed out. "I've had no complaints about my bedside manner - at least, not when there's a bed involved."
Drew's blush brought a little much-needed color back to her ashen complexion, and she was suddenly very aware of how close he was standing. His hands were gentle but sure as he carefully cleaned away the dirt and dried blood; her own hands were beginning to shake violently.
"I'm going to need to close that cut, there - it's still leaking, and it looks like it nicked the artery."
"Ugh." She didn't trust herself to say anything else.
Jonny knew the feeling. He'd been stitched up enough that he felt like he had a solid understanding of the procedure. He found what he was looking for in a small box at the very bottom of the duffle bag.
"Take two of these, and one of these, and call me," he joked, doling out pills from translucent orange bottles.
Her lips twisted in a wry smile. "I hate needles," she muttered, before tossing back the pills with a grimace.
Jonny figured they were running on a tight clock. Drew was pale and shaking - fatigue and delayed adrenaline. He should know. The pills would take a few minutes to take effect, and they'd serve the dual purpose of preventing her from going into shock and knocking her out so he could sew her up. A quick search of a few drawers yielded a towel that looked clean enough. Dousing it with a bottle of water, he began to clean the dirt from her face. It didn't take long before he noticed her eyelids beginning to droop.
Before long, she was down for the count, her pupils dilated and unresponsive, and she didn't stir as he picked her up and moved her onto one of the counters where the light was better - and where he could be sure she wouldn't just fall of the stool she'd been perched on. He kicked himself for not checking her pupils before he'd drugged her, remembering the blow to her head during their confrontation. Who knows what else had happened to her when she was kidnapped. The slash he was worried about was relatively small, but crooked, two sides of a triangle, and he closed it neatly and quickly with two separate stitches. He wrapped the sutures with gauze, and for good measure mummified her other wrist as well. Infection was a real risk here, but getting sand in those welts wouldn't feel fantastic either.
He was dead on his feet, and he still wasn't sure if he could trust Dean. Who was still conspicuously absent. Jonny was pretty sure that Dean wasn't his real name. He was also pretty sure that he knew him. 'Dean' was probably old enough to know Race - or to have known him, before ... he was also reasonably sure he could trust Drew not to try to kill or expose him - at least for the next six hours or so, until the narcotics and muscle relaxers wore off. He cast about for the AK-47 they'd brought back, slinging it over his shoulder before scooping Drew up carefully.
She was lighter than he'd have thought, given her height. He left the kitchen as quietly as he could manage and headed toward the back of the house, making his way to the front of the house and up a long, curved flight of steps. He found what he was looking for at the end of a long, dark corridor: the harim was secured behind two sets of thick, ornately carved double doors. The harim would be one of the more secure locations in the building, assuming it was more or less intact.
The double doors opened into a large round room, lavishly appointed with silks and low, tufted furniture. Overhead, pierced tin lanterns swung gently as Jonny passed, emitting the faint scent of old incense. Arched doorways dotted the perimeter of the room, presumably leading off to the private quarters. Jonny chose a hallway at random, adjusting Drew slightly to give him better access to the gun. There was light at the end of the hallway, which opened out into another round room. Pierced metal screens covered the windows, allowing only a few thin streams of sunlight without obstructing the view of the once-lavish gardens. At the center of the room was one of the largest beds Jonny had ever seen, round and swathed in nearly transparent hanging silks and strewn liberally with pillows. The interior of the bed was surprisingly clean. He supposed the silks kept the dust at bay.
He shouldered the hangings aside, depositing Drew carefully on the bed and pulling off her shoes before taking quick stock of the room. There were only two doors; one led to the hallway back to the communal area, and the other led to a sumptuous bath. The screens on the windows looked like they'd do a decent job of keeping someone out - or in, he supposed - and there were no windows in the bath. He shoved a footstool in front of the door to the hallway. It wouldn't prevent anyone from entering, but it would probably annoy them and cause a commotion if anyone unexpected showed up.
Drew looked very helpless and innocent on that big bed, her mass of red-blonde curls spilling over her pale face. He was momentarily tempted to crawl into bed - there was more than enough room for both of them, and a baseball team besides - but he remembered the crack on his jaw that she'd landed the last time he'd surprised her. She was neither innocent nor helpless (well, not after the drugs wore off, anyway).
He snatched a few pillows and settled himself on the floor between her and the door, his gun at the ready.