Rotten Gods Read Online Free Page B
return ⦠give thanks for the rest of my life if only You spare them and bring them to me alive ⦠and punish these men who stole them away from me â¦
The mujahedin place bricks of semtex, carried in the sports bags, around the room, wired together with thin red cable to a central control box. Wired to blow from the plastic remote control Ali Khalid Abukar carries: an electronic gadget so clever it uses fine tendrils of water as conductors, tuned to explode all the charges, including those in the briefcase.
Isabellaâs eyes fix on Zhyogal â the loverâs mask removed so that he is no longer handsome, but the face of death itself, with skin stretched tight as tissue paper over a kite frame, the sunken cheeks and the eyes recessed, showing the hatred freely now. For just an instant their eyes meet and there is no regret there, only triumph.
She feels other eyes on her. Her own people. It seems to her that they know she is the one who betrayed them. Betrayed those who employed and trusted her for so many years. Helped bring this viper into a room that holds the most powerful men and women of her generation. Of course they had not told her what was inside the briefcase, but she had known in her heart.
Head in her hands, Isabella begins to weep. Wanting it to be over, knowing she does not deserve this. She has always been so sensible.
Until she met him in Nairobi.
The role of British assets in protecting and ensuring the delivery of humanitarian aid to the refugee camps in Northern Kenya was politically sensitive, and it was her job to smooth the way. Hard, demanding work against bull-headed negotiators, many of whom saw the mere existence of the camps as a threat to national security.
Rami caught her at a weak moment â handsome, debonair, charming, apparently a financier. The meeting seemed to be an accident, a traveller sharing her table at the crowded Kengeles restaurant, unhurriedly engaging her in conversation.
Nairobi can be a lonely city, even dangerous when you are by yourself â¦
At first she resisted, but he was persistent. Cancelling a planned engagement at the embassy, she accepted his invitation to dinner.
Iâm single now. Hell, why shouldnât I have any fun?
Nightclubs frequented by Westerners in Nairobi are few, and have in the past been the target of terrorist attacks, like the grenade strike on the Mwauras Club that injured twelve people a few years earlier. Isabella hesitated when he first suggested they go dancing, but felt safe in his arms at the popular New Florida Club, the décor of which was once described by travel writer Paul Chai as looking like a spaceship crash-landed on a service station. Kelly and the children watched DVD movies back at the hotel while Isabella and Rami shared their first kiss.
On the second night she went to his charming suite at the Safari Club on University Road with its antique furniture and colonial feel, a willing subject to an intense and intelligent seduction. When she moved on to Yemen, trying to patch relations with a country devastated by the long revolution, he followed. They spent two more nights together in Aden.
âMy English rose,â he joked.
âMy desert stallion,â she laughed back.
The knowledge that the man who now patrols the conference room with a gun, touched her as a lover, makes her shake with anger and shame. When he catches her eyes it is with complete detachment. She glares back with all the vitriol and hatred that floods her soul, remembering that moment at Aden Airport when she realised that the girls were gone. Remembering how the luggage carousel blurred. How the man who had introduced himself as Rami gripped her arm.
âWhat are you doing? Youâre hurting me.â
âStop drawing attention to yourself. Your daughters are safe, for the time being.â
âWhere are they?â
âSafe. Listen to me. Continue your journey as planned. Tell anyone
The mujahedin place bricks of semtex, carried in the sports bags, around the room, wired together with thin red cable to a central control box. Wired to blow from the plastic remote control Ali Khalid Abukar carries: an electronic gadget so clever it uses fine tendrils of water as conductors, tuned to explode all the charges, including those in the briefcase.
Isabellaâs eyes fix on Zhyogal â the loverâs mask removed so that he is no longer handsome, but the face of death itself, with skin stretched tight as tissue paper over a kite frame, the sunken cheeks and the eyes recessed, showing the hatred freely now. For just an instant their eyes meet and there is no regret there, only triumph.
She feels other eyes on her. Her own people. It seems to her that they know she is the one who betrayed them. Betrayed those who employed and trusted her for so many years. Helped bring this viper into a room that holds the most powerful men and women of her generation. Of course they had not told her what was inside the briefcase, but she had known in her heart.
Head in her hands, Isabella begins to weep. Wanting it to be over, knowing she does not deserve this. She has always been so sensible.
Until she met him in Nairobi.
The role of British assets in protecting and ensuring the delivery of humanitarian aid to the refugee camps in Northern Kenya was politically sensitive, and it was her job to smooth the way. Hard, demanding work against bull-headed negotiators, many of whom saw the mere existence of the camps as a threat to national security.
Rami caught her at a weak moment â handsome, debonair, charming, apparently a financier. The meeting seemed to be an accident, a traveller sharing her table at the crowded Kengeles restaurant, unhurriedly engaging her in conversation.
Nairobi can be a lonely city, even dangerous when you are by yourself â¦
At first she resisted, but he was persistent. Cancelling a planned engagement at the embassy, she accepted his invitation to dinner.
Iâm single now. Hell, why shouldnât I have any fun?
Nightclubs frequented by Westerners in Nairobi are few, and have in the past been the target of terrorist attacks, like the grenade strike on the Mwauras Club that injured twelve people a few years earlier. Isabella hesitated when he first suggested they go dancing, but felt safe in his arms at the popular New Florida Club, the décor of which was once described by travel writer Paul Chai as looking like a spaceship crash-landed on a service station. Kelly and the children watched DVD movies back at the hotel while Isabella and Rami shared their first kiss.
On the second night she went to his charming suite at the Safari Club on University Road with its antique furniture and colonial feel, a willing subject to an intense and intelligent seduction. When she moved on to Yemen, trying to patch relations with a country devastated by the long revolution, he followed. They spent two more nights together in Aden.
âMy English rose,â he joked.
âMy desert stallion,â she laughed back.
The knowledge that the man who now patrols the conference room with a gun, touched her as a lover, makes her shake with anger and shame. When he catches her eyes it is with complete detachment. She glares back with all the vitriol and hatred that floods her soul, remembering that moment at Aden Airport when she realised that the girls were gone. Remembering how the luggage carousel blurred. How the man who had introduced himself as Rami gripped her arm.
âWhat are you doing? Youâre hurting me.â
âStop drawing attention to yourself. Your daughters are safe, for the time being.â
âWhere are they?â
âSafe. Listen to me. Continue your journey as planned. Tell anyone
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