Chapter 9 : Ghost in Terminal 3
335 Words
Elias doesn’t know I’m alive.
He walks through the airstrip.
Linen suit. Sunglasses. Two guards.
The scar on his cheek.
I watch from the car. Binoculars.
“He’s fatter,” I tell Sabastian.
“Guilt does that,” he says.
Elias gets in Cross’s car.
We don’t follow.
“We’re letting him go?”
“We’re letting him lead us.” He starts the engine. “Cross has 12 safe houses. Now we know which one.”
He hands me a tablet.
A red dot. Moving.
“Tracker. On the car.”
We tail him. Three cars back.
The dot stops. The Mellah.
“Cross’s money house,” Sabastian says. “Where Elias cleans cash.”
We wait.
An hour.
Elias comes out. Alone.
Sabastian hands me an earpiece.
“Go. 10 minutes before guards sweep.”
I slip out. Headscarf on.
I follow Elias.
Souk. Crowds.
He stops. Buys oranges.
Normal. Like he didn’t kill my parents.
He turns. An alley. Empty.
I move.
Hand on his shoulder. Spin him.
Knife at his throat.
His eyes go wide.
“Yvonne? You’re dead.”
“Not anymore.” Blood beads. “Where is Cross?”
“I can’t. He’ll kill her.”
Her.
My heart stops.
“Who?”
Elias breaks. “We had a daughter, Yvonne. After the fire. Cross took her.”
Sabastian in my ear: “Yvonne. Guards. 30 seconds.”
A daughter.
I have a daughter.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know! He moves her!”
Footsteps. Running.
“Yvonne, now!” Sabastian yells.
I slice Elias’s cheek. The clean one.
“Next time, I take your eyes.”
I run.
Bullets hit stone behind me.
In the car. I can’t breathe.
“A daughter,” I tell Sabastian.
His face goes to stone.
He pulls up a file.
_Project Phoenix._
A birth certificate.
A death certificate.
_Layla Lancaster. Date of death: 09/15/26._
Five months from now.
“Now we burn Cross to the ground,” he says.
- Writer
