“It will work,” Skara said as she came up beside him.
“What color?”
“Black. A Citroën.” She breathed against his shoulder. Her scent was curious, cinnamon and something slightly bitter, burnt almond, perhaps. “Three minutes from now no one will remember it.”
El-Arian nodded again, almost absently. The familiar frisson coming off her still made him slightly uncomfortable. He thought fleetingly of his wife and children safe, protected by many layers, but so far away.
“Who will I be tomorrow?”
He turned to see her slender hand extended. Reaching into the breast pocket of his jacket, he produced a thick packet.
Opening it, Skara found a passport, her new legend, a first-class air ticket with an open return, credit cards, and three thousand American dollars. “Margaret Penrod,” she read off the open passport.
“Maggie,” El-Arian said. “You call yourself Maggie.” He tilted his head slightly as his gaze returned to the street below them. “It’s all in the legend.”
Skara nodded, as if satisfied. “I’ll memorize it tonight on the plane.”
“There’s Laurent,” El-Arian said, indicating a figure in a dark suit exiting their building. He could not keep a certain excitement out of his voice.
Skara drew out a disposable cell phone and punched in Laurent’s number. At once, a pre-programmed code was transmitted. El-Arian had already commenced his mental countdown. Laurent gave a little shiver and, drawing out his cell, checked its screen.
“What’s he doing?” El-Arian said.
“Nothing,” Skara assured him. “He must have felt the pulse, that’s all.”
El-Arian frowned. “He shouldn’t have felt anything.”
Skara shrugged.
“Can he do anything about it?”
“Not a thing.”
At zero minus fifteen, a blur appeared in his peripheral vision, and he shifted his gaze to the oncoming black Citroën.
El-Arian craned his neck. “Is he calling someone?”
Skara’s shapely shoulders lifted and fell. “There’s no need to worry.”
The next instant El-Arian understood her certainty. The Citroën struck Laurent so hard he flew perhaps ten feet in the air. He hit the ground, lay there for several seconds, then, astonishingly, began to move, trying to crawl back to the curb. The car swerved to allow its right-hand tires to crush his head, then it sped off so fast that by the time bystanders started to rush out into the street it had vanished.
More Jason Bourne Adventures!
Robert Ludlum’s
The Bourne Betrayal
By Eric Van Lustbader
He has lost his memory, his identity, and his past. Now Jason Bourne loses his only friend in the world when a CIA deputy director is kidnapped. Vowing to rescue his last tie to humanity, Bourne heads to Africa—and discovers a global network of Islamic supremacists determined to acquire nuclear weapons. But there’s more: These madmen have anticipated Jason Bourne’s every move—and plan to use him to destroy America.