The Vines by Shelley Nolden (ebook and pdf reader .TXT) 📕

and his interpreter. That day in 2002, when he’d convinced their leader to allow Finn’s civilian relief team to evacuate Ferkessedougou, still caused him to wake during the night.

Slowly exhaling, he reminded himself that those diplomacy skills could help him here, too. And his street smarts—a trait that had helped him make friends as a skinny, rich white boy in a New York City public high school.

“You certainly know your local history.” He whistled.

“History was one of my favorite subjects,” she replied, still out of sight. “That and grammar, which you already know—knew.”

If I could make eye contact, this would be a hell of a lot easier, he thought. Casually, he moved closer to the glass—the first unbroken pane he’d seen since stepping ashore seven hours ago. “I think both are right.”

“I know that,” she snapped.

“Or knew that?” he said, smiling.

She didn’t respond.

“Irregardless,” he said to even the error count, “you outwitted me. I thought you were by the docks.”

“It’s regardless. And it’s called a diversion. That canoe washed ashore in a storm years ago. I’d been saving it for—” She coughed, that deep, hacking sound.

Years ago? If that were the case, she could be the woman in my mom’s note, Finn thought. Prolonged asbestos exposure would explain the cough.

He had to get himself out of this shitstorm before Lily became so worried that she called Kristian. To buy himself more time, he should text her that the river was becoming too choppy so he’d have to stay until the following night. He slid his phone from his pocket.

“No,” the woman said as if addressing a dog, “I’ll take that, and the knife.”

Finn flinched. Although he could never harm her, the corkscrew would be perfect for digging through the wall if it came to that. “It’s got sentimental value.”

“The dead have no need for sentiment.”

His muscles tensed, and he refused to show any reaction.

Her face appeared in the window.

This close, he could tell that the white marks speckling her tanned cheeks were scars. Yet somehow, they didn’t detract from her beauty. Those spots, coupled with the burned red tinge to her brown hair and slightly upturned nose, gave her an Irish air. And, those eyes. Even through the mesh, he could make out the long lashes that framed them.

The fact that she was so pretty unsettled him. He knew that he would have been equally concerned for her if she weren’t as attractive, yet he still felt guilty for the urge to protect her that swelled within him each time he looked at her.

“Put everything by the door, now,” she said as he noticed a smudge of dirt on her chin. Or chocolate.

“Did you like the Toblerone?”

She responded with a rap on the window.

Without his gear, he would be completely at her mercy. Banking on the fact that it had been a while since her last real meal, he shrugged off his pack. “Sure, but first: I brought you—”

“My scalpel?”

He flinched. It was sitting in the back of his desk drawer. “Sorry. You have so many.”

“That one with the ivory is special.”

Of course it is, he thought, trying not to roll his eyes. “That ivory is why African elephants are endangered.”

She furrowed her brow. “I’ve got nothing to do with that, if it’s even true. For twenty-five years, it was my only one. To get the rest back”—she shook her pouch, and the metal within jangled—“I had to kill.”

He sucked in air through his teeth. Although she obviously couldn’t be that old, he did believe her capable of murder. “If you let me go, I’ll return it, I swear.”

“So, you’re willing to barter.” She crossed her arms over her chest, and Finn averted his gaze from the gaping neckline of her tank top.

“If you tell me where the tunnel is, I’ll let you go. Then you can drop my blade off on the dock.”

“A tunnel? Here?”

“You think I’m that stupid?” she spat and ducked out of sight.

His finger found the power button on his phone.

“C’mon,” he whispered as it stirred to life, his eyes darting.

A dark, hooded figure appeared at the observation window, and Finn reeled backward.

She was wearing a World War II–era gas mask; his heart thudded faster.

I’m too late. This woman had been damaged beyond repair. And now he would suffer the retribution.

The panic rising in his chest demanded air. Finn allowed himself a shallow breath, which triggered a need for more.

“Maybe now you’ll take me seriously,” she stated in a mechanical voice.

The bug eye windows and snout-like mouth filter, connected to a tube that snaked down her chest, made her look alien. Even more disturbing was the wholesale absence of emotion in her eyes as she stared him down.

“I told you, I don’t know anything about that,” he said, sliding the phone back into his pocket as a creeping realization solidified. He did know: when he’d been twelve, the night before July Fourth, he’d visited their storage unit in the basement to retrieve an American flag and had run into his dad. “Get back upstairs!” Rollie barked. Finn bolted, but not before glimpsing what looked like bundles of fireworks—or explosives.

The following day, Rollie left for North Brother Island before sunrise and returned after midnight. Kristian had gone with him, for the first time. Sylvia had taken Finn to the riverfront to watch the fireworks display. Devastated that he’d again been excluded, and irritated that he had no idea what they were doing with that dynamite, he’d barely noticed the fireworks. Sylvia must have been feeling equally distraught; she’d gripped his hand throughout the entire event. Although too old to be holding his mom’s hand in public, where he might run into a classmate, he’d done just that. Because he’d known that she needed him.

Finn hadn’t seen any evidence that they’d used the explosives aboveground. But nothing in the records he’d found supported her claim. “I’ve seen my dad’s map. There’s no tunnel on it.”

“I don’t believe you.” She raised a canister and tapped the glass, indicating he