Page 76 of The Circle

“Allo?”

And for the first time, I hear our driver speak. His voice is more of a tenor than I expected. Big, strong guy; I assumed he’d have some kind of rumbling bass spilling out when he talks, but it’s just a neutral, pleasant-sounding tone with a distinctly South African accent. I’ve heard that accent a million times. I’d know it anywhere. “One of the ladies is unwell,” he says. “I need to pull over so she doesn’t get sick in the car, yeah?”

There is a beat. A pause that is probably less than a second but that feels like it goes on for five minutes. Whether he gets permission to pull over or not, I am going to puke somewhere in about two more seconds, that much is certain. I can feel my throat constricting as I try to hold on a little longer.

Finally, the guy who our driver has labeled in his phone as “Boss” says, “Oh. All right. I suppose,” and the car starts to slow and slide over to the shoulder.

I don’t wait for it to come to a complete stop. I open the door and practically dive out while it’s still rolling, vomiting a stream of puke as I do. I don’t like throwing up. Not even a little bit. I honestly don’t know anyone who does. They may be out there, but I’ve never met them. But, right now, after trying to hold it back and then being able to let it go, it’s one of the best feelings I’ve ever had. Obviously way, way down the list below something like having an orgasm, but maybe slightly above a foot massage. Which, I know, sounds ridiculous, but in this moment, that’s where I’m ranking it.

I’m on my hands and knees, purging what little is left in my system. I feel like I haven’t put anything inside my body besides water in maybe a couple of days—well, Danny, and to a lesser degree, Alec, but no, like, food. But it doesn’t seem to matter because I continue throwing up until whatever remnants of what was once in my stomach are all over the side of the Autobahn.

I dry-heave a couple of time just as Eliza reaches me. “Christine,” she says, the posher version of her voice now back in her lungs, “you all right, love?”

There’s genuine concern in it. She calls me ‘love.’ I’m brought back to years ago, when we first met, sitting outside of that club in Soho where she and I talked about what it would take to steal the Crown Jewels. It darts in and out of my thoughts, but it’s vivid as it flits past.

I nod as I continue spitting strands of saliva free from my lips. Twisting my head to the left, I see the passenger door of the Mercedes in front of us open and the man with glasses jump out.

Ms. Keene. Mr. van den Berg. Allow me to introduce Mr. Gorny.

Gorny. Mr. Gorny. A man with a scar. Holy shit. I remember. I remember something. I close my eyes and I remember… something.

But the memory is swept away by the sound of my name being called with a fair amount of urgency.

DANNY

“Christine! Christine!”

She opens her eyes from where she’s bent over on the ground to see me breaking the record for the fifty-yard dash as I race past Hans. Alec is just behind me, tight on my six, both of us sprinting toward her.

I slide to a stop on my knees and come to rest beside her hunched body. “What happened? What happened? What happened?” I ask it in quick succession to her, Eliza, and their driver, who has just stepped near as well.

“She was looking down at her phone and suddenly got sick,” Eliza explains. “Does she get carsick easily?”

“She does,” Alec interjects. “There was this one time we were in New York and—”

“I’m fine,” Christine cuts him off. “I’m fine.” Her insistence is barely believable. At least to me. Because I know why she’s throwing up and it ain’t because of no fucking carsickness.

I push her hair out of her face, stroke the back of her head. “You okay?” I ask with probably more than a little pointedness than I intend. “You sure you’re okay?”

She breathes in deeply through her nose and lets it out. Nods. “Yeah. I’m fine.”

I turn to Hans. “She can’t come. You need to take her somewhere safe. The rest of us will go, but she needs to not be here.”

I see her blanch at that. I know. I get it. This is a clear overreaction to someone getting a little carsick and the last thing we need is attention being drawn to anything that makes us appear more vulnerable than we already are. But, again, she ain’t fuckin’ carsick. Or maybe she is, but she’s not just carsick. That’s all I’m saying.

“I am sorry, Mr. Fortnight, but that is not an option,” Hans says. “As I mentioned previously, we have some questions for Ms. Keene specifically.”

I stand to my full height, which is at least a good three or four inches above the guy, and get right up into his chest. I don’t want this to turn into more than it needs to be. I really don’t. I think back to when I found out from Brasil that we had been trafficking people—human fuckin’ beings—without my knowledge, and the reaction I had then. I got hot, wanted to kill the fucker, shoved a gun into his neck. And I wonder, if I hadn’t done that then—if I had played it all a little cooler—if we wouldn’t be in this situation now. If I had been somehow, I dunno, more diplomatic, if all of this might have worked out better.

Maybe, maybe not. I don’t really believe in “destiny.” I don’t necessarily think all this shit was “preordained” or whatever. But I do believe in actions yielding reactions. So I choose my words carefully when I look down into Hans’s bespectacled face and say as calmly as I possibly can…

“I could rip your fucking spinal cord out of your body right now, wrap it around your throat and choke you to death with it.”

CHRISTINE

Hearing Dannysay that, like that, is a comfort I can’t explain. Knowing that his ability to rage and terrify hasn’t been dampened but, in fact, enhanced fills me with all kinds of relief. The Austrian doesn’t seem scared though. Maybe he’s not used to dealing with people who actually do the kind of violent shit they say they’re going to do. Because Danny will do what he says if he’s pushed.

Regardless, the Austrian just grins. “I have no doubt at least the first part of that is true, Mr. Fortnight. Although, presumably, the removal of my spine would hasten my death prior to your strangulation of me. But, in either case, it would fail to bring Ms. Watson any closer to being reunited with her child and brother, and you would very likely also be dead before my spineless corpse crumpled on the side of the road.”