Page 172 of Secrets Beneath the Waves
I shake my head. “I don’t know.”
It’s the same question I’m asking myself. It has to be related to Oumar’s disappearance and apparent kidnapping, but we simply don’t have enough information at this point. There are too many unknowns in the equation, including the identity of the person following us. But there’s something else that’s bothering me. Graham is trained in how to evade someone following him. Keeping up with our vehicle in the congested traffic should be almost impossible.
Unless Mariam is being tracked.
I turn to her. “I need you to turn off your phone.”
“You think they’re tracking me?”
“I think it’s a very real possibility.”
She fumbles for her purse, pulls her phone out, then turns it off.
“There’s a Faraday bag behind my seat,” Graham says.
I pull it out of the pocket and motion for her to drop her phone into the bag.
“What’s a Faraday bag?” she asks.
“Just an extra precaution. It blocks all incoming and outgoing signals, ensuring they can’t track you.”
“I’m sorry,” she says, crying again. “I tried to be careful. Tried to make sure I wasn’t being followed.”
“This isn’t your fault,” I say, trying to reassure her.
“I think I’ve lost them for now,” Graham says, “but we might still have a problem.”
He drives a few more minutes before pulling off onto a narrow street and jumping out of the car.
I tell Mariam to stay where she is, then get out as well. “What’s going on?”
“It might not be Mariam they’re tracking.” Graham rips off his jacket. “I had an encounter with that armed man at the church.”
“What happened?”
“He came at me, tried to throw me against the wall, either to scare me or question me. I don’t think he was expecting me to fight back quite so hard, but I think it’s possible he planted a tracker on me in the struggle. He ended up running out of the church, and I lost him.”
I glance at the car. “You think this was some kind of setup?”
“I don’t know what’s going on, but we can’t take any chances. I need you to pat me down.”
I hesitate for a moment at the request. “Pat you down?”
“If he managed to put a tracker on me, we’re not safe.”
I nod, then move behind him and start with the collar of his T-shirt at the back of his neck, looking for a tracker while he searches his jacket.
“Nothing yet,” I say, slowly working my way down to his waist.
Once I’m done, he turns around and holds his hands up, waiting for me to keep searching. I’m not sure why his nearness makes me feel so uncomfortable, but I can’t focus on the awkwardness. I run my fingers down his sides, then across his collar. I can see the tension in his jawline, but I’m sure for him, his unease is about not knowing who the enemy is.
And not knowingwherethe enemy is.
I feel something hard and stop along the seam of his shirt near his shoulder.
“Hold on. . .” I shine the light of my phone on him, then pull off a tiny metal disc with sticky backing, frowning before dropping it to the ground and stomping on it. We’ll need to keep it as evidence, but I also need to make sure it can no longer track us.
“We need to get out of here,” Graham says. “They’ll still be able to trace its last location.”
