The Wreckage - Michael Robotham [35]
Daniela tilts her head, studying him. “Did something happen today?”
“I took a drive to Mosul—following up on a story. It didn’t go to plan.”
“Meaning?”
“Two men died.”
“Journalists?”
“Haji.”
She shivers. Not from cold. They find a quiet corner of the lounge with armchairs and a sofa. Daniela wants a hot chocolate.
“I don’t know if that’s a house specialty.”
“Maybe I’ll be surprised.”
He sits opposite her, his head clearer now.
“You won a Pulitzer Prize.”
“You Googled me.”
“I was curious. Nosey. I shouldn’t have told you that. Are you sobering up?”
“Yes.”
“Do you always drink so much?”
“No.”
Tucking her legs under her, she leans on the side of the sofa, resting her chin on her hands.
“What made you come to Iraq?”
“I’m a war correspondent. This is a war.”
The answer is too flippant. She lets him know it and he tries again, his voice a hoarse whisper.
“I guess I needed to understand why this mess was necessary in the first place. And why it’s necessary now. Growing up, I heard so many stories about Iraq from my mother that I felt I might belong here.”
“Is that because you don’t belong anywhere else?”
The prescience of the observation rattles something inside him. He blinks twice, moving his mouth, but no words come out. A waiter arrives and delivers their drinks.
Daniela is holding her mug in both hands. Her pink tongue appears, wetting her bottom lip, and disappears again. For the next hour they talk about Iraq, Afghanistan and other war zones in his career. As he tells her stories, Luca can feel himself being drawn into the scene like an actor who forgets that he’s acting and the drama becomes his life—the journeys to sad, violent places; reporting on the best and worst of human beings.
“So much for me,” he says, not liking the way she’s looking at him, her neutrality, her silence, the way her eyes seem to be probing him for weaknesses—not to hurt him but to see where he’s broken.
“Were you scared today?”
“Yes.”
“You’re not like any journalist I’ve ever met.”
“How so?”
“You don’t seem very excited about what you do or driven to make your mark.”
“That’s because I wonder if I make things worse by being here. I distort the outcome. The observation of an event alters the event itself.”
“Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle?”
“You know your physics?”
“My father was a mathematician, remember?”
“If people like me weren’t here reporting the bombings and sniper attacks and sectarian killings, would they still be happening?”
“Yes.”
“What makes you so sure?”
She shrugs. “We can’t just look the other way.”
“Why not?”
“Because the innocents are the first to suffer—the women and children.”
Daniela has finished her drink. She runs her finger through the pale froth left on the rim of the mug.
Luca glances through the doors. “I should go home.”
“It’s dangerous out there.”
“I know the back streets.”
She opens her mouth, changes her mind. Tries again.
“You can get a room here.”
“They’re booked out.”
“You could stay in my room.”
He looks at her a moment too long.
“There are twin beds. You can use the shower.”
The practiced womanizer in Luca wants to celebrate his success. The sexual historian within him reminds him of past mistakes. He’s not a player, remember? She’s too young, too earnest, she’s been hurt before; he should go now, leave her be, wish her a long and happy life.
Sitting in silence he looks into her eyes, down to her breasts and then at his own hands, still covered in gun oil.
Daniela uses the bathroom first. She has cleared her papers and books from the spare bed. There are pages of handwritten notes in a neat, slanting hand. Luca sits in the cone of lamplight and stares at his reflection in the window, exhausted, half sober.
After he showers he borrows a robe and carries his clothes into the bedroom. Daniela is already in bed. Her eyes open. She notices the holster and weapon on his folded clothes.
“I didn’t think journalists carried guns.”
“I live outside the wire.”
“Is that a reason or an excuse?”
He picks up