Trapping Zero. Джек Марс

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      “So,” Sara started, “those two men that chased us on the boardwalk…?”

      He hesitated, unsure if this was too much for her to hear. But he had promised honesty. “They were terrorists,” he told her. “They were men that were trying to get to you to hurt me. Just like…” He caught himself before saying anything about Rais or the Slovakian traffickers.

      “Look,” he started again, “for a long time I thought that I was the only one who could get hurt by doing this. But now I see how wrong I was. So I’m done. I still work for them, but I do administrative stuff. No more fieldwork.”

      “So we’re safe?”

      Reid’s heart broke anew at not only the question, but the hope in his youngest daughter’s eyes. The truth, he reminded himself. “No,” he told her. “The truth is that no one ever really is. As wonderful and beautiful as this world can be, there will always be wicked people that want to do harm to others. Now I know firsthand that there are a lot of good people out there that are making sure there are fewer wicked people every day. But no matter what they do, or what I do, I can’t ever guarantee that you’ll be safe from everything.”

      He didn’t know where these words were coming from, but it felt like they were just as much for his own benefit as for his girls. It was a lesson that he very much needed to learn. “That doesn’t mean I won’t try,” he added. “I will never stop trying to keep you two safe. Just like you should always try to keep yourselves safe too.”

      “How?” Sara asked. The faraway look was back in her eye. Reid knew exactly what she was thinking: how could she, a fourteen-year-old weighing eighty pounds soaking wet, keep something like the incident from happening again?

      “Well,” said Reid, “apparently your sister’s been sneaking off to a self-defense class.”

      Sara looked sharply over at her sister. “Really?”

      Maya rolled her eyes. “Thanks for selling me out, Dad.”

      Sara glanced back over at him. “I want to learn to shoot a gun.”

      “Whoa.” Reid held up a hand. “Pump the brakes, kiddo. That’s a pretty serious request…”

      “Why not?” Maya chimed in. “Don’t you think we’re responsible enough?”

      “Of course, I do,” he replied flatly, “I just—”

      “You said we should keep ourselves safe too,” Sara added.

      “I did say that, but there are other ways to—”

      “My friend Brent has been going hunting with his dad since he was twelve,” Maya cut in. “He knows how to shoot a gun. Why shouldn’t we?”

      “Because that’s different,” Reid said forcefully. “And no ganging up on me. That’s unfair.” Up until then, he had thought this was going quite well, but now they were using his own words against him. He pointed at Sara. “You want to learn to shoot? You can. But only with me. And first, I want you caught up with school and I want positive reports from Dr. Branson. And you.” He pointed at Maya. “No more secret self-defense classes, okay? I don’t know what that guy is teaching you. You want to learn to fight, to defend yourself, you ask me.”

      “Really? You’ll teach me?” Maya seemed buoyant at the prospect.

      “Yes, I will.” He picked up his menu and opened it. “If you have more questions, I’ll answer them. But I think that’s about good for one evening, yeah?”

      He considered himself lucky that Sara hadn’t asked him anything that he couldn’t answer. He didn’t want to have to explain the memory suppressor—that might complicate matters and reinforce their doubt about who he was—but he also didn’t want to have to answer that he didn’t know something. They would immediately suspect he was keeping it from them.

      That clinches it, he thought. He had to get it done, and soon. No more waiting or excuses.

      “Hey,” he said over his menu, “what do you say we check out Zurich tomorrow? It’s a beautiful city. Tons of history and shopping and culture.”

      “Sure,” Maya agreed. But Sara said nothing. When Reid looked over his menu again, her face was scrunched into a pensive frown. “Sara?” he asked.

      She looked up at him. “Did Mom know?”

      The question had been a curveball once before when Maya had asked, not much more than a month earlier, and it took him by surprise again hearing it from Sara.

      He shook his head. “No. She didn’t.”

      “Isn’t that…” She hesitated, but then took a breath and asked, “Isn’t that kind of like lying?”

      Reid folded his menu and set it down on the table. Suddenly he wasn’t very hungry anymore. “Yeah, sweetheart. It’s exactly like lying.”

      The next morning Reid and the girls took the train north from Engelberg to Zurich. They didn’t talk any further about his past, or about the incident; if Sara had any more questions, she held them back, at least for now.

      Instead they enjoyed the scenic views of the Swiss Alps on the two-hour train ride, snapping photos through the window. They spent the late morning enjoying the breathtaking medieval architecture of Old Town and walked the shores of the Limmat River. Despite not claiming to enjoy history as much as he did, both girls were stunned by the beauty of the twelfth-century Grossmünster cathedral (though they groaned when Reid began to lecture them about Huldrych Zwingli and his sixteenth-century religious reforms that took place there).

      Though Reid was having a great time with his daughters, his smile was at least partially forced. He was anxious about what was coming.

      “What’s next?” Maya asked after a lunch at a small café with views of the river.

      “You know what would be really great after a meal like that?” Reid said. “A movie.”

      “A movie,” his eldest repeated flatly. “Yeah, we definitely should have come all the way to Switzerland to do something we can do at home.”

      Reid grinned. “Not just any movie. The Swiss National Museum isn’t far, and they’re showing a documentary on the history of Zurich from the Middle Ages to the present. Doesn’t that sound neat?”

      “No,” said Maya.

      “Not really,” Sara agreed.

      “Huh. Well, I’m the dad, and I say we go see it. Then we can do whatever you two want to do and I won’t complain. I promise.”

      Maya sighed. “Fair is fair. Lead the way.”

      Less than ten minutes later they arrived at the Swiss National Museum, which really was showing a documentary about the history of Zurich. And Reid genuinely was interested in seeing it. And even though he bought three tickets, he only intended on using two of them.

      “Sara, do you need to use the restroom before we go in?” he asked.

      “Good idea.” She ducked into the bathroom. Maya started to follow, but Reid quickly grabbed her by the arm.

      “Wait. СКАЧАТЬ