Mad, Bad & Dangerous to Know - Samira Ahmed Page 0,63

of the bookstore.

His phone clatters to the cobblestones.

I lurch forward to help and end up dropping my book. All of a sudden, I’m trying not to fall, but too late, because now we’re a tangle of legs and bags and apologies in Dutch, then French, then English. The Dutch speak so many languages. Why are Americans so bad at learning other languages?

Crap. Get up, Khayyam. Stop bemoaning our piss-poor linguistic skills. I jump up and grab my book and bag, hoping Alexandre doesn’t notice.

Could it get any worse?

The danger about asking yourself that question, about even letting it flit through your brain, is that the answer is always yes.

Of course he sees me.

Everyone at the café is staring at the embarrassing tourist jumble. My face is aflame. My entire body burns in humiliation. I head in the opposite direction and leave the Dutch tourist with a quick wave of the hand, only then noticing the little scratches and cement burn on my palm and the inside of my left wrist, which has started to throb—

“Khayyam?”

Alexandre’s voice.

It can get worse. So. Much. Worse. I’m already walking away, ignoring him. Please don’t, I beg him telepathically. But I hear the scrape of a chair against the pavement. Then footsteps. Dammit. I rush down the sidewalk and hop down onto the narrow street, run past two restaurants, and take a right to dash across the snarl of traffic on Quai de la Tournelle. A throng of scooters passes, and when I see two slow lumbering buses, I know it’s my only chance. He’s still calling my name as I sprint into traffic and make it across in a flurry of honking horns and two ambling bicyclists who have to swerve not to hit me.

“Désolée!” I call out to them.

Only then, the traffic safely between us, do I turn.

Across the street, Alexandre puts a hand up and motions for me to wait. I shake my head. My body trembles. I’m near sobbing. He steps out as a taxi crosses inches in front of him, the driver honking and swearing out of his window. I take the moment to turn away. Alexandre yells out my name again, then some other words I can’t make out because I’m already crossing the bridge to ?le de la Cité, lost in the mass of people heading toward Notre-Dame.

The great thing about being surrounded by hundreds of eager tourists and pilgrims heading to one of the world’s great holy sites to pay homage, even if from a distance, to her resilience?

No one notices a girl with tears streaming down her face.

Leila

There is no time to protest or even scream. My hands and feet are bound and my mouth gagged. The janissary aga carries me over his shoulder and drops me to the ground at the Gate of Salutation.

I raise my head to see Pasha standing before me, dressed in full battle uniform, his kilij unsheathed in his hand. He pulls me to standing. “You have allowed yourself to be sullied. Thanks to the sharp eye of the Valide, you and your Giaour shall both meet the fate you deserve.”

I try to scream, but I choke on the cloth in my mouth. Pasha steps in front of me; I feel his breath on my face and see the daggers in his eyes. He lowers my gag and kisses me hard on the lips. When he steps back, I spit on the stones at his feet.

He laughs. “Spirited until the end. Midnight eyes and raven hair and luscious lips. I showed you favor and mercy despite the rumors of your devotion to the courtyard jinn. I was willing to overlook some of your peculiarities, but now you have shamed me. And now you will know my wrath.”

“If any has sullied me, it is you.” I spew my words like a curse. “May you never leave an heir. May history forget your name. May your suffering follow you from this world into the next.”

He slaps me across the face. Then he pulls the gag back over my mouth and motions to his janissaries, who step forward with a large burlap bag. I