Someone had a shovel. He put the blunt of it on her collar-bone. Her eyes were open and she said, All merciful, all merciful. He pushed into the sand. The head came in one part, away from the shoulder. And still she said all merciful. They began to push the knife into her stomach and out through her under her heart.

The jitter stopped. The eyes stopped open.

Chapter 16

16

Ghazi, without Aziz, went back to the U-Stor-It. He hid and watched. Rafik and Kamal sometimes came together, sometimes separately, but always in a Brighton Moving and Storage truck. Others came in a white Econoline van. Once Rafik brought beer boxes. Sometimes there were metal drums like the one Aziz and Ghazi had lifted like a plastic cup. Sometimes there were wardrobe boxes. There was no sign of suitcases.

Ghazi wanted Aziz to come with him. To be lookout, so Ghazi could open boxes, pry apart containers. Aziz turned it over in his mind. Not to know was not to be responsible. To be loyal was to not try to know. He must always act as if Heather did not exist. These rules had been good the last two years. But new facts were plain and stout before him. Heather did exist. There was a U-Stor-It. Something wrong or nothing wrong—or many things in between—was in it.

Why not do what Ghazi wanted? Since they had made their confessions, Aziz realized Ghazi’s motives were better than his own. Djamila’s betrayal was every reason and more to leave home. It had carried away Aziz’s last doubts. Ghazi was not DRS sent. His father may have been military intelligence, a DRS loyalist, but he was mostly to be condemned for how he treated his own son. Soft hens, Ghazi had called DRS. Ghazi knew nothing of DRS if he could call them that.

The plan was complicated. They would have to wait until Rafik and Heather, still in their Ghazi-made bliss, had one of their Saturday dates. They debated involving Mourad. Ghazi argued for it. A stun gun was good. Mourad meant police were certain, countered Aziz. He has changed, said Ghazi. We lose control, insisted Aziz. Ghazi conceded. Maybe just take Mourad’s stun gun. Especially if Mourad was at Reach that night. Aziz agreed.

Ghazi bought two cell phones. He made two copies of the key hidden in the aquarium and gave one to Aziz. Ghazi would enter the unit. Aziz, down at the main entrance in a rental car, was to call if he saw the Econoline van or the Brighton Moving truck. If some vehicle Aziz did not recognize went by and Ghazi’s key was confiscated by Kamal or one of his cohorts, they would still have Aziz’s key for another attempt later. And this time Ghazi had bobby pins, razor blades, packing tape, pliers, crowbar, and three flashlights.