“May I have time alone with him?”

The doctor hesitated, but seeing Issa in a rare mood of happiness asked that she report to him whatever happened between them.

“Of course, doctor,” she said, knowing she wouldn’t.

The doctor nodded and left the room.

Issa gestured for her to sit next to him by the window. He may be a patient in a hospital, but whatever privilege he’d had in the outside world he claimed here as well.

“You’re the journalist my brother spoke of.” He had a voice like a young boy.

“You’ve talked to him,” she said, surprised.

“It’s not every day someone tries to understand us.”

Dominique was unsure if Mariam telling her about Issa had been planned. Was she being played? Or was it providence like she’d assured Bruton?

“Did you know I’d come?”

“I’d hoped you would.”

“Why?”

“Don’t worry, you’re not in danger. My brother cannot speak of such things. I can.”

“What things?” she said, not sure where this was leading.

“The reason you’re still alive is because my brother remembers you. But trust is harder earned than memory.”

“He remembers me?”

“Yes. At the hospital, in the killing field, with the old man when he was a boy. I helped him remember. When he told me you’d come to see him, I told him who you were and had been to him.”

Dominique’s eyes narrowed. “If you’re this prescient, why are you here?”

His eyes fired with delight. He bound up from the chair like an excited child. She could see he was full of things to say. And while she was aware this could go south—after all he was in an institution, and his brother an imam who secretly led a local terrorist cell—she knew her job was to be the vehicle for what he needed to say. And so, she listened.

“After your occurrence in the desert I knew what the evolution of it would bring. I didn’t know the details, but I knew to tell my brother to be aware that there were others who would come to him, who also believed in a way out of jihad.”

“Is this what Nazir sensed in his meeting with him?”

“Yes. My brother knew the air had filled with the scent of roses, too.”

She could see he knew the amazing effect he was having on her.

“Did your brother have an experience like we did in the desert?”

“No. I did. That’s why I’m in here. If they think I’m crazy, nothing I say will challenge their beliefs.”

“You mean, ISIS.”

“I mean all of them.”

“So, you’ve been guiding your brother from inside this place?”

“You could say that. We’re not all crazy here.”