As was so often the case, Finn figured he hadn’t slept at all. The helicopters overhead certainly hadn’t helped. He’d almost dropped off when the sounds of approaching aircraft rotors roused him to full alert, his heart pounding. Before he realized it, he’d leapt out of bed, blindly rummaging in the closet next to the toilet for his assault rifle—a weapon he didn’t possess any longer. It had taken him at least thirty seconds of deep breathing to talk himself out of the belief that he was still in Kandahar. He couldn’t even shower off his sweat-soaked body for fear of waking his guest upstairs.
Finally, at six o’clock the next morning, despite the darkness outside the porthole above his bed, he slipped into his jeans, T-shirt, and leather jacket, and tiptoed up the ladder from his stateroom. Silently, he padded in stocking feet to the pilothouse without waking his visitor and put on his shoes and jacket outside the door.
The morning air was as glacial as it had been the night before and he could see his breath as he trotted up the incline from the quay to the street level and continued up the hill to his local boulangerie. Finn had mastered enough French in the previous six months to order a couple of croissants and select his daily baguette, along with drinking his first cup of coffee of the day. He sipped it slowly, standing in a corner and watching the stream of Trocadero residents file into the shop to make their own morning purchases. His thoughts drifted to the sight of the woman curled up on his couch and wondered if he’d get any sleep at all while she was staying onboard? It wouldn’t be great if he awoke in the middle of the night with one of his full-blown—
Don’t go there!
He forced himself to shift his thoughts and concentrate on the babble of customers while consciously inhaling the rich scent of baking bread. He’d been advised to latch onto anything in his immediate surroundings that would keep his thoughts from spiraling into worry or flashing back to scenes he was being schooled to put out of his mind. He took another gulp of his coffee, swallowed, and breathed deeply again. Glancing at his watch, he decided that he should purchase some extra croissants to deliver to Madame Grenelle, next door, and got back into the line. By that time he returned to the barge, perhaps Ms. Juliet Thayer would have awakened and another bizarre day would begin.
* * *
Juliet awoke to the sound of river traffic sending waves slapping into the hull on the other side of the couch where she’d been out like a light. In the distance, another helicopter churned through leaden skies. She stayed very still, trying to get her bearings and pull together her scattered thoughts of the previous twenty-four hours. She was on a barge. Her host was a former drone pilot. Her friend was in terrible shape in a Paris hospital. Jean-Pierre was at death’s door. Terrorists were still at large. Wonderful.
Her breath caught at the thought that nothing felt safe, except perhaps in the company of the Major, and actually, not even then.
She heard the ping of her cell phone from the depths of her tote bag. Is that what woke me up? She reached in and read the latest text message.
Jules... are you really here,
or did I dream you came to Paris?
AE
She quickly texted Avery that she’d be at the hospital in half an hour, then sprang off the sofa, folded the sheets and blanket and put them with the pillow into a neat pile. She could see by the open door leading to Finn’s stateroom that his bed was empty, so she raced downstairs, accomplishing her ablutions in record time. Quickly scribbling a note of thanks to her host, along with her cell phone number so they could coordinate their comings and goings by text, she sprinted down the gangway and headed for the street above the river. She had no doubt she’d see him later in the day with his landlady outside the ICU where poor Jean-Pierre was fighting for his life.
Amazingly enough, a taxi was the first car to drive past on the street flanking the river. She hailed it, directing it to take her to the American Hospital in Neuilly-sur-Seine. The streets were filling up with more cars than she’d seen the day before, yet she felt as if her entire body was still on high alert.
At the hospital, Avery’s day was filled with tests, medications, naps, and a ten-minute period of sitting upright in a nearby chair. Juliet did her best to boost her friend’s morale, but felt at a loss for how to comfort Avery as she constantly asked for information about Jean-Pierre. Juliet pretended she’d inquired at the nurses’ station—she actually was afraid to ask, just telling her friend, “No further news, I guess.”
Finn and his Aunt Claudine looked in on Room 203 in the late afternoon when Avery had fallen asleep again, exhausted from her recent exertions sitting up. When Juliet noticed the visitors standing in the doorway, she tiptoed across the room and motioned for them to follow her a few steps down the hallway.
“How’s Jean-Pierre doing today?” she asked.
Claudine merely shook her head as Finn said, “The same, which is bad.”
Juliet glanced back over her shoulder and was relieved to see that Avery remained sound asleep. Maybe she could avoid answering her questions for one more day.
Just then, one of the nurses came by and announced visiting hours were over and that the evening meals were due to arrive at any moment, an obvious hint the visitors should be on their way.
Claudine looked as weary as Juliet felt, announcing that she was going to take the metro home, heat some soup, and fall into bed.
“Is it really safe to do that?” Juliet asked. “Take the metro, I mean?”
“When one is seventy-seven, it’s safe enough,” Claudine responded with a shrug.
Juliet agreed with a heavy sigh. “After Avery has her supper, that’s what I’d like to do, too. Just have soup and crash.”
The nurse spoke up. “Ms. Evans probably won’t wake up for an hour or more, as we’ve given her additional sedation after sitting up in the chair for the first time.”
“Why not leave Avery a note like you did yesterday?” Finn suggested. “You can come with me now, which will be easier all around.”
Juliet was relieved to hear this plan as—unlike Claudine—she didn’t feel up to negotiating a strange subway system guarded everywhere by men in full battle gear.
“Just give me a sec,” she answered, fatigue starting to invade every pore.
To everyone’s relief, the number 82 bus was idling, curbside, just outside the hospital and Claudine gingerly hopped aboard. All three of them were glad she had the choice of riding it home to her apartment, rather than braving the metro. Finn stopped briefly at a shop he knew near the barge and emerged with a carton of Soupe au Pistou—a concoction made of carrots, zucchini, green beans, and button mushrooms in a rich chicken broth topped with a green sauce resembling Italian pesto.
“It’s the French version,” Finn explained, “made—as is pesto—from finely chopped fresh basil, garlic, and olive oil.” The two were soon seated at the small table in the barge’s “salon,” as Finn called the main section of the pilothouse. Besides the soup, he provided a basket with heated slices of bread, along with butter in a small crock.
“You seem pretty up on French food,” she commented, taking another spoonful of the rich, steaming liquid. The helicopter patrol along the Seine had lessened somewhat and conversation was easier, now.
“Cooking is my newest hobby, although I’m too beat to make anything tonight,” he allowed. “On a normal day, I find it very relaxing.”
“Even on two burners?” She nodded in the direction of the tiny stovetop.
“It ups the challenge,” he replied with a faint grin. Finn appeared to study her across the table for a long moment. “I’ve been meaning to ask you... You alluded yesterday that the family company your brother runs didn’t always produce video war games when you first started in the art department. What did it produce?”
Juliet wasn’t surprised that a former rescue helicopter and drone pilot might be curious about the evolution of her brother’s firm.
“In the beginning, which was five years ago, we were doing our version of Angry Birds and electronic tic-tac-toe types of products. As I mentioned before, Avery and I both had student debt to pay off. We figured when my eldest brother, Brad, offered us jobs, it was the quickest way to get on with the type of art we really wanted to pursue.”
“Well, if you don’t mind my asking, has your brother-the-boss ever flown a drone, or any aircraft?”
“Just simulators.”
“Was he ever in the military?”
“No. Make that God, no.” Juliet suddenly felt that a deep freeze colder than Avery’s frigid flat had descended on the barge. “And if you can at least view my friend Avery in a decent light, she quit in protest last spring as head of our graphic arts department when the videos became increasingly violent.”
“But you didn’t quit?” After a moment’s silence he added in a tone that softened his words, “You just don’t seem very war-like.”
“You’re right, I’m not.” She met his glance. “Maybe in your world you’ll think it’s a lame excuse, but my parents’ entire future is at risk right now. Just as I was managing to pay off my college debt, my father took out a huge equity loan against our family’s hotel. He did it to help our resident Golden Boy launch this new video war games phase of the business. My parents also run a small architectural firm in addition to overseeing the hotel, and they’re nearing retirement age. I haven’t left GatherGames because I want to make sure Brad pays Dad back, now that the drone series is doing phenomenally well and the stock is sold on the open market.”
“So you took over Avery’s job when she quit?”
Juliet nodded. “I need the leverage of being design director to make sure Brad makes good on that loan. His excuse for not paying back the money is that he needs Dad’s funds to keep reinvesting in the company to ‘scale it,’ as he insists we should.”
The truth was, Juliet had been stunned when she’d found out that her father had wagered the family’s celebrated boutique establishment atop Nob Hill on such a risky venture spawned by his first born. However, such was the strange power that brother Brad seemed to wield over everyone, especially Juliet’s parents.
“So you’re genuinely worried that your brother won’t reimburse your father?”
Finn’s doubtful expression prompted Juliet to offer a fuller explanation. “Oh, eventually he will, I’m hoping—if he can—but he burns through cash like a hot knife through butter and he’s always chasing the new-new thing. Paying back our father is not high on his personal priority list, I guess. I’m just afraid we’ll have another dot-com bubble burst before he gets around to it... which would be disastrous for the rest of us, including my other brother, as well as my folks.”
“Is this other brother also involved in the family firm?”
“Yes, my younger brother Jamie, who’s a total sweetheart. He edits the videos.”
“That does sound complicated,” Finn noted diplomatically.
To Juliet’s relief, her host’s tempered expression seemed to indicate he apparently understood a bit better the quandary in which she found herself.
Finn rose from the table and gathered their soup bowls, heading the few steps toward the small sink embedded in the desk where his laptop stood open.
“How about I make a fire tonight?” he suggested. He glanced out the window where evening had closed in around the dim outline of the Eiffel Tower on the opposite shore. Then he stooped down and reached for some kindling and a few small logs from a brass bucket to throw into the iron fireplace that dominated one corner in the main stateroom. “And do Brad’s simulated war games involve encrypted messages between the players?” he asked, his back to her.
Oh, boy, here it comes... Finn probably knows way more than Brad about the implications of private encryption...
“Yes,” she admitted, watching Finn’s broad back as he crumpled up newspaper.
Finn glanced over his shoulder. “You know, don’t you, that French authorities are pretty sure the terrorists, here, employed encryption used in video game technology and phone apps? The theory is they disguised their messages sent back and forth between their members as they planned and executed what happened here last Friday.”
“Yes, I know that. I read the same article in The New York Times this weekend that you probably did.” Brad’s counter-arguments surged into her mind. “Our world is now based on encryption—and certainly the military is.”
“That’s true,” Finn agreed.
Juliet said, “Look, we all know that banks use encrypted software to keep people’s accounts secure. The airlines use it, companies use it, and every government agency in the universe needs encryption to keep information protected.”
“That’s also true.” Finn poked at the fire to encourage the flames. “And it’s getting damn scary to think it can be turned against us by some bad actors.”
“Yeah, but how would Americans feel if some foreign power used unmanned drones to drop a bomb on a bad guy next door to them... and it just happened to kill a couple of innocent neighbors in the process?”
Finn fell silent. His face, in profile as he tended the fire, had become an expressionless mask. Finally he said, “This latest terrorist attack is going to bring about a big public reaction because evil people can use drones and encryption for evil purposes. But in a strange sense, encryption may be the one thing that’s defending our freedoms from governments that use it to invade our privacy and control people.”
“But look what damage the really bad guys can do,” Juliet said glumly.
“A tiny minority use knives to kill people,” Finn noted, “but that doesn’t mean ordinary citizens should be forced to turn over all the knives in their kitchens to higher authority.”
Juliet looked at her host with amazement. “So, I take it, you are not in favor of law enforcement demanding ways to decode the encryption used by terrorists, despite what’s just happened in France? Despite what’s just happened to our friends?”
“No, I’m not in favor. Once powerful authorities have that ability, what’s to stop them from sucking up our private data without warrants in the name of national security—which they do already—and then having the means to crack the codes and know every single thing about each citizen? At the end of the day, I’ve come to think that secure, private communication is a good thing. It’s the only thing that stands between citizens and an authoritarian, militarized regime, whichever country they’re in.”
“Wow,” murmured Juliet, “You sound like Brad—only nicer. I can’t believe you were career military.”
“I’m not anymore. And besides, encryption is only one piece of this mess.”
“No kidding,” Juliet said with some heat. “For sure I respect your service, Finn, but I happen to think the U.S. attacks in the Middle East that killed so many civilians are the very events that created this international hornet’s nest in the first place. You’re right. You can’t blame it all on encryption.”
Finn threw another log on the fire with a thud.
“Nope. And what about the lies we were fed that Saddam had yellow-cake uranium and that he was ready to use nuclear weapons? If you can’t trust top officials in your country to tell the truth, we’re in a pretty sorry state.”
Juliet was shocked to hear a former military man agree with her own opinion on the U.S. government’s faulty reasons for the build up to the war in Iraq. She said, “I was certainly persuaded by those fake arguments back then to support the Iraq invasion, more’s the pity.”
Finn threw another log on the pile with another show of force. “Weren’t we all? I went into the military thinking I was one of the good guys.”
“And now?”
Finn rose to his full height and turned around. “As you’ve just pointed out, civilian and military uses of encryption have created issues that aren’t easy to sort out, and anyone who sees the disaster that defines the Middle East simply in black-and-white is a fool. Why, exactly, have we been fighting wars for a decade and a half—and still counting? Was it just about the oil? Was it multi-national corporations only caring about their profits? Was it radical Islam wanting to wipe out all other religions? Was it the revolving door between our military and U.S. weapons makers that kept the merry-go-round spinning? No one has the corner on truth anymore.” He wiped the dust off his hands onto his jeans. “You know how your family tends to produce architects and artists? Scores of men in my family were in the military, back to the dawn of the country. It’s what we Deschanels did for God and country. My dad wrangled me an appointment to the Air Force Academy, and off I went, like the Eagle Scout I’d been in high school. Back then, who knew about drones and targeted killings?”
Finn sounded self-mocking and bitter.
“How long did it take for you to become... aware, I guess you’d call it?” she asked.
“It’s taken me a long time—too long, in fact—to see behind the curtain about a lot of issues and think things through for myself, based on some very first-hand reality checks.” He pulled a box of matches off a nearby table and stepped back to the fireplace. “After I finished flight training, I flew those combat rescue missions, and it was all about the guys in my unit and trying to save lives. I didn’t have time to consider misinformation about Saddam Hussein having yellow cake to build a nuclear bomb. It was all about avenging 9/11 and protecting the homeland.”
He lit a match and leaned down. The flames were soon licking the crumpled paper he’d stuffed under the kindling. He prodded the logs with an iron poker. “When I spent eight months in a VA hospital recuperating after my helicopter was shot out from under me, I had plenty of time to think about how America got into these wars.”
“That was when the four other soldiers died?”
Finn nodded. “When I failed the regular flight physical, but I was fit enough to pilot drones, I figured I owed those guys... something. I accepted the assignment at Creech in Nevada, which I did for three years. So you see, I responded to peer and family pressures just like you. I drank the Kool-Aid. I followed orders. I did as I was told—and as my father and my entire family back to the founding of this country would have expected of me.”
As Finn rose and stood in front of the fire, Juliet slowly shook her head. “So, while my brother was teaching horny teenagers to shoot pretend enemies, you were actually killing real enemies.”
By this time, the fire in the iron stove was burning brightly and throwing off heat. Finn closed the glass doors and sat down on the leather armchair.
“By the time I got to Nevada, our forces had already made many tribal factions in the Middle East into our enemies, so yes... they were my targets.”
“Do you miss it?” Juliet asked, holding his gaze.
“Killing people?”
“No!” Juliet recoiled, absorbing his admission that he’d killed other human beings. “Flying real aircraft. Being an Academy grad and all that goes with that? All the macho, military stuff,” she pressed. “Because that’s what I think has hooked my brother as if he was main-lining heroin. He and his friends are pretend big shot warriors who get a huge rush from all this high-flying hardware.”
“Heroin?” Finn repeated. “Well, I can tell you that what I did sitting in those unmarked trailers in the desert, killing by remote control, never delivered a ‘high’ as far I was concerned. It was soul-destroying, and I couldn’t wait to get away.”
Finn was staring at his hands in his lap, his face now a mask.
“But at least you were getting rid of some very bad guys,” she ventured.
He looked up. “Yeah, that, but we were not just shooting down psychopathic killers. My job included pointing our high-powered eyes in the sky at the aftermath of those Hellfire missiles, right down to the scenes of innocent sheep farmers whose legs we’d blown off.”
Juliet saw the haunted look that invaded his eyes.
“God, Finn,” she murmured, “what an awful thing to have seen.”
“It was worse to be the cause of it. Regular pilots just drop their bombs and fly on. There are always women and children who inadvertently get caught in those explosions. You try ending your duty shift writing up the gory details in the daily reports about the dead six-year-olds whose deaths you witnessed and know you caused.”
He compressed his lips as if willing himself to end this confession.
“God, Almighty,” Juliet said, barely above a whisper.
Finn stared out the large, darkened window on his right that faced the river. “I have no idea why, but you are the only person I’ve ever given that particular detail to.”
“Accounting for the children?”
“Yes.”
Finn had the same look she’d seen earlier, an unseeing, thousand-yard stare.
Juliet murmured almost to herself, “It would be hard to ever erase those kinds of images from my mind. I have trouble trying to forget the grisly, make-believe scenes in the junk we make.”
Finn abruptly rose from his chair and reached toward a standing lamp, flipping the switch. He began prowling the room like a panther, turning on a few other lights with military precision.
“I got to a point where I wanted to put a bullet through my head if I had to drop any more hell on people seven thousand miles away from the God-damned Las Vegas Strip.” He clicked on a wall switch with a vengeance. “When I’d finally fulfilled my obligation, I walked out of those trailers and resigned my commission without a word about it to anyone. When the paperwork was finally processed, I caught the first plane from Vegas to New York, and flew straight on to Paris where I collapsed on my aunt’s couch and didn’t even speak to her for a month.”
“That must have been a terrible time,” Juliet commented quietly.
“Drone pilots are quitting by the scores,” he announced in a flat voice. “Any self-respecting pilot hates these jobs that ‘keep us out of harm’s way,’ as the Pentagon folks are fond of putting it. It got so I could barely drag myself to the antiseptic, air-conditioned control room where we steered our Hellfires toward ‘high value targets’ seven thousand miles away and watched ’em die.”
“It sounds as if your Aunt Claudine understood what you were going through,” Juliet suggested cautiously. “She’s obviously helped you get back on track.”
Finn halted in the middle of the stateroom. “It’ll be quite a while before that happens,” he replied with a warning look, and for a moment, Juliet felt a chill run down her spine.
“Are you getting... help for...?”
She wondered how to politely ask if a person was a human time bomb?
As if he read her mind, Finn said, “Claudine got me to admit I probably had a full-blown case of PTSD, whether anyone else believed it of drone pilots or not. If you don’t have blood spurting out of your ears, the military thinks you’re fine.”
“What about your father?” Juliet challenged. “Wouldn’t he—”
“No, he wouldn’t,” Finn interrupted her roughly. “He’d never believe a drone pilot who quit wasn’t anything but a weakling, but I’ve seen guys who really flipped out and—” He shook his head. “Never mind what I’ve seen.” Hands defiantly on his hips, he continued to gaze across the stateroom as if he expected her to rise from the sofa and walk off the boat. “So, Ms. California,” he asked with one eyebrow cocked, “are you sure you’re still okay about sleeping on my couch another night?”