Zealot Read Free Page A

“I’ll have the dorade grillée and some pommes frites.” Then he dismissed the waiter
     and turned to Maral. “So you’re a doctor?”
    “PhD,” she replied. “Chairman of the Western Studies department at Bir Zeit University.”
    “In Israel?”
    She shrugged. “That depends on whom you ask. It’s in Ramallah, a little town on the West Bank. It’s where I was born.”
    “You’re Palestinian,” MacLeod said. “That explains it.”
    “Explains what?” MacLead wasn’t prepared for the intensity of her defensiveness.
    “Your accent. I couldn’t quite place it.” He thought for a moment. “But you’ve spent some time in the States, haven’t you?”
    Maral bristled. “Would you like to see my identity papers? How about my travel permits?” As she busied herself with her water
     glass, MacLeod could feel a wall click into place between them. He’d obviously rubbed a sore wound.
    “Maral, I’m sorry,” he said earnestly. He turned his charm up a notch. “If you let me take my foot out of my mouth, I’ll make
     it up to you. Promise.” He smiled a wee smile, hoping she’d follow suit.
    After a long moment she finally did, her smile a little wry, her dark eyes a little sad. “I’m sorry, too, Duncan. I’m usually
     not like this. It’s the end of a very difficult, very disappointing week.” She looked beyond MacLeod toward the gothic spires
     of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, towering over the next block. “I just thought maybe Paris would be different somehow. I always
     thought that Paris would be magical.”
    “Maybe you just need to give Paris a chance. Magic can happen when you least expect it.”
    He liked the way her eyes brightened with flecks of copper when she smiled. “When I was eleven, my father took a position
     teaching political science at Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey.” The way she pronounced the name made it sound
     like a kingdom in a fairy tale. “He wanted to keep us safe from the trouble at home.”
    As Maral spoke, MacLeod came to the sudden realization that he was being watched from the sidewalk.
    “So I guess you could say I spent my formative years as a ‘Joisy Goil.’ ” Her attempt at a New Jersey accent made him laugh.
     As he did, he subtly turned his chair to get a better view of his observer. Olive-skinned, dark glasses, bushy mustache, surveillance
     earpiece. “I went to college at Rutgers, got my PhD from Columbia.” His first guess was that the man was a Watcher, one of
     the secret society of mortals dedicated to observing and chronicling the Immortals, but he’d never seen a Watcher as badly
     trained at surveillance as this guy was.
    “What made you go back to Ramallah?” he prompted. He needed to keep her talking, didn’t want her to get alarmed.
    “I needed to discover who I really was. I couldn’t turn my back on my people like my father had.”
    “You mean you weren’t cut out to be a Bruce Springsteen song?” he added, glibly, his mind only half on their conversation.
     It was obvious that whoever the guy was, he’d learned his surveillance technique from old Cold War spy movies. MacLeod was
     waiting for him to start talking into his sleeve.
    When Maral laughed, it reminded him of wind chimes. “I went home to teach. And then I met someone …” MacLeod’s mysterious
     observer turned to the side to light a cigarette and MacLeod spotted the telltale bulge under his left arm that confirmed
     this was no Watcher. Maybe the guy was inept, but he was deadly serious.
    “Maral,” he interrupted her quickly, “hold that thought. I have to …” He gestured vaguely at the interior of the café. “I’ll
     be right back.”
    “Of course,” she said, and watched him sprint into the restaurant.
    MacLeod made a beeline for the kitchen. The maître d’, seating a young couple at a table inside, called out to him with concern—“Monsieur?”—but
     MacLeod kept moving, pushing past a waiter in the narrow aisle