“It’s fine.” She shot him a tense smile. “I just need some privacy.”

“Of course.” He nodded and lifted a hand toward the elevators, but Ava didn’t want to chance that someone might join her. Voices always grew more agitated in confined spaces, and the elevators in the hotel were small. She walked toward the stairs instead. Her phone was already out and she was dialing her mother’s number when she pushed the door to the terrace open. Sunlight flooded over her, baking the tile that covered the roof. Ava took shelter under one of the generous shade covers that marked a quiet corner. As she suspected, the terrace was deserted. Keeping away from any windows or open doors, she let the phone ring across the world in Los Angeles.

“Hello?” Lena Matheson answered in a groggy voice. “Ava, what’s wrong?”

It was just past midnight in L.A.

“Did you and Carl hire someone local?”

“What?” She heard Carl’s voice in the background, a quiet growl that her mother shushed. “What are you talking about?”

“Did you hire someone, Mother?”

There was a quiet huff. “Well, really, Ava, what did you expect? You asked Carl to have pepper spray delivered to your hotel. He—”

“That’s precautionary, Mom! I do that anywhere I’ve never been before when I’m traveling alone.” A tight, nervous part of her stomach relaxed. It wasn’t a stranger after all. Despite the unusual voice, the man following her was just another guard hired by her overprotective mother and stepfather. Nothing she couldn’t handle.

“Just go about your business and ignore him. He has a job to do, and you know Carl won’t fire him.”

No, but he might hire more if he got wind of the incident in the alley today. “This is Istanbul. It’s very safe as long as you’re smart. I’d probably be in more danger traveling in New Jersey. You really don’t need to—”

“Have you forgotten Cassie Traver? She was in Paris and she was kidnapped. Let’s not take any chances, Ava. You know how he worries.”

You mean how his accountant worries. The only reason her stepfather had started up with the guards again was because of the enormous amount of money the Travers had been forced to pay to Cassie’s kidnappers. Ava had no illusions of paternal concern.

“Just tell him to keep his distance. I know you won’t fire him, but I don’t want to see him anywhere near me.”

“Do you want to talk to Carl?”

“What do you think?”

There was a heavy pause on the line. “Okay. Are you… having fun?”

She heard Carl growl again. Her mother covered the phone with her hand.

“It’s late, Mom.” Ava swallowed the lump in her throat. “I’ll call you back another time.”

“No, it’s fine. I’ll just—”

“I gotta go. There’s someone I need to meet with. For work.”

“Call me back tomorrow?”

“I don’t know—”

“Later, then. Just call me later.”

“Sure.” Ava collapsed in one of the luxurious chairs under the shade and ran her fingers along the frond of a potted palm. “I’ll call you later.”

“I love you.”

“Love you, too. Bye.” Ava hung up before Lena could say anything more, then stared over the rooftops of Istanbul, far above the crowds.

Silence. At last, silence.

Ava started early the next day. She’d been to Topkapi Palace before but had woken when the first prayer calls floated over the city and couldn’t get back to sleep. She lay in bed for a few hours, loading and editing work on her laptop, then decided to beat the crowds and some of the heat. She headed toward the opulent palace in the center of the old city, walked past the first gate, and started working.

Photography had been her escape for years. There was something about the intense visual focus that helped Ava block out the voices around her. She could get lost behind the lens. An observer instead of an outsider. She snapped pictures of the stunning architecture, trying to capture it from unique angles in the morning light. But more and more, she found herself drawn to the people who began crowding the various courtyards.

Whispers of excitement.

Routine hums.

The clear, pure thoughts of the youngest children, uncluttered by the static of their parents and guardians.

And each and every one completely unintelligible to her. She recognized common words and phrases. She could probably quote things from memory, though she had no idea what she would be saying. People’s inner voices didn’t work the way their spoken voices did. They thought in slips and starts. Their minds drifted from one emotion to another, often so quickly it made her ill.

“Excuse me,” she said, working her way through a tour group and toward an empty corner where she could watch the growing crowds.

Workers. Tourists. Families on holiday and the odd wanderer like herself. Ava turned her camera on them, capturing their fleeting expressions and sudden smiles. People were nice… from a distance. She’d avoided cities for years, preferring the peace of wilderness destinations and hidden enclaves where the voices of the locals weren’t quite so overwhelming. She was still in shock that she’d agreed to come to Istanbul. Couldn’t explain why, exactly, but she’d felt drawn to it. Maybe it was the promise of help. She couldn’t allow herself to believe this doctor—Doctor J. Sadik—could actually help her. But perhaps she could allow herself to be curious.