Not that she was in danger of signing up with these guys any time soon. The burqa requirement, the stoning, and so on pretty much ruled that out. But she had been so powerless for so long (and yet not that long—less than a week). Striding out of the Hyatt with enough PETN in her wake to take down the building gave her some weird vicarious feeling of power. The tired businessmen checking in at the registration desk were still giving her the same up-and-down body scan look. And yet she didn’t care what they thought of her any longer. She had gone beyond all that, was part of a reality much bigger and more intense than anything they could possibly imagine. They and their opinions of her were irrelevant. Puny.