by Alex Archer
“I don’t know how I missed it.”
“Get them out of there. We have to go.”
Cory tore away the fabric.
Annja felt sure their situation was about to get a lot worse.
* * *
WHEN HE SPOTTED THE parachutists, MacKenzie swore with inarticulate rage. “Who are those people?”
“We believe they belong to your target.”
MacKenzie counted eighteen parachutes. There were probably more he missed. If they had been sent by Habib ibn Thabit, the man wasn’t wasting time. Overhead, he heard the faint drone of airplane engines only now reaching him through the battlefield gunfire.
“Is he with them?” MacKenzie sighted through his rifle’s sights and bracketed another Bedouin’s head as the guy ran toward a tent. That was the last place MacKenzie had seen Annja Creed headed. He squeezed the trigger and watched the Bedouin spill forward in a jumble of arms and legs.
“We don’t know.”
MacKenzie got up and ran toward the camp. “But it’s not very likely, is it?”
“No.”
Trust Sophie to give it to him straight. She was never one to beat around the bush. Judging from the descent rate of the parachutes, they’d be among them in short order.
“That’s too bad, because the rescue op here was going so well.”
“You have a casualty.”
That surprised MacKenzie. “Who?”
“Jane Doe.” Sophie gave him the cover name of one of the female mercenaries. MacKenzie hated to hear it. He’d worked with the woman on a few other missions and she’d always been dependable.
“Given the changing parameters of your current mission, we’ve chosen a new objective for you.”
MacKenzie went into the camp in a crouch, half stepping quickly the way the military had taught him, keeping the rifle up while keeping himself mobile and as small as he could. “What?”
“Get Annja Creed out of there.”
MacKenzie knew Annja wasn’t going to agree to that. “That could be a problem.”
“You’re not paid to point out problems.” Sophie’s voice held a dangerous edge. “You’re supposed to solve them.”
And survive. But MacKenzie didn’t mention that. He changed his course and headed for Annja Creed’s position behind the tent. She was linked in over the comm. She would know he’d be coming and what he intended to do.
Chapter 25
Get Annja Creed out of there.
A chill passed through Annja when she heard the order. It was the first true indication she’d had that MacKenzie wasn’t calling his own shots.
“Let’s go, let’s go.” Cory reached through the back of the tent, grabbing for the graduate students and hustling them along.
Annja had been looking out for the Bedouin warriors; now she had to add MacKenzie and his crew to that list.
And the parachutists. You can’t forget about them.
When one of the graduate students slipped, Annja caught the young woman by the arm to steady her.
Annja sensed the presence above her before she saw the parachutist and brought her rifle to bear as she looked up. He swooped in on her like a predatory bird, letting go of one of the guide controls and reaching for the machine pistol holstered across his abdomen.
Bracketing him in her sights, Annja squeezed the trigger. The bullets caused him to jerk reflexively. Thinking that he might, like her, be wearing Kevlar body armor, she put her next burst into his face, then barely had time to dive to the side as he fell.
She rolled to her feet and awkwardly came up with the rifle, but she still had it. Swiveling, staying low, she wheeled around to where the parachutist lay on the mountainside twenty feet away. The parachute twisted in the breeze for a moment, then gave a final flutter and draped over the man. He didn’t move.
“Annja!” Cory was on his way up the mountain. “Come on!”
“More are coming!” Theresa pointed into the sky.
Annja spotted ten or fifteen more parachutists dropping out of the night. Few Bedouin warriors remained to engage them, and most were trying to escape.
She thought wistfully of Abdelilah Karam’s scroll, the part she didn’t have, and wished she knew where to look. But the first priority was the safety of the archaeological team. She turned and ran.
Only a short distance ahead, though, she saw that there was no place to run. More parachutists landed ahead of them, dropping from the sky like ravens. Several of them fired bursts over their heads, driving them to the ground.
Annja pulled up behind a ridge with Theresa and Cory.
“Oh, man!” Cory peered over the ridge at the airborne troops who were already shrugging out of their parachute harnesses. “We are so screwed. Until you shot that guy, I thought they were here to rescue us.” He looked at her reproachfully. “Who are they?”
Annja shook her head. “I don’t know.”
“And who are the guys you’re out here with? Friends of yours?”
Get Annja Creed.
“Not exactly.” Annja peered over the ridge, searching for an escape route. The parachute arrivals were digging in, setting up a perimeter and cutting off any forward advance.
“Annja,” MacKenzie said over the earwig.
Annja didn’t reply. She was angry at him, but mostly at herself. She wished she had waited for Garin. Part of the reason she hadn’t was because she didn’t like having to ask for anything. Especially from him. Their relationship, and the relationship they each had with Roux, was complicated.
But waiting on Garin’s help might have taken too long. Of course, given her present circumstances, late or early didn’t seem to matter much. Nobody was safe.
“Annja, I know you can hear me.” MacKenzie sounded slightly out of breath.
“It would probably be better if you stayed away from me right now.” Annja peered through the darkness, searching for MacKenzie. She didn’t know who she felt more threatened by, him or the new arrivals.
“Help!” Theresa called.
Annja turned to see MacKenzie standing behind Theresa. He had his left arm wrapped over her throat, holding her back against him. A flat black pistol in his right hand was pointed at Annja.
Cory launched himself at MacKenzie. Maybe he didn’t see the pistol, or maybe he thought he could overwhelm MacKenzie. Either way, MacKenzie swung the pistol in a blur and laid the barrel along Cory’s temple when he got close. Poleaxed and out on his feet, Cory toppled and lay at Theresa’s feet. She struggled against MacKenzie, but it didn’t do any good.
Annja pointed the rifle, but only the barest profile of MacKenzie’s face showed past Theresa’s head. He held his pistol against the young woman’s neck. In the moonlight, even if Annja had been an excellent shot, she couldn’t have guaranteed success. And she still didn’t know if MacKenzie was the enemy. Or if he worked for one.
“You can’t shoot me, Annja. You’re not that good. You also don’t want me to accidentally pull this trigger. Even if you miss me, I can’t say that I won’t shoot. These aren’t exactly stress-free moments we’re enjoying here.”
Even though she decided she wasn’t going to shoot, Annja didn’t lower her weapon. “She doesn’t have anything to do with this. Let her go.”
“If I let her go, you might try something stupid.”
“I was stupid when I took you on for a partner.”
“Pains me to hear you say that. Matter of fact, if this present situation hadn’t gone toxic, I’d have gotten your friends out of here, and I’d be a hero.”
“Who are you working for?”
“Can’t say. I subcontract for a woman who organizes jobs sometimes. This is just something she took on from somebody else. A handoff.”
“Are you there?” Annja spoke sharply
as sporadic gunfire echoed around them. “I heard you talking to MacKenzie earlier.”
No response.
MacKenzie shook his head. “She doesn’t like talking to people.”
“She’s going to talk to me.”
“I don’t think so.”
“I’m not going to leave these people here to die.”
“If you come with me now, they can live. Once those guys figure out you’re gone, those men will walk away.”
Doing the math on that didn’t take long. Annja stared at MacKenzie over her rifle sights. “So those people are after me, too?”
The woman at the other end of the commlink cursed.
MacKenzie blinked. “We haven’t got a whole lot of time. Those men are closing in. I’m the only chance you’ve got.”
Beyond MacKenzie, Yahya dropped into position and pointed his rifle at Annja’s face. The young man looked grim and merciless behind the weapon.
“Annja Creed!” A man’s voice rang out over the mountain. He had a Middle Eastern accent.
Not taking her gaze off MacKenzie, Annja spotted one of the parachutists out of the corner of her eye. He was standing in the open. David Smythe, gripped by the hair and on his knees, sat on the ground beside him.
“Annja Creed, I am going to shoot this man. Then I am going to shoot another one. Show yourself.”
“You’re not the only way out of here,” Annja told MacKenzie.
MacKenzie’s expression hardened. “Don’t be a fool. You can’t go out there.”
Annja tossed the AK-47 away and rose to her feet with her hands over her head. She raised her voice. “Over here.”
The unknown woman’s voice crackled over the earwig. “Those men will kill you when they’re done with you.”
“I don’t know that you people aren’t planning the same thing.”
“We want the man responsible for sending them here.”
“Who would that be?”
No reply.
The parachutist holding David Smythe waved her forward. “This way, Creed.”
Conscious of the rifles trained in her direction, Annja started walking.
MacKenzie’s voice was flat in her ear as he asked, “Do you want me to kill her?”
A chill spread between Annja’s shoulder blades, but she kept walking. If she turned around now, the man holding Smythe might either kill the archaeologist or her. She was committed.
“No.” The woman sounded angry. “Get your team out of there, Dove.”
“Roger that.”
Annja kept walking till she reached Smythe’s captor. She studied his features, but she hadn’t seen him before. The Middle Eastern heritage was apparent in his dark skin, black hair and dark eyes.
“I’m glad you are being sensible,” the man said softly. He released Smythe, who fell to the ground.
Annja knelt slowly to examine the professor. “David?”
“I’m all right.” Gingerly, Smythe straightened, but only managed to get to his knees before their captor dropped a gloved hand on his shoulder and kept him down.
“Stay there, Professor Smythe. You are going, as well.” The gunman swept his gaze over the mountain. “I suppose the men you were with abandoned you?”
“I don’t know.”
“Well, we will find out soon enough.” He looked at her. “You may call me Hamez.”
“Do you work for Habib ibn Thabit?”
“You will find out what you need to know when the time is right. Give me your phone.”
Annja pulled it from her pocket and handed it over. Hamez dropped it on the ground and smashed it underfoot. He waved over two men. One of them forced Annja to her knees and secured her hands behind her back with disposable cuffs.
Annja barely controlled her anxiety. As long as her hands had been unbound, she wasn’t helpless. She could have reached for the sword. She knelt quietly beside Smythe.
“Annja?” Fear showed in Smythe’s eyes as he looked at her. “Who are these people?”
“I think they work for a man named Habib ibn Thabit.”
“But who is he?”
“I don’t know.” Annja took a deep breath and tried to remain calm.
“What does he want with you? With us?”
“I don’t know that, either, but I think it has to do with the scroll Mustafa found.” Annja scoured the countryside for MacKenzie and his people, but saw nothing.
“What’s the significance of the scroll?”
“I don’t know that, either. I only got a piece of it.” Annja looked at him. “Have you ever heard of a Muslim historian named Abdelilah Karam?”
“No. Why?”
Annja sighed. “I wish I knew, but that man—dead for hundreds of years—seems to have started all of this.”
“But that doesn’t make any sense.”
“Not yet.” Annja studied Hamez, who was talking over a commlink. She couldn’t overhear the conversation. “I thought at first they were just here for the rest of the scroll. But they wouldn’t want us if that was true.”
She wondered what was really at stake. If Thabit was after her for some reason, and MacKenzie was not after whatever the scroll represented, that could only mean that MacKenzie—or whoever he was ultimately working for—was after Thabit.
Quite the little triangle you’ve got yourself involved in, Annja. Things were definitely interesting, but she hadn’t given up hope of getting away. She just couldn’t do that with all the dig team at risk. Getting away later with Smythe was going to be difficult enough.
Chapter 26
Several minutes passed and Annja’s knees started aching from the strain of kneeling. She was also conscious of the earwig in her ear canal and her connection to MacKenzie’s unseen masters. They probably had a GPS lock on the device, as well. She didn’t know whether to be relieved or concerned.
The possibility remained that Hamez or his men might find it.
Boots crunched across the dry soil. She looked up and saw Hamez returning, followed by two men. Between them, they forced Mustafa to stumble along. The Bedouin leader’s hands were bound behind his back. They threw him on the ground in front of Annja.
Bruised and battered, one eye swollen shut, several teeth missing in front and blood running down his chin, Mustafa still managed to glare at Annja. “I should have killed you the night I saw you.”
She had bigger problems than he was currently in position to offer.
Hamez looked at Annja. “This is Mustafa?”
“Yes.”
“He killed one of my men while they were trying to take him.”
Mustafa spat blood at Hamez’s boots. “Put a knife in my hand and give me the chance to kill another.”
Hamez ignored him, then produced the scroll. Annja’s heart leaped. “Is this the scroll that was found? The one you have been asking about?”
So they were interested in the scroll? Annja filed that away, but she still didn’t know where she fit into their scheme. “Yes.”
Hamez stared at her, then spoke quickly to one of his men, who took Smythe by the arm, pulled him to his feet and led him a short distance away. Hamez pulled out his knife.
“The man I work for wishes to know what you have learned about the scroll.”
Annja hesitated.
“If I get the impression you are lying to me, or holding back, I will have Professor Smythe executed. Do you believe me?”
Annja swallowed. Her mouth was dry. “Yes.”
“Then tell me.”
“The scroll belonged to Abdelilah Karam, a historian of the caliphate during Muhammad’s reign.”
Hamez walked away and said something into his commlink. He was too far away for Annja to hear, and she didn’t know much of th
e language, anyway.
Mustafa lay on the ground and cursed his pain and the men who held him captive. He promised them unholy wrath once he was free.
Hamez returned to Annja. Her stomach threatened to roll. She didn’t know anything else to tell the man. She hoped it had been enough to keep Smythe alive.
“What is in the scroll?”
Annja returned the man’s gaze. “I don’t know. The only thing I can tell you is that it belonged to Karam. I’ve traced down other leads to Fes. There was a professor at the university there who studied Karam. I planned to take the scroll there to see if I could get it translated. Or at least compare it to other examples of his work.”
Hamez frowned. “You cannot read the scroll?”
“No.” Annja looked at the old paper. “But if you let me examine it, I might be able to learn something.”
For a moment, Hamez hesitated. Then he leaned down behind her, thrusting his face into hers. His breath blew warm on her cheek. “If you try to escape, I will have Professor Smythe killed. And I will kill you. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
Hamez leaned in a little more. Annja felt the cold steel press against her flesh. A second later, the plastic cuffs fell off her wrists. Hamez helped her up.
“Remember, if you run, I kill your friend. And you will not get away.” Hamez’s expression was hard.
Before Annja could respond, Hamez pulled his pistol and shot Mustafa through the head. The Bedouin warlord relaxed back against the ground, his face a mask of surprise.
Annja got the message.
As he holstered his pistol, Hamez looked up. Gazing in the same direction, Annja spotted the two small cargo helicopters speeding toward them. A moment later, the chopping beats of the rotors passed over them.
Hamez’s men laid down flares to mark out a landing zone. The helicopters set down easily, the rotor wash whipping up a wave of sand and dust.
Annja wrapped her arm over her nose and mouth to keep from choking, and squinted through the haze. Hamez put an arm on her shoulder and pushed her forward.
“Let’s go.”
Annja took a final look around the mountain. The fires in the Bedouin camp had died down, and four of the tents had been reduced to faintly glowing embers. Burned bodies lay in all of them, though whether they had been killed by flames or gunfire, she didn’t know.