Prince Incognito

by Rachelle Mccalla

  “Do you think you could work my hands free?”

  “It’s worth a try. Can you get your hands where I can reach them? Don’t let the soldiers see what we’re doing.”

  Shifting subtly, Lillian managed to get her hands aimed at the soldier, who’d turned his body at a similar angle toward her. She found his fingers, and he gave her hand a reassuring squeeze, distracting her for a moment with the comfort he offered in that tiny gesture. It reminded her that she wasn’t alone—that even though they were no longer facing one another, he was with her, working for her freedom as much as his.

  She found the nylon strap of the zip tie he’d been bound with, and located the ratcheting mechanism with her fingers. If it was like the ones she’d encountered at the vet clinic, all she had to do was squeeze the head to open up the ratchet box, then depress the engaged ratchet enough to slide it out from the rack. In concept, the steps were easy enough for her to envision.

  But with her arm muscles already cramping from their awkward position, and unable to see what she was doing, coaxing the two sides apart proved to be a difficult trick. She squeezed the stubborn plastic box with her fingernails, trying to apply just the right amount of pressure to weaken its hold on the strap.

  Finally, it slipped back the slightest bit, and her heart rejoiced for a moment before the box caught on the very next ratchet.

  It would take her all night at this rate!

  They didn’t have all night. In fact, she suspected they didn’t have very long at all. Repeating the motions that had worked before, she tried to ease the strap back another notch, but her hand began to cramp from the constricted angle required to pinch the zip tie.

  She flexed her fingers.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Hand cramp. I just need a second. It’s working.” When the spasm at the base of her thumb stopped throbbing, she squeezed the zip tie again, trying to direct her motions for maximum effectiveness. The strap popped back one notch, and she flexed her fingers while a bead of sweat trickled down her arm. She pinched again, loosened it another notch and kept going. As she worked, the molded nylon became more pliant, allowing her to slip it past the notches more freely.

  “Stop there,” the soldier requested when she had the zip tie near the end of its length. “I’ll be able to slip my hands out through the loop when I need to, but I want to give the appearance of still being bound. If they realize we’re loose, they’ll only tie us up again.”

  Lillian saw the wisdom of his plan. “Do you think you can work me free?”

  “I can try. How did you do it?” He leaned closer to her as they spoke, but kept one hand on her fingers.

  Lily told herself he was holding on so that he didn’t have to find her hand again, but at the same time, the security of his touch calmed her heart. She found her voice, and explained how she’d backed the ratchets out. “Think you can do it?”

  “My fingers aren’t as nimble as yours, but I don’t see any other way of getting you free. Let me have a go at it.”

  Turning away from her again, he tugged on her arm until he could reach the zip tie, and she felt him struggle to work the tricky notches free.

  As he’d hinted, his larger hands weren’t as dexterous as her agile fingers, but he kept working on the zip tie, in spite of his lack of progress.

  “Do you need to try something else?” she asked after several long, fruitless minutes.

  “I think I’m getting closer. It’s tricky. Do you have a better idea?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Then I’m going to keep at it. I’m not about to give up.” His determination with the obstinate zip tie spoke volumes about his commitment to keeping her with him as he made his escape, which Lillian found reassuring. After all, he was strong and, based on the way he’d overcome the four armed men on her father’s boat, obviously a skilled fighter. If either of them had a shot at freedom, he was clearly far better equipped to make his bid. If she got left behind, she’d be at her uncle’s mercy.

  And she didn’t believe for one second the promise he’d made to her parents, that she’d be fine. Uncle David had lied through his teeth. He’d tied her up and shoved her into the stowage compartment as though she was nothing more than a piece of luggage. She was a weapon to him, valuable only as long as she was useful. If the soldier escaped without her, she’d no longer be useful to her uncle. She didn’t want to think about what might happen then.

  Just as she began to fear her zip tie was a lost cause, she felt its tight hold slacken slightly.

  “I’m making progress.” Relief filled his voice.

  “Good.” Lily didn’t want to distract him, but the whir of the rotors had lowered in pitch. They were slowing down, likely approaching their destination and preparing to land. They might not have much longer. “If you can get it loose enough, maybe I’ll be able to squeeze my hand out.”

  “Whatever happens, whether I get you free or not, I want you to follow my lead when we disembark.”

  “What’s your plan?”

  “It will depend on where we are, how many men are on the ground and what kind of weapons they’re carrying.”

  The mere thought of armed men sent a shudder rippling through Lily.

  He obviously felt it, because he quickly reassured her. “We’ll have the element of surprise on our side. They won’t be expecting us to make any sort of move. We’ll use that to our advantage.”

  “But we’re already outnumbered.”

  “True. But you said earlier they need the knowledge that’s in my head. They’re not going to risk killing me.”

  Lily swallowed. “What about me?”

  “I thought that David fellow was your uncle.”

  “Yes, but you saw how he tied me up and shoved me back here. I don’t have any critical information in my head.” As she spoke, they shifted with a hollow thump. The helicopter’s skids settled to the ground. They’d landed. And though the soldier had worked the zip tie back a few more notches, Lillian was still securely restrained. She wasn’t even sure she could stand up without help.

  “He’s not going to hurt you.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “I won’t let him.”

  FOUR

  One of the armed men grabbed Lillian roughly by the shoulder, hauling her to her feet, shoving her in the direction of the door. She couldn’t imagine climbing down a ladder with her hands still bound, but as she blinked into the courtyard outside, she saw in the illumination of fluorescent yard lights that a set of wheeled steps had been pushed into place.

  Wherever they were, these folks were obviously used to receiving helicopters if they had a set of steps handy.

  “Go down,” her uncle instructed her from just beyond the armed man’s shoulder.

  Lily hesitated. She didn’t want to go anywhere alone. She and the soldier hadn’t had time to discuss any specifics of their plan. He’d said he needed to see what he was dealing with before he would know how to act. Perhaps the best thing she could do was disembark so he could get a good look at what was going on outside.

  Her legs, tired from pedaling the rickshaw up and down the hills of Sardis all day, and cramped from the ride in the helicopter, trembled as she tried to descend without the free use of her arms for balance. When she nearly keeled sideways on the second step, the armed man clenched her shoulder with one hand, jerking her backward.

  She decided that if it came to a fight, she’d feel no compunction hitting him.

  As she made her way down the steps, she looked around, trying to spot some means of escape. High stone walls encircled the enclosure, with a gated door at one end guarded by more armed men, and a fortresslike building along the other side. The heavy wooden doors looked impenetrable. The sound of crashing surf carrie
d through the still night air. They must be near the ocean.

  Her damp sneakers squeaked against the cobblestone floor of the courtyard, and she braced herself, ready for the soldier to make his move. She half expected him to leap from the helicopter doorway and take out the soldiers in one mighty pounce, but instead he kept his hands behind his back and his head down submissively.

  The armed men shoved them toward the building. Lily went, though inside her heart was screaming. If they entered the building, they might never come out. They needed to do something. They needed to fight!

  Two guards held a door open, and Lily stepped through to a marble hallway. She could hear the soldier’s footsteps behind her, and she perked up her ears for any change in rhythm that might indicate he was about to make his move.

  He plodded on, so she did, too. They passed several closed doors, then changed direction as the hallway bent ninety degrees. If she had her guess, they’d entered the back way and now were headed toward the front of the imposing structure. As she moved, she tugged her arms against the nylon straps that bound her. The soldier had managed to loosen the zip ties considerably. In fact, if she thought she could do it without being seen, she just might be able to squeeze her wrists free.

  Ahead she saw two multipaned French doors opening to a large, gracious parlor, its high arched windows showcasing only darkness outside. She caught a glimpse of a few twinkling stars, and the longing to be outside distracted her for a moment.

  The soldier’s sudden movement caught her unaware. If she hadn’t heard the grunt of the guard collapsing behind her, she might not have even realized anything was happening. Before she could spin around, the soldier had looped an arm around her waist and swept her into the parlor. He pulled the French doors shut after them, and the velvet door curtains had almost settled into place when they were kicked open again.

  “Hold your fire!” David Bardici barked at the guards who’d raised their guns. “Capture them both alive!”

  The guards dived forward, but just as quickly the soldier who’d rescued her grabbed a floor lamp that looked to be made of heavy wrought iron and swung it like a bat, sending the first man crumpling down with an ugly welt on his forehead. The next guard ducked, diving for the soldier’s legs, but he got knocked on the back of his head and slumped on top of his comrade.

  Twisting and squeezing, Lily shifted her hands free of the zip ties. She counted six more men besides her uncle. They split up, clambering over and around the prone figures on the floor, giving the lamp-brandishing soldier wide berth.

  With shock, she realized they were coming after her. Of course. The soldier had already demonstrated that the easiest way to subdue him was to threaten her.

  A second matching floor lamp stood on the other side of a wood-inlaid sofa. She grabbed the lamp, hefting its surprising weight and attempting to brandish it in a threatening manner toward the guards who approached her. The heavy base drooped toward the wood-inlaid parquet floor.

  Heaving it upward, she swung it around. Once she got it moving, the momentum carried her in a complete circle.

  “Lily!” the soldier shouted. “Facedown on the chaise—now!”

  She staggered backward toward where she’d spotted a delicately arched, crème-velvet chaise bench near one of the twelve-foot-high windows. Nearly tripping over the lamp cord, she dropped the heavy thing and dived onto the lightweight chaise, curling into a ball and instinctively covering her head. She didn’t know what the soldier was planning, but she wasn’t about to get in his way.

  The sound of breaking glass nearly drowned out her uncle’s words as he screamed, “You can’t go through the window! It’s a thirty-meter drop with rocks below!”

  She thought her uncle David’s warning sounded ominous enough, but before he’d hardly finished his sentence, the chaise rocked beneath her as the soldier lifted the dainty bench with her clinging to its sides. She could hear the crash of waves outside and guessed the ocean to be directly below them. The soldier must have heard it, too.

  Lily opened one eye in time to see the soldier hoisting the antique piece toward the gaping mouth of the wide-open window he’d broken out. She held on tight to the chaise as he hurled her through to the darkness beyond.

  Cool air lifted her hair, blasting her face as she sailed through the darkness into the open sky. Terror struck her. What had the soldier done? She couldn’t see anything in the dark night, but she could hear waves crashing below, and smelled the iodine tang of the seashore.

  “Hold on!” His voice echoed off the cliffs behind her, and she realized he’d leapt out after her.

  She hit the sea with an awful, jarring crack, and her face smashed into the padded arm of the chaise, squashing her nose and sending tears springing to her eyes. The soldier landed behind her on the back of the bench an instant later, sending it lurching backward. “Are you all right?”

  “I don’t know.” She looked around, but could see little in the darkness, save for the closest foam-tipped waves that churned around them, peeling back to reveal menacing rocks like the teeth of a giant, hungry and ready to swallow them.

  The soldier had hold of the sides of the chaise, and its lightweight wooden frame proved to be just enough to keep them afloat. As it was, the bench rode low in the water, nearly submerged by the foamy waves. “Keep it balanced. If we tumble off, the undertow could get us.”

  It was all Lily could do to nod and keep a grip on the upholstery as the salty spray soaked her face, stinging her eyes. “Where do we go from here?”

  “I don’t know. The waves are pushing us back. Perhaps we can get ashore?”

  If he hadn’t been behind her, and she hadn’t been clinging for dear life to the sodden couch, she might have tried to shake him. Instead she shook off the waves that had doused her and screamed back, “Next time, you’ve got to have a better plan than this.”

  “I got us out of there, didn’t I?”

  “I’m not sure which is worse.” As she spoke, the couch lurched backward on the crest of a particularly swelling wave, shoving the foot of the chaise into the cliff face behind them.

  “Here now.” The soldier’s arms wrapped securely around her, and his voice carried much closer to her ears, deeper now that he wasn’t shouting, echoing against the overhanging rocks.

  “Where are we?” Her teeth chattered, not so much from the chill of the constant spray, but from fear.

  “Hard to say.” He rocked as another wave pushed them farther back, then pulled her up a bit more, as though preparing to step off the security of the sofa with her. “It appears the waves have worn out a groove here under the cliff face, like a wide-open cave.”

  Lily clutched at the upholstery as the soldier tugged her backward. “You’re not thinking of leaving the chaise, are you?”

  “It snapped in two when we hit the water. The fabric is the only thing holding it together. It won’t last much longer.” He leaned back toward the solid rock, away from the crashing waves.

  She hesitated to follow. “Is it safe?”

  “I don’t know. But I can guess it won’t be long before your uncle sends someone down here to look for us. They can’t see us from above because we’re under the lip of the rock, but we need to be gone before anyone arrives.” As he spoke, he hauled her off the sodden sofa, which was quickly becoming waterlogged and losing all its buoyancy.

  The soles of Lily’s sneakers crunched against the gravel spit at the base of the cliffs. “So we’re going to strike out and pray we don’t get smashed against the cliff, or fall into the sea or run out of horizontal ground to walk on?”

  He pulled her closer as he leaned back against the cliff side, keeping them away from the bulk of the spray, the crashing fury of the waves muffled by his strong arms. “Have you got a better idea?”

  She couldn’t think of
anything besides the very appealing idea of holding tight to his strong arms, burying her head in his shoulder and pretending there was nothing else in the world beyond the man who held her.

  But that wouldn’t get them anywhere, except caught again by her uncle. She couldn’t let that happen. “Which way do you think we should go?”

  He peered into the darkness in either direction. “Most of the North African coast is white sand.”

  Lily didn’t see any white sand, only cliffs and gravel. “Then where are we?”

  “If your uncle really brought us to North Africa, then we must be about a hundred kilometers north of Benghazi. That’s the only place I know of on the North African coast with cliffs like this.”

  The thought of plodding a hundred kilometers along the slippery cliff face made her stomach churn. She didn’t question how the soldier could recall so many geographic details, but didn’t remember anything about himself. Obviously his amnesia had only affected the personal parts of his memory. His intelligence was keen, and highly functional. In fact, his detailed knowledge of the area was slightly unnerving, but she didn’t have time to evaluate what it meant. “So we should head south?”

  “Southwest.” He nodded. “That sounds like the best route. This spit we’re walking along should transition to beach within a few kilometers.”

  Lily kept tight hold of the soldier’s right hand with her left as she stepped forward, following him southward. They proceeded in single file along the precarious path as the waves splashed against their feet. The gravel spit beneath grew narrower instead of wider until, as they came to the sharp curve of a promontory, the spit of sand they walked upon disappeared completely.

  “Careful now.” The soldier peered around the point of the bluff.

  Holding tight to the soldier’s hand, Lily tried to peek past his wide shoulders, but between the darkness and the spray that splashed freely on the unprotected point, she couldn’t make out any sign of further footing.

  “Now what?” she asked as he hesitated.