She managed to keep her winning smile as they stepped down from the platform. What was she supposed to do now? Return to work? This was beyond awkward.
“You must join us for the final celebration meal,” said Osman.
“Oh, I can’t, I have to pick up Maddy from day care.” Their dinners went on for hours.
“Don’t worry, it’s a late lunch in about an hour. You’ll have plenty of time.”
“I should probably get back to work.” Amahd wouldn’t want her there.
“Nonsense, you’re a member of our team now,” said Zadir. “We’d be offended if you didn’t join us.”
“You really should,” said Osman. “Shouldn’t she, Amahd?”
“I suppose so.” He growled the words, like they were being dragged out of him. Great. Now she’d be thrust on him when he didn’t want her around. That hurt.
“So you’ll be there?” Zadir pressed for her response.
“Uh….” Why shouldn’t she celebrate the victory she’d helped win for them? And she didn’t want to be rude to his brothers who’d been so kind to her. She resolved to sit as far away from Amahd as possible, so he wouldn’t have to be annoyed or embarrassed by her humble presence. It was disturbing how she could be on top of the moon—making passionate love with Amahd! Winning a gold medal with him!—one minute and in the depths of misery the next.
“Great. We’ll see you in the banqueting room.”
She slid away, keeping her eyes off Amahd so she wouldn’t feel his rejection like a punch in the gut. Did she really think he’d suddenly start acting like her boyfriend once she slept with him? No. She’d never been that delusional. The reality was that once they were alone together, and close enough to touch, she simply stopped thinking.
Something else took over. Something intense and primal and difficult—maybe even impossible—to stop.
She was definitely quitting, money or no money. She could get a similar job in another desert country with oil wells. There were plenty more of them on the website where she’d found this one. What was one more upheaval? She could survive it and she’d try to make things as smooth as possible for Maddy.
She only wished she hadn’t let her poor bruised heart get put through the ringer again.
Amahd congratulated himself on keeping everything discreet and professional with Mackenzie. It wasn’t easy standing next to her for so long, with that lush body calling out to him, but he’d managed it. She’d been discreet, too. No one around them could have any idea that yesterday afternoon they’d writhed together in his bed, his mind and body gripped with feelings he’d never dreamed he was capable of.
“Gibran agrees that now is the time.” Osman’s voice jerked him rudely back to reality. “With this many people present he’ll have to listen to the accusations and there will be plenty of witnesses to his response, whatever it is.”
“The guards are on notice to make sure he can’t escape?”
“Yes. The palace is sealed.”
The palace, with its warren of back alleys and servants’ entrances that had evolved over the years, didn’t seal up too tightly, so Amahd hoped he was right. “Are you sure we shouldn’t warn Darud?”
Osman shook his head. “This is his closest advisor and powerful men don’t like to be wrong. He might not believe us. If he did, he’d surely confront him himself, which would warn him.”
“What if the suspect is armed?” Amahd’s gut tingled with misgivings.
“All weapons were surrendered upon entry to the palace.”
Amahd inhaled deeply. “I’ll sit next to him.”
Osman frowned. “I think it would be better if Gibran did.”
“Gibran should sit across the table, in a better position to make the accusations.” Amahd liked and trusted Gibran, and respected his skills, but he did not want to take a chance on anything happening when he could prevent it himself.
In addition to his entire family and all their local allies, Mackenzie would be there. He did not want her at this meal, but his brothers had made it impossible to send her to safety.
“I suppose you have a point. And our guards are armed, though their weapons are concealed.” Osman clearly had more faith in human nature, and the skill of their guards, than Amahd did. They might accuse him of being cynical but mostly he was just practical. The man they would be accusing was older, successful and respected, with a lot to lose, and the evidence was too compelling to reject. It proved him guilty.
Anything could happen.
CHAPTER TWENTY
“Mackenzie, come sit here!” Aliyah beckoned her, in heavily accented English. She could hardly refuse. Aliyah was so sweet.
“Where are your girls?”
“Oh, they’re taking a nap with the nanny. Gibran suggested it.” Aliyah smiled and poured her a pink rose water drink as she sat down. “I have no idea why.”
Mac glanced around. As far as she knew, their suspect in the violence was still walking around mingling with the other guests, his identity a secret. Gibran telling Aliyah to keep her children at home might be construed as a warning.
She knew better than to bring that up, though. Mac sipped her drink—she liked the rosy flavor or so many things here—and told Aliyah how much Maddy had enjoyed spending time with her daughters.
Ronnie and Sam were seated next to important female guests, so she and Aliyah talked about girls and their passions while they ate a delicious feast of roasted meat—she’d learned not to ask what it was as they ate some very strange things here—spiced rice, breads, fruit and some vegetable dishes.
Osman stood up and made a speech, but Mac couldn’t understand more than a few words in the Ubarite language. People seemed to like it, though. Zadir and Amahd also made short speeches. The speeches were a relief, as making conversation with Aliyah was not exactly effortless due to the language barrier.
Waitstaff were passing around plates of sumptuous desserts when Gibran stood up. His speech—also in Ubarite—started out with the same jovial tone as the others, but soon his voice grew graver and a hush started to fall over the room as guests stopped eating and turned to stare.
“What’s he saying?” Mac couldn’t resist asking Aliyah.
Aliyah’s face was drawn as she whispered, “He’s saying they’ve identified the culprit behind the attacks and he’s here in the room.”
Mac stifled a curse. Was he nuts? Why didn’t they confront him in private? No wonder everyone suddenly looked nervous.
Gibran continued to speak in a low voice, looking around the room as if trying to decide on the guilty party. Then his stern gaze fixed on one man. She’d come to recognize the subtle differences in dress between the countries so she could tell this guy was from Tabriq.
He was also sitting next to Amahd. She struggled not to sneak a glance at Amahd as she took in the suspect.
An older man with a gray beard, dressed in a long grayish brown robe and a tightly wound green and brown turban, he looked startled as Gibran spoke directly to him.
Mac recognized the Ubarite word for “listen,” then they all sat in stunned silence as a recording began to play. Once again, the meaning was lost on her, but Aliyah leaned in and whispered. “It’s one of the prisoners, saying that this man gave them money to light Zadir and Ronnie’s plane on fire.”
Darud the Twelfth—she knew who he was by now—suddenly rose to his feet and started shouting at the man, who raised his hands like he was trying to explain something.
“He’s saying he did it for the honor of Tabriq,” whispered Aliyah, in a stunned voice.
Mac sat there, open mouthed, as Darud banged his fist on the table, drawing a sharp intake of breath from those around him. He shouted something that raised a cheer of agreement from the crowd.
Mac turned to Aliyah, who swallowed. “They want him dead.” She blinked. “Darud said, I want his head on a platter.”
Darud swept up an engraved brass platter, scattering its tiny pastries. Mac stared. Did people really sti
ll get beheaded in this part of the world? Without a trial?
Osman rose to his feet and appeared to plead for calm, with a settle-down type of hand gesture. Darud brandished the plate in the air, yelling, and most people’s eyes—including Mac’s—were on him when the suspect suddenly pulled a small firearm from the sash at his waist and fired shots into the air.
Mac was under the table in a flash, and she tugged Aliyah down with her. Her thoughts immediately flew to Amahd, seated right next to the armed man, and terror gripped her as she risked a peek above the table.
Two more shots ricocheted loudly off a nearby stone column—as Amahd wrested the gun from the man’s hands and shot him in the face with it. Mac screamed as blood splattered over Amahd and nearby guests. Blood poured down Amahd’s hand and arm.
The room erupted in chaos, with women screaming and chairs scraping and falling as people rushed for the exits. Mac’s eyes stayed fixed on Amahd, who watched the dead man fall back, then crumple out of sight behind the table.
Then she saw the stone column crack.
“Look out!” she screamed. It was right behind Amahd, and she watched, helpless as he turned just in time to watch a bullet-scarred section of the column fall and knock him to the ground.
Mac didn’t waste energy screaming. She was across the room in seconds, pushing through the crowd. Osman calmly told people to leave the room. His words, which she could barely understand, buzzed and hummed in her ears as she dropped to her knees beside Amahd’s crumpled, blood-spattered body.
He wasn’t moving. Or breathing.
“He needs CPR,” she said, then started to give it. She’d been trained at more than one of her jobs because of the dangerous work environment. Adrenaline and panic surged through her but she stayed focused, pumping his chest and blowing into his mouth.
He’d been shot in the hand, she could see that. And maybe the arm, too. She tried to keep her breathing steady, when she wanted to sob or scream.
He’d been so brave to grab the gun. Where were the security guards? Were they all in on this? She didn’t know who to trust.
Pump. Blow. Pump. Blow.
At last he started to cough and a huge wave of relief swept through her. “Amahd, talk to me. It’s Mac.”
She touched his cheek. He was breathing. Yes! But he still didn’t wake up.
“Wake up! You can’t leave us. I need you.” Her entreaty was a plaintive whimper.
Osman and Zadir now crouched over him, their big hands on his body. “He’s unconscious,” said Osman. “Where’s the doctor?”
Zadir touched Amahd’s forehead. “On his way.” He must have been nearby as he pushed through their tight knot and checked Amahd’s pulse.
It frustrated her that she couldn’t understand what they said. “I think he’s going into shock. You need to stop the blood loss,” she pleaded.
The doctor yelled orders and staff eventually came forward with bandages and patched up the bleeding wound in his hand and up near his bicep.
But Amahd still didn’t make a sound. His breathing was shallow and insubstantial. Was she about to lose him forever?
“Mac, we should let them do their job.” Sam’s soft hand on her arm startled her.
Everything inside her recoiled from the suggestion. “I can’t leave him.”
“They have to move him. There’s an ambulance on site that can take him right to the hospital. Come with me.”
Panic flashed through her that they’d take Amahd away and she’d never see him again. But right now she was making a spectacle of herself and probably embarrassing them. “Okay.”
“Hang in there,” she whispered to Amahd. Then she leaned in close, her lips almost to his ear and her heart in her mouth. “I love you.”
The words appalled her even as she said them. But what if this was her one chance? How could she fall in love with a man who wanted nothing more than an affair? Then again, how could she not? And his last heroic act only underscored the impressive list of things she already admired—and loved—about Amahd.
The medics carried Amahd away on a stretcher. “He’ll be okay.” Sam sounded unconvinced even as she said the words. “The doctors here are very good.”
Mac glanced back at the dead man who’d started all this. Someone had thrown a table napkin over his destroyed face and others had thrown food at him.
Most of the guests, their conversation a traumatized hum, milled around outside the room.
“I heard what you said,” whispered Sam. “There is something between you.”
Mac’s heart clenched. “There was. Something. I don’t know what it was.”
“He cares about you, too. I can tell.”
She sighed. “He has very set ideas about what he wants.”
“Yes, and they have nothing to do with what he needs.” Sam raised an eyebrow. “But sooner or later he’ll come to his senses.”
If he gets the chance.
The unspoken words hung in the air between them.
“Mama, when can we go back to the palace?” She and Maddy sat on the sofa while she sewed a button back on Maddy’s favorite pants.
“I don’t know, sweetie.” It had been three days since her last victorious and disastrous day there. Every minute since had ached with uncertainty, doubt and fear.
Being back at her regular job, with its long list of routine maintenance checks and the rest of the inventory and organization she’d volunteered for, was not the escape she’d once imagined.
Amahd’s absence from the oil fields made everyone testy. No one seemed to know what kind of shape he was in—she wasn’t even sure if he’d regained consciousness. She wanted to call someone, maybe Sam, and ask, but had a feeling that she’d be overstepping her bounds and possibly doing something Amahd would hate. Also, she suspected that if there was good news to share, Sam would have called her with it anyway.
Part of her itched to quit her job and escape the heartache she woke to each morning. But she knew the pain would follow her anyway, and she couldn’t leave without knowing Amahd was safe from danger.
“Why can’t we go visit Parsia and Nasri?”
Mac was surprised Maddy remembered the unusual names of Aliyah’s children.
“We were there for a party. We haven’t been invited to anything today.” As if they might be tomorrow, or the day after. “I was thinking maybe we should move somewhere different. Perhaps with a pool.” It probably wouldn’t make much difference to Maddy if they moved to another apartment near this oil field, or to one in Kuwait or Saudi Arabia.
“No!” Maddy’s vehement response surprised her. “I like it here and I don’t want to move again. I have friends now—at last!”
At last? Her daughter’s dramatic language amused her. But still, this was news. “Who? Is that that little boy with the red hair? Tommy, wasn’t it?”
“Not Tommy! He’s a boy, silly. Nasri and Parsia.” She grinned, looking pleased with herself. “They’re really nice. And they’re princesses!”
“Oh.” Maddy frowned. She had to admit that a real princess possibly trumped even a Disney princess. “They’re sweet girls but I’m not sure how often we’ll see them.
Even if Amahd recovered from his injuries—there was that horrible feeling in the pit of her stomach again—she didn’t expect a personal invitation to the palace after how cool and professional he’d been the day after they….
Her heart ached and her head was beginning to hurt, too. “It’s been a long day, honey. Maybe we’d better both go to bed.”
“But you didn’t even finish my button!”
The pink, heart-shaped button sat between her thumb and finger but the needle had come unthreaded and her hand was shaking too much to thread it again.
“I’ll do it tomorrow. I promise.”
“You’re always making promises and you don’t always keep them. You said I could get a cat.”
“Not yet, honey. I never said we’d get one right now. One day we’ll get a cat.”
“His eyes are open!”
Amahd closed them again against the painful bright light. His brother Osman’s voice filled his heart with joy.
“What? No, they’re not.” Zadir was here too. “You’re imagining things. Damn. It’s been three days. I wish something would happen. I can’t stand seeing him here in this hospital room with a needle stuck in his arm.”
Amahd made a valiant effort to open his eyes again, despite the burning light.
“Look!” Osman rushed to him.
“You’re right. They are open.” Zadir moved in, too. They were both blurry, and he could barely keep his eyes cracked open.
Amahd felt one of his brothers grab his good hand—the other hurt like fire—and squeeze gently. “We’re here with you. You’re going to be fine.”
Amahd experimented with opening his mouth but had no idea what to say. He’d been dreaming—a long, agonizing dream about a battle on an open plain with copious amounts of bloodshed and tragedy. “I’m back.”
“And not a moment too soon.” Zadir kissed his forehead. “We’ve been going crazy worrying about you. You were shot in the hand and forearm, but they’ve patched you up.”
Shot? So he was in battle. No. He wrestled a gun away from Isfar Dallah and got shot while doing it.
Then he shot his adversary in the face.
The memory soaked through him like boiling water that scalded his soul. “Is Dallah dead?”
“Yes. Dropped dead on the spot,” said Zadir. “Everyone was impressed and it saved us all a lot of trouble trying to convince Darud not to behead him.”
“I would have preferred to take him into custody.” His voice sounded hoarse from lack of use. The memory of Dallah’s blood flying at him made him flinch. “I didn’t want to be judge, jury and executioner.”
“You had no choice. You acted to save the innocent people in the room.” Osman’s deep voice soothed him. “No one else was hurt, and that’s nothing short of a miracle considering that Dallah fired eight bullets and a six-hundred-year-old stone pillar collapsed.”
Desert Kings Boxed Set: The Complete Series Books 1-6 Page 78