by Linda Conrad
“Are we taking the car? Shall I do the driving?” Darin wanted to push these men as far as possible, hoping for any mistake on their part.
The same man who’d seemed to be the leader of this trio in Bellinzona took a knife from his robes and slashed the ties binding Darin’s hands. “You will remember that both your whore’s life and her beauty are on the line as we travel through the city, Kadir.”
He thrust the camera phone at Darin. “We will be taking a taxi to the train station and you shall not make one sound of protest on the trip. Do not hope to use that phone for any reason other than your bargain with our master.”
Darin nodded, but said nothing. He could feel watchful eyes following his every move from the shadows in the alley. But instead of fear, he felt comforted. He was as sure of Tarik’s presence nearby as he was of his growing hatred for Hamad.
Two of the Taj Zabbar men stayed behind as Darin had known they would. Their leader walked Darin to the corner and hailed a taxicab. Darin felt sure the other two men would be jumping into the parked car to follow them as soon as the taxi was out of sight.
The main street was oddly deserted at dusk. Seemingly out of nowhere, a lone taxi pulled up to the curb and Darin was unceremoniously shoved into the backseat.
As the taxi took off again, Darin straightened out and raised his head. He was surprised to see a man sitting in the front passenger seat. The man’s body was turned around to face the backseat and he was holding a powerful gun in his hand. Even more surprisingly, the barrel of that weapon was pointed not at Darin but at the Taj Zabbar henchman.
That’s when Darin spotted a very familiar profile sitting in the driver’s seat. “Tarik. I knew you weren’t too far away.”
The Taj Zabbar assassin jerked and reached into his robes. But the deadly click of a safety being released in the front seat had him raising his empty hands in the air instead.
“Don’t kill him,” Darin warned the other two men. “I believe there’s a GPS-type chip embedded under his skin that not only tells the Taj Zabbar of his location but also whether he remains alive or not.”
The man in the front seat nodded and released his finger from the trigger. But he kept his weapon trained at the Taj Zabbar gunman’s head.
“Good intelligence work, brother,” Tarik told him. “But I guess that means your intentions are to try saving Miss Hunt. Otherwise, it wouldn’t matter at all if we killed these assassins quickly and then blew away their Taj Zabbar leader with a few well-placed bombs. Dying in an explosion would bring justice for Uncle Sunnar, after all.”
“As soon as Rylie is safe, you can do anything you want with these assassins. But Hamad Taj Zabbar is mine.”
Tarik said nothing to that but kept his eyes on the road ahead.
“How’d you locate us?”
“The Taj Zabbar use ordinary cell-phone technology.” Tarik shook his head at the thought. “Not the brightest move for people who are supposedly familiar with technology.”
Tarik shrugged and went on. “We intercepted their calls with little trouble. Then when we had their location pinned down within a mile or two, I sent out as many men as I could find to scour the area. One of them spotted Miss Hunt riding in the backseat of their car and we followed it to their new headquarters. I have to hand it to her, she is both brave and smart.”
“Drive to the train station as fast as you can,” Darin quickly interjected. “I need to recover those Taj Zabbar papers and get back here in a hurry to save her.”
Tarik turned the taxi down a side street, pulled to the curb and let it idle. “Not necessary. I’ve already recovered the Taj Zabbar’s papers. Good work on hiding them, by the way.”
“How did you find them behind the padded wallpaper in our sleeping car?” Darin was astounded. “I’m absolutely positive they couldn’t be spotted. I even used toothpaste to glue the quilting back down good and tight so no one would notice it had been disturbed. Not even the Taj Zabbar’s best men would ever have found them there.”
“Like I said,” Tarik said with a chuckle, “good work. But remember it was me who taught you that trick. Those papers are on their way to headquarters right now. We’ll have them decoded within days. You’re a hero.”
“What?” Darin felt a thrust of real panic for the first time since he’d known Tarik had come to their rescue. “Those papers aren’t in Milan? How fast can you get them back here?”
“They’ve been in the air for a good hour. So at least that long. Maybe an hour more for the return trip. Why?”
“You may have just sealed Rylie’s fate. Without those papers, she’s as good as dead.”
Chapter 13
“Are you comfortable?” Hamad stood beside Rylie, close enough that she could smell his spicy aftershave.
The stink made her gag. He’d had her shoved into a back bedroom and tied to a chair the same way he’d done to Darin.
“Oh, fine and dandy, thanks.” Her neck wound was beginning to itch. The ties binding her hands behind her back were too flippin’ tight. She was hot and hungry and nearly hysterical with worry over Darin. But she would never give this bastard the satisfaction of saying so.
“You think I am asking only to be mean? You think I am evil?” A look of concern crossed his face. “Not true, Miss Hunt. I have a proposition to make, and I believe you must be clearheaded to consider what I say.”
“What kind of a proposition?”
Hamad pulled another chair close and sat down beside her. “You are a smart woman, which is easy to see. And may I say, very beautiful, too. You could do many things in your lifetime. Profitable things.”
Rylie glared at him, wondering what came next.
“It would be a shame to see your life cut short and all that potential destroyed.”
“I couldn’t agree more.”
Hamad’s leer widened. A little drool began dripping from the corner of one lip. “See there? Smart. Not like your friend the Kadir dog. He and his kind are not smart. And they shall perish for their stupidity.”
It was all she could do not to spit in his face. But she didn’t figure making the man mad would get her anywhere. Hamad seemed ready to propose some kind of deal. Perhaps another bid for freedom for her and Darin? Whatever it was, it could mean a chance to get out of here.
That’s all Rylie wanted. A chance to free herself and save Darin. So she kept her mouth shut and listened.
“We both know that your friend will not live to see another sunrise.”
“But you made him a deal,” she blurted. “Why should I believe anything you have to say if you’re just going to lie?”
Hamad gave her another leer along with a low chuckle. “The deal I made with him was for your life—not his. But I never had any intention of harming you.” He reached over and tenderly drew his finger down her cheek.
Disgusted, she jerked her head away from his hand.
“Well, yes, perhaps you are right,” he said with a shake of his head. “It is never wise to play with your work.”
“What’s your proposition?” Rylie’s stomach churned as the bile rose in her throat.
“I have business partners and wealthy clients, men of both integrity and power, who are in the market for a wife. Your beauty and brains would fit their requirements quite nicely.”
“You want to sell me?” This bastard’s gall was beyond belief. “Are you nuts? Why would I ever agree to become someone’s sex slave?”
Hamad tsked at her. “Do not be so hasty. No one said anything about slavery. Let me give you a few names and you’ll see what I mean by powerful.”
He ticked off a half a dozen names. She recognized some as leaders of third-world countries, others as major international industrialists.
Rylie could barely sit still. She fidgeted in her seat, tugged on her ties and pursed her lips. “All right. Go on.”
“I propose we hold a marriage auction. Bids to start at…say…twenty million U.S. dollars. Proceeds from the auction will be split betwe
en us.”
The man wanted to auction her off to the highest bidder? He was insane. But she still needed to humor him. She had to get free, and this might provide her best chance.
“What good would that much money do for me if I ended up a slave anyway?” She could barely speak in a civil voice.
“Stop talking about slavery. Leave it to me to choose the bidders wisely. None of my clients would harm you. In fact, we would make them sign a marital contract in advance. A contract giving you both considerable freedom and a generous portion of their estate.”
Estates? Now Rylie was beginning to get the picture.
“So,” she began as her mind put two and two together. “If something were to happen to my new husband. Say for instance, if he died suddenly after the marriage…”
“Then you would be a very wealthy and powerful woman.”
“And terribly grateful to you for putting me in that position?”
“Of course.”
One of Hamad’s men stuck his head in the room then and spoke in that dialect Darin had said was the Taj Zabbar language.
Hamad spit out what seemed like a curse, and then turned back to her. “You must pardon me for a few minutes, Miss Hunt. It appears that excuse for a man you find so attractive is trying a double cross. His taxi has stopped on a side street. I would guess that he is trying to bribe my employee. However, the dog will be sorely surprised on that account.”
“You don’t think your employee can be bribed?”
Hamad actually grinned. “Someday I will explain the special training my employees receive. They are known as assassins and fanatics, and they would rather cut off their appendages than go against their master. Each of them has already lost a toe or a finger to prove their loyalty. So, no, Miss Hunt. I am sure that my employee will not be bribed by a Kadir.”
“They cut off their own fingers and toes?” Ewww. Rylie was horrified at the notion.
“I can be a most appreciative master for such loyalty.” He withdrew his knife, stepped behind her and cut the ties binding her hands. “See how kind I can be? I want you to think about our partnership without discomfort.”
Hamad started to leave, but turned back at the door. “Please take this time to consider my offer. I have ordered a pleasant supper if you would be generous enough to join me. The food should arrive in about an hour—after your friend has retrieved my property and met his end. We shall talk further about our partnership then.”
With those horrid words, Hamad left the room and shut the door behind him. Rylie rubbed at her arms to force the circulation back into limbs that had fallen asleep.
In a few seconds, she tried standing and shook out the kinks in her legs. The next thing she did was run to the window to look for a way out. The glass doors of the window ran from the floor almost to the ceiling and she could fling them wide-open for air. But that would be as far as she could go. The window was four flights straight up. Below was a narrow residential side street with cars parallel-parked down one side. Clearly there wouldn’t be any escaping that way.
Turning a full three-sixty, she studied every inch of the room where she was being held a prisoner. One window. One door. One bed. Two chairs, a lighted wall sconce and a table. Nothing to help her escape, or that could be used to attack her jailer.
She felt useless. Tied without ropes. Nothing to use as a weapon.
With at least three large Taj Zabbar men, she was outnumbered and overpowered physically. Her brains were all she had left with which to defend herself. And right this minute she couldn’t think of anything that might help. Darin was the one and only thought occupying her mind. She might get out of here in one piece by using her wits, but what about him? Damn it. They were a team now. He couldn’t die. How could she let that happen?
Standing at the open window, she kicked furiously and hit nothing but air. Sighing, she looked out over the Milan rooflines, just beginning to disappear in the dusk settling over the labyrinth of city buildings. From here she caught a glimpse of the Castello Sforzesco. A place she knew as a historic castle, located on a marvelous piazza that made for good photographs. Rylie remembered it from having been in Milan once before with her parents—years ago as a teenage tourist.
The fleeting thought of her parents brought a familiar ache. Her father would’ve known how to get out of a mess like this. But Rylie was stumped. Aware that for the first time in her life she was in a situation that she couldn’t control, Rylie sank down on the bed.
She thought of Darin. The first man she had ever truly loved with her whole heart. The only man other than her father that she could envision as a partner. But in Darin’s case, it was as a partner for life.
Rylie yearned for him. The two of them had never gotten their chance to talk. Or to just be together. And now she had no way of helping him, either. He was out there somewhere, fighting to save her life. And here she was, a useless puppet with no way out. She had always been a fighter, and the frustration of being boxed in weighed heavily on her chest.
Staring bleakly out at the first of the evening stars, she had to swipe at her cheeks as tears began to roll. Useless. Out of control. Boxed in.
She thought of her mother. Of the others back at home who still needed her help when she couldn’t even help herself. More tears threatened. Defeat settled in around her shoulders like a shawl.
Finally she threw herself across the bed and sobbed. A fountain of liquid pain erupted from somewhere deep inside. Her tears appeared at first because of the frustrating situation. But they quickly turned into a waterfall of the unshed grief that she had refused to express for the last six months.
Oh, Daddy, I miss you. I’m so sorry to let you down but I can’t do this one alone. For the first time ever, I admit I need help and now no one is there to come save me.
Below the window, standing in the growing shadows, Darin and his brother looked up at the light as Rylie’s image had moved in and then back out of view.
“Miss Hunt doesn’t look much like a prisoner to me.” Tarik spoke in soft voice.
“She is.” Darin could feel Rylie’s frustration and desperation in the same way as he had felt Tarik’s presence earlier.
Speaking quietly to his brother over his shoulder, he said, “Are you sure that assassin is still alive and on his way to the train station?” Darin was smart enough to match Tarik’s low whispers.
“Positive. As we tied him and put him in the taxi’s trunk, he attempted suicide, but we were too quick for him. We also took care of his pals, the ones in the car following the taxi.”
“We have to get Rylie out of there soon.” Darin’s anxiety was growing as the minutes ticked by. “Before Hamad realizes I don’t have access to his papers.”
Tarik turned to face him. “I’ve had a thought about that, bro. There might be another trick that’ll give us the few extra minutes we need to form a rescue plan.”
It was all Darin could do to drag his gaze away from the fourth-story window where he knew Rylie was being held. “What is it? We don’t have a lot of time for preparations. That taxi will be pulling in to the train station at any moment.”
“No need for long, drawn-out preparations.” Tarik was studying his face in the low light coming from a nearby second-story window. “We only need your ability to carry out a covert story line. How are you at lying?”
A flash of his earlier smart-assed reply to Hamad about Kadirs not lying ran through Darin’s mind. But the thought was quickly replaced by a picture of Rylie’s face in the throes of passion. What if he could never see that spectacular look of pleasure ever again? Hell, he couldn’t lose her now. That she’d landed in this mess in the first place was all his fault.
“I can lie when necessary,” he said slowly.
“Uh-huh.”
“Tell me what you want me to do, Tarik. I’ll do anything.”
Tarik sighed. “You really love her, don’t you? I’ve never seen you respond to a woman this way before.”
“Tel
l me.”
Tarik was carrying a high-tech toy in a pocket and it buzzed twice, then stopped. “That’s the signal. The taxi has arrived at the station. You have to do this now. Put in a call to Hamad like you promised. But tell him the train is surrounded by cops and you can’t reach the sleeping car. Tell him he has to give you more time. Another hour so that you can find a way past the police.”
It might work and was worth a try.
Darin took a deep breath and pulled Hamad’s cell phone from his pocket. “He doesn’t have a way of locating me from this phone, does he?”
Tarik chuckled. “Naw. I pulled the GPS chip, put it in a throwaway cell and put it in the taxi. These Taj dudes are seriously screwy. It’s like they have one foot in the twenty-first century and one foot in the Middle Ages. Make the call.”
Darin punched the single phone button like Hamad had shown him. When the bastard answered, Darin gave him the lie and even managed to bluff a line about why there wasn’t any background noise in the train station.
After he hung up, Darin didn’t feel as elated over making Hamad believe the story as he’d thought he should. He hadn’t been able to talk to Rylie, and they still needed a plan to free her. He wasn’t going to feel anything good until she was back by his side.
“Nice work, brother.”
The new voice had Darin whirling around. “Shakir! How did you sneak up on me? What are you doing here?”
“I move quietly.” Shakir’s understatement almost made Darin grin. “And you don’t think I would let my two brothers have all the fun, do you?”
“I’m not sure fun would be the word for attacking a Taj Zabbar stronghold.”
Shakir patted him on the shoulder. “Now, now. Thus far, I’ve been enjoying myself immensely. I took down the three outside Taj Zabbar guards a few moments ago. Well, with help from one of Tarik’s men. And I found that action to be bloody brilliant.”
Shakir rubbed his hands together. “So, what’s the plan for reaching the fourth floor?”