by Holly Rayner
Once I could bring myself to stop, I handed the bucket over to Rose, who eagerly drank as well. She was a little more careful than I was and didn’t drip much. She heaved a huge sigh of relief as she lowered the bucket.
“That was a tough one,” she said.
“Yes,” I said heavily. “I don’t want to think about what might have happened, had we not been here to help.”
As it was, I could hear the woman hurrying away from the cottage to spread the good news, and I smiled.
Setting the bucket back on the edge of the well, Rose turned to me and laid a soft hand on my shoulder. “It was your quick work that saved them both. And I think they know that.”
“Oh, I couldn’t have done it anywhere near as easily without you keeping her calm and focused. It just wouldn’t have been the same without my favorite nurse there.” I turned to her, sliding a hand down her arm.
We gazed at each other. Silence stretched out between us. She tilted her face up to me and I moved toward her. When we kissed, soft and slow, it still almost managed to shock me.
She let out the softest little whimper against my lips, leaving me fighting down a surge of desire. But then we parted…reluctantly…and I smiled down at her as I looked into her eyes.
“Doctor!”
Yusuf, you have terrible timing. “Yes?” I turned away from the slightly flustered-looking Rose and gave the man a smile.
The man came over, beaming so widely that his smile barely fit his narrow face. “I wanted to thank you again for saving my grandson. I fear we would have lost him and my daughter both without your intervention. Surely, God heard our cries for help.”
“Well, I would venture to say so under the circumstances,” I acknowledged warmly.
“Please accept the hospitality of my village for as long as you like,” Yusuf said enthusiastically. “I am chief here, and on behalf of all of us I can say that you are most welcome.”
I hesitated. Rose looked at me pleadingly. We were both exhausted, hungry, in need of a bath, a good meal, and a lot of sleep. But the more I thought about it, the more I worried that we might end up drawing trouble here just by our presence.
“I am sorry. We are very grateful for the offer, but we must continue on.” My apology was half for Yusuf and half for Rose. “If you don’t mind supplying us with some food and water for our journey, I would be grateful enough.”
Yusuf looked at us curiously but nodded after a moment. “I will see to it.” And he left us alone at the well to go do so.
“I truly am sorry,” I told Rose gently after he left. “I would gladly stay with you here tonight, but if we do so, we increase the risk of our not only being caught, but of also bringing suffering to others.”
She gave me a weary smile. “I get it. I just really hope we can find someplace with quicker transport back—and soon.”
Chapter 23
Rose
Another dawn over the desert. Was it the third since my kidnapping? The fourth? I was so tired that I couldn’t remember any more. I hadn’t slept more than three or four hours a night since all of this started, and though my leg wound no longer hurt, my whole body ached with the need for real rest.
“How much farther do you think it is?” I puffed, wiping sweat from my eyes for the hundredth time since the sun had risen. My other hand groped for Vincenzo’s, a habit that had only strengthened over time.
He readjusted the old military pack strapped to his back and smiled at me reassuringly. Truly, he had worked very hard to keep my spirits up this whole time. He had carried the supplies—and sometimes me. He had kept watch more than I when we stopped to rest. When I was cold, he had held me and wrapped us in the blanket Iyad had given me.
“We must be getting close. Another day at most, especially with all the progress we have been making by night.” Nighttime: the time where walking was the only option to keep warm. I nodded, and he smiled. “Don’t worry, Rose. We’re almost home.”
Home. My stomach flipped with both anticipation and dread. On the one hand: a bed, a shower, a real meal, a break away from the desert. On the other…
He’s going to go away after this. We kissed. He likes me. I like him. We’ve been through so much together. But he’s going to go away. And I don’t know what to do about it.
I had to tell him, I decided as we plodded along. I had to let him know how I felt, and that if he left, I wanted to go with him. Duty was one thing, but Vincenzo was quite another. All the work in the world wouldn’t distract me this time if I lost him too.
I can’t go through that again. Even though I can see it coming and prepare myself for it this time, it’s going to hurt just as much as losing Karla.
I couldn’t let that happen.
I braced myself, then squeezed his hand to get his attention. “Vincenzo—”
He turned his head to look at me—and then looked past me instead, and his eyes widened in horror. A moment later, before I had even finished turning around to see what he had caught sight of, I heard the roar of a straining engine.
I looked—and saw a terribly familiar van, battered and sand-streaked, bouncing over the dunes toward us. Our kidnappers were laboring to follow our footsteps off road, but they were still catching up fast.
I heard myself screaming as the van blasted toward us at top speed, fishtailing in the sand as they corrected.
No…not again. Not after all we’ve been through!
Vincenzo shoved me behind him as the van roared up; for a moment, I thought they were going to slam into us. Instead, they skidded to a stop, kicking up a rooster tail of sand over us. We both coughed and waved the dust away—but before we could get our breathing under control and run, four men leaped out of the van and pointed their rifles at us.
We put our hands up. There was nothing else to do. Heart in my shoes, I glared back at them.
“Take the girl!” the commander snapped as he jumped out of the passenger seat. “Separate them.”
My blood froze—and then Vincenzo turned and wrapped his arms around me before they could pull us apart, holding me to him with all his strength. “I won’t let you!”
They still tried. Three of them pulled on Vincenzo as he held me close. I felt hands grab me from behind. I elbowed backward as hard as I could, hitting something soft. That insurgent let out a soft oof and then let me go, stumbling back a bit. One of the others laughed at him.
“Leave the girl alone. There’s no bounty on her!” I heard Vincenzo grunt as one of the men hit him with the butt of the rifle. “Leave her alone! Just take me and leave her here!”
“No!” I cried out, clinging to him. One of the rifle butts slammed into my arm; it hurt, but I clung on regardless. “No, I want to stay with you!”
This time it was the huge driver who swung his rifle into Vincenzo’s back. Vincenzo groaned and fell over hard; I collapsed to my knees next to him, holding him close as I screamed his name. His eyes were squeezed closed in pain; I covered him with my body, trying to shield him from any more blows.
“This is ridiculous,” the commander complained. “Can’t you pry that little mouse of a woman off of him? Are you men or boys?”
The biggest one slung his rifle with a grunt of assent and stomped up to me, looking down at me with small black eyes. I hung onto Vincenzo for dear life as he reached for me.
And that was when a rumble of hooves made everyone look up.
A cloud of dust rose from the way we—and they—had come. The rumbling grew louder and louder, the dust started to blow our direction—and by the time I sat up, two dozen riders had crested the dune and were bearing down on us.
For a terrifying moment, I thought they were reinforcements for the insurgents. But instead of black military clothing and masks, they were wearing a variety of earth-toned robes and head wraps, and they were carrying guns themselves. Old hunting rifles, modern automatic rifles, paired pistols. As they drew nearer, I recognized the man out front: it was Yusuf!
He looked more than
stern as he bore down on the kidnappers with four times the manpower they had. They pointed their rifles as they went, shouting something I didn’t recognize in Arabic, while I covered as much of Vincenzo as I could with my body. I heard him groan and knew he was coming around—but meanwhile, there were the kidnappers to deal with.
Or so I thought. When I looked around, I saw the men in chaos. Four of them piled into the van to flee, including the commander. One ran off on foot with horses after him. One last hapless man was knocked down by the van and had his arm run over.
“Vincenzo, look!” I whispered.
He blinked awake fully and sat up, looking around. He let out a laugh. “Well, look who came after them!”
Four men went to see to the single, injured kidnapper while Yusuf dismounted nimbly and hurried over to us.
“Are you all right?” he asked us.
“Thanks to you, yes,” Vincenzo confirmed as I helped him up. “Your timing couldn’t have been better.”
“They showed up at our camp and held some of us at gunpoint to get information about you out of us. Once they were gone, we got our horses and guns and gave chase.” He looked over at the insurgent. “I warned them they would face consequences for all they have done—to you, and to us. But they did not listen.”
“Well, I bet they’re listening now,” I growled under my breath.
Yusuf nodded. “Fortunately, they could not drive very quickly off of the track. Our horses do not have that problem, so we were able to catch up.”
All but a few of his men had already taken off after the kidnappers. The rest surrounded the man they had captured. One of them pulled off his mask, revealing a surprisingly young man with a thin, handsome face.
“I am with the militia!” the man called out, putting up his uninjured arm.
Both Vincenzo and I looked at him in shock.
“Wait!” Vincenzo called out as the men pointed their rifles. “This man’s name is Iyad. He is telling the truth. He infiltrated the insurgents, and helped us get away from them.”
Yusuf looked between Iyad and us. “You will vouch for him, then?”
“He saved us both,” I agreed. “Without his help we might still be rotting in the place they imprisoned us.”
“He’s going to need that arm patched up,” Vincenzo said, looking over at me. “Looks like we need to perform one last surgery before we return to the aid center.”
“We will bring him back to my village. You can use my home. It is larger than my daughter’s.” Yusuf shouted over to his men, who nodded and helped Iyad up and onto a horse.
That done, he turned back to us. “You will need to ride double. I will have one of my men spare the pair of you a horse.”
The ride back was hot and dry, but we had water, and company—and for the moment, safety. Surrounded by armed men whose leader owed us deeply, we rode a dun-colored gelding that was the largest they had. The horse plodded patiently along with the others while I rode in Vincenzo’s arms.
“How is your back?” I asked as we rode along.
He grinned wryly. “I’ve had worse. It will be fine.”
For the first time in days, he sounded like he wasn’t just saying that to reassure me. He sounded confident as well as kind. Maybe a bit relieved as well. Though we still had trials ahead, the worst was over.
I just hoped someone back in the village had a car, too. Because I was done with walking.
Chapter 24
Vincenzo
The softness of the sand had saved Iyad’s arm from more than simple fractures. I set his arm and wrapped it in plaster while Rose hunted up painkillers and a meal for the unfortunate undercover agent.
“Do you think you will be able to go back to work as an infiltrator after this?” I asked him as I finished wrapping the cast.
“No,” he admitted. “Word of the group’s capture will reach the others, and we will all be considered suspect. Many insurgents tell everything they know upon capture to try and lessen their punishment. They will assume that I am no different.”
“Well, it is too bad your surveillance has been disrupted, but at least you have survived it more or less intact.” It was the closest I would come to an apology. In reality, I couldn’t apologize for being plunged into this situation and needing his help.
He nodded. “Thank you for all of your help. I can survive undercover work, but having a van run over my arm wasn’t on the agenda.”
“It’s the sort of thing I came here for,” I reassured kindly.
He smiled. “I will make sure to tell the others of your assistance when they arrive. I am certain that they will aid you in getting back to Safirah.”
I chuckled with relief. “Rose will be happy to hear that. I think another few miles on foot in the desert and she would have gone mad.”
He chuckled but went quiet as Rose returned with a bottle of prescription-strength ibuprofen. She handed it to him with a smile.
“Here, take these as needed. And thank you again for helping us.”
Once we had finished up, Rose and I left the large cottage where Iyad lay resting and went away from the main street to walk hand in hand under the stars. The profound silence of the desert night was almost magical. Her presence banished the sense of isolation I had felt when gazing on that spectacle before. I felt more complete with her there.
I feel more complete with her, period, I thought then. And it’s time I said something about it.
Rose squeezed my hand, her little way of getting my attention. “You know…” she ventured. “Now that I’ve really gotten to know you, I should let you know that I really like what I see.”
I swallowed hard but managed a smooth, easy smile. “Is it the doctor, the chef, the musician, or the prince that you like best?”
She looked thoughtful, then smiled up at me. “It’s the good man behind them I like best. The rest is just the hats you wear.”
“Yes, well, you do tend to bring out the best in me,” I said softly.
I wanted to say more. I could tell she did too. But the nervous twisting of her hands together down at her waist told me she was even more nervous about this conversation than I. I feel like a teenager again.
This time, she kissed me: arms around my neck, lips soft and tender against mine. I held her against me, not wanting to let her go. I didn’t have the words for what I was feeling, so I put it all in how I responded.
Then the sound of vehicles approaching snapped us out of it. I looked up warily and saw four pairs of headlights approaching from the northwest. For half a harrowing minute, I held Rose as we watched the vehicles draw nearer, worried we would see the all-black uniforms of the insurgents.
Then I saw the flag flying from the antennae of each jeep: the flag of Al-Rasmah. “It’s the militia!”
“Iyad will be happy to see them.”
Rose moved from my arms reluctantly and took hold of my hand again. We stood together as we waited for them to arrive.
The debriefing was a little awkward, with ten members of the militia crammed into the sleeping chamber where Iyad was recovering from having his arm set. Rose stood with me as we listened to the exchange.
“There was no time for a ransom request to take place before their hostages escaped,” Iyad told the man in charge, a grizzled fellow in his forties with a scar across one cheek. “Therefore, the Marino family was not pulled into this. Nor will the insurgents be receiving any additional funding.”
I smiled with relief at that. Oh good. When I get back in touch with my family, I want it to be on my own terms.
“It’s too bad that you were injured in the confrontation earlier. However, the cell you were part of won’t have had time to alert others to your ‘compromised’ status.” The man tugged on his mustache. “The five missing men have been captured. One was brought to us by Yusuf’s men, and four we apprehended in their jeep taking the road south.”
“Well, that’s lucky,” Iyad said and sighed. “I will still need some time to recover
before any attempt to re-infiltrate, but at least it remains possible.”
“Yes,” the scarred man said approvingly. “You have done well. Get some rest.”
“Sir, before you go, this is Dr. Marino and his nurse, Rose. They were the hostages, and they were of great help to me and to the village in treating our wounded.” He gestured to us and his superior nodded our way. “Is it possible to bring them back to Safirah when we return?”
The man in charge considered for a moment, then nodded once. “Yes, I believe that can be arranged. You and they should prepare yourselves for the journey. We leave in half an hour.”
Rose sagged so much with relief at that I had to help her to stay upright again. “Oh, thank God,” she murmured. “Maybe I can finally get all the sand out of my shoes…”
Exactly thirty minutes later, gear in hand and bellies full of mutton, lentils, and rice from Yusuf’s table, we set out for Safirah in the back seat of one of the jeeps, Iyad in another with his fellow soldiers. The final leg of our journey, instead of being further days of plodding, would be over in hours.
At peace for the first time since the insurgents had burst through my trailer door, I kept my arm around Rose and watched the stars as we quietly rode along. I had a million things to say, but I couldn’t sort out which one to say first. So I simply enjoyed our time together…and did my best not to think about the fact that it might soon come to an end.
“Looks like we’ll be home safe soon,” Rose said, smiling as she broke the silence. She pointed far, far ahead of us on the road, at the gleam of city lights in the distance.
I couldn’t help but tense. When Rose squeezed my hand, I looked over at her with a stab of apprehension.
“What is it?” she asked softly.
“I must prepare to leave as soon as we return,” I said, apology and regret in my tone. “Now that the insurgents know who I am, others will come and try the same thing. It will place not only myself, but you, the other aid workers, and the entire city in danger.”