The Hilton was an international hotel. There were other Americans here. She’d heard them downstairs over breakfast before she’d headed over to MMPOIL the day before. Once she reached the hallway, she would run like a champion and raise holy hell. She was prepared to scream her head off and bring all the other guests and the staff running. Even if the staff wouldn’t take her side against a sheik, she was certain that her compatriots would defend her. If it was the only way to get out of this country and back home to safety, she wasn’t averse to causing an international incident. She had few illusions about Sheik Karim Abdullah getting into any trouble.
She took a deep breath, ready for her escape, her hand on the lock by the time she thought to look through the peephole.
Two men stood outside, dressed in white robes and headdresses. One scanned the hallway, while the other was focusing on the door. They wore identical grim expressions. They didn’t belong to Karim’s security. She recognized them from earlier and the breath got stuck in her throat. It couldn’t be true. This couldn’t be happening.
“Karim?” Desperation made her voice high and squeaky.
She glanced back at him. His eyes floated open for a moment before closing again. He looked formidable even slack-jawed.
She looked out the peephole again, her heart racing at double speed at the sight. The men waiting to get in were from that dark sedan that chased them, the same men who had done their best to kill Karim and her just a little while ago.
“Karim, you have to wake up.” She judged the distance between her and the gun on Karim’s lap, wondered if she could even figure out how to take off the safety. But before she could make up her mind, it became apparent that she wasn’t going to have time to go for a weapon.
Something scraped against the card reader. She shoved her full weight against the door. That didn’t seem as effective as she had hoped. She gained maybe two seconds. The security chain held the men back for another two. Before she could blink, they were already pushing their way inside.
Chapter Four
When the two men outside heaved and slammed the door open, Julia was smacked against the wall, the air leaving her lungs with a whoosh, pain exploding in her back. And she was glad that the point of impact hadn’t been any lower.
She slid to the dark gray carpet that covered the floor, stunned for a moment, but pulling her hands in a protective gesture in front of her. The baby. Don’t let them harm the baby. And it seemed, at least for the moment, that her prayer was answered, because the intruders paid scant attention to her.
One closed the door and guarded it while the other dove for Karim, shouting something in Arabic. Both men held their guns on him.
Everything was happening too fast, her mind reeling. The attack had come so unexpectedly, she couldn’t catch up, couldn’t think, didn’t know what to do. She glanced toward the door, but she couldn’t work up the nerve to tackle the guy blocking it.
At least Karim was rising to the occasion, lurching to the left, toward the bed. He squeezed off a shot but missed. His movements were definitely uncoordinated. He looked like those big game-reserve lions on the National Geographic Channel after being hit with the tranquilizer shot, ready to be tagged. Then he was on the floor, and for a moment she thought he had passed out and fallen, not realizing until he rolled under the bed that the drop had been deliberate.
Not that hiding out under there was an option. The attackers filled the mattress with lead the next second.
“No!” The word tore from Julia’s throat unbidden. He was a controlling bastard, but she didn’t want him harmed. Didn’t want to be responsible for his death. She had given him the pills. She had immobilized him and served him up to his enemies.
He was her baby’s uncle. He didn’t deserve this. He was bossy and arrogant, but in some ways he was okay. Misguided as his efforts were, he did want to keep her safe. Just before the men came, he’d been talking about getting her to safety. And she had done this to him.
“No, please,” she pleaded again, against the instinct to keep quiet and invisible, but the two bad guys didn’t even glance at her.
The gunfire did stop, however. The guy who guarded the door stepped forward. The other moved closer to the bed and dropped to his knees in front of it, probably to check if their job was finished.
The air stopped halfway to her lungs. Karim was dead. And she would be next.
Whoever these two were, they wouldn’t want to leave a witness. They just assassinated a sheik. She had no idea why and she didn’t need to know right now. Their reasons were immaterial at the moment.
She had to do something. But she was frozen with fear, paralyzed by the smell of gunpowder in the air and by the sight of those guns and the assassins who held them. A terrible realization held her in place, the knowledge that there was nothing she could do to change the outcome of the situation she was in. It had been determined the moment the two thugs had busted into the room, armed against a drugged sheik and a defenseless woman.
Her hands moved protectively to her abdomen. She wanted the best for her baby, had promised the best, had sworn to provide the safety, love and family that she hadn’t been given. She hated to fail even before her child was born. That was the thought that got to her more than anything, more than the possibility of Karim’s death or her own. She could not face the fact that her child would never see the world.
Then something shifted inside her. To hell with the bastards. She was no defenseless woman. She was a mother. Nobody was going to hurt her baby.
She shifted and had the element of surprise on her side when she kicked at the gun in the nearest man’s hand, kicked and met her aim, sending the weapon flying across the room. Almost at the same time, a gun went off, drawing her attention to the bed just in time to watch the other attacker fold to the floor, red blooming on his white caftan.
Karim rolled out from under the bed, his weapon in hand, but his movements were slow, his gaze unfocused. The remaining attacker took advantage and dove for his firearm, then fired as soon as he had it.
Karim’s gaze finally caught on her for a split second before he put himself between her and the bullets. “Go!”
She didn’t need to be told twice. Adrenaline pushed her to her feet. She got the door open, glancing back only to see Karim lunge after her as more gunshots exploded behind them. His momentum carried him another couple of yards before he slowed again, shook his head as if to clear his mind.
A million thoughts raced through her head in a fraction of a second, the topmost being that she was out of the room, could leave him now and he could do nothing to stop her. The guy with the gun wanted Karim. Karim would probably put up a fight, even if it would only last seconds, minutes at best. But it was time she could use. She could get away, be free.
Free. The word pounded through her head.
She would be free and Karim would be dead.
“Help! Please help!” she screamed toward the row of doors on each side.
Nobody stirred, nobody volunteered to rush to the rescue. Given the gunfire, the other guests were probably locking themselves in their rooms. Housekeeping was obviously working another floor. Not that they could have defended her against bullets with a broom.
She grabbed Karim’s hand and dragged him toward the staircase. The fireproof steel door was just closing behind them when bullets pinged off the metal on the other side. She couldn’t leave Karim behind. She would get him out of here, then leave him somewhere by the side of the road where he’d be safe. Safer, at least.
She shoved him forward then yanked on the fire hose and tied the door shut before going after Karim, who was tumbling down the stairs. She ran, grabbed his arm, and her momentum carried the both of them forward. He grunted and she did, too, along with him. He was heavy and not fully in control of his powerful body, hard to direct.
At the landing he slammed against the wall, leaving a bloodstain on the white paint. His arm was bleeding, but she didn’t have time to worry abo
ut whether that was the old wound or a new one. Maybe she could put him out by a hospital, although, God help her, she had no idea where one of those would be in this city. “Go, go, go!”
The gunshots stopped outside the staircase, which meant the attacker was probably taking the elevator to cut them off. Julia raced for her life, muscles pitted against machinery.
The flight to the parking garage passed in a blur. She hadn’t noticed before, but Karim had parked his car right in front of the door of the emergency exit, right where they came out of the staircase. Probably on purpose. He seemed like the type of guy who planned ahead.
He was now together enough to reach into his pocket. He opened the car with his remote, then handed her the keys.
Oh, God.
Of course, he couldn’t drive in his condition. She hadn’t even considered that. Which left her to handle the task. But she didn’t know the city. And she was a mediocre driver at best, not equipped for armed pursuit. But she had no choice.
When he just stood there in drug-induced stupor, she dragged him toward the passenger side and shoved him in unceremoniously, slammed the door behind him before sprinting to her side. Then she remembered the stick shift. Why, oh why?
“I can only drive automatic,” she yelled at him as if it was all his fault.
What were the pedals? Clutch, break, gas, if she remembered correctly. A high school boyfriend had spent some time coaching her on his pickup a million years ago, but it had turned out to be a brief relationship and she hadn’t paid much attention to the driving lessons in any case, not when they were just a distraction between make-out sessions.
And make-out sessions they were, nothing more. She’d been a good girl all through high school, petrified that she’d get pregnant and would end up alone with a child. Her number-one goal had been avoiding becoming like her mother. She’d never slept with a man unless they were in a committed relationship, of which she’d had two. Then came those few irresponsible days with Aziz. And they had used protection. Not that it mattered. Fate sure had a way of laughing in her face.
She was going to have a baby.
If she stayed alive long enough.
Through some miracle, she managed to put the car in first gear. Karim had backed into his parking spot, so at least she didn’t have to worry about backing out. Okay, which way? Most of the signs were in Arabic. She almost cried in relief when she spotted an old-fashioned English exit sign, a lit red box with white letters. Thank God for international hotel chains.
The first gear took her to the exit just fine. Then she stalled when trying to shift to second. She needed to start up the damn car all over again. She winced as the engine whined. She’d never driven a car this nice before, a silver BMW with more power than she was comfortable with. She really didn’t want to break it. Then she thought, to hell with it, Karim’s fancy car was the least of their problems.
She didn’t dare look in the rearview mirror to see if the bad guy was behind them or not. She focused her full attention on the shift and clutch.
The shot Karim fired through the back window and the responding gunfire the next second tipped her off to the severity of their situation. They were sitting ducks unless she managed to get the car moving.
She got it into first gear again and moved up to the gate that opened on its own, no card required to get out. Thank God, because she had no idea where her parking pass was at this stage. She passed through and stepped on the gas, and with some grinding of the gears switched the transmission into second. They were out on the boulevard at last.
“Clutch. Shift. Now,” Karim instructed.
Third gear slid into place with nothing but a small hiccup. Fourth. Good, really good.
Except that someone cut in front of her and she needed to slow, but knew that shifting down would make her stall all over again. She kept her foot steady on the gas pedal instead, and yanked the steering wheel to the right, going around the car in front of her, causing a minor disturbance on the road, and a flurry of beeping horns.
But the car was still moving. Yippee.
If her lips weren’t frozen in a tight line of concentration, she might have smiled. The small burst of relief vanished soon enough.
“Where are we going?” She weaved through traffic, taking unnecessary chances just to keep a steady pace so she wouldn’t have to shift.
He took a long time to answer. “Aziz’s palace. Left at the next light, right, then left again.” A long pause followed. “Blue.” Was he still talking about the palace?
She caught a green light, thankfully, sailing through, barely slowing to make the turn. The tires squealed in protest. “Which right, the next right?”
When no response came, she risked taking her eyes off the road for a split second to glance at him. Karim slumped in his seat, completely out of it. She wasn’t sure whether from the drug or blood loss. A hospital would have been great right about now, but they were clearly in a residential neighborhood.
And she had a feeling these residents were anything but ordinary. A row of palaces lined the road on each side, some traditional, some startlingly modern. She had to shift down. After some hesitation, she actually succeeded. Then she took stock of the front yards that were protected by stone walls and wrought-iron gates. There was no way she could just pull into a driveway and pretend to belong there. Especially not with the back window of Karim’s BMW being blown out.
She glanced into the rearview mirror, but couldn’t tell if they were being followed. She couldn’t see the dark sedan anywhere, but that didn’t mean the assassin hadn’t commandeered another car. Assassin or assassins. She wasn’t sure how badly Karim had hurt the one he’d shot. Could be they were both still out there, on their tail.
“Karim?” She reached over to shake him, couldn’t be too forceful with his bad arm. “You need to wake up now.”
The street she was on looked completely unfamiliar to her, all the signs on the buildings in Arabic. Blue, he had said. About every third house was blue.
He didn’t seem to care. His head tilted to the side. For the moment, he was completely out.
She was lost in a strange place, her only possible protection injured and unconscious and there was a better than good chance that they had an assassin or two following not far behind—serious bad guys whom she was too inexperienced and frazzled to even hope to spot.
If things were going to get any worse, she didn’t want to know it.
KARIM STRUGGLED to open his eyes, struggled to remember where he was. Through a slit, he caught a glimpse of Julia next to him, her hair all messed up and wild, her eyes wide as she stared at the road ahead, her face pinched in concentration.
They were in danger, but he couldn’t remember why or from whom. He had to stay awake. Frustration pulsed through him, but he couldn’t sustain the urgency of it. He felt like he was diving, underwater, floating in the deep. His body seemed incredibly relaxed. All was peaceful inside. He could sense turmoil outside, but felt as if it had been somehow walled off from him.
He smiled at the mermaid in the driver’s seat. “You’re beautiful.” He slurred the words.
She barely spared him a glance. “Which house? You need to tell me which house it is.”
Where were they going? He could only think that someone was after them and they must get away. But he couldn’t keep focused on that for more than a second. “You shine like an angel.”
“Speak English,” she snapped.
Julia Gardner was an exceedingly beautiful woman. He liked her hair the most. And her eyes. Her skin glowed pink. Her lips were—
“Karim,” she snapped at him again. “I need you to tell me how to get there.”
Where were they heading? A long moment passed before he could remember. “Aziz.”
“Right. Which one is his palace?” She sounded exceedingly impatient. Might have even growled a little.
The sound made him smile.
With effort, he turned his gaze from her and realized that
they were on Aziz’s street. He reached for the remote in his glove compartment, feeling darkness closing in. “Aziz,” he said one more time, then sunk into oblivion.
“KARIM, WAKE UP! Wake up, dammit.”
Julia took her right hand off the steering wheel, a move she could hardly afford, and shook him.
Nothing.
She grabbed the remote from his hand. What was this for? She pushed the top button. Down the road lined by modern palaces, a wrought-iron gate opened. She hoped there was a correlation between that and the remote. In any case, she had to get off the road. She had to hide.
Of course, the second she tried to shift down, she stalled the car. Damn. Okay. Let’s start over.
First gear. Good. It got her through the gate.
She pushed buttons randomly until the gate closed and the door to a garage bay opened. Then she pulled in, gawking at the selection of sport and luxury vehicles. She closed the garage door. The lights came on automatically.
She sat motionless and listened, but could hear no car stopping in front of the house, no bullets hitting the garage door behind them. A reprieve. She leaned back in her seat and closed her eyes, wanting to stay that way forever.
But she had to get out of here, away from Karim before he came to. A glance at him confirmed that he wasn’t even close to that yet.
She stepped out of the car, shaking from the chase and maybe a little with hunger. Something red caught her eye in the side mirror and she realized her clothes were bloody. From Karim. She had to find something to wear before she went out onto the street. A disguise wouldn’t have been a bad idea, in any case. Just so the assassins wouldn’t recognize her if they ran into each other. She needed one of those burqas local women wore, the black dress that made them virtually indistinguishable from each other.
A week ago she would have sworn that nothing and nobody could make her wear one of those things. Two days in this country and she was already begging to put on the veil.
Desert Jewels & Rising Stars Page 83
