Somewhere in the City

by Toby Neal

  I scream then, really let rip with everything I’ve got as full-blown panic sets in—this is like the attack in Boston where I got mugged, only so much worse. I thrash wildly, flinging myself around, desperate to get away. One of the men smacks me in the head, hard enough to see stars, and now I’m dizzy, my ears ringing, unable to get enough air as they quickly secure my hands behind my back with a zip tie and, still yelling at me in Arabic, one of them hauls me out of my hiding place by the arms.

  Rendered blind, desperately sucking for air inside the hood, I have no choice but to stumble after my captor.

  I try to calm my breathing because I’m not getting enough oxygen. The fabric of the hood is not only blinding, it’s stifling. I try to figure out where I am, but he’s practically carrying me along, my bare feet stumbling and scraping as we go down stairs. The blackness all around me is filled with the chaos of screaming, the thunder of running feet.

  I can’t make it easy for this guy. Wherever I’m going can’t be good. I go totally limp, buckle my knees, and collapse. He hits me in the head again, yelling at me, pulling on my arms, but now I’m dead weight. I refuse to make this easy. His accomplice grabs my other arm. They’re dragging me now, but I’m making them work for it, sliding my feet and trying to slow them down.

  I don’t scream any more. It’s a waste of breath I need.

  Suddenly, close by, the sound of gunfire. One of my captor’s jerks and lets go of me. I throw myself forward so that the other one has to let go too. This wrenches my arm out of his hands, but I have no way to break my fall. My shoulder takes the brunt, wringing a groan out of me as my forehead cracks down on the ground right behind it.

  Blam! Blam! Blam!

  Gunfire, right over my head. I’m so dizzy and breathless inside the hood. And then, horribly, I feel someone fall on me. He’s heavy, and smells of body odor, garlic, and the iron tang of blood. He’s smothering me. I writhe, my arms crushed behind my back beneath him. I get a knee up, forcing a little room so that my laboring lungs can draw a breath inside the hood. I just have to breathe, and not panic.

  Breathe.

  Breathe.

  But spots are closing in around me, and then darkness.

  Magnus

  It’s all gone to shit, and I think I might have killed her.

  There’s nothing in the hall but the two fallen masked kidnappers, and one of them crashed down right on top of Pearl. I don’t think I hit her when I was firing, but as I heave the body off her, she’s face down, hands bound behind her back, not moving. There’s a hood on her head, and she’s barefoot. I only know it’s her by the silly flower dress she’s wearing.

  Oh God.

  I yank at the hood on her head but it’s tied on tight. I pull my knife and slash the cord, ripping it off.

  Pearl’s totally pale, her eyes closed—but I remember she was painted white with that opalescent glitter stuff, so there’s no way to tell anything. I hear running feet and more gunfire, so I can’t take time to see if she’s okay right here. I scoop her up, throwing her over my shoulder in a fireman’s carry, and run down the hall toward the exit.

  I’m supposed to rendezvous with Derrick in the op van outside the building—but if I take her there, our security is blown. That’s if she’s even alive.

  I refuse to imagine that she’s not alive.

  I get to the emergency exit, push the bar, and maneuver her body out the door into the alley. It’s hot and airless out here even after dark, and I remember I’m in Dubai and it’s still desert, even at night. Looking around, the van’s nowhere in sight. I remember I’m supposed to meet the van on the other side of the building.

  “Black Two, this is Black One. In alley on north side of building.”

  “Roger that. Coming to your location.” Derrick’s voice crackles in my earbud. I’ve been keeping him updated—all except the little detail of rescuing Pearl.

  I move over against the wall, behind the door in case anyone exits behind me. I can hear the hotel’s alarm systems going off deep inside the shiny steel structure. Police are coming with their high-pitched, foreign-sounding sirens. This crisis will be over shortly, and it’s imperative that I’m not caught up in it.

  I squat carefully and lower Pearl to the ground, lying her down on her back. She’s coming around, her eyelids fluttering—but that’s when the steel exit door bangs open as someone else runs out. It’s one of the kidnappers, and he’s tugging another hooded model by the arm. He sees me and goes for his weapon, but I get him first.

  He drops. The woman is standing there, screaming her head off inside her black hood. I jump up and haul her over next to Pearl, pushing her back against the wall.

  “You’re safe, now,” I say. “Sit down, you’ll be okay.” I guide the woman, now sobbing, her hands still bound behind her back, into a seated position against the wall. I turn back to Pearl to check on her. Her eyes are open, fastened on my face, wide with shock.

  “Oh my God,” she whispers. “What are you doing here?”

  “Shh.” I draw her up against me for precious seconds, squeezing her hard. I know I stink of adrenaline and the terror of her coming to harm, but even with her hands bound, she leans into me, shivering uncontrollably. “You’re safe now. Help is on the way.”

  I hear a screech—it’s the op van turning into the alley.

  “I have to cover you up. But you’ll be okay now. Don’t tell anyone you saw me. I’ll explain later.” I pull the hood out of my back pocket.

  Pearl shakes her head wildly. “No! No!” she cries, but I can’t let my team know she’s seen me, and I put the hood over her head in spite of her struggles. The van screeches to a halt and the door bangs back.

  “Get in!” Derrick yells.

  I lean close to Pearl as I move her back against the wall, as gentle as I can be, but she’s still yelling, “No!” and trying to thrash the hood off. I don’t blame her a bit. I know she’ll get it off in a minute. I just need to get away while she still has it on.

  “Shhh,” I say again, close to her ear. “Help’s on the way. I’ll see you on the other side.”

  “Get in!” Derrick yells again, from the driver’s seat of the van. “What the hell are you waiting for? An engraved invitation?”

  I stand up and do the hardest thing I’ve ever done—I leap into the van and slam the door. The vehicle peels away so fast I’m thrown backwards, but I grab the seat and haul myself into it.

  “Why were you talking to that woman?” Derrick says.

  “I just told her help was on the way.” I throw on the safety belt and then begin my post-op check, going over my weapons and the items on my body for anything lost, standard procedure after a mission. The distance rifle I left in position after the shoot, per the op specs when the plan was for me to come out in a tux and blend.

  That was before the kidnappers ambushed the show and I had to shoot three of them.

  “Why did you get involved, dammit? You had a mission, and getting out clean is part of that.”

  “Those poor women were getting grabbed. What the hell, with that going on right during our op? Why didn’t you know about it?”

  “Pure screwed-up coincidence. We had no intel.”

  “Got any idea who was grabbing those girls? They were speaking Arabic.”

  “Probably either kidnappers grabbing them for ransom, or sex slavers.”

  “Seriously. Sex slavers?”

  “You got a better idea?”

  I didn’t. I did know that Pearl was worth money as a kidnap victim. Her brother-in-law was loaded, and her sister Ruby would have made sure they paid. But what about the other women? And why in the middle of a show? “We should find out what’s going on.”

  “Quite frankly, not our problem. What is our problem is getting you out of here, without some model describing you after the sheikh was shot.”

  “They didn’t see anything. But, I did take out three of the guys.”

  “That means you left trace. Slugs from your sid
earm.”

  “Whatever.” I shoot the clip out of the Glock .40 I carry. Only one round left. The Glock’s a reliable gun, and so common it’s like carrying a Bic lighter. Of course it’s unregistered, serial number filed off, clean of any use, and my fingerprints are masked by a silicone coating better than gloves. I check my pockets and vest—all weapons and ammo accounted for.

  The van weaves onto the highway as we head for the airport. I know I’ve got a lot of post-op debrief to get through even if we make it off the ground without being stopped—but all I can think about is Pearl, sitting bound and vulnerable in the alley without me.

  Chapter 34

  Pearl

  It feels like forever, but I’m pretty sure it only takes a few minutes for me to get the hood with its broken drawstring off my head. By then Magnus is long gone. The model next to me is still sobbing, and the warm Dubai darkness is lit by a few yellow security lights throwing light into the alley.

  Now that I can breathe, I’m aware of all of my aches and pains-- my wrenched shoulder, my hands, bound too tightly and so painful. I hear sirens getting closer and closer, and then a small, bright yellow police vehicle, light whirling atop its roof, screeches into the alley.

  I don’t have time to think about Magnus. What he was doing here, why he didn’t take me with him, where he was going.

  I need to get out of the bindings that are cutting off the circulation in my hands. I stagger to my feet, yelling for help.

  It’s hours later, and Odile slides the key into the door of my hotel room. She’s solicitous, fussing over me, and behind us is the hulking shadow of the bodyguard the Melissa Agency has assigned to Naomi and me until we fly out tomorrow. The bodyguard pushes forward as she unlocks the door. He’s big and brown with buzz-cut hair and one of those curly cords stuck into his ear.

  “Need to check that the room’s clear.” He goes in ahead with his weapon, a sight that would have made me nervous just a day ago—but now, after what I’ve been through, it’s just reassuring.

  “Clear.”

  “Stay outside in the hall,” Odile tells him. “We fly out in the morning.”

  He nods, and I go in and head straight for the bathroom.

  I can’t wait to get in the shower, get the caked-on makeup and blood spatter off me. Because I’m decorated with a fine spray of it along with a heavy smear that pooled on my back from the body. All that helped corroborate my story, which is the truth. A mysterious rescuer shot my kidnappers and took me outside. A few minutes later, he shot the man holding Bella, the model rescued with me. Escaped before I could get a look at him.

  “Who was this man?” the translator must have asked me a hundred times. I said the same thing, over and over.

  “I have no idea. He was strong enough to carry me outside, and he spoke to me in Arabic. I don’t know what he said but I can tell he was trying to reassure me I’d be safe.”

  “How did you get the hood off?”

  “I didn’t. He took it off me, I think to see if I was alive because I passed out under the body. I was smothering.”

  “So how is it that you didn’t see him, with the hood off?”

  “He put it back on as soon as he saw I was coming around. I never saw anything. After I heard his getaway car leave, I moved around until I could get the hood off.”

  I told the tale over and over. When I asked for a lawyer, they just stared at me with hard brown eyes. But finally a lawyer arrived anyway, hired by Melissa, and eventually they had to let me and the other models go.

  Now I turn my face up under the wide, gentle, rain-like shower head and let the water cleanse me. I hear a rustle outside.

  “It’s Odile. I’m taking your clothing for the police. They asked for them as evidence.”

  “Whatever.” I hope Magnus didn’t leave anything behind, a hair clinging to my dress or a drop of his own blood—but in the chaos and the filth of the alley, how could anything trace back to him?

  And why am I so intent on protecting him? What was he doing there, dressed in a black tux, shooting our attackers without batting an eye? He was as scary as one of the kidnappers, if better dressed.

  But I trust him with my life.

  I let myself remember all I can of the rescue, trying to puzzle out what his role could be. I’d woken up lying on my back on the cement in the alley, my arms still bound beneath me, and as I came to consciousness I was looking at Magnus, partly turned away from me but his body still protectively over mine, his eyes trained on someone in the alley. I saw the gun in his hand, the same one I’d found in the small of his back that time we’d kissed in the barn. He moved and fired, so fast it was a blur.

  The report was deafening and the expended shell flew past me and tinkled on the ground. Lifting my head, I saw the kidnapper fall, heard the woman wearing a hood screaming. Only then did Magnus leap up, go to her, settle her beside me, and finally turn back to check on me. I knew when he hauled me tight against him, our hearts pounding against each other in a kind of wordless desperation, that I meant something to him. Something more than he wanted me to mean. Whatever he was mixed up in was really dangerous.

  I shut my eyes under the water and let myself savor the feeling of being held so close my breath was squeezed out of my lungs. I loved that memory—so much more than his hurried words telling me to be quiet, not to identify him. Then the moment that he put the hated hood back over my head. But I know that I wasn’t supposed to have seen him. It was dangerous for me to have seen him.

  I use soft creamy soap and a washcloth to scrub all the body paint off. Back out in the room, the lights are dimmed but Odile is making up the trundle bed. Naomi’s already a humped shape, turned away from the light.

  “I’m sleeping in here tonight,” Odile says.

  “Thanks. So do you know anything about our attackers?”

  “I kept asking the police. They wouldn’t tell me anything, but Mr. Singh, the lawyer Melissa hired, says they were taking you hostage. Those of you who could pay ransom they’d take that, and anyone that couldn’t pay was going to be sold.”

  “Sold? Like a slave?”

  “Yes.” Her nod is an abrupt movement. My stomach lurches. Thank God Magnus came when he had. “Who was that man that rescued you and Bella? What was he doing here?”

  “Like I told the police a hundred times, I have no idea.” I dried the short fluff of my hair with a towel. “But thank God he got us away.”

  “Yeah. They took three other girls. We’re working with Interpol on their ransoms. I’m not supposed to say anything to you, but I thought you should know.”

  “Thanks.” I slide into my sleep tee, and even though I’m a-jangle with exhaustion, I know sleep is a long way away.

  “Besides the private detail Melissa hired, Interpol has agents deployed all around the hotel,” Odile said. “You’re safe.”

  “I won’t feel safe until I’m back in the ol’ U S of A,” I say, getting into bed. “Do you happen to have a sleeping pill?”

  “I already gave one to Naomi. You can see they work,” Odile smiles, and hands me a yellow capsule along with a carafe of water.

  “So what did that sheikh getting shot have to do with the kidnappings?” I ask.

  “What sheikh getting shot?”

  I tell her what I saw just before the attack on the models.

  “I don’t know anything about that. Maybe you were in shock.” She’s tucking herself into the trundle bed beside me, clearly done talking.

  “Maybe,” I murmur. It’s not worth debating. That pill really does work, because a few minutes later, darkness pulls me under.

  The trip back to the States is anticlimactic once we reach the airport the next day, heavily guarded until we get onto the Emirates Air jet and take up the entire first class. I sleep most of the time, and arrive in New York feeling feisty—at least, that’s the word that comes to mind to describe how I’m eager to get on my Harley and drive out to Magnus’s place and demand he tell me what the hell’s goi
ng on. What was he doing there, so conveniently? Our kidnapping attack is all over the international news I watch on the flight and on the internet, but I can’t find one word about the sheikh whose blood I know I saw.

  It’s almost like the chaos and drama of our attack covered up the sheikh’s death. Forty-eight hours have gone by since the three models that were nabbed were rescued, after their ransoms were paid.

  Odile informs me that I have a meeting arranged with my psychologist, Dr. Rosenfeld. “Your sister set it up. Don’t worry, Melissa’s paying for any trauma counseling you need after this incident.”

  “I don’t need counseling,” I snort. “I need to pack a gun from now on. Good thing counseling is already arranged.” She forwards a memo to my phone.

  “We’ll see.” I’m planning to be talking to Magnus Thorne tomorrow, and hopefully getting some answers.

  It’s late the next morning before I’m able to get out of the house and Ruby’s worried hovering, with the excuse that I have to go to Dr. Rosenfeld’s. But before I leave, I pack my backpack with a couple of changes of clothes and don my sexiest lingerie, the black G-string and demi-bra set.

  I plan on going to Magnus’s place. I’m hoping to have tons of sex and get some answers. That’ll help me sleep better than any amount of therapy or sleeping pills.

  Chapter 35

  Magnus

  It’s two days after the op and I drive my bike out of the private airstrip outside Boston toward home. I feel a sort of bone-deep weariness that’s more than physical.

  I’ve been debriefed about my actions during the op at length. First, by Derrick, then by management, who put me on furlough while they wait for the shit to die down and see if I’ve compromised the company with my “reckless sentimentalism.”