Stay focused or you will die.
She pulled out again, starting down the mountain just a little more cautiously. That’s when she glimpsed headlights in her rearview mirror, coming fast.
Tariq’s men.
She lay on the gas again, tires squealing round the next hairpin bend.
But the car behind her was coming too fast. It rammed her from the back. Hands fisting on the wheel, Bella struggled to control her vehicle.
The car behind her sped up again, this time slamming into her left rear just as she was trying to round the next steep bend. She went into a sickening spin, tires failing to find purchase over the slick surface. Her vehicle caromed against the guardrail, sparks flying. Bella swung her wheel back, trying to make the next bend, but she overshot and went through the next guardrail.
Her car rolled over the edge. Bella’s world spiraled into a crunching mess of black sky, branches, rocks, dirt, breaking glass. The car came to a stop, lolling on its side, the hood bent off, engine whining, the smell of gas strong. Bella lay dead-still for a moment, unable to believe she was alive. Then, cautiously, she tried to move her limbs. Pain radiated out from her shoulder and down her arm as she found her seat belt buckle. She managed to undo it and wriggle her legs free from beneath the crushed dash. The driver’s-side window glass had blown out and she was able to drag herself through, pulling her bag with the laptop behind her.
She stood, unsteady on her feet. The treed embankment inclined sharply down toward the harbor in the distance. Rain was coming down heavily now. She could hear men yelling up on the road. Bella caught sight of a flashlight beam panning the darkness up above her. They were coming down, looking to see if she’d survived the car wreck. Adrenaline punched through Bella as she started to quickly clamber and slide down the muddy mountain. She came to a stop under the cover of pines and caught her breath. She could taste blood in her mouth. Her lip was cut. So was her hand. Her clothes were ripped.
Another flashlight beam arced through the bushes not far above and Bella heard more yelling. Arabic.
Tariq’s men weren’t just looking for her, they’d tried to kill her, and clearly wanted to finish the job.
She could hear them begin beating brush, widening out from her car, flashlights panning out in circles, voices calling to each other.
Bella started to grope her way down the mountain through trees and brush, clinging onto wet branches where the ground dropped away. Mud sucked at her boots and rocks clattered down where she dislodged them. Brambles ripped at her skin and clothes as she went.
If she could just get down this mountain, make it down to that harbor in the distance… But she stilled as the faint but distinct sound of a helicopter came from somewhere behind the clouds.
She glanced back up the mountain to the road. The headlights of another car panned across the landscape as it rounded a bend. As it approached the first vehicle, Bella heard gunshots.
Quickly, she crouched down into the wet scrub, heart hammering.
Chapter 10
As Tariq and his men rounded a switchback searching for Bella, their path was suddenly blocked by a black sedan stopped sideways across the road, gleaming in the rain, doors wide open. A man standing in front of the car spun round in shock as their lights illuminated him. He was dark-skinned, well-built and tall, with black hair, a goatee, shoulder-length hair.
As if in slow motion, Tariq saw the man raise a gun and take aim. He fired and a hail of bullets exploded across the body of the limousine, several piercing through the windshield, and one traveling so close to Tariq’s cheek he could feel the heat and hear it buzz.
“Get down! Automatic weapon!” his driver yelled as he took a hit in his arm and yanked the wheel round, slamming on the brakes. The limo skidded sideways toward the car in the road. The man started to run and yell at someone down the side of the mountain. That’s when Tariq saw the damaged guardrail. It looked as though a car had gone through and plunged over the side.
Bella!
Adrenaline rushed through his body as his driver brought the vehicle to a stop. His bodyguards, their own weapons in hand, flung open doors and crouched behind them as they took another burst of gunfire.
One of his men forced Tariq to the floor of the car, but he yelled at his guard to focus on the shooter instead. There were also flashlight beams cutting the blackness—more people down the side of the mountain, making their way back up to the road. They must’ve been searching for Bella in her car. Had to be MagMo, thought Tariq.
Bella had said she was attacked in D.C. by Arabic-speaking men—that was how she’d come by the medallion. They must have finally traced her here to the island, and they didn’t want her breaking her story. He’d bet his life they’d come for him next.
More shots peppered the air as Tariq scrambled into the back of the limo to remove a rifle his men kept in a case.
He got the gun and climbed out the vehicle, crouching behind the door. More bullets pinged off the vehicle and his injured driver returned fire. Rain was coming down heavily now, a silver sheen. The men with flashlights—three of them—were coming back over the edge of the road, running toward their sedan as their comrade covered them. Suddenly, Tariq heard a chopper somewhere above the cloud. He frowned. Omair and his F.D.S. colleagues should be arriving, but they wouldn’t be hovering around this side of the island.
“They’ve got air support coming!” one of his men yelled.
Tariq cursed, ducking back as a bullet smashed through the window above his head. He reached inside the car for his sat phone, hit speed dial for his brother.
“What are our coordinates!” Tariq yelled to his guard, taking cover behind the passenger door as the phone rang. His guard crawled into the limo passenger seat, staying low, and yelled out the GPS coordinates to Tariq.
Omair answered his phone, the loud noise of the chopper he was in forcing him to yell.
“How far out are you?” Tariq ducked again as more bullets were fired.
“Approaching land, west side of Ile-en-Mer, heading for the abbey landing pad.”
“We’re on the village side, above harbor, taking enemy fire.” Tariq gave the coordinates.
The other chopper was lowering, a powerful searchlight trying to break through the low clouds. They were scanning the mountainside—they must’ve called it in to help hunt Bella from the air.
Tariq swore, rage exploding through his veins. He got up, balanced the rifle with his bad arm and fired. His men also released a volley of bullets, and the man behind the black sedan took one in the chest, staggered back.
The chopper lowered farther, thudding. Downdraft ripped at trees, whipped mist, drove the rain sideways in squalls.
Suddenly through the cloud cover, an explosion of white light broke through as a searchlight panned over the scene. Someone fired from the chopper. Tariq’s men returned the shots, aiming at the craft. The helicopter rose suddenly again, as heavy cloud closed back in. Tariq stepped out from behind the door of his limo, fired again. This time he hit someone. The man stumbled backward, clutching his stomach.
“Cover me!” he yelled to his guards. His men released another burst of fire as Tariq scrambled behind the limo, then ran to the cliff edge. About fifty yards down was his vehicle, smashed. It had gone through the rail and come to rest against a clump of trees, lying on its side.
He could hear the chopper trying to come in low again. Wind began to rip at his hair, his cloak billowing out behind him from the downdraft.
“Bella!” he screamed down the mountain. “Bella, where are you!”
*
The lights of the helicopter broke through fog again, the sound reverberating in Bella’s bones as the chopper searchlight beamed across the slope once more. She scrambled under a bush and sat dead-still as the spotlight passed right over her, momentarily lighting a narrow and twisting little goat path down the mountain. Her heart kicked. If she used that path, she could get down to the harbor faster. But only if cloud closed in
again, because the chopper was going to illuminate her like a sitting duck if she moved out from cover.
Bella crouched farther back into the brambles, shivering from cold, adrenaline, shock. She could hear the ongoing gun battle up on the road, and was chilled as she registered the sound of automatic weapons. She saw lights, heard yelling. But who was fighting who? She’d thought it was Tariq’s men after her in that car. Who was in the second vehicle? Who was in the chopper?
A man screamed. More shots. Then more yelling. She saw the chopper coming through cloud again, lowering over the scene on the road above, the searchlights illuminating everything like some kind of mad play. And suddenly she thought, imagined, she heard her name. Bella tried to peer up through the brambles.
She saw him then. Tariq. In a pool of light from the helicopter. Standing way up there on the edge of the road, rifle in hand, his cape billowing out behind him, hair gleaming wet.
“Bella!”
He was calling her. Or was she imagining the sound of his voice in the noise? He began to move off the road, coming down the mountain. Terror gushed through her chest.
She had to get away, from all of them.
She had no idea who to trust, if anyone.
But before she could make a move, Bella saw a man scrambling along the side of the mountain below Tariq. He had a gun. Tariq hadn’t seen him coming. The man stopped, aimed his weapon up at the sheik.
A scream of warning rose in Bella’s throat. But the vignette went suddenly black as the chopper hovered back into the clouds. She heard another gunshot and Bella shut her eyes tight, bile rising in her throat. She hugged her knees, rocking, wondering if Tariq was dead. Tears streamed down her face. The mud around her ankles was cold. She was hurting. Disoriented. Confused. Her body started to shake. She wasn’t going to make it.
Then she thought of Scoob. Of Hurley and Agnes. Of what she’d started, and was now responsible for. She had to move, now, while she could, while it was dark again, while another thick swath of cloud was sifting up from the water.
Bella crawled out from under the bushes. From there she scrambled to where she’d seen the goat path leading down to the sea.
*
Small waves slapped softly against the ancient stone pier and fog was dense. Bella could barely make out the fishing boats bobbing against their moorings. Faint halos of lamplight lit the length of the pier. She could hear the distant boom of a foghorn.
Staggering along the pier, Bella reached the little ferryman’s hut at the end and banged on the door.
It opened. The ferryman was perhaps in his sixties, broad-jawed and whiskered. Her wore a checked shirt and pants with suspenders. Confusion creased his face at the sight of her.
“I…I need a ride to the mainland,” she stammered quickly in French. “I must get to the airport in a hurry.”
Hand remaining firmly on his doorknob, the ferryman’s eyes lowered, taking in her ripped, wet clothing, her cuts, her shaking hands.
“I had an accident on my bike on the way down,” she explained. “I’ll have to pick up some new clothes at the airport.”
He glanced back up the pier in search of her bike.
“Had to leave it…can’t be late for my flight.” Bella’s tongue felt thick. She was having trouble forming words. “Please.”
“The fog,” he said, “it’s thick, the wind off the point is—”
“Please.” Desperation cracked her voice. My mother is very ill. I need to get to her. I…I can’t let her die without me at her side.”
His face softened. “Come, come inside. Wait here.” He pulled on a cable-knit sweater and oil slicker as he spoke, then he reached for his oilskin hat, hesitated. “Are you sure you don’t want to get dry first?”
“No, no, please. I need to go, now.”
He frowned and she could see him wondering if she might be in some kind of trouble, and whether he should inform authorities.
Desperately, Bella reached into her bag, took out the money she’d stashed in the floorboards. “Look, I have cash,” she said, holding out a wad. “I’ll pay double.”
Seconds later the ferryman’s little boat was chugging quietly out the harbor, water slick, the mist swirling around them. Beyond the pier the waves turned choppy. Wind started to whip.
Bella flinched as she heard the sound of a helicopter approaching. Her ferryman glanced up and shook his head. “Not good weather to fly,” he said. “Or to sail.”
Anxiety mounted in Bella as the thudding of the chopper grew closer. If there was a gap in the blowing cloud they’d be sitting ducks—a red and a green light chugging across the dark water. Then she heard a second helicopter, the sound much fainter. Or was she imagining it?
The chopper came even closer, almost over them now. She gripped the side of the boat, knuckles white. But the helicopter was traveling fast and it went straight overhead, high above the cloud. Then she heard it heading away, up the coastline.
The sound of the second helicopter was also distant now, fading in the opposite direction. Bella allowed herself to take a shuddering breath.
A lighthouse on the mainland came into view, emitting a periodic pulse of weak light. As they entered a bay, the water grew calmer, and there was less mist.
She paid her fare, ran up the ramp. A cab was parked there, the driver inside sleeping. She rapped on the window. Startled by her appearance, he wound down the window just a crack.
“L’aéroport,” she said breathlessly, rain plastering her hair to her face. “Vite.” He asked which airport, she told him Charles de Gaulle.
She scrambled into the backseat, closed her eyes, prayed Hurley and Agnes were going to be okay. This was all her fault.
You came to wreck my life, profit from of my loss, my grief…
Bella started to shake hard. How many lives had been wrecked by this story—had Tariq been shot and killed up on that road because of her? Who’d been in the first car—MagMo and Etherington’s men? Had they finally managed to assassinate the prince, finishing off what their bomb had failed to do at JFK? Had she led them right to his door?
Scoob’s words ran through her mind.
If they got to them, made them talk, they’re coming after you as we speak…
And they weren’t going to stop with killing Tariq. They were going to keep coming after her until she was dead, too.
*
Tariq questioned the ferryman. The old islander was nervous, fidgeting, as he kept glancing at the one large bodyguard Tariq had brought with him down to the harbor.
Omair was back at the abbey with his own men, interrogating the injured MagMo operative they’d captured. A second operative had been killed. A third had been severely wounded in his shoulder by Tariq who had shot him as the man had tried to creep up the mountain from below. However, the wounded man had escaped with the aid of the fourth comrade, who’d managed to drag him back into the sedan and drive off as Tariq and his men had taken heavy fire from the helicopter above.
The chopper had pinned Tariq and his bodyguards in place for almost twenty minutes, before suddenly veering back up into the clouds, presumably to pick up the two escapees somewhere else on the island. Or because the pilot had detected Omair’s helo coming in.
While the two MagMo operatives had escaped via chopper, the only way Bella could get off the island was by boat. The harbor was the first place they were looking for her now.
The ferryman explained that he thought the woman he’d given passage to might have been in trouble, but she’d told him that her mother was dying, that she needed desperately to fly home. She’d also paid cash, double the fare. He needed the money. His wife was not well.
Home, thought Tariq. Bella was going back to the States. She was going to break her story there. But if Sam Etherington used his apparent connections with STRIKE, Tariq figured that by the time Bella landed in the U.S., there’d be people waiting for her. And she wasn’t going to make it.
“Was she injured?” he asked the ferryman.<
br />
“Just a mess. Her clothes were ripped, skin scratched. She said she’d fallen off her bicycle.”
Relief rushed through Tariq’s chest as he and his bodyguard returned to the bullet-ridden limo. From the car he called Omair. “The ferryman says he took her across to the mainland where she got a cab to the airport. We need to find out if she’s at Orly or De Gaulle—I think she’s going back to the States.”
Forty minutes later their chopper had refueled and Tariq, Omair and several F.D.S. contract soldiers were in the air. Omair had contacted his Interpol connection in Paris and called in a favor.
The Interpol agent had managed to access the passenger manifests for flights departing for D.C. Bella DiCaprio had paid with credit card for a ticket on an Air France flight out of Charles de Gaulle.
Tariq was tense as they neared the airport, rubbing his crippled arm.
“You all right?” Omair said, watching his movements.
Tariq gave his brother a wry smile. “It’s been good to use my body. I still have worth.”
Omair’s eyes were steady as he regarded his brother. “You could still work as a doctor, you know.”
“Not a surgeon.”
“Still.”
“First,” Tariq said quietly into his mouthpiece, “we take down The Moor, now that we think we know who he is.”
“Or we leave him to the system.”
Tariq shot his brother a sharp glance. “You getting soft, brother?”
Omair gave a dry laugh. “You’re getting hard, Tariq.” He was silent for a beat. “You were the one who said the cycle of violence must end here.”
“We can use Bella,” Tariq said. “If we get to her in time. We can work together.”
“She must be something special for you to believe in her like this,” Omair said.
Tariq looked out the window, at the lights below, approaching Paris, avoiding Omair’s comment. He wasn’t ready to articulate to his brother just what he felt for Bella right now. All he wanted was to find her safe.
Surgeon Sheik's Rescue Page 17
