How much further until she saw signs of life? A road would give her encouragement, at least, and give her a solid direction to travel. Even if it led back to the palace. At this point, she would accept whatever happened just to survive the day.
Trudging over a hard-packed section of compressed terrain, she considered changing direction yet again. What if she was walking in circles, thinking she was putting more distance between herself and the palace, when in fact she kept cycling through the same landscape? Everything looked so much the same, she couldn't tell if she'd been here before or not.
Something had to give. She needed water, and she needed it fast. Her legs were weak and she didn't know how long she would last upright if she didn't come across some kind of haven. Even shelter from the sun. Something. Anything.
An hour and a half later, she knew she was in trouble.
Serious trouble. Her throat was so dry that she coughed every time she swallowed and her body didn't want to move forward even one more step. Blistering heat seared her skin, and tears pricked the back of her eyes from the burning pain. She'd taken to walking with her arms folded over her front in an attempt to alternately shield them as much as possible. The silk shirt was soaked between her shoulder blades, down her spine and along her ribs from the profuse sweat of physical exertion.
Using the side of a small dune to try and take cover from the wind, she knelt down and made a small ball of herself. Just a few minutes to rest, to give her body a break from the relentless pace of walking. She swallowed convulsively several times, misery drawing a tear from the corner of an eye.
She'd thought it would be so easy to find her way. To bump across the private air strip and simply follow the road to temporary salvation. This far out in the open, her cell phone had no signal, so it was useless to try and call for help. She also couldn't access the map application to help guide her in the right direction. How frustrating to know she had the capability to save herself if only the technology worked.
Sessily couldn't imagine what might have happened to Iris. The morning had come and gone, and Ahsan was still alive. Bashir, a man of his word, must have exacted his revenge.
Tormented by her failure to free Iris and find civilization, Sessily endured the elements while giving her body a chance to rest and recuperate.
. . .
Hot, hot, hot. In delirium's grip, Sessily flinched as something icy flicked across her face. Surfacing from a black out, she groaned and sloppily waved a hand toward her cheek, thinking the sun had finally begun to sizzle skin from bone.
Another flicker of ice seared her arm and her forehead. Muddled voices, accents thick and heavy—Ahsan's accent—penetrated the rush in her ears.
Oh God, he'd come to save her. He wasn't the devil after all.
Hands lifted her from the sand. She had the odd thought that her body might melt between the fingers that held her, become one with the dunes. Listless, she had the dizzying sensation of motion. Water touched her chapped lips, lips that didn't open far enough, fast enough, and she choked.
A male voice, as if from a great distance, rattled commands down at her.
Ahsan. Always bossing her around. She got a swallow down, and another.
Then she knew nothing more.
. . .
Darkness greeted her when she opened her eyes. Night must have fallen in the desert, Sessily thought. Yet she couldn't see any stars, didn't feel the arid desert air on her sunburnt skin. Something softer than dirt plumped against her back and she sat up suddenly, weaving back and forth with a fresh dizzy spell.
“Ahsan?” Her voice squeaked out, like a rusty hinge. He'd found her and brought her home. Yet she got no answer. And why was it so dark? He hadn't left even one light burning to help her see.
Slowly, carefully, she set her feet on the ground. Groaning, she set a hand down on the mattress and realized it wasn't the lush bedding of the palace.
Lights snapped on overhead, so bright it blinded her.
“What are you doing? Shut those off, I can't see.” Throwing a hand up, she attempted to block the glare. Had Ahsan lost his mind?
“It is very unfortunate you did not follow through with our plans,” a masculine voice said, thick with accent.
It was not Ahsan's voice, but Bashir's.
A cold chill raced down Sessily's spine. Blinking away the blurriness from her vision, she finally focused on the Crown Prince sitting in a chair across the room. Flanked by two security guards—as if she might have the strength to best him in a fight—Bashir studied her like a bug under a pin. In light robes, face rounder and fuller than his brother's, with the same dark eyes, Bashir clasped his hands in his lap.
“I couldn't follow through.” Sessily belatedly remembered she needed to cover her tracks. To give a reason for not poisoning the Sheikh. “He left the palace without warning.”
“Excuse me?”
“He left before I had an opportunity to do anything.” It was a bald faced lie. Sessily sold it as truth because she had to. Because her and her sister's lives might depend upon it.
Bashir leaned his head back. When his man bent down to listen, Bashir whispered something, then looked at Sessily again. The guard left the room.
“Did he leave because you told him of the plan?” Bashir asked.
“No. I didn't tell him, I didn't tell anyone. Why would I when I know you've got my sister here?” Fear helped burn away the last vestiges of sleep and confusion. She needed to be sharp despite the physical pain she was in. Someone had given her water, at least, because her tongue didn't feel made of cotton and she could swallow without too much effort. Likewise, her arms and face had been smothered with some sort of salve to help take the sunburn sting away.
“Perhaps because you've become smitten with him? The way you used his name when we roused you out of the desert sounded intimate.”
Had she said Ahsan's name aloud when she thought he'd come to save her? The memory was vague and muddled. And why had she forgiven the Sheikh so easily, anyway? Perhaps knowing she wouldn't die had sent her into a state of false euphoria.
“Delirium, most likely. How did you find me, anyway?” she asked, emboldened by her clearer mind.
“The phone. We had GPS tracking on it the whole time. It took us a while to figure out that you'd actually—stupidly—left the palace to take on the desert and hadn't gone on a sightseeing jaunt with my brother. That was the delay in recovering you.” He cocked his chin, never taking his eyes off her.
Sessily refused to squirm under his gaze. Of course they'd tracked the phone. She should have known. “Where is my sister?”
“You are in no position to ask questions. I told you what would happen should you fail to perform your intended duties,” he said, calm and collected.
“And I told you, he left! What was I supposed to do? I want to know where my sister is.” Fear made her tongue even bolder. What did it matter if she'd caused fatal harm to her only sibling?
“If you do not have a care with your tone, you will shortly join her,” he said with the calm bleeding away to something more openly ominous. “In case you do not realize it, you have lost the only bargaining chip you owned. I sent you on an errand that you failed to complete. You have become dead weight.”
Sessily pinched her lips closed over a tart reply. He hadn't expressly said Iris was dead, which meant there was always hope.
Rising, he departed the room with his guard in tow. A lock clicked in their wake.
Sitting forward, she propped her forehead against her palms, a ginger pose thanks to the sting of the sunburn. Although her skin had been treated, it hadn't taken away every ounce of pain. Tonguing her chapped lips, she considered her options.
Right now, there didn't seem to be many.
Chapter Thirteen
“Someone must have been waiting for her on the road, too far away to see in the dark,” Ahsan said. He washed the foul taste from his tongue with a drink of liquor. Pacing his office, he looked down at the phon
e on his desk, at the speaker specifically, and waited for Leander, Mattias and Chayton to give their input. He'd filled them in on everything else already.
“Sounds like it. I doubt she'd risk her life by wandering off through the desert. Probably the same people who provided the horse picked her up and took her...somewhere.” Leander's voice cracked over the speaker.
“Knowing what we know about Bashir so far, and our earlier concern that he may be out for revenge or something of that nature, I think your guess that she's with him is correct,” Mattias added. “What he wanted her to do in your home is still a question with no easy answer. Unless he simply wanted an 'inside' person to keep track of your movements. Report back your comings and goings, or visitors.”
“Do you really think she's one of his mistresses?” Chayton inquired.
“I don't know.” Ahsan had another drink. He'd consumed several shot glasses full of cognac already. “You could be right, Mattias. Maybe he took a huge chance that I'd be attracted to her and she'd wind up at the palace. It was a big gamble.”
“I'm unconvinced she's not been compromised some other way. Her sister is missing, which suggests to me the idea of blackmail has to be considered along with everything else,” Chayton added.
“I gave her every reason to trust me. She should have just said something.” Ahsan didn't want to believe that Sessily would have kept up the ruse after everything else. Yet, what did they have between them? Some hot looks, a few laughs, and conversation that might have been all lies on her part?
“She might have been too afraid to confide in you. There could be more reasons we don't know about. Was there anything else she said that seemed out of place?” Leander asked.
Ahsan's glass hit the desk with a thud. How could he have forgotten the incident in the stall earlier with the man who'd handled her so roughly? Sessily had insisted the man was just upset about the pink slips—but what if he'd been threatening her? Scaring her further? Pressing Bashir's power home so she wouldn't sway?
“Damn,” he swore.
“What?” Mattias asked.
“Earlier I came across Sessily and one of the men who delivered the horse having a little disagreement or something in the stables. Actually, it looked more like he was bullying her or trying to cow her, although she covered for him when I stepped in,” Ahsan said.
“Are the men still there?” Leander asked.
“I'll call you back.” Ahsan didn't waste time. Snatching his cell phone off the desk, he left his brethren still talking over the speaker as he broke into a jog that took him more quickly through the halls of his home. On the way, he dialed the stable-master and discovered that the truck and trailer were still on the premises. It was odd—why hadn't the delivery men just taken her away?
It would have been too noticeable, that's why. Leaving the men behind had been a good decoy to give Sessily a necessary head start. He ordered the stable-master to alert security around the stables. The delivery crew were not allowed to leave the property before he had a chance to question them.
Through the halls, more guards fell into his shadow, guards well versed in the art of killing. Ahsan ate the distance between the foyer and the guest rooms where he'd given the men a place to stay in record time.
Approaching the first door, he didn't bother knocking but went straight in. This was the room that should house the man he'd had a confrontation with earlier. Sure enough, the brute was passed out on the bed, one arm slung over the edge, a half consumed bottle of liquor on the nightstand. So much for staying in the truck as he'd been told.
Ahsan loomed over him and hauled the man up by his shirt. “Wake up.”
“What...” Drunk and sloppy, the man flailed his arms and barely got his feet beneath him.
Ahsan bulled the man into the wall, holding him upright by sheer force. One of his personal guards utilized a glass and a pitcher of water near the liquor, adding a splash of cool liquid against the delivery man's ruddy cheeks.
Roused, a brief struggle ensued. “What the hell is the meaning of this?” the man demanded, voice a slur.
Ahsan glared down, fists tight in the man's shirt. “What's his name?” he asked of his guards.
“Robert.”
“Robert. I want to know exactly what Bashir is up to sending Sessily here.” Ahsan was taking an enormous chance that he was right in his assumption. The way Robert's eyes widened let him know that he was at least on the right track.
“I don't know what you're talking about. We're from—”
“Save it. I know you're not from Romania. Lie again, and I'll start collecting teeth for a necklace.”
“Don't know any Bashir! I swear it. We're up from--”
Ahsan used one hand to brace the man and cocked a fist back.
“Wait, wait!” Robert said, flailing his hands out as if he might prevent a strike to the jaw.
“Start talking. Now.” Ahsan stepped back and two of his guards took over propping Robert up. Pacing in front of Bashir's handyman, he waited for a reply.
“I don't know what he wants. All I know is that we were brought on to drive the horse up here, and given a story about being from Romania. Part of Sessily's 'stables' or something like that.” Robert, the whites of his eyes showing, tracked Ahsan's movements. His words were still slurred, the syllables running into and over each other.
“That can't be all.”
“It is. I swear it.”
“Then tell me what that little display was in the stables, when you were in her face, making threats.” Ahsan's gut told him there was a lot more to the story. Robert might be drunk, but drunks could still withhold pertinent information.
“I was directed to remind her what she's—I mean I was reminding her where her allegiance belonged.”
“What she's...what? That's not what you were going to say.” Ahsan narrowed his eyes. His hands flexed in and out of fists.
“Just that. She needed to focus on her, on the...” Robert swallowed hard.
Ahsan swerved his steps right up to Robert, disgusted by the fetid breaths that smelled of too much whiskey. “On the what? Make me stand here much longer, keep leading me on, and you're going to regret it.”
“I think Bashir was afraid she would beg for your help,” Robert said in a rush. “I had to remind her to stay on task.”
“And what task was that?”
“To win the race. To earn your trust.”
“For?”
“He sent her here to spy on you. Well. He'd hoped you would bring her home.”
“For what purpose?” Ahsan took no joy knowing he'd been at least partly right about Sessily. All her interest in him at the gala had nothing to do with any chemistry between them, just a feigned connection that she'd played to the hilt.
“I don't know what for. I swear on my life.” Robert put his hands up, palms out. “Bashir's men didn't tell us all that. I guess just to watch you, see what you do. I don't know.”
“Put him under lock and key. He's not allowed out until I say so.” Ahsan left the order with his guards and exited the room, oblivious to Robert's rambling protests.
It took him two complete circuits of the palace to cool his raging temper. Very few times in his life had he been taken off guard, and he disliked being played both by Bashir and Sessily. Even if she was being blackmailed, he'd given her ample time and reason to confide in him. He could have helped her, could have—he stopped that train of thought in its tracks. It did him no good to lament what he could not change.
Sessily wasn't affected by him at all. She'd played her part, enduring his attention and company because she had to, rather than because she wanted to.
Back in his office, he dialed the Prince of Latvala, Mattias Ahtissari, and waited through three full rings.
“Yes?” Mattias said.
“We were right. Bashir set me up. He planted Sessily at the party on the off chance that we would hook up.”
“I'm sorry to hear it, brother,” Mattias said. “What w
as the reason for her presence in your home?”
“To spy on me. Perhaps to report my movements, or maybe how much security I have, things like that.”
“It makes sense, especially if he is making bigger plans to bring you to ruin. You would be on your guard too much if he came for a brotherly 'visit'. This was a better way to find out information.” Mattias paused, then asked, “What will you do now? Do you need the three of us to return?”
“You may want to. I intend on paying my brother a visit of my own at first light. If you don't hear from me by tomorrow evening, assume he's taken action against me.” Ahsan wouldn't put it past Bashir, not at this point. Part of his reason for calling the members of the Royal Elite was not only to recall them to Afshar, but to put them on alert. If he did go missing, then there were three prominent members of society who knew the whole story and what his plans were.
“Maybe you should wait until we arrive,” Mattias said.
“Unless you can get here in the next four hours or so, I'm gone at dawn.”
Ahsan meant to confront Bashir at the soonest possible opportunity.
. . .
She got little sleep in the room with no windows. Stone walls surrounded her in every direction, the gray color unappealing, depressing. The only piece of furniture was a thin cot with no pillow and no blanket, hardly comfortable enough to get prone on. The prick of springs in the lumpy mattress drove her to distraction. A sliver of light penetrated the crack at the bottom of the door, providing the only illumination to see by.
Rolling to her feet the following morning, she groaned as she stood and stretched. Everything hurt. Her entire body ached and her skin had started to itch. No salve remained, and she knew better than to ask for more. They'd given her just enough to take the initial pain away, leaving her to suffer in the aftermath. Her windblown hair felt gritty with sand, and no amount of finger-combing helped.
The Royal Elite: Ahsan (Elite, Book 2) Page 13
