by Olivia Gates
“So? I don’t see that stopping you.”
“It is my duty and my responsibility.”
“Ditto. I’m a doctor here, too. Helping the injured is the job description. Or am I supposed to join humanitarian missions only if they present no danger? If such missions exist.”
“How about starting with something less dangerous?”
“Like what? A drive on a satin-smooth and empty highway in broad daylight? We found out how safe that was this morning.”
His lips twitched. The next moment they were uncompromising, however, making her doubt she’d seen that sign of unwilling humor. “You’re staying here, Janaan, and that’s final.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “And what should I do while people who need my medical skill drown and die? Stay in my hotel, preferably under my bed? With my luck, Damhoor will be hit with its first earthquake and I’ll be crushed underneath it.”
He closed his eyes, visibly wrestling with his impatience. “Janaan, I don’t have time to argue—”
“Then don’t. Let me hop inside that chopper with you and let’s go do our job.”
“Your job is with GAO. Wait for their mission.” With that he turned away, his dismissal freezing her blood.
He’d just taken a couple of strides when she called out to him. He turned to scowl at her, the lights from the restaurant casting shadows on his annoyed, unyielding, brutally handsome face.
“Just to let you know, I am joining GAO’s mission—the one I’m sure they’ll organize to the afflicted region. If they don’t, I’ll fly there on my own. I’m sure any humanitarian effort will want my services. Maybe I’ll see you there.” Then she turned and ran towards the car he’d provided for her use.
Less than a heartbeat later both her arms were clamped inexorably by his hands. He couldn’t have moved so quickly!
But he was at her back, swamping her with his heat and presence, muttering to himself, “Ya Gawwi men hadi’l aneedah.”
That she got. She guessed. He was calling on God to help him endure her stubbornness.
Sure enough, he growled, “You stubborn firebrand.” Then he marched her towards the helicopter, his body shielding her from the buffeting that had almost swept her away when she’d first approached it. He took the four steps up in one bound then bent to her, scooped her up as if she weighed nothing.
As one of his men jumped inside after them and drew up the door, her heart slammed around inside her chest.
Malek still had his arm around her when minutes ago she’d been certain she’d never see him again. The fact that he was taking her with him was too much!
Her legs wobbled as he guided her through a cargo bay with dozens of folded seats lining its sides and towering crates marked as medical and relief supplies. In the next section, she saw many closed compartments flanking a bay that contained over a dozen emergency stations.
She finally located her voice and croaked, “What’s this thing? A flying hospital?”
He only gave her an inscrutable look as he steered her forward to a four-seat pressurized passenger compartment. Four men came out of what had to be the cockpit, and from what she knew of aircrews they had to be a pilot, a copilot, a navigator, and a flight engineer. She saw the respect with which they treated Malek, knew they considered him a superior—no, far more.
She had a vague idea that Damhoor had thousands of people related to the royal family who were of incredibly varying levels of importance and power. From the men’s reaction, it seemed Malek was fairly high on the royal food chain. And she couldn’t believe it hadn’t occurred to her to ask exactly what his position was! The man she’d shared so many firsts with.
Her first time as a first responder. Her first sharing of her life story with another. Her first plunge into total loss of control. So many world-shaking experiences. Her world, that was. And she knew nothing about him beyond his name, that he was a doctor and a sheikh, and obviously an important one.
Soon he sent the crew back to the cockpit, seated her and himself, fastened their seat belts, and the chopper took off without so much as a tremor.
As they soared, she felt Malek’s eyes on her. She tore her gaze away from the breathtaking sight of the glittering city receding beneath them in the deepening night and turned to him.
“In answer to your earlier question,” he drawled, “this chopper is the next best thing to a real flying hospital—it can land in Mejbel where there’s no landing strip. It’s an Mi-26MS helicopter, a Medevac version built to my specifications. It features an OR, an ER, an IC and sixteen stretcher stations. It’s carrying its top load of seventy thousand pounds of medical and relief supplies but, once unloaded, it can hold over a hundred people in the cargo bay.”
Before she could process the staggering resources and power that had secured such a giant and its equipment and supplies, his hands clamped her shoulders, turned her to him, burning more palm prints into her flesh. “So are you happy now your ruse worked?”
“What ruse?” She gaped at him.
“So cunningly giving me a choice between you being in danger with me or without me, knowing which way I’d jump.”
“I did no such thing!” she cried indignantly. “I was just telling you I didn’t need your approval to do my job!”
His gaze went on and on, boring into her, until she felt he could read her every thought. And that he would let his accusation go unwithdrawn and her protest unacknowledged.
Then he shook his head with a half amused, half incredulous sound. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I believe you.”
“Oh, I’m just thrilled! How lovely to have a slur withdrawn by such a near insult.”
His lips twisted. “Where’s the slur in the fact that females reach their goals through manipulation? And where’s the insult in my belief in your shocking deficiency in that basic skill?”
“You’d better watch it before you have an offensiveness overdose and slip into a chauvinistic coma,” she scoffed.
He barked a laugh. “If either can assure me of some solid sleep, I’d welcome it.”
She seethed at the unfairness of it all, that one person should be endowed with all that, that he’d probably make real offensiveness and chauvinism look delicious.
He adjusted his seat backwards, sprawled in a more comfortable position. “I hope you won’t think me more of an uncouth miscreant if I sleep until we reach our destination.”
She again noticed fatigue straining his face and dulling his eyes, felt contrite that she’d been the reason he’d gone an extra twelve hours without sleep, barely stopped herself from offering her bosom, or any part of her for more comfort.
“Please, go ahead. I’ll shut up now.” But before she did … “But, uh, you do believe I wasn’t being manipulative, don’t you?”
“I wouldn’t have said I did if I didn’t.” His eyelids swept down until ridiculously thick lashes brushed razor-sharp cheekbones, his voice growing thicker and even more intoxicating with impending sleep. “What you did worked nevertheless. You may soon wish it hadn’t, though. I’m keeping you within three feet of me all through our time in Mejbel. And this, Janaan, is non-negotiable.”
Before she could say anything to that, he pulled her to him, bringing her head resting on his bosom, probably frying her speech centers permanently. Before his breathing fell into the regular cadence of deep sleep he murmured into her temple, “Get some sleep, Janaan. I foresee some harrowing times ahead. We’d better stock up on stamina.”
The last things Malek remembered before he surrendered to exhaustion was soaking up Janaan’s softness and warmth, filling his lungs with her scent and feeling his every nerve humming with the pleasure of her nearness.
The very things whose absence woke him up now.
He opened his eyes to the darkened cabin, felt she wasn’t there, not even on board, even before he felt that they’d landed.
Groggy with the coma-like sleep he’d plunged into, he snatched off his seat belt,
heaved himself up to his feet, an unreasoning fear riding him that she’d somehow disappeared while he’d slept, that something had happened to her under his very nose.
As wakefulness chased away doubt, he was certain she’d just disembarked when they’d landed, not wanting to disturb him. And probably showing him she wouldn’t abide by his three-feet decree. He clamped his jaw. Oh, she would abide by it.
He might have succumbed to his need to have her with him, but he was keeping her within those three feet or less until the crisis was over. He was sending her back, no matter what she said, if he felt he couldn’t keep her a hundred percent safe, or if he felt her unable to deal with the reality of the situation.
He stepped out of the helicopter. He had some aides he had to blast for not waking him up as soon as they’d arrived with the crisis in progress and for letting her out of the helicopter.
Then the first thing his eyes fell on a hundred feet away was her lithe figure glowing in his helicopter’s lights, her hair blowing around her and everything drained out of him but the need to be by her side.
He exhaled remnants of anxiety, inhaled steadiness for the coming ordeals then bounded across the distance separating them.
Jay stood staring at the squadron of helicopters that was landing around theirs and wondered if she could stop being stunned at the extent of resources Malek commanded.
The area around them had been turned in part into a camp for the reception of displaced people and in part into a field hospital. She was sure everything had materialized in the two hours it had taken them to get there, at his orders.
Suddenly coin-sized drops of water splashed down on her. Before she could move, it was as if floodgates had burst and there was no point in rushing away any more—or at all. She’d probably spend the next days soaking wet anyway. To make it worse, it was clear the heatwave had broken. With a vengeance.
She shuddered, raised her eyes to the sky, and even in the darkness saw the bloated clouds that promised a ceaseless deluge, and hoped Malek had estimated the site of their relief operation correctly, that it was on high enough ground not to join the afflicted areas in their watery fate.
“What have I told you about moving about without me?”
She jumped with a yelp before she subsided against him as he wrapped her in his jacket. Another thing she’d never get used to—his stealth. How could such a big man move so quietly?
He towed her to the nearest tent. “You’re soaked, and you weren’t dressed for this to start with.”
“Neither are you. And then I started the day in a heatwave, lost my jacket …” Stop, stop, you’re babbling.
And was it any wonder? Her eyes couldn’t tear themselves away from the sight of his clinging wet clothes showcasing the majesty of his chest, abdomen and thighs in distressing detail.
God—she was ogling him. She’d never done that, never felt the painful urge, or any urge at all, to tear a man’s clothes off him. And for her to feel this way here, now. It was crazy!
She busied herself with wringing her hair out as another crew member provided them with towels and waterproof, phosphorescent yellow uniforms like those everyone in the relief effort was wearing. She hurried into one of the still empty treatment compartments, dried herself and dressed, only then noticing that he’d ordered her a uniform indicating she was a doctor. “Tubeeb” was written in big letters above “Doctor”, front and back, plus the red crescent, indicating medical services.
She rushed out to find one of Malek’s men, Saeed, a huge, intimidating-looking man, the one she was now certain was the top aide he’d bequeathed her when he’d intended to leave her behind, and who’d been the one who’d accompanied them on the flight, taking Malek aside for a short, tense tête-à-tête.
Malek turned with a deep frown, reached out a silent hand to her. She rushed to take it.
“We’re holding a strategy planning meeting,” he murmured as she hurried beside him to another compartment where there were five men and one woman. They were gathered around a table with maps spread on it.
As soon as Malek entered they sprang up straight. The closest rushed over and kissed Malek’s shoulder.
Was that a kiss on the cheek going astray, with the man being so much shorter than Malek?
Malek cut through her musings. “No time for standing on ceremony.” Ceremony? This was the way to greet sheikhs here? Not that it was time to begin her education in the land’s customs. Malek’s taut admonition sent them all backing away. “A quick introduction is in order, though. Everyone, Dr Janaan Latimer is an emergency doctor who just this morning saved a citizen from a car crash. She’s an affiliate of GAO and she is generously volunteering even more services to our kingdom in its time of need.” Then he turned to her. “Janaan, let me introduce your colleagues in the relief effort. Dr Hessuh El-Etaibi.”
The striking dark-haired woman, who to Jay’s surprise was unveiled and dressed like the men, came forward and shook her hand with a smile full of genuine charm and interest.
She would have loved to have exchanged a more substantial greeting with her, but Malek swept her into a succession of lightning-quick introductions, giving her colleagues’ names but nothing about their functions.
It was over in one minute flat then Malek said, “Reports?”
“Those who escaped when the flashflood forged a new path down El Shamekh mountain,” Dr Essam said, “described it as a wall of water that came crashing down on them. They say their villages, which lie at its foot, here and here.” he pointed a baton on the map “ … have been wiped out.”
“Our meteorologists estimate that over twenty centimeters of rain have fallen over the last twelve hours,” Khaled El-Mussri, who looked and acted like some military type, said. “They predict more over the next seventy-two hours. Even in the areas that weren’t hit as hard, the water choked arterial roads and blocked them with waist-high water.”
“The timing, with night falling, proved a huge complication,” Hessuh said. “Then power lines went down and the blackout compounded the chaos. The local police and emergency services are paralyzed. The new mobile health units are either inundated by water or by people. We’re the first outside help to arrive.”
Malek took in all the information and exhaled. “The army has been mobilized but with the roads inaccessible, soldiers must hike for hours then use inflatable boats to reach the disaster areas. Every helicopter in the kingdom is on its way, but right now we are the only chance the victims have for immediate help.”
Essam shook his head. “There’s nothing we can do right now. The wind alone can bring the lighter helicopters down, and the zero visibility makes any rescue attempt before dawn futile.”
Malek straightened. She felt everyone in the compartment shrinking. She shivered, but it wasn’t with cold.
“Those people will not wait till dawn,” Malek snarled. “We’re repeating the drill we conducted in Ashgoon. Search-and-rescue teams will conduct continuous aerial surveys using the floodlights being fitted to the helicopters as we speak. They will pick up victims, deliver them to our medical team, then go back for more. When every single injured or stranded person has been rescued, we’ll continue the search for the missing and the dead. I am not leaving one person unaccounted for. Is that clear?”
There were unanimous nods, hers the most vigorous.
She knew that with him in charge, every life would be fought for and if not salvaged then honored, with everything humanly possible.
She ran after him as he distributed assignments to his team leaders.
“On which team will you be?” she gasped.
Malek looked down on her. “My helicopter is the only one equipped for both rescue and critical care. I’ll be on both.”
She speeded up to keep up with him. “And since I’m to be kept within three feet of you, so will I.”
CHAPTER SIX
MEJBEL WAS A collection of small towns and villages, one of the few places in Damhoor where the modern world
hadn’t taken over. Right now it was water that had.
Jay looked down from her window, failed again to imagine what the people had felt when water had invaded their homes, swept away their lives as they’d known it. Her heart seemed to be in a state of perpetual contraction as she saw nothing but roofs jutting out of the water, with higher areas in the path of the torrent becoming instant burial grounds. They’d rescued people who’d wept about how they’d failed to dig out their loved ones from the landslides with nothing to use but their bare hands.
It had been nine hours of unceasing flying between the most affected areas and the relief operation site. Their helicopter alone had rescued six hundred and eighty-two stranded and injured people. The rest of the chopper fleet had contributed a total flying time of six hundred hours, each rescuing over three hundred people. They’d rescued people from everywhere they’d escaped to—rooftops, trees, upper floors of makeshift shelters in schools, public buildings and mosques. At six a.m. their camp and field hospital had been filled beyond capacity with around forty thousand people vying for shelter and treatment.
On the way to the camp they’d treated those whose condition had been critical. With another doctor, whose specialty she didn’t catch, and four trauma nurses along, they treated everything from concussion to severe crush injuries to near-drownings. They resuscitated dozens, stabilized more, lost three casualties, two to drowning and one to electrocution. Malek had flitted between his medical and co-ordinating roles, making her head spin just watching his sheer energy and efficiency.
The local police informed them that they’d issued warnings to two hundred thousand people in the areas predicted to be hit hardest to evacuate their residences. Most hadn’t complied.
And who could blame them? Leave everything they had behind and go where?
She knew all had a tragedy to relate but in the deluge of faces it was one family, whose father spoke good English, who gave her a close-up look at the heart-wrenching losses suffered. And they were one of the lucky families who hadn’t lost a member or been separated in the chaos.
