“I got an invitation to come here this morning. I’m pretty sure it came from her.”
“I did not clear it. I will discuss that with her doctor.”
“I would have come anyway.”
“And I would have stopped you. Anyway.”
“Prince.”
“Yes.”
“Arif and I had a conversation last night. After you kidnapped his wife. Before you blew him to pieces. He told me some things. He asked me to tell them to her.”
“I will need . . .”
“And only her. I’ll get debriefed first thing tomorrow morning. Military intelligence, State Department, CIA. I’m okay with keeping my word to Arif and telling just his wife, then leave it at that. Or I can do it your way and talk to everybody else. Which brief do you want to read?”
Abd al-Aziz ran the fingers and gold of one hand down his breast, smoothing the impeccable cloth of his black robe. The hand stalled at his gut, which he patted in thought.
“You know who I am, Sergeant.”
“I do. And you don’t know who I am. Let’s leave it like that.”
The old Saudi was dressed like death, in black with gold accents. When he grimaced, deeply carved lines set off his eyes.
“You do not avoid a conflict with me. Why is that?”
“I’m not looking for trouble, Prince. But I’m not looking to break my word.”
“You have no fear?”
“I don’t let it make my decisions for me.”
Abd al-Aziz nodded, and when he smiled the creases beside his eyes bent upward, too.
“I suppose I cannot celebrate the man who defied the odds to save my daughter, who then defies me. You are a zealot, Sergeant. So was Arif. We have a few in the Kingdom, and it is my profession to deal with them. This is not a welcoming land for such men. You have two minutes.”
The prince turned for his daughter’s door. With another wave of a hand, the guards parted to let LB pass alone into the room.
The hospital room was immense. Even so, a single, gigantic floral arrangement filled one corner. In the bed, the princess lay awake, propped on pillows. A hand came to her forehead to tuck stray locks inside a hastily thrown-on silk scarf. The scarf did not prevent her black hair, touched with gray, from falling far past her shoulders. Behind pulled-up sheets and a long-sleeved gown, only her hands, face, and one IV-plugged arm were visible. She looked newly flush.
“How you feeling, Doctor?”
“Better. Thank you.”
“The operation went okay?”
“I’m told it was successful. The surgeons were impressed with you.”
“So you’ll keep the leg.”
“For all else I’ve lost, I will keep that. Please sit, Sergeant.”
LB filled the chair already beside the bed. The prince had likely been sitting here, explaining himself. She put clear black eyes on LB, keen and focused without pain and drugs clouding them. She smiled in grief and gratitude together.
“I’m glad you’ve come. I wish to thank you personally.”
“Ma’am, I’m sorry for your loss. And for all this.”
“Thank you.”
“I don’t have much time with you alone. Your father.”
“I know.”
“Arif.”
The princess drew a sharp breath, which caught in her lungs as if she’d inhaled a thorn. She struggled to release it and continue breathing.
When she could speak, she opened her mouth. Her lips stayed parted, her gaze strayed from LB. He said it for her.
“He’s dead. You know that.”
She blinked but dropped no tears. She bottled them to keep up her courage.
“Yes. I have been told how. And why.”
“Arif asked me to tell you a few things. I said I would.”
“He did?”
“I need to do it right now.”
The princess scooted higher against her pillows.
“Yes.”
“Just after he said he was sending you back with my unit, he had me stand with him while he talked to you on the stretcher. He had me listen. Do you remember any of that?”
“No.”
“Okay.”
LB had done his best to commit Arif’s words to memory. He’d scribbled notes on the plane ride from Sharurah. He’d let this become important.
“He said he wanted you to forgive him. He . . .”
“Sergeant.”
The princess extended a hand. LB left it ungrasped for an uncomfortable moment before he reached back. He laid her hand on the bed and covered it.
“Yeah.”
“Please. If I may ask one final kindness.”
LB closed his fingers around her palm, he put his thumb on the blue-veined back of her wrist.
“Okay.”
“Speak to me as if it is Arif. Please. I want to hear him. Will you do that?”
LB looked away, past the hospital blinds to the scorching Saudi sky. When he came back to her face, the first tears had moistened her eyes.
This was what LB had won, this moment between the requests of the dying and the living. This was what LB did when he saved a life, let it go on.
“Okay.”
She sniffled. LB spoke to her hand in his. He did not imitate Arif, just said his last words.
“Forgive me. When I believed you were going to die, or lose your leg, I was desperate for it to be beside me. Now that you will live, now that you will be whole, it cannot be with me any longer.”
She wiped away a tear, leaving a gleam across her cheek. Arif had done the same with his rough thumb.
“Your father will not stop. Will we go through this again? I must send you with the Americans to save you from me. Go to your family. End your sacrifice.”
The princess chewed her lip. She squeezed LB’s hand as if she expected this was all.
“Thank you.”
She said this in farewell, not to Arif but to LB. He spoke as himself.
“There’s more.”
“There is?”
“Yeah. This is tough.”
“It is not the hardest thing you’ve done for me, Sergeant. Please.”
LB released her hand, no longer her husband.
“Arif did not try to kill your father.”
The princess reared her head, stricken. She flung both hands to her mouth, speaking behind her fingers.
“Tell me.”
She showed no doubt. She granted the truth of everything before LB said it.
In short phrases, he explained the plot gone crazy. Arif had hacked into her father’s computer. He let himself get convinced to hand the info over to an al-Qaeda named Ghalib.
She spoke behind the veil of her hands.
“The son of Qasim. Our landlord.”
LB continued, quickly, before the prince interrupted.
Ghalib gave the information to an AQ bomber who used it to worm his way in to see her father at his home in Riyadh. The bomber blew himself up, framing Arif with a last-second cell phone call. The prince was sure that Arif was behind the attempt on his life. He made a deal with the CIA and the Yemenis to kidnap her, get her away from Arif before the CIA could target him in return. The Americans placed a diplomat in her car as a decoy, to make Arif’s pursuit qualify for a drone strike. Ghalib, the one actually behind the bombing, got hit first last night, by mistake. Then Arif.
LB made no mention of Khalil’s shooting or the remorseful, wounded Josh upstairs. Of course, the prince had probably been watching the CIA satellite feed live when Arif pulled the trigger. Right now, LB saw no need to tell Arif’s widow.
She lowered her hands. Her mouth hung open.
“Arif did not do it.”
“I don’t think he did, ma’am.”
She
swelled, up off her pillows, the IV lines following, as if her big husband had entered the room and she could move in front of him, to protect him.
“My father had him killed wrongly.”
“Looks like it.”
Her face, sunken and pale no more, glowed red-hot with new blood and anger. Arif had been resurrected out of her shame.
“Send in my father.”
LB raised a palm. “One last thing.”
“Say it in front of him. All of it.”
“Princess, listen to me. Then you make up your own mind.”
Like she had after one of her bouts of suffering, Nadya settled against the bed, exhausted, drawn down by the efforts of living. She wasn’t healed and wouldn’t be for a while. In some ways, she probably never would be. She spoke to the ceiling.
“Yes, Sergeant.”
“Arif asked you to keep this to yourself.”
Against the pillow, she turned her head away. LB read in this gesture the beginning of his dismissal.
“Why on earth?”
“He knew you’d want to rip your father.”
“I want to damn him.”
A knock sounded at the door. They had to hurry.
“Sergeant.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Say it as Arif. Let me hear him say it.”
She turned to LB a last time and rested her hand once more where he could take it. LB did not, should the door open too soon. Instead he leaned closer, lowering his voice, to lay the last secret like a wreath between Arif and his wife.
“Don’t tell your father. Let him think I opposed him enough to want to kill him. Let this be one victory, a small one, for me over him.”
The princess blinked shining eyes; the creases beside them were the same as her father’s. She lifted a hand to LB’s face for a terribly sad caress.
“Good-bye.”
The door opened, and the prince swirled in with his robe flying. The room was large enough for him to need seconds to stride to the bedside.
In those moments, LB wanted to ask her, what will you do?
Instead, before the prince reached them, LB touched fingertips to the princess’s hand against his temple. He smiled bravely in case she saw on him, at the end, Arif.
LB considered bumping Abd al-Aziz on the way out, but that would be looking for trouble.
Chapter 45
Camp Lemonnier
Djibouti
Wally went to fetch the second round. Half the team was not drinking, on alert tonight. LB and Berko were in that half. They puffed on Berko’s cigars, blowing the smoke straight up to avoid bothering Major Torres. She told them there was no need and reached for LB’s stogie to try. With a nasty face, she kept it.
It was hot as usual after dark in 11 Degrees North, but not so jammed. The camp’s runway buzzed with flights; the aircrews who normally packed the canteen were occupied elsewhere. Most of the crowd was navy and marines, and contractors. The PJ team didn’t have to shout to talk, and they were gabby tonight.
The cigars had the same kindly effect on LB and Berko, made them both quiet and observant. They smoked side by side with Torres. She was saying that she liked men and their ways, and when Wally swung six more beers onto the table, it remained clear that she liked him.
LB tipped his cigar into the night to the princess alone in her Riyadh hospital bed. In those moments when he’d been the visitation of her husband, LB had felt, though fleeting and not his, the power of the woman’s heart. A lifetime of that, even cut short, must have been remarkable for Arif.
Torres and Wally could have that. LB raised his cigar to the major across from him. Okay. This was his family. It could grow. Torres looked back quizzically.
Berko nudged LB.
“That was nice.”
“Don’t know what you mean.”
LB and Berko took puffs together. The others took swigs. Berko copied LB’s gesture, lifting his cigar at LB.
“Something you said to me.”
“And what was that, Lieutenant?”
“You’ve got time.”
“I did say that.”
“You do, too.”
LB got to his feet, intending to walk off before this became a session about him. He rested both hands on his hips, cigar smoke curling around him. He backed away a step. The full PJ team and Torres seated around the table seemed puzzled.
Wally asked, “Where you going?”
“Figured I’d be alone for a little while.”
The team objected. Torres joined him on her feet, bringing the cigar with her. She took a draw and still had a ways to go before she looked natural doing it. She smiled around the glowing stogie.
“When you could be with us, why would you be with just you?”
The team raised voices at him to stay. Berko and Doc shouted, “Good point.”
LB sat. Out on the runway, behind the fence and in the dark, a plane, another mission, lifted off. The part of the PJ team drinking tonight lifted their beers to it.
Acknowledgments
One of the great thrills of writing a novel is the opportunity and responsibility to learn of worlds and ways both foreign and exciting, to bring home a powerful story. Along the path, a writer travels to incredible places, even if it’s only through a book or a website. He meets remarkable people, even if these are the authors of related works, names and lives in a vivid history, or voices on the phone.
For this PJ series, I’ve read extensively, journeyed to remote corners of the globe, and spoken with dozens of folks who’ve been generous guides, deepening my understanding of my own stories. Each author, expert, and airline pilot, even if unknowingly, owns a place in my personal pantheon of gratitude. But a few helpers have stood out, a small cadre of living, breathing heroes who’ve taken me by my naïve, unknowing hand to guide me through the awesome world of the pararescuemen, the Guardian Angels.
They take my calls, stay patient with me, invent parts of the story for me when I falter, cheer me on, even sail with me, and bring me to earth. I am proud to know them as men and friends, and damned happy to have them in my corner as a writer: Maj. (retired) Scott Williams, USAF Lt. Col. John McElroy, Lt. Col. Sean Fitzgerald, Capt. Chris Baker, and Sr. Master Sgt. Jules Roy.
Another key guide star for these PJ novels is my Machiavellian cousin, Bob Bigman. I can’t tell you what he does for a living, but every time I think I’ve stretched the bounds of credulity, Bobby tells me more is not only possible but likely. Wow.
As always, as he has for all my books from the beginning, my old and dear friend Dr. Jim Redington walks me through every wound, bandage, pill, and medical trauma I write about. And he bought a house on the river, finally. Thank you.
I appreciate the Honors College of VCU for letting me learn and teach there, and the publishers of Boomer Magazine for giving me a platform for seven hundred words every other month. And Capt. Mike Beach for allowing Miami Beach to be my home away from home.
My copy editor, Kevin Smith, was again a marvel to work with. He was given to me by my publisher, Thomas & Mercer, and my editor, Alan Turkus, who have shown a refreshing belief in me and my writing. Thank you.
Lastly, my agent, Luke Janklow, and his super assistant, Clair Dippel, are irreplaceable components of my career. If you’re a writer, make no mistake: talented, connected, and committed representation is as important as anything you put on the page. Thanks, team. And onward.
About the Author
David L. Robbins currently teaches advanced creative writing at VCU Honors College. He is the author of eleven action-packed novels, including War of the Rats, Broken Jewel, The Betrayal Game, The Assassins Gallery, and Scorched Earth. An award-winning essayist and screenwriter, Robbins founded the James River Writers, an organization dedicated to supporting professional and aspiring writers. He also cofounded the
Podium Foundation, which encourages artistic expression in Richmond’s high schools. Robbins extends his creative scope beyond fiction as an guitarist and student of jazz, pop, and Latin classical music. When he’s not writing, he’s often found sailing, shooting, weight lifting, and traveling the world. He lives in his hometown of Richmond, Virginia.
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