Desert Knights

by Conrad, Linda; Conrad, Linda

  But it was sheer desperation that had driven her to this point because no one—not the U.S. State Department, FBI, Interpol, the Burkina Faso government nor any other agency—had been able to help Kathleen locate her missing sister, and for nine months she’d badgered them all. Kathleen had actually begun to think she was being stonewalled. So, as a last resort, she’d packed her own bags and headed for Tessalit in northern Mali, from where a postcard had come with a cryptic phrase hastily scrawled in Jennie’s distinctive hand, in Gaelic: Taim i gcruachais anois.

  A cry for help in the language of their ancestors, a language Jennie had taught Kathleen as a child. It was their special, secret oasis of communication in a dysfunctional family with an absent mother and a philandering, alcoholic father.

  Kathleen turned to watch her old Berber guide squatting besides the fire he’d built at the center of their camp. He was crouched forward, tending to a blackened pot that hung over the flames. He’d likely sit there all night, stoking the fire until dawn rippled once more over the Sahara.

  The younger of her two guides ordinarily kept vigil by the fire with the old man and, from inside her tent, Kathleen would listen to their soft, intermittent, Arabic chatter—a comforting, human sound in the vast and desolate Sahara blackness.

  But tonight, the young guide was out in the desert somewhere along the periphery of their camp where the camels had been hobbled so they could chew on sharp tufts of grass sprouting between rock. Kathleen couldn’t see him in the darkness, but she could hear the thin notes coming from his flute. She wondered why he’d chosen this particular night to leave the comfort of the fire to guard the camels.

  With growing unease, she lowered her tent flap for privacy and lit a candle. The flame guttered in the breeze as she changed into her nightgown, the hot, waxy scent reminiscent of a time past—or so the historian in her imagined. Kathleen loved old things, beautiful things, that took time to craft and were made with passion and care. To her, they represented value, respect, commitment.

  Seating herself on her camp cot she reached for the cloth saddlebag at her side and removed a leather-bound journal—her last birthday gift from Jennie. The feel of old leather against her palms grounded Kathleen. But as she opened the cover, Jennie’s postcard slipped out, falling to the sand, rattling her all over again.

  Kathleen picked the card up—a picture of an oasis on the front, the Gaelic scrawl on the back. There was zero doubt in her mind it had come from Jennie. Her chest tightened as she turned the card over. Jennie was in some kind of deep trouble, and she’d been trying to communicate this to her sister in secret. Why? What was she afraid of?

  Where was she now?

  How on earth could she have just have vanished without a clue from the medical convention she’d been attending in Burkina Faso to find herself in Tessalit, a small town in northern Mali. It made no sense.

  Kathleen tucked the card into the back of her diary and opened the book to a blank page.

  She began to write.

  We’re close to Adrar now, and I must confess I am afraid. I’m not sure whether to be more apprehensive of learning a terrible truth about Jennie, or of finding nothing, my search coming to a dead end. But oddly, under my fear, under the sheer desperation that drove me here, I am learning something about myself. This Sahara desert, its history, its peoples who once lived only in my dreams and between the pages of beloved old tomes, are coming to vivid life. And in a way, so am I. I’ve been forced out of the pages of my books to physically walk these burning sands myself, to meet and talk to and touch the people that make a home in these desolate plains, and it’s awakening something in me…

  Her pen stilled.

  Kathleen looked up. Was that the chink of a bridle she’d heard?

  The wind had fallen silent. The thin, clear notes of the flute had also died. She listened intently for some sound but could hear nothing. Yet she sensed a presence in the air.

  Kathleen slowly rose, opened the tent flap. Her guide still sat by the fire, his back to her, his turbaned head bent forward as he poked the logs. Sparks spattered hot orange up into the black sky. It all looked normal. Perhaps the young guide had simply fallen asleep.

  She resumed her position and writing.

  Sayeed Ali dismounted, landing soft as a cat in the warm sand. Bandoliers containing rounds of ammunition crisscrossed his chest. A scimitar and dagger were sheathed in leather at his waist. His black tunic, black cotton pants, black boots and black turban that left only slits for his eyes rendered him almost invisible against the darkness.

  Moonlight glinted off bridles as the twelve other men in the hunting posse silently circled the camp astride their horses. Similarly swathed, they moved like black blots against the desert night.

  Sayeed raised his hand, giving them the signal to wait along the periphery of the camp. Then he crept in a crouch toward the back of the woman’s tent, the hilt of his curved dagger warm in his palm.

  The guard they’d encountered outside the camp lay still, lifeblood from his carotid draining into thirsty sand, his flute silent in limp fingers. The man had not seen nor heard the mounted posse coming. His fate had been swift, which was a relief to Sayeed.

  Creeping closer to Kathleen Flaherty’s tent, he aimed for a slit in the canvas through which a strip of yellow light flickered. His orders were clear—locate the American woman’s camp, kill her and everyone else traveling with her on sight. Not one witness to be left alive.

  Inching the canvas slit open with the backs of his fingers, Sayeed peered through the gap. Shock rippled through him.

  His target sat on a camp cot, writing in a book by the light of a candle. She wore a white cotton nightdress—ankle length—with little eyelets along the hem. Old-fashioned but startlingly sexy to Sayeed. Her bare feet were slim with delicate arches, and they rested on a faded woven rug she’d laid over the sand. Hair the color of a red Sahara sunset fell in a thick wave across her cheek as she bent forward. Her skin was like alabaster but, as she hooked a fall of auburn hair behind her ear, Sayeed could see that the desert sun had burned and freckled her nose and cheeks.

  She bit her bottom lip as she wrote, and Sayeed noted she was using a fountain pen and that her journal was bound in leather. He’d seen occasional tourists brave this part of the Sahara—usually Germans. Sometimes the odd American. They tended to wear the latest in adventure gear and carry high-tech navigational equipment, but this woman looked like something beautiful and gentle out of a colonial past, and the vignette threw him.

  He could see in Kathleen Flaherty the genetic echoes of her older sister. But while Dr. Jennie Flaherty was whippet-thin with angular features and hair more honey-blond than red, this much younger woman had gentle curves, a soft, feminine sexiness that unexpectedly did something to Sayeed. Stalling him. Mesmerizing him. And for a strange moment rendering him immobile, indecisive. And it cost him.

  Because, before he could force himself to rip open the canvas and take his quarry, he heard Qasim sound the command.

  The Moors came roaring into camp, hooves drumming on hard sand. They shrieked like a band of wild marauders, machetes and scimitars wielded up high as they bore down on the old Berber guide at the campfire.

  Adrenaline slammed into Sayeed.

  He raced to the front of the tent, yelling at them to stop. But it was too late.

  Bloodcurdling screams sliced through the night, and Kathleen gasped, dropped her book, a raw, primal terror clawing through her. She dashed to the tent flap, yanked it open, and her stomach turned to water at the sight before her.

  Silhouetted by firelight, men on black horses with scimitars held high were bearing down on her old guide. He screamed for mercy in high-pitched Arabic, arms raised above his head, but they forced him back toward the flames.

  One of the men leaned down as he barreled past on his horse and swung his scimitar across the guide’s neck. Time turned slow and thick as Kathleen saw the guide’s head loll back, a gaping red maw appear across h
is neck, the spurt of arterial blood.

  The old Berber seemed momentarily suspended in midair, then he sank slowly to his knees and slumped to the ground. Flames began to lick at his white robes, sparks fizzing and crackling hot orange in the night.

  Bile lurched to her throat. But before she could move, the killer on the horse caught sight of her. She froze. The man’s eyes glittered evilly from the slit in his black turban. He pointed his sword at her and yelled in Arabic. Then he kicked his horse and came for her at full gallop, scimitar pointed forward like a knight’s lance. The hooves of the other marauders thudded behind him as the men began their wild shrieking again.

  Kathleen flung back into her tent, desperately searching for something she could use as a weapon, but the horseman swiped at a support pole and the heavy canvas flopped down on top of her, dropping her to her knees. Ensnared in canvas and guy ropes, Kathleen was dragged through the sand behind the horse, her head hitting rocks, a sharp one gashing her temple.

  The killer stopped suddenly, rearing his horse.

  Quickly disentangling herself from the canvas, Kathleen got up to run. Her assailant laughed, head thrown back to the stars, then with a wild, ululating shriek, he barreled down on her again, lunging with his sword as he rode past.

  Kathleen threw herself to the ground, rolling in a ball as she hit sand. The tip of his scimitar missed its mark, slicing only the fabric down her back and leaving a thin, searing burn across her skin, fine as a razor cut.

  With a violent curse her attacker dropped down from his horse and marched toward her.

  He grabbed a fistful of her hair, lifting her from the ground so that her toes dangled just above sand. The tearing pain in her scalp was so severe it left no wind in her lungs to scream. He unsheathed his dagger, pressed the blade to her throat.

  Kathleen said a silent prayer.

  But with a resonating clang, the dagger shot free of her attacker’s hand, flying in a wide arc to the sand.

  Another tribesman, taller, broader, also dressed all in black, stepped forward.

  “This kill,” he said in Arabic, “is mine.”

  Chapter 2

  “Please,” Kathleen whispered, tears filling her eyes so that the man above her blurred into a dark, looming form. “Please don’t kill me.”

  He raised his sword and a scream swelled into her chest. But instead of bringing the blade down on her neck, he sheathed it at his waist.

  “My name is Sayeed Ali,” he said. In English. Not French. Nor Arabic, nor any of the more common languages spoken in the Sahara. He reached down to help her to her feet, but as he did, the other man lunged at him with his sword.

  Her savior ducked to the side, avoiding the swipe of the blade. As he moved, he unsheathed his own curved sword and swung, slicing her attacker’s wrist.

  The attacker dropped his scimitar and clamped his hand over the bleeding wound. He glared at the man called Sayeed, neck muscles pumped in rage, black eyes crackling in fury.

  The other men in the posse dismounted and moved closer, drawing horses by bridles. Tension hung thick, simmering, silent.

  Kathleen tried to scoot back in the sand, but her rescuer stomped his leather boot onto the edge of her nightgown, trapping her like a bug on the dirt.

  “Why do you let her live?” Her attacker demanded in an Old Arabic dialect that surprised Kathleen, a dialect she understood with a scholar’s passion. “Our orders were to kill her on sight!”

  “We will kill her, Qasim. But first we interrogate her.” Her savior spoke in Arabic again, calm, a low, guttural, rolling sound.

  Horses whinnied as the circle of men drew even closer.

  “Interrogate her! Are you stupid? Bakkar said he wants her dead, not questioned!” The man called Qasim waved his arm in a wide sweep. “He ordered everyone in this camp dead. And you let our key target live?”

  “And you challenged my command of this raid,” said Sayeed, his voice very low, but dangerous, subtext lingering heavily. The other men seemed to hang on to each word, observe every nuance of movement—wild and violent marauders watching to see which of these two dominant tribesmen would emerge victorious.

  “Bakkar made it clear I was in charge.”

  “You took too long behind the tent.”

  “And you made a mistake by not being patient enough to wait for my sign.” Sayeed pointed at her on the ground. “This woman might know something. She could have told others. That could lead another search party in this direction. Sheik Bakkar Al Barrah would not like that—it could be fatal for our plan. We will take her to the camp, question her there. Bakkar can then decide how he wants to dispose of her.”

  Kathleen began to shake. They had to have made a mistake. They had the wrong woman.

  They’ll let me go when they figure it out, surely?

  Qasim glared at Sayeed. The other men shuffled. Finally, the attacker reached for his fallen sword, sheathed it. Muttering an explicit curse, he turned and yelled for his horse. “And what are you fools all looking at?” he barked at the other men as he swung himself up onto his tasseled saddle. “Get moving—burn everything in the camp, then clear out!” He kicked his horse and galloped, hooves thundering, into the blackness of the night, dust clouding behind him.

  “Search her tent first,” ordered Sayeed as he watched his challenger vanish into darkness. “I want this woman’s journal and any photos you find. Burn everything else.”

  Sayeed bent down and clasped Kathleen’s hand. His grip was warm, strong, his palm rough. He pulled her to her feet. “Walk,” he demanded, pushing her forward. “To my horse over there.”

  But she was shaking so badly that her legs buckled out from under her. He caught her, hauling her up again, and he held her steady as he marched her forward. His body was hard, hot, the fabric of his tunic rough against the skin on her back where her nightgown had been cut open.

  She craned her neck, trying to see what was happening. Men were running from the campfire with sticks ablaze. They set the burning sticks to her tent and belongings. Canvas billowed up in a hot whoosh. One of the men ran out ahead of the flames carrying her journal and a box of photos of Jennie.

  “No!” She tried to jerk free. “Wait, that’s mine! Please, don’t—”

  Sayeed silenced her with a rough shove from his knee and a yank on her arm. “Quiet,” he hissed. “Keep walking. Fight me, try to escape, and maybe I won’t be able to save you next time.”

  He shoved her forward.

  Terrible, burning scents and thick, black smoke choked the air. Kathleen thought of her guides, men she’d been responsible for bringing out here, now dead. She was shaking badly—big, body shudders that made her stumble to the ground again. He yanked her up again. Tears rolled down her cheeks. She tried to wipe them from her face, but her hand came away sticky with blood. The wound on her temple was still bleeding badly. Her nightgown was full of her own blood.

  Sayeed hauled Kathleen up onto his horse. He positioned her between his thighs on the saddle, and he put his arms around her to take the reins.

  “What is your name?” he whispered against her ear.

  “Ka…Kathleen Falherty.”

  “Trust me, Kathleen. Do everything I say, and you might live. Understand?”

  “Why?” she pleaded, struggling to turn around and face him, tears filling her eyes. “Why did you do this? What do you want from me? Who are you all?”

  “Shhh.” His breath was warm through her hair, his demeanor almost gentle now that they were momentarily out of sight of the other men. His arms and thighs around her felt protective for a second. A raw surge of emotion hiccupped through her.

  “Why do you want my photos? My journal? Does this have anything to do with my sister—do you know Dr. Jennie Flaherty? Do you know what happened to her?” Desperation pitched her voice high.

  “I don’t know anything.”

  “Then why did that man try to kill me? Why…”

  …does someone named Sheik Bakkar Al Barra
h want me dead?

  But Kathleen clamped her mouth shut, instinct suddenly warning her to say no more. These men didn’t know that she understood their Arabic dialect, that she’d heard them say a man called Bakkar had ordered the raid to kill her and her guards. This knowledge might serve as a tool to help her escape, and she needed to grasp at any advantage she could.

  “That’s better. Now stay quiet, don’t struggle, and maybe—just maybe—we’ll have a fighting chance at saving your life.”

  We.

  He was pretending to be on her side.

  But she’d heard him say she was his kill, and the only reason she was alive now was because he wanted to interrogate her first. She had to convince him he had the wrong woman. “If this is not about my sister, I think you’ve made a terrible mistake—”

  “Yaaa!” He kicked his heels, and his horse took off in the direction her attacker had charged. She grabbed and hung on to the saddle horn for dear life. The other men mounted and with final, ululating, bloodcurdling shrieks of triumph, they thundered behind. The sky behind them glowed blood-orange as they charged into a sea of Sahara blackness.

  Her savior had just turned abductor.

  They journeyed for hours through the night, Kathleen fading in and out of consciousness, throbbing with pain, awakening from time to time to find herself cradled in Sayeed’s strong arms, his rock-hard thighs holding her steady on the horse. Her mouth felt dry as dust, her throat thick. Nausea rolled through her stomach in waves. The entire Milky Way seemed to have shifted across the sky. Dawn was not far off. In moments of lucidity, Kathleen tried to replay the horror of the night’s events in an effort to make sense of the overheard orders to kill her. And it dawned on Kathleen that Sayeed’s English had been flawless and spoken with an American accent. For some misguided reason, that one, little, familiar thing in this hostile, foreign environment gave her a flare of hope, and she clung to it in her desperation. Because the other part of Kathleen understood the reality—injured, bleeding, barefoot, wearing only a ripped nightgown and with no food, water, map or mode of transport—she was entirely at this man’s mercy.