Sandstorm (Sigma Force 1)

Kara stopped him. “How are you going to get a truck with no money?”

Barak answered her in English, “Allah helps those who help themselves.”

“You’re going to steal one?”

“Borrow. It is tradition among our desert tribes. A man may borrow what he needs. Stealing is a crime.”

With this little bit of wisdom, the man headed out toward the distant lights at a steady jog, disappearing into the night like a true phantom.

“Barak will not fail us,” Captain al-Haffi assured them. “He will find a vehicle large enough to carry all of us…and the horse.”

Painter glanced back along the rocky shore. The remaining Phantom, a taciturn young man named Sharif, led the stallion with a length of towline.

“Why bring the horse?” Painter asked, concerned about the exposure of a large vehicle. “There’s good grazing here, and someone would find it.”

Captain al-Haffi answered, “We have little money. And the horse may be bartered, sold. Used as transportation if needed. It is also a cover for us to be traveling to Salalah. The horse farms there are well known. It will lessen suspicion if we bring the stallion along on our journey. And besides, white is good luck.” This last was said with deadly seriousness. Luck among the folks of Arabia was as important as a roof over one’s head.

They made a brief camp. While Omaha and Painter beached the launch behind some rocks to hide it, the others built a fire out of drift-wood, sheltering it within the lee of a tumbled section of cliff. Hidden, the tiny pyre would be hard to spot, and they all needed its warmth and light.

Forty minutes later, the grinding of gears announced the arrival of their transportation. Headlights rounded a bend in the coastal road. A flatbed truck rolled up. It was an old International 4900, painted yellow, scarred with rust. Its bed was framed in wooden fencing with a drop gate behind.

Barak hopped out.

“I see you found something to borrow,” Kara said.

He shrugged.

They put out the fire. Barak had also managed to borrow some clothes: robes and cloaks. They quickly dressed, concealing their Western wear.

Once ready, Captain al-Haffi and his men took the truck’s cab, in case they were stopped. The others clambered into the back. It took blind-folding the horse to get it to walk up the drop gate into the flatbed. They tied the Arabian near the front cab. Then Painter and the others huddled near the back.

As the truck bounced onto the coastal road, Painter studied the stallion. White is good luck. Painter hoped so…they would need every bit of it.

Part Three

Tombs

Sandstorm

Marooned

Sandstorm

DECEMBER 3, 12:22 P.M.

SALALAH

S AFIA WOKE in a cell, disoriented and nauseated. The dark room spun and jittered as she moved her head. A groan bubbled up from her core. A high barred window let in stabbing shafts of light. Too bright, searing.

A wave of queasiness rolled over her.

She turned on her side and dragged her head, too heavy for her shoulders, over the edge of the cot. Her stomach clenched, then clenched again. Nothing. Still, she tasted bile as she collapsed back down.

She took deep breaths, and slowly the walls stopped their spin.

She became aware of the sweat covering her body, pasting the thin cotton shift to her legs and chest. The heat stifled. Her lips felt cracked, parched. How long had she been drugged? She remembered the man with the needle. Cold, tall, dressed in black. He had forced her to change out of her wet clothes aboard the boat and into the khaki shift.

Carefully, Safia stared around her. The room was stone walls, plank flooring. It stank of fried onions and dirty feet. The cot was the only furnishing. A single door of stout oak stood closed. No doubt locked.

She lay unmoving for several more minutes. Her mind floated, half deadened by the aftereffects of the drug they had given her. Still, deep inside her, panic coiled around her heart. She was alone, captured. The others dead. She pictured flames in the night, reflecting off storm-swept water. The memory had burned into her like a camera flash in the dark. All red, painful, too bright to blink away. Her breathing tightened, throat closed down. She wanted to cry but couldn’t. If she started, she would never stop.

Finally, she pushed up and rolled her feet to the floor. It was not with any determination beyond the heavy pressure in her bladder. Biological need, a reminder that she lived. She stood, unsteady, a hand against the wall. The stones were welcoming cool.

She stared up at the barred window. From the heat, the angle of the sun, it had to be close to midday. But which day? Where was she? She smelled the sea and the sand. Still in Arabia, she was sure. She crossed the room. The burning in her bladder sharpened.

She hobbled to the door, lifted an arm. Would they merely drug her again? She fingered the purple bruise at the angle of her left arm, where the needle had dug in. She had no choice. Need outweighed caution. She pounded on the door and called out hoarsely, “Hello! Can anyone hear me?” She repeated her words in Arabic.

No one answered.

She knocked harder, stinging her knuckles, an ache flaring between her shoulder blades. She was weak, dehydrated. Had they left her here to die?

Finally, footsteps responded. A heavy bar scraped against wood. The door swung open. She found herself facing the same man as before. He stood a half a foot taller than she, looming in a black shirt and scuffed, faded jeans. She was surprised to find his head shaved. She didn’t remember that. No, he had been wearing a black cap then. The only hair on his head were his dark eyebrows and a small tuft at his chin. But she did not forget those eyes, blue and cold, unreadable, passionless. A shark’s eyes.

She shivered as he stared at her, the heat suddenly gone from the room.

“You’re up,” he said. “Come with me.”

She heard a trace of an Aussie accent, but one blunted by years away from home. “Where…I have to use the lavatory.”

He frowned at her and strode away. “Follow me.”

He led her to a small hall bath. It had a squat toilet, curtainless shower, and a small stained washbasin with a leaking tap. Safia ducked inside. She reached a hand to the door, unsure if she would be allowed privacy.

“Don’t be long,” he said, pulling the door the rest of the way shut.

Alone, she searched the room for some weapon, some means of escape. Again the lone window was barred. But she could at least see out of this one. She hurried forward and stared out at the small township below, nestled against the sea. Palm trees and white buildings spread between her and the water. Off to the left, a flutter of rainbow-colored tarps and awnings marked off a market souk. And in the distance, green patches beyond the city defined banana, coconut, sugarcane, and papaya plantations.