Sandstorm (Sigma Force 1)

“Did they come back down?” Painter urged, speaking now in Arabic, slowly infiltrating the conversation. Perhaps his own brown skin, ambiguously ethnic, helped alleviate their suspicion of his foreignness.

“No,” the sheikh answered, waving a hand toward the rising lands. “They stay at the tomb of Nabi Ayoub.”

Painter stared up the dark road. So they were still up there. Omaha stood by the open passenger door. He had heard the exchange.

“Enough already,” he urged. “Let’s get going,”

The Bait Kathir had begun to round up their camels and shoo them off the road. The beasts protested with gurgles and angry belches.

“Wait,” Painter said. He turned to Captain al-Haffi. “How much money do you have left from the sale of the stallion?”

The man shrugged. “Nothing but a handful of rials.”

“Enough to buy or rent a few camels?”

The captain’s eyes narrowed. “You want the camels. For what? Cover?”

“To get closer to the tomb. A small group of us.”

The captain nodded and turned to Sheikh Emir. They spoke rapidly, two leaders conferring.

Omaha stepped to Painter. “The van is faster.”

“On these roads, not much faster. And with the camels, we should be able to get very close to the tomb without alerting Cassandra’s group. I’m sure she noted these tribesmen on her way up. Their presence will not be unexpected. Just a part of the natural landscape.”

“And what do we do when we’re up there?”

Painter already had a plan in mind. He told Omaha the gist of it. By the time he was done, Captain al-Haffi had reached some agreement with the sheikh.

“He will lend us his camels,” the captain said.

“How many?”

“All of them.” The captain answered Painter’s look of surprise. “It is unseemly for a Bedu to refuse the request of a guest. But there is a condition.”

“What is that?”

“I told them of our wish to rescue a woman from the group up at the tomb. They are most agreeable to help. It would be an honor to them.”

“Plus they like to shoot their guns,” Barak added.

Painter was reluctant to put them in danger.

Omaha did not share his hesitation. “They do have weapons. If your plan is going to work, the more firepower the better.”

Painter had to agree.

With Painter’s acquiescence, the sheikh broke into a broad grin and rallied his men. Saddles were cinched, camels were dropped into crouched positions for easy mounting, and ammunition was spread around like party favors.

Painter pulled his own group together, pooled in the headlights of the Eurovan. “Kara, I want you to stay behind with the van.”

She opened her mouth to protest, but it was a weak effort. Her face shone with a film of sweat, despite the wind and chill of the night.

Painter cut her off. “We’ll need someone to hide the van off the road, then bring it forward on my signal. Clay and Danny will stay with you with a rifle and a pistol. If we should fail, and Cassandra flees with Safia, you’ll be the only ones able to track them.”

Kara frowned, hard lines creasing her face, but she nodded. “You’d better not fail,” she said fiercely. But even this outburst seemed to tax her.

To the side, Danny argued with his brother, wanting to come along.

Omaha stood firm. “You don’t even have your goddamn eyeglasses. You’ll just end up shooting me in the ass by mistake.” Still, he placed a hand on his younger brother’s shoulder. “And I’m counting on you here. You’re the last line against trouble. I can’t risk losing her again.”

Danny nodded and backed down.

Clay had no objection to being left behind. He stood a step away, a burning cigarette in his fingers. His eyes stared at nothing, almost glazed over. He was nearing the end of his ability to handle all this.

With matters decided, Painter turned to the waiting camels. “Mount up!”

Omaha strode beside him. “Have you ever ridden a camel?”

“No.” Painter glanced at him.

For the first time in the past day, Omaha wore a wide grin as he stepped away. “This’ll be fun.”

7:05 P.M.

B ATHED IN the beams of two floodlights, Cassandra watched as one of Kane’s men waved the metal detector over the back wall of the niche. Just right of center in the wall, the detector buzzed with discovery. She tightened and turned to Safia. “You knew something would be found. How?”

Safia shrugged. “The iron heart had been posted by the coastal tomb of Imran, hidden in a sandstone sculpture. It pointed here. Up into the mountains. It only made sense that the next marker would be something similar. Another piece of iron, like the heart. The only mystery was where it was located.”

Cassandra stared at the wall. Despite the frustrated anger she felt for the prisoner, the curator had indeed proven her worth. “What now?”

Safia shook her head. “It will have to be dug out. Freed from the stone. Like the iron heart from the statue.” She faced Cassandra. “We’ll have to proceed with caution. A single misstep and the buried artifact could be damaged. It will take days to extract it.”

“Perhaps not.” Cassandra turned and strode away, leaving Safia under Kane’s watch. Stepping out of the prayer room, she crossed back toward the trucks, following the white gravel path through the dark gardens. As she marched past the entrance to the main tomb, a flicker of shadow caught her eye.

In a fluid motion, Cassandra dropped to a knee, sweeping a pistol from her shoulder holster, fueled by reflex and wariness. She covered the entrance and waited a full two breaths. Winds whispered the fronds of a palmetto bush. Her ears strained to listen.

Nothing. No movement from the tomb.

She rose smoothly, pistol held steady on the opening. She sidled toward the entrance, stepping off the path and onto the bare dirt to avoid the crunch of gravel. She reached the doorway, covered one side of the room, edged in, and swept the other. The back windows allowed in enough reflected glow from the powerful work lights next door.

The grave mound was a shadowed hummock. There was no furniture. No place to hide. The tomb was empty.

She backed out and holstered her pistol. Just a mirage of shadows and lights. Perhaps someone had stepped in front of one of the work lights.

With a final glance around, she swung back to the path. With determined strides, she marched off toward the waiting trucks and silently scolded herself for jumping at shadows.