Tearing off a piece of the crusty flat bread, she dipped it into the cup and mashed the soggy bread to the roof of her mouth. Her tongue had that thick, raw feel to it from when she’d bitten the side. “I’m sorry you got dragged into this.”
“Not your fault. They took Amara and Sarah too.”
She stopped chewing and closed her eyes.Shit. “Did they take any others?”
“I don’t think so. They kept me with the other two until last night. They brought me in here and told me to fix you.” Her eyes became sad. “You are the only one they’ve beaten.”
“I’m the only white woman.” She accepted another piece of bread Anuli offered her.
“Maybe they won’t hit you if you make the video.”
Not likely.“They’ll find something to beat me for even if I make the video.”
“You have to do something, Miss Emme. They’ll kill you if they beat you again.”
“They won’t. They want the ransom.” She hoped her voice sounded more sure than she felt. Her eyes stung as she blinked back the tears.
It was too much money. The NGO wasn’t going to pay it and her family sure as hell couldn’t afford ten million dollars. Even as a retired one-star, her dad didn’t have that kind of collateral.
Tears spilled over. She brushed them away.That’s not going to help.“How long have we been here?”
Anuli looked at the sliver of daylight filtering in through the small window. “Jum’ah was three or four days ago.”
“Was that the only one since we’ve been taken?”
“The second.”
Two Fridays. They’d been taken on a Wednesday, so they’d been in captivity for two weeks.Think, Emme.“Did you hear the call to prayer?”
Anuli shook her head. “No. We could hear the men praying in the other room.” She pointed at the high window.
If Anuli didn’t hear the call to prayer, they weren’t near a village. Even the smallest village played the call to prayer. “Do you know where they took us?”
Another head shake. “They put bags over our heads. We drove for a long time. The sun was setting when we arrived here.”
She needed a plan. Something to keep her mind on. Wait or try to escape? What to do?
“W2D2?”Doug’s voice whispered in her mind.What Would Dad Do?She smiled and winced when her lip split. Their inside joke as kids. They’d ask each other “W2D2” whenever they found themselves in tight spot or needed to figure something out. What would her special-operations, combat-veteran father do?
Anything it takes.
He’d move heaven and earth to get her. Pull in every marker and call every contact he had. Hell, she wouldn’t put it past him to go through the back ofSoldier of Fortunemagazine and call every two-bit, mercenary wanna-be if it meant getting her out alive.
All she had to do was stay alive.
