Page 111 of Down and Dirty

He smiled for the first time in days. “I run like hell. That’s what Uncle Danny says.”

Their opportunity did not come till early that evening when Daoud finally came with a tray of food for them: hamburgers, Frankish fries, and fizzy drinks from that Scottish place, McDonald’s. Daoud placed the tray on the table and said, “I will release the arm restraints. Samir first.” Daoud’s English was excellent compared to Arsallah and the others. “While he is eating, I will hold a gun to your head, Miss Asado. The least wrong move by Samir, and you will be dead. Likewise, when he is tied up again, you will eat while a gun is to his head. Do you both understand?”

The second Daoud bent down to untie Sammy’s ropes, she, still sitting, smote him over the head with the chair leg. He went down, unconscious, immediately. Sammy ran to the door to lock it. She tore off a piece of Daoud’s shert and stuffed it in his mouth. Then she tied his hands behind his back and his ankles together. Quickly, she moved the table over by the window and put Sammy on top.

“Are you ready?”

He nodded.

“Once I hit the window, the noise may attract the others, so there will be no time to hesitate. What are you going to do, Sammy?”

“Run like hell.”

She tried to smile and cracked her lip even more.

“If I am not able to follow,” she said, her voice choking up, “tell your father… tell Zachary that I love him.”

She cracked the window open then, shoved Sammy through, and immediately heard shouts upstairs. It took her a bit longer to get through the window, and by then the basement door had been broken down and there were orders to go after them.

Britta began running in the opposite direction from Sammy, what she had planned all along. It was not an easy exercise with her injured ankle. She could hear the men coming after her, the distance closing between them. Then there was the sound of gunfire.

She glanced right and left. On the one side was a steep hill, which would only slow her down more. On the right side was a steep incline leading to a rocky beach. The ocean or a lake, she could not be sure.

Her best choice lay in running forward, but then she felt a sharp pain in her back. It must be a bullet from one of the weapons. The pain drew her up short. She stumbled. Fell. Then rolled over and over and over, each rock and sharp bramble digging into her already bruised flesh. She could feel a warm substance — blood? — running down her back. She crashed to the bottom, striking her head on a boulder. The pain was excruciating, but soon it eased.

She thought she saw a flock of black birds flying overhead. A sign of death in Norse legends. The ravens of death. Berserk warriors often saw the vultures in the midst of battle.

With a long sigh, she surrendered to her destiny. The Norns of Fate had won.

So, this is death.

Chapter 19

You win some, you lose some…

The next day, Cage drove Zach to the small Bella Rosa police station near a private airfield fifty miles from San Diego. Cage drove because Zach’s hands were shaking so badly.

Cage’s Jeep was first in a caravan, followed by vehicles holding other SEALs, police, FBI, CIA, State Department, and Department of Defense reps, and Zach’s family: his father and mother, who had put aside their differences for this occasion, Danny, and his grandfather and grandmother. And the news media, of course, who couldn’t be kept away.

Zach had gone through absolute hell the past four days. The first twenty-four hours were bad when Aljazeera had shown an interview with Arsallah, who played the meek-and-injured-party card, pleading for some of his evil cohorts to be released from prison. Like that was ever going to happen. The tangos in question were the worst of the worst. Arsallah had forced Sammy to repeat his demands, interspersed with anti-American insults. Britta had sat in the background, looking a bit bruised but not too bad. He had assumed by the tilt of her chin that she’d declined Arsallah’s “invitation” to speak that time.

But then yesterday, Zach had received a manila envelope containing photos and a tape. These were bad. Really bad. But at least they were not body parts, as he had feared.

They must not have fed Sammy and Britta much or given them more than a minimum of liquids since their capture, because their faces were drawn and haggard. Sammy had bruises over every inch of exposed skin. Britta… poor Britta… had one eye swollen shut, a bleeding, puffy lip, cuts and bruises, and possibly a broken ankle. Her chin had still been raised defiantly as she gave her canned bullshit talk to Arsallah’s cameraman.

On the day of their escape, Britta had somehow managed to get herself and Sammy out of the basement they had been kept in. Sammy had hidden in the garage of an abandoned gas station till the next morning, fearing that he would be caught by Arsallah’s men. Which gave Arsallah’s men time to leave the area. Hell, they’d probably left the country by now. And Britta, well, she had not yet been found. Zach had been warned to expect the worst.

When they got to the police station, Zach told Cage, “Hold everyone off. Let me have some private time with Sammy first. Okay?”

Cage nodded and squeezed his shoulder.

Zach opened the door.

Sammy saw him first and screamed, “Daaaa-ddyyyyy!” as he rushed forward and launched himself into his arms, hugging him tight with his legs straddling his chest. The boy was squeezing so tight that Zach could barely breathe. But who the hell cared about that! Tears ran down Zach’s face and onto Sammy’s neck. Sammy’s tears wet Zach’s neck, too.

Pushing his way into an interrogation room and slamming the door with his foot, Zach sat down and just held Sammy in his lap, head pressed against his heart. His clothing was filthy, and he smelled like he’d wet his pants a time or two, or worse, but he was whole and alive, and that was all that mattered.

Finally, Sammy pulled his head back and said, “I escaped.”