Bodyguard Lockdown(7)

“My parents will be safer without me around.”

An engine gunned behind them. Booker swore, his eyes focused on the rearview mirror, his grip locked on the steering wheel. “Hold on!”

A sedan darted around a corner, slammed into their back bumper. Sandra flew forward, hit the dash with her shoulder. She gripped the dashboard, then swung around, saw the car.

Two Caucasian men. The one in the passenger seat shifted halfway out the window and pointed a machine gun at their car.

“Gun, Booker!”

He slammed on the brake, jerked the steering wheel left and sent the car skidding around the nearest corner.

The sedan whipped around the corner behind them, its tires screeching.

Booker hit the gas, broke free of the city and headed out to the desert.

He glanced at the dashboard gauges. “Let’s see what this baby can do.”

He swerved off the road onto the sandy plains. Brush banged against the hood, scraped the underbelly and shook the frame until Sandra’s teeth rattled.

“Hold on.” He spotted the ravine between two sand dunes in the distance.

Sandra followed his eyes. “Going fast in a narrow space might not be the best idea.”

Booker cut the wheel into a tight turn and headed straight into the ravine. “If you have a better one, now would be the time to share it.”

The sedan turned off the road, following them.

“Where’s your gun?” Sandra lowered the passenger window. Wind slapped at her face, kicked grit and dust into the car. “I can stop them with a few well-placed bullets.”

“There is no way you are going to shoot at them hanging out the damn window!”

“It’s my better idea.” She held out her hand. “Give me your pistol.”

“Killing people goes against the Hippocratic oath.”

“I don’t have to shoot them. I can take out their tires.”

“Not today.” Even if she could, it would only increase the chance she’d get shot or thrown from the vehicle.



Their car hit a rut, slammed them both back in their seats. Booker forced the car onto a flat path, hugged the right side of the ravine.

“Switch with me!” he ordered, then unsnapped his seat belt.

“What?”

“You’re small. Unbuckle, and scoot over.” He pushed the seat back as far as it could go. “Then place your right foot on the accelerator.

“Of all the stupid...” she muttered. “My shooting them would be easier than this.” Still, she unsnapped her seat belt.

Gritting his teeth, he hooked one arm around her back and lifted her onto his thighs. “Put your foot on the gas, and your hands on the steering wheel.”

“Got it.”

Dodging the steering wheel, she wiggled down between his thighs.

“Okay,” she breathed, her knuckles white, her eyes focused on the landscape.



He slid out from under her, ignoring the jab of the middle console, then maneuvered to the other seat. “Keep clear of the brush and walls. I don’t want to dodge anything but bullets, got me?” he ordered, his harsh voice cutting across the air rushing through the open passenger window.

Gunfire pelted their back window, shattering the glass.

* * *

SANDRA DIDN’T SCREAM. Instead she hit the gas.

“Hold on!” She swerved the car, barely missing twin boulders. Booker grabbed the window frame.

“What the hell are you doing?”

“Trying to keep us alive. This ravine is like a minefield.”

“Just keep this damn thing steady and ahead of them. Without pitching me out the window.” He aimed his pistol through the back window and emptied the clip into the other car’s windshield.

The driver slumped forward. The car skidded, hit the wall, then flipped on its back. Spinning. Once, twice. Its belly burst into flames.

“Hit the accelerator. We just created a bonfire for all their friends to see.” Booker turned back and settled in the passenger seat. “Not bad, Doc. Not bad at all.”

“Thanks.” But a fear was there, one that creased her forehead. “I think.”



“Drive back to the road.” He glanced at the gas gauge. Full. Perfect. “Then head east.”

“East?” Sandra asked, suspicious. “Why?”

“We need a place to lie low for a while,” Booker replied.

“What place?”

“Omasto.” He leaned his head back against the seat and closed his eyes. “Don’t worry, Doc, you’ll fit right in.”

“And why is that?”

“Your friends the Al Asheera might be there.”

* * *

TRYGG SHOVED HIS FOOT against the nearest of the two dead men. Years of self-restraint made him hold back the disgust that threatened to let loose.

These men were lucky McKnight killed them. Trygg would’ve done much worse had they survived without Sandra Haddad in hand.

At his sentencing, the judge told him he wasn’t God. But the judge was wrong. They were all wrong.

On the battlefield, he was God. And the men who’d serve him would be indestructible.

Archangels.

Colonel Jim Rayo took the nearest man’s chin and tilted it until he could see his features. “Can’t be dead more than a few hours, General.”

Trygg glanced at the second body, badly burned by the car fire. “How about the others from the apartment? Are they also dead?”



“Yes, sir,” Jim replied, frowning. “One man at the apartment was King Jarek’s. If McKnight killed him, he’ll suspect we have others in the palace.” Jim stood and grimly faced the open desert.

“What’s on your mind, Jim?”

“Booker McKnight is a top military man. He just killed nine of our men and took Sandra Haddad.”

“They weren’t our best men. We chose these men specifically. We wanted her to escape. We need her to retrieve the cylinders.”

“Yes, sir,” Jim responded slowly, knowing he was walking a minefield. “But we still may have underestimated Booker McKnight.”

“You might be right,” Trygg said after a moment. “I want you to inform our Al Asheera allies that there is a bounty of one million dollars on Sandra Haddad. Alive. Another million on McKnight. Dead.” Trygg walked beside him and slapped his shoulder. “Let’s keep the pressure on.”

But the uneasiness didn’t shake itself from between Jim’s shoulders. He understood Booker’s grief, his drive to find the men responsible. Glancing back, he found the general studying him.

“Everything okay, Colonel?”

“Yes, sir,” Jim answered in a short, clipped tone. His jaw tight, his features carefully blank.

The general’s strategies had never failed them.

Yet, came the whispered thought.

“Let me know if anything changes, Colonel.”

Understanding Booker’s grief didn’t change twenty years of loyalty to Trygg.

“I will, sir.”

* * *

ALMOST IMMEDIATELY SANDRA’S adrenaline wore off. Her eyes blinked with fatigue while Booker drove through the night in relative silence. Sandra eventually pushed her seat back and slept.

Dawn broke over the horizon a few hours later. The heat of the morning sun drove up the temperature.

Booker clicked on the air conditioner, felt immediate relief.

They were at less then a quarter of a tank, but only twenty miles from the settlement of Omasto.

Most desert towns were little more than encampments of canvas tents and stick. Some, the more permanent residents, made their homes of stone and animal skins.

Many only stopped to rest, drink water, buy food or fuel. Most used the settlement for trade. Cloth, spices and cookware crowded makeshift tables, spilled over onto blankets covering the sand.

But there were a few, the more corrupt, who bartered in the shadows. Their wares of weapons turned a larger profit out of the hot sun. Away from the inquisitive, the talkative.

Booker needed the latter if he were to keep Sandra safe.

And he knew the man who’d deal with him. The same man who’d tipped him off about her kidnapping. Aaron Sabra. Ex-con. Black-market dealer.

Sandra shifted; her breath deepened.

He’d watched her sleep a hundred times, tangled in the comforter and sheets. Most times, he kissed her awake until the comforter slipped to the floor and tangled limbs took its place.

Now a silk curtain of hair covered part of her face. The dark strands were stark against her pale skin, deepening the shadows beneath her eyes.

Sleep softened the stubborn chin, the feminine pride. Left the vulnerability bare in the soft, delicate lines of her face.

For a moment he ignored the sand, the danger.

The responsibility to his deceased wife and his men.