Chapter 8
Jeddah, Saudi Arabia
Something had shifted between her handing him the plate of tomato-y snotty eggs and this instant.
He didn’t know what, but her entire posture and demeanor shrank from him.
It had gotten worse when he’d talked about the safari—the route he’d hoped to take advantage of to effect an escape.
But he couldn’t tell her that. Not yet. She was too determined that he not do anything on her behalf.
“Sabah al-khayr,” spoke the prince.
Owen stared at the phone, dumbfounded. Arabic?
“He said ‘good morning,’” Leighton whispered from beside him.
“Good morning, Prince Rayan. This is Apollo.”
“Mr. Apollo,” the prince said evenly. “ I heard about your unfortunate incident.”
“Yeah, fun in reverse,” Owen said, not really interested in rehashing all that. “Listen, I wanted to verify something you told me.”
“Of course. How can I help?”
This guy was entirely too nice. “Seems there’s a bit of confusion about whether the safari is happening or not.”
“The flight departs tomorrow morning at six.”
“And…Nouri is going?”
“You will both be on the jet.”
Leighton arched her eyebrow.
“Good to know.”
“Please be ready for pickup at five a.m. ”
“Are we supposed to pack? How long is the—”
“Fourteen days. All will be provided.”
“Understood. Thank you.”
Leighton turned away and wore a track in the floor as she chewed that thumbnail again, worry plain on her face.
Owen sensed she wanted to talk without extra ears listening. And look at the time… “Ready for the garden?”
She whirled. “Yes!”
This time, they didn’t get lost on the way down.
By the time they reached the far wall, Leighton looked ready to combust. “I don’t get it,” she snapped, walking the length of the path that ran parallel to the brick wall. “Why are they taking me? Do they want me to have some terrible accident?”
“But you said they wanted to get your mom here—that can’t happen if they off you.”
“Wow, don’t spare my feelings.”
“I only—”
“Yeah, yeah, I know,” she growled. “I know they aren’t being nice to me—we’ve both seen that in this family, the kindness gene is missing.”
Did she realize that meant she wasn’t kind too?
As if she read his thoughts, she glowered at him. “Don’t.”
Owen huffed a laugh.
“I see the wheels of your brain turning, Apollo,” she bit out. “You want me to escape while we are on safari.”
Oh, that. “It would be feasible. My team—”
“Listen to me,” she snarled, rushing at him. “It is not feasible. It will not happen.”
Surprised by her venom, he held up his hands. “Hey,” he said quietly. “Listen to your voice—it’s pitched, frantic. That’s fear. Fear is driving that decision.”
“Yes,” she railed. “Yes, it is. I am afraid you will get Ummi killed. These people are capable of that.”
“Agreed,” he said gently, “but they’re also capable of killing you. A moment ago, you were afraid they wanted you to die out there.”
She swallowed hard, uncertainty filling in the gaps between her vehemence. “Do you think that’s why they’re letting me go? So I’ll die?”
What a loaded question. “It’s a legitimate concern. And I know you’re dead set against me extracting you, but that is my mission. My goal. I will not let you die, and I will not leave you here.”
With a groan, she buried her face in her hands, then scrubbed them through her hair beneath her head covering as she pivoted away. Walked to the long hedgerow.
“I’m not going to let them make the first move, not against you, Leighton.” He cringed at using her real name aloud but knew they were far from snooping ears.
“And if I forbid you from doing anything?”
He considered her for a hot second. Knew if he told her his stance on that, she’d fight him. And things would be infinitely more complicated.
“Unbelievable!” She whimpered and angled in, shaking her head. “What is wrong with you? Why can’t you understand that I want to save my ummi?”
A thought struck him then. “Why don’t you call her ‘Mom’?”
The question made her withdraw. She sighed, this time moving back and forth but not quite pacing.
“It’s not an easy answer—and it’s confusing.
I don’t want my mother—the one who raised me—to think my biological mother is more important.
So, using the Arabic term for mother creates distinction.
” Sagging against the wall, she looked at the sky.
“It’s probably dumb, but it seemed better than calling her Yasmina, as if she were a friend or some other person I know.
And it helps me avoid the ‘adoptive mom,’ ‘biological mom’ thing. ”
“Both moms are important to you.”
“Yeah,” she said with relief.
“And you knew…where you came from?”
She nodded. “It was necessary—vital that I knew. I grew up being told my story, that I was born here in Jeddah and was secreted to America. All my life, it was this huge secret. They taught me that I must be good, must be quiet about the past or Ummi would die. My parents always said Ummi was brave, that she loved me and risked her own life to save mine.”
Now he was tracking. “So you feel you have to do the same for her.”
Wide, brown eyes pooled with unshed tears. “Yes,” she breathed, then her expression knotted as she came off the wall. “Yet…no. Never have I felt that I have to do this for her. It has only ever been that I want to.”
“You want to be the hero too.”
Leighton looked to the pebbled path. “Wow, that makes me sound so shallow.”
“Wanting to be the hero isn’t a bad thing.”
“I’m not looking for glory or to be hailed a hero,” Leighton said as she wandered the gardens. “I just…I want her safe. After what she did to ensure I was safe, I need to do that for her. Really, I want all of us safe.”
He understood then that what he had taken for granted his whole life, she had never experienced. “I legit cannot imagine what it must’ve been like to grow up keeping this dark secret. What an albatross to hang over a kid’s head.”
She stopped and looked at him, head tilted. “You aren’t hearing me—it wasn’t a burden.”
“Actually, it was,” he countered, wishing she could see how this had affected her entire life. “A big one. But a burden isn’t always bad. It’s heavy, for sure.”
Leighton absorbed his words, then conceded with a slow nod.
A sharp whistle crackled in his ear. “Augh!” He touched the spot.
“Apollo, you there?”
“You okay?” Leighton asked, drawing closer.
At the sound of Pike’s voice via the implant, Owen turned his back to the palace. “Yeah.”
“You alone?”
Owen skated a glance in her direction. “I’m with Nouri.”
She angled toward him with a very confused look.
“What’s your sit-rep?” Pike asked.
“They’re a bit hands-on here, but we’re holding our own. Tomorrow, we leave for a two-week safari.”
“Interesting.”
“Maybe an ideal situation for an extraction.”
“No!” Leighton snapped, eyes wide. “Who are you talking to? How are you talking to them?” Panic scratched into her pretty face. “I told you—”
He moved away, keeping his head up in case anyone was watching, so they wouldn’t figure out he was on comms with the team.
“We’ll get into their system. Work something out.”
“Sounds good.” Only then did he wonder why she wasn’t bothering him or interrupting him. When he glanced over his shoulder to her, he found her gone. What? Where…? He scanned the gardens and spotted her abaya fluttering through the inner garden. Son of a biscuit! “Gotta go.”
“Problem?”
“Yeah, all five-seven of her.” With a loud pop, the comms went inactive as he broke into a jog, which sent shards of fire through his side and lungs from the cracked rib.
But if she went inside without him, they’d both get more hands-on hospitality.
And by her fuming expression, she knew that and was willing to endure it.
All to stop him from talking with the team.
He cut across the gardens to reach her quicker. “Nouri!”
Grabbing the door handle, she shot him a seething look.
He crashed into the door, choking the breath from him, but he’d successfully stopped her. “What’s going on?”
“I told you,” she hissed, “I’m not—”
A ghostlike figure appeared on the other side of the glass door.
Leighton flinched and yelped. Then gave a nervous laugh to Prince Rayan, who stood on the other side watching them. Had he seen their argument? Her rushing away while he was standing there talking to thin air?
Owen drew open the door. “Ah, just the prince I’d hoped to see.”
Stepping aside as they entered the narrow passage, Rayan eyed them. “It would seem being American does not automatically make you two friends.”
“Not even close,” Leighton snarled as she shifted to the other side of Rayan.
Owen stepped in—and a blur came at him, amid a flurry of Arabic. A knifehand strike nailed the side of his neck. He heard a crack even as the air gusted from the blow. Before he could make sense of what’d just happened, he heard shouts. Saw Nasir and Rayan pull off a red-faced Hassan.
Choking, neck throbbing, Owen shifted back, ready to fight if someone came at him again.
“Are you okay?” Leighton’s eyes were wide. Filled with panic and fear.
He nodded, but felt the spot the guy had struck. Recalled that crack—had the guy broken the implant? A knot was forming there. “What was that for?”
The crown prince and his brother drew away the enraged Hassan.
“He said you are a dog who should not be here.”
Owen blinked. “What…?”
“I fear,” Rayan said as the others left, “he saw you blocking the princess’s path.”
For the love of all that was holy… “He hates her,” Owen objected.
“Yes, but she belongs to House al-Zahrani. You do not.”
“Got it,” Owen said around a grunt in his aching throat.