The Forbidden Tomb

37

Kamal stared at the lavish home of Hassan and swallowed hard. Of the eight men who had been sent after Sarah, only Kamal and the lookout he had assigned to the boiler room had survived the cisterns. Despite the staggering amount of bloodshed that occurred in the tunnels, both men realized that their biggest threat still lay ahead.

They had yet to face their boss.

Nothing that day had gone as Kamal had intended. Tarek and five others were dead, and their target had eluded them. Worse still, an entire city block of Hassan’s territory had been utterly demolished, and Kamal had no idea who was responsible.

He would be punished for his failures.

He was sure of that.

For a fleeting instant, Kamal considered running away. He wondered how far he could get before dawn and how long it would be before Hassan placed a bounty on his head. In the end, it didn’t matter. Hassan would demand blood, and there were few places Kamal could hide for any length of time. He was way too large and too well known to hide anywhere in Egypt, and if Hassan turned the whole underworld against him with a promise of riches, he would have to leave the hemisphere.

No, running away wouldn’t solve his problems; it would only make them worse.

So he climbed the stairs to meet his fate.

Hassan’s bodyguard Awad answered the door. He smiled wide when he saw Kamal and the other henchman on the porch. It wasn’t a friendly greeting. It was excitement over what was to come. Awad didn’t want to miss Kamal’s explanation of what had happened in the city — or the consequences that would follow.

Without saying a word, Awad led them into the house.

As Kamal passed the foyer mural, he glanced at the image of the treasure thief who had found mercy through admitting his crimes. When his trusted servant had wronged him, Pharaoh Ramses had granted the misguided craftsman a reprieve. Kamal wondered if Hassan would be so forgiving or if he would live up to his fiery reputation.

Kamal would find out soon enough.

As he stepped into Hassan’s office, his eye was drawn to the center of his boss’s desk. The gleaming Desert Eagle .50 was still there, loaded and ready to be fired.

Hassan looked up at him from across the room. His eyes were fiery with rage. The veins in his neck bulged, as if ready to erupt. ‘Sit down.’

The words were growled more than they were spoken.

Kamal and the lookout did as they were told. They dared not speak until spoken to, but as the silence drew out, they began to second-guess their decision. Finally, after the quietest minute of their lives, Hassan vented his anger.

‘A whole city block — gone! Police and soldiers everywhere! The eyes of the world upon us! Do you realize how much this will cost me?’

The loss of life was of little interest to Hassan. He was more concerned with the financial considerations of the tragedy. It was hard to collect from dead tenants.

Hassan slammed his fist down onto his desk. ‘I gave you and your boyfriend six men to find the girl! More than enough to bring her back to me! Instead, you destroy my city and return with nothing. At best, your actions are incompetent. At worst, they reek of defiance. Is that what this is, a mutiny?’

Kamal knew Hassan was addressing him and only him. Hassan had given him the responsibility to find Dade’s friend, and he alone was to answer for the calamity. Unfortunately, the lookout — who had never met Hassan before today — ignored the chain of command and charged in with a defense of their actions.

‘I swear, it was not our fault,’ he pleaded. ‘We did everything we could. There were others protecting the girl. At least—’

All it took was a glance from Hassan for his bodyguard to spring into action. Awad grabbed the unsuspecting lookout from behind, forced his head back, and pried his jaw open. Before the lookout could say a word, Awad pulled a small stiletto from his belt and severed the lookout’s tongue from the base of his mouth. Not wanting to spill any blood in Hassan’s meticulous office, Awad left the meaty hunk of muscle in the victim’s mouth and then pulled his forearm under the lookout’s chin, forcing his jaw shut.

Hassan barely blinked. ‘Don’t say another word.’

The henchman struggled for breath as Awad kept his grip tight. It wasn’t the chokehold that was cutting off his air; it was the lifeless tongue in his mouth and the blood draining down his throat. As his lungs began to fill, he strained against the grasp of the muscular bodyguard, slowly but surely drowning in his own bodily fluids.

Despite the distraction, Hassan continued his questioning. ‘Is this true? There was someone protecting the girl?’

They were the most unsettling questions Kamal had ever heard. Not because of the words themselves, but because of the coldness of the man asking them. Hassan carried on like there was nothing else happening — as if they were alone in his office and there wasn’t a man fighting for his life in the chair next to Kamal. Even more chilling, the tortured agony seemed to have a calming effect on Hassan.

Kamal nodded. ‘She was not alone. Two of our men were shot. The others were disemboweled. There is simply no way she could have killed that many men in that many places in that short a time. Not by herself. Only a demon could do such a thing.’

There was something about his description that gave Hassan a moment of pause. Kamal could see the concern on his face. Hassan’s eyes shifted uneasily, as if the destruction of his city made perfect sense. His lip curled in thought.

Hassan glanced at Awad as he spoke. ‘Did you see these other forces?’

Kamal didn’t know what was going on, but he knew better than to delay his response. ‘No. I only saw the bodies they left behind.’

‘Do you believe that they survived the explosion?’

Kamal couldn’t see how anyone could have survived the blast, but he also didn’t believe it was a suicide mission. It stood to reason that those who triggered the explosion were well clear of the area before it went off.

Kamal swallowed hard. ‘I do.’

Hassan rocked back in his chair. He said nothing as he contemplated his next move. After a few moments of silence, he leaned forward and delivered his order. ‘Find them. The girl and her guardians. Bring them to me, dead or alive.’

‘Yes, sir. Of course, sir.’

‘Take whomever you need, whatever you need. But do not fail me again.’

Kamal nodded. ‘I won’t, sir. I promise.’

‘Now leave me,’ he said with a wave of his hand. Then he turned his gaze to the lifeless body in the other chair. ‘And take him with you.’

The forward lounge of the yacht was designed for entertainment. It included a well-stocked bar and a selection of comfortable couches and chairs from which the passengers could take in the scenery. A semicircle of floor-to-ceiling windows offered sweeping views of the sea or the current port of call. When there was little to see — moonless nights on the open ocean can result in a stunningly blank panorama — the space could be converted into a de facto theater room. With the touch of a button, a massive flat-screen television could be dropped from a hidden compartment in the ceiling.

Like everything else on the boat, the design was meticulous.

No expense was spared.

While it would be several more hours before Garcia could determine if there was any recoverable data on Jasmine and Sarah’s flashlights, he had been able to access the footage from the other hard drives immediately. As Cobb lowered the screen in order to view the recordings that he and McNutt had made in the tunnels, Sarah stared vacantly through the glass walls. It was a look Cobb had seen before.

He didn’t need to ask her what was wrong.

He already knew what she was thinking.

‘Now’s as good a time as any, don’t you think?’

It took Sarah a moment to realize that Cobb had spoken at all, much less that he had been addressing her. She turned from the vista of the marina and the open water beyond and saw Cobb linking one of Garcia’s laptops to the colossal monitor.

‘I’m sorry. What was that?’

Cobb glanced over his shoulder. ‘I said, we might as well talk about it now.’

Sarah furrowed her brow. ‘Talk about what?’

‘What do you think?’

Sarah knew there was no use in playing coy. Cobb had a way of knowing exactly what was on her mind. It was a connection she had never experienced before; and one she didn’t yet know how to handle.

She nodded knowingly. ‘You’re talking about Simon.’

Cobb said nothing. He merely waited for her to continue.

She pursed her lips. ‘Trust me, I’ve been thinking about it all night, and I honestly don’t know what to say. Why would the goons who chased Simon follow us into the tunnels?’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t believe that Simon set us up. Why would he do that? We’ve got nothing to do with this place. We’re not on anyone’s shit list.’

‘You’re right,’ Cobb said. ‘We have nothing to do with this place, but you do.’

Sarah flinched. ‘You think they were coming after me?’

He shrugged. ‘Maybe, maybe not. But if they hadn’t been chasing us, we would have had a much better chance of noticing the bombers. Instead, we were so preoccupied with the Bigfoot twins that we lost Jasmine in the chaos.’

He let the idea sink in.

Sarah often projected a ‘me against the world’ attitude, but Cobb saw through her tough exterior. He knew the thought of putting other lives at risk would get to her. It was an ember that would slowly smolder in her consciousness.

When the time was right, she would know how to use it.