Pushing Up Daisies (14 page)

Sarah patted the older woman's arm. “One day, you'll get it back.”

Hanifa sighed. “I fear many of our men will die in the effort, but that is the lot of women. We watch them die and have to carry on without them.”

Sarah nodded. “I'm beginning to understand your pain.

Hanifa smiled. “You know we also have men who wish to live as women. Our people allow this as their right to choose their own identity. There is one in the woman's tent right now. He has wished to wear Purdah and go as a woman since he was young. We do not believe in punishing this. What is in a person's heart is for us to accept.”

“That's such a great attitude. You could teach the world a thing or two.”

“Is it not this way in your culture?”

“No, it is not.”

When she was covered in her burqa and wearing the beaded veil, Sarah was actually relieved. Wearing only her purple-flowered dress left her feeling exposed and indecent.

The tent flap lifted and Daisy strode in wearing her khakis, her black T-shirt, plates, her forty-five and the ammo belts. The big rifle hung from her back on a strap and Sarah knew her thirty-eight was in a holster on her back where she could grab it fast.

“House and Abdalla's son just took off to call for the pickup,” she said. “I'm supposed to watch you. House has some crazy idea you're gonna be snatched by al Qaida.”

Sarah sat on a comfortable pillow as Hanifa brought her a breakfast of hot millet, camel's milk and tea. She dumped the camel's milk into the tea. After living in foreign countries all her life, Sarah did not spurn the food of different cultures and had consumed camel's milk when her father was working in the Egyptian embassy. He encouraged her to try everything and to participate in a country's culture through their cuisine.

The tea was warm and sweet. Hanifa had added honey which must be a rare commodity for the Rizeigat. While she ate, Daisy stared at her with a scowl on her face.

“What's wrong?” Sarah asked.

“What's right?” Daisy grunted. “House thinks he's going to own you and push me to the side.”

Sarah put her tea down and crawled to Daisy. She wrapped her arms around Daisy's stiff body. “I love you, Daisy. Don't allow him to push you away from me.”

“He's team leader,” she said. “I got to do what he says.”

“Only where the mission is concerned. He has no right to tell you who to love and care about.” Sarah tried to kiss Daisy's compressed lips and Daisy refused to respond. She took Sarah by the shoulders and pushed her away. “I'm on duty. You're my responsibility. We'll talk about this later.”

Sarah was just sitting down when she heard a noise outside the tent. It sounded like a muffled scream and a pop. Hanifa ran into the tent and collapsed. She was followed by a Somali pirate. Daisy pulled her pistol and shot the pirate in his face. She turned to the tent flap as two more pirates rushed in. Daisy capped both of them but one got off a shot. It hit Daisy under her left arm where the armor plates left a gap. As Daisy fell, she killed another pirate with a shot to his head.

An arm reached under the edge of the tent and grabbed Sarah's leg. She started to scream, but another pirate pushed through the tent door and tackled her. He lay on her with one hand over her mouth pressing something between her lips. She tasted salt and something bitter. It was a drug.

Sarah cast one last look at Daisy. Blood seeped out of a wound under her arm in a gap the armored plates didn't cover. Daisy couldn't lift her head but her eyes still sparkled with life and tears. Sarah looked into those beautiful eyes as the world spun. She watched Daisy's life drain into the sand as the fast-acting drug hit her and she succumbed to darkness.

* * * *

House ran to the top of a hill twenty miles from the camp. Nasr, his tongue lolling in a wolf smile ran with him. When House reached the hilltop, he shifted and stood naked with the phone tied around his neck. He unhooked the phone, switched it on and dialed the familiar number to headquarters. As he dialed, he prayed al Qaida had no way to listen. Tracking and listening to a cell phone was easy if you knew where it was. They would have to search for his signal and he planned to be off the phone way before they connected.

His handler answered the phone. With quick, succinct language, House fed them the coordinates and requested a pickup. He hung up after only three minutes. With any luck, al Qaida had not heard him pass on the critical numbers that represented their location.

Nasr grinned. “Running as a wolf is the most wonderful thing I have ever done.” He bowed to House. “You have given us a gift we can never repay. Our tribe will always be in your debt.”

House slapped Nasr on the back. “Talk to me in a couple of years and see if you feel the same way.”

They shifted and sat on the top of the hill surveying everything around them. With his enhanced vision, House saw a dust trail rising far away. Someone was traveling across the desert at a high rate of speed. He howled. The trail was close to the Bedouin camp and seemed to be heading north.

Nasr followed his line of sight and saw what House did. The two took off running as fast as they could for the camp. It was a long run. When they got there, they found Abdalla wailing with grief.

House shifted and dressed. Abdalla was waiting for him with tears running down his weathered cheeks. His red keffiyeh was askew. Tufts of gray hair stuck out from under it in clumps. Something bad had happened. House was almost too terrified to ask, but he had to know.

He grabbed Abdalla by his white robe. “What's wrong?”

The older man could barely speak. “My Hanifa, my beautiful wife…” he dissolved into heavy sobs.

Nasr ran past House to the women's tent. House abandoned Abdalla who was clearly overcome and followed Nasr. When he drew closer to the tent, his steps slowed. Where was Daisy? Why hadn't she come out to meet him?

He pushed through the crowd of men and women congregating around the door to the women's tent. Taking a deep breath, he plunged inside. The first thing he saw was Daisy's boots and blood. Next to her was a bundle of dark fabric and more blood. His heart stopped. Sarah!

He grabbed people and roughly shoved them aside. He knelt over the crumpled burqa and without thinking tore off the beaded veil. An older Rizeigat woman's dead eyes stared back at him. Relief flooded him. It wasn't Sarah. He closed the woman's eyes with two fingers and laid her veil back across her face.

He turned to Daisy. She was blowing blood bubbles. She reached for him with a trembling hand. He took it and stripped off her armor. She'd been shot under her left arm. He knew without a doubt she'd have been dead already if she wasn't a were.

He knelt close. “Shift,” he said. “You'll heal.”

She closed her eyes. “Can't, already tried.” Blood oozed out of her mouth with every word. “Find her House. Get her back.” She opened her eyes one last time. “I love her…love you.”

Her voice was so low, House strained to hear each word. “Who took her, Daisy? Don't die, dammit, who took her?”

Daisy coughed and her smile was just the tiniest twitch of her lips. “Going home,” she said. Then her head fell to the side and a long rattling breath eased out of her followed by a flood of dark red blood.

House howled. He grabbed Daisy's bloody body and pulled it into his arms rocking her and howling. She meant so much more to him than he'd imagined. They'd run together as wolves since they joined the Company. He suddenly realized how much he cared about her. Visions of all the battles they'd been in together raced through his head. He saw her naked and with Sarah and tears ran down his face. Without her, he would be alone.

The anguish burning in House's heart swiftly turned to anger. He gently lay Daisy down and closed her eyes. He reached into her pocket and collected her coins. She carried two, just like him; one for the Seals and one issued by Gray Thunder. He shoved them into his own pocket and stood up. Where was Sarah?

Nasr entered the tent and saw the two dead women. He did not mourn his mother, or try to hold her. His eyes flashed red and then gold. House knew Nasr was close to shifting. He placed one hand on the young man's shoulder. “Who did this? Did anyone see?”

Nasr shook his head. “The women said it was a group of men driving an older Land Rover. They are useless. They are women.”

Sometimes the Arab mentality where women were concerned was so stupid it became an impediment. “Nasr, women are people. Was Daisy useless?”

Nasr's face twisted with confusion. “She was different. She was a warrior. These women ran and hid and saw nothing.”

House pushed past Nasr. “They know more than you think,” he said over his shoulder as he ducked out of the tent. “Come with me so I can question them without causing an international incident.”

Nasr's hands were spread in front of him, palms up. “I will help you, House, but soon you will see what a waste of time it is.”

Nasr was surprised to discover the women had noticed things and were grateful for the opportunity to help.

Hanifa had three daughters. They did not remove their veils; all were married and mothers, but they had seen the men who attacked and killed Daisy.

Ghayda, a tall, thin woman covered in black and veiled, spoke softly to Nasr. She refused to speak to House because he was a strange man. So House asked the questions, Nasr repeated them and she answered.

“What language did the men speak?”

“I don't know. I couldn't understand anything they said.”

House thought for a moment. Al Qaida spoke Farsi and Arabic for the most part. The women should have understood them. But this was not conclusive. Al Qaida recruited from many countries.

“Were they black men or brown? What did they wear?”

“They were very black and they wore robes such as all men wear.”

“Were their heads covered?”

“Some,” Ghayda said.

“What kind of hair did the men with uncovered heads have?” House was still confused. Had al Qaida taken Sarah or Somali pirates?

“Some had very short hair, shaven heads. Some had long hair braided in rows.”

It was sounding more and more like pirates had taken her. House sighed and closed his eyes. This news was good and bad. Al Qaida would try to regain control over the Rizeigat by torturing Sarah and threatening her. The pirates would hostage her to the UN. Neither picture these thoughts painted for House was pretty.

“Did the men take any other women or just Sarah?”

“They took two very young girls.” Ghayda dissolved into sobs. “They took my daughter, Dimah and the daughter of my sister, Fayruz. Neither girl was yet a woman.” Ghayda sobbed again her hands covering her veiled face to muffle them.

“Were both girls related in any way to Nasr?” House thought al Qaida would want to put pressure on the boy to rejoin them and bring his tribe home.

Ghayda nodded. “Yes, they are his cousins.”

“How many men came for them?”

“Many, maybe eight.”

“Did you notice anything about them that was different?”

The women conferred in whispers and Ghayda spoke for them. “The one who killed Hanifa and your warrior had a golden tooth.” She pointed to her mouth.

House nodded. “Thank you ladies, you did great.”

Nasr stood up. “This is my fault. Al Qaida has found me. They took my cousins and Sarah to force me to return to them. I will follow them and give myself up.”

House stood beside him. “I'm not sure, Nasr. This could be the work of pirates. I swear to you, I will find them and I will kill them all. I will make their deaths hard and their screams will echo across the desert for killing Daisy and taking Sarah and your cousins. I will recover them alive and return your cousins to their tribe. We brought this on your tribe. It is up to me to fix it.”

“We will run together as wolves and track them,” Nasr said.

There was nothing House wanted to do more than drop to all fours and shift. His blood burned for revenge. He wanted to taste the blood of Daisy's killers more than he'd ever wanted anything in his life. He growled. “I would gladly do this, Nasr, but you can't carry weapons when you're a wolf and we need more than our teeth.”

“Father will allow us to take the Rover. We can still track them. Wherever they run we will find them.”

House nodded. This was a good answer, but the Company pickup was coming after dark. That was six hours away. He didn't know what to do. He squatted next to Daisy's body and laid one hand on her back. “I'll revenge your death if it's the last thing I do,” he swore to her.

They left the tent and women swarmed inside to take care of the bodies. This was their job. House strode around the tents sniffing and looking for a trail. Nasr followed close behind. When House began stripping off his clothes, Nasr did the same.

“Let's track them until we know for sure where they're headed. When the Little Bird gets here, we'll use the helicopter to follow them.”

He and Nasr tracked the raiders up a cliff and to a flat surface on the top. Tire tracks from two vehicles were easy for them to see. House loped along following until he was sure where they headed. The two vehicles turned north and headed for Somalia and the sea.

Pirates had Sarah.

Sarah's arms had fallen asleep beneath her. The bag over her head prevented her from seeing where they were going or who was in the vehicle. It was unbearably hot, and somewhere close, two girls sniffled and wept.

The sound of a slap startled her. “Be quiet! Stop the crying or I will beat you until my arm grows tired.”

The sniveling ceased. The voice had spoken in Somali. Sarah now knew the pirates had reacquired her. Her heart ached over Daisy. She hoped her friend would live but doubted it. The amount of blood on the floor of the tent had seemed enormous. Sarah cried silently, the tears dripping into her veil and the bag over her head. It wouldn't help if she were to succumb to despair. The only hope she held for herself the girls was for her to retain her wits and figure out a way to escape.