Page 1 of Her Tempting Protector

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“Doc, is it as bad as I think it is?”

Dr. Carys Adams glanced sideways at the sweating man who had been assigned to lead their security detail here in Sudan.

Had he really just asked that?

Carys glanced back out the window, it felt like there were at least forty gun barrels pointed directly at her head. There weren’t, it just seemed like it. Logically she knew they were trying to protect the hospital from the Rapid Support Force troops who had been responsible for the massacre last summer, but that still didn’t make it any easier for her to see all the matte black steel in the crowd. She swallowed down bile-flavored saliva, then tried to calm her expression before turning back to Hans.

“It’s bad, really bad. Hans, I need you to do me a favor.”

“Anything,” he nodded.

“Get Isaac down here, then you go back and make sure all of the nurses have the patients ready to evacuate. I don’t want one single patient left behind. Do a double sweep, make sure you don’t miss anyone.”

“Why do you need Isaac?” His voice was petulant.

Oh, for pity’s sake, was he worried that she was giving Isaac a more important job when they were about to be killed? Or worse? Again, her thoughts went back to what had happened here in Khartoum a few months back before the regime change.

She rested her hand on Han’s forearm. “I know I can depend on you to keep those people safe. I can, can’t I?” she asked softly. He stood straighter.

“I won’t let you down, Dr. Adams.”

Great, he responded to flattery, instead of just getting the job done like he should.

He started to sprint across the dilapidated linoleum lobby. Then he turned back when he hit the elevator button. “I’ll make sure the patients stay safe,” he promised.

“Hans, the power’s iffy. Take the stairs just to be safe.” She kept her voice low, but loud enough to carry across the empty room. She gritted her teeth at his ineptitude.

He ran to the stair entrance.

Carys went back to looking out the window through the blinds. With the angle of the sun, nobody could see through to her vantage point. She watched as a beautiful woman in a bright orange robe spoke from the back of a truck. She had a bullhorn in one hand, and her other hand pointed upwards to heaven. She spoke Arabic to the crowd, telling them that their new prime minister was their way to salvation. He would save them from their decades of struggles. He was their nation’s salvation.

Carys hoped she was right. She hadn’t just bet her life on the new prime minister, she had bet her team’s lives on the regime change.

The woman continued. Abdalla Hamdok was a man to believe in. Her voice was melodic as she explained that he was a steadfast man with a realistic vision for his nation. Carys concurred.

When his people had contacted her two months ago to consult with the Central Committee of Sundanese Doctors, she’d weighed all the pros and cons, and finally agreed to take the assignment in Sudan. Especially knowing that she would be reunited with one of her med-school friends, Joyce Dandekar, who’d been a surgeon at the hospital in Sudan’s capital city of Khartoum, a huge modern city of five million. It had a deadly regime change, but that was over—she’d been so sure.

But here she was, once again in the middle of a bad dream.

Please, God, don’t let it turn into something like the horror she’d lived through almost four years ago in Santa Flores.

Carys heard the stair door open and turned to see Isaac move quickly and gracefully toward her, he was tall and thin, with a commanding presence. As he got to her, he gently pulled her to the side of the window, so she was even farther from sight. “We’ve got five patients who can’t be moved,” he told her quietly.

Carys winced. She knew that some would be stuck here, but she’d really hoped the number would be lower. “Who made the call?”

“Perkins.” His voice was devoid of emotion, but which made it all the more clear he was not impressed with his assessment. Isaac might not be a doctor, but he had a heck of a lot of common sense.

“They’re all on upper floors?”

He nodded.

She twisted the Claddagh ring on her pinkie. It stung.

Deep breath, Adams, same thing, different country…kind of.

“What has she been saying?” Isaac nodded toward the beautiful woman who had captured the crowd’s attention.