Page 81 of Locked and Loaded

Lennox stopped. "You have camels."

He chuckled. "A necessity when one lives in the Sahara Desert." He walked up to the nearest one and stroked its neck. The camel regarded him with the bored, imperious expression of an animal that had seen everything and was impressed by none of it. "This is Jamila. She is very gentle. Very patient. She will take you into the dunes whenever you are ready."

"I've never ridden a camel."

"Jamila has never been ridden by you. You will learn together."

Lennox reached out and touched the camel's coarse coat. Jamila blinked slowly and didn't move. Her presence was oddly calming, solid and ancient and completely indifferent to the chaos of Lennox's life.

"Why are you helping us?" she asked.

Hassan didn't answer right away. He kept stroking the camel's neck, his eyes somewhere far away. "Many years ago, Dragan came to me much as you have come to me now. Running. Wounded. Chased by men who wanted him dead. I gave him a tent and tea and a place to rest. He stayed almost a year."

"What was he running from?"

"That is his story to tell. But I will say this… When he arrived, he was a man who had forgotten how to be human. When he left, he remembered. The desert did that. Not me."

He turned to look at her. "You remind me of him. The same fire. The same weight. The same refusal to stop fighting even when stopping would be easier."

Lennox swallowed. The guilt was back, pressing against her ribs, making it hard to breathe. "He thinks my sister is dead." She hadn’t even consciously realized that fact but knew it was correct as soon as the words left her lips.

Hassan was quiet for a moment. "Do you?"

"I don't know." Her voice cracked on the last word. "I don't know, and I can't stop looking until I do. If I stop, and she's still out there⁠—”

She couldn't finish.

Hassan nodded. "Then you do not stop. That is the right answer. The only answer." He patted Jamila's neck. "When you need a ride, she will be here. The dunes are good for thinking. They clear the mind in ways that walls cannot."

"Thank you."

"No thanks are necessary. Any friend of Dragan's." He smiled. "Now come. You have not finished your lunch, and the lamb is better hot."

She followed him back to the main tent, the sneakers solid on the hot sand, the sun beating down on her shoulders, and tried to hold onto the clarity she'd felt when she woke up. It was slipping. The guilt was eating at the edges of it, the way the desert ate at everything.

But underneath the guilt, something else remained. Determination. Focus. The stubborn refusal to quit that had kept her alive this long.

She was going to find her sister. She was going to get her back.

Whatever it took.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

The office tent was smaller than the others, set back from the main circle behind a screen of low dunes. Dragan had spotted it on his way to find Lennox's shoes. Hassan's doing. The man had probably set it up the second Dragan texted him from John's warehouse, understanding without being told that whatever trouble Dragan was bringing with him would need a place to land.

Inside, the tent was sparse but functional. A wooden desk with a single chair. A solar-powered charging station with three outlets, all of them working. A small cooler of water and tea. A map of the Sahara pinned to one canvas wall with routes marked in faded ink. Hassan's handwriting.

Dragan sat down and pulled out his phone.

Mick picked up on the second ring, same as always. His face filled the screen. "You're supposed to be dead by now."

"Disappointing everyone is a hobby,” he shot back.

"How's the arm?"

"Hurts. Wait, how do you know about that?”

"That's what happens when you get shot,” he said as he leaned back in his chair. “John called Mitch to let him know.”