As soon as Alex saw Frida pull the gun out of sight, she hopped up on her knees and reached for the lid to pull it back down.
The jeep sped forward again.
Realizing there was no way she’d get hold of the lid in time, Alex did the only thing she could. She crouched, her feet poised and ready. Right before Frida’s vehicle hit them again, she jumped.
She almost blew it. Her jump had been too good, sending her all the way over the jeep’s hood into its windshield, nearly bouncing her off the vehicle altogether. The only thing that saved her was throwing her arm around the top of the windshield at the last second and hanging on.
“If only I had a camera,” Frida shouted. “YouTube gold!”
She pointed the gun directly through the glass at Alex, but instead of pulling the trigger, she jerked the steering wheel first one way, then the other.
Alex’s feet swung out over the edge of the car, then slammed back into the front fender, but she didn’t let go.
Frida smiled. “Oh, you’re good. How about we go again?”
When Frida jerked the wheel again, Alex was ready. Using the swerving vehicle’s momentum, she swung around the windshield and dropped into the front passenger seat. Caught off guard, the grin on Frida’s face disappeared as she whipped the gun toward Alex. Alex shot her hand out, grabbing the woman’s wrist, and pushing it into the dash. The gun went off, the bullet slicing its way through the passenger door and into the night.
“Stop the car!” Alex yelled.
Frida laughed. “Does that really work? Do people listen to you when you say stupid things like that?”
Alex slammed Frida’s wrist against the dash again, trying to dislodge the weapon, but the assassin held on tight. Realizing she needed a different strategy, Alex swung her left leg into the driver’s side footwell and shoved it toward the brake.
Frida blocked it with her own foot, kicking it to the side. That was fine by Alex. She hadn’t thought it would work, but she knew it would provide the distraction she needed to grab the emergency brake handle.
She yanked it up.
The tires screamed and the smell of rubber filled the air. Frida let up on the gas as she tightened her one-handed grip on the steering wheel and fought for control. Alex moved her foot over to the regular brake and slammed it home.
The car came to a screeching halt in the middle of the road, the vehicle spinning sideways until it was almost perpendicular to the lanes.
Frida let go of the steering wheel and twisted to the side, pulling with all her strength to free the hand holding the gun. When she was finally able to yank it away, the momentum brought her arm upward, pointing the gun at the sky.
Alex thrust forward and reached for it. She wasn’t able to get hold of the weapon, but she was able to knock it out of Frida’s hand, sending it tumbling onto the jeep’s floor.
Both women scrambled for it. Alex got there first, but Frida’s hand was right on top of hers. The gun rocked back and forth on the floor of the vehicle, its barrel pointing skyward again. Alex felt Frida’s finger slip over the trigger, so she shoved at the weapon just as it went off.
The bullet passed through the front lip of the driver’s seat before cutting a hole through Frida’s thigh. The second shot entered Frida’s body, just below her rib cage, traveling through a lung, nicking her heart, and finally coming to rest against the C4 vertebra of her spine.
She didn’t die right away, but it was only a matter of seconds.
Chapter Forty-Two
For the rest of the ride, Alex used a rope to hold the trunk lid closed from inside. Eighty-five minutes later, they reached the secluded bay southwest of Slavne with no further incident.
The arranged fishing vessel was waiting for them.
By the time the sun came up, they were twenty-five miles off the coast, where they met up with the Nanu, a Belgium-registered, oceanic science vessel. The Nanu was owned by the Teetaert Institute, a research firm that was itself owned — after a few additional corporate layers — by Stonewell International.
The scientists aboard the Nanu were a bit miffed that their research trip to the Black Sea had to be put on hold for several days, while the ship made its way back through the Bosphorus and then to a Greek island in the Mediterranean Sea. The purpose of the side trip was to ferry a group referred to as VIPs who had suddenly shown up on the ship one day. But a promise of adding the missing time to the end of the voyage seemed to mollify most of the researchers.
Alex never got the name of the island where they were dropped off. They were met at the pier by a blue sedan with black-tinted windows, and whisked away to a private airfield where a Stonewell jet was waiting.
El-Hashim was assigned to the back row of the plane, where she sat with the two Stonewell security officers who had been waiting for them at the airfield.
Alex took a seat in a row by herself near the front of the jet. She tilted her chair back the moment she was able and fell fast asleep.
“Miss Poe?”
Someone touched her.
“Miss Poe?”
She opened her eyes. It was one of the security men, his hand on her shoulder. She thought at first she had slept right through the landing, but no, she could hear the engines still droning.
“Yes?” she said as she tried to blink the sleep from her eyes.
“The prisoner has asked if she can speak with you.”
“Uh, sure. Okay.”
She followed him to the back. As she passed through the cabin, she could see Deuce passed out a couple rows behind where she had been. Cooper was on the other side of the plane, reading a book.
El-Hashim sat in the middle of the back row, holding a cup of water. When she saw Alex, she nodded a greeting and gestured to the seat beside her.
She then looked at the guard who’d brought Alex back. “May we have a bit of privacy?”
The man didn’t move for a moment, but finally said, “Five minutes. That’s all.”
“It’s more than enough.”
The security man nodded to his partner, and they both moved a few rows up.
“What do you want?” Alex said.
“You asked me a question.”
“One you didn’t feel the need to answer, if I remember correctly.”
El-Hashim tilted her head, conceding the point. “I’ve had time to think.”
“And?”
“I will tell,” she said, glancing at the two security men. “If you will do me a favor.”
“I don’t do favors for terrorists.”
“I’m not a terrorist.”
Alex shrugged. “Semantics.”
“I simply want you to deliver a message.”
“That doesn’t do much to change my mind.”
“Maybe this will. The person I want you to deliver the message to is your father.”
Alex narrowed her eyes, but said nothing.
“All you need to say is, the committee should know that El-Hashim never forgets.”
“And what’s that code for?”
“I assure you, there’s nothing coded in that message at all.”
“You will, of course, forgive the fact that I have a hard time trusting what you say.”
“So, will you do this for me?”
Alex looked away, shaking her head to herself.
“You realize,” El-Hashim said. “All you need to do is say yes. I won’t actually know for some time if you delivered the message.”
“And maybe the contact information you give me won’t even be for my father. Maybe it’s a way of sending a message to someone in your network.”
“You asked me for the information. And now I am offering it to you.”