Xander lifted his eyebrows. “Who?”
“A smuggler.”
No. Oh, please, no. He slowly reclined in his seat, his entire body feeling like it was falling into a bottomless pit.
“Her handset system has an answering machine, remember? So, I went back to the flat. There was no message, unfortunately. But.” Elmahdy sucked in a deep breath. “I found something while I was in there. And, well, I think you need to see it.”
Xander swore and turned his head to look out the window, though he saw nothing of their surroundings. He grasped his chin as if to hold himself together for whatever was coming next.
The detective slowed the car, bumped over the curb, and parked halfway on the sidewalk.
“It wasn’t there before,” Elmahdy went on as he reached across Xander and popped open the glove compartment. “I’ve even reviewed our photos of the flat again and it definitely wasn’t there. And sure enough, someone had broken in. The bedroom window looked manhandled.”
Xander lowered his hand, his fingers curling into a tight fist.
The detective pulled out a folded piece of paper and spread it out slowly, holding the contents so that Xander couldn’t see. “It’s a photo. It may be distur—”
Xander snatched the page and turned it over. A black and white copy of a picture filled the center. His heart jolted to a stop, and his lungs constricted.
She was dead. That was the first thought that came to mind. His brain screamed at him to put the photo away, but he couldn’t take his eyes off of it. The more he looked at it, the more he realized something. It was exaggerated—the pose, the injuries, the lighting. The photo was staged.
She was alive.
Battered and bruised, but alive. The woman on the bridge had insisted she was helping. What if Leila had been kidnapped by the smuggler in the meantime? This, the break-in, the photo, could all be a trick to mess with their heads. A warning of what could happen. A demand for ransom money would most likely follow.
Xander crumpled the paper into a ball. “I’m going after her.”
“Harrison, it’s impossible,” Elmahdy snapped. Frowning, he gripped the steering wheel with both hands and jerked the car back into traffic. “Do you really think you can just drive into the desert and she’ll be waiting for you to pick her up? One hundred miles east doesn’t get any more vague. All we can do is try our best to find the smuggler while we wait for another phone call.” Elmahdy swerved to avoid a donkey cart in the left lane.
“I’m not waiting.” Xander pounded his fist on the window.
“You’ll stay right here. You’re going under house arrest. I’ve been way too accommodating and you’ve only taken advantage. Punching prisoners, getting your hands on illegal firearms. It ends now.”
“I—” Xander’s mouth hung open. The man couldn’t be serious. “I did not take advantage.”
“You won’t leave that hotel room until I say you can. I already have security cameras installed by your door and a guard posted at the hotel.”
“You can’t do that.”
“Of course I can. You’ll barge out there and make everything worse. Do I have to throw you in Tora?”
Xander gritted his teeth. No one was going to hold him back. Leila needed help now. He leaned his head onto the plastic leather seat, his damp skin sticking to the material. Right now, all he had to do was let Elmahdy think he’d won.
A mental list of what he had to do formed in his mind. Pack bag. No—he didn’t need anything. Who cared about changing clothes and brushing teeth out there? What else would he need? More guns. Who knew what might be lurking behind the sand dunes.
His phone. He also needed his phone.
“Nobody would’ve happened to have found a smartphone anywhere on the bridge or on the boat, would they?”
Elmahdy shook his head. “Not that I’m aware of.”
Xander scowled. So much for that. He didn’t have time to go looking for it, either.
They were quiet for the rest of the drive, Xander lost in a world of possible worst case scenarios and checklists. After they exited the highway in Saqqara and weaved their way to Xander’s hotel, Elmahdy pulled the car under the porte-cochère.
“Thanks for the lift,” Xander said, already halfway out of the vehicle.
“Mr. Harrison,” Elmahdy called after him, his voice full of warning. “I mean it. If you step foot out of this hotel, you’ll be in a cage with Faris Al-Rashid. It’s your choice.”
Xander eyed the inspector for a moment, nodded once, then shuffled into the hotel. He was greeted with an unsmiling hello from the man at the reception desk, which he returned as he made his way to the elevator. Was it him, or was the receptionist a little bit colder than before? Xander shook the feeling off. Elmahdy had probably talked to him.
The elevator reached his floor and he pushed the door open. A police officer stood before him, arms crossed. Xander pressed his lips together. Ridiculous.
The officer narrowed his eyes.
Xander pushed past and strode down the hallway, throwing a glimpse over his shoulder as the officer stepped into the elevator and shut the door. Xander stopped in front of his room and let out a long breath. Elmahdy was wrong.
The detective had left him with no choice at all.
Xander rattled the keys in the lock until the door gave way, then stormed across the room. His bag sat on the foot of his bed where he’d left it, paper still scattered across the floor. He stepped over them and dug through his bag until he found it. The burner. After hitting a few buttons, he called the only number saved on the phone.
“I’m in,” he said, not waiting for a greeting, “but on one condition.”
“Yes?”
“You help me find Leila. And you get that detective off my back.”
“Consider it done.”
