#Chapter Forty Four#

"Drop the gun."

My eyes slowly strayed from the shiny black piece of metal that could end my life in one swift pull, to Ahmad, who had materialised out of thin air. His eyes locked upon mine for one second and I instantly sensed his message.

Don't move.

Which was extremely hard not to do when a weapon was pointed less than ten centimetres from my face. My heart was thrashing manically inside of me. I could hear the distinct thump thump sound through my ears. The blood was rushing through my veins at an unnatural pace, causing my face to heat up and hands turn clammy.

At the same time, I felt a surge of adrenaline course through my body as my mind went into flight or fight mode.

A deep throated chuckle penetrated the air and I snapped my head back to the man with the gun.

"Do you seriously think you stand a chance?" he asked in the most casual tone, turning half his body in the direction of Ahmad, his gun never steering clear of me. "This place is crawling with men. My men."

"I said," Ahmad grit out, "drop the gun."

He pouted his lips and sent Ahmad a calculating look. And then, to the surprise of us both, grinned and began to lower his gun to the floor. "OK." Ahmad narrowed his eyes suspiciously and tracked his movements carefully. He placed the gun flat on the floor and then stood to his full height again. "Now what?"

"Kick it to me," Ahmad ordered.

He kicked it. "And then?"

"Sam-,"

"No I know! Now this!" he said with a tone that was much too happy and proud as he pulled something out of his suit jacket.

"NO!"

The word had barely even left my lips before Ahmad was on the ground with blood pouring out of his side.

No, no, no, no, no, I chanted in my head as my legs finally decided to function again. I ran towards his body to check for a pulse but I was harshly pulled away by the edge of my hijab.

"Oh, no you don't. You're coming with me."

And just like that I was trapped.

One arm snaked around my waist and held me back firmly to his chest whilst the other held the gun, this time, pointed at my neck. I could feel his hot breath fanning my cheek and I had the strongest urge to barf out everything I had just eaten. As he began to pull me away, my eyes fell upon Ahmad's unmoving body and I began to thrash in his arms.

"STOP. LET GO OF ME!"

"You better shut it or another one of your men dies at my word. This time maybe someone a little closer to heart. Salem perhaps?"

That made me stop. "What did you do to him," I croaked out as my eyes blurred with new tears and my throat filled with bile. "Where is he?!"

"For now he's unconscious in a little room that could barely fit his body. Suffocation is a horrible way to die don't you think?" He chuckled again, as if he was telling a kid a funny bedtime story. "Or even if he did survive, the pain of having a mangled body part would surely send him to his death. How sad."

"You asshole!" I screeched, my mind and body going into overdrive as I began to thrash in his arms again. "Let go of me!"

"I should of just done this before," he sighed.

And with that he used his free hand to deliver a blow so strong to my abdomen, that I physically fell back against his body for support. I bit my lip from crying out in pain and closed my eyes so the unshed tears could slip away.

"Now for the fun part," he mumbled as he dragged my sagging body into the main hall.

The first thing that struck me was that it was extremely quiet. Quiet, as in I could hear a pin drop quiet. I decided to look up to see what was happening, despite the immense amount of pain I was in.

And the sight that I was met with almost made me fall to my knees. In fact, I probably would have, had it not been for the arm that was still around my waist.

I gasped and sucked in harsh breaths as my eyes scanned over the area. Men, dressed in black suits with a distinct orange flower in their pocket, were placed across the room in strategic areas.

All of them armed.

There must have been at least a hundred of them. They had their guns pointed at the innocent guests, all of whom were either on the floor with their hands up or seated and shaking in fear.

But what stood out the most and that sent real, piercing fear through me, was that for every one of our guards, another outmatched him with two.

And I realised that something of this length had to have been planned. Planned by a skilled tactician, someone with inside information, someone who had organised this for months.

And I knew it was none other than the man with his arm around me.

I heard a strangled sob to my right.

Turning my head slowly, I came face to face with my family. At their horrified expressions, I wanted nothing more than to weep and weep and pretend that this wasn't all happening. Especially since somewhere at the back of mind, I knew we could not possibly overcome the enemy. Not when they had that much numbers.

Mira, Lia and Sarah were sobbing. My baby Abir was held protectively in her mother's arms. Ziad had a guard holding him down with his arms locked behind his back. Tariq and baba were the only two standing with clenched fists and a mixture of fury and shock marring their faces.

"Mr. Redwan," baba uttered slowly, his eyes burning holes through the man behind me.

I didn't need to see him to know that he was smiling. "How lovely that you remember me!" he called out in a cheerful tone.

Everyone in the hall was watching us intently now.

"I should have known. I should have known you were the leader of Al Ghorban!"

"I'm not just the leader. I'm the creator. I'm the mastermind behind all of this and believe me when I say, you messed with the wrong person when you decided to work against me."

Baba's face was set in a grim line and his eyes flickered to me every few seconds. "I hope this isn't a petty revenge scheme because I fired you for abusing my daughter."

He blew up with laughter. "Oh please, that stupid job was all to maintain a facade, I was more than happy when you fired me. No this," he continued, his voice suddenly turning venomous, "this is for my son, who this little wench put into jail."

I choked on my saliva.

Baba's eyes widened.

"Isaac..."

"Yes. I was not a happy man when I received a phone call that my son was being thrown into a cell and his face plastered across every newspaper, titled the countries biggest traitor. Oh, I spent years training him for this opportunity. Who do you think got rid of your old pal Abdel?" he asked in a mocking tone.

Abdel...baba's old advisor and best friend who had died of 'unknown causes.'

"You animal," baba spat, moving to take one step forward but one of Mr Redwan's men instantly halted him.

"It was I who made the position available in the first place. I spent almost five years teaching Isaac on how to infiltrate the system and how to cleanly kill you off. But then you," he nudged me with the gun and I flinched, "had to get in the damn way. Maybe if the stupid boy had listened to me and wooed you, we wouldn't be in this position. But, it is what it is and now I must deal with this situation in the dirtiest way possible. By killing you all off."

"You wouldn't dare," I challenged.

He dug the gun into my neck. "Wouldn't I?"

"What do you want Redwan? Is it power? Status? Wealth? Tell me what you want." Baba's demeanour was so eerily calm that I wondered whether he had fully comprehended what was happening right now. My eyes found Tariq's and they watered at the raw terror on his face. I sent him a reassuring smile to stop him from struggling in the guards hold, who must have restrained him when Mr Redwan brought the gun closer to my neck.

"You all dead." I heard him fumble with something. "Men are we all ready?"

All of them gave a curt nod.

"Ready your weapons. You all know who need to go."

I bit my lip and squeezed my eyes shut as the tears fell relentlessly. This was it. There was absolutely nothing we could do.

Powerless before our very enemies.

I opened my eyes to look at my family members one last time. I opened my mouth to tell them that I loved them more than anything in my life.

But, a voice cut me off.

"I brought you a little present."

On instinct, we all snapped our heads to the door which had previously been shut.

Now however, a dangling Isaac hung from one of Salem's large hands, whose expression screamed murder.

At his reappearance I felt a relieved breath leave my lips.

I knew you would make it Salem.

"Son of a..."

"If you don't let go of Sameena within the next two seconds and tell all your men to drop their weapons, your son is dead."

"You think you can-,"

The sound of a shot being fired resounded through the air and I felt Mr Redwan jump in shock behind me.

Isaac tumbled to the floor and clutched at his wounded leg as he rolled around and yelled out in pain.

"Let me get something straight. When I give out an order I expect results. So I'll say it one more time Mr Redwan. Let go of Sameena or your son dies right before your very eyes."

"And all of your men," he added with a twisted smile.

I hadn't realised it before because I had been so happy to see Salem alive and healthy, but there were hundreds of guards filtering through each of the emergency exits. They lined up against the walls robotically and waited patiently for orders from Salem.

Slowly but surely, I felt the arm fall away from around me and Mr Redwan step away from me. "You heard him boys. Drop your weapons."

There were now so many people in this one hall that I was finding it hard to breathe. I took two more steps away from him and tried to stand firmly on my shaky legs.

Mr Redwan and Salem were staring at each other with heated glares and for a while I thought that they might stay like that for hours but something none of us would have anticipated happened.

"BOYS RUN!" Mr Redwan yelled and on cue, the hall turned into absolute chaos.

His men attempted to run out of the hallways or climb their way to the second level of the building, whilst our guards didn't waste a second before going after them. People were zooming in and out of my visual field and I could hear my name being called from somewhere by a familiar voice but there was just too much going on for me to make them out.

All of a sudden, I felt a strong wave of nausea hit me and half a second later, I was on my knees.

"SAMEENA!"

I was so confused. Why did I suddenly feel so weak? So sleepy? So choked up?

I felt something wet on my hand and when I looked down, I saw deep red blood oozing out through my dress and onto the floor.

"Sameena what happened, talk to me!"

It was Tariq.

"I-I don't know. O-one second I was standing and the next I was b-bleeding." I felt myself sway and before I could use my weight to support myself, I found myself falling headfirst to the fall.

"No, no, this isn't happening, you're going to be fine OK!" Tariq yelled as he caught me and positioned my head into his lap quickly. I saw him take his suit jacket off and place it over my wound. I faintly heard him yell out for an ambulance.

"T-Tariq," I stuttered out. It was so hard to breathe. I found his hand and grasped it as firmly as I could. "I-I want to go home. Take me home."

Again, I felt something wet land on my face but when I opened my eyes, I saw that it was Tariq's tears.

"We're going to go home right now OK? Just be a little patient with me. Keep your eyes open."

"Don't c-cry. Why are y-you c-crying?"

"I don't know," he whispered, leaning his forehead upon mine. I closed my eyes at the contact and very quickly realised it was becoming increasingly harder for me to open them.

"Mmmm," I mumbled. "I l-love you, y-you know that?"

The last thing I heard was a siren and a strangled 'I love you too.'

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