*Amir*

*Seventy-Two Hours Ago*

"Why do you have to leave now?" Faris asked me as I continued packing my things. He was at my house when I felt Luna's soul shattering.

"It's just something that I have to do. Something I need to do." More like someone who I needed to save.

"I don't get it, but okay. You want anyone to go with you?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Are you offering to keep me company?"

He shrugged and smiled. "I don't have work for another three days. Why not?"

My bedroom door opened slowly, and Faisal popped in.

"Hey man, sorry for barging in," Faisal murmured in my doorway. "I knocked several times and then used your spare key behind the light switch." I stopped what I was doing and glared at him. I showed him that in case of an emergency. He glanced down to my bed and saw my stuff thrown out. "Are you going somewhere?"

"Amir decided that he's just going to up and leave for America," Faris said as he stood near my window while I finished packing my suitcase. Faisal's mouth dropped open.

"What? Are you serious, bro?"

I nodded.

Faris scoffed. "I don't understand. Why now?"

"Dude, trust me, you wouldn't. But I understand why, and I'm excited for Amir." Faisal came over to me and gave me a light hug, then patted me on the back.

Faris sighed. "All right. I guess I should run home and pack, then buy a ticket online."

"You're traveling too?" Faisal asked him, turning his way.

"He and I were just talking about that before you showed up. I haven't agreed to have a travel companion. I just need to get there as soon as possible."

"If you need a travel companion, I'd go with you," Faisal offered.

"Honestly, I already paid for a ticket for you, Faisal," I told him as we stood still next to my bed. "I will need your help with a particular project that I'll be working on."

"Really? When were you going to tell me? You were just going to stop by my house and tell me to go?"

"Am I missing something?" Faris asked, chiming in.

We both shrugged and shook our head.

"Amir is meeting a therapist. He has some... problems."

Faris snickered and began walking toward the bedroom door. "Okay. Well, I will go put my phone on the charger in my truck." He exited the room. And Faisal grips me into a bear hug.

"What are you doing?" I asked, staring down at him.

"Dude, this is amazing. You're about to save her. You'll get to see her, but don't touch her. Don't lay one finger on her. Do you understand me?"

"I wasn't planning to." But that didn't mean I didn't want to. I want to hold her hand like the times I'd embraced her soul. I didn't really have a solid plan yet, but I'll think of something when I get there. "You can let go now," I choked out as he still had a grip on my body. "I won't go anywhere if I can't breathe."

He loosened up and stepped back. "Sorry, man. This is just huge. I just hope nothing messes up."

"Me too. I need to finish packing. My tickets are in the printer. Can you grab them for me?" Faisal nodded, and I finished tossing clothes into a bag. Then I heard a muffled voice in another room of my house. Cassie must be here.

I stopped packing and strolled down the hallway. I listened in and heard Faisal talking to Cami at my desk. I hovered around the corner and eavesdropped on their conversation before I made myself known. He better not inform her of my plan. I don't know if my plan would work.

"I'm just surprised to see you over here," she whispered, talking to Faisal.

"Oh. I came by to ask Amir about something. Our friend, Faris, is outside. What's going on, baby?"

"It's about Luna and what I found out. I connected to you to see if you were busy and was surprised to see you at Amir's house."

"Oh." What's happening to Luna? "What's going on?"

"Well, Luna was transferred in the middle of the night to the Orange floor. They have her down for several treatment plans and under a different medication that I'm not familiar with. Tomorrow is the first—Sarah's birthday. I also saw Chase in the lobby at the hospital."

All I saw was red. What the hell does that prick want?

"Do you know what he's there for?" Faisal asked, and Cami shook her head.

"No. I saw him with two doctors. I think he's able to make decisions for Luna still. I have a bad feeling about it."

Faisal stepped to her side and laid his hands on his hips. "This is bad. But we have a plan. I don't know what it is yet, but-"

"But nothing," I said, interrupting him. "We were going over different things and nothing came to mind." I didn't want to inform her, or Luna, of our plans to fly to America. Their hopes would be up and anything bad could happen. Their disappointment wouldn't play too well on my conscience.

"Hey, Amir," Cami said, waving to me.

I waved back and reached for our plane tickets. "I can't connect to Luna. At all. It's so frustrating not knowing where she is in that damn hospital."

"I know. It's lonely for me lying in my bed and she's not sitting here with me." I tuned into Cami's tiny room and glanced around. It occurred to me that I've never seen her room before. I'd always stayed next door-with my wife.

When I heard the front door beep, I poked my head around the corner and watched Faris walking back inside. Then I gazed at the two of them, figuring out what to do about him.

"What are we going to do about Faris?" Faisal asked, keeping his gaze at the door.

"I'll go tell him that I have a lot of packing to do and that I need time to myself."

"Okay. I didn't expect him to be here when I pulled up. But we need to hurry. We need to go over our plan, Amir."

"Plan?" Cami murmured. He must be blind not to see her still standing next to us. She can't know our plan.

"Yeah, Faisal and I will look on the web to check out other facilities. There has to be something that I can tell Ahmed about and inform Liberty. She is still on Luna's health care paper."

"But I thought we were-"

I turned toward my cousin with a shut-the-hell-up look, and he closed his mouth.

"I'm going to tell Faris I'm about to leave soon. Then you and I can talk," I told Faisal, walking away from him.

"Faris?" I said, walking towards my best friend.

"Yo!" he replied.

"I'm not sure when I'm coming back, or when I'll be home, but could you do me a favor and look after my home for me while I'm away?" Faris nodded, and I handed him a set of keys to my house. "Thank you. The gold-plated key is the key to my front door and only opens that door. The silver key opens every room in the house. And the bronze key opens the garage. The passcode to my alarm system is three-eleven-eighteen."

"Wow. The third of November, two-thousand-and-eighteen. That must be a special day for you." After Faris said that and figured the numbers were a date, that gained my curiosity. I gave him a confused look upon my face and scrunched my eyebrows together.

"How did you know it was a particular date, Faris?"

"I wasn't sure, really, but I saw the date circled on your calender on the wall in your kitchen." That was just like Faris. Very observant.

"Right. Well, actually, the date is symbolic to me. Something miraculous happened to me on that day." I met Luna. Of course, those numbers would be my pass code. 

"Cool. What?" he asked, grinning wildly.

"That's another story for another time," I explained, ready to hurry and go. Each minute wasted here was another minute Luna was in pain. I was ready to flee from here and get my woman out of the hell she was brought into. "My fish have already had their food this morning. You could come by tomorrow and feed them around eight in the morning."

Minutes went by as I continued explaining my house and how to set the alarm. Once Faris and Cami were gone, it was finally just Faisal and I as we chatted in my room.

Folding a pair of pants and placing them in my suitcase, I turned his way and said, "Listen. What I plan to do will be risky. Anything could go wrong. But I have to go. I have to get Luna out of there."

"Yeah, I know, man. But you got to do what you got to do. She needs to get out of there. So does Cami."

"Well, my plan is to go in as a volunteer from Pakistan. The hospital's website says that they are always looking for new volunteers, mostly for housekeeping or cafeteria workers. Dr. Chauvin has granted me clearance at his hospital, believing that I wanted to make my trip over there after all, but my sole purpose is to go to Luna. Cyrus got in touch with a colleague of his who can help get me into her hospital. You have to have certain qualifications to perform anything in there, and unfortunately, I don't have everything St. Matthew's looks for in an employee..." I trailed off, explaining the rest of my plan. "I'll tell you more on the way to America."

My plan was risky, but I'm hopeful it works. I prayed it will.

It was now ten in the morning and my stuff was packed. Faisal and I rushed out of my driveway and headed quickly to his place so he could pack a few things. I laughed when I saw his cute teddy bear he got for Cami a few days ago when we went into the mall. He won it in one of those prize machines, and luckily stuffed teddy bears were her comfort. Faisal's passport and visa were up-to-date, which made things easier for us.

After saying a few goodbyes to my aunt and uncle and reassuring our family that we'd be okay, we drove quickly to the airport and immediately checked in. Our flight will arrive in Louisiana around four am, but he and I had planned to stay in a local hotel that was near St. Matthew's. After getting settled in our seats and ready to see Louisiana, I exhaled a deep breath and tilted my head back, wishing I could connect to Luna. Whatever she was injected with, I could no longer feel her presence. My soul felt blank. So I ended up resting and falling asleep on this anticipated plane ride.

"We're here," Faisal whispered into my ear, waking me up. "The flight attendant said we can rent a car at the front from Hertz. So I requested for them to place a hold from my credit card." I opened my eyes and nodded, happy he took care of that. I'd forgotten about what we were going to do for transportation.

The both of us jumped out of our seats and grabbed our bags from the baggage area. We quickly ran to the Hertz counter and rented a nice size SUV for our stay.

I wasn't too familiar with driving on the right-side, but I believe I could manage. Faisal knew how, so he could get us around, too. We finally left the airport parking lot, and I drove as I followed the directions to the facility. Thirty minutes later, we finally come upon the hospital, and I noticed a run-down motel that was a few blocks away. It must be used mostly for people who traveled a long way to visit someone inside that place.

We gradually came to a complete stop as we were now directly in the front of the gates, glaring hard at the tall building. It was larger than I thought, and about twenty or thirty stories high, with windows that looked shatter-proof. A large yard with a fence wrapped around it had barbed wire at the top and bottom parts, so that no one could ever escape from here. My eyes traveled around the facility and landed on the small, unkept picnic tables that were settled underneath several trees. The place looked and felt creepy, especially when gray clouds started rolling in, indicting it was about to rain.

The access road was fairly busy with passerbys speeding quickly down the road. Each time a car passed by, the guards would peer their gaze onto the road, then place their hand on their weapon. I guess they were certain some shady stuff would go down. As I gazed around the outside of the building, I saw many cameras and security systems pointed in different directions. Even the front entrance had two cameras; one for the front of a visitor's car, and one for the back.

Faisal probably thought I didn't think things through, but I did. A lot was on the line for me. Not only my life, but Luna's, and also my family's. Once I have access inside, things would definitely get rough. Getting in may not be a hassle, considering my contact in New Orleans gave me a well-written recommendation, and that I've known Dr. Chauvin for many years. If I could get Luna and Cami free, then we'll figure out what to do next.

All I cared about was freeing Luna from here. Her protector had come, and he wasn't going anywhere until she was safe and away from these people. Her life was all that mattered.