Page 38 of Sheltering You

“Good.” To Kyle, he said, “Nice job.”

“Where should I take you?”

That was the question. It was one thing for Basma’s security to guess Derrick might be headed to Dulles—as opposed to the other two major airports in the DC area—but how had they guessed they’d be headed to the private terminal?

Either the guards had virtually unlimited resources, enough to cover every terminal in the metro area—and Derrick wasn’t buying that—or they’d known where they were going.

Which didn’t make any sense at all.

“Jazz?” He kept his voice low and conversational. “Did you tell your friend how we were getting here this morning?”

“No.”

“You’re sure? No hints?”

“It was not a game of guessing. I gave no hints.”

“Did you tell her we were flying, even if you didn’t mention my jet?”

“Derrick, I did not tell her⁠—”

“Did you mention Dulles?”

“I told her nothing,” Jasmine snapped.

Fine. But if she didn’t tell Basma, then how did the security guys know?

“Is it possible we overreacted?” she asked. “Perhaps the man inside the building was not searching for us. Perhaps the black SUV was not following us.”

“You were watching him. What do you think?”

Her lips pressed together, and her gaze flicked toward the rear window. “He was also driving…like this one.” She tipped her chin toward Kyle. “But not as…”

“Aggressively?”

“Yes. I think. Perhaps he is just a bad driver. Perhaps we only thought we saw something that we didn’t see.”

Yeah. Maybe.

Much as he didn’t want Basma’s people to be that far ahead of them, he hated to think he’d panicked.

It was all so convoluted and crazy.

“You guys decide where to go?” Kyle asked.

It seemed they’d lost the bad guys for now—assuming anyone had been following them in the first place. Derrick just needed to get Jasmine and Rabie somewhere safe where they could rest and regroup. He pulled his phone from his pocket. “Let me make a call.”

This was Derrick’s favorite hotel in the DC metro, not because it was fancy—it wasn’t. But because it was close enough to the airport to get there quickly, far enough away that he could go for a jog without the constant rumble of takeoffs and landings, and affordable.

He’d been surprised to learn they had a suite available. The word suite made it sound much fancier than it was. One room had a kitchenette with a small table and a living area with a pull-out sofa.

Jasmine and Rabie were in the other room. The door was closed, the shower running. Derrick had insisted Rabie leave his backpack, which had nearly caused a full meltdown.

There’d been screaming and tears, but Jasmine had calmed him, speaking soothingly in Arabic. The kid hadn’t relaxed until Jasmine had said to Derrick, “You aren’t going to take anything or break anything, right?”

“I don’t plan to.” He didn’t figure Rabie would miss a tracker, assuming Derrick found one. It’d occurred to him—too late, obviously—that a tracker could explain how the guards had guessed their destination.

“And you’ll give it right back?” Jasmine asked.