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‘You have friends.’
Khalid gave a hard laugh. ‘I buy people...that doesn’t make them my friends.’
Zain had never imagined his brother capable of such insight, let alone the courage to admit it aloud.
‘Come, let’s not argue. Take a drive with me.’ Khalid pulled the door wider. ‘I haven’t put her through her paces yet.’
After a pause, Zain got in.
‘All buckled up?’ Khalid asked, glancing at his brother. ‘You can’t be too careful. I thought we’d take the scenic route.’
Zain glanced at the speedometer as they hit the first bend. His brows lifted at the number on the dial, but he didn’t feel nervous—his half-brother was bad at many things but driving wasn’t one of them.
By the time they hit the third bend on a road famous for its hairpin turns and the crashes they had caused, a layer of tension had descended onto his shoulders.
‘Do you want me to slow down, little brother?’ Khalid mocked as he overtook a lorry on a bend, pulling in just in time to avoid a car coming in the opposite direction.
‘Are you high?’ Zain asked.
‘High on life...high on...actually I probably am, though the drugs don’t really work the same now. You see, little brother, I’m dying. I have lung cancer and it’s already spread. I’m terminal.’
‘Medical—’
‘Advances are made every day. I know. But I also know they won’t work for me.’ The low purr of the car became a growl as he floored it once more around the next bend.
‘It’s not too late for us to—’
‘Bury the hatchet? How heroically noble and so very Zain...’ he spat. ‘But it’s too late for that. Don’t look sad, brother, we all die. But knowing the when and the how...that changes things, gives you back the power. Yes,’ he said, watching with a smile as Zain’s hand moved to the door handle. ‘It’s locked, but going at this speed you’d die even if you could open it.
‘You know, the worst thing about learning I was going to die was knowing that you’d be there after me, taking my place on the throne...in my wife’s bed...but now it’s fine because I’ve realised that death is actually a gift. Because I can take you with me.’
Zain lunged to take the wheel but his brother kept the car on its trajectory, a trajectory that would send it sailing off the cliff and into space. Zain transferred his attentions to the door, slamming and kicking to gain his freedom.
‘Relax and enjoy it, little brother. I intend to.’ Khalid’s laugh turned into a cry of rage as the door finally gave and Zain threw himself through it.
* * *
Wide, cool corridors radiated out from the octagonal central atrium, where light from the glass dome sparked rainbow reflections off the water cascading from the fountain into a mosaic-lined pool.
It felt more like a five-star hotel than any hospital Abby had ever experienced, certainly nothing like the ones she remembered from her childhood. She’d been six when she had first arrived at one in the back of an ambulance. She remembered the rush of cold December air that brushed over her before the trolley she had lain on was pushed through a wide set of double doors and whisked along what had seemed a never-ending corridor. The lights shining down from the ceiling had made her head ache.
There was a gap in her recollections between that point and later when she’d found herself sitting in a hard-backed chair, her feet not touching the floor as she swung them. She had been counting in her head the trail of bright red splodges on the tiled floor that stopped at the curtain that hid from view the people who were making the loud noises, the people who were trying to save her parents.
They’d tried for a long time. Abby had climbed out of the chair and wandered off long before they’d admitted defeat. Her gran told the story of how she’d been found later, thumb in mouth, asleep on the floor of a sluice room.
‘Sorry to keep you waiting.’
Abby dropped the hand she’d raised to shade her eyes from the rainbow colours dancing on the water and turned, the motion displacing the silk scarf that her British escort had handed her before they stepped out of the car... Not essential but a nice gesture, he’d said.
She knew the green filaments in the scarf emphasised the deep emerald of her eyes and she adjusted it again over the burnished waves of her hair, which seemed determined not to be covered.
‘Will we be able to fly back tonight, Mr Jones?
‘We all want this situation to be resolved as swiftly as possible,’ came the frustratingly vague response.
His voice, like everything else about the man, was nondescript and unmemorable. Abby had only encountered him once before and if it had not been for the extraordinary circumstances under which they’d met, she doubted she ever would have remembered him. And circumstances didn’t get much more extraordinary than the ones that had preceded her arrival at the British Embassy in the Aarifan capital city ten months ago.
She’d told her story to at least half a dozen people before Mr Jones appeared, and over another cup of tea she had related her tale yet again. He had listened, then pressed her on a few specific points. Had she actually read the document she’d signed? Had the man who’d come to her rescue given his name?
