Edge of Courage (Edge Security Series Book 5) (4 page)

The blood drained from Sarah’s face. The girl was too young. But according to the Islamic State’s interpretation of Sharia, a girl as young as nine could be married or used sexually. Sarah kept her eyes lowered and her mouth shut, though she wanted to throw her dagger into Dahab’s eye.

But no. The girl was not part of the mission. Though Sarah knew leaving her in this hellhole would carve out another piece of her soul.

Sarah moved down the hall to the front of the house. Men’s laughter and excited rumblings came from the front room. When she entered, the noise level didn’t dim in the slightest. The jihadist soldiers sat on the couches around the room and ignored her completely as she made her way to the low table in the center of the room. Most wore black, and some had turbans or
kufis
on their heads. Their bearded faces were wreathed with smiles; their weapons of choice, whether AK-47s or machetes, lay across their laps or beside them. A picture window overlooked the front dust patch and the guards stationed at the gate.

She couldn’t see Rakin over the stone wall but she knew he was there. Not that he could help her if something went wrong. Her heart beat harder at the thought and she took a deep, calming breath and focused on the task at hand. She
became
a simple tea-seller.

She laid out the
hajji badah
on a platter already on the table for that purpose and filled the teapot from her carafe. The men waited until she was on her way out of the room before reaching for the cookies and tea.

They must keep up their energy for what was to come. Her hands tightened on the carafe and pail. She expelled her breath harshly and forced herself to relax. Saving the English girl Claire was her top priority. She made her way to the kitchen again.

Dahab wasn’t at the back door. The girl at the sink didn’t look up from washing, her skinny shoulders hunched in. Sarah was secretly glad she didn’t have to see the girl’s sad eyes again.

She set the carafe and pail down by the table and walked to the stairs at the end of the room.

Time for a character change.

The tea-seller would never go upstairs and Sarah needed to. She straightened her shoulders, lifted her chin and moved up the stairs with purpose, leaving the limp behind. Aqsa, Russian-born and high-ranking within the brigade, had the right to go anywhere she wanted and that was who Sarah became next. On the way up the steps, she pulled the al-Khansa headband from under her
abaya
and put it on.

The hall at the top had three doors on one side and two on the other. It led to a wider set of stairs at the other end, going down to the front door. That was the staircase the men used.

The muffled sounds of crying and grunts made bile rise in her throat. She pushed all thoughts of what was happening on the other side of those doors away. She had to stay focused.

Sarah walked tall, swinging her arms just so, portraying an arrogance that came with the absolute power Aqsa held over the women in this house.

She curled her lip, knowing a sneer would enter her Russian-accented Arabic when she spoke. She’d practiced mimicking Aqsa’s voice last night. The woman believed herself better than most Iraqis: pious, arrogant, a true zealot.

And a complete bitch. But one who could go anywhere in the house without question.

She opened the first door on her right and assessed the situation in a split second. Six Yazidi women and four girls who couldn’t have been more than fifteen huddled on one side of the room, their bare faces streaked with tears and bruises, while two veiled women in
abayas
and gloves held thin iron rods. Sarah knew how much those rods could hurt when handled correctly. She had been taught by the Brigade how to inflict maximum pain.

They turned to her.

“Where is the
kuffar
woman?” she demanded, her voice pitched slightly higher and her Arabic tinged with Russian. “Yusef wants her.”

One of the women nodded. “She is in the next room, Aqsa,” she said.

Sarah didn’t thank her; she just strode from the room as if everyone in it were beneath her, just like Aqsa would do.

She went to the next room on the right, knowing from the sounds she heard that the ones on the left were being used by some of the ISIS soldiers from downstairs. She threw open the door, just like before.

Dahab, by her wide-legged stance, stood there speaking with two members of the brigade. In this room, along with the complement of women and girls huddled together, was a girl lying on her side, seemingly unconscious. Her face was uncovered, and one eye was swollen almost shut.

Claire Hayden.

“Wake her up,” she ordered, pointing at the girl. “Yusef wants her.”

“He does?” Dahab said. “I wasn’t informed.”

“Do you think Yusef al-Basri tells you of everything he decides?” Sarah said.

“Of course not, Aqsa.” Dahab bowed her head. She marched to the girl and hit her across the back with her whip. The girl grunted and her eyelashes fluttered. Dahab pulled her arm back for another strike.

Sarah stepped in. “We know you’re awake,
sabaya
. Get up or you will be beaten until you do.”

The girl’s gray eyes opened, vivid against her bruised skin. She glared at them all. Sarah wanted to wring her neck. As much as she admired the girl’s willingness to fight, she needed her meek and compliant for the plan to work.

“This is not Islam,” Claire said in a low, hoarse voice, her English accent making her Arabic clipped.

Dahab’s whip whistled down on the girl. “Blasphemy!” She struck the girl again. And again.

“Enough,” Sarah said. “She will be punished, Dahab. But first she needs to be able to walk.” She looked at the girl. “Follow me or I will let Dahab beat you to death.”

Dahab almost vibrated with anticipation. Sarah wanted to strike her down for that, but held in all feelings. She had to be Aqsa in every thought and action. If she let Sarah the E.D.G.E. operator show at all, then it wouldn’t be just the girl getting beaten, raped, and executed.

“Perhaps I should come with you, Aqsa, to help with this
kuffar
.”

“No, Dahab,” she said. “You have your duties. There is an escort waiting outside for us.”

She left the room, praying it worked and that Dahab didn’t follow. She wouldn’t mind killing the woman, but it would interfere with the plan.

Only the slow, plodding footsteps of the girl sounded behind her. She didn’t turn, but started down the stairs to the kitchen.

“What are you going to do with me?” the girl asked quietly.

Sarah glanced behind her. Dahab had shut the door to the slaves’ room. For the moment, they were alone.

“I’m here to rescue you, Claire,” Sarah whispered in her own voice. “Your father sent me.”

“My father?” The girl’s voice trembled.

Sarah lifted her own veil so the girl could see her eyes, and the truth there. “You must be strong right now if we are to escape. You must do everything I tell you. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” she whispered back.

“Good.” She pulled a tightly folded package from under her
abaya
. It was an extra black cloak and head covering for the girl. She threw the
abaya
around the girl’s shoulders and then pulled the
niqab
over her head. Now only her gray eyes could be seen. Last, she brought the face veil down so that even her eyes were covered. “Keep your hands hidden and your eyes down. Don’t speak. Follow me.”

She went down the last few steps into the kitchen. The only person there was the girl. She’d stopped washing dishes and stood in the middle of the kitchen. “Please,” she whispered. “I heard what you said. Take me with you.”

“Fuck,” Sarah muttered. Both girls flinched. Swearing was an automatic beating if someone heard, but she had more worries than that right now.

The girl had no
abaya
, just a long tunic that left her hands uncovered. And although she wore a
hijab
that covered her hair and neck, her face was bare.

It was a complete mission risk to leave the girl behind. She could tell someone what was happening and blow Sarah’s cover. But Sarah also wasn’t equipped to take her. Protocol dictated that she kill the girl to keep the mission on track.

“Please,” the girl said again.

They didn’t have time for this. Sarah felt her knife strapped at the small of her back. She could hide the girl’s body in a cupboard. She’d probably be doing the child a favor by releasing her from this hellhole.

And in the process, Sarah would lose the rest of her soul.

The girl’s blue eyes shone with desperation and hope.

Make a decision, Sarah!

She slid her knife back into its sheath. She pulled the girl’s
hijab
loose and rewound it around her head so that it covered everything but her eyes, leaving only the barest slit for them. As she did this, she spoke to Claire.

“Take that tea carafe. Go to the woman’s gate. Limp with your left leg. Let the guard open the gate for you. Do not speak. He’ll think you’re the tea woman.” She glanced down the hallway, her heart pounding, but it was still empty. “There’s a tea cart in the alley,” she continued. “Wait until no one is looking. There’s enough space for you in the cabinet. Get inside. Go now.”

“Without you?”

“We’ll be right behind you. You’ll have a better chance on your own. Go.”

She glanced around the kitchen. The white cloth from her pail of baked goods might work. Unmarried women were supposed to wear white. It wouldn’t be unusual for a girl her age to have a white
chador
, a head and shoulder covering. She threw it around the girl’s shoulders. It was short, only coming to her elbows. It would have to do. “What’s your name?”

“Jalila.”

“Don’t look up, Jalila. You’re my slave if the guard asks. I need you to act like it.”

Jalila nodded. Sarah handed her the empty pail to carry, and then pulled the girl’s sleeves down over her hands so her skin wouldn’t show.

“Follow me.”

They went out the back door. Jalila visibly trembled beside her. She squeezed her shoulder where the guard couldn’t see. Claire was nowhere in sight.

Please let her have followed instructions.

She walked to the gate, another faceless veiled member of the brigade with a child
sabaya
in tow. “My
mahram
awaits me,” Sarah said in accentless Arabic.

The man opened the gate without even looking at them, trusting in the brigade.

In the alley, Sarah welcomed the smell of rotting garbage that kept the area clear of people. The tea cart waited beside the gate where Sarah had left it. She could see the busy street ahead.

She pulled off the brigade headband and stuffed it away under her robe before sliding the panel on the side of the cart open. Claire huddled inside, panting.

“Relax,” Sarah said. “It’s going to be a tight fit for the two of you. And it will be a long trip. But don’t make a sound. I will get you out of here.”

Both girls nodded. Jalila squeezed in opposite Claire.

Sarah latched the door, made sure the tea carafes were secure on top and started to push the cart back to the street, limping heavily again.

Rakin appeared at the end of the alley. She nodded at him and he nodded back before he turned away, guiding the way back to their truck parked on the other side of the souq.

S
arah crouched
in the confines of the hidden room in the basement of the house she and Rakin used. It was a small, old CIA safe house, attached in a long row to homes like it, all built of concrete, their tiny dust-patch yards separated by stone walls. The room with its door masked by a fake bookshelf was invaluable, and held all of their communications equipment and weapons. As well as any escaped slaves they might have.

“We’ll move you when it’s safe,” she said to the two girls, who sat on mats with plates of food on their laps. Jalila hadn’t said much since the rescue the day before.

Claire thumped the mat with a fist. “But when? When can I go home?” she said. “I hate this place. I hate it so much that I think I’m going to scream.”

“Do that and you’ll be back at the brothel after they’ve killed Rakin and me.”

“You don’t understand,” Claire whispered, scrubbing at her arm. The girl had spent thirty minutes yesterday in the shower. When she’d come out, her skin had been raw.

Sarah reached out and squeezed her hand stopping the frantic motion. “I don’t know everything you’ve been through, but trust me. We’re doing everything in our power to keep you both safe and get you home as soon as possible.”

Jalila looked up. “I have no home, but my sister would care for me. We must get Besma out.”

Sarah’s chest tightened. This was the first she’d heard of a sister. “Do you know where she is?”

Why did she ask that? She couldn’t do anything about it.

“Besma is in that place that you took me from.”

Damn. Damn. Damn.

She could get the girl out. She knew she could. But it was a risk. A huge risk.

Most of the girls they rescued weren’t like Claire, with connected families who could persuade governments to send in a special ops team to get their little girls. Most of the girls were Yazidi, whose families had either been captured or killed. These girls had no one else to help them.

She and Rakin usually rescued girls and some women from individual homes. Not all the
sabaya
stayed in the brothels. A large percentage went with a soldier to his home for a week or two before being given to another. As an admin clerk, Sarah had access to the records of where the slaves were housed.

She and Rakin only rescued a girl when no one but the slave was home. They would break in, find her, give her an
abaya
and veil, and have her follow them out. Then Sarah would get the girl into her network and out of Mosul.

The rescues weren’t many, and they didn’t do much to fight ISIS, but it helped appease the helplessness both she and Rakin felt as they watched the monsters running the city.

She bit her lip and stared into Jalila’s dark gaze. Sarah couldn’t make a promise. She should tell the girl not to worry about her sister. That her sister would want her safe. But she thought about the horrible conditions in that house and she couldn’t stop the words. “I’ll get her out.”

Jalila didn’t smile, but Sarah saw the spark of hope light her eyes.

Her stomach roiling with the promise she’d made, Sarah stood and climbed the stairs up to the main floor. Rakin sat at the low table in the front room, holding a cup of the strong coffee they drank here.

He was a fine specimen of a man, one who definitely turned heads, even those of the chaperoned and veiled women who walked the streets of Mosul. Within their first week of working together, he’d invited her to share his bed. Sarah had declined. She’d known they would have fun, but she found men too often became overly protective of the women they’d slept with. She didn’t want that happening here.

It had nothing to do with the blue-eyed man she’d left back at E.D.G.E. HQ.

So although she didn’t sleep with Rakin, over the past few months he’d become increasingly protective of her anyway. Probably influenced by the fact that he had to pretend every day to be her strict Muslim brother.

She sat across from him and poured a cup of coffee from the steel carafe on the table. “Take Claire tonight. You know by tomorrow they’ll be doing a search at all the checkpoints for her. Jalila can go into the network when you get back.”

He pressed his lips together. “It’s not safe for you to be here alone.”

Sarah set her cup down. “You know I can handle myself. We should get Claire out of here ASAP, and I can’t travel with her like you can.”

He shook his head. “You should come with us, so I can protect you.”

And there it was.

“Rakin,” she said in a low voice that didn’t carry, but had the steel of the CIA agent she had been and the E.D.G.E. operator she now was. “Do not forget who I really am or what kind of training I have. I am not some jihadi bride to be dismissed to the kitchen.”

Rakin ran his hands through his hair. “I’m out there more than you are,” he said. “The things they do to women…”

“I am out there just as much as you and I know exactly what they do to women,” she said. “I signed on to this job knowing that. This is the work we both do. Besides…” She leaned back in her chair. “We work for two different organizations. You have no authority over me. You know I’m right. Get the girl out of Mosul.”

He stood. “Fine. You win.” He stomped outside, slamming the front door behind him. She wished she had the luxury to do the same, but it would draw too much attention if she were to follow him.

It was time Rakin was pulled from the assignment. It was why she’d insisted they be brother and sister, rather than husband and wife. Another “cousin” or family member could come and take his place without disturbing her work. She would recommend that tonight when she called in.

It was two hours before Rakin came back, his scowl firmly in place and his arms filled with supplies. “I bought groceries. I’ll only be gone two days, but you should be fine until I return.”

“You know I can ask Amirah and her husband to escort me if needed.” Amirah was her neighbor and had become a friend, as much as it surprised Sarah. More so because she so rarely made friends.

“Will you stop being so stubborn? Just stay in as much as possible until I get back.”

She crossed her arms. “What will you do if I get caught? Try to rescue me?”

His eyes widened. “You’re my partner. Of course I wouldn’t leave you.”

She barely refrained from rolling her eyes. “We are two high-level operators who know the score. If I’m taken, there will be nothing you can do about it. Don’t waste your life.”

“Jesus, you’re cold.”

“No, I’m realistic.”

“If you’re so realistic, then why’d you bring the little girl back too? She was a risk to the mission.”

Sarah’s throat tightened. “I don’t know, but I couldn’t leave her there.”

Rakin sighed. “Perhaps we’ve been here too long. Let’s just get through this week. We’ll get the girl into the network when I’m back.”

“Fine,” she said. “When are you leaving?”

“After I’m back from the
Maghrib
prayers. I want to be at the city’s outer limits by full dark.”

“Then you’ll travel south?”

“The SAS have arranged a squad to meet up with us near the farthest checkpoint. They’ll take her through the back country and ship the girl back to England. Stupid twit.”

The UK’s Special Air Service was one of the best special ops units in the world. Claire would be safe with them.

“Try to keep your opinions to yourself,” she said dryly. “She’s a teenager who’s been through a lot. Handle her like she’s a grenade without a pin.”

“Wilco,” he muttered.

She left Rakin out front prepping for his journey while she cleaned up the small cooking area and prepped for dinner. They usually shared the household chores, but right now he needed to focus on getting Claire out of the city.

By the time she’d finished washing up, they could hear the
adhan
, the call to prayer, over the loudspeakers placed on the minarets of the mosques all over the city.

“You should go to prayer first,” she said. “I’ll have the girl ready for you when you get back.”

“Make sure you put out the prayer rug in case anyone comes by,” he said before he left.

She pulled aside the curtain of the front window and watched Rakin leave through the front gate. Through it, she could see men walking down the street toward the mosque. The gate shut and closed off her view of the world outside.

She took a small rolled rug from a bookshelf that also held a cloth-wrapped Koran. She shook out the rug and set it on the floor so that it faced toward Mecca. She was about to go check on the girls when someone pounded on her door.

“Open up,” a heavy voice shouted.

“Dammit,” she muttered, grabbing her
niqab
and hastily throwing it on. It was never good to get a knock during a call to prayer. The pounding on the front door continued until she hustled over and opened it a crack.

She swore inwardly. Three ISIS fighters stood in front of her door. On the street beyond, watching through the open gate, was her neighbor Ahmed, the man who wanted to marry her. His potbelly bumped out the front of his
dishdasha
.

“
As-salamu alaykum,
” she said, keeping her chin down, but discreetly surveying her visitors.

“
Wa-alaikum salaam
.” The soldier in front gave the usual response to her greeting of peace upon them. “Where is your
mahram
?” He leaned on the door, and craned his neck to see beyond her.

She kept her voice calm and quiet, and let the door open a little but not all the way, just enough for them to see she was alone. “My brother has gone to the mosque. Did you need him?”

“A female slave escaped yesterday from a
sabaya
house,” the leader said. “You belong to the al-Khansa, correct?”

“Yes,” Sarah said. “But what does that have to do with me? I wasn’t at the
sabaya
house yesterday.”

“We are checking in with your whole unit and anyone else who might have gone into the house.” The man narrowed his eyes as he looked at her. “Where were you yesterday afternoon?”

Her heart rate accelerated, but she kept her voice even. “I was at the souq, shopping with my brother.”

“Which one?”

“Najafi,” she said, naming a large street market in the southern part of the city far from where they’d rescued Claire and Jalila. “There’s a vendor there who sells the best spices.”

Ahmed, who’d moved closer while they’d been speaking, stepped up with a sneer on his face. “I think they should both be questioned. Her actions are suspicious.”

Asshole. She should have silenced Ahmed long ago, right after the nosy dick had peeked in their front window and seen her without a veil. The peeping tom had been pestering Rakin about marriage ever since.

The leader looked back at Ahmed. “And you are?”

“Ahmed Mahmood. I belong to the
hisbah.
And I think Rakin isn’t a true believer. I don’t think he teaches his sister proper respect. She might be a member of the al-Khansa, but I’ve caught her without a veil on.”

She had to shut Ahmed down now, before he persuaded the fighters to take Rakin away. Thankfully he’d given her an out already. She gasped. “That’s a horrid accusation, Ahmed. You were looking in our windows. It’s why we keep our curtains closed now. Why would you say that about Rakin? Is it because he refused to let you marry me?”

Ahmed gasped in turn and spluttered his protests.

Sarah smiled behind her veil. She could see the leader weighing her words. He turned back to her. “Is your brother your sole
mahram
?”

She nodded.

“Then Ahmed will take responsibility for you if anything happens to your brother. The man is devout and has offered to marry you. You will not have to worry for your future.”

Ahmed smiled.

Her jaw ached from clenching it so hard to stop her retort.

“If you see anything suspicious,” the man continued, “report it to your superiors.”

The three soldiers left, but Ahmed stayed behind.

“I look forward to the day you become my wife,” he said quietly. His eyes roved over her, as if searching for an opening under her veil. “Then I will teach you proper respect.” He walked after the others to go to the mosque.

Sarah shut and locked the door.

“He’s creepy.” Claire stood in the doorway to the basement stairs. Jalila waited on the steps behind her.

“Shit,” Sarah said. “Are you insane? I told you to hide. It would mean all of our deaths if you’re caught here.”

Claire swallowed and then shook her head. “I couldn’t just wait in that hole. That’s how they caught me when I first tried to escape. I let someone try to ‘hide’ me. It didn’t work.”

Sarah yanked off her veil. “And what were you going to do? Fight them off?” She made sure the front window’s curtains overlapped and nothing could be seen.

Claire frowned. “Run.” She held up the veil and
abaya
Sarah had given her to escape. “I would be anonymous.”

“Not bad,” she said, and the girl fairly preened. Time to nip that false confidence in the bud. “But you’d be trying to escape right at prayer time, when only the men are out and going to mosque. A single woman, even anonymous under a veil, is a target. You wouldn’t get a block.”

The girl’s lower lip trembled, but she lifted her chin. “I can’t stand that room. It’s tiny and there’s no window. I’ve been locked up for weeks now.”

Sympathy moved through Sarah. The girl had endured horrific hardships. She went to the stove and set the kettle on for tea. “You won’t have to be there long. Rakin will take you out after he comes back. By last prayer tonight, the two of you should be out of the city.”

“Really?” Her hands clasped together.

Sarah smiled and put some cookies on a plate in front of her. “You might as well come sit, too, Jalila. I know you’re there.” The little girl peeked her head around the corner before silently coming to the table. Sarah set a plate in front of her, too.

The girls ate while Sarah sipped tea, enjoying the peace for a moment. She’d saved two from the brothel. They weren’t clear yet by far, but she’d take each little victory she could.

She wasn’t sure what she’d tell the soldiers if they remembered they wanted to see Rakin and came looking for him, but she’d worry about that tomorrow.