Free The Sheik's Command by Loreth Anne White

radio contact at all times, and I will carry a GPS so that you can map the way into their village.”
    A ripple of surprise passed through the guard and his men. They were his top five bodyguards, and they knew he was taking a risk. “May I speak, your Royal Highness?” asked Gelu.
    “Make it quick. I want to get into those mountains before nightfall.”
    “I do not believe this is wise, your Highness. You could meet with an ambush. The woman herself is not to be trusted. She could be allied to the enemy.”
    “I am aware of this,” he snapped. “I will watch her carefully. And I will be armed. She will not.”
    “But your Highness—”
    He raised his hand. “Enough. We move. Now!”
    Gelu caught the eyes of the other guards, but no one said anything more.
     
    Zakir paced beneath the Bedouin tent cover, his boots soundless on the soft sand. The small desert encampment at the south end of the Red Valley provided only minimal respite from the windstorm. A table with monitoring and radio equipment had been set up under the canvas, behind a screen. With this equipment his Gurkha militia would track his progress into the mountains.
    He’d sent Nikki to wait in another tent while he changedhis robes and organized the loading of supplies onto camels. Zakir had already dismissed the animals’ handler and sent him back to his camp. He did not want anyone from the army aware of his new plans. He trusted only his Gurkhas.
    It’s better to die than to be a coward.
    That was the historic slogan of the Gurkhas—Nepalese soldiers once designated by the Victorian British as having been descended from a “martial race.” The British military still recruited about 200 Gurkhas each year in one of the toughest and most fiercely contested military selection procedures in the world.
    Omair had informed Zakir that 30,000 young men vied for the British Army spots each year, and the private military company for which Omair contracted had managed to start recruiting several hundred of these Gurkhas annually—men who’d either been overlooked in the selection process or soldiers who had chosen to retire from the ranks of the British military. Tenzing Gelu was such a man. He had a long history with the Brits, but had chosen to leave in favor of a more lucrative freelance profession.
    Omair had personally selected a cadre of these Gurkhas for Zakir’s protection after the assassination of their parents and brother, and he’d put them through a rapid Arabic learning process, which was still ongoing.
    Zakir’s Gurkhas had no emotional or historical connection to the locals of Al Na’Jar and would be loyal only to him for the duration of their contract.
    While Zakir had told Nikki that he knew little of Omair’s movements, it was only partially true. Omair remained in constant contact with his brothers even though the exact nature of his whereabouts was kept secret. Omair could just as easily be deep in some South American jungle as he could be moving undercover among the top society of Washington, D.C., or in London.
    But one thing Zakir did know was that once Omair had taken on a mission he’d stop at nothing until his jambiya had tasted the blood of his quarry.
    Zakir flicked out his wrist and checked his watch. He wanted to leave within the next ten minutes.
     
    The canvas walls of her tent flapped in gusts, and sand scraped at the outsides. Nerves danced inside Nikki’s stomach. Would she remember the way into the village? It all seemed so different in the blowing sand.
    She plunked down onto the military camp cot and began running through the landmarks in her mind, but suddenly something in the atmosphere shifted and the hair on the back of her neck prickled—someone had entered the tent.
    But before she could spin around, a cold blade pressed against her throat and a hand clamped over mouth, skin rough, dry. “Do not make a sound,” a man’s voice hissed in her ear in English.
    She nodded slightly, afraid that any