Free Personal Assistance (Entangled Ignite) by Louise Rose-Innes

couldn’t afford to let her live?
    “They’re looking for a blond Westerner, not a local woman with a rebel sympathizer. Those two guys in the square wouldn’t have seen your hair, and if they did, they wouldn’t have had time to relay the information back to their colleagues yet. We’ve got a narrow margin in which to exit this city. We must use it well.”
    They crossed at the traffic lights, Hannah keeping her head well down, while Tom remained alert, his head moving slowly from left to right like a radio beacon. No one stopped them, and so they blended with the civilian exodus from Syman City.
    They were almost at the first rest area when five or six police vehicles roared past, sirens wailing and blue lights flashing. Tom muttered an expletive and pulled her back into the sparse vegetation that lined the dusty off-road patch.
    They watched as the cars came to a screeching halt about a mile up ahead. The blue lights could clearly be seen from their position. And they weren’t getting any smaller.
    “They’re setting up an army checkpoint.” His expression was grim.
    She felt like crying. “We nearly made it.” The blue lights spread out across the road and the traffic started backing up. “Now what?”
    “They’re going to stop more rebels from entering the city and joining the rallies.”
    “You mean it’s not for me?”
    “Not officially, no. But they’ll have orders to watch out for you.”
    With the cars reducing speed in lieu of the checkpoint, it was easier to flag someone down. The first car was a lone driver, a man. He let that one pass.
    The second was a smart Mercedes with two businessmen inside. While she was tempted to shove Tom out into the road to get their attention, he didn’t stop them, either.
    “What are you looking for?” she asked.
    “Something they’re not expecting,” he replied, his eyes squinting at the next car, a silver sedan, slightly run down, not the latest model. There was a woman next to the driver and another two people in the back. Tom jumped out into the road, waving his hand and forcing the driver to stop. The army definitely wouldn’t be looking for a family.
    Tom beckoned Hannah over. “Ask him where he’s going.”
    She did as she was told, in flawlessly accented Arabic. The man didn’t seem to realize she was a Westerner. She took that as a good sign.
    “He’s going to Bani Hatwah,” she whispered. A visual of Bani Hatwah written on the map popped into her mind. It was a tiny village, a thumbnail’s distance south of Syman City. The woman sitting in the passenger seat looked impatiently at her husband.
    “That’s good enough. Ask him for a lift. Tell him I’ll pay.”
    “Okay.” She relayed the information to the driver, a slightly paunchy man of about sixty with a beard and a turban. At first he looked about to refuse, then he heard the word “pay.” Money was essential during a crisis. Banks were often closed or unavailable; the cost of goods went up as demand multiplied.
    “How much?” he asked.
    “I’ll give him a hundred dollars,” Tom said, not bothering to wait for her to translate as he pulled the notes out of his pocket. He must have anticipated this.
    At the sight of the money, the wife nudged him eagerly. Reluctantly, the driver signaled for them to get in. He shook his head at the gun, though, and said he didn’t want to be caught harboring rebels.
    Tom nodded in understanding. “You get in,” he said to Hannah, opening the back door for her. Two faces stared up at them—a wrinkled woman in a burka , and a young girl of about fourteen, in jeans and a pink T-shirt with sequins on the front. Both had the same anxious brown eyes and pale, scared faces. Despite the age difference, it was clear they were related. Hannah smiled reassuringly, but it did little good. They both continued to stare at her with something close to terror.
    Then Tom did the strangest thing. He dropped down onto his back and rolled under the car. There