‘I don’t care what he said,’ Stanley insisted. ‘The man paid millions to have everybody go silent and abandon what I’d achieved. Clearwater sold out, Amber, the whole town. They didn’t give a damn about what I’d done as soon as Seavers waved a few million bucks in their faces. He stole the device from me, Amber.’
‘He says he doesn’t have it,’ Amber replied. ‘He’s just the company through which those people were paid off, but most of the money came from elsewhere. If we can prove that, then we can show that Seavers is not behind this and that somebody else is paying people off to remain silent.’
‘Seavers is a liar,’ Stanley almost shouted. ‘He would say anything in order to turn you to his side. I will never sell — out to somebody like him.’
‘Seavers might be lying about his motivation,’ Ethan said, ‘but this stuff about the shadow government? Did he ever mention something called Majestic Twelve?’
Amber shook her head. ‘He never mentioned names of any kind, and he said he didn’t know any of the members of the shadow government he insists is behind all of this. He said they could crush him like a worm if he didn’t do as they said.’
‘It’s too late now,’ Lopez pointed out. ‘We just abducted you from that convoy, and these trigger — happy goons probably killed a few of Seavers’ guards. That’s murder in any country, and Sharia Law’s not going to look favourably upon us. We need to leave before we find ourselves rotting in a Saudi jail for the next five hundred years.’
Ethan was about to reply when he heard a faint humming sound that drifted down the wadi from somewhere above them. He froze in motion and raised a hand to forestall any more conversation as he focused all of his senses on the sound, closed his eyes and tried to identify from where it was coming. The militants around him beat him to it.
‘Predator drone, probably within a mile of us,’ one of them identified the noise. ‘It must have taken off from Damman and hasn’t had time to get to enough height to be inaudible to us.’
Ethan opened his eyes and pointed at Stanley.
‘We need to split up,’ he said. ‘The only way we can ensure the maximum number of us escape is to provide too many targets for them to follow once.’
‘Agreed,’ the lead militant said. ‘But we can also fight back.’
Without prompting, two of the women guarding the water reached beneath their burqas and produced a pair of rocket — propelled grenade launchers, the long barrelled weapons easily concealed beneath their flowing robes.
The militants took the weapons and began jogging away down the wadi in an attempt to gain a visual on the circling drone before it climbed out of sight.
‘What about us?’ Stanley asked.
‘We have further transport for you,’ the militant leader said as he beckoned for them to follow him down the wadi.
Ethan followed them at a jog as they made their way through the winding confines of the canyon, the heat rising and the air scented with the musk of ancient desert sand. They reached a tight curve in the wadi, and there parked beneath the soaring cliffs were several motorbikes and two non — descript looking vehicles, sedans with peeling paint and ancient, almost flat tires devoid of grip.
‘There will be more traffic on the roads by now,’ the militant said. ‘The police will set up roadblocks into and out of the city. My men and I will ride further out into the desert and meet you on the outskirts of Damman, where we will once again change vehicles in order to help conceal you as you enter the city. Make sure you leave the road before you reach the city, we will be waiting for you at An Nandah.’
The militant slid a grenade launcher from his shoulder and pressed it into Ethan’s hands.
‘May Allah walk with you. Inshallah.’
Ethan walked quickly across to the motorbikes, all three of which were fairly powerful and designed for off — road use. They were older machines, but fully functional and kept clean and likely well — maintained. He climbed aboard one, switched on the fuel valve and then brought his boot down on the kick starter. The engine roared into life immediately and he nodded with satisfaction as he looked at Amber.
‘Time to leave. Get on.’
As if on cue, Ethan heard a clatter of gunfire and a sudden thumping sound that reverberated down the wadi as a helicopter thundered overhead.
‘Saudi Arabia has arrived!’ the militant yelled.
‘Let’s get out of here!’ Stanley shouted as he looked at the lead militant. ‘You have the plans now! Can you build it?’
‘We can try,’ the militant replied. ‘Now go, all of you! Get to Damman as fast as you can!’
XX
Ethan twisted the motorbike’s throttle and it swung around on the dusty floor of the wadi and accelerated downhill toward where once, long ago, a river had flowed out of the canyon onto a fertile flood plain. He saw Lopez following him with Stanley Meyer on her pillion seat as Amber yelled at Ethan above the wind, her arms wrapped around his waist.
‘We’re running the wrong way! Huck Seavers wants to help!’
‘He can’t be trusted!’ Ethan shouted back. ‘Hang on!’
They were gathering speed and the breeze was a welcome relief from the overwhelming heat. The deep wadi wound left and right ahead of them, but now the lofty walls of the chasm were coming down and he could see the wadi exit ahead, a brilliant flare of sunlight searing the horizon and blazing into his eyes.
Then, above the crunching of their tires on the dusty track, Ethan heard a new sound growing in intensity, and quickly he was able to distinguish the rhythmic thump — thump — thump of rotor blades beating the air as the helicopter returned.
He saw at the end of the wadi the two militants who had rushed away earlier, both armed with rocket — propelled grenade launchers. Before them, sweeping across the glowing sky, was the formidable shape of an AH–64 Apache gunship.
‘Damn,’ he uttered.
The Apache was a lethal weapons platform, the most feared of all attack helicopter gunships and sold to the Saudis by America. Ethan glanced over his shoulder and saw Lopez following close behind, and behind her the militants on horseback, galloping in pursuit and leaving swirling clouds of glowing dust in their wake.
Ethan twisted the throttle wide open and the little motorbike surged toward the wadi exit as the two gunmen took aim at the circling Apache. Even before they could open fire, the attack helicopter surged upward and sideways into the air, its rotors kicking up billowing clouds of desert sand as a series of brilliantly burning orbs sprayed in a fearsome pyrotechnic light show to fall toward the desert.
‘Decoy flares!’ Ethan yelled. ‘They’ve seen the grenade launchers!’
Ethan craned his neck back as the Apache swung out of sight over the wadi, and then plunged back into view behind them.
‘Hang on!’ Ethan yelled as he twisted the bike’s throttle wide open.
Ethan looked back again and saw the helicopter sweeping in, a black silhouette against the brilliant sky, and then suddenly something let out a cloud of smoke and screeched down toward the floor of the wadi.
‘Incoming!’
Ethan hunched his shoulders and squinted as the motorbike shot from out of the wadi’s confines and into the open desert as a Hellfire missile slammed into the wadi’s depths and exploded with a deafening blast. The shockwave thumped into Amber’s back and she slammed into Ethan as he fought to keep the bike upright, clouds of flame and debris blasting by them.