Chapter Nine

Safiya

I could not breathe.

My skin was crawling, my heart was racing, I needed to run and I could not breathe.

All because I had cracked a window.

An action that was supposed to bring me a breath of untainted air. A single inhale not laced with masculine musk and the faint vanilla scent of an overwhelmingly innocent and beautiful young blonde.

All I had wanted was one deep, cleansing breath.

Instead, I had heard her.

Carried on the wind, her na?ve, guileless voice pierced my heart with a staggering blow.

I never kissed my husband.

Her husband.

Her husband!

The man who was my husband, he was hers.

Hers .

Eight years were decimated in an instant more devastating than the moment I saw her in the SUV, and I did not know how I had gotten here—waiting, pining, biding my time—for what?

A secretive ghost of a man who gave orders, married other women and left empty promises?

How could I have been so na?ve?

I thought I had not deceived myself. I had been telling myself all along that there were others. That every time he left or returned, it was because there were others. They weighed on his shoulders, on his expression, in his voice, all the while I was sure, absolutely positive , that none of them knew this about him because he was mine.

He was my husband.

He had me sign those papers in my real name that very first week when I had never penned my name on any document.

He had said it was for protection—of me—and he had made that sound special. Even though he had said he would not touch me, not like a husband touches a wife. Even though he had placed that boundary and kept his word. He had still, still made it seem real.

But it was not.

None of it was.

Not the beach house, not the marriage paperwork, not the visits with the focused attention like he cared, like he was listening, like I mattered. Not all of the gifts. The gifts . Every article of clothing I wore was from him. Everything I had, period, was from him.

But he was not mine.

He was hers. He was all of theirs—however many there were.

My stomach twisted, my chest pained, the past became the present and I needed to run. Get out of the car, run . Implore those men to help you. Ask the tall, imposing one to take you. Beg for help. Leave. Just leave .

But I did nothing.

I sat in the vehicle, and I broke.

I broke more than I had the moment when he had found me in a windowless prison eight years ago. A moment I swore I would never relive. Not in this lifetime, even if it meant taking my last breath at my own hands. I would not be a victim.

My mother had died so I would not have to.

I was here because I had made choices. Choices that had taken me from the life I had been given, the life my anne had been proud of, one I should have been proud of too. And I had been, but I also had not regretted my new life. Not like this. Not until this very moment.

Every year since I had met a blue-eyed American disappeared in a flash, and suddenly I was back in the stifling two-room dwelling with insurgents yelling and guns firing, and my mother's arms around me as we crouched as low to the ground as possible.

Her panicked whisper bled into my ear. "Safiya, you must run. This is your chance."

"No, anne ." I could not even think of leaving her.

"This is your only choice. Get free of here. Run and do not look back. Make it to auntie's home. You know the way. Remember how I taught you to stay hidden. Go, now."

"No." I refused. "I am not leaving without you." She was all I had. It had been only my mother and me for as long as I had memories.

"You must." She squeezed me hard. "You are older now. You know what this means. I have warned you." Her voice broke. "Please. Leave before they take you."

"They will not take me." But even as I spoke the words, I knew they were not true. I had seen the men looking differently at me this time.

"You are too beautiful. Your blood is mixed. With baba's , with mine, with the land we live on. They will not understand or tolerate this. I have told you this many times. You have no baba to protect you. I cannot keep them off for long. Please," she begged. "Go now, while they are distracted."

Tears welled and anger fell. "They are not distracted. They are shooting , anne." Like they always did when they showed up in our village to pillage our supplies, vandalize our homes and take the younger women who never returned.

Releasing me, my mother, my beloved anne , patted my back. "Yes, yes, I know. But they are only shooting in the front. Leave through the back." She pushed me. "Go, now, before they decide to stop hunting the American. Do not take anything. Run, Safiya. Run ." With one final shove, my mother turned away from me right as an explosion of new gunfire rained down on our small home.

I did not think.

I ran.

Out the back door and right into a wall of muscle.

Before I could scream, a hand clamped over my mouth, my body was dragged back, and a man in all camouflage looked down at me with the bluest eyes I had ever seen as he held a quick finger to his full lips.

The American.

I nodded.

He released me, and before I could blink, the giant gun that was hanging from his shoulder was back in his hands and his gaze was already off mine. Pointing his weapon toward my ancient, bullet-riddled concrete home with piles of rubble surrounding it, he scanned with his aim, settling on the back door.

"Do not shoot," I whispered frantically in English.

Those sharp eyes cut to me for less than a single breath. Then his voice, dark and deep but quiet like a dry well, feathered across my soul. "You speak English."

"Yes." Momentarily caught by his presence, his unusual scent, the danger emanating from him, I stared at the most arresting man I had ever seen. Then I blurted out more than I should. "My mother taught me. She said my father taught her."

The insurgents began shouting to one another, their anger breaking through the arid night air right before another burst of gunfire came from the front of my house.

As if to protect me, the American stepped in front of me. "They're speaking Kurmanji. Your accent is Turkish."

"Yes."

With his gaze locked on a sighting mechanism, he swept his large gun across the land as he spoke in accusation. "They knew I was coming."

"I do not know what they know. But they will kill you." And I suddenly did not want this man dead.

"They'll kill you for speaking to me. Leave." He moved toward my house.

"Wait." I grabbed his arm. "My mother is inside."

The soldier glanced at my hand before meeting my eyes. Then he pierced me with a stare so complete that for a single heartbeat, he eclipsed my entire existence. "Have they taken her hostage?"

"I do not know."

"Description," he demanded.

"She has long hair like mine, but darker and with gray. Her eyes are brown, and her ?alvar and g?mlek are blue."

The American gave a brief nod of his head that was so short, I almost missed it. "Copy. You've got a safe place to go to?"

I struggled to remember the English word and could not. "Yes, my mother's sister is not far."

He repeated part of his question. "It's safe?"

More so than here right now. "Yes."

The slight lift of his chin happened again. "Go." He focused back on his gun and his aim, but he did not promise to help, and he did not appear to have anyone helping him.

Wanting more, not wanting him to die, I gave the only information I had in trade. "The valley to the east. If you leave that way, they will not follow."

His eyes met mine again, but he did not speak.

Hoping I was not misleading him, I explained. "The valley is…." I waved my hand to indicate uneven terrain before I remembered another English word. "It is steep. The temperatures are steep. The bad men avoid it."

"Understood. Leave."

I could not without asking about my anne . "My mother?"

"I'll get her out." He no sooner made the promise than the back door of my home banged open.

My anne, bloodied and stumbling with ripped clothes, fell to the dirt face-first as one of the evil men followed behind and kicked her.

A horrified gasp of anger and terror escaped, and I surged forward.

But an arm locked around my waist and a gloved hand clamped over my mouth. The dry-well voice struck my cheek in a graveled whisper of a command. "You give away our position, we're all dead."

Frantic, I fought against the American military man who was twice my size as the insurgent kicked my mother again.

" Stop . Go to your aunt's," the American ordered in a rough rasp. "NOW."

My anne , my mother, my only blood family, looked up, and as if she had heard the American, as if she could see us through the dark, her lips parted with a pained cry. "Run!"

The evil man aimed his gun at my mother, the American swung his rifle toward the insurgent, then two shots, one after the other, echoed through the night.

My anne went still, horror struck, and the evil man crumpled. More insurgents came rushing out, my body was spun around, my back was pushed, and a command in harsh, whispered English was hurled at me as I was thrust into the darkness. "GO."

Gunfire erupted.

Tears streamed.

And I ran.

I ran until two men grabbed me by the arms and forced me to the ground.

The driver's door of the SUV opened, throwing me back into the present as the American with the dry-well voice, the SEAL who I thought was my husband, got behind the wheel.

I could not hold it in. "I heard what she called you."