Operation Burlesque BBW Romance Read online

  Clearing the pothole, he answered my question. “No. We’ve got someone on the inside who’s going to bring her out.”

  “How did you manage that?”

  “Everything outside the US is based on who you know. If I know someone, I know everyone they know. The guys,” he nodded back to the Range Rover, “have relatives who work for Frankie.”

  “They’re related to his muscle?” I asked horrified. I tried to picture how that worked, how it didn’t end in disaster. Someone would betray us, I just knew it.

  Blake swerved the Jeep around another pothole, one that looked big enough to swallow a person whole. “No, they’re not that close to Frankie. I’m talking like maid and cook level. People that are invisible to Frankie.”

  Something niggled at me. “Blake?” I put a hand on the dash board to steady myself as we ran into a pothole. Without the headlights Blake couldn’t see the smaller ones coming. The Jeep lurched like a drunk about to face plant and the steel frame shuddered, but with some quick acceleration Blake pulled us out.

  “Yes?” He didn’t look at me, saving his focus for the road.

  “You don’t know who told Ferrid about us, right?”

  “Yeah, so?” He waved a hand. “I’m over it.”

  “Well, I was just thinking about the staff at the Riad. What if they talked? What if they knew Ferrid?” The cook especially would’ve been able to overhear all of our conversations on the main floor.

  “No,” he said quickly. “They’re vetted. They’re not random staff like Frankie’s set up.”

  “And double agents are a myth?” I challenged. “No one has ever betrayed a mission in the history of espionage?”

  “Okay, you’re right,” he conceded with a nod. “It’s a possibility. I’ll mention it in my report.”

  I kept going, unable to let it go. The more I thought about it, the more it made sense.“No one else knew about the op except those of us in the Riad, right? Seems to me that the cook or the housekeeping staff could’ve been a weak link.”

  “They were vetted,” Blake said again, his voice short.

  “By who?” I crossed my arms. “Did you vet them or were you just told they were okay? Do you even know if anyone was swapped out at the last minute?”

  Blake sighed. “No, I didn’t vet them personally and no, I wouldn’t have known if someone new came in. It’s a decent theory. Like I said, I’ll mention it and it will be investigated. Now, can we please focus on the task at hand instead of Monday morning quarterbacking?”

  “Yeah, sure. Sorry,” I said, flushing, thankful that the dark hid the color in my cheeks.

  “Don’t be sorry.” He put a warm hand on my knee and gave it a gentle squeeze. “It’s a good instinct, something I’ve considered myself, but now is not the time.”

  I felt my cheeks grow even hotter. Here, I’d been telling him something he already knew like I was a boss, when really I was just a fool.

  We bounced through a series of shallow potholes. I felt like I was on a poorly constructed carnival ride. My seat belt went tight across my chest and I had to use both hands on the dash this time to keep myself in place.

  “What’s the deal with the roads?” The roads were in serious disrepair and didn’t match the fancy neighborhood they ran through.

  “Cheap thief deterrent,” came the short answer. “The owners of these houses have money and they want to make it hard to get in and out.”

  “They don’t have police?”

  “The police are corrupt here. You’d have to bribe them to get anywhere and that’s only if the thieves don’t already own them.”

  Blake hit the brakes and swung a left while the Range Rover kept going straight. He drove a bit further and then went right, rolling to a stop behind one of the tall fences.

  I peered out the window, making out a small gate. “We’re here?”

  “Yep. This is it.” He shifted the Jeep into park.

  “So now what?”

  “Come take the driver’s seat and I’ll gear up for my date with Frankie. Then we wait. When Lilli comes out, we hustle her into the Jeep and you haul ass to the embassy.” He unbuckled his seat belt and I followed suit.

  “Which is where, exactly?” I peered down the street, hoping to find my bearings and came up empty.

  He pointed to the road in front of us. “Go straight, turn right and then left on the main road and go down about a mile. You can’t miss the embassy. It’ll be all lit up with a US flag. Okay?”

  “Got it.” I winced though, thinking of all the potholes. I just hoped my reflexes were up to the task.

  We both stepped out of the Jeep. Blake to get his gear together in the back and me to settle into the driver’s seat. I buckled myself in and went over the instrument panel, making sure I knew where the lights and gear shift were.

  Blake leaned against the front of the Jeep, a rifle in his hand and a small pack on his back. I rolled down the Jeep’s window.

  “Hey, pssst,” I whispered.

  “What?” He came to stand by the driver door.

  “What do we do now?”

  “We wait for the explosions and then Lilli.”

  He went to stand at the front of the Jeep again, leaving me to drum my fingers on the steering wheel. We waited so long I began to think it was a bust, but then I heard it: A loud boom that shook the ground followed by the sound of rubble collapsing.

  Blake snapped to attention and aimed his gun in front of him, waiting. I gripped the steering wheel tight, ready for action.

  Someone shouted. Guns went off. Another explosion, this one stronger, but still no sign of Lilli. Had we come all this way, blown up everything for nothing?

  “Where is she?” I whispered to myself. The rat-a-tat-tat of gunfire punctuated my question.

  Poked my head out the driver’s side window, I called out to Blake, “What’s going on?”

  He shook his head and checked his watch. “I don’t know. She should be here by now.”

  “So what do we do?”

  Blake stared at his watch, thinking. “One more minute and I’m going in.” Another explosion rocked the ground, this one powerful enough to send debris from the front of the house raining down onto us at the back of the big mansion. Blake sprinted to the passenger side and jumped into the Jeep as small rocks and wood glowing red with fire bounced off the vehicle.

  Even though there was a roof over my head, I still ducked anyway. I couldn’t help myself.

  “What the hell was that?” I asked, jumping as a big piece of stucco slammed into the Jeep’s hood. It bounced off and fell to the ground, leaving behind a grapefruit sized dent.

  “A hell of a lot of explosives.” Blake frowned. “Something’s not right. I’m going in.”

  “What should I do?” I felt a flutter of panic at the idea of Blake running into danger.

  “Stay here, wait for Lilli. When she comes out, go. Don’t wait for me.”

  “Are you sure?”

  He gave a curt nod. “I’m sure. I’m going to be stuck here a while cleaning up. Don’t wait and don’t worry, okay?” Blake gave me a reassuring smile. “I know what I’m doing.”

  I swallowed hard and nodded mutely.

  I thought he would get out of the car and run off then, but instead he leaned in toward me and we shared one last kiss. The world was exploding around us, but it couldn’t compare with the sensation of his lips on mine, the rough scrub of his beard stubble or the familiar musky scent that I would always associate with Blake. I drank him in, my mouth moving urgently under his. We both ran our hands through each other’s hair, holding on tight, pressing close.

  And then he let me go. Before I’d even fully registered the end of our kiss, he was gone.

  ***

  After he left, I stared out into the night, my thoughts in turmoil, and my body buzzing from our kiss. That was it. The End. Fin. Done. Kaput. Whatever we had was over. Nothing would be the same once the night was over. I just hoped the change in the air mea
nt escape and not a scenario where Frankie or some other gangster gained the upper hand.

  Another bomb detonated, this one weaker than the last. The boom was soft and muted, like they hadn’t used enough explosives or something. Not that I knew anything at all about bombs, but thinking about it kept my brain occupied.

  Where the hell was Lilli?

  Time dragged on until impatience crowded me, jittery under my skin. A horrific thought occurred to me. What if Lilli never came? What if it was just me?

  “Oh god,” I moaned, dropping my forehead to the steering wheel. Is that what the delay meant? That Lilli was dead? My breathing became short and tears hovered in my eyes. What was I going to do?

  Well, first, I thought, sniffing back my emotions, I need to decide how long to wait. Naturally, I had no watch and the Jeep’s clock didn’t work. Blake had been my timepiece. Some black op this was. A beat up Jeep, bombs that alternately did too much damage and too little and no way to keep time.

  Awesome.

  I started to count. “One one thousand. Two one thousand.”

  At sixty, I started over at one. I had no idea how long I would go for, but at least I could track time.

  At the four minute mark, Lilli finally emerged, stepping through the back gate, furtively looking over her shoulder as she went. She wore a black robe and a hijab, but I recognized her by her shape and the lock of red hair that slipped past her head covering.

  “Lilli,” I screamed.

  She started and put a warning finger to her lips, a horrified expression on her face. Moving fast, but with a pronounced limp, she headed for me. I frowned when I saw the limp. Frankie had snatched her right after her surgery. I hoped he hadn’t made things worse.

  Lilli slipped inside the Jeep, slamming the door after her. “Go,” she said, her voice tight. “They’re right behind me.”

  Sure enough, a small group of men spilled out into the street, guns in hand. Before they could shoot at us, there was a massive explosion and Frankie’s house collapsed in on itself while simultaneously launching big chunks of rubble into the air. Everyone ducked and took cover except me. I stared, transfixed at the explosion, my reaction dominated by one thought.

  Blake.

  Was he still inside? Did he get out? Was he hurt?

  I wanted to run inside and search for him, but before I could act on that impulse, the men following Lilli started shooting. Their shots went wide though because another explosion blasted the air, shaking the ground and shooting rubble out at a pace that would rival a machine gun.

  “Shit,” I said as I turned the ignition. The Jeep’s engine rumbled to life and I wasted no time in hitting the accelerator. Hoping my instincts were as good as Blake said they were, I aimed straight for the men at top speed. They either had to get out of the way or get run over. Thankfully, they all scrambled to the side and we roared past them, gaining speed as we went.

  Figuring we didn’t have to worry about stealth anymore, I turned on the headlights. A good thing too, because a massive pothole deep as a five gallon bucket and wide as a suitcase yawned in front of us. Yanking the steering wheel hard to the right, we skirted its edges.

  I breathed a sigh of relief and sent a silent prayer of thanks up to the heavens. However, the headlights in the rearview mirror told me we weren’t out of danger yet. Not even close. As if to prove the point, bullets thudded into the back of the Jeep.

  “Get down,” I screamed, completely flooring the accelerator and doing my best to duck without losing sight of the road. Lilli folded herself into a compact ball, her eyes closed tight and her lips moving as if in prayer.

  At the first cross street, I turned right and then left at the next street. This put us on the main road, the one that would lead to the embassy. The potholes weren’t so bad here and the Jeep sped along. Soon we were up to ninety miles an hour. So were the cars behind us. In fact, one of them was going faster, gaining ground and aiming to pass us.

  Shit. How had they moved so fast? There’d been no cars in the road except the Jeep. Or were these new bad guys who were just shooting at us for the first time? I bit my lip, overwhelmed at being a target for multiple guns.

  Lilli, for her part, remained huddled in her seat. She was so still, I became concerned.

  “Lil? You okay.” I lightly tapped her shoulder.

  She shot straight up, eyes flying open and wildly looking around the car. When she realized it was just me, she calmed somewhat. “I’m fine,” she said. “Just get us out of here, okay? I can’t take much more of this.”

  “Tell me about it,” I responded, watching as a large, black SUV angled up next to us. There were two men in the front seat, a driver and a passenger. Both leveled guns at us.

  Lilli caught sight of them and immediately took off her seat belt and hunkered down on the floor, arms over her head. “Oh god, oh god, oh god,” she keened.

  Since I knew I couldn’t go any faster, I did the only thing that made sense, I slowed down. They didn’t expect that, and, by the time the men pulled their triggers, their bullets went nowhere. Not even a ping on the Jeep’s battered metal shell.

  I gave a fist pump of victory. “Yes.”

  Then the car behind us open fired and they had guns that spit out a lot of bullets all at once. A spray of bullets hit the Jeep and shattered the back window. I felt one thud into the back of my seat and just prayed it didn’t have the energy to go any further. Hitting the accelerator again, I zoomed forward.

  “Lilli,” I said, my voice firm. When she didn’t respond, I shouted, “Lilli, come on! I need you!”

  She peeked up at me, her eyes puffy with tears. “What?”

  I jerked my head toward the back seat. “See if you can find a gun or something we can use as a weapon.”

  Lilli nodded, a determined expression on her face, one I recognized as her ‘time to get shit done’ face. It was the look she wore when performing while in the throes of food poisoning. It was the look that meant she wouldn’t let anything stop her.

  She climbed into the back seat with a soft ‘oof’ and rummaged around while I drove in an erratic zigzag pattern. I was no security expert but had a dim memory of a long ago women’s safety seminar that had said it was harder to hit a target that moved unpredictably. Add some basic geometry to that theory and I was sold. The shortest distance between two points is always a straight line, even for bullets, but while the Jeep could travel curves, the bullets couldn’t. It sounded good to me and nothing had hit us in a while.

  Of course, no one was shooting at us for the moment, and the car ahead of us had made no move to come back and finish the job. Instead they kept going, not leaving us behind so much as deliberately staking out and maintaining a lead. I wasn’t sure if these were good signs or ominous warnings of something worse to come.

  Where the hell was the embassy? I peered into the horizon, checking the road ahead of us. It seemed to me that there was a bunch of lights in the distance which could be a business district or, you know, the US embassy. Blake had said it would be a mile, surely we were almost there? Those lights had to be it.

  Lilli thrust something at me from the back seat. “I found this.”

  I took it and looked at it as I drove. From its small, round shape I took it to be a grenade. Huh. An idea formed in my mind. It would be a ballsy move, but if I could pull it off, we would be in much better shape.

  “Anything else back there?” I asked Lilli. Two, three or a dozen deadly weapons would be better than one. I mentally kicked myself for not asking Blake for a gun. For some reason, I’d never thought I would be adrift in the world without him even though we’d discussed, more than once, how it was over between us. A pang went through me as I recalled the explosion back at Frankie’s compound. I hoped he was okay.

  “No, nothing,” she said. “Except a spare tire we could maybe throw at them.”

  “Any way to set it on fire?” I asked. Throwing things in the road was a good idea, but I wanted to make it as lethal as po
ssible. A plain tire wouldn’t do much more than bounce.

  “Sorry, all I’ve got are the clothes on my back.” She climbed back into her seat and just in time as someone decided to start taking pot shots at us again. We both ducked and I changed up my driving pattern by zagging first and zigging second.

  “Same here, but,” I held up the grenade, “at least we have this.” I increased the speed, maxing out the Jeep’s speedometer. We got up to ninety-five miles an hour and then the Jeep just refused to go any faster, but it was fast enough to catch up to the lead vehicle. Or maybe they had slowed down. Either way.

  I examined the grenade as I steered. I’d never used one before but had seen enough movies to know there would be a pin. It would have to be fast. There would be maybe five seconds or less for me to do what I wanted to with the grenade and then once the pin was pulled, if the movies I’d seen were right, I would have mere seconds to get the hell out of dodge.

  I took a deep breath and drew up behind the black car in front of us. “How good is your hand eye coordination?” I asked Lilli.

  She looked at me wide-eyed. “What?”

  I brandished the grenade. “I need you to throw this.”

  Lilli made a high pitched ‘eep’ of panic.

  “So, how good is your aim?” The passenger in the SUV turned in his seat and aimed his gun out the back window. I swerved at the last second and the bullet sailed by harmlessly.

  Lilli held on for dear life as my driving threw her one way and then the other.

  “Come on, Lil,” I said, my voice a stern bark. “We’re almost there, but we’ve got to stop these assholes.”

  She blinked and, when she spoke, it was with a theatrical southern drawl. Mae West kicking ass or perhaps Scarlett taking on Rhett. Where that came from I had no idea. Maybe it was stress or Lilli’s attempt to buck up. “My aim is just fine, it’s your driving I’m worried about.” She snatched the grenade from me and settled into her seat, studying the SUV in front of us carefully. “I was pitcher for my High School softball team. Even scouted by a university.”

  “Good,” I said relieved she actually had some experience. I pointed toward the vehicle. “I’m going to pull up beside them. You’re going to throw the grenade into the car.”