He guesstimated that he’d swum for well over an hour before collapsing on this stretch of sand and passing out exhausted for the rest of the night. The only thing motivating him to stay alive was the fact that there was too much at stake for him to die. He was one transaction away from being a rich man and that idiot Dan Adams had almost ruined it all, him and his damn daughter. The meddlesome little witch.
He’d needed Dan. His reputation in their partnership was gold. The land didn’t exist, at least not land owned by him, but by the time the damn foreigners found out about it, it would be too late. Except Dan wanted to pull out of the partnership.
He’d shown up on the yacht to give Dan one more chance. Ava Adams was never supposed to have been on board. Dan had told him he was going on a yachting vacation and he hadn’t mentioned his daughter. Instead he’d mentioned the fact that his daughter had accepted a position—her first job. Supposedly it started in some forsaken Wyoming town in the next week or two. He’d forgotten the details. It had only amazed him at the time. Amazed him that anyone would want to live in that backwater. But she’d gone to school there and had been forever infatuated with Wyoming. All that aside, he’d never expected to see her. He’d never thought that she’d fly down to join her father. Dan had never mentioned the possibility.
His hand slid to his waist. Empty. He’d been armed at the beginning of this. Dan had hit him and for a minute his world had grayed and then, when he’d come to, he’d shot him and seen Dan fall overboard.
Now, Ava Adams, if she survived, at best she knew he’d killed her father, at worst she knew it all. He had no idea what her father had told her. What he did know was that he needed to close his last deal before the truth came out. But his Canadian buyer was already showing suspicion and reluctant to pay the balance of what he owed for that tract of land he was so hot to have. Time was of the essence, for he’d heard both impatience and a hint of disbelief in their last phone call. It was as if the buyer had lost confidence in the deal, in Ben’s ability to facilitate the transfer. It was as if he sensed the truth. That couldn’t happen, for the truth would destroy everything. Even without Dan’s reputation backing him, he planned to close this deal. There was too much money at stake. One word from Dan’s daughter and it would be over before he had a chance to leave. He needed that last payout and he needed it desperately. He couldn’t chance the possibility that Ava Adams would reveal what she knew.
She needed to be dealt with immediately. But the grim reaper wouldn’t deal out death by sleight of hand. If she wasn’t dead yet, in order for her to die, he needed a gun.
Saturday, June 11—12:01 p.m.
The flight to Mercy Hospital in Miami seemed to take forever. During the time in the air, Ava Adams had gotten worse. Her breathing was shallow. She hadn’t regained consciousness since Faisal had stripped most of her wet clothes from her and wrapped her in thermal blankets. She wasn’t shivering anymore but she wasn’t moving either.
Now, seeing her like this, flirting with death the way she was, was killing him. It was like reliving another dark time when the life of someone he’d loved had been in jeopardy. Then, there had been nothing he could do. Here, there was still hope. He thought of that time. It had been a tragedy. His sister kidnapped. It had ended well. His sister was safe and completing her studies in the United States. Tara had intentions of joining Nassar Security in a full-time position when she graduated with her master’s. He wasn’t sure if he or any of his brothers were ready for that. He smiled at the thought, and his smile dropped as he looked at Ava. He pulled the blanket up, tucking it beneath her shoulders.
“How much longer, Jer?” he asked, although he already had the answer to that question. They were just words to fill the space, to make everything seem more normal.
“We’re ten minutes out. How is she?”
“Unconscious,” he said curtly. Nothing could make this normal and there was nothing more to say. Only Ava’s thin breaths and her fragile pulse assured him that she was alive, that she was fighting to stay alive.
He had done all he could. The rest was up to Jer to get them onto the hospital helipad and Ava into medical experts’ hands without delay.
“I’ve got this beauty flying her heart out,” Jer assured him as if he’d read his mind. “We’re only a few miles out now. She hanging in?”
“She’s stable. Her breathing has leveled out. Pulse stable but a little faster than I’d like.” He didn’t like the way things were. For the truth was she hadn’t regained consciousness in over ten minutes. Ahead, he could see the horizon open up on Miami. The city skyline appeared on the horizon and soon seemed to rise out of the ocean. Seagulls skimmed between sky and ocean. The slim stretch of sand became a dividing line between the endless stretch of ocean and the steel-and-glass high-rises that pierced the sky. The high-rises gleamed in the sun, which had broken through half an hour ago. The expanse of steel and glass set as a backdrop to the timeless ocean was postcard material. But now he could only allow for seconds of appreciation. They would be landing soon. It was noon and it seemed like they’d been at sea for days rather than hours. But the thought that medical help was now within sight had him breathing a sigh of relief. Ava had been unconscious for almost the entire trip. Faisal couldn’t have imagined this day during the fun party days they’d shared. When they’d danced on the edges of a friendship that might have been more. In a way they’d been a platonic couple with the suggestion of more, and yet, they’d never crossed that line. It was strange, because the spark had been there. But he’d had another girlfriend at the time and even though that girl hadn’t been the love of his life, it wasn’t in him to cheat on one woman for another. Things might have been different otherwise. Why he thought of all that now, he didn’t know.
He’d finally broken it off with his girlfriend at the time but Ava was too immersed in her studies to see the truth of what he felt. And he’d never asked her out or admitted that he felt so much more. He knew now that saying nothing was a youthful mistake. But time and life had intervened. He was reminded of it all now and faced with how much he still cared.
He looked out the window and below the city seemed to have taken over the landscape. One minute they were on the edge of the city and the next they were targeting a landing strip on the back edge of the hospital. A stretcher and an emergency team were already waiting.
The landing was smooth. The hospital staff were as efficient as the last time they had done this over a year ago; only this time, the roof helipad was closed for repairs and they were forced to divert to the original pad at ground level located just outside the emergency entrance.
On the ground there was a bit of chaos as reporters and camera operators pushed forward. They’d arrived as the stretcher was coming off the helicopter and the camera operators were in their faces almost immediately. They seemed to know who Ava was and more importantly who her father was. As Faisal forcibly pushed back against the onslaught, cameras flashed.
“Do you know where Dan Adams is?” a reporter asked, pushing the mic in his face.
Faisal ignored him, trying to shield the stretcher and Ava with his body.
“Is his daughter, Ava, the only survivor? What happened to Dan Adams? Has he been found?”
The questions were rapid-fire and Faisal had to push forward, demanding that they move back and give the stretcher room. It was the first sign of how much local fame Dan’s philanthropy with local boys’ and girls’ clubs and other charities had given him. Dan had started an organization that reached out to troubled children, and it had branches across Florida and the Caribbean, where he lived for most of the year. His celebrity status put a different spin on this investigation