LITMIR.BIZ

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her shock as she put her right hand over her mouth. She couldn’t believe what she was seeing.

      It wasn’t possible.

      Her brain, her feet—everything had frozen at the shock and horror of what lay ahead of her. Things like what she was seeing only happened on television. Not to normal everyday people like her and her father. And yet she knew her father wasn’t normal. He was a wealthy philanthropist. But that wasn’t the issue. Or was it?

      The moonlight was glinting off the black barrel of the handgun that Ben had aimed at her father. The handgun’s deadly gloss seemed to wink in the muted light of the deck. Worse, that same barrel was against her father’s head. Time seemed to make the moment unendingly long when she knew that it was only seconds. She hadn’t had time to think, to react, to recover from the shock. She could only watch this like it wasn’t real, like it was happening to someone else. Because before she could move, her father twisted, grabbed Ben’s gun hand and slammed it against the railing. Once, twice—the gun dropped and skidded across the deck.

      “No! What are you doing?” Her voice seemed loud in the sudden silence. Vaguely, she realized that she hadn’t shouted at all, that her cry had been no more than a whimper. She was behind and to the side of them and neither one of the men had seen or heard her. She glanced around the deck as if the answer to her father’s plight lay there.

      Unarmed, in bare feet and a silk wrap, with shaking hands, she was no one’s hero. She looked around for a weapon, something to leverage her defense of her father. There was nothing.

      Moonlight spilled over the surface of the water. She could see nothing but an endless tract of ocean around them. There was no sign of land, of Paradise Island or of the beautiful cove that they had docked in. They were in open water with no land in sight. But as much as that frightened her, the scene in front of her frightened her more.

      One calamity had replaced another. Ben had her father by the throat.

      “Dad!” This time the words crept past her frozen throat. This time the words weren’t just her imagination. But still they were no help.

      “Stay back!” Her father choked out the words with what seemed more willpower than strength, for she’d had to strain to hear him.

      But rage flooded her and, despite her earlier doubts, she only knew that she had to join forces with her father. Take this threat down no matter what the odds. They could do it together, as a team—as her father always said they could. Of course, he’d meant much smaller, much less threatening situations than this. It didn’t matter. This was life and death. It was, for whatever reason, them against him.

      “What are you doing?” She flew at her father’s attacker. The fact that the man had, a few hours ago, greeted her with all the cordiality of a long-lost friend, was now lost to her.

      He was the enemy and she’d do anything in her power to stop him. Fueled by panic and a desperate kind of bravery, she grabbed his arm, trying to free her father.

      “Let go!” she screeched. Her nails raked his cheek. Her actions were as desperate as she knew they were ineffective. There was no choice, there was only her and her father, who she feared would die without her help.

      The punch hit her in the jaw and dropped her to her knees. She remembered nothing after that. She came in and out of consciousness. Minutes could have passed, even hours—she didn’t know. The deck offered her its slick, rocking comfort as her face pressed against the cool surface.

      As consciousness returned once more, the one thing that was clear was the silence. She struggled to keep her eyes open. Her head pounded and she lost consciousness again for a minute, a second—she wasn’t sure.

      This time when she came to she was groggy but able to sit up. As she did she saw the shadow of something against the wheelhouse. She tried to stand and slipped. Her hand caught her fall. She looked up, blinking, trying to clear her vision. She saw that Ben had somehow managed to get the pistol. But he had no chance to use it, for her father’s arm came up. His arm smashed into his assailant, knocking him backward, sending the pistol flying.

      “Go!” Her father waved. He glanced her way for just a second. Then, he was pulled back into a chokehold. His assailant had taken advantage of his brief distraction. Her father directed her with his eyes. Glancing to a place behind her. There was a life raft and she knew that he wanted her to leave, to leave him alone with his attacker.

      “No!” she screamed, scrambling to her feet. She clenched her fists—her hands were empty. No phone. But something else caught her eye. It was the hammer her father had used earlier to fix the back ladder. She grabbed it.

      Despite her earlier failure, she wasn’t willing to give up. She’d do whatever it took to help her father. She wasn’t thinking straight. She was unschooled in any sort of self-defense but desperate times called for desperate measures. Her attack could confuse, muddy the waters, give her father an opening. And with that her only thought, she charged forward. She was unaware of the breeze that lifted her short sleep T-shirt revealing her upper thighs. Unaware that the silk wrap had slipped off her shoulders or that it floated behind her. Her father choked as Ben crushed his throat with one arm. But she’d caught Ben’s attention, she could feel his eyes on her and that was all she needed. She’d become the distraction and hopefully by doing that give her father enough of an edge to get free. Unfortunately, she could see from the look on his face that the only thing that stood between her and rape was her father. If her father died...

      Ben looked at her with eyes filled with lust. He smiled in a way that held an ugly promise, one no woman would fail to recognize and one no woman would ever want. It made her feel dirty and terrified at once. She was frightened not just for her father but for herself. Too late, she realized her mistake. She should have put something else on, anything but what she had grabbed in her panic.

      She’d never trusted him. She wished she’d told her father that. But it was too late. As if killing her father wasn’t enough... It wouldn’t happen. Her father wasn’t dead and no matter how many times she had to remind herself of that, it wouldn’t happen.

      She raised the hammer and brought it down, catching Ben in the shoulder. He roared, releasing his grip on her father, reaching for her.

      “Dad!” she screamed as she scrambled to get away from Ben.

      Her father slammed Ben’s arm into the wheelhouse. He buried his fist in the man’s midsection, throwing him off balance. Another punch hit him in the jaw and Ben gasped for breath. His third punch knocked Ben down.

      “Run, Ava!” her father shouted and didn’t give her a chance to consider before he had grabbed her hand. Together they ran, stumbling, propping each other up heading for the back of the yacht.

      “Get in the life raft,” he hissed in an urgent undertone. “Get out of here. I’ll catch up. Once I...” His words were slurred. A tooth was broken and blood streamed from his mouth. His hair was wild and his eyes glazed. “Go.” He was half lifting her over the edge of the yacht, giving her no option. She shook her head. Her fractured thoughts spun.

      “Call Faisal!” her father said with a shove that had her landing in the dinghy. “Al-Nassar,” he added as if she wouldn’t know who he meant with just his given name. There was no other Faisal who had been in their life. But why call him now? Then she remembered—Nassar Security. There was no time for thoughts or justifications—there was no time for anything. They needed to get out of here. Already her father was undoing the ropes that attached the small craft to the yacht.

      “No.” She couldn’t leave him alone. “Come with me!”

      “This is the only way you can help me, kid.” It was the pet name he’d always used for her, and still did despite her recent quarter-of-a-century status. He’d teased her on her birthday about how old she was and how old that made him.

      Her eyes met his.

      “Go.”

      “No.” The word was strangled, panicked. As if she had any choice. She was already below deck level

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