On the Line Read online

  “I was thinking,” he heard Natalia’s voice over the phone’s intercom. “We could fly the plane in.”

  “What’s with the we?” Alex asked.

  “Jet or Micah can fly it in,” she said. “And I can stay with the plane while the three of you go find Preston.”

  “No!” A resounding refusal from all three men sounded.

  “There is no way I’m taking you in there,” Micah nearly barked. Jet could understand. Taking Natalia in would be like Jet taking Akira in with him.”

  “You taught me how to shoot, Micah. I can guard the plane.”

  Micah growled low as if he were trying desperately to restrain the words ready to come out his mouth. Jet decided to interject some reasoning to Natalia’s line of thinking. “It’s too dangerous, Natalia. The plane won’t be safe and anybody coming to take it won’t come alone. The answer is no. We’re not changing our mind on that.”

  “But—”

  “No, Natalia,” Alex said forcefully.

  “Fine,” she said. “I just thought I would try to help.” She disconnected the link between them but not before Jet detected the serious tone of annoyance in her voice. She didn’t like that they had shut down her offer. She had to understand it was for the best. How could she not see that?

  He reached the reception area the same time as the other guys. Apparently they all had the same idea to set Natalia straight on some things and then get back to work on their mission—finding Preston. She did help them and she had to know that. She had to see that.

  “I said fine,” she stressed her words. “No need for lectures.”

  “There is a need,” Micah said harshly and she glared at him.

  “Natalia,” Jet said calmly. “If you’re on that plane we’re all going to be worried about you, Micah more than any of us,” although he would say Alex might be equally as worried. The two shared a bond that went deeper than anything he had seen between two unromantically linked people in a long time. “The distraction could get one of us killed. If we know you’re here, safe and out of harm’s way, we’ll be able to do our job. Do you understand that?”

  She nibbled on her bottom lip before shaking her head yes. “It’s just that he’s my friend too and I want to help him.”

  “You’re helping by finding us a starting point…and maybe even an exact location if you can.”

  She nodded. “He came for me when I needed you all. I just wanted to go with you all, but I get it. I understand why I can’t. Go do what you do,” she said as she returned her attention back to her computer screen.

  Jet couldn’t speak for the others but he knew her words hadn’t sent reassuring feelings rushing through him. Their Natalia had changed since her abduction. She wasn’t the same shy woman who worked for them those previous eight years before her ordeal. He, like all the other guys, liked the change. She felt more like family now because she was family, but that didn’t mean her newly acquired risk taking streak was comforting to any of them. He laughed inwardly and shook his head. Thank God his wife only took chances on the ice. That was enough to keep him on edge whenever she did a charity event, but if she had started talking about joining him on a mission, seriously talking about it like Natalia was, he would be more worried. The ice he could deal with; Akira on a rescue mission he could not.

  Chapter Five

  Zahara looked at her reflection in the mirror. Her costume looked great on her. She didn’t have the same body type as the other dancers; for the most part the women were secure enough in themselves not to pick on her for it. She noticed women who were less secure with their own body type had a tendency to pick on other women for not having the same type. Most of the women she shared the stage with were so in love with their own body that they didn’t have time to obsess over somebody else’s body. She meant that in a good way because she thought people should love their body. “You only get one,” she had always. One body to take care of was all anybody had so they should nurture it and love it.

  She danced the same type of dance as the other women and she knew the physical fitness it took to get through one routine, let alone four, five and sometimes six. No matter how much jiggle there was to the middle that didn’t mean those women couldn’t hold their own on the dance floor. Just like no matter how atypical her body was for a belly dancer didn’t mean she couldn’t rock the dance floor. Ariana had always told her she owned the floor because she felt the music and clearly was born to dance. Zahara could agree that she felt the music. When she was on stage, when she was dancing around the house or in the backyard she just felt the music and went with it. She was really good as an improvisational dancer because she let the music guide her body. She wouldn’t agree that she was born to dance though. She always thought she was born to study the stars. Astronomy was her first passion, dance her second, and that’s how she still saw it even today.

  She was nervous. She was always nervous before a show. She was even more nervous because she was dancing right after Ariana. That was so not fair. She was going second behind the best dancer ever and she wondered if she would drop the excitement level of the audience down a notch. Ariana had told her she arranged it as such because she needed to keep the momentum of the opening going and she perceived her to be the best solo to keep that energy going with. After her solo there were group dances from the intermediate level classes—all three classes of them, then the beginning level classes—four different groups, then a few solos before intermission when they would come back with the advanced level class dances and the troop dances, with Ariana closing the show as always.

  Zahara looked at her reflection in the mirror once more and smiled. She had on far more makeup than she ever wore—which was easy to do because she never wore makeup. She liked the look of the makeup actually. She still looked like herself, just with more colors. Her hair was hanging in a straight ponytail combination that made her look hot, she would say. It was the first time she really looked at herself and thought she looked hot. The section of hair she had braided and wrapped around the ponytail like a cinnamon bun was pretty and made her feel like a sexy goddess.

  She took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. She was ready for this.

  “Ten minutes,” Ariana patted her on the shoulder as she whisked on by her. Zahara smiled. Her few minutes of contemplative peace had nearly made her forget the chaos back stage. The first time performers in one of these shows seemed to be nervously trying to make sure their coin belts and other accessories were secure on their body. They had all heard the stories of dancers losing articles of clothing while shaking their body on the dance floor. Perhaps the most embarrassing of the stories was the one who had the unfortunate experience of her top coming off. At least she had managed to stop it from falling away from her breasts and gracefully dance herself off the stage in the process of continuing to conceal her breasts. Zahara thought that she personally would have ran off the stage with flushed cheeks and never returned, but Ariana assured her she would do no such thing. She was probably right. Zahara hoped she would handle the situation with grace too.

  Thinking about what could go wrong with costuming made her double check her own costuming accessories. Because she knew the routine for the advanced level group Ariana had decided last minute that Zahara should dance the veil routine too. That was the dance that would come right before the last dance of the show—Ariana’s closing dance. Zahara had laughed when she realized that Ariana would not have made a decision last minute at all. Ariana had made sure she learned the routine, not because she wanted her to try out double veil dancing, but because she was plotting this move.

  Two days before the show Ariana broke the news that she needed her to actually do the routine because the ladies had gotten used to the extra beautiful body in the routine and she didn’t want to throw them off by taking her out before the show. Zahara had tried to get out of it by reminding Ariana that she really only had the one stage costume. She had several class costumes, but this was her first really pro
fessional performance costume. Ariana hadn’t let her use that as an excuse. She had simply told her that the costume she wore for her first performance would work just perfectly for her second performance too. And of course she just happened to have matching veils for her to dance with. She had set her up. Somehow that didn’t upset Zahara at all. She was looking forward to it actually. Of course she was still nervous, but after the first dance she was going to be ready to go again—she always was. Although the last few times she danced in front of people had either been dancing in the class-only recitals where they danced their dances for the next level up, which last time had been in front of the troop instead of the next level up for her class, or the couple restaurant dance nights she had done outside of Round Rock.

  She took another series of calming breaths as she listened to the announcements about the evening, the food, the basic have respect for the people around by not texting or talking on the phone, in fact the standard please turn the phone off or to vibrate only announcement had been issued. The mandatory no videotaping, but still photography was okay, announcement was the last of the announcements before Ariana took the stage. Zahara watched her in complete awe of her skills and talent. She was beautiful and graceful and the black and gold cabaret costume made her look like an elegant princess. Zahara thought of Ariana like a sister, even though she knew the woman was old enough to be her mother—a young mother—she felt more like a sister and best friend than anything else. She looked more like a sister too. Even the subtle hints of gray in her hair were hidden beneath all the darkened curls. Zahara would have never seen them if Ariana hadn’t lifted her hair in the back and pointed out the sections where a few strands of silver lay hidden. A few strands weren’t a big deal, but Ariana had been making a point that she was older than she looked and one day, she had said, she would be completely gray.

  Once Ariana finished her dance she took the microphone, thanked the audience for attending, blew kisses to the kids and waved with a big smile on her face. Then, the inevitable happened and she introduced their next dancer stating they were about to be in the presence of a “goddess,” and then she called her name. Zahara took a deep breath and exhaled slowly. All of her nerves kept jittering and the butterflies in her stomach made her want to run away, but instead, she heard the introduction music for her routine and on the down beat she started her slow walking graceful entrance to the stage where she did her few subtle snake arm movements and then, right after her back to the audience goddess arms pose, the music kicked up to tempo and took over her body. She found the one person in the audience she could connect with, that one person who didn’t scare her senseless and she gave him her flirty shimmy with her come hither eyes long enough to draw him deeper into her routine and make him think she was dancing only for him, and then she went back to just feeling the music until her last step was taken. A subtle bow and a graceful exit from the stage and she ran back to the dressing area where Ariana awaited her at this point.

  “I saw your entire routine,” she pulled her in for a hug. “You did so great, lady.” She released her from the hug and the girls in the troop gave her a thumb up.

  “I was so nervous, but once I started dancing I just had it. And I did like you said with finding a person in the audience to pay a little attention to somewhere in the routine.”

  “Yes, I saw that look you gave the blond in the front row. He was cute.”

  She wrinkled her nose and shook her head no. “Not my type.”

  “You know this how?”

  “Because he’s not the one,” she told her. “But I had fun playing with him.”

  Ariana laughed. “I received a card with flowers before the show asking me to open the card after my first dance. I wanted to see you dance so I waited. I’m going to go back and see what the mystery is. Come back after you get some water to replenish your body. I want you to see my roses.”

  “Do you think a certain somebody may have sent them? This is the first event in Austin in a very long time.”

  She shook her head no. “He knows my favorite flowers are tulips. He would never send me roses. But they are pretty, white with a red trim,” she winked. “Looks like somebody put a lot of thought into them as each rose looks near perfection. I’m curious to see who sent them.”

  “Admirer maybe?”

  “Maybe, but I don’t want one. Maybe it is time I move on, but I just can’t.”

  “I know,” Zahara squeezed Ariana’s hand. “But that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy the roses.”

  “True. Come look, okay?”

  “I will be right back. Let me just grab a bottle of water. I can walk and drink at the same time.”

  “No, you can’t,” she laughed. “I have seen you spill water all over yourself while trying to do that before.”

  “I have plenty of time for it to dry,” she told her.

  “True.” She laughed before giving her one last hug and taking off down the hall toward the room the hotel management had allotted for her to use to store extra event decorations and needs. She also had her changing area back there so Zahara was sure Ariana would soon be changing into her costume for her final dance.

  She slipped her high heeled red strappy sandals on to her feet, grabbed a bottle of water from the cooler and drank a little first. Ariana was right, she needed the water and she also would spill more than she drank if she tried to walk and put the bottle up to her mouth at the same time. Her long standing joke was that she had the world’s best coordination except for when it came to drinking anything. She could be sitting still and somehow still manage to spill water down her blouse sometimes. She chuckled as she put the cap back on the bottle, said a quick thank you to Dalphina, who had congratulated her on a dance well done, and then she went down the hall to see Ariana and her flowers.

  She didn’t think it had taken her that long, but when she neared the room she saw a man heading out the back exit door with an unconscious Ariana in his arms with her head lulled back and her arm dangling listlessly. “Hey!” She yelled as she ran toward the man. He looked at her, with menacing dark eyes, and then he turned swiftly and disappeared out the exit door. His disappearance didn’t stop her. She ran until she reached the door and then she threw it open, getting out just in time to see the man closing the sliding door to the van, and another man in the front seat pulled away swiftly. “Somebody stop them!” She tried to run to catch up enough to get a license plate, but the more she looked, the more she realized she couldn’t make out the numbers and the van was moving too swiftly for her to catch up to it.

  A security guard ran up to her. “What’s the trouble, miss?”

  “Those men just abducted Ariana.” She could hear the frantic tone of her voice. “You have to do something.”

  “I’ll call the police,” he said as he unclipped the phone from his belt and called in her “alleged” abduction. Since he didn’t see it he assumed it hadn’t happened.

  When the cops arrived they took her statement, but they didn’t seem eager enough to help, in her opinion. They wanted to see the security tapes. Those men could be anywhere, and could do anything to Ariana by the time they went through the footage. She had only one option.

  She spotted a guy pulling up on his bike. She ran toward him before he could pull in a park.

  “What’s up doll?”

  “I need a ride. Can you take me somewhere?” She looked back at the officers who were still speaking with the security guard over in their spot under the front entrance. She could see them inside looking at her, and so could the blond on his bike.

  “Sure, doll. Hop on and tell me where you need to go.”

  She didn’t bother to sit the ladylike way given her scantily clad body. She straddled the bike, placed her hands on his waist and gave him the Squadron address that she had found while thinking about playing matchmaker and trying to arrange a way to get Ariana and Preston to at least have to see each other and talk. She knew if they did that, if the man had even an ounce of l
ove left for the woman, both would realize they were still meant for each other. That was the plan in her head anyway. She didn’t know how she was going to put it together and make it a reality, but that didn’t stop her from plotting and planning and in order to plot and plan she needed to know where this Squadron that he ran happened to be located.

  She held on as the guy helping her sped out the parking lot toward the location she gave him. It was late. They could be closed by now, but she hoped they weren’t. She hoped somebody was still there. Seven thirty was well past closing time and if there wasn’t anybody there she didn’t know what she would do. She didn’t have another plan. Waiting on the cops didn’t seem like the best option either because with as slow as they were going anything could happen to her friend between now and their finding her—if they found her.

  Zahara got off the motorcycle so fast she was surprised she hadn’t tripped over the skirt of her costume and fallen on her face. She hollered a quick thank you to the man who had given her a ride and she ran through the front doors of the building. She looked for the standard plaque to tell her what floor and what office number to go to, but she didn’t see one, which told her that the building was most likely solely theirs. She ran up the stairs and came to a glass set of doors. She tried to open them, but they were locked. Since she could see a woman sitting at the desk she banged on the door until she heard the lock click and then she rushed in. She was on her way to ask the woman to point her to Preston Strauss’s office when another man stepped out in her path.