Looking at the bedside table, he spotted a small digital clock. He climbed back to his feet, took off his shirt, draped it over the back of a nearby chair, and walked back to the bed. He set the alarm for seven-forty-five, then stretched out on the mattress, resting his head back against the pillows.
Kaan got points for having very comfortable prison cells. But that was the only thing he got.
Ben would find a way out of this prison or find a way to let others find him.
-=-
Liliya knocked on the door jamb and nodded to Evelyn. The Sergeant turned to face the other blonde, and the dark smudges under her eyes made Liliya frown.
“Are you not sleeping?” she asked in concern.
“I need to be here when the General’s call comes in,” Evelyn said, her voice rough with fatigue.
Liliya frowned. “You will not help Ben by burning yourself out! The General has many people activated to find him. You must rest while you can. Ben needs you to protect his family, too, while he’s away!”
Evelyn stared at Liliya, and the assassin could see the guilt on her face. Her expression hardened. “Do not! Do not blame yourself for his abduction!”
“I should have sent Ben back inside while I went up the tower with the commandos! They took him right under my nose!” she exclaimed, distraught.
“Do you think I don’t feel the shame of not being there to protect him?” she insisted. “The extraction was perfectly timed and coordinated. I could not have done it better myself.”
Evelyn looked shattered. Liliya took a lesson from Ben. She leaned forward and pulled the woman into a hug. It caught the woman by surprise, and she stiffened up momentarily, but Liliya rubbed her back, and Evelyn soon had her arms around Liliya and released her tears. Liliya had training for this, but instead of using it to manipulate a mark, she could use it to heal her friend.
When the tears slowed, Liliya held Evelyn’s shoulders and pushed her back gently until she could look into her eyes. “You will sleep now. I will wait here with you to take the call if the General has news. I promise to wake you if he does.
Evelyn’s nose was red, and her eyes were glassy, but Liliya could see acceptance in her body language.
“Thank you.”
She just nodded to the Sergeant and pointed to the cot. Evelyn moved to it and dropped her weary body on it. Shortly, she was asleep as she was far more exhausted than she was letting on.
Liliya settled in to wait for the General’s call. Truthfully, she didn’t expect to hear from him for at least another twenty-four hours. They were hunting a very canny predator who’d been successfully avoiding detection from multiple hunters for years. If the General failed to find Ben soon, Liliya would join the hunt and wouldn’t stop until Kaan Sadik was dead and Ben was home again.
She might hunt down Russo, too.
-=-
Dinner on Kaan’s mega yacht was superb. He had some top-notch people in his kitchen, and Ben hoped they were being paid very well and weren’t hostages like him.
“You enjoyed dinner?” Kaan asked from across the table as he dabbed his mouth with his napkin.
“Very much! Your chef and kitchen crew are highly skilled!” Ben said.
Kaan nodded. “Yes, they are! Dessert?”
Ben shook his head. “No, thanks.” He looked toward the window and saw they were moving. There was a slight vibration and a gentle sway, but the ship was exceptionally stable on the peaceful seas. Ben’s thought of stowing away on the supply ship, as slim as it was, was now moot.
Additionally, now that they were moving, his rescuers had a moving target and one that somehow evaded detection. He’d love to take a look at the tech Kaan was using for that.
He glanced back at Kaan and saw the man was looking at him with a smile.
“It’s true.”
Ben raised a curious eyebrow.
“You have no poker face. Your thoughts are plain to see there. My ship intrigues you.”
Ben smiled. “I’m a mechanical engineer. This ship is a big and complex mechanism. Of course, it intrigues me.”
Princess Zama made sure she was sitting next to Ben when dinner began and had been glancing at him throughout the meal. Now she had the opportunity to ask him a question.
“Ben, what does a mechanical engineer do?” she blurted, and the others at the table froze as it was the first time any of them had heard her speak.
“I like to invent solutions for engineering problems,” Ben responded.
“Such as?” she continued.
Ben chuckled. “Nothing you’d recognize. Valves for nuclear power plants and oil refineries, air filters for heavy mining equipment in uranium mining, and dozens of other solutions. I love puzzles, and solving them gives me a great sense of accomplishment.”
Noah gave him a curious look. “Doing that earns you a living?
Ben grinned. “I do okay.”
Kaan slapped a hand on the table, and heads turned in his direction. He appeared very angry, and none of his guests had seen this before. It unnerved them. “That sort of false modesty led me to lose a thirteen-million-dollar wager to you!”
Ben shook his head. “It’s not false modesty. It’s just nobody’s business how much money I make. That’s private. I earn enough from my inventions for my family and me to live comfortably. That’s enough for anyone to know. I’ve invented many of these little devices.” He locked his eyes on Kaan’s. “And I told you, you lost that bet due to the fickleness of random chance. That’s all it was.”
That seemed to stir some life in Ulrich. “You won thirteen million dollars in a single wager?”
Ben looked over at the older man. “It was a game of Texas Hold’em, and that was the final pot.”
Noah was grinning. “You must do very well indeed if you can gamble that much on a single hand.”
Ben had to restrict his answer to a nod as going into the explanation might lead to his current circumstance. His eyes moved to Kaan, who was watching him carefully.
“What are you going to spend the thirteen million on?” Yvonne asked.
“Yes, Ben. Where did my money go?” Kaan asked with a slight edge to his voice.
Ben shook his head with a frown. “The Casino took five percent for hosting the game. I was also playing with five and a half million dollars in casino credit, so that went back to them-”
“No casino would extend that much credit to a single player!” Ulrich protested.
Kaan looked at the man with a scowl. “They were pleased to loan it to Ben.”
“Perhaps another consequence of the exciting life I’ve led,” Ben said, and Kaan’s chin came up, acknowledging the subtle dig as he recognized his own words.
Noah was doing some mental math. “You would still be left with a little more than six-point-eight million.”
“Yes. I gave that to a lovely older couple from Texas that I met in the casino. They stopped me for a photo. It was her birthday, and her husband brought her to Casablanca as it was her favorite movie. Very romantic!”
“Que c’est beau! That’s so sweet!” Yvonne gushed.
“And very generous!” Zama said, bringing another smile and nod from Yvonne.
“It’s easy to be generous with other people’s money,” Ulrich scoffed condescendingly.
Yvonne and Noah burst into harsh laughter as they stared incredulously at Ulrich.
“I can’t believe you, of all people, have the nerve to accuse someone else of misusing money that doesn’t belong to them!” Yvonne exclaimed after she throttled her laughter.
“I earned that money!” Ulrich snapped as he shook his chubby fist at them. “I was the one who invested it, managed it all those years, and grew it into the huge fund it became!”
Noah scoffed. “But the money wasn’t yours to begin with, Ulrich! It belonged to the company and the employees. You collected a salary as you grew that money. You stole your company’s working capital and the employee’s pension fund!”
His face ruddy with suppressed rage, Ulrich exploded. “You, the man who violently murdered his wife and her lover in a fit of jealous rage, feel morally superior to me, whose crime was not violent and hurt no one?”
It was Yvonne’s turn to attack. “How can you honestly believe you hurt no one! All those people lost their retirement savings, then their jobs when the company went bankrupt! You hurt all of them!” she snapped.
Ulrich pushed himself to his feet as he knocked his chair back. “I don’t need to hear this drivel from the Whore of Babylon!”
Ben was impressed by the strength and accuracy of Yvonne’s throw as the decanter of scalding hot coffee she’d snatched from the tray of a passing server struck the heavyset man’s face and splashed over him.
He screamed as he stumbled backward, tripping on his overturned chair. He went down hard, striking his head against the ornate metal cap on the foot of the next table.
Ulrich went silent with a wheeze and limp as life suddenly faded from his body.
There was a moment of stunned silence at the table as everyone stared in shock at the sudden demise of the man.
Ben rose from his chair, moved to him, and felt for a pulse. He was still. The man’s head rolled easily, which revealed substantial damage to his neck vertebrae. Ben looked back to his dinner companions and shook his head.
No one was more unnerved by the outcome than Yvonne, whose hand had launched the coffee missile.
Princess Zama leaped to her feet and rushed away with her hands over her mouth as if to contain her scream. She quickly climbed the stairs and was gone.
Ben glanced at Kaan to see what he would do next. The man was looking at Ulrich with disappointment.
“How unfortunate. As the owner of this vessel in international waters, it falls to me to investigate and report the cause of death to the authorities once we reach our next port.” He looked into Yvonne’s shocked eyes. “I will let you know what I’ve determined before we reach our destination,” Kaan said to Yvonne with a smile.