A Summer Smile

Iris Johansen

One

The young woman in the photograph was smiling. It was a summer smile, warm and wise yet brimming with the promise of richness and beauty still to come.

She was dressed in jeans and a plaid cotton western shirt and was sitting on the back of a beautiful palomino horse. Her green eyes held the serenity and gravity of a much older woman, but her lips were slightly parted and her face lit with such warmth and eagerness that it caused Daniel's hand to tighten involuntarily on the snapshot. "Very pretty." He forced his voice to sound casual. "What did you say her name was?"

"Zilah Dabala." Clancy Donahue leaned back, his blue eyes narrowed on the man in the executive chair behind the desk. "You met her mother two years ago when I took you to that party at Karim's. She's in charge of the housekeeping for all of his houses."

"Yes, I remember her," Daniel murmured, still gazing absently at the photograph.

Clancy had known he would. He would wager Daniel Seifert could recall every person and incident that had crossed his path in the last ten years. It was one of the abilities that had made him invaluable as Clancy's first lieutenant in Sedikhan's security service for over two years. That, along with a lethal deadli-ness that was honed to razor sharpness, had made him a weapon more potent than any in Clancy's extensive arsenal. "Yasmin is a very fine woman and terribly worried about Zilah."

"She doesn't look like her mother.'' As Daniel recalled, Yasmin was an attractive woman in her late forties with an olive complexion and dark hair and eyes. The woman in the picture had a skin tone that appeared to be pale gold rather than olive. Her wideset eyes were slightly uptilted at the corners and were a beautiful shade of clear, pale green. Her hair wasn't dark but a light tan, sunstreaked with gold, and tumbled down her back in a straight shining curtain.

"Her mother is a native of Sedikhan," Clancy said. "Zilah s only half Sedikhanese. But she's intimately linked to those in power through her association with David Bradford."

"Bradford?" Daniel tore his gaze from the photograph to glance up swiftly. "What the devil does Bradford have to do with this?"

"Zilah and he go back a long way." Clancy paused. "You might say she's something of a protegee of David's."

"Really?" Daniel's lips twisted in a cynical smile. "And I heard he was so much in love with that copper-haired wife of his." He studied the photograph appraisingly.  "However,  Zilah is certainly lovely

enough to be any man's prize 'protegee.' A little young for Bradford though, isn't she?"

"She's twenty-one and she's not—" Clancy broke off. "I'm not at liberty to discuss Zilah's relationship with David."

Daniel shrugged. "I wouldn't think of prying into the man's personal life. It's nothing to me if he keeps a hundred women on the side." He tossed the photograph onto the desk in front of him and resolutely kept his eyes away from it. Why the hell was he feeling this helpless fascination with the girl in the photograph? It didn't make any sense at all. She was lovely, but the Khadim who had occupied his bed the night before was far more beautiful. Lord, he had even felt a surge of sheer possessive rage when Clancy had identified her as Bradford's mistress.

He leaned back in his chair and drew up one knee to rest against the desk. "I can see how her closeness to Bradford might be a weapon in the terrorists' hands." He had never met David Bradford, but Daniel was well aware that the man was regarded with deep affection by both Sheikh Alex Ben Raschid, who was the reigning monarch of Sedikhan, and his wife Sabrina. Even old Karim Ben Raschid, the former ruler, was tremendously fond of him. "Yes, if Bradford chose to exert a little muscle on behalf of his chere amle, there's no doubt he would have the ear to the throne."

Clancy nodded grimly. "You're damn right he would. David would be just as upset as Yasmin if he knew about the hijacking. That's why Alex wants this mess cleaned up before David hears about it."

Daniel lifted a brow. "He doesn't know about it yet?",

"He's in New York at the moment with his wife, Billie. She had to fly to the U.S. to sign a contract for a song she's written."

"And, of course, Alex doesn't want his old friend to have his domestic bliss shattered by this very inconvenient hijacking," Daniel said caustically.

Clancy's brow knotted in a frown. "Let's just say he doesn't want David to be made unhappy by this matter. And why the hell are you harping on David's association with Zilah, anyway? You're not exactly a puritan, Daniel."

"I'm not harping. I just—" Daniel broke off. He was harping and he knew it. How could he explain his anger at the idea of Bradford making love to the woman in that photograph when he didn't understand it himself? "You're right. I sure as hell haven't the right to cast the first stone." He clasped his hands around his knee. "Okay, fill me in. So far you've told me only that four terrorists have hijacked a Sedikhan Oil Company plane and are holding Zilah Dabala and the pilot hostage to force Ben Raschid to release two of their group from a Sedikhan prison. I gather you wouldn't be here unless you wanted my help. What's the scenario?" A slight smile touched his lips. "I admit to being curious about why you think I'd be interested in the job after my two years in official retirement."

Clancy scowled. "Alex was overgenerous, as usual. How does he expect me to run an efficient security system if he makes my best man rich enough to quit the business?"

"You could have suggested that he not give me those oil wells," Daniel said with a grin. "Your opinion carries a good deal of weight with Alex."

"After you saved Sabrina and her son when that nut tried to shoot them?" Clancy asked sourly. "I'm just surprised he didn't give you a seat on the board of Sedikhan Oil as well."

"He offered to do that, but I told him I'd just as soon the company stayed solvent." Daniel's eyes were twinkling. "I'm no businessman."

"No, your talents lie in other directions," Clancy agreed. "And so does your experience. That's why I'm here. I would have handled the matter myself but the situation has become a little touchy."

"Touchy?"

"As in complicated." Clancy's lips tightened. "All right, here's the way it's shaping up." He leaned forward in the cane chair and his words fired out with machine-gun rapidity. "The terrorists are headed by one Ali Hassan, who is the brother of one of the prisoners being held in Marasef. We think the group has been waiting for this chance for a long time. They've done their homework if they've linked David with Zilah. She's been in the United States for a number of years and is presently attending Texas A&M University." For a moment there was a flicker of impersonal admiration in his expression. "They're not stupid. They've picked their target very carefully. The security around Alex, his family and his friends is almost impregnable. Zilah, on the other hand, is on the outer fringe of that circle and yet is close to one of its most important members. They must have been watching for an opportunity, and when Karim arranged for the company plane to fly Zilah home to Sedikhan, they pounced. They managed to substitute one of their own men for the copilot, and when they were airborne out of Houston, he made his move. That was yesterday morning. They landed in the Madrona Desert and were met by the other three terrorists."