Chapter 21
Sofia smiled at the naivety of Tess's misunderstanding. "No silly." She laughed, "I mean Ally will be here soon." Sofia explained. "Ally phoned our boss for help tracking you two down as soon as he saw that you'd been kidnapped. Sami and Farooq were the ones who found you and brought you back here. Ally called Gus to say he'd found the van you were in and he's bringing it here to collect you. I've spoken to the boss just now on the phone and Ally was five hours behind you. So that means he'll be here soon."
"What time is it? Shit. Seven thirty. We got here at three AM. That means he could be here by eight." Tess panicked, understanding the situation a little clearer now.
Sofia took hold of Tess's shoulders and calmed her down a little. "Has he asked you to marry him yet?"
"We've discussed it in a roundabout way, yes. Why?"
"Because Gus has asked Sami if he would be willing to perform the ceremony and he seems more than happy." Sofia said, letting the cat out of the bag and steeling the surprise from her fiancé.
"Sami?" She repeated, "He's not a priest."
"What is a priest?" Sofia asked.
"You know. A priest. A man who performs a wedding ceremony." Tess explained.
"That maybe the case where you come from but not down here." Sofia corrected her. "A wedding ceremony in this country is known as Nikah and only requires a person to be religiously knowledgeable enough to carry out the proceedings. He will also need consent from you and Ally. Oh, and two witnesses."
Tess couldn't believe her ears. Surely the man she'd masturbated by means of a hand job only hours ago, couldn't then perform a marriage ceremony with her to someone else could he?
"He also needs a present for you." Sofia continued.
"Who needs a present?"
"Ally must give you a present." Sofia explained, "It's the tradition. Then Sami will have to register the marriage legally, but you will be together as an item immediately after Nikah."
"Why Sami?" Tess asked, feeling guilty about what she'd done.
"There are plenty of knowledgeable men around who could do it, but Sami was the first to be asked and he is obviously pleased."
"And it's as simple as that?" Tess asked.
"Well it sounds simple but there's a bit more to it. For a start, you'll have to look the part by wearing one of our traditional Kaftan wedding gowns. I have a gold, sapphire pendent head chain which will look great sitting just here." Touching the middle of Tess's forehead to demonstrate exactly where the jewel would hang, reminded Sofia, "I also need to do your hair."
Tess agreed and sat back in the comfortable, now upright chair where she had slept.
Wasting no time, Sofia applied the same procedure to platting Tess's hair as Ingrid had but instead of using an elastic band, she used a more decorative single pearl bobble design of hair tie. Starting at her temple, she worked towards the back of her head, stopping to duplicate her work at the other side, before joining the two braids together behind her head and platting all of her hair down her back.
Tess loved the feeling of her hair being played with but couldn't hide her distraction because of the words Sofia had let slip about the wedding.
Without knocking, a young girl entered the room carrying the food Sofia had ordered, then left after only saying one word to her.
The omelette and tomato style bread hadn't begun to touch the sides when the girl reappeared in a hurry.
A quick conversation took place between the two women before Sofia felt the need to involve Tess. "Ally's here."
Tess leapt to her feet, stuffing the remnants of food from her hands into her mouth, whilst hurrying out of the salon. She ran through the reception area and out of the glass front doors of the spa to see the back of Ally's motorhome disappearing from view into the courtyard of a carpark behind the spa. By the time she'd caught up with him, he'd climbed out of the driving seat and turned to see her running.
Sofia Followed Tess as far as the reception area where she stopped to call her boss, Gus and announce Ally's arrival. Gus told her to bring Tess and Ally to meet him at the mansion.
Knowing that this would take them time to walk over to him, he called one of his more trusted henchmen who went by the name of Omar, as well as the complex's maintenance guy, asking them both to meet him in the plant-room where Ingrid currently sat cuffed in the corner of her cell.
After their tight embrace, Ally held Tess away from him by placing his hands on the tops of her shoulders. He accepted that her wrists were unlocked from behind her but still wanted to give her the once over to check on her wellbeing. Looking at her missing ankle cuffs, he could see the occasional red marks on her calves where Ingrid's whip had wrapped itself around her leg and stung her like a box jellyfish.
Tess looked down at her legs and immediately began to explain. "She thought we were going to kill her and dump her out in the desert somewhere. She put a hood over my head so that I didn't know you weren't there and drove us away without you." Tess said, showing little concern for her injuries down below.
"I know." Ally interjected, "I translated the messages she sent to her husband and found out that she was planning to kidnap you anyway to get revenge on us and get her money back. I imagine she knew that I would figure this out at the service station and fled through fear of how I'd react."
"Really?" Tess replied. "She chained my legs up and whipped me half to death, then tried to leave me on the roadside so she could get away. How was she going to get her money back?"
"Don't worry about that now." Ally said, wanting to stipulate the more important facts, "I don't know how, but Gus already has her partner-in-crime husband, Kristofer, so we don't have to worry about being chased by him. But we must get our stories straight. Right?"
"Yeah." Tess agreed, never looking so serious. "Definitely."
"When I came here last time, to find you, I told Gus that my brother knew where I was and that he was in the Algerian police, so Gus would think twice about simply making me disappear.
This time he thinks I asked my brother to be on the lookout for Ingrid and that he'd told me about a girl matching her description, hitchhiking at a service station where all this happened."
"I didn't know your brother was a cop."
"No. No, he isn't. Please, we don't have much time, just hear me out. I told him that we'd acted on my brother's information and went to pick her up, with the deception of taking her to the embassy, but I told Gus we were going to bring her here. I explained that Ingrid kidnapped you and that I could do with a little help finding you as I didn't really want the police involved."
