Naina (Al-Ameen Family #4)

Borders

My head bobbed to the beat of my music as I polished off my gun. Nothing like a calm afternoon cleaning my apartment and doing nothing else. I put everything away and hid the box back under my flooring. Cliché but it was the easiest place to keep a weapon without it easily being fired by some kid from the building messing about my stuff.

There was a knock on the door, startling me. I did a quick sweep of the room to make sure nothing was out. I swung the door open to see the two girls from the colony.

"Didi, cheeni chahiye," the little one held up an empty bowl. I raised an eyebrow at her.

"Cheeni chahiye ya kuch aur?" I stepped aside to let them in. The girls ran to my TV giggling. I handed them the remote and let them switch channels to whatever they wanted to watch.

"Khana ho gaya?" I asked them both and they absentmindedly nodded. I let them do their thing while I went about cleaning my place. My phone rang so I went into my bedroom to answer.

"Hi boss," I greeted Namrata.

"Hi Naina. I'm emailing you for a job tomorrow. I need you to go back to Punjab."

I loved going to Delhi. "No problem boss, I'll check the email." I slipped my phone back into my pocket and checked her email. Flying out tomorrow 4pm, exactly 24 hours.

I read through the details. I was going to Pakistan. I kept my bedroom door wide open so I could keep an eye on the girls too. Passports (real and fake), clothes, phones, chocolate, extra ammo that I literally never use, GPS, and other stuff I packed in without paying attention because I did this weekly.

4pm the next day I was in the air, en route to Delhi. I spent the six hour flight going over details and mapping out my route. I was to get on a private bus departing from the Ludhiana airport with some other diplomats or something, Namrata wasn't clear or maybe I just wasn't listening. I could squeeze in a two and a half hour nap before I had to be up all night.

From there, I would get off close to the Wagah border and take my usual route to the Pakistani border.

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Armaan

"Yes mom, I ate. I have to go now, our ride is here."

"Okay Armaan, dhyan rakhna! Aur call karte rehne. Aur khana time par kha lena-"

"Yes mom yes. Tension kyun lete ho itni. Main rakhta hoon ab, Allah hafiz." I hung up before she went on for another hour. I ran onto the large coach bus, the last one to get on. The only seat available was in the back and my teams pushed me till I got there. I fell onto the seat with a groan and threw my bag down beside me.

I heard a sound of annoyance and looked over to my left to see a girl pulling a shawl over her head tighter. I slipped my Beats over my ears and closed my eyes, trying to get some sleep in too. I didn't sleep at all on the flight and my head was starting to ache.

I don't know when I fell asleep but I woke up when I felt the bus stop. The girl beside me picked up her backpack and walked towards the door. It was too dark for me to see anything but her silhouette. She gracefully strutted to the front and yelled, "sat sri akal paaji," to the driver.

"Oho sat sri akal beta," he called back. I sat up and watched as she swung her backpack over her shoulder. I still couldn't see her face properly but something about her intrigued me. Dressed in leather pants and a black shirt, she was the only girl on the entire bus. And she seemed to be around my age, which begged the question of what she was doing going to a small village in Punjab all by herself with only a backpack.