Man Hunt

by Misty Evans

  Chloe, her mind whispered. Her sister's face swam in front of her and a new wave of panic rippled out. If Karl had discovered who Mia was, who Ryker was, Mia might well be looking at the inside of her coffin.

  She’d known the mission was dangerous, but she'd really never let herself think about what would happen to Chloe if she didn't make it home. She hadn’t considered not making it.

  Her head fell back against the stones, so heavy she could hardly hold it upright.

  Of all my screw-ups, this has to be the worst. The fault was hers. She'd pushed too hard about the baby angle, or…something. She dropped her head into her hands, trying to think. Somehow, someway, Karl had figured it out. Everything had been going so perfectly—where had it gone wrong?

  Did it matter? Ryker might already be dead.

  Once again, she’d broken her vow to her parents. How long would Karl keep her here? Did he plan to torture her, or just shoot her and leave her body to decay in this prison cell? Either way, there was no one left to take care of Chloe.

  No. I will not let that happen.

  She was going to figure this out. Find Ryker. Get home to Chloe.

  She started mentally chanting, Find Ryker. Get home to Chloe over and over. Taking several controlled breaths, she forced her racing pulse to slow down. Between her pounding head and heart, she couldn't hear, couldn't think. She had to gain control.

  A noise made her pulse leap. Closing her eyes, she cocked an ear toward the iron bars of the cell.

  There. Voices. Men’s voices. The rise and fall of murmurs, grunts, arguing…

  Ryker.

  The relief that swept through her nearly made her cry. He was still alive, although she guessed he was in a similar situation. She scooted closer to the bars, pressing her cheek against them and straining to hear what was being said.

  The weak glow of the wall sconces showed more shadows than light, but she didn't recognize the hallway. They had not come to this section of the dungeon, and she wondered how far away the women were, the elevator.

  “I want my son,” she heard Karl growl. “You know where he is, you know who took him.”

  A quiet chuckle, strained as though Ryker were in pain. “Your son died in that fire.” The words were bitten out, vehement in their force. “Your guilt over what happened to him and his mother is eating you up, making you crazy. No one stole your son, Karl. His death is on your hands.”

  The sound of a fist smacking flesh echoed in the shadows, a grunt making bile rise in her throat again. Was Ryker’s undercover identity still intact?

  Mia prayed that it was. Hers too. It seemed an insignificant thing but it gave her hope, and right now, with her arms and legs bound and no obvious way to escape, she needed every ounce of hope she could get.

  Where were Parker and the others? Surely, they had figured out that Ryker and Mia had been kidnapped and taken to the dungeon.

  A fresh wave of hope soared through her. The cavalry would come, they would be saved.

  Escape. Rescue Ryker. Take out Karl.

  Get home to Chloe.

  She whispered the mantras out loud, giving herself courage to go along with the hope.

  Thing was, waiting on Parker could be a fool’s game. Mia had no doubt Parker was coming for them, but she might be too late. It wasn't like she could walk in and raid the place—she and Shadow Force International were not law enforcement. By the time they came, Ryker and Mia could be dead.

  Her vision began to clear, although her mouth still felt as dry as the stones under her butt. She wrestled with the handcuffs, the cold metal rubbing her skin raw. Her ankles were bound by a zip tie. She struggled to break it, but it was too tight.

  Hanging on to the bars but trying not to clink the metal against them and alert her captor she was awake, she pulled herself to her feet and scanned the cell one more time. It was bare except for a set of small bones in one corner. Animal. She made a face but stared at them. The shadows played tricks on her eyes, yet she knew what the tiny skeleton had once been. Rat.

  She gave an involuntary shudder.

  There were no windows, not even a mat to lay on. Nothing but stone and the dry bones of a creature long gone.

  People had died here centuries ago. For a moment, she felt the ghosts squeezing in around her, nearly suffocating her. The tortured, the damned, the forgotten.

  I will not be one of them.

  God, she hated rats. There was no other choice, though. She wasn't wearing her handy-dandy watch, there was no stone sharp enough to cut through the zip tie, and she needed a tool.

  Taking another steadying breath, she dropped to her hands and knees and began scooting toward the shadowed corner and those tiny bones.

  Chapter Twelve

  Stay within your cover at all costs

  * * *

  Ryker was positioned in a chair secured to the floor.

  Kaiser looked almost bored as he lounged in an opposite chair. His two henchmen flanked Ryker and had been the ones doling out the beating. Karl didn't like to get his hands dirty.

  Ryker still wasn't sure what had happened—why Kaiser decided he didn't believe Gaspard’s story—but he had a feeling he was about to find out.

  Karl snapped his fingers at Enya, who’d been standing outside the large torture chamber watching Kaiser question him with her flat eyes. She'd been the one to inject Mia with the knockout drug and Ryker had already let the bitch know he was going to personally break all her fingers once he was free.

  Where was Mia? The two goons currently using him as a punching bag had a few bruises and black eyes to show for their scuffle with him in the room. While he'd been beating the crap out of them, Enya had managed to jam a needle into his back, the drug working to fell him when Kaiser’s men couldn’t. After that, he couldn’t remember anything. He prayed Mia was okay.

  At Kaiser’s finger snap, the bitch disappeared down the hallway. “Let’s bring your…wife…in and see if that loosens your tongue,” he sneered.

  Ryker spit blood on the floor, his jaw aching. His lip was split and he had a loose tooth, but that was the least of his injuries. Blood ran from a gash on his right thigh where one of the lugheads had buried a knife in it. “What the fuck is the matter with you? Your son is dead, how many times do I have to say it? No one kidnapped him, certainly not me. JoAn knows nothing.”

  Kaiser looked to the man on Ryker’s left and gave a nod. The man nailed him in the ribs. Again. The pain was excruciating. Pretty sure it's broken now. For a few seconds, he saw stars in front of his eyes and couldn’t draw a breath.

  “No!” Mia's voice echoed down the hallway. “Tell me where my husband is!”

  In the back of his mind, Ryker wished he could hug her for staying in character. After all she’d been through, it was an amazing feat.

  But then, she had continually surprised him.

  He heard scuffling, Mia's curses ringing against the narrow walls and high ceiling, making his blood boil. Not only would he break every one of Enya's fingers, he’d subject her to everything she did to Mia. Twice. If she was still alive when he got done, he would throw her in one of these dungeons and not look back. Let her rot.

  First, he had to get loose and save his partner. He couldn't be sure Parker had understood what happened, or would know where to look for them. The hotel was immense, this underground dungeon only accessible with Kaiser’s thumbprint.

  Kaiser rose from his chair and slammed it out of the way. “Bring her here.”

  Enya appeared in the doorway, dragging something behind her. Ryker jerked forward, the chair straining against its bolts when he saw what it was. Who it was.

  Enya had Mia by the hair, lugging her into the cell, sweat dotting her face at the exertion. Mia fought every step, hands around Enya’s wrists, legs kicking, her entire body bucking against the bitch’s vicious treatment.

  Good girl. Keep fighting.

  He’d been working on the ties around his wrist that pinned him to the chair. They were too
tight to slip out of. Even if he dislocated a thumb, he doubted he could get his beefy hand through one. His legs were also immobile, zip tied to the legs. He needed to break one, just one, but so far, no luck.

  As the goons had been working on him, however, he’d felt some give in the bolts sunk into the stone to hold the chair in place. Each time one of the goons hit him, he jerked a bit extra to put more pressure on those sunken bolts. The stone wasn’t concrete, and it was old and brittle. Probably limestone, which was not the best material against brute force. He’d need a boatload of luck to shake the chair free, but at that moment, it was the only thing he had.

  Luck and Mia.

  “She doesn't know anything,” Ryker ground out. “Let. Her. Go.”

  Enya dragged Mia into the cell, dropping her at Kaiser's feet. Mia tried to reach out and kick her but Enya easily side-stepped the attempt.

  “Gaspard,” Mia gasped, coming up on her hands and knees. “What’s going on? I don't understand. I woke up in… in a prison cell.” Her voice hiccupped as if she were on the verge of tears. What an actress. “My God, what have they done to you?”

  She started crawling toward him, the look in her eyes filled with mixed emotions. Fear, confusion, but most of all, anger. He saw determination too. She was staying in character, and if he could’ve, he would have winked or something to let her know how much he appreciated it, how impressed he was.

  “Our host is crazy,” he said. He had to let her know they were still undercover and thank God for that. Otherwise, he was quite sure they’d both have bullets in their heads. “He thinks I kidnapped his son.”

  “What? This again?” She was so close, only inches from him, her bound hands coming off the floor and reaching for him, her body climbing between his legs. The message was clear in her eyes and she stared directly into his—she had a plan.

  He almost laughed with incredulousness. There was absolutely no stopping this woman when she made up her mind. Anger and outrage flickered in her green orbs, telling him that when she got loose, she’d bring hell down on Karl and Enya.

  I’m with you.

  Her hands brushed his cheeks, but then she was ripped away, Kaiser grabbing her by the hair and jerking her backward.

  She landed on her butt, and the anger flickering in her eyes exploded out of her. Her fists punched his thigh, even as she swung her bound legs around to trip him.

  She nearly knocked him off balance, but Enya was there to steady him.

  Mia got a kick in the ribs for her trouble.

  She gasped for breath, and Kaiser hauled her onto her knees and gave her a shake. “You can quit lying. No one believes you, and if I don't get my son back…” — he leaned down and put his face close to her ear — “I'm going to torture you both until you tell me where he is.”

  Mia, the hellcat, took another swing at him, even though she was still gasping for air. Ryker felt helpless, struggling against his bonds, hating himself for getting her in this situation.

  Kaiser pulled out a gun and everything inside Ryker went still, cold. The end of the barrel went flush against Mia's temple.

  Mia froze mid-struggle, her gaze snapping to Ryker’s. He shook his head ever so slightly.

  Don't move.

  Kaiser stared at Ryker. “Where is my son? Tell me or I put a bullet in her head.”

  He prayed Mia could read his mind now as easily as she had over the last couple days. Forget your plan. Let me get you out of this.

  How? Her eyes seemed to reflect back to him.

  He had no idea. His mind flashed to Petra, her pleading eyes begging him to save her son, the promise that had fallen from his lips so easily now tasted like ashes on his tongue.

  He either had to give up Jaeger to save Mia or Mia to save Jaeger.

  Guilt rose with a fury inside him. He’d failed to save Petra and now he was about to lose Mia too? No way. No fucking way.

  Save her.

  His stomach churned, sweat rolling down the back of his neck. He could taste the blood in his mouth, feel the broken rib ready to pierce his lung.

  “Let JoAn go and I'll take you to your son.”

  Just like in poker, sometimes you had to bluff, but doing that with Mia's life wasn't an option. Bluffing about taking Kaiser to see Jaeger was the best he could do. Somehow along the way, he would kill the bastard.

  “No!” Mia’s eyes once more told him she wasn't ready to give up. She yelled at Kaiser, “Why would I want a baby if I already had your son, Karl? Do you hear yourself? What happened to him is a tragedy, but he's gone. There's no bringing him back, no matter how much you torture us. No matter how much you want to raise him from the dead.”

  Damn, she was too good. Whatever fear she was feeling, she’d pushed it down, kept her head, and was using logic to worm into Kaiser’s mind.

  Ryker had already tried, so he was surprised when he saw the slight waver in the man’s demeanor. The gun lowered half an inch. Kaiser didn't say anything, a tense silence hovering around them.

  He was considering that she was telling the truth.

  Come on, believe her. Let her go.

  Tears welled in Mia's eyes, a few slipping over the bottom lids and sliding down her cheeks. Logic first, then emotions. It had worked before, why not now?

  She glanced at Kaiser out of the corner of her eye, his face still close to hers, those tears flowing. “I just want a baby. I'll give you my whole company if you let us go and take Catherine's baby. Please.” It was barely a whisper.

  Oscar winning, even with a gun pointed at her head. The courage, the absolute balls, staggered Ryker.

  Kaiser was right there, right on the tipping point. It could go either way…

  “We’ll do anything you want,” Ryker added quietly, hoping his words might ease Kaiser over the edge and into believing them again. “Anything. I can give you even more wealth, help you expand your networks, whatever you want. The one thing I can’t do is bring your son back from the dead.”

  The gun lowered another half inch as Kaiser straightened, his gaze dropping to the floor. His shoulders relaxed and he let go of Mia. She lost her balance and fell on her stomach, but Ryker silently sighed through his nose.

  Kaiser rubbed his eyes with one hand, and Ryker had the distinct impression he really did want to believe Jaeger was alive. It was hard to swallow, since all Kaiser had ever done was mistreat Petra and ignore the boy. Why was his son so valuable to him now?

  “Turn him loose,” Kaiser growled at his goons.

  Unbelievable relief flooded through him. One of his abusers flipped out a knife and sliced the tie on Ryker’s left wrist. He was about to cut the second when a new player entered the cell, holding up a photograph.

  “I told you,” Warren Hinch said, pushing past Enya and shoving the photo in Kaiser’s face. “I knew she looked familiar.”

  He reached down and flipped Mia onto her back. “Thought I wouldn't recognize you, didn't you? I probably wouldn't have, but I have friends everywhere and one warned me about you and how you were trying to bring accusations against me when you were with the CIA. I saw your file, your Agency picture, and even though it's been a while, I never forget a face.”

  Kaiser’s already pale face went an unhealthy shade of gray. “CIA?”

  Hinch leaned over Mia, sneering. Bad move, since she returned it then spit in his face.

  Slowing wiping spit off his cheek, he straddled her, and slapped her. Mia’s head ricocheted to the side, and with everyone watching that, Ryker new this would be his only chance. He punched the goon in the side with his free hand and ripped the knife from his grip.

  * * *

  Participate in your own rescue

  * * *

  She'd tried, really tried, to get out of this with as little bloodshed as possible. No telling how hurt Ryker was and she certainly couldn't overpower Karl, Enya, and the two muscled bodyguards with nothing more than a rat bone. So, she’d done the only thing she knew—acted.

  Karl had bought it
, she’d seen it in his eyes, and the other three minions would do whatever he told them. Success had been so close she could taste it.

  And then Hinch had stalked in and ruined everything.

  Her head still reverberated from his slap when she heard a grunt then a cry coming from one of Kaiser's men. Enya cursed, Karl took a step back, and running on pure instinct, Mia’s fingers searched for the hidden bone.

  Her plan had been to use it to sever the zip tie around her ankles, but she'd heard Enya coming before she'd gotten anywhere on it. A weapon was a weapon, so she hid it in her underwear. She’d thought for sure it would've fallen out when Enya dragged her down the hallway, but it only slid into a very uncomfortable spot.

  All hell cut loose behind her, Hinch now watching whatever was going on. Ryker. He was what was going on. He had one hand free, and even though he was secured to a chair bolted into the floor, she had no doubt he was just as efficient and lethal as he was with both. There was shouting and yelling, and she gripped the rat bone between both hands. Without hesitation, she sat up and jammed it straight between Hinch’s legs.

  The man cried out and fell backward, grabbing his crotch. He tumbled into Karl and they both went down in a heap. Enya descended on her, screaming, and Mia gripped the bone tighter and struck out at her face.

  She barely missed Enya’s eye and felt the sting of the woman’s fist hit her chest, the woman grunting in pain as the bone sliced the skin near her temple. Enya made to kick Mia, but Mia was too quick, rolling away.

  Enya tripped on Karl, who was trying to crawl from under Hinch, and she went down, hitting her head on the stone wall. Her body went limp, and Karl grabbed her leg to use as leverage to get away from the senator, who was still grabbing his crotch and crying like a baby.

  Mia found herself looking up at Ryker, now free from all his restraints. One bodyguard was slumped on the floor, blood running from a deep gash in his neck. The other circled the chair, trying to stay out of Ryker’s way. Ryker held a gun in one hand, a knife in the other, apparently disarming the dead bodyguard with ease. The second didn't seem to like having a gun pointed at him and sprinted for the open cell door.