by Milly Taiden
13
“How much longer?”
“Two minutes less than the last time you asked,” Donovan groused, not looking up from the screen of her laptop. “They said an hour. It’ll be an hour. Stop pacing. Go get coffee. Run around the block. Play in traffic. Hell, go mess up Brock’s desk, just let me get this request done or you’ll never get the rest of the evidence from Beastly.”
“But…”
“But nothing. The lab is analyzing that sliver of silver. You already know it had blood on it and that it was Sway’s. I’m not sure what you think they can find that your senses don’t already know, but you insisted and I did as you asked. So, now we wait.”
“I told you why I wanted them to test it,” he growled. “There is something weird about the way it smells. It’s Sway, but then there’s something about it that’s not Sway. I can’t explain it.”
“Right.”
“Okay, hotshot. How do you explain his trail ending at a wall? And, before you ask, no, that’s not where it started. Actually, it’s where it stopped only because I can’t walk through walls.”
“And here I thought you were Super Agent man.”
Ignoring Donovan, needing to say it all out loud one more time, Hunter continued, “And Sway can’t walk through walls either. No matter what you all think. But disappearing into the wall isn’t the weirdest thing…”
“You don’t say?” Jane grumbled.
“…it mysteriously moved without a trail. Like jumped ten feet, didn’t touch anything and bingo-bango reappeared in the center of a stall.”
“Bingo-bango? That’s a new one.”
“Don’t sass me, Donovan,” Hunter gave up and acknowledged her running commentary, but refused to stop his own. “There was no backtracking, no layers, nada. Ken doll stench was there, it was gone, and then it was over there. And this bears repeating, Sway may be picture perfect, but the bastard can’t walk through walls or do fucking magic tricks.”
“Damn straight,” Ramirez chimed in, entering the tech room. “He’s not fucking perfect either,” he added, heading straight for his wife.
Turning away as the happy couple said a very thorough hello, Hunter couldn’t stop thinking about Kat. Sure, the boss had told her not to come into the office and had tucked her away in a safe house. It just wasn’t like his tenacious mate not to find a way to call in and talk to Donovan about the case.
When an hour went by without word from Mejia, he’d called the undercover officers stationed outside her location. Douglas reported everything was okay. Nothing out of the ordinary. So why was his dragon charging the confines of his mind, pummeling Hunter to be let free, to protect Katrina.
“You can turn around now,” Donovan laughed. “We should be good for another ten minutes or so.”
“Make that five,” Ramirez grinned while waggling his eyebrows.
“I’ve got an email,” Donavan announced before Cross could make a smartass comment.
Across the room and peering over her shoulder as fast as his feet would carry him, Cross read the findings twice before shaking his head and thinking aloud, “It’s his. They say it’s a ninety-nine-point-nine percent match to the sample you gave them.”
“Did they test for any chemical presence?” Ramirez quizzed.
“Wouldn’t matter. It’s his blood.” Rolling his shoulders to relieve some of the tension, Hunter sighed, “I gotta go tell the boss. I’m already gonna lose my ass for waiting this long. I just thought…”
His words trailing off as the phone on Donovan’s desk rang, he opened the door when she gasped, “Say that again.”
Stopping in his tracks, Hunter heard four words that made his blood run cold. “Agent Mejia is missing.”
Back across the room with his hand reaching for the receiver, he slammed the hard plastic to his ear and roared, “How long since last contact?”
“Ten minutes.”
“Visual?”
“No, sir. Text.”
“FUCK! What the fuck?!” Pulling the phone from his ear then pushing it right back into place, he snarled, “Could you be any fucking stupider? When was the last visual contact?”
“Nine a.m.”
Eyes flying to the clock on the wall, he bellowed, “Three-and-a-half-fucking hours ago? Fucking morons! Stupid fucking mor…”
“What is going on in here?” Brock’s boomed as he threw the door open.
Slamming the receiver on the desk next to Donovan, Hunter spun toward the boss, crossed the room in two huge strides, and stopping just short of bumping Brock’s nose with his own, roared, “The bastard’s got Kat.”
14
She regained consciousness a bit and took a moment to study her body and surroundings. Hot and humid, miserably sticky, the air so thick it was hard to draw a breath… Covering in slimy sweat, her clothes clung to her skin like heavy strips of papier-mâché…
Had the air conditioner broken? What was going on? Climate change was real, but this shit was ridiculous. It hadn’t been hot when she’d gotten home. Was the AC even on? What time was it? What day was it? What was that horrible smell?
Whatever was happening, she’d have to get up and call her landlord before she melted into a puddle of slushy Latin goo. She was hotter than she could ever remember being, and she grew up south of the border.
No way she could deal with being miserable all the time. Being hot just sucked. There were only so many clothes she could take off before ta-da she would be down to her birthday suit. God knew the rent was high enough. “Premium rent for premium location,” the landlord had touted. Well, dammit all to hell, everything in the “premium place” should work.
“Maybe later…” she mumbled aloud. “Need…sleep…”
Foggy, lost in her own mind, she was more unconscious than actually asleep, swimming against a mental tide of steamy, gooey quicksand. Thick, unbreakable, steel bands tightened around her chest…or was there a huge rock pressing the life out of her? Was this what happened when somebody got too hot? Was this heat exhaustion? A heat stroke? Maybe she was just dreaming…
NO! Wake up, Kat! Wake your ass up, NOW!
Was she yelling at herself? Could that happen? Why would she do that? The alarm hadn’t gone off, she wasn’t late for work…or was she? Nothing made sense. Everything was upside-down and inside-out.
Wait… No, she wasn’t the one screaming, was she? It was inside her mind. So, it was her…kinda, in a manner of speaking. That little voice her abuela said would keep her safe, always be there to warn her away from danger. But why now? What the hell could go wrong in her own bed?
Fighting to open her eyes, trying to swallow with her tongue stuck against the roof of her mouth and her throat as dry as the Sahara, the icy claws of dread sunk their jagged tips into her psyche. Cold, shocking, dangerously alarming, an explosion of adrenalin shot through her body.
Jerking her hands from over her head, pure agony exploded in her wrists as the clang of metal against metal echoed through her mind at the same time it bit into her flesh. Something was wrong…really, really wrong. She was caught, shackled, couldn’t move. Inhaling deeply through her mouth, she gagged and coughed and struggled to catch her breath as acrid fumes of rotting vegetation and decaying fish wound into a suffocating ball in the base of her throat.
Forcing her eyelids open, she shook with a volatile tincture of fear and rage when she could see no farther than the tip of her nose. Matted, tangled, and slick with mud, her hair was thrown over her face, so heavy she couldn’t move it no matter what she tried.
Rushing toward complete consciousness, flashes of lights, blurry pictures, misshapen faces, all flooded her mind. It was maddening frenzy she couldn’t comprehend and couldn’t make stop.
Holding tightly to the tiny bits of reality she could pluck from the miasma, her nails bit into her palms, the pain dredging her from the murderous undertow of the narcotics swimming through her veins. Working backward and without concentrating on one thing for longer than a split
second, the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle her memories had become blessedly began to fall into place.
Huge holes, missing shards with no border, some bits too were bright, others too dark, and still another set so far out of focus she let them fall away. Turning her head sideways to escape the stench of the muck in her hair, she gasped at the thimbleful of almost fresh air. Her neck ached, a concentrated pang just like a Band-Aid bring ripped off before she was ready radiated from one small spot.
And there it was… She had been drugged. Injected with something incredibly fasting acting. Visions where she was falling forward and the thud of her knees slamming into a tile floor burst into view. A horrible floral-patterned couch pulsed in and out of focus. “Where the hell am I… the safe house,” she silently swore.
That was the spark, the nudge her brain needed to replay everything in painfully specific detail. She’d been kidnapped…by someone who knew where she was…knew how to get into the back entrance of the safe house…knew her by name.
It was time to get to work. Time to figure out where she was, who had done this to her, and how she was going to escape. Slamming her eyes as tight as they would go, she did the only thing that made sense, she focused on identifying the sounds around her.
A whoosh-whoosh-whoosh on her left was closer than the drip-drip-drip somewhere behind her head but not as close as the clickclick-clickclick-clickclick just beyond the tip of her toes. She was in a large exposed space where the left side was open to the outside if the smells assaulting her nose meant anything at all.
“Put it together, Kat. Pull that shit outta thin air like they taught you to do. You scored the highest in your class. Think. Think, dammit. You have to figure out where you are if you’re gonna get out of this alive,” she fumed under her breath.
Squeezing her eyes tighter, this time she held her breath, directing all her energy on the whoosh. This wasn’t the first time she’d heard that noise. It was too familiar not to have been in the last year or so. But where? She’d been so many places. Only paying attention when it was for work or part of her training.
Starting soft, it got louder and louder crescendoing to a pinnacle then faded out again the entire time its mechanical cadence was somehow out of time. Rotating! It was rotating 180 degrees one way and then back, over and over.
“A fan. It’s fan. Not a little house fan. An industrial fan,” she thought aloud. “Yes! Got it.”
But not in a factory. Wherever she was simply wasn’t that big. There would’ve been more echoes, more dust, less air and the smells would’ve been musty not moldy. So, not at the old industrial park or the condemned tenements on the eastside. Knowing what something wasn’t meant she was one step closer to knowing what it was. At least that’s what one of her instructors at the academy always said.
Turning her attention to the drip that remained constant with a bit of a warble from one to the other. It had to be water, or even raindrops, falling onto a tarp or into a shallow plastic bucket…probably. It was the only thing that fit but did that go with the fan?
Shaking with frustration, knowing she was taking too long, sure her captor would be back, Kat prayed for something…anything new. Whipping her head to the other side, she scooted and pushed the scant inches she could until just the tip of her nose finally pushed through her hair.
No smell of salt water, no sound of boat engines, no horns, she couldn’t be at the docks or anywhere close. If nothing else, she would be able to hear the waves splashing against the cement pylons holding up the wharves.
There was no giving up. She would figure it out. No stupid fucker who had to drug his victims was going to get the best of her. She just needed to think, to get her heart to stop pounding and her imagination to stop coming up with one morbid situation after another.
Flipping her head back the other way, she stopped cold and refused to breathe. “Whispers. Somebody’s here.” Holding perfectly still, she willed the faint, murmurs to her ears.
Ragged coughing and dry-heaving, followed by gut-wrenching gagging then another round of coughing interrupted the hums. The guy was either gonna hurl, die, or both, and she couldn’t let that happen.
Ready to come to the ailing person’s aid, the blood froze in her veins as the same raspy voice that had whispered in her ear, snarled, “You’re a weak fuck, and weak fucks are expendable.”
Waiting for more, sure it was coming, a shocked scream flew from her lips when a huge hand gripped the hair hiding her face, jerking straight toward the ceiling. Her shoulders popped out their sockets and her neck was craned at an odd angle, but she refused to cry out more than she already had.
Shifting her eyes left, right, up, and down, trying to catch a glimpse of her abductor, hot fetid breath hit the side of her neck as the bastard licked her cheek and sneered, “You taste good enough to eat.”
15
Pushing past Brock, Hunter made it halfway down the hall before the boss was standing in front of him with a look of murder in his eyes. “How the hell?” Unwilling to wait for the answer or even slow down, he swerved to the left only to be snared as a thick veil of magic fell all around him.
Unable to move, stuck in place, he shifted his eyes as far right as they would go and watched Brock deliberately closing the distance between them. Leaning close, the boss warned, “Pull that shit again and I’ll bury you so deep, the fucking Devil won’t be able to find you.”
Just as quickly as he’d been caught, Hunter was released from whatever voodoo the boss had used. A million questions ran through his mind, questions he’d ask after Kat was safe and Sway was dead.
“My office,” Brock spat, walking away with the arrogance of a man who knew his order would be followed.
“I’ve gotta go,” Hunter contradicted. “We can have a tea party later.”
“Cross.”
The threat was clear. Hunter didn’t care.
“Brock. You want answers. You better catch up.”
With every step, he waited to be stricken with whatever super power the boss had running through his veins. So, when Brock appeared at Hunter’s side as he was racing down the stairs, the dragon was more than a little relieved.
Barely touching the floor as he flew out the door, Hunter turned right as Brock snarled, “My car. I don’t ride bitch.”
Deciding he’d pushed his luck as far as he could, Hunter spun around, caught up and was in the car a second after the locks were disengaged. “Drive it like you stole it,” he growled, thankful when Brock left rubber on the asphalt and rode on two wheels when he turned out of the parking lot.
Never one to mince words, Hunter demanded, “What the fuck were you thinking letting Sway anywhere near Kat?”
“I was thinking that you’re too much of an asshole. That you knew she was your mate and weren’t going to do anything about it. That you’d let testosterone and pride get in the way of the investigation and put a new agent in danger. That at least if Mejia was partnered with Sway you’d focus on the case if it meant keeping her safe.” Sliding his eyes to the side and glaring as he made a quick left, he spat, “Anymore stupid questions?”
“Did you know he was dirty?”
“Do you know for sure he is?”
Leaving a perfect imprint of his knuckles as he slammed his fist into the dashboard, Hunter roared, “Fuck yes, I do!” Hitting the wounded plastic again and again, the accusation flew like flames. “And so do you. Do you need a two-by-four to the fucking head?”
Another right and an immediate left then straight into a driveway before standing on the brakes, Brock slammed the car into park and opened his door. Out of the car and halfway to the porch before Hunter caught up with him, the boss clipped, “You have your doubts, or you would’ve already brought everything to me.”
“Donovan,” Hunter spat, lifting his foot and kicking in the door to Sway’s house. “She was talking to you the whole damned time.”
“What of it?”
Ignoring the question in favor of finding any
information leading to the location of his mate, Hunter went straight to the back of the house and into the tiny office. Ripping open drawers, tearing through files, throwing papers that didn’t suit his search over his shoulder, his hand wrapped around the handle of the bottom drawer of the desk and pulled. “Locked! Fuck that!”
Tearing it completely out into the light of day, he let the broken wood fall onto the floor, retrieving the olive-green, metal lockbox as it flew through the air. Breaking the lock, he snatched out an envelope of photos and another full of folded papers.
Shredding the wrapper with the tips of his talons as they pushed through the ends of his fingers, he boomed, “Got him!”
Appearing at the door, Brock demanded, “What did you find?”
Grabbing the pictures and the documents, Hunter sprinted around the desk and past the boss as he snarled, “Tell ya in the car.”
Leaving the door hanging on one hinge with Brock at his back, Hunter jumped from the porch, hit the ground running, and slid across the hood of the car. Any other time, he would’ve had a smartass comment about Starsky and Hutch, but in this case, all he wanted was to find Kat. She was all that mattered.
Bang! Bang! Two doors shut. Key went into the ignition. Engine gunned. And they were off.
“Tell me,” Brock barked.
“Sway’s got pictures of this old greenhouse on the other side of Nokesville.” He threw the photos on the seat. “The route from here to there is perfectly documented. Deed transfer from Emmett Smith to Wyatt Sway, title of ownership in the name of Wyatt Sway, and receipt of cash transfer from the account name of Wyatt Sway to the out-of-state account of Emmett Smith.” Slamming the documents on top of the photos, he snidely asked, “Is the Ken doll a closet florist?”
“How the fuck would I know?” Steering the racing car under the I95 overpass then onto Aden Road, he goaded, “But I’ll ask him as soon as I see him.”
“Not if I get to him first. I’m gonna—”
“Not do a fucking thing but get Kat out safely and let me handle my agent.”