by Elle Kennedy
Isabel yelled something in Spanish, and then dove out the door, both guns raised as she led the terrified girls toward the chopper. Kane rushed out to meet her, while Luke, Ethan, and Morgan provided cover fire as the girls rushed forward with their heads ducked down.
Trevor was about to race after them when the door flew open from behind and three guards erupted into the room. He went on the attack, lunging forward to kick a rifle out of one guard’s hands and head-butting the other so quickly that the second weapon crashed to the floor too.
He lifted his rifle, only to have it knocked away by the first guard, a man packing about two hundred and fifty pounds and strong muscular arms. As the big man rushed him, Trevor got him in a leglock and both men went hurtling to the floor. The third guard threw himself into the fight, but Trevor got in a lucky punch to the man’s nose that had him slumping over like a stone, unconscious.
The big one was harder to handle. Before Trevor knew it, he was on his back, with the guard’s meaty hands wrapped around his throat. He shoved at the man’s chest, to no avail, unable to get the monster off him. From the corner of his eye, he could see the open doorway, make out the huddled shapes climbing onto the chopper. Relief shot through him. The girls had made it. Isabel had done good.
Mr. Big’s fingers circled Trevor’s throat. Trevor got a hand in there too, digging his fingers into the guard’s iron grip, straining to pry it away. He had a chance when Mr. Big lifted one hand, leaving Trevor to deal with only one, but then the guard pulled a knife from his belt and lowered it to Trevor’s throat.
Trevor switched tactics. He grabbed the guard’s knife hand, groaning as he tried to stop the blade from connecting with his throat.
Let go.
The whisper in his head was teasing. Seductive.
He let go slightly, and the blade moved an inch closer.
Mr. Big grunted on top of him, spittle from his mouth soaking Trevor’s face.
This was what he’d wanted, wasn’t it?
To die.
To see Gina again.
The knife moved a fraction of an inch closer.
God, he wanted to see her again. All he had to do was close his eyes and let go. Let the behemoth on top of him slice his throat wide open. Close his eyes and—
A gush of hot moisture drenched Trevor’s face.
He blinked his eyes open. The guard on top of him went limp, blood spurting out of the gaping slash on his throat. Isabel loomed over them, holding a knife in one manicured hand, a knife that clattered to the floor as she bent down to help lift the dead guard off Trevor.
She’d come back for him. She’d been on the chopper, safe and sound, and for some stupid reason she’d decided to come back for him.
“Come on,” she said urgently, gripping his arm. “We have to get out of here.”
Anger clamped around his spine. “Why the hell did you come back?” he spat out.
Her eyes flickered with confusion. “You needed help.” Without letting him protest, she hauled him to his feet and tugged him toward the door. “Now let’s get on the damn chopper.”
He was too stunned to argue. As he followed her out of the storage room, a rush of pure helplessness seized his insides, making him want to hit something. He’d been so close. Goddamn Isabel and her fucking compassion. How could she—
With a hoarse cry, Isabel went down.
All the air left Trevor’s body as her slender body fell to the pavement. A flash of red appeared on her pale green dress. She’d been shot. In the stomach, from the looks of it.
He saw Morgan sprinting in their direction. Heard a bullet whiz right above his head as he dropped to his knees and pressed his hands to Isabel’s abdomen. Her eyelids fluttered wildly, her delicate face unbelievably pale despite the bronzed makeup she used to disguise herself as Paloma.
“Trevor?” she said with a moan.
There was too much blood, staining her dress and his fingers. Something hot and painful twisted in his chest. Swallowing hard, he tucked his rifle under his arm and scooped her up. Blood poured out of her side, soaking his suit jacket.
“Trevor?” she said again, her voice faint.
“Don’t talk. Save your strength,” he said gruffly. And then he cradled her body against his chest and ran toward the waiting chopper.
Chapter 23
The sun sat high in a cloudless sky as Abby killed the motorcycle’s engine on the outskirts of the little village of Corturo. The village was bustling with life. A group of boys with happy tanned faces kicked a soccer ball around the dirt field near the main square. Women were chattering animatedly outside the simple wooden church, while a few feet away, half a dozen men gathered around a milk crate, shooting dice and shouting in excitement.
There was a joyful feel to it all, and the feeling grew stronger as she approached the one-story shack that belonged to Inez Alvaro and her daughter. A skinny man with a long face and a thick mustache emerged from the house with three small suitcases in his hands. He was tailed by Inez Alvaro, whose face lit up at the sight of Abby.
The next thing she knew, Inez’s plump arms were surrounding her in a bear hug, and the woman spoke a mile a minute in Spanish, thanking Abby profusely for everything she’d done.
“You are an angel sent from heaven,” Inez finished, her dark eyes shining.
Compliments had never sat well with her, so she shrugged awkwardly. “It was all Isabel. She’s the one who went in and—”
“Señorita Isabel told me you were the reason she was involved in the first place.” Tears filled the woman’s eyes. “I can never repay you for what you did.”
Abby shifted in discomfort. She gestured to the man who’d exited the house. He was now loading the suitcases into the back of a rusted old Volvo that looked like it had seen better days. “Are you going somewhere?”
Inez nodded. “I am taking my daughter to the city. We are going to live with my sister.” Her nose lifted in distaste as she looked around the lively village. “I do not feel safe here anymore.”
“Blanco is dead,” Abby pointed out quietly. “He can no longer hurt you.”
“It doesn’t matter. We don’t belong here anymore.”
Abby turned her head when the girl she’d so desperately wanted to save walked out of the house. Like her mother, Lucia lit up when she saw Abby, dashing over with surprising energy despite the fact she’d been locked up in a bunker for a week. Abby endured another hug, though this one brought a rush of emotion. She clung to Lucia’s fragile body, running her hands over the bumps of her spine.
“Are you all right?” she asked, searching Lucia’s eyes.
The girl nodded. “Yes. Thanks to you and your friends.”
“Good.” She gave the girl a final once-over, making sure she was indeed okay, then cleared her throat. “I should be going. I have a plane to catch.”
“Wait. I have something to give you.” Lucia darted off and disappeared into the house. Inez smiled at Abby, encouraging her to wait. When the girl returned a moment later, she held out a faded photograph. After a moment of hesitation, Abby accepted it. It was a photo of Lucia, wearing a red skirt and white shirt that Abby recognized as the uniform the village girls wore in the schoolhouse. Lucia’s long brown hair hung in a braid over her shoulder and her face exuded youth and innocence.
“This is so you don’t forget me,” Lucia said happily, suddenly sounding very much like the young girl she was.
“I don’t need the picture for that.” Abby swallowed. “But thanks just the same.”
Inez and her daughter insisted on hugging Abby again, and a few minutes later she was back on the bike and speeding away. She had one more stop to make before hopping on the plane Noelle had chartered for her, which would take her to Noelle’s home in Vermont.
The hospital, like the village, was bustling when Abby strode in. She dodged a couple of doctors and headed to the nurses’ station, where she was directed to Isabel’s room. Not the ICU, thank God. Apparently Isabel was
on her way to a speedy recovery.
She didn’t look recovered, though, when Abby entered the private room that Noelle must have paid someone off to secure. Isabel’s fair face was pale, almost gray, and she looked incredibly frail in her pink hospital gown. Her blue eyes, however, sparkled at the sight of Abby. Lifting a hand, from which an IV line dangled, she beckoned for her to come closer.
“Hey,” Abby greeted her friend. “How are you doing?”
“I’m okay.” Isabel shrugged. “The bullet went through and through, so at least I didn’t need surgery. Surgical scars are a bitch.”
A smile flitted across Abby’s mouth. “But puckered little bullet scars are okay?”
“They’re easier to cover with makeup.”
Laughing, Abby approached the bed. “I came here to thank you. You risked your life going in to save those girls and I—” Her voice trembled. “I’m so unbelievably grateful, Izzy.”
Isabel looked touched. “You don’t have to thank me. I did what I had to do. What you had to do. I’m so relieved the girls are safe.”
“I’m relieved you’re safe. I would have never forgiven myself if…”
“If I’d died?” Isabel said bluntly. Her eyes twinkled. “Not to worry. I’m alive and kicking. And I’ll be back to work in no time.”
“Don’t rush yourself.”
“I won’t,” Isabel promised.
“Liar.” She paused. “Are you sure you don’t want me to stay? I can hang around until you’re released.”
“No, I’ll be fine. Hospitals are so boring—I wouldn’t want to force anyone to be here if they didn’t have to.”
“I don’t mind…”
“Go,” Isabel said firmly. “The doctor says I can leave in a week or so, and there’s nothing you can do here anyway.” She grinned. “And I’m sure Kane is eager to get home.”
Abby averted her eyes. “Actually, I’m heading back to the States alone. Noelle sent a plane.”
There was a beat of silence.
“What about Kane?” Isabel demanded.
Abby’s insides coiled into tense, painful knots. Ignoring them, she gave a little shrug. “We’re going our separate ways.”
“Oh, Abs. What did you do?”
Irritation spread through her. “Why do you assume I did something?”
“Because I know you,” Isabel said with a sigh. “Jesus, Abby. Do you want to live the rest of your life closed off to people?”
Isabel’s question sent another tornado of pain and sorrow spinning through her body. She wanted to defend herself, to tell Isabel that she was wrong, but she couldn’t muster the words. Fortunately, she didn’t have to, because a tentative knock sounded from the door.
Trevor Callaghan stood in the doorway, clad in the same ratty clothes he’d worn the day he’d shown up at Morgan’s compound. Gone were the sleek Julian Martin business suits. And gone was that flicker of life she’d seen in his eyes only a day ago. His gaze had reverted back to empty. Broken.
Sort of like hers.
“Is this a bad time?” Trevor asked, looking from one woman to the other.
“No, it’s fine,” Abby said quickly. “I was just leaving.”
Disappointment flashed across Isabel’s ashen face. “Abby…” She seemed to have a hundred more things to say, but then her shoulders sagged and she simply said, “Don’t be a stranger, okay?”
“I won’t.” With a half smile, Abby reached down to touch Isabel’s arm, then left the room.
Ten minutes later, she was on her way to the airport. Alone.
Whatever he’d come here to say, it didn’t look good. He didn’t look good. Isabel bit back a sigh as Trevor came closer, then paused at the foot of her hospital bed. His T-shirt had a hole in the sleeve and his wrinkled jeans didn’t hug his legs the way those suit trousers had. Nothing about him seemed inviting. Not his shabby clothing, and especially not his dead eyes.
She remembered the way he’d looked at her right before they’d almost kissed, his face taut with arousal. Sure, there had been grief and uneasiness there too, but any emotion was better than none. It was all gone now.
“You look better,” he began awkwardly. “Color’s coming back to your face.”
“You can’t keep me down for long,” she quipped.
He wrung his hands together as if he couldn’t decide what to do with them. Finally he just let them dangle at his sides. “I’m flying out in an hour.” He halted abruptly.
“I guess you coming to see me in New York isn’t going to be in the cards, is it?”
For a second, she thought she glimpsed a burst of emotion in his eyes, but before she could begin to decode what she’d seen, he went impassive again. “That’s probably not a good idea. I’m heading back to Aspen.”
Right. Back to that condo he’d lived in with his dead fiancée.
She swallowed down her frustration, grounding herself in reality. She’d known from the moment they’d met that nothing could ever happen between them. He was broken beyond repair. She’d known that.
So why was disappointment pulsing through her veins?
The silence that descended was thick with tension. He was avoiding her eyes. Discomfort? Self-hatred for allowing himself to open up to her this past week? Both options proved to be false when he finally locked his gaze with hers.
Anger.
Isabel sucked in a breath, shocked by his expression. “Trevor,” she started.
“Damn you,” he interrupted, fury etched into every hard angle of his face. “Why the fuck did you come back for me?”
Isabel’s palms dampened. “Because you were in trouble. That guard had a knife to your—”
“I wanted him to do it!” he roared.
“You don’t mean that.”
A harsh laugh burst out of his mouth. “I didn’t need you to save me—I didn’t want you to save me. But no, you had to come back and fuck everything up.” He spoke with sharp, ragged breaths. “And you got shot. You got shot because of me, because for some fucked-up reason you thought I actually needed to be saved.”
She swallowed again. “It wasn’t your fault I got shot.”
“Wasn’t it?” His jaw twitched. “You were coming back for me.”
“I couldn’t just let you die,” she snapped. “God, you’re being a total asshole right now. No matter what you say, I know you don’t want to die.”
“You don’t know a fucking thing about me, Isabel.”
She flinched.
He edged away, his entire body vibrating with anger. She wanted to say something, anything, but her throat was too tight to get a single word out. She couldn’t believe how furious he looked. Why? Because she hadn’t let him die back there at the compound? Because she’d seen in him something worth saving?
Without looking at her, Trevor spoke in a raspy voice. “Send word to Morgan when you get back to the States, just so he knows you made it safely.”
Isabel’s gut ached, and it wasn’t due to the bullet that had gone through it. But what had she really been expecting? For Trevor to throw himself on the ground and kiss her feet for saving his ass? For him to be somehow healed from losing the love of his life?
Not the anger, though. She hadn’t thought he’d be angry about it.
She stared at his grungy clothing, the inflexible set of his shoulders, the deep frown creasing his mouth, and his anger rubbed off on her, settling in the pit of her stomach.
“I won’t apologize for coming back for you,” she said in an even tone. “You can be as pissed off about it as you like, but I won’t fucking apologize. I saved your life. Live with it.”
His body went even stiffer. “I have to go,” he said hoarsely, turning toward the door.
“Seriously? You’re just going to walk away, pretend that the past week didn’t happen, that I don’t exist?” Her casual tone was betrayed by the trembling of her hands.
He kept his back to her. “Take care of yourself, Isabel.”
There was a momen
t of hesitation, a brief sag of his shoulders. He lingered in the doorway. Didn’t utter a word. A second passed, two, three.
Then he was gone.
“Good-bye, Trevor,” she murmured to the empty doorway.
They’d been in the air for an hour before someone had the balls to come near Kane. He’d seen the other men exchanging worried glances since the moment they’d rendezvoused back at the safe house last night. Nobody commented on the fact that Kane had come in alone, though he’d heard Ethan murmuring to Morgan about Abby’s whereabouts. D, in particular, had been keeping his distance, yet it was he who came over and sat beside Kane now.
The tattoos on his bare forearms flexed as he crossed his arms over his chest and said, “I’m only apologizing because you’re obviously still pissed, but I wholly believe I did the right thing by helping Abby.”
Kane didn’t answer. The mere sound of her name sent agony streaking through his body. He hadn’t felt this ravaged since Emily’s suicide.
What the hell was wrong with him? How did he always manage to fall for emotional headaches?
“Look,” D said, mistaking the silence for anger, “she would’ve tried to do it on her own and gotten herself killed, man. At least with me involved, she had some guns and a fast bike.”
Kane sighed. “Would you shut up already? I’m not pissed about it.”
“You’re not?”
“No.” He ground his teeth together. “So quit apologizing and go away. I want to take a nap.”
D didn’t buy it. “No, you don’t. You want to sulk.” He paused. “So what happened?”
“Nothing.”
“Then where’s Abby?”
“Probably on a plane to her next job.”
“And you’re cool with that?”
“Fuck,” Kane burst out. “What the hell do you care? You didn’t like her from the get-go. She’s gone. Bust out a parade or something, and leave me the fuck alone.”
A hush fell over the cabin of the jet.
To Kane’s relief, D slowly got up and moved to the other side of the cabin. In the background, he heard the others quietly talking about the rescue. Apparently Blanco’s men had scattered after the death of their employer. Morgan said Blanco’s entire empire was in disarray, competitors creeping out of the shadows and fighting to take over.