by B. J Daniels
They didn’t talk about the future or about what they might do when they got out. Jaime would have some compulsory therapy to go through. A whole detox situation with the FBI, along with preparations for the future trial. Any further investigating that needed to be done would at least fall somewhat within his responsibility.
But he was done with undercover work. He’d known that before he’d met Gabby. These past two years had taken too much of a toll and he couldn’t be a good law-enforcement officer in this position anymore. He didn’t plan to leave the FBI, but undercover work was over.
Once he got Gabby out, he would make sure that “something different” included her. She would need therapy, as well, and time to heal. It would take time to find ways back to their old selves.
He could wait. He could do anything if it meant having a chance with her.
But their time here in this other world was running out. The Stallion would be expecting a full report from Rodriguez, and Jaime had put it off long enough.
He would do all the things he had to do to protect her. To free her.
“You have to go meet with him,” she said, her tone void of any emotion.
He turned to face her on the bed. It was too narrow and they barely fit together, and yet he was grateful for the lack of space, for the excuse to always be this close. “How’d you figure that out?”
“You got all tense,” she replied, rubbing at his shoulders as though this was something they could be. A couple. Who talked to each other, offered comfort to each other.
He couldn’t think of anything he’d ever wanted more, including his position with the FBI.
“He’s expecting a report from me.”
Gabby frowned and didn’t look at him when she asked her question. “Are you going to tell him I cried?”
He’d been planning on it. He knew it poked her pride, but it would be best if The Stallion thought her broken. It would be best if Jaime made himself look like a master torturer.
“Do you not want me to?”
“You would tell him you failed?”
He shrugged, trying to act as though it wasn’t a big deal, though it was. “If you want me to. I don’t think it would put me in any danger to make it look like I’d failed one thing considering everything else that’s currently going down.”
“You don’t think?”
“He’s not exactly the most predictable man in the world, no matter how scheduled and regimented he is.”
“That’s very true,” she mused, looking somewhere beyond him.
“Gabby.”
Her dark gaze met his, that warrior battle light in them. “Tell him I cried. Tell him I sobbed and begged. What does it matter? I didn’t actually.”
“If it matters something to you—”
“All that matters to me is you.” She blinked as if surprised by the force of her words. “And getting out of here,” she added somewhat after the fact.
He pressed a kiss to her mouth. Whatever tension he’d had was gone. Or perhaps not gone, but different somehow.
Screw The Stallion. Screw responsibility. She was all that mattered. He wanted to believe that as he fell into the kiss, wanted to hold on to that possibility, that new tenet of his life. Gabby and only Gabby.
But life was never quite that easy. Because Gabby, being the most important thing, the central thing for him, meant he had to keep her safe. It meant that responsibility did have a place here. It was his responsibility to get her out. His responsibility to get her free.
He started to pull away but she spoke before he could.
“Go have a meeting. Find out if there’s any news about Nattie, and make sure you remember every last detail. And then, when you can...” She smoothed her hand over his chest and offered him a smile that was weak at best, but she was trying. For him, he knew.
“When you’re done, when you can, come back to me,” she said softly.
He brought her hand to his mouth and pressed a kiss to her palm. “Always,” he said, holding her gaze. Hoping she understood and believed how much he meant that.
He slid out of bed, because the sooner he got this meeting with The Stallion over with, the sooner he could find a way to make sure that this was over. For Gabby and for him.
Jaime collected his weapons. He could feel Gabby’s eyes on him though he couldn’t read her expression. She had perfected the art of giving nothing away and as much as it sometimes frustrated him as a man, he was certainly glad she had built such effective protective layers for herself.
He put the knives back in his boots and then strapped on his cross-chest holster with all of his guns. He buckled it, still watching her expressionless face.
She slid off the bed and crossed to him. She flashed a smile Jaime didn’t think had much happiness behind it, but she brushed her lips against his.
“Good luck,” she said as though she were scared. For him.
“I have to lock the door,” he said, regretting the words as they came out of his mouth. Regretting the way her expression shuttered.
“Yeah, I know.” She gave a careless shrug.
Her knowing didn’t make him feel any better about doing it, but he had to. There were certain things he still had to do. Things that would keep her safe in the end, and that was all that could matter.
He kissed her once more, knowing he was only delaying the inevitable. He steeled all that certainty and finally managed to back himself out of the room. Away from her smile, away from her sweet mouth.
Away from his heart and soul.
He closed the door and locked it from the outside. He regretted having to add the chain, but any regrets were a small price to pay to get her out. He would keep telling himself that over and over again until he believed it. This was all a small price to pay for getting her out.
He walked briskly down the hall, noting the house was eerily quiet. It wasn’t unusual, but often in the afternoon there was a little bit of chatter from the common rooms as the girls worked on their projects or fixed dinner.
Jaime cursed and retraced his steps to check on them. The two calm ones from yesterday were sitting on the couch working on something The Stallion had undoubtedly given them to do. Alyssa was pacing the kitchen.
None of them looked at him, so he could only assume he’d been quiet enough. Satisfied that things seemed to be mostly normal, he backed out of the room. Alyssa’s frenzied pacing bothered him a bit. Gabby was right, the girl was a loose cannon, and it was the last thing they needed. But what could he do about it?
There wasn’t anything. Not now.
He walked back along the hallway, going through the hassle of unlocking and unchaining the door, stepping out, then redoing all the work. His thoughts were jumbled and he had to sort them out before he actually saw The Stallion.
He paused in the backyard, taking a deep breath, trying to focus his thoughts. He forced himself to hone in on all the strategies he’d been taught in his years as a police officer and FBI agent.
He had to put on the cloak of Rodriguez, get the information he was after, lie to The Stallion about Gabby, then go back to her. Once this was over, he could go back to her.
With a nod to himself, he stepped forward, but it was then he heard the noise. Something strange and faint. Almost a moan. He paused and studied the yard around him.
The next sound wasn’t so much a moaning but almost like someone rasping “Rodriguez” and failing.
Jaime started moving toward the noise, listening hard as he walked around the backyard. He held his small handgun in one hand, leaving his other hand free should he need to fight off any attacker.
He rounded the front of the house, still listening to the sound and following the source. When he did, he nearly gasped.
Wallace and Layne were sprawled out in the yard. Layne was a little closer to the house than Wallace, but the
y were both caked with blood and dirt.
“Rodriguez. Rodriguez.” Layne moved his arm wildly and stumbled to his feet. “I’ve been dragging this piece of shit for who knows how long. Go get The Stallion. And water. By God, I need water.”
“Where is your vehicle?” Jaime asked, his tone dispassionate and unhurried.
“Only go so far...” Layne gasped for air, stumbling to the ground again. “Asshole shot our tires. Got as far as I could.”
Jaime looked at both men in various states of bloodied harm. “You don’t have her.”
Layne’s dirty, bloody face curled into a scowl, but he gave brief shake of the head.
“I don’t know if you want me to get The Stallion if you don’t have her.”
“He shot us,” Layne said disgustedly. “That prick shot us. Wallace might die. We need The Stallion. We need help.”
“You may wish you had died,” Jaime said, affecting as much detached disinterest as he could.
On the inside he was reeling. Gabby’s sister had escaped these men with Ranger Cooper, which meant that it was time. It was time to move forward. It was time to get the hell out. Her sister was safe and now it was her turn.
“Go get The Stallion,” Layne yelled, lunging at him. He had a bloody wound on his shoulder and he was pale. Still, he seemed to be in slightly better shape than Wallace who was lying on the ground moaning, a bullet wound apparently in his thigh.
After a long study that had Layne growling at him as he tried to walk farther, Jaime inclined his head and then began striding purposefully back to The Stallion’s shed. He knocked and only entered once The Stallion unlocked the door and bid him entrance.
“What took you so long?” The Stallion demanded and Jaime was more than a little happy that he had a decent enough excuse to explain his long absence in a way that didn’t have anything to do with Gabby.
“Senor, Wallace and Layne are in the yard. Injured.”
The Stallion had just sat in his desk chair, but immediately leaped to his feet. “They don’t have her?” he bellowed.
“No.”
“Imbeciles. Useless, worthless trash. Kill them. Kill them both immediately,” he ordered with the flick of a wrist.
Jaime had to curb his initial reaction, which was to refuse. He might find Wallace and Layne disgusting excuses for human beings, he might even believe they deserved to die, but he was not comfortable with it being at his hand.
“Senor, if this is your wish, I will absolutely mete out your justice. But perhaps...”
“Perhaps what?” he snapped.
“You will want to go after the girl yourself, sí?”
The Stallion frowned as he walked over and stood by his dolls, grabbing one hand as though he was holding the hand of a little girl.
Jaime had to ignore that and press his advantage. “Clearly the Ranger is smarter than your men. But certainly not smarter than you. If you go after him, you can do whatever you want with both of them. Surely you, of all people, could outsmart them.”
The Stallion had begun to nod the more Jaime complimented him. “You’re right. You’re right.”
He dropped the doll’s hand and Jaime nearly sagged with relief.
“You’ll have to go with me, Rodriguez.”
Jaime stilled. That was not part of his plan. “Tell Layne and Wallace they’re in charge of the girls. We’ll leave immediately.”
“Their injuries are severe. Shot. Both of them. Surely incapable of watching after anything. You must have other men you can take with you, and I’ll stay—”
“No.” The Stallion shook his head. “No, you’re coming with me. Wallace and Layne, no matter how injured, can keep a door locked. I’ll send for another man, and he can kill them and take over here. Yes, yes, that’s the plan. I need you. I need you, Rodriguez.” The Stallion took one of the dolls off the shelf. He petted the doll’s dark hair as though it were a puppy. “If you prove your worth to me on this, there is nothing that I wouldn’t give you, Rodriguez.” He held out the doll between them.
Jaime was afraid he looked as horrified as he felt, but he kept his hands grasped lightly behind his back. He forced himself to smile languidly at the unseeing doll. “Then I am at your service, senor.”
“Go tell them the plan,” The Stallion said, gesturing with the doll, thank God not making him take it. “Not the killing part, of course, just the watching-after-the-girls part. Pack all your weapons and all your ammunition. Pack up all the water in my supplies and put it in the Jeep. We’ll leave as soon as you’ve gotten everything together. Do you understand?”
Jaime nodded, trying to steady the panic rising inside him. “Sí, senor.”
It wasn’t such a terrible thing. He’d be there to stop The Stallion from getting any kind of hold on Gabby’s sister and Ranger Cooper. But it left Gabby here. Exposed.
And he only had limited time to figure out how to fix that.
Chapter 13
Gabby tried to ignore how locked in she felt. She’d been a victim for eight years. A prisoner of this place. Being locked in her room and unable to leave was certainly no greater trial to bear.
But she hadn’t been locked in her room for any stretch of time since the very beginning. Mostly she’d been able to go to the common room or the kitchen whenever she wanted.
She’d gotten used to that freedom, and it was clawing at her to have lost some of it. That made it a very effective punishment all in all.
She wondered what the girls were doing. Had Alyssa calmed down? Was she ranting? Was she bringing reality to her threat to kill everyone in an effort to get out of there?
Gabby buried her face in her pillow and tried to block it all out, but when she inhaled she could smell Jaime and something in her chest turned over.
Oh, Jaime. That was part of why this locked-up thing was harder to bear, too. She’d felt almost real for nearly twenty-four hours. She and Jaime had spent the night, and most of today, having sex and talking and enjoying each other’s company. As though they lived in an outside world where they were themselves and not undercover agent and kidnapping victim.
It made it so much harder to be fully forced into what she really was. Victim. Captive. Not any closer to having any power than she’d been twenty-four hours ago.
Except she’d stolen a moment of it, and wasn’t that something worth celebrating?
She heard someone unlocking her door from the outside and sat bolt upright in bed. Jaime hadn’t been gone very long. If he was back already, it had to be bad news.
If it wasn’t Jaime on the other side, so much the worse.
But it was the man she’d taken as a lover who stepped into her room, shutting the door behind him with more force than necessary. His face reminded her of that first day. Rodriguez. The mask, not the man.
“Do you have anything in here you’d want to take with you?” he demanded.
“What?” She couldn’t follow him as he walked the perimeter of her room as if searching for something valuable.
“I don’t have time to explain. I don’t have time to do anything but get you out now.”
“What happened?” she asked, jumping off the bed.
His hand curled around her forearm, tight and without any of its usual kindness. “Is there anything you need to take?” he repeated, glaring at her.
“What’s happened?” she pleaded with him. Her heart beat a heavy cadence against her chest and she couldn’t think past the panic gripping her. “Is it Nattie? Is—”
He began pulling her to the door. “Your sister and the Ranger escaped.”
“Escaped? Escaped!” Hope burst in her chest, bright and wonderful. “So we’re...we’re just running?”
He looked up and down the hallway. “You are. I’ll get the other girls after.”
That stopped Gabby in her tracks, no matter how he pulled
on her arm. “What?” she demanded.
“Layne and Wallace are hurt. I can get one of you out now without raising any questions because you’re supposed to be locked up, but I can’t get you all out. Not right this second. I have to go with The Stallion to track down your sister. Which is good,” he said before she could argue with him or ask him what the hell he was talking about. “Because I will obviously make sure that doesn’t happen. I have—” he glanced at his watch “—maybe five seconds to contact my superiors to let them know to raid this place, and then to try to find one just like it in the south.” He shoved her into the hallway, but she fought him.
“You can’t take me and not them.”
His gaze locked on hers. “Of course I can. And that’s what we’re doing.”
“No. You can’t. They’ll fall apart without me.”
“They won’t. And they’ll be saved in a day or two. Three tops.”
“You really expect me to leave Tabitha and Jasmine here with Alyssa? Alyssa will instigate something. You know she will. They’ll all be dead before...” She didn’t want to say it out loud, no matter how much he wasn’t being careful himself.
He grabbed her by the shoulders and gave her a little shake, his eyes fierce and stubborn. “But you won’t be.”
It was her turn to look up and down the hallway. She didn’t know where the girls were, where Wallace and Layne or The Stallion were milling about. Jaime was losing his mind and it was her... Well, it was her responsibility to make him find it.
“You have to get it together,” she snapped in a low, quiet voice. “You have to be sensible about this, and you have to calm down.”
He thrust his fingers into his hair, looking more than a little wild. “Gabby, I do not have time. You have to do what I say, and you have to do it now.”
“Take Alyssa,” she said, though it pained her to offer that. A stabbing pain of fear, but it was the only option.
“Wh-what?” he spluttered.