How many times had I wished to be back in his arms? How many tears had I cried thinking he was forever gone? Too many. He’d haunted me. Drove me to the brink of insanity. And just when I’d learned how to live without him and stand on my own, there he was again.
It broke me in ways I couldn’t have fathomed. Cracked me in half to the point that I’d felt like half of me had died while the other half just existed. I’d searched high and low looking for him, wanting to hurt him the way he’d hurt me. Wanting to snuff him from my life, once and for all.
He snorted. “Sulk all you like. It makes no difference to me either way.”
“Go to hell,” I snapped.
“Been there. Done that,” he replied evenly as he carried me along the shoreline.
I knew I couldn’t fight my way free of him. That didn’t mean I wasn’t going to make it easy for him, though. I gathered every bit of strength I had and made a feeble attempt at throwing him off balance as I said, “You should have stayed there.”
He grunted, corrected his footing, and then heaved me over the side of a small jet boat. I landed with a bounce onto a bench seat as he pulled himself over the side to join me.
I looked over the side, willing my body to move. To dive in and get lost in the water as he asked, “Do you know why I made you swim to shore?”
Trent didn’t do anything without a reason, but at that moment, I didn’t really care to hear what it was.
That didn’t stop him from saying it though.
“I made you swim because I knew it would tire you out. I knew once you got to shore, you wouldn’t have any fight left in you.”
“I have plenty of fight left in me,” I said, trying to stand.
It took several attempts, but I finally forced my arms and legs to work together even if they felt like overcooked noodles. I swayed like a drunk as panic clawed at me knowing that once he got behind the wheel of the boat I’d probably never be found again. If that happened, I’d become his companion ghost stuck to wander the shadows of the underground world.
There was a reason Trent had been one of Cole Enterprise’s elite. He could walk amongst the shadows and never once disturb them. A chill rolled through me. Had I been blinded by some twisted romantic sense of danger, unable to see what was in front of me all along? He’d never been tender, never showed me a softer side. Not like Josh had. I learned early on that Trent didn’t do hysterics. He didn’t do tears. And he damn sure didn’t go out of his way to put anyone but himself first. I had been okay with it. I’d learned to love the hardened man he was, because that was the only way I could have him. Looking back, I realized how selfish he’d been. Even in his supposed love for me.
The realization sickened me that it took so long for me to fully grasp how twisted our relationship had been. And whatever it was, it wasn’t love. It couldn’t have been. Love was laughing together and wanting to see the other person smile because they were happy. It was simple touches of encouragement. A shoulder to lean on when you didn’t have your own strength to hold yourself upright. It was everything Josh had shown me for the very first time. I couldn’t let Trent take me. If he did, I’d never see Josh again. I refused to believe he was dead. I’d already lost one husband to that hellish nightmare.
“Sit down before you hurt yourself,” he snapped, sliding behind the wheel. “And if you even think about tossing yourself overboard, I’ll haul you back into this boat by your hair, so don’t even try it. I have you now and the less you fight me, the better off you’ll be.”
My body burned with rage as I looked at him. “You gonna shoot me if I don’t do as you say?” I jutted my chin out. “Go ahead and get it over with, because I’m not playing your game, whatever it may be,” I said, lunging at him.
He came up, hand slicing out and catching me upside the head. I staggered back, lost my footing, and then landed in a heap. My head smacked against something very hard and unmoving. I curled onto my side, clutching it to keep it from splitting wide open. The pain was so intense that I couldn’t even scream.
“I told you not to do anything stupid,” Trent said, looming over me.
Black splotches wove in and out of my vision.
“Isabella.” Trent barked my name at me, shaking me.
I threw up.
He left me there.
Before my eyes could close, the boat was bouncing along the waves, carrying me further away from being able to do anything to help Josh. I couldn’t even help myself.
CHAPTER 25
JOSH
The bullet had caught the outside of my arm, and that was only because of the way Ella had been pulled away from me. Had I not had a hold of her, I would have taken it right to the heart.
Before I could get to my feet, they were both over the side. Jumping overboard after them was an option, but only if I wanted to call the sharks to us like some sort of plasma dinner bell. My only option was to get to the captain and have him turn the yacht around while I made a mad dash for our room to get the gun. With any luck, I’d be able to get a shot off at Trent and get Ella out of the water before all hell broke loose.
It hadn’t worked out like that at all.
By the time I made it to the wheelhouse, the first mate took one look at me and about shit himself. I shouted for him to get the captain because nobody would listen to me when I’d said that Ella had gone overboard. They were all too busy freaking out about the blood dripping on the floor in a puddle by my feet.
No one was doing anything to help. I shoved the first mate out of my way and lunged for the phone, punching in Oliver’s number, blinking back the colorful dots that swam in my vision. Fighting to stay on my feet, a sob slipped from me when Oliver answered.
“What happened?” he asked, knowing without me saying that something was wrong.
“Trent has Ella.”
“How?”
“He boarded the boat, shot me, and then went over the side with her.”
“Coordinates,” Oliver demanded.
“As soon as they went overboard, the boat started moving. Our coordinates are different than when we were anchored.”
“They should be logged. Get them and call me back,” Oliver said, hanging up the phone.
I pulled the phone from my ear, blinking stupidly at it as the captain came skidding to a stop beside me. “What the hell is going on here? Bodies overboard? Then I find out someone is bleeding all over my wheelhouse?” His eyes bulged seeing the blood dripping down my elbow, and then he dragged his hand over his face. “Where the hell is the doctor?” He turned, bellowing the question at the crew.
“Sir, I need the coordinates from when we were anchored,” I said, feeling more than a little lightheaded.
“You need to sit down. I’ll contact the Coast Guard and circle back,” the captain said, turning to his crew and barking out orders.
“I need the coordinates,” I repeated through clenched teeth.
“I don’t have time for this. Go sit down,” the captain said, nodding at someone behind him.
I latched onto the sleeve of his shirt, forcing his attention on me. “You’re not dismissing me. I want those coordinates, or it’ll be your ass if I can’t find my operative,” I shouted back at him.
He yanked away from me. “You’re raving. Get him out of here!”
I was jerked back and hauled out of the wheelhouse by one of the crew. The door slammed behind me and locked.
I went into a blind rage, alternately kicking the door and then slamming my good shoulder into it, shoving the pain to the darkest recesses of my mind. Nothing mattered if I couldn’t save Ella.
“Josh?” Alex said, grabbing my arm and spinning me to face him.
White-hot pain surged through me. “Let go!”
Alex looked down and jerked his hand back. “What happened? Did you see who took Allyson and Summer?”
“Who took Allyson and Summer?” The nightmare went two-fold. Had Trent taken all three of them? And how could he when he was busy abductin
g Ella and shooting me? Had he been hired by whoever had sent the threats to Garett Baron?
“That’s what I just asked you! Move, I want to see the captain,” he said. Pushing by me, he grabbed the door handle and tried to open it.
“It’s locked,” I said, feeling the world slipping and sliding around me.
Alex growled and then slammed the side of his fist over and over again, but no one came to let him in.
I went to my knees, praying as I swayed side to side that I wouldn’t pass out. I couldn’t pass out. I had to call Oliver back and tell him the captain refused to give me the coordinates. That Allyson and Summer had been taken off the boat as well.
“Alex!”
He wasn’t listening. Couldn’t hear me past his own rage.
Go figure, the guy with the bullet hole in his arm had to be the one who kept his composure. “Alex.” I called his name again, reaching out to grab his arm. “I need you to help me get to my room.”
He snatched his arm away, eyes distant with panic. “I’m not going anywhere unless it’s inside that wheelhouse.” He gave the door two good kicks, but it did no good. The door, hell, the ship was solidly made. The wheelhouse had to have been constructed to keep the captain and crew safe in case there was an issue onboard.
Alex had worked himself up into a fine state of rage.
“The captain isn’t going to help us,” I shouted over the string of profanities Alex spewed at the steel door. “He isn’t going to help us!” I yelled again, but it was no use.
“I’ll have his license for this! Do you hear me? You’ll never captain a ship again if you don’t let me in,” Alex bellowed.
I forced myself to my feet, holding my arm to my side as I clenched my teeth. “Alex, listen to me,” I commanded with enough grit in my tone to get his attention. “I can help you, but you have to help me get to my room.”
His eyes turned into slits. “And what the hell are you going to do?”
I took a step forward, knowing what I was about to do was risky… maybe even wrong, but time was escaping me and I had run out of options.
“Well, for starters, I’m going to call in backup, and then I’m going on a manhunt,” I answered slowly, carefully keeping eye contact.
I watched as he tossed what I said around in his head, the pieces slowly clicking into place as his chest heaved in and out. As everything he thought he knew moved further and further away from him.
His eyebrows nearly touched when his gaze met mine again. “Wait a minute… Backup? Who the hell are you, Josh?”
I had his attention then.
“I’ll explain everything when you get me back to my room. We’re wasting time standing here. Every minute counts right now,” I answered, not waiting for him to follow as I turned and bee-lined for my room.
A few minutes later, with the door shut firmly behind me and Alex right on my heels, I gestured to the phone and said, “You need to call Garett and let him know what’s happened. And I need to make a call as well.” I grabbed the cell phone and called Oliver.
“Did you get them?” he asked, picking up halfway through the first ring.
“No,” I said, my chest tight. “The captain booted me out of the wheelhouse. Listen… we have another problem. Allyson and her sister Summer were taken from the boat as well.”
I glanced over to Alex who was stalking back and forth, holding the phone to his ear as Oliver hissed. “Was there anyone else with Trent?”
“No. It was just him.”
“Any witnesses?”
“Yes. Allyson’s husband but I don’t think he knows who it was.”
“It couldn’t have been Trent,” Oliver said.
“What makes you think that?” I asked, tucking the phone between my ear and shoulder so I could wrap my arm in a towel to keep the blood from dripping all over the floor.
“He shot you to take Ella off the ship. Don’t you think that if he was willing to kill you that he would have done the same thing to Allyson’s husband?”
“Maybe he had more reason to shoot me? If it wasn’t him… who the hell could it have been? Oh, and I’m fine, by the way,” I huffed, wincing when I put pressure against the wound to staunch the bleeding.
“I know you are, otherwise you wouldn’t have called me,” he snorted and then continued, “I have tech going through the last twenty-four hours of surveillance footage. That’s our only lead other than Allyson’s husband. Let’s get him on the phone so we can get as much information as possible.”
Alex was still on the phone, arguing with the person on the other end. “I don’t care if he’s in a meeting. Put me through to him immediately. This is his son-in-law, and if you don’t put me through, you won’t have a job when he finds out.”
He pulled the phone back, blinked at it, and then turned the air blue.
I put the phone on speaker and called Alex’s name. “We’ll get a hold of him, but right now, I have someone on the line who needs to ask you some questions.”
CHAPTER 26
ELLA
I wasn’t sure what I’d expected, but a tropical paradise wasn’t at all where I thought Trent would stash me.
He’d taken me from the boat bound hand and foot depositing me inside a sea plane as I wavered in and out of consciousness. Once secured in my seat, the pilot was executed and tossed out the door, a plea lodged somewhere deep in my throat and stuck there as the last image I had of Josh surfaced.
Trent wasn’t leaving any witnesses behind.
Struggling to stay conscious, I leaned forward, sending a searing pain through my skull. Bile raced up my throat, but I swallowed hard, forcing it back down and did my best to steady my breathing. I had to remain calm and alert. If I could do that, then the panic I felt looming in the back of my thoughts wouldn’t be able to slip through and get its hooks into me.
Looking out my window, I watched as the plane lifted into the air, nose pointed in the direction of the clouds. The sun was somewhere behind us. If I gauged it right, we were headed southwest.
Think, Ella… what’s southwest of where we’d been anchored just off the shore of Parrot Cay. Central America? South America? Was he heading for an island? Into the jungle? And why? Why take me unless it was to get back at Cole? What had happened? He’d lived… remembered, so why hadn’t he come back to us?
None of the answers came to me as we flew further and further away from any hope of being found.
It was midafternoon of the following day by the time Trent brought the plane down with a shuddering bounce and I couldn’t help but wonder where the wheels stayed hidden when the plane was used for water take offs and landings.
The sun had worked its way across the sky, and become a golden dot on the horizon. The small strip we’d landed on looked more like a dirt road than a runway, which meant it probably was. Once Trent had the plane stashed under a thick canvas of greenery, he unloaded me like the cargo I was and carried me to a shack where he then deposited me inside the cab of a small truck.
It was hot and stunk like old sweat and garbage. My eyes watered furiously; even with the windows down there was no reprieve from the smell, or the heat. We traveled dirt paths that looked more like hiking trails and never saw a single person for the entire ride. When the trail ended it dumped us out behind a sprawling bungalow. Once ushered inside, he untied me and left me standing in the middle of the sparsely furnished living room area.
There was no point in trying to run. I wouldn’t even make it out of the house before he caught me. So, instead, I walked over to the window, pretending to look at the view, but was really checking the glass. I knew Trent, or at least I thought I had. I never would have thought he’d be capable of being who he turned out to be. But there were other things that would remain the same. His training wouldn’t have gone away. He’d be on full alert. He’d have high-tech security and surveillance. He’d have bulletproof glass and God only knows what kind of explosives around the property.
I was, for the most part
, screwed.
My eyes pinched shut and I leaned my head against the glass, willing myself to stay calm. To think clearly. It was the only way to outsmart Trent.
“Your room is down the hall on the left,” he said from behind me, startling me.
I set my shoulders and turned around. “My room…” I repeated with a shake of my head and then asked, “Where are we?”
He ignored my question. “The kitchen is stocked. There’s a washer and dryer along with anything else you need,” he said, pointing down a dimly lit hallway.
I looked at him. Really looked at him for the first time since he hauled me overboard. He was the same, yet different. A new scar rode over his eyebrow. It wasn’t there the last time I saw him. His eyes were harder, more lifeless, if that were even possible. And he held himself as if expecting an attack at any moment. Which was probably because I was wound tight enough to spring at him. I wouldn’t win a fight against him. I knew that. Had always known that. We’d sparred on many occasions, and I’d always ended up on the ground. My head throbbed, reminding me I wasn’t running at one hundred percent and to even think about taking him on made my stomach roll.
I crossed my arms and leaned my shoulder against the window. Physically attacking him wouldn’t get me anywhere. Words would be my weapon. He’d never liked arguing with me, because I could, and usually did, get my point across. Once he realized I wasn’t going to shut up, he’d actually listen. He didn’t look like he’d listen anymore, but I still had to try.
“Why?” I demanded.
His gaze skimmed over me from head to toe. “Go rest—you look like hell.”
“Why?” I asked again.
He blinked and his eyes changed. It was like watching a wall come up the way they dulled. He turned away and left me standing alone in the living room.
A hiss of air whistled through my teeth. I wasn’t dealing with the man I’d known. What had I expected? His time away from Cole Enterprise was a complete mystery. His reasons locked away to a part of him I couldn’t get to unless I started playing by his rules.
All We Are (The Six Series Book 5) Page 14