Colt nodded. “I had to kill him, Jonas, he tried to kill me.” He shrugged, cringing in pain at the action.
Barkley patted Colt’s good shoulder. “I know. You did what you had to do, Raines. Don’t let it bother you. He asked for it.” He glanced at Smitty. “You’ll keep an eye on her until Colt’s better.”
“I’m fine. I can watch her,” Colt told him trying to sit up.
Barkley waved him back down. “You need to heal. I’m going to need you when I meet with Lofton. I’m calling him tomorrow. I want you to go with me.”
Colt nodded and scowled. Isabella watched him, but he wouldn’t meet her eyes. Smitty and Dayton lifted Blackman’s body and carried it out. Suddenly her stomach roiled. All this murder going on around her was making her physically sick. She ran to the bathroom, slamming the door behind her.
* * * *
Barkley cocked an eyebrow at Mont and chuckled. “Some people just can’t take it, I guess.”
Mont gave a nod, looking to the door, and then back to Barkley. “He’d almost done it. If I hadn’t gotten here when I did, he would’ve raped and killed her.”
“I don’t like that rape shit. No man should rape a woman, but killing her would’ve helped with some of our problems.” Barkley strode from the room, not seeing the angry, murderous scowl Mont threw his way.
Mont couldn’t believe she’d stayed when she had the perfect opportunity to run and get away. Isabella would have had a good head start on them. No one was due to come back to the house until tomorrow. She would have been long gone and by the time he woke up, it would be too late to try to find her. He knew without a doubt Barkley would have killed him. Barkley trusted Mont but with Blackman dead and her gone, there was no one to tell what had actually happened. The number of people Barkley trusted would fit on one hand and Mont was one of them, but he wasn’t sure Barkley would have believed him about Blackman if Isabella hadn’t stuck around. Knowing the man’s mistrust of most people, it wasn’t too much of a stretch for him to believe Mont killed Blackman to allow her to escape.
Mont watched Isabella reenter the bedroom and take a seat in the chair by the door of the bathroom.
“Are you all right?” he asked.
Isabella nodded. “I thought I was going to be sick, but I’m fine.” Her eyes narrowed with questioning concern. “How are you feeling?”
“Drowsy. I don’t know what Smitty gave me but it’s starting to kick my ass,” he said, hearing the slur in his voice.
“Did Barkley leave?”
“Not yet. He’ll be here until Smitty gets back, so don’t think of trying anything. He will kill you, Bella.”
“I know,” she replied with a frown, pulling her eyebrows together.
Mont reached his hand out toward her. “Come here and lie down beside me.” He saw her glance toward the door. “Don’t worry. Barkley won’t come in. As soon as Smitty gets back, he’ll head out.”
Isabella stood. She moved hesitantly toward the bed, stopping at the edge, and then climbed on, curling in against him. He heard her exhale a deep breath as he wrapped his arm around her before giving into the drug Smitty gave him.
* * * *
Three days later, Mont was in better shape and able to move around with more ease. He hated that he had to leave Isabella, but he trusted Smitty to keep her safe. He sat at the kitchen table waiting for Barkley to send for him. Once the governor got away, he knew Barkley would call for him and together they’d go meet with Barton Lofton. Smitty sat at the table with him.
“I won’t let anything happen to her,” Smitty told Mont, giving him confidence.
“I know. It bothers me about why all of a sudden Barkley wants me with him during a job. That wasn’t part of the deal when we decided to work together.” Mont shook his head, getting a bad feeling about how things were starting to go down. “I told him I would do my part from the inside. But suddenly, he wants me to go with him. I don’t like it.”
“You don’t have a choice about it. We all do what Barkley wants. You know I’d rather go, but he wants you there,” Smitty said with a shrug.
“I’m not a killer, Smitty—unless I have no other choice.” His eyes met Smitty’s brown ones and knew he was thinking of Blackman too.
Smitty reached out and squeezed Mont’s arm. “I know that but as I said, we do what he wants. No questions asked.”
Mont suddenly pushed away from the table and got to his feet.
“Well, I’m going to ask him. This changes our deal. I don’t like it,” he repeated. Just then, his cell phone rang. He knew who it was and answered it. After listening for a few minutes, he hung up. “This is it,” he told Smitty, who pressed back in his chair in a tense gesture.
Mont walked to the bedroom where Isabella was, unlocking the door and slipping into the room. She was sitting on the bed, only glancing at him as he stood there. God, she was so beautiful he had trouble breathing around her and he truly wished he could get her out of here.
“I’m leaving, princess. I just wanted to let you know Smitty’s going to be here. He won’t lay a hand on you, I promise. I trust him. You can too.”
Isabella snorted. “I can’t trust any of you,” she exclaimed turning away from him.
He watched her for a few seconds, and then sighed. He closed the door behind him, locked it, and returned to the kitchen.
“I’ll call you later. Seriously, keep an eye on her. She’s not going to hesitate to run again.”
“Again?” Smitty raised an eyebrow.
Mont’s mouth twitched. “I didn’t say that.”
Smitty grinned at him. “Threw the lamp at the window, huh?”
Mont burst out laughing. Smitty laughed with him then pushed out of his chair, moving close to Mont where he slapped him on the back. “Be careful.”
Mont nodded and left by the back door. He climbed on his motorcycle and started it up. With a last glance at the house, he drove away down the road.
* * * *
Isabella heard a motorcycle start up and knew it must be Colt. It sounded like the same one she’d heard the day Blackman almost raped her. She’d started feeling better since then, but Colt was keeping his distance, only checking in on her regularly. He brought her food or asked if she needed anything, but hadn’t touched her. Her lip had healed and the bruises on her cheeks were fading, but it still hurt to touch them. She wanted to feel his arms around her again. Experience his kiss and his lovemaking. She choked back a sob.
Her predicament was killing her. She needed to escape and get free of Barkley, but leaving Colt was tearing her heart out. She also knew that his leaving today meant he was meeting with Barkley to go after her father. She felt so helpless. Placing her hands over her face, she began to cry. They were going to kill her father and she couldn’t do anything to stop it. She fell back on the bed and sobbed so hard her chest hurt.
Please, God. Don’t let anything happen to my father.
“Please,” she whispered her prayer. She was so tired. Her ordeal was going on two weeks, and honestly, other than the incident with Blackman, no one had mistreated her. Even Barkley was civil to her. Colt and Smitty talked nicely to her, but Dayton didn’t speak at all. She knew tonight had to be the night to go. She wasn’t sure how yet, but it had to be tonight.
* * * *
Mont drove the bike up to the entrance to the warehouse and shut it off. He swung his leg over, removed his helmet, squared his shoulders, and walked inside. Once his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he saw Barkley sitting at a large table with five other men seated there with him. He waved for Mont to join them. Mont walked toward the table, keeping his eyes on the other men. He stopped near the table and raised an eyebrow at Barkley.
“These are the men I wanted you to meet, Raines. These are the guys I told you about when we were inside. My outside men,” Barkley told him.
Mont barely hid his surprise. Finally, he was meeting the men who pulled off Barkley’s orders from prison. Barkley had told him about th
em. They did all the work while he sat in a cell.
Barkley smiled at him.
“I told you I’d get them all together and you’d meet them.”
Mont glared at him, folding his arms across this chest. “Took you long enough, though.”
Barkley looked surprised, but then burst out laughing. The other men started laughing too. Barkley looked around the table.
“I told you he was a smart-ass.”
Mont smiled even as he wanted to punch Barkley’s face. He pulled out a chair, taking a seat at the table. This was what he’d been waiting on from the beginning. To be a part of this, he was on the inside. He looked at the five men at the table. He knew some of their faces, but he waited for introductions. He glanced over to Barkley.
“Colt, let me introduce John Pollard, Stewart Rodgers, Jack Lewis, Henry Gentry and last but not least, Dylan Long. Men, this is Colt Raines. I’ve been telling you about him since the day I met him in prison. He was in the cell next to mine and I knew the day they threw him in there, we were going to get along great.” Barkley laughed. “He punched one of the guards in the face and broke his nose.” Barkley slapped Mont on the back. “That man went down like a ton of bricks. The other guards had to beat the shit outta Colt before they were able to control him.”
The men at the table all looked at Mont. All but one smiled. Stewart Rodgers didn’t find any of it amusing. One side of Mont’s mouth lifted. He wanted Rodgers to know he didn’t give a shit whether he liked him or not. Rodgers glared at him, but Mont didn’t care whether Rodgers accepted him or not. He wasn’t here to make lifelong friends. All he cared about was getting in with these men.
“So just what have you men been up to? What have you been taking care of for Jonas while he’s been away?”
Barkley let out a bark of laughter. “This is why he’s my new right-hand man. He takes care of me.” He looked over at Henry Gentry. “Tell him.”
Gentry hesitated but after a go-ahead look from Barkley, he began talking.
“We’ve done two kidnappings, starting with the mayor’s son. He’s seven and was an easy pick- up. We know the mayor comes from money and his son means the world to him so he’ll pay whatever we want. The other one was Gavin Brown. His wife is the one with the money. We’ve contacted her and she’ll pay anything to have her hubby back.” He shrugged. “Two easy pickings and a helluva lot of money.”
Gentry stared at Mont and when he didn’t interject, Gentry continued.
“We’ve been working on these cases for a few months. We didn’t just want to go into it without doing our homework.” Gentry continued to watch Mont as if waiting for him to say something about how long they took planning the kidnappings. When Mont didn’t say anything, Gentry cleared his throat. “We figure kidnapping is easier than robbing banks. No chance of one of those God damn money bags exploding.” He grinned but Mont didn’t crack a smile but just stared back at him. Barkley laughed.
“See, Colt. These men have been taking care of business for me. They’ve killed a few people, too. I told them to do whatever they had to do. The kid’s bodyguard got in the way and Brown’s gardener tried to stop them from taking him.” He shrugged shaking his head. “The God damned gardener, for Christ’s sake.”
“Where are they?” Mont asked in as calm a voice as he could muster.
Gentry started and glanced at Barkley. “Why does he need to know where they are?”
Barkley stood, leaning his hands heavy on the table, and glared at Gentry. “‘Cause I said so, that’s why. He’s to know everything I know. You got that?” He looked at each man around the table. “All of you understand that?”
All the men nodded. Gentry cleared his throat, and smirked at Mont.
“Closer than you think.”
Mont raised an eyebrow at him and waited. Gentry rolled his eyes. He probably thought Mont had no sense of humor, whatsoever.
“They’re in the back room.” He nodded toward a closed door over his shoulder.
Mont looked to Barkley. “So this meeting had nothing to do with Lofton?”
Barkley bared his teeth in a growl. “That son of a bitch hasn’t been able to get away. So he says, anyway.”
“He’s probably telling the truth. The FBI and any other kind of protection they could bring in are probably surrounding him. Give him time. You have his daughter and he’ll do anything to get her back.”
Barkley agreed and looked at the other men. “When’s the money coming from the other two in the back?”
The conversation soon centered on the phone calls they were going to make and figuring where to have the drop-offs for the money.
Chapter Five
Isabella lay still as if asleep when she heard the door open. She didn’t answer when Smitty softly spoke her name. When she heard the door close again, she rolled over, glancing toward it. Smitty had left. He hadn’t stayed in the room. She exhaled in relief. She had no idea if he planned to sleep in the room with her or not, though. Of course, there was no one else in the house so he had no worry of one of the men trying to get to her. He would probably sleep in one of the other bedrooms. She hoped.
She climbed from the bed and went to the window. She looked over the piece of wood covering the bottom half. How was she going to get the board down without making noise? She glanced around the room, her gaze landing on the chair sitting by the bathroom door. The same chair Colt slept in the first night she was there. She crossed over to it and slowly began pulling it away from the wall. It was lighter than it looked. She scooted it over to the window. Anytime she thought she’d made too loud of a noise, she’d stop and hold her breath. Smitty wouldn’t hesitate to charge into the room if he thought she were up to no good. She finally got the chair to the window. Climbing onto it, she peeked over the wood to the outside world.
The sun was beginning to set. Isabella hated the thought of going out into the night, but she had no choice. Although it was spring, the nights in Wyoming were still cold so she’d made sure she had socks on and as a last minute thought, she put her pajama bottoms on under her jeans. She started to pull on the top of the wood, working the nails loose. She wiggled it back and forth on the nails. She knew she had to do it slowly, all the while praying Smitty didn’t come in to check on her.
She was scared to death. She placed her hands at the top of the board and pulled with all her might. The board creaked as she pulled on it but soon it was sliding along the nails, working them loose. She moved her hands down the sides of it and pulled at it. If she could get all three sides loose, one good pull could do it. She jerked it as hard as she could and the board came away from the window. She almost fell, but caught herself. She wanted to shout for joy.
Isabella had just begun moving the chair away from the window when suddenly she heard the lock on the door turning. She scrambled as fast as she could and no longer cared how much noise she made, she was going to succeed. She gave the chair a final push away from the window and began crawling through the window. She had one leg out when she heard Smitty yell her name, and then felt him grab her ankle. She kicked at him, but he was stronger. He pulled her back inside the window and tossed her toward the bed. She scrambled across the bed and ran for the door.
She made it clear to the kitchen before Smitty grabbed her around the waist. She pushed and screamed at him but he paid no mind, continuing to hold on to her. Spotting a platter on the table, she reached for it, turned in his arms, and slammed the heavy ceramic down on the top of his head. She saw in his eyes that she’d dazed him. His grip loosened and she pushed at him hard enough to get away from him. He stumbled backwards and she ran for the door. She made it outside and for a moment, she had no idea which way to go.
The front of the house had a gravel road running in both directions in front of it. Heading in either direction looked like a long trek. Woods filled the area behind the house as well as across the road. She just picked a direction and ran. She heard Smitty yelling her name, but she ran as fast as she c
ould. She didn’t look back as she headed into the woods. She figured she could hide until she figured out what to do.
Isabella heard him yelling and he seemed to be coming closer so she stopped and squatted down. She had to be quiet. If she kept running, he’d be able to hear what direction she was heading. She stayed so quiet, she barely breathed. She was so scared that every inch of her was trembling making her ache. She could hear him moving through the woods.
“Isabella! Come out here. Come on. You’re not helping your dad by doing this.”
It didn’t surprise her he would use whatever persuasion he could think of to get her to return. Barkley wasn’t going to be happy.
Isabella sat stock-still. She wasn’t going to listen to anything anyone had to say anymore. She was free and she planned to stay that way. She was going to get home and help the FBI find these men. Her heart ached when she thought of Colt’s arrest, but he was one of the bad guys. He was a criminal with whom she’d foolishly fallen in love.
She heard Smitty walking away from her and smiled. He was giving up. He couldn’t find her. It was going to be dark soon so it was best she stay where she was. It was too easy for her to get lost in the dark. Once the sun came up, she would start moving again. Sitting back against the tree, she tried to get comfortable but she couldn’t fall asleep. There was always a chance Smitty might come back out with a flashlight, and continue looking for her.
* * * *
Mont’s cell phone buzzed. He moved away from the table and answered it. Listening, his gaze quickly glanced around the table of men. He cursed under his breath.
“I told you to keep an eye on her,” he whispered into the phone.
Montgomery Page 7