Running On Empty: An LCR Elite Novel

by Christy Reece

  Playing the helpless female didn’t sit well with her, and she was sure Declan saw through the thin veneer she’d adopted. It didn’t matter. Keeping Declan safe was the only concern she had. Ego went out the back door when it came to protecting the man she loved.

  Wanting to ease Jackson’s worry without revealing anything, Sabrina threw him a reassuring smile. “I’ve seen the guys he’s hired to help out. Looks like they can do the job.”

  “Not like a trained agent.”

  Sabrina didn’t respond to that complaint. What could she say? Noah, Aidan, Justin, and Jake were close to Declan, behind closed doors, ready to assist. Since they couldn’t tell Jackson about LCR and their involvement, Declan had claimed he’d hired some former Special Forces guys to help out. There was actually quite a bit of truth in that.

  Thankfully, Jackson had bought the story, even if he didn’t like it.

  “You really think they’ll show?” he asked.

  “Yes. They know it’s a setup, but Declan’s right. They’ll be arrogant enough to think they can win.”

  “Risky as hell.”

  “It is, but pulling them out from underground is our only hope to capture them.”

  “As elaborate a setup as they had, they’ve got some big money backing them. They bring an army in, Declan doesn’t have a prayer.”

  She winced at the image but couldn’t deny the truth. Maybe that’s why their lovemaking had held felt so desperate. It had been as if they were saying good-bye to one another. For the past two days, they’d hardly spoken to each other. Whenever she’d had something to say, she had used as few words as possible. Declan, not to be outdone, had used mostly grunts and body language to get his message across.

  “He’s better trained than they are.”

  “You trying to convince me or yourself?”

  She lifted her shoulder in a halfhearted shrug. Saying that Declan was better trained than anyone else was all she could come up with to reassure herself that he wouldn’t die tonight. She simply didn’t know what he would face.

  “So you and Declan are back together, right? His being gone didn’t mess you guys up?”

  Even though he was their friend, Sabrina didn’t feel comfortable spilling her guts to him. She gave him a vague, “We’re working through things.”

  “Seems as protective of you as ever.”

  Yes, Declan had always had that protective streak. Even in their early years, when he’d been her trainer and so incredibly tough on her, she’d always been safe with him. He would always do everything within his power to take care of her.

  Her gaze riveted to the screen, Sabrina sat up in her seat. “We’ve got some activity.”

  She and Jackson watched as Declan strode into the building. No one in his right mind would assume he would come in unarmed, so he didn’t bother to conceal the SIG Sauer in his right hand. If they checked, they’d find at least five more weapons on him. She hoped like hell that no one got close enough to try.

  The expression on his face was grim, implacable, and determined. She knew that look…had seen it on his face many times in the past. His intentions were clear. He would end this thing tonight, no matter what.

  A movement in the corner of another screen caught her attention. Her breath caught and held. She shook her head in denial. No. Just no.

  “What the hell?” Jackson snarled. “No. No way in hell. This has got to be a mistake.”

  She didn’t want to believe it, either, but the ugly proof was on the screen in front of them. They now knew who the traitor was. But, oh, sweet heavens…why?

  Declan stood in the middle of the room and waited. He wasn’t alone. McCall and three LCR Elite team members were out of sight, ready to assist. No one would expect him to show up alone, but revealing his backup would do him no favors. He would pretend this wasn’t a setup until it became necessary to stop pretending.

  Knowing that Sabrina was a block away was both reassuring and worried the hell out of him. She would come running, guns a’blazing if this thing went to shit, which she definitely believed it would. And because the possibility was all too real, he felt fear for her. He didn’t want her involved, but didn’t have the heart to trick her into staying completely out of it.

  Jackson would see to her safety—no matter what went down.

  He heard footsteps and turned immediately to his right. When he made out the person coming toward him, a mule kick to the chest couldn’t have surprised him more.

  “Declan? I’m here.”

  “So you are.”

  “You said you wanted to talk. But why here? I could’ve come to Sabrina’s apartment again.”

  And because he had to know, he said, “Why, Albert?”

  “Why what?”

  “Don’t play games with me. Why did you betray your country? Betray me and Sabrina?”

  “What are you talking about?”

  He wanted to play games? Then Declan would oblige. “I sent a message, underground. Set up the meeting to talk. You’re here.”

  “What the hell? I got a phone call from you. Said you wanted to meet me. You gave me this address. Said you had an idea of the traitor’s identity.”

  Could that be true? Was this just another hoax? Or was this a setup to try to grab Albert, too. Or was the old man lying?

  Unable to take the chance, he held his gun steady and said, “Why don’t we wait and see if anyone else comes, then we’ll decide if you’re telling the truth?”

  His expression one of both anger and resignation, Albert nodded. “Fine. But when this is over, we’re damn well going to have a long talk.”

  They waited ten, then fifteen minutes. Deciding no one else was coming, he called out, “Okay, guys. Looks like this is over. Come on out.”

  Appearing out of the darkness were McCall, Thorne, Kelly, and Mallory. Even though he hadn’t needed them, LCR’s backup had been much appreciated.

  Knowing he wouldn’t be able to keep her away from the questions he had for Albert, Declan spoke into his mic. “Sabrina, you and Jackson want to join us?”

  No answer.

  “Sabrina? Jackson?”

  Shit! Declan took off. Running from the building, he raced down the street. The black van was still there. But why wasn’t she answering?

  “Sabrina, dammit, check in.” Then, “Jackson, can you hear me?”

  Silence.

  His gun at the ready, he reached the van and then jerked to a halt. The back doors lay on the street. Jackson was on the van’s floor. Blood trickled from his forehead—he was either unconscious or dead. And Sabrina? She wasn’t there.

  Declan knew his worst fears had been realized.

  Chapter Twenty-nine

  Sabrina listened carefully. She’d woken several minutes ago and, realizing immediately what had happened, quickly regulated her breathing. If they thought she was still unconscious, she might be able to pick up something.

  Other than a dull headache and a wrenching in her shoulders from her wrists being cuffed and tied to her ankles, she felt reasonably good.

  So far, she’d heard nothing substantial or helpful from the men who surrounded her. She had yet to see them, but there appeared to be five distinct voices. Three were American and two French. Unless someone else showed up, language would not be a barrier. Now if she could just figure out the identity of the traitor, the moneyman calling the shots and, oh yeah, a way to escape.

  Declan must be going crazy. And he was sure to be blaming himself. He wouldn’t agree, but this was all on her. She had insisted on being involved. And Jackson? He had to be okay. There was no reason for them to want him. She was the prize—she would be what they wanted so they could get at Declan again.

  She remembered little of what had happened. Someone had knocked on the van’s back door. Jackson had stood and gone to look out the window. There’d been a small pop. Before she could react, the doors had dropped away, and two masked men were there. She remembered electrified agony rushing through her body, kne
w she had been Tasered. Then nothing.

  How would they use her to lure Declan? She had no doubt that he would comply with their demands. He might deny his love to her face, but she knew his heart. Declan would give himself up to save her.

  No! She wouldn’t allow it. She still had her locator device in her arm. LCR would track her down, just as they had before. They would—

  The memory returned of what had happened right before the attack. Albert had appeared. He was the traitor. How could that be? How could he have done this to her and Declan?

  Her mind was scrambling to fight back despair when footsteps approached. She continued to breathe in easy, regular breaths. Damned if they would know that—

  “Okay. Up and at ’em,” a gruff voice shouted. He pulled at the rope locking her hands and her ankles together. What was happening?

  She heard it before she felt the tug on her restraints—the squeak of a pulley. Wrenched from the ground, she was hefted up and found herself hanging several feet in the air, facing downward. Her hands locked behind her and bound to her ankles, she swung back and forth like a pendulum. The pressure on her shoulders and back was immense. An unwilling screech of agony shrieked from her mouth.

  Someone gave her braided hair a nasty tug. “That’s a good girl. Give us a good show.”

  Fighting the pain with all her might, Sabrina raised her head and faced a camera. They were filming her. No. She refused to give them the entertainment they wanted. Biting the inside of her mouth until she tasted blood, she lowered her head, determined not to utter another sound.

  The laughter of several men erupted, but before she could raise her head to get a look at them, something struck her in the stomach. Took her breath. Shit, that hurt. Another hit, then another.

  Her chin tucked against her chest, she drew in a breath as she absorbed each blow. They wouldn’t hear a peep from her.

  More laughter. Then their fun really began. Unable to stop, the pain immense and overwhelming, her screams erupted. Minutes, hours later, her voice hoarse from the strain of her cries, a hard hit landed on her head. The blessed relief of darkness descended.

  LCR Headquarters

  Declan sat across a table from Albert. Even while everything was screaming inside him to run out the door and try to find Sabrina, he had no choice but to do the work. Sabrina’s tracker had stopped working within an hour of her disappearance. They’d traced the signal to an old airstrip outside of Fairfax, Virginia. And then it disappeared.

  “I love Sabrina like a daughter, Declan. And you like a son. I’d never betray either of you, much less the Agency or my country. You need to stop focusing on me and look for someone else.”

  “You’re the only other person who knew about the tracker in her arm.”

  “Maybe she told someone. Noah McCall knew about it. Maybe he—”

  “No,” a cold voice said.

  Declan didn’t bother glancing over his shoulder as the LCR leader entered. If there was anyone almost as motivated to find Sabrina, it was McCall.

  “Then I don’t know what to tell you. As I’ve said a hundred times already, I got a call from you, from your cell phone. You asked me to meet you at the warehouse. You said you believed you had targeted the traitor and wanted my input. I talked to you.” Albert took off his glasses and rubbed his bloodshot eyes. “I even asked you if you’d caught any of Friday’s Nationals game.”

  “And what did I say?” Declan asked.

  “That you’d been too busy trying to catch a fucking traitor.” Albert lifted a shoulder in a halfhearted shrug and gave him an apologetic smile. “I reprimanded you for your language. Sorry.”

  Dammit, that sounded exactly how one of their conversations might have gone. “McCall, what about the phone?”

  The LCR leader placed Albert’s cell phone on the table. “The block on the phone that prevents calls from being logged is a damn good program. Took our techs a few hours, but we found a back door in. A phone call came from your cell phone, Steele. Yesterday morning. The call lasted less than a minute.”

  Unable to sit still any longer, Declan surged to his feet and began to pace. Someone had been close enough to clone his phone? Several people qualified, including Albert.

  He eyed the man who’d been his friend and mentor for almost half his life. Albert had trained him, taught him everything he knew about lying, deceit, and taking advantage of another person to get the job done. Declan knew what the man was capable of. Question was, was he capable of betraying his country for financial gain? His heart said no. His brain told him it was possible.

  “I can’t take the chance with you, Albert.”

  “If you’re telling the truth, Marks,” McCall said, “you’ll be released after Sabrina’s rescue. Until then, feel free to enjoy LCR’s hospitality. If you’re not, I’ll leave it to Steele to decide your fate.”

  As if he’d known what the answer would be all along, Albert leaned back in his chair. “If you would be good enough to let me know when she’s safe, I would appreciate it.”

  Declan nodded and walked out the door. He couldn’t worry about Albert’s disappointment. Even though his instincts said the man was telling the truth, he could take no chances. Not when it came to Sabrina’s survival.

  So far, Jackson had been unable to tell them anything. He was in the hospital, still unconscious from the blow to his head. The doctors believed he would be fine but had admitted that his continued unconsciousness had them worried.

  Feeling as helpless and desperate as he ever had as a prisoner, Declan went into a small office that McCall had lent him. Fat lot of good the office was doing him, though. They had nothing. The tracker had been their only hope, but by the time they’d made it to the airstrip, the plane had been long gone, and the signal had stopped.

  He turned to leave the room when a ping on his laptop told him he had an email. Stomach roiling, Declan had to force himself to go to the desk and click on his email icon. He had known they would be contacting him. There was no email message, only an attachment. Why use words when a graphic image said so much more?

  Jaw clenched, he clicked the attachment and watched the video. A small sound, like the whimper of a wounded animal, escaped him. The image before him would be engraved in his brain forever. Nausea forged upward, clogged his throat. Declan swallowed it back. Getting Sabrina back alive meant staying strong for her.

  Grabbing the laptop, he stormed out the door and into McCall’s office.

  Noah watched Steele come into his office like a warrior on a mission. The stark whiteness of his features, the burning hell in his eyes told Noah that he’d received the contact they’d been waiting on.

  “Got a video,” Steele growled.

  Noah jerked his head at the conference table. “Put the laptop down and let’s see what we’ve got.”

  Within seconds of plugging in the laptop, the video appeared on the large screen on the wall.

  “Shit,” Noah said softly.

  The video lasted less than two minutes, but that didn’t mean the torture hadn’t continued for hours. Seeing Sabrina, his operative and someone he liked and admired, treated in such a manner sent both fury and sickness through him. Just what was it doing to the man beside him?

  “I’ll get Angela to trace the IP address.”

  “It won’t do any good. They’re too smart for that.”

  “Maybe. But we explore all possibilities.”

  While Noah placed the call to Angela, he watched Steele stalk out the door. In the midst of his instructions to Angela, he heard a massive crash. Having dealt with tough operatives and volatile tempers for many years, Noah figured he knew what the noise had been.

  A minute later, Steele returned and said simply, “I owe you a vending machine, McCall.”

  Her body trembling with shock and pain, Sabrina worked to gather her wits and fight against the agony. She was alone. All voices were in another part of the building. There was no telling when the bastards might return and do something m
uch worse.

  She would never look at a piñata the same way again. She had been used as a human one. Four men had beaten her with sticks, another had filmed it. By now, Declan had seen the footage. Worrying about him would do no good. He and LCR would be here soon. She was sure of it. They’d found her before. They would find her again.

  She moved gingerly as she evaluated her health. Starting from the top down, she mentally listed and acknowledged each injury. Contusions to her head, probable concussion. Her head ached with a pounding consistency, but that could be a physical reaction to the stress and her other injuries. The broken nose she was sure she had could produce a blinding headache. Three, maybe four, cracked ribs, broken left wrist, severely bruised abdomen that she could only pray didn’t include internal bleeding, possible fractured pelvis. In short, she was a mess.

  On the bright side, when she had woken, she had found herself untied, alone, and still alive.

  Gritting her teeth, she worked to sit up and managed only part of the way before she collapsed. Not giving up, she used her right arm as leverage and crawled toward the wall. Sitting up would go a long way to making her feel less vulnerable. Agony screamed through her at every inch of progress, but finally she made it to the wall. Dizziness swamped her, and she bit the inside of her mouth as hard as she could to keep herself conscious. When it finally passed, she dragged her body the last few inches and then rolled over onto her back. Now came the tricky part. Sitting up was going to hurt like a son of a bitch. She couldn’t let that stop her. She had to get off her back.

  Though black dots danced before her eyes and tears spilled down her face, she finally managed to prop herself against the wall. Breathless, she forced herself to take shallow breaths and did her best to ignore the protest of her damaged ribs screaming with each breath she took.

  Exhausted but finally able to concentrate on something other than her discomfort, she took in her dismal surroundings and made more assessments. Dirt floor, square room, one door, tiny windows. Musty, dank odor. A basement or cellar?