He couldn’t leave her in danger. It was simply impossible to even contemplate.
Riley hurried up the sloping ground, doing his best to ignore the burn of his protesting leg.
“Riley?” Sophie’s voice was weak, but it was still music to his ears.
“It’s me, honey. Stay still. We’re almost there.” He patted her in a lame effort to offer her comfort, and the feel of her full bottom against his palm was more than enough motivation for him to hurry the hell up.
An ass like that was definitely worth risking his life to save.
He skidded down the far side of the hill, going as fast as he dared. Her head was unprotected, and one wrong move on his part would bash it into the tree branches.
Their vehicle sat in the distance, gleaming under the moonlight. Riley opened the back door and eased her inside.
Her eyes tried to open, but he could tell it took a lot of effort to keep them that way.
“Just rest,” he told her. “I’ll be back in just a second.”
“Don’t leave me.” The fear in her tone nearly tore him to pieces.
He crawled in enough that she could see his face. “I won’t be gone long. I promise. When I get back, you’re going to say yes.”
“Yes?”
“That’s right. You told me to ask you again, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do. So you get your mouth all set while I’m gone.”
She didn’t seem to understand him, but it didn’t matter. As long as she stayed here, she’d be safe.
He checked to make sure the car was running so she could drive off if he and Gage didn’t make it back. Of course, with a childhood like hers, hot-wiring a car probably wasn’t beyond her skills.
He closed the door and watched her eyes drift shut.
His internal clock said there was less than five minutes left on that timer, and far too many men in there for Gage to save them all by himself.
Riley gritted his teeth against the pain in his leg and sprinted back up the hill.
Chapter Thirty-seven
Adam had been shot before, but never like this. He was losing blood fast enough that he could feel his strength fading.
Mira unlaced her shoe and handed him the string.
At least she didn’t actively want him dead. It wasn’t much, but it was something.
Then again, maybe she just didn’t want his bleeding making her sick.
Adam counted the seconds. Each one put them farther away from help and closer to whatever it was Sage had in store for them. His back was to the pilot, facing the rear of the aircraft, so he couldn’t see where they were headed. His internal compass told him they were going south, but there was no way to know how far.
Adam was not going to let Mira’s father hurt her the way he had planned. Sadly, there were only two ways to stop it from happening: kill Sage or kill Mira.
He knew which one he was capable of doing and which he wasn’t.
The helicopter cleared the ridge hiding the clearing, then headed over the building, hugging the ground. They flew over a sea of trees with no landmarks to guide them.
“Staying off radar?” Adam shouted at Sage so he could be heard over the rotors. As he spoke, he tied the makeshift tourniquet and tried to pretend he wasn’t growing weaker by the second.
“Norwood is always sticking his nose into my business. No sense in making it easy on him.”
Blood pooled on the metal floor at Adam’s feet. “But you know he’ll come for you.”
“He hasn’t found me yet.”
“Where are we going?” asked Mira.
“To your new home.”
She shuddered visibly at that. “You and your new home can go fuck themselves.”
Sage scowled at her use of language. “Unless you’ve decided to be more trouble than you’re worth. Like your mother.”
She swallowed and looked away, but not before Adam saw furious tears shimmer in her eyes.
Mira was planning something. He could see the wheels in her head turning. And if he knew her well enough to see it, then so did her father.
“It won’t work,” said Sage. “Whatever you’re planning, there’s nowhere to run. Nowhere to hide.”
She peered out the open side of the helicopter. That’s when Adam saw what she was going to do.
She was going to jump.
“Don’t,” he said, reaching for her.
She saw the blood on his fingers and recoiled. “Don’t what?”
“He’s not worth it.”
Sage moved the gun to Adam. “Stop talking to her.”
Adam stared at Mira, silently begging her to stop planning whatever it was she had in mind. As soon as they landed, they’d join forces and fight Sage together. Until then, she just needed to stay alive.
She glared at him. “Like you care.”
“I do. Deeply. More than you know.”
“I doubt you’re even capable of such depth.”
“I hope to live long enough to prove it to you.”
She glanced at his wound and blanched. The bleeding had slowed significantly, but he’d already lost enough that he was well below peak performance.
“You will,” she said. “Men like you always survive. However they can.”
“Stop talking!” shouted Sage.
Behind them, the sky lit up in an orange glow. A moment later, a deafening blast shook the helicopter.
The lab and everyone in it went up in flames.
Chapter Thirty-eight
Riley shook the dirt from his body. The unconscious man beneath him was alive, as were three others he and Gage had pulled out of the building. Nearby, a blond woman’s body lay still and charred. She hadn’t been there a second ago, leaving Riley to assume she’d been thrown from the building. There was a piece of metal embedded in her chest. It had torn cleanly through her prim suit, leaving no chance for survival. Her empty eyes stared up at the night sky as her blood soaked the frozen ground.
Gage stood and started jogging toward the car Adam had left behind. It was closer than the one where Riley had put Sophie, well out of the blast radius. The car’s paint job was destroyed, but it seemed drivable.
“Where are you going?”
“Chopper took off.”
“And you’re going to follow it?”
He nodded as he kept running. “They have our friends.”
No arguing with that. “I’ll be right behind you.”
Gage didn’t respond. He was already behind the wheel, sliding over the dirt road in the same general direction the helicopter had gone.
Riley pulled the unconscious men a bit farther away from the flames before he cuffed them and left them to wait for reinforcements. These men would get the help they needed or, at the very least, be put where they would never hurt anyone again.
It was the best he could offer.
As soon as it was safe, he jogged back to Sophie. The blast had apparently woken her enough that she was sitting up when he arrived. Whatever drugs they’d pumped into her seemed to be wearing off fast.
He was so relieved to see her moving under her own steam that the last few steps he made toward her were on wobbly knees.
“You’re hurt,” she said, her voice still a little weak.
“Just a little.”
“What was that noise?”
“The lab went boom. Good riddance.”
She frowned and a distant look haunted her eyes as her memory came back. “Sage had me. I saw Mira and Adam. Sage was hurting me. Mira was crying.” She sucked in a terrified breath. “Oh no. They were in there, too. Please tell me they got out okay.”
His hands were dirty, but he didn’t let that stop him from stroking her hair in an effort to soothe her. “They got out. Gage is going after them now.”
�
�Going after them?”
“Shh. It’s okay. Nothing for you to worry about.”
“Are they safe?”
“They will be. Everything is going to be fine.”
She flung her arms around his neck and held on tight. “I didn’t think I was going to make it out of there alive. Thank you for coming for me. Again.”
He leaned back just enough that she could see his eyes. It was important to him that she saw he was telling the truth. “I’ll always come for you, Sophie. Every single time. But do me a favor, okay?”
“Anything.”
“Try to stay safe this time? Knowing that the woman I love is in danger is taking years off my life.”
She offered him a watery smile. “You love me?”
“I do.”
Her smile widened, brightened, until he could barely stare into the face of so much beauty all at once. “I love you, too.”
And that was it. Riley knew in that moment that the woman looking at him was his future. His whole life. And he was going to do whatever it took to keep her. “Marry me,” he urged, his tone almost bordering on desperation.
“What about the goons that are after me?”
“If we see them, I’ll take care of it. They won’t bother you again.”
She smiled. “You are kind of a badass, aren’t you?”
“I am. Especially when it comes to protecting you. That’s why you should marry me.”
“You’re not worried I’m going to crack from what was done to me as a kid and try to kill you in your sleep?”
“Never.”
“Why?”
“One, I’ve seen what cracking looks like, and you’re nowhere close to the breaking point. I’d never let you get that far before getting you help. Two, I sleep with a gun. And three, I don’t think either of us is going to be getting much sleep anytime soon.”
“How can I contradict such a well-thought-out argument?”
“You can’t. Marry me, Sophie.”
She blinked back a few happy tears. “Yes. The answer has always been yes.”
“I don’t want to wait. Vegas?” he asked, grinning, so eager to start their new lives he could hardly wait for her response, much less some lengthy set of wedding plans.
She nodded, her smile radiant. “Hell yeah, Vegas. Babies?”
“Hell yeah, babies.” The sense of rightness that fell over him was so powerful it almost choked off his air. He saw his entire life stretching out before him, all in this woman’s pretty eyes. He had to struggle to say, “Let’s go save our friends. We have a plane to catch.”
Chapter Thirty-nine
The laboratory explosion was the final straw. Mira’s friends had come to rescue her and Sophie. For all she knew, they’d been inside that lab when it blew.
Sophie had been, drugged and bound to a bed. Completely helpless.
If Mira let herself think about it too long, she would break down in a soggy puddle of tears, right next to that pool of Adam’s blood.
She had to stay calm and cool—at least until her father was dead. Once that happened, she’d let go and crumble. But not yet. Not while Richard Sage still drew breath.
Mira’s father’s killing spree ended here.
“How many people did you just kill?” she asked.
He shrugged. “None that count. I have what I need from that facility.”
“And where will you go now?”
He glanced at the man piloting the helicopter. “He is always making contingency plans. It’s how I designed his mind to work. If only you’d been so useful.”
The cold air whipping in through the opening chilled Mira to the bone. She had no coat. Her fingers were almost numb. Only her fury kept her core temperature up above dangerous levels.
Adam shivered visibly. He also had no coat, was wet with blood, and was running a couple of pints low.
The second her gaze strayed to his, his eyes seemed to focus. Intensity burned there, and while she had no idea what he was thinking, she had no doubt that he, too, was making contingency plans.
They were still flying low to the ground—so low she thought about jumping until she actually peered over the side. Her head made a dizzying spin, and her already twisty stomach rebelled at the thought.
“Don’t,” said Adam, the single word cutting through the roar of the rotors easily.
“I have to do something.”
“Not here. Not now.”
Her father shifted in his seat and re-aimed the gun at whoever was talking. “Shut up! Both of you.”
This was her chance. The farther away from her friends she got, the more likely she was never to be found again. If her father had a hiding place, it could be years before Bella and the others uncovered it.
Mira wouldn’t survive that long.
“I’ll say whatever the fuck I want,” she snapped.
“Mira,” said Adam. “Don’t.”
She scowled at him. “You can’t tell me what to do.”
“You’re going to get yourself killed.”
“I’m dead anyway.”
“But not like—”
When the barrel was pointed halfway between the two of them, Mira pounced. She lunged at her father, grabbing the weapon in both hands.
The steel was so cold her clammy hands stuck to the metal. Instantly, her father tried to pull it away, but he was old and she was pumped full of adrenaline and hate.
She managed to control the gun enough to keep it away from both her and Adam. It barked in her hands as her father’s finger squeezed the trigger. She didn’t know if he’d meant to or not, but the effect was all the same.
The bullet ripped through the back of the pilot’s head. Blood and brains splattered across the inside of the windshield.
The helicopter lurched and started to go down.
Chapter Forty
As low as they were flying, Adam had only a few seconds to keep them from crashing into the trees.
He shoved his way into the cockpit, opened the door, unlatched the pilot’s seat belt, and pushed his body out. Adam regained control of the helicopter, but not before it clipped the top of some trees.
The aircraft canted sideways, and Mira let out a scream of fear.
A quick glance behind him showed her dangling from the open doorway with only her death grip on her father’s sleeve holding her inside.
If Adam didn’t land now, the woman he loved was dead.
His view was obscured by the interior of the pilot’s skull, so he swiped it away with frozen fingers.
The ground here was too hilly and covered in trees to find a safe landing spot. The best he could think to do was turn around and land near the small lake they’d flown over a couple of minutes ago.
He deployed the emergency floats, just in case, and made a beeline for the tiny ring of flat, clear ground near the water’s edge. “Hold on, Mira. We’re landing.”
* * *
Mira wasn’t going to be able to hang on that long. Her frigid grip was already failing. She couldn’t feel her fingers, but she could see them slipping on the slick nylon of her father’s winter coat.
“Don’t let me fall,” she begged.
His eyes were empty as he looked at her. No fatherly love. No humanity. He was a vacant shell held together only by his work. She was nothing more to him than the growth at the bottom of a petri dish.
She’d known that for a long time, but she felt it now. Saw it in his eyes. She really meant nothing to him.
No fucking way was she going to let him take her down.
Mira gathered her strength and tightened her grip. Her feet were dangling over the edge, but she felt them bump against something hard. She found that surface and pushed herself up, climbing up her father’s arm as she went.
He fired the gun. She f
elt the heat of the explosion against her cheek, but he had no control of his aim with her clinging to him like she was.
He fired again and again. Her eyes stung and watered from the gunshot residue that hit her face. Her tears were swept away by the frigid wind before they could fall.
The helicopter was moving fast. The trees under her seemed to be only inches away. Up ahead she saw moonlight gleaming on water and the headlights of a car speeding toward them.
Friends? Enemies? There was no way to know, and they were so far out of reach it hardly mattered.
Her father stopped trying to pry her away and used his free hand to unzip his coat.
Mira knew what was coming next. Once that coat was loose, she would have nothing left to cling to. She’d fall to her death and he would still be alive to hurt more people.
She couldn’t let that happen. She needed this to be over, even if it meant going with him.
With no other options coming to mind, Mira reached up and grabbed the latch on her father’s seat belt. He saw what she was doing too late.
The metal clicked open. She let her feet fall from their perch. Her weight dragged him out of his seat. He tried to grab something, but it was no use. They both fell from the helicopter.
Mira’s last thought was one of relief. There was no way she was going to survive the fall, but neither would her father.
His days of hurting people were finally over.
Chapter Forty-one
Adam felt the weight of the helicopter shift as he began his landing. He glanced back. Saw Sage and Mira were both gone.
His world went dark. Mira was gone. He was still too far up for anyone to survive the fall.
A crushing weight of agony fell on him. Grief. He knew how it felt, how debilitating it could be. He’d mastered his skills of emotional containment because of that pain, and yet now, as he tried to gather it all up and shove it in a box, his ability failed him.
Mira and the power she had over him could never be contained.
A low moan of mourning rattled in his chest. He was powerless to stop it, just as he’d been powerless to both fly the craft and keep her from falling.
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