Taken Hostage

by Jordyn Redwood

  Blood?

  She blinked her eyes several times and soon she was able to discern the shape of a head in the darkness within arm’s reach. She walked her hand out farther, touching skin that felt like coarse sandpaper. She walked her fingers up slowly—more tacky fluid.

  Colby. A cut to his forehead.

  She pushed up onto her elbows and shimmied next to him, the small movement sapping her strength. Her last memory came to the forefront of her mind and she reached with tentative fingers and brushed them along the side of her neck. The projectile was missing. In its place, a small crusted hill of dried blood.

  She reached out for his shoulder and shook it—more than a gentle nudging. “Colby,” she whispered. She army-crawled closer and laid her head on his chest. His breathing was slow, rhythmic. Likely enough to keep his oxygen levels up. Regan pulled his arm across her body and nestled her fingers in the groove of his wrist to feel for a pulse.

  It was strong and steady under her touch.

  Just like he was.

  Like no other man she’d ever known.

  Drugs were funny things. Each person had some degree of variance as to how they would react. If Regan fashioned a guess as to what the kidnappers’ drug of choice had been, she’d put forth ketamine as the answer. However, ketamine was relatively short-acting. Depending on the dose, it might incapacitate a person for thirty to forty-five minutes. Too short to pick the two of them up, grab Olivia, and bring them to this place unless it was close to the location of the park. What other medication had they used to prolong their downtime?

  Trouble was, this place felt empty and hollow. Like they’d been dropped into the bottom of an abandoned well, though from what she could see it looked like a large cage—dark, black lines jutted from the floor to the ceiling. The faint smell of rusty metal hung in her nose.

  Where was Olivia? Was she here in this place? Was she safe? Still alive?

  A lump formed at the base of Regan’s throat. She bit her lip to prevent the tears from flowing. Had this been the right way to handle the situation? Or had she made every wrong choice along the way, putting Olivia’s life at risk, as well as Colby’s and all of her patients’? Should she have gone to the police right away?

  Lord, I don’t know the answer to all of these questions. I’m scared. Please, keep Olivia safe. Wake Colby up. Show us a way out of this prison.

  She sniffed back tears, and Colby’s body stirred next to hers. She turned onto her side and snuggled closer to him, holding his arm around her body, keeping her fingers pressed gently against his pulse as some sort of measure on his physical condition.

  It wouldn’t surprise her if these criminals had used an additional drug dose on Colby once he was down. He was bigger—stronger. They wouldn’t have difficulty subduing Regan, even in the absence of the drug, but Colby would have been a different story.

  Closing her eyes, she tried to focus on what she remembered. She’d seen Olivia—alive. They’d kept her safe. But taking Regan alive meant they wanted her for something and this event that had upended her life was far from over.

  A snort—snoring? But Colby’s body was still under her head. Nothing but the quiet rise and fall of his chest.

  Another sound. Like someone clearing mucus from their throat. Regan lifted her head and narrowed her eyes against the darkness. The black lines were interrupted. She widened her eyelids, drinking in every molecule of light to discern the shape in the distance.

  A man sitting in the corner—propped up? Seemingly drugged like she and Colby had been. She gripped Colby’s hand tighter, almost willing the pressure to pull him out of his slumber. When that didn’t work, she elbowed him against the ribs.

  He moaned and turned on his side.

  The man on the other side of the cage reached up and scratched his nose.

  That made her think of the side effects of opiate narcotics like fentanyl, which could make people’s noses itch. When an opiate was combined with ketamine it prolonged the sedative effects. Had that been the other drug they’d use to keep them down?

  That was unknown, but what was known was that Regan and Colby were not alone in their cell.

  * * *

  A spark of pain along Colby’s right ribs forced his eyes open. The world felt heavy. There was something pressing against his chest, making it hard for him to breathe. He knocked his head backward to force his senses to move more rapidly toward wakefulness and was met not with the soft surface of a pillow but cement. He reached his hand up and palpated the weight on his chest, first touching hair, then skin, then something cold and wet.

  A hand gripped his tightly. “Colby, you’re poking my eye.”

  Regan’s voice. Merely a whisper. She lifted up her head. He blinked again, confirming his eyes were open. The darkness was deep. Where were they? He could make out steel bars, cold cement and little else.

  A cell? A prison?

  Whatever they’d hit him with felt like something he’d never experienced—even during some misguided days in his young adult life where alcohol seemed fun until the next morning. Only one or two episodes of that had taught him that was no way to feel. He hated that feeling.

  Now it was a hundred times worse.

  “Colby? Can you hear me?” Regan asked.

  He could, but her whispers were drowned out by the jackhammer working on his brain. His forehead felt like it could explode off his body at any moment. He reached up and felt dried blood. Had they hit him with something to keep him unconscious longer? Hopefully, he’d put up a fight trying to save Regan and Olivia, and that was the cause of his injury.

  “Colby!”

  He winced, her words like daggers in his ears. The pain, the most intense he’d ever experienced. Even the migraines he’d suffered in the desert from dehydration and battle stress didn’t compare to this.

  He better answer her before she took drastic action. “I’m here.” He groped for his watch. The kidnappers had taken it.

  “Your head. I think it’s cut open. There’s a lot of blood.”

  That explained partly why he felt like he’d been on the losing end of a fight. He shifted to his side but had to lay his head down for the vertigo to subside. Never in such a short time had he been injured so much. First tased. Now drugged. Perhaps pistol-whipped to the head to keep him down longer.

  What he could never say was that life with Regan was boring.

  “Where are we?” he asked.

  “Keep your voice down. There’s someone else here.”

  He pushed up onto his elbow. “Where?”

  “In the cell with us.”

  Another prisoner? “Who?”

  “I don’t know. It’s too dark. I can’t make his face out.”

  Colby sat up and crossed his legs to give himself a steady base. His body cried for sleep—real sleep. Not this concussion, drug-induced haze he was battling through. Colby squinted and could make out the shape in the distance. “Hey!”

  Regan put her hand over his mouth like he was a wayward child. “What are you doing?”

  Colby pulled her hand down. “Trying to find out if he’s alive.”

  There was no movement from the man.

  “He’s probably been drugged like we were.”

  Colby shrugged. Did he want to go over there and check? What could he do at the moment? Honestly, he didn’t feel well. From what he could tell, there didn’t appear to be anything to sleep on.

  “Let’s just rest. He’s obviously not a threat at the moment. He’s a prisoner like us. We can’t do anything right now until there’s light, or people or something. But what we can do is rest.”

  Colby scooted back against a wall, and she sat next to him. He inched her forward, putting his arm around her shoulders and pulling her closer. For warmth? He wasn’t sure in the moment, but she
willingly allowed the closeness and nestled herself against his chest.

  It had been a long time since he’d had a woman so close to him. After his wife and unborn baby had died, he’d dated a few other women, but hadn’t found any emotional connection. Regan was different in ways he found hard to express with words. Maybe it was the push-away-no-please-help-me quality that complicated so many relationships between men and women.

  Right now with Regan next to him, even considering their current predicament, a lot felt right with the world. If God destined certain events to happen, then there was reason and purpose behind their meeting. With Colby’s skill set, he was the perfect person to get involved in a situation such as Regan’s. He lived close to the edge of the law but never over it. Regan pushed the boundaries of her field enough to come up with a solution to one of the most devastating cancers that afflicted the human race. Two personality peas from the same pod.

  A small shudder raced through Regan’s body, and Colby cupped her head with his hand, brushing his fingers over her hair. Colby suspected she’d drifted off to sleep. He’d often wondered how people in these situations could sleep, but his body begged for it.

  How was Sam? Was she okay? Was she still alive? His mother was probably rife with worry. Had the police paired him and Regan together? What did the public think about Regan right now? That she’d murdered her nanny? And if they believed that, would the medical board ever let Regan practice medicine again?

  At first, the solution to Regan’s problem seemed simple. Get Olivia back. Deliver a placebo that could hopefully pass well enough for the real thing—at least long enough for them to escape. Get Regan back to the hospital with the real deal—the true cure. Save Sam.

  But now, the layers of this crisis were beyond anything Colby could have imagined. What was his old military friend turned nemesis doing at Regan’s house? Who was this other man drugged in their cage? Seemingly not a cell, as it had nothing to sleep on and smelled faintly of musty, wet canine.

  Colby leaned his head against the concrete and just as he closed his eyes...

  Someone turned on the lights.

  TEN

  Colby’s body jerked, and Regan’s eyes flew open as their world whitewashed. She covered her eyes with her hands and felt Colby stand next to her. Slowly, she inched her hands away, allowing varying degrees of light in until her pupils constricted from the dark world they’d opened themselves up to.

  It was as if she and Colby had landed in a foreign country. Realistically they could be in a foreign country. At least she didn’t think so. Regan struggled to her feet, brushing the dirt and leaves from her pants, eventually giving up when she realized what a futile gesture it was in her current state.

  Colby took her hand gently in his and took a step forward in a protective stance.

  A man stood in front of them dressed in black cargo pants and a black T-shirt. His face was uncovered and a look of displeasure creased his features, some sort of automatic weapon strapped crosswise against his body. He was bald, clean-shaved, with mean almost-black eyes. There was a black cobra tattooed onto the back of his right hand.

  “About time you woke up. Well, at least two of you.”

  For the first time, Regan got a clear look at the other man in the cage. It was Brian Hollis. Had they burned down his house as a threat and then taken him? Where was the rest of his staff? Why was he there? What did they want them to do?

  Regan turned back to the hostage-taker. “Where’s my daughter?”

  Baldy raised a finger and wiggled it back and forth like he was warning a wayward child. “You, Dr. Lockhart, haven’t been following directions very well. What I can tell you is Olivia is safe for the time being, but if you don’t start doing as you’re asked, then all that will change.”

  “I want to see her,” Regan demanded.

  “Give us something we want and we’ll return the favor. So far, you’ve made this whole process very difficult.”

  Another man approached, holding a cardboard box. Same stocky build but with black hair and vibrant green eyes. Baldy took his weapon and aimed it their way. Colby moved Regan behind him. Would he really take a bullet for her?

  “Step to the back of the cell,” Baldy ordered.

  They complied and he let the weapon drop so he could unlock the door. Then Green Eyes slid the box across the concrete, and the door was quickly closed and locked.

  “When everyone’s awake, we’ll talk. The sooner you can make that happen, Dr. Lockhart, perhaps we’ll let you see your daughter. Just know—there are no guarantees,” Baldy said, offering a snarl to add credence to his threat. Then they both walked away.

  Colby dropped her hand and neared the box. At this juncture Regan doubted there was anything dangerous in it. Why kill them now when they seemed intent on keeping them alive for some purpose? He lifted the flaps and motioned her over.

  It was filled with medical supplies and some food.

  “First, we need to check Brian.”

  Colby raised an eyebrow. “You know him?”

  Regan walked to Brian and kneeled next to him. “This is the man who owns the lab we went to.” She settled her hand on his shoulder and shook him gently. “Brian. It’s Regan Lockhart. Can you hear me?”

  “You want this?” Colby asked, holding up a stethoscope. Interesting addition to the box. Any medical provider worth their salt should be able to tell if a patient was breathing and had a heartbeat without one.

  She held her hand up and Colby walked over. “Looks like they worked him over pretty good.”

  Regan put the eartips in her ears and applied the bell to Brian’s chest. Heartbeat steady. Breathing even but shallow. She looped the stethoscope around her neck and gently pulled his eyelids open. The pupils constricted normally.

  With light fingers, she palpated his face to see if any of the bones appeared broken around the bruising. Without an X-ray she couldn’t be sure, but the bones were in a normal position and didn’t shift under her touch. She examined the skin around his neck and couldn’t discern an injection site. Nothing on his arms until she examined the skin at the bend of Brian’s right elbow and saw what she presumed was a needle mark. No bruising at the site.

  Interesting.

  “What’s wrong?” Colby asked.

  “With him? Concussion probably. There’s a lot of bruising to his face. Could be partly why he’s not woken up yet.”

  “No, I meant why do you have that look on your face?”

  “What look?”

  “Like you’re bothered by something you found. Doctors always have that look when they’re thinking something but they don’t necessarily want to share it.”

  Could Colby discern her looks so easily or did this come from the time he’d been forced to spend with doctors during his wife’s and sister’s illnesses?

  “The injection mark here...” Regan tapped Brian’s skin. “It seems like an odd place for someone unwilling to be drugged.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Regan stood. “Think about where we were hit. My neck. Your arm. With a dart. The drugs entered our system through our muscles. Muscles aren’t a bad way to deliver drugs because there’re lots of them and they can be relatively large targets.” Regan eyed Colby’s biceps. “There’s no muscle at that injection point. That site is used to access a vein. Veins are really hard to get into when someone is struggling.”

  “You’re suggesting he might have been a willing participant?”

  “I don’t know. I’m just saying it looks weird. They could have knocked him out and then drugged him to keep him down longer. We’ll have to wait until he wakes up.”

  Regan neared the box and began to remove its contents. Towels. Irrigation solution. A suture kit. Sutures. Sterile gauze. Antibiotic ointment. Bandages. Protein bars. Water.

&nb
sp; Nothing fancy. No lidocaine to numb the area as was standard for stitch placement, but everything else she needed to fix Colby’s laceration.

  “There’s no numbing medicine, but you can handle a few stitches without anesthetic, right?” Regan asked.

  Colby took two steps away from her.

  * * *

  Regan’s suggestion that he allow himself to be stitched without the area being numbed was barbaric to him. Sure, he was tough, but was he that tough? He hated needles. Not just a strong dislike but outright disdain. Maybe fear bordering on phobia.

  “Colby. Really?” Her voice was firm and somewhat surprised. “If I don’t clean and close that cut, it’s going to get infected. The scarring will be much worse.”

  “It’s going to leave a scar?”

  Regan bent over and began scooping items up into her arms. “Every cut that needs stitches leaves a scar. Come on, it will be a story to tell your children one day about how you saved a woman and her daughter and...” Regan’s voice trailed and she took one edge of a towel and dabbed the inner corners of her eyes. “Seriously. You’re willing to take a bullet, but getting stitches has you terrified?”

  “I don’t like needles.”

  “Congratulations, you’re a normal human. Now, sit yourself back in the corner and step up so we can get this done. Hopefully our additional guest will be awake by then.”

  Colby did as she asked. Bringing the supplies closer, she knelt next to him. “You’re going to have to lie down on your left side.” He settled into the position as she’d instructed and she brushed sand and dirt from his hair. Her touch caused his nerves to tingle and he couldn’t help but be captured by her beauty in spite of the jeans and ragged flannel shirt she wore. She caught his gaze and he looked away, like a child trapped with his hand in the cookie jar.

  “This is just saline. Rest your head on the towels. It’s going to be cold.”

  With one hand, she held his head down and squirted the solution into the cut. He clenched his teeth as the freezing water was forced into the cut under pressure. It was all he could do to not reach up and force her hand away and maintain the image of a street-tough bounty hunter when he wanted to cry like a baby.