Speaking of tomorrow, he had to remember to drop his Navy dress whites at the dry cleaners after work so they would be ready for Ian and Angie’s wedding. Fancy had taken that afternoon off from work and would meet him at the church after she made sure the cake got to the reception in one piece. He was also going to see if she would take the weekend of the hoedown off and accompany him to Texas. He couldn’t wait to introduce her to his parents and siblings and was confident they would love her instantly.
As he made a right turn toward his neighborhood, his cell phone rang. Hitting the button on his steering wheel, he connected the call to his car’s Bluetooth system, which automatically silenced the music from the radio. “Hello?”
A familiar male voice came over the speakers. “Hey, Brody, it’s Corey. I’m at Fancy’s shop. I saw someone run behind the building as I was driving past. He’s gone, but…I think you better get over here. Is Fancy with you?”
His gut clenched. “No. She went out with a few girls for dinner. What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know. I don’t even know what I’m looking at. I’m calling the cops as soon as I hang up with you. I think there’s a dead body in the woods back here, but it’s such a mess. I don’t want to risk screwing up a crime scene.”
Fuck! Was there a body like Heather’s and the other girl dumped behind Fancy’s shop? Maybe it was one of the missing submissives who had disappeared before Heather. Brody glanced in his side view mirrors and did a U-turn. “I’m less than five minutes away. Don’t touch anything.”
“I won’t. Let me hang up and call the police. I’ll see you in a few.”
A few minutes later, Brody sped into the bakery’s parking lot. It must be a busy night because he’d beaten the cops there. This part of town was mostly shops which had shut down hours ago and there was very little traffic. That was one of the reasons he was glad Fancy hadn’t had insomnia lately, giving her the urge to bake in the middle of the night. Stopping near the back of the shop next to Corey’s truck, he threw the gear in park and killed the engine. Grabbing his Mag-lite from under the seat, he opened the door and jumped out. “Corey?”
“Yo, back here!” The man stuck his head around the corner of the brick building. “The cops are on their way, but apparently, the full moon is fucking with the call volume. Dispatch said they’ll get someone here as soon as they can and not to disturb the scene. You can kind of see it without getting too close, but it’s covered in a lot of brush.”
“Let me take a look.”
He rounded the corner and started walking toward where Fancy’s brother-in-law was pointing. As he passed the man, pain shot through him, and his legs buckled when nearly 50,000 volts of electricity from a Taser being held on his exposed neck coursed through his body. His hand lost its grip on the flashlight, and he dropped hard and fast to the ground as his muscles spasmed out of control. When the device cut off after five seconds as it was supposed to, he barely felt the needle that was stabbed into his upper arm. As he tried to figure out what the hell had just happened he sank into a sea of darkness.
* * *
Russell Adams watched helplessly as the bastard who’d stabbed him in the chest earlier picked up an unconscious Senior Chief Evans. Using a fireman’s carry, he loaded him into the bed of the retired SEAL’s Ford F-150. The man pulled a tarp from his own truck and covered Evans with it before starting the Chevy and driving away in it.
Despite his wound, which was slowly bleeding despite the dirty bandana he’d shoved in it, Russell tried to crawl his way through the wooded area to help the man who’d been nothing but kind to a fellow seaman. But the blood loss was making him weak, and he couldn’t go more than a foot or two before stopping. He’d seen the man before in Fancy’s shop, and according to the cute, blonde girl who worked with Fancy in the morning, the guy was the owner’s brother-in-law, and a city fireman.
Pain coursed through Russell’s body, forcing an unwanted flashback into his mind. Russell’s last tour in Iraq had been the worst. Assigned to Camp Bucca, one of the U.S. Naval bases in that part of the world, he’d been there through numerous attacks on American personnel, both on and off the base. They had been on constant alert for suicide bombers and Iraqis pretending to be allies, when in reality they were trying to get on the base to kill as many Americans as possible. Russell had lost one of his best friends in one incident, and missed being KIA himself by a mere five minutes. A suicide bomber had gotten close enough to one of the camp’s manned gates to kill three naval guards who had relieved Russell and two others from duty minutes before. That was when his PTSD symptoms had started taking over his life. Now medically discharged, he was wary of everyone—not a good way to be unless you lived on a deserted island.
Running footsteps caught his attention, bringing his mind back to the present. The assailant must have parked his Chevy nearby because he’d returned and was climbing into the driver’s seat of Evans’s Ford. Russell’s heart plummeted when the vehicle backed out of the parking space and took off as if on a Sunday afternoon drive.
His head spun, and he stopped to rest again. Going after the truck was not an option. Neither was calling for help—the bastard had searched his pockets and found the cell phone Evans had given him and smashed it to pieces, and pay phones were hard to come by these days. There had to be a way to save himself and the senior chief—there had to be.
Russell collapsed at the edge of the parking lot, barely out of the bushes. No one was around and even if there was, he didn’t have the strength to yell or get their attention. Maybe if he rested a bit, he could crawl across the lot and flag down someone driving by. Rest. . .just for a minute or two.
* * *
Glancing at his watch again, Boomer paced the parking lot in front of the Trident offices. Brody was fifteen minutes late, and that was highly unusual; the geek was never late.
Boomer pulled out his phone and hit the speed dial for his friend. “Hey, Egghead. It’s me again. Get out of Fancy’s bed, if that’s where you’re at, and get your ass to work. If I don’t hear from you in five minutes, I’ll head out and let you know how to catch up with me. See you in a bit.”
Hanging up, he climbed into his truck and started the engine. It was way too early to wake anyone else up. None of his teammates would appreciate a call at 0300. He could handle this detail alone as long as the guy they were supposed to be following didn’t notice he was being shadowed. That was why the team liked to use two vehicles in this type of situation…they could hopscotch and alternate tailing the subject. The only problem was the guy they would be tailing usually left at 4:00 a.m. when there was almost no traffic on the roads.
After seven minutes, Boomer knew he couldn’t wait any longer because it was a fifteen-minute ride to the target’s house. Putting the truck in drive, he left the compound. Once he reached his destination, if he still hadn’t heard from Brody, he’d send Ian a text. The last thing he wanted to do was wake the boss. It was like walking into a bear’s den shouting “hi, honey, I’m home”—not a good, fucking thing to do.
* * *
Devon strode through the door to his brother’s office, not even bothering to knock. “Any word?”
It was a rhetorical question; Brody had been missing for at least three hours and Ian would have let him know if the status had changed. After getting the early morning call from Boomer, the eldest Sawyer had gotten into his car and gone looking for their AWOL teammate. In their business and experience, a missing man usually spelled trouble.
The geek and his truck were nowhere to be found. His boss had let himself into Brody’s house to find it empty, then drove past Fancy’s apartment. Ian hadn’t wanted to awaken the woman and worry her unnecessarily, but it was getting to the point when they would have to question her.
“No. The computer’s not picking up any signal from his cell phone, and I drove all over the place trying to figure out where he might be. Cook will be here in about twenty minutes, but I can’t think of anything he can do that
I haven’t already done.” The new computer tech would need a starting point, and since they didn’t have one yet, he’d be spinning his wheels just like everyone else. “I swear I’m ordering tracking devices and implanting them in everyone’s ass around here. I’m fucking tired of people going off on their own and getting into trouble. Usually it’s the women around here, but the guys have done their fair share, too.”
Dropping into a visitor’s chair, Dev rubbed his tired eyes. You’d think after years of being a SEAL, he’d be used to functioning on little sleep. JD had been up half the night crying. Then after the baby was finally asleep, and his father had been just drifting off, Ian had called him at 4:45 a.m. “I’m worried.”
“So am I, brother,” Ian replied, the frustration in his voice was unmistakable. “But I have no idea where else to look for him. I’ve got Marco and the Omega team out searching the entire city for him. I called Chase Dixon, and he’s sending one of his guys to relieve Boomer, so he’ll be free in a bit. And I also just put a call in to Isaac Webb to put an APB out on Egghead’s truck. If you’ve got any other suggestions, I’m all ears.” They both knew the police usually wouldn’t take a missing person’s report until twenty-four hours had passed, at the very least, but thankfully, they had plenty of connections and were able to bypass the waiting period.
“Do you think this has anything to do with the missing submissives? I mean, is it possible this guy is targeting anyone in the lifestyle?” Devon didn’t know what to think. He didn’t think a serial killer would stray that far from his routine MO and victim type, but then again, he’d never before seen or heard of what the bastard terrorizing the BDSM community in Tampa was doing.
Ian sighed and stood, picking up his empty coffee cup. “I don’t know, but we have to consider every angle.” He was about to round his desk when the landline phone rang. Reaching over, he stabbed the speaker key. “Sawyer.”
“Ian, it’s Webb—”
Devon flew to his feet. “Did you find Brody?”
“No. But I may have a lead. Just got a call from a patrol car. He found a half unconscious guy in a parking lot with a stab wound. I pulled up at the same time as the medics. The guy had been alert enough to hand the officer a business card. It’s Evans’ Trident card. Before we could question him further, he passed out. I’m pulling up to the ER at Tampa General now. This guy’s going to need surgery as soon as possible.”
Grabbing his keys and cell phone from the desk, Ian said, “I’m on my way. Wait a second. . .what parking lot?”
“It’s for a few shops—a dry cleaner, a bakery and two other stores.”
As Devon’s eyes grew wide, Ian gut clenched. “Fancy’s Bakery?”
“Yeah, how’d you know?”
“Fuck, I’ll tell you when I get there. I’m on my way.” Ian disconnected the call and hurried out of the office with Devon on his heels. “What the fuck is going on?”
“No clue, but I’m going with you.”
Ian hopped into his car and sped out of the compound with Devon in the passenger seat sending out texts to update everyone. Ian just prayed the victim, whoever he was, held on long enough to give them a lead to Brody if he had one.
* * *
Ian and Devon strode into the ER waiting room and made a beeline for Detective Webb as soon as they spotted him standing with a uniformed officer. Webb turned their way, and Ian didn’t bother with pleasantries. “Did you talk to him?”
The tall, black man shook his head. “No. The paramedics said he almost coded in the bus. The doctors are still working to stabilize him before they send him to surgery.”
A “bus” was what medics and cops called an ambulance and “coding” was when a person stopped breathing and went into cardiac arrest. If this guy knew what happened to Brody and died before they could talk to him, they were screwed. “Fuck. What happened?”
The beat cop stepped forward. “I had the bakery on my list of properties to check during my shift. Apparently, the shop’s had a lot of vandalism lately.” Ian knew all about that so he nodded for the man to continue. “I was going to check behind the building, and suddenly I see this homeless guy on the ground at the back of the lot. Had just enough strength to flag me down, I guess. He was really out of it, and after calling for a bus, I got out the first aid bag and tried to stop the bleeding from a stab wound to his chest. I think the only reason he’s still alive is he stuffed a bandana in the wound and laid on his stomach which slowed the bleeding. He kept grabbing for my hand—I thought he was trying to stop me from treating him, but then I noticed this in his hand.” The man held up a clear evidence bag with a dirty and bloody business card in it…Trident Security, Inc., Brody Evans. “Then he managed to speak, but all he said was ‘help him.’”
“‘Help him’ as in ‘help me?’ Or ‘help him?’” Ian asked for clarification.
The officer shook the evidence bag in his hand. “I understood it as ‘help him.’ As in help Brody Evans. That’s all I got as the medics pulled up and took over.”
“All right. Thanks, officer.”
The man nodded then went back to his paperwork. Ian turned to Webb and was about to ask something when a nurse opened the door leading to the treatment area. “Detective?”
Webb approached the woman. “Yes?”
“The doctor wants to send the patient up to surgery, but he’s awake and won’t leave until he talks to a police officer. You have to hurry.”
She held the door open for the man, but when Ian began to follow, she tried to stop him. “Sir, you can’t—”
“Yes, he can,” Webb told her over his shoulder. “He’s with me.”
Ian was glad the detective intervened, because there was no way he wasn’t going to talk to the injured man, and he would’ve raised hell if he had to. When they entered the trauma room, the man was lying on a gurney with two nurses and a doctor doing everything they could to keep him alive. They were attaching the portable monitors and IV bags to the stretcher for transport. His hips and legs were covered with a white sheet, and a pressure bandage was taped over his wound. IV tubes and monitor wires snaked from various parts of his body to whatever they were connected to. Beeps came from several devices, indicating the man was still alive.
When the detective stepped forward, one of the nurses said to him, “According to his Navy dog tags, his name is Russell Adams. You need to make it quick, we have to get him to surgery.”
Upon hearing his name, Adams opened his eyes. Webb stood near the head of the gurney where he could be seen. “My name is Detective Webb, Russell. You wanted to talk to me?”
“Y-yes.” The injured man’s voice was raspy and filled with pain. “H-help him.”
“Help who? Brody Evans?”
Adams weakly nodded and then swallowed several times trying to gather moisture in his mouth to speak. “Kid-kid. . .nap.”
Webb’s eyes went to Ian’s in alarm and then back to Adams. “Kidnapped? He was kidnapped?”
“Y-yes.”
Several monitors began blaring at once as Adams gasped for air. The doctor and nurses pushed the two men out of the way to get to their patient. Using his foot, the doctor unlocked the gurney and began rolling it toward the door. “We have to get him to surgery now, or we’ll lose him.”
Adams’ hand shot out to weakly grab Ian’s arm. “Fire. . .f-fire. . .m-man.”
The staff raced the gurney to the elevator as Ian and Webb stared after them. “Fireman?” the detective asked. “What the hell did he mean by that?”
Ian shook his head and then led the way back to the waiting room. “I have no fucking clue, but you bet your ass I’m going to find out.”
While they had been in the trauma room, Boomer and Marco had arrived and joined Devon. The three men stopped talking when Ian approached. “Do any of you know what this guy meant when he said a fireman kidnapped Brody?”
“Fuck!” The curse was spat out by both Boomer and Marco, but it was the latter who scrambled to explain. “Fancy’
s brother-in-law, Corey Maguire, he’s a fireman. It’s got to be him. I knew something about that guy didn’t sit right with me, but why the fuck would he kidnap Brody?”
“I don’t know, but it’s time to pay Fancy a visit, and she better not be involved in this. . .whatever this fucking is.”
Chapter 21
Fancy’s jaw dropped as she pulled into the parking lot and saw two patrol cars and a crime scene unit. Sal was standing with one of the uniformed officers and the relief she felt when she saw he was okay was brief. What the hell had happened this time? It couldn’t be another vandalism, not with this much of a response.
Her gut clenched as she parked and hurried over to find out what happened. “Sal—”
He held up a hand, stopping her from asking the question on the tip of her tongue. “It’s Russell, Fancy. The homeless veteran. He was assaulted sometime last night, back there.”
She gasped. “Oh my God! Is he okay? What. . .who. . .”
The female officer hung up the cell phone she’d been talking on and stepped toward her. “Are you Fancy Maguire?”
“Yes, I’m Fancy. What—”
“I need you to stay here, ma’am. There’s a detective on the way to speak to you.”
Fancy was confused as she glanced around trying to make sense of what was happening. “To me? But I wasn’t even here. I don’t even know what’s going on. Is Russell okay?”
“I don’t know, ma’am,” the officer replied. “All I do know is they’re taking him to surgery, and Detective Webb wants to speak to you specifically and told me to wait with you.”
She didn’t like the sound of that. It was almost as if they thought she was the person who had hurt the homeless veteran. She’d never hurt a fly. Pulling her phone out of her purse, she called the one person she needed right now—Brody. She groaned inwardly when the call went to voicemail. He was probably still on that detail which had started in the wee morning hours. Not wanting to worry him until she could actually speak to him or had more information, she hung up without leaving a message.
Tickle His Fancy: Trident Security Book 6 (Trident Security Series) Page 19