And not just the right woman. The perfect woman. And there could be only one perfect woman.
Her.
CHAPTER 8
Harper
What in the hell just happened?
The thought kept playing through my mind as I drove home.
Earlier this morning I was single and had a stalker. Two very less than desirable things to have in a woman’s life. It wasn’t even dinner time and the stalker was taken care of as was my relationship status.
Mason insisted I was his girl now. It was so sudden and the idea of it made no sense. If you would have told me yesterday that some guy would be trying to claim me tomorrow I would have turned and run a million miles in the other direction. But this wasn’t some guy. It wasn’t a guy at all. It was a man. A real man. A man who was there to help me out, and a whole, whole, whole lot more.
I knew a good thing when I saw it and Mason was it. But he was more than a good thing. He was an amazing thing. The best thing.
I basked in the afterglow of meeting him and all the different pleasures that brought. The drive home felt like I was floating on cloud nine. There could have been rush hour traffic at its worst. I wouldn’t have even noticed. My head was still in the clouds.
I needed to make it home quickly to take a shower and get my dress for tonight.
Finally, something to look forward to. He wanted me back over at his place tonight. All he promised was dinner by the fireplace. He told me to leave the rest up to my imagination. An imagination that was working a mile a minute.
I couldn’t wait to get back to him. To feel his kiss. To feel him inside me. And to feel that warmth, safety, and comfort of being inside his arms. His strong, masculine arms.
My car seat was getting wet just thinking of it.
I pulled up to my block and parked. I engaged the lock and went to my door. I unlocked the door and stared at the unopened mail on the floor. Bills. Even they couldn’t bring down my mood.
I headed for my room to grab some things for after my shower. A shower I was very much looking forward to.
I entered the room and just as I reached to flick on the light…whack!
My whole world went black and I felt myself falling.
CHAPTER 9
Mason
Three months later
Local law enforcement hadn’t been able to find her. They had her stalker in custody when she was abducted so he was ruled out. But not by me. I wasn’t taking any chances. I had eyes and ears on everybody. Everybody except her, but I wasn’t giving up. I was determined to find her. She was my woman. When I told her that she was mine that day I meant it. Not mine for the afternoon, or the week, or the month, or the rest of that year. She was mine forever. And it immediately became my life’s mission to find my woman.
I handed off all my incoming calls and jobs to a SEAL buddy. I had no idea what was going on with them, and frankly, I didn’t care. I only focused on one thing and one thing only. Finding her and bringing her home safe. Back to me. And once that was done there was sure as hell going to be some sick son-of-a-bitch that was going to pay. I would make sure of that.
But all that mattered first, was finding her. Bringing her back to me safely.
I had traced her route back dozens of times. I had been inside her apartment dozens more. I continued paying her rent, hoping a clue might show up. Something. Just one little thing that would point me in the right direction. Just get me on the way to finding her. Just one step closer. Just a string that would unravel that whole ball of yarn.
No fingerprints. No DNA. No witnesses.
Not even any surveillance cameras in the area. How was that?
Gone without a trace was the official word. But I wasn’t buying it. There was a trace. It was just up to me to find it.
I had lost twenty pounds. It would have been more if I hadn’t forced myself to eat. Partly I didn’t eat out of anger and longing, and partly because I was working around the clock trying to find her.
And I forced myself to maintain my daily workouts. I had to be strong for the moment when I confronted her captors. I didn’t know how many men I’d be up against in that moment. I had to be prepared for anything.
Our time together had been so brief, yet so electric. We connected instantly, and not only in the physical way. It tore me up every day knowing she wasn’t with me, and not knowing where she was.
I had never felt so strongly over anything in my whole life. Her absence was tormenting me, twisting my entire body into knots. I looked like shit. Felt like hell. Though it all I kept going. Kept searching.
I was going to do whatever it took to find her. To bring her back to me. Safe and sound. Forever.
CHAPTER 10
Harper
Eight and a half months later
My captors couldn’t believe their luck.
Turns out my stalker was more than just a run-of-the-mill stalker, if there even is such a thing. He was somehow worse. Worse than that. He stalked but not only for his own purposes. He was hired help. He watched girls for a Russian human trafficker.
I was to be shipped in a container off to Dubai to work the high end clubs. There I would be subjected to the worst kind of sexual depravity imaginable. There was another girl captive in my makeshift cell who told me what to expect. She had escaped, only to be found just a few weeks later and captured again. She was going back. Back to her personal hell. She was sad, but she said she was nearly resigned to her fate.
I told her to keep fighting. I told her to never give up as we sat up at night hugging each other for warmth. I said these words partly to comfort her, but also to comfort myself.
I was naive she would say. I had no idea what I was up against. She was right. I didn’t. But she also didn’t know who I had in my corner. Who I had fighting for me.
There was something special about the way Mason said I was his girl. How we were together now and forever. It had been so quick, and with any other man I would have been sure he would have forgotten about me long ago. Not Mason. Something inside me knew he was looking for me. He was coming for me. And he would find me.
I had to keep fighting. I had to stay brave until he arrived, because he would arrive. It was only a matter of time. He was the best of the best.
A strange thing had happened before I shipped out to Dubai. There was a delay at the port with our container. Apparently the docks were being watched much more closely for this sort of thing. I wondered if Mason was behind it. If he had pulled the right strings to tighten up regulations, or if he was the one doing it personally.
We were still miles away from any port. Never knowing the minute we might be taken in the night and driven off.
I didn’t think we were too far from my small town. From time-to-time I recognized the delivery boxes from which the guards ate. They were usually from one of the bigger cities, not far from where I was from. And a couple of the logos were restaurants that only operated in the region. I hadn’t been moved far…yet.
And then something even stranger happened. I began getting sick in the morning. They thought it was just the stress and adapting to the terrible conditions. I knew it was something more. I felt it inside me. It wasn’t just a normal sickness that would run its course. It was different. It was more.
And when they finally did perform a crude ultrasound it was confirmed. I was pregnant.
I was beyond terrified. I thought for sure this would be a death sentence for me. How could they use me with a baby in my stomach? How could I make them money? And of course even worse was the idea of bringing a child into this life I now lived, if you can even call it a life. It was merely an existence, if even that. Survive the next minute. Survive until the next hour. Survive until the next day.
“You lucky lucky,” one of the guards said one day. “You have girl in there. Baby girl. We get good money. You live.”
They had sold my baby. My baby. Took it like it was their own, and disregarded it like it wasn’t.
I cr
ied myself to sleep at night. What would happen to the life I was going to bring into this world? What would happen to me?
I had been so close with Mason. I had found my happiness and it was snatched away from me with just that one taste. That one afternoon.
They tried to break me, but I just thought of him. Mason. He would come for me. I knew it. It was just a matter of time. He was the best of the best. He would find me, and when he did these men would pay for what they did. Pay for not only what they did to me, but to all those poor women over the years.
It was only a matter of time until he found me. Until he scooped me up in his arms. Only a matter of time…but time was running out.
CHAPTER 11
Mason
I opened the cupboard. Empty. Fuck, I had eaten all my canned tuna again. Too late to make a run for the grocery store. It would have to be the other staple in my diet since Harper went missing. Delivery.
I hit the number stored on speed dial, and was told it would arrive in over an hour. What the fuck? It’s always thirty minutes or less. That’s their thing. Apparently tonight it wasn’t. I was told there was a big order that had called in just front of mine. I reluctantly agreed to the wait.
I hung up the phone went to shut the cupboard. When I came in front of the opened doors something caught my eye. I just stared at it there, sitting in the back of the cupboard. That bottle of champagne I had bought for that night. What was to be our first night together. I was so amped up for that night. Our night. The night that never came.
I vowed I would keep that bottle of champagne until our night did come. It was only a matter of time. Everybody makes mistakes, and when her captors do I’m going to know it. I’m going to pounce. And Harper will be here with me in front of the fireplace drinking champagne, just like I planned. We were going to get our first night together. I was going to make damn sure of it.
I made my way over to the couch. I was exhausted from the day’s search. Going through folder after folder of documents. Making calls. Another day had passed without a lead. But every ‘no’ was one step closer to a ‘yes.’ A ‘yes’ we have some information for you. A ‘yes’ we’ve seen that girl. A ‘yes’ we know where that girl is.
I thought about all the big cartels we’d gone against when I led my SEAL team. The hostages we’d rescued in the far corners of the earth. I prayed she wasn’t in one of those hell holes. I prayed she was okay.
The doorbell rang. I looked at the clock. Damn, ninety minutes had already passed. My mind had wandered. My subconscious running through scenarios of where she might be.
It was the same delivery boy that it always was. A nice kid, and we’d gotten to know each other due to my late night need to eat after day after day of searching without taking out time for lunch. I would skip food all day, just looking. By nine or ten I would be famished and go to my canned tuna or opt for Chinese delivery.
He looked fidgety. In a rush.
I reached for my wallet. “You sure are busy tonight.”
“Yeah, big order. Last few months it’s like we’ve been feeding a small army.”
“Come again?” I said.
“The old Johnson house.”
“The one with the big bushes.”
“Yep. Ordering three or four times a week. Minimum.”
“Must be hungry,” I said.
“Must be,” he said. He took my money and beelined for his delivery car.
I closed the door and sat my food on the counter. I flipped open my laptop and pulled up the census records for town.
Old man Johnson had lived there alone for the last few years before he passed away. The place was bought a year ago. Strange thing was it wasn’t bought by a person, but by a Delaware corporation. Somebody’s hiding something.
I pulled up the tax and zoning records. A few clicks later I was looking at the blueprints to the home.
Shit! A big basement and concealed back exit which could easily be used to cut through some farmland which led to a county road and then straight to the highway. A perfect, concealed route. Fuck!
I grabbed my food and my tactical backpack which was always ready to go and made a quick break out the door and to my Jeep.
CHAPTER 12
Mason
I cut the headlights and shut down the engine fifty yards out.
The delivery car sped on down the road in the other direction. Damn, I hadn’t gotten a look inside, or at who answered the door.
There was no gate and the place was outside of town, so there wasn’t likely to be outside surveillance. Low profile is how these guys wanted to operate.
In a perfect world I’d case the place for a couple days and come up with a plan of getting inside and seeing what I find. Only problem…this isn’t a perfect world and if Harper was in there she could be here today, gone tomorrow. No way I’m taking that risk. And local law enforcement would need too much paperwork to back me up. Even with my connections it would take too long. And if we just went in Rambo style it would get thrown out of court.
There was only one course of action, not that I ever considered another. It was me and me alone. And I’m going in tonight.
I ran up to the perimeter of the house. Put my back against the exterior and counted to ten. No sounds. No one had been alerted. I stayed low and looked for a point of entry. The ground floor windows had been locked tight. Multiple locks and added security from the inside.
I ran back to the car. Guess we’ll have to try this a different way.
I took deep breaths as I approached the house. I needed to stay calm for the mayhem that was about to ensue.
I reached up and pressed the doorbell.
Twenty seconds later a man opened the door. He was still chewing.
“You forgot your wonton sauce,” I said.
He looked at me suspiciously and quickly made a move for the back of his jeans. The wrong move.
I ducked down and executed a sweep kick, taking him to the floor. I had him flipped over and cuffed with the plastic handcuffs I carry with me everywhere. Three seconds from the time he hit the deck to the time he was cuffed. I pulled a gag from my backpack and stuck it in his mouth. He passed out in under ten seconds.
I quickly surveyed the entry room. Yep, something wasn’t right. And the gun I pulled from him was Russian made. He was probably comfortable with it from his days in the Russian military. He looked like Spetsnaz. He was either Russian special forces or privately trained. Either way he wanted to keep me from something.
I felt the adrenaline inside me kick. It was the closest I had felt to Harper in over eight months. Eight plus long months. Something told me she was here, or she was here. And if she was I was going to get answers really quick. And these guys were going to pay.
I made my way to the doorjamb of the next room and waited. I counted three separate voices talking in-between bites. I knew from looking at the blueprint that I’d have to get through the kitchen to get to the basement.
The voices were low and muffled. Mostly just grunts in-between bites. There were three distinct tones indicating the three men, but I couldn’t make out their words, until finally I recognized one. Devochki. It meant girls in Russian. My blood boiled. I wanted to go in there right now, guns blazing, and take these dirt bags out. I had to stay calm. It was me against the world in here and I didn’t want to tip off any other guards who might be in other rooms. That and I could tell the voices were spread out. I couldn’t come at them all at once if I came in with just my fists. It would be too risky. I wasn’t taking any risks when it came to getting my girl back.
I heard the men eating for a solid twenty minutes. It was too much food. They’d have to use the bathroom at some point. I waited for them to get up. Three minutes later it happened. One man stood and pushed his chair back. I ducked behind the sofa and listened. I heard his footsteps as he walked right past me.
I matched him step for step in the hallway and waited just outside the door. I listened for him to undo his pants and be
gin. I flew through the door hitting him square in the temple. He didn’t have a chance to even scream. I had him cuffed and in the tub in under thirty seconds.
He was ethnic Chinese. One Chinese and one Russian. Not just that they were different nationalities, but they were big, burly dudes. Not as big and as burley as me, but you could easily see they must have both been special forces in their respective countries. Different countries. What was going on here?
Rescued: A Navy SEAL Secret Baby Romance (A Man Who Knows What He Wants Book #5) Page 3