Finding His Mark (Stealth Ops Book 1)

by Brittney Sahin

  “Ender, wait!” Travis yelled. “The USB’s been destroyed!”

  The sentence held no meaning to her, but she prayed to God it’d somehow keep her alive.

  “Who has the code?” He pointed the gun at her and then switched it to Travis.

  “She knows five digits of the code, and I know the other five. It keeps us both alive,” Travis said.

  Code? A foggy haze secured itself in her mind like a self-defense mechanism that would protect her from pain if a bullet pierced her flesh.

  “And how do I know you’re telling the truth?”

  “You don’t. The question is can you take the risk?” Travis’s self-assured tone with not the slightest waver in it, almost comforted her.

  Murmured voices in another language continued as she thought about all of the things she still wanted in life and might never get a chance to experience.

  “Get her up,” the man growled, and her stomach muscles banded tight.

  She struggled, floundering like a wet fish on the dock as they lifted her. “Get your hands off me!” she begged once standing.

  The man referred to as Ender removed his mask, and she shut her eyes.

  Wasn’t seeing someone’s face the kiss of death—or was that only true in Hollywood?

  “Strip,” he demanded in a low, guttural voice that had her skin crawling. His black brows dropped as his dark lashes lifted, his eyes traveling the length of her body.

  “No.” She looked at Travis, hoping for a savior, not sure what the hell kind of mess she’d gotten herself into.

  “You didn’t make me strip. You can pat her down with her clothes on.” Travis’s voice was rough and intimidating, but the man cocked a gun her way and angled his head, ignoring him.

  “Fine. Tell me the code, and she can stay clothed.” The man edged closer to him.

  “Sure, so you can kill us both, here and now?” Travis’s face tightened, and a slow creep of redness spread up his throat and then deepened as if anger had burst through and he could no longer hold himself back.

  The man redirected his attention to Eva after a breathy huff fell from his lips. “Strip.”

  “Don’t make her do this.” Travis started to move in her direction, but two masked men roped their hands around his arms in an attempt to hold him back. He simply dragged them along with him. “Don’t disgrace a woman like this.”

  “Make her do it, or she’ll die. We’ll roll the dice as to whether you lied about the code or not.” Ender’s lips twisted into a grim sneer.

  “They’re making sure you’re not wired,” Travis said a moment later in a softer voice.

  “You can leave your undergarments on,” Ender said.

  She swallowed the rise of bile in her throat. The pain in her stomach traveled north and into her chest, and her entire body began to hurt. “Okay,” she surrendered.

  Eva slowly removed her jacket and bent forward to unzip her knee-length brown boots. Her fast pulse pricked her neck as she went through the motions of stripping down in front of complete strangers.

  The men forced Travis back to his knees. It took four guys to get him there. While he’d dropped easily in the driveway earlier, for some reason, he’d become more of a lion inside the cabin—ferocity filled his eyes.

  Her cold fingers reached for the hem of her long-sleeved sweater, and she nervously lifted it over her head. She immediately clutched it in front of her chest, but the man—Ender—stepped in and grabbed it from her. “You hiding something?”

  “No.” She could feel Travis’s eyes on her, but when she looked at him, he wasn’t staring at her body like she was sure the men in the room were—no, his eyes were burning with hate, with something dark and primitive. It was as if he were ready to charge at the men in the room and tear them to shreds.

  “Pants, too.” Ender motioned for her to hurry.

  As she unzipped her jeans, another masked man at her side began speaking in a different language. He held two phones in his hand, the one Travis had given her, plus her personal cell.

  Shit. “See, I’m okay.” She opened her arms wide as Ender circled her.

  She flinched when he snatched her glasses from her face and stomped on them with his booted foot—and then snapped a photo of her with his phone a moment later.

  “Get dressed. We’re going.” The burn of Ender’s gaze was like a hot iron on her skin.

  She scrambled for her clothes as the men forced Travis back to his feet.

  He whispered, “Sorry,” as he brushed past her on the way out.

  Sorry was reserved for spilling coffee on your blouse or for deleting your favorite show from the DVR.

  Sorry was not for getting you kidnapped and probably killed.

  Ender escorted her to the rental truck once dressed, and Travis was already sitting inside. His ankles were tied and his hands were behind his back, attached to something that appeared bolted to the floor.

  Before she knew it, she was positioned in the same way, but directly across from him.

  The door fell shut a moment later, and they were left alone in the dark.

  With her chin tucked against her chest, she closed her eyes and tried to come up with a plan. But she had a feeling she couldn’t write herself out of this mess. This was a serious plot twist in her life, and she was damn sure there’d be no happy ending.

  “Are you okay?” Travis asked once the engine purred and they were on the move.

  “Of course I’m not,” she hissed.

  “I’m sorry,” he said a minute later. “You were never supposed to get dragged into this.”

  “Four days early. Why did we have to finish filming four days early?” she whispered under her breath.

  She tilted her head back and squeezed the emotions down her throat, trying to find some sense of calm, but it was damn next to impossible.

  “Why’d you lie to them about me?” Tremors shot through her arms.

  “To keep you alive,” he said softly. “Otherwise they’d have put a bullet in your head and burned your body.”

  “Burned my . . .” She couldn’t even finish the sentence.

  She wasn’t on a TV show, she reminded herself. This was reality. But how could this possibly be her reality?

  She was boring.

  Flannel pajamas–History Channel–and–black coffee boring.

  Everly Reed was glamour, not Eva. And she hadn’t been Everly in three years.

  But God, after tonight, she’d give anything to have her old life back if it meant she’d live to see another day.

  “What’s your real name? I keep calling you Travis in my head, and I know that’s not who you are.” She narrowed her eyes, trying to see better. She could finally make out his shape, at least. His broad shoulders were hard to miss.

  “Luke. I’d offer to shake your hand . . .”

  Luke. It fit better. If he was telling the truth, of course. How could she ever believe anything he said? “What the hell happened back there? You owe me that much after I’ve been shot at, forced to get nearly naked, and—”

  “I’m so fucking sorry,” he rushed out. “You weren’t supposed to be there.”

  “You keep saying that, but this is insane.”

  “You’re going to be okay.”

  His steady voice should’ve reassured her, but how could they possibly be fine after all of this? “I think we’re outnumbered.”

  “Once my team realizes you’ve been taken, too, they’ll come get us.” Disappointment wrapped tightly around his words.

  “You don’t want them to come for us, though, do you?” Her body grew stiff.

  “I don’t want you getting hurt, which trumps whatever was supposed to happen.”

  “And what exactly was supposed to happen? Who is Malik? And what USB—or code—do they want?”

  A minute of silence swept the cool interior of the truck before he answered. “I can’t tell you anything. I’m sorry.”

  “Since these guys think I know half of this code, I o
ught to be clued in.” She was close to snapping like one of her younger brother’s worn-out guitar strings.

  “The less you know, the better, but I promise you’ll be safe soon. Why don’t you try distracting yourself while we wait for an extract?”

  “Distract myself?” Tears crept into her eyes. “And what do you suggest for a distraction? You have a harmonica on you? You want to sing folk songs?” She faked a laugh. “Right, you’re cuffed to the inside of a truck, and so am I. I’m thinking there’s nothing that will take my mind off our imminent death.”

  “You’re not gonna die.”

  She wished she could see his eyes; she was always good at reading people. “I’m thinking we are. Your so-called team won’t be able to find us because that man took my phone, and, I’m assuming, yours, too.”

  “My people are tracking me, don’t worry. They’ll need to wait for the right moment to rescue us. We’re driving in the mountains during a snowstorm, which makes things trickier.”

  “How can you be so calm right now?” She shut her eyes. “Are you government? Police? FBI? DEA?”

  “Something like that.”

  His words had her lifting her chin and opening her eyes. “Okay, so that’s good. Why didn’t you just tell me that?” She arched her back and shifted on her bottom, trying to keep her limbs from going numb. “Your people can outnumber these guys then, right?” She took a sobering breath.

  “It’s more about quality than quantity,” he said, his vagueness testing her nerves.

  Being in the dark with a stranger and some serious bad guys behind the wheel should’ve broken her; but somehow, she found herself clinging to hope. Without hope, she’d have nothing left, and so . . .

  “Why’d you rent my cabin? Why were you bait? Bait for what?” Her questions pinged off the metal walls, and she impatiently waited for his response.

  After a minute, he said, “None of that matters. Focus on staying calm. Okay?”

  She bit her lip, wishing she could click her heels like Dorothy and be back home right now. “If you really want to provide me with a distraction, at least talk to me. Tell me something. Anything.”

  But, of course, he remained quiet.

  “I’m screwing something big up, aren’t I?” Sudden guilt tugged at her heart. “Your people are only going to come for us because of me; you wanted to be taken, and so now . . . shit.”

  “This isn’t on you. Try not to think about it.”

  She shot him a humorless smile, forgetting he wouldn’t be able to see her. “Sure. You told me not to come. You told me to run in the woods . . . so this is my fault.”

  “No,” he said firmly, but he didn’t offer more than that.

  “If I didn’t ruin your plans, what would’ve happened?” She hung her head, knowing she was wasting her breath. The man probably couldn’t tell her anything if he was part of some three-letter agency.

  “Why’d you show up to the cabin?” he asked instead.

  “My job finished earlier than expected, so I wanted to come up here. I like the quiet. Being at the cabin always helps cure my writer’s block.”

  “You’re a writer?”

  “Yeah. I’m a showrunner for a TV series, but I’m also working on a screenplay. I’m stuck on the ending. Of course, you chucked my life’s work over a cliff, and so—”

  “You don’t have a backup?”

  “Yes, but it’s not going to be the same.”

  “Well, what’s your script about?”

  “You won’t talk, but you want me to?”

  “It’s that or silence. Take your pick.”

  “I’m not a fan of talking about myself,” she said softly a few minutes later.

  “Neither am I.”

  “No surprise there.” Her hands were officially numb, damn it.

  “But I wasn’t asking you to talk about yourself. I asked about your script.”

  “True.” Movies and TV had always been her entire world. Films were her comfort zone; even after she’d tried to escape the life, she’d found herself right back in it by working on SEAL Security. Destined to be, she supposed. “Well, it’s an action movie. Maybe you’d like it. It involves the FBI hunting down a serial killer.”

  “Not what I expected.”

  “Really?” A dark brow arched. “And why is that?” God, she was nearly forgetting where she was right now, her heartbeat even beginning to settle to its normal rhythm. “Do I have to be a guy to write an action movie?”

  “Didn’t say that.”

  “Well, what were you expecting?”

  “Something lighter. Happier.”

  “I guess looks can be deceiving.”

  “You have no idea,” he said in a low voice. “So, uh, what TV show do you work for? And what is a showrunner?”

  “A showrunner’s basically a writer and producer. I help come up with storylines, and then I’m on set during filming.” She’d give anything for tonight to have been a scene from the show instead of real life. “Maybe you’ve heard of it. SEAL Security.”

  “As in Navy SEALs?” There was a hint of humor in his voice, and it bothered the hell out of her.

  “Is that funny to you?” A slip of anger dug into her tone.

  “Not funny at all,” he said, but she could hear his smile, even if she couldn’t see it.

  “Well, I assure you, the show is very realistic.”

  “I’ve never seen it, and I wouldn’t know how true to life it is since I’m a businessman from Charlotte.”

  She snorted and then gasped at the sound she’d made. “I, uh—” The truck hit a bump in the road, cutting her off. They fishtailed, giving her a serious case of whiplash. Had she not been tied down, she probably would’ve flown across the truck and landed on his lap.

  “That’s them,” Luke said a moment later, his words stealing her breath and catching her off guard. “Tuck your chin to your chest.”

  “What? I don’t hear anything.” The truck flipped on its side a second later and her head banged against the wall. She looked up to see Luke hanging above her; his hands must’ve been still anchored to the truck behind his back. That had to hurt . . .

  There was no way the cuffs would hold his weight for much longer, though. She jerked her head to the side and closed her eyes when Luke crashed down on top of her.

  He looped his arms over her neck, the chain of his cuffs probably broken, and he pulled her in, shielding her with his body.

  Her teeth chattered and her limbs vibrated as the truck slid on the road, bouncing from side to side, most likely off the guardrails.

  Luke held her tight, her head beneath his chin, as gunfire rippled through the air like the popping of fireworks.

  Machine guns or rifles, she wasn’t sure, had her cringing with each blast, worried she’d get hit. The noise intensified, much louder than the props used on set earlier that morning.

  Everything happened lightning-fast once the truck finally stopped skidding along the road.

  “Don’t move,” Luke said into her ear, as bullets continued to ping the exterior of the vehicle like a tap dancer on speed.

  “Not like I can,” she cried, her shoulders flinching with every shot.

  The gunfire finally ceased, and a moment later, the sound of the truck door sliding open had her craning her neck to the side and away from Luke’s chest.

  Who was there?

  Friend or foe? At this point, could she distinguish between the two?

  A beam of light shone on her face, causing her to blink and avert her gaze. Luke lifted his hands above her head and shifted into a seated position before her.

  “Luke?” It was a male voice, and she had to assume he was a member of the good-guy team.

  “Is it over? Are we okay?” The desperation to live, to survive this hell of a night pierced through her words.

  “Yeah, it’s over,” the voice answered. “Anyone get hit?” the man asked once before them.

  “I’m okay,” she answered, surprised by the fa
ct that no bullet had penetrated the walls of the truck to shred her flesh.

  “I’m good,” Luke said.

  “I won’t hurt you.” The man began to work at her hands, holding a small flashlight between his teeth.

  “Took you long enough,” Luke scoffed as the guy untied her ankles.

  “Yeah, well, this was one situation we didn’t account for.” After freeing Eva’s hands and feet, he tossed Luke the flashlight and keys.

  Luke worked at the rope binding his legs, then removed the metal bracelets still circling his wrists, the broken chain attached dangling from one of the loops.

  Eva shook her arms at her sides, trying to revive the feeling within them, and then Luke took her by the elbow and guided her out of the truck.

  Harsh lights met her eyes from the SUV’s high beams positioned opposite of her.

  A shriek ripped from her throat when she noticed a dead body in the snow bank off to the side of the road, and she cringed and turned toward Luke, burying her face in his chest.

  His hand rubbed up and down the center of her back, the stroke of his fingers, even atop her jacket, somehow soothing her.

  “Are they all dead?” she asked, her words probably getting lost against his hard chest.

  But he answered, “Not sure. Can you give me a minute? Will you be okay?”

  He stepped back, and she peered up at him, the car lights from behind casting a glow around him as if he were some sort of savior. A hero, maybe. “I guess.”

  “Stay here and don’t move. Try not to look at anything, either, okay?”

  She swallowed the terror that stuck in her throat and managed a nod, then scanned the group of men walking around, dressed in tactical gear. Military-style fatigues and bulletproof vests. They had guns strapped to their legs, and some still had rifles in hand as they scoped out the scene.

  Eva spotted one woman amidst the group. She had a ball cap on, but her long hair was in a ponytail, and her eyes were focused on Eva, even though she was speaking to Luke. She spoke what sounded like German, and Luke answered her in the same tongue.

  “You good?” The man who had untied her was at her side now.

  “I’m alive, so I guess I’m okay.” She watched as more men appeared. They knelt alongside the dead body closest to the truck and lifted it.