Standing Fast

by Maggie K. Black

  “Do you know where you are?” he asked.

  “In a room with a guy I don’t know who happens to have a knife. Let me go,” she responded.

  “You’re twenty miles from town. In an old shipping container that someone converted to a building. It’s sitting in a graveyard of other containers in the middle of a forest that would be very easy to get lost in.”

  “I’ll take my chances. Let me go,” she repeated.

  “I have a vehicle. It’s parked a couple of miles from here. We’ll walk there, drive back to town and contact the authorities,” he said as if she hadn’t spoken.

  “You either didn’t hear me, or you misunderstood what I said. I’m willing to take my chances on going it alone.” She tried to pull away, but he didn’t release her.

  “I think you’re the one who misunderstood. We’re going together, because the men who brought you here aren’t playing around. I’m not sure if they plan to kill you or sell you to the highest bidder, but I don’t think either sounds like how you want to spend the rest of the night.”

  “Who are you?” she asked, running his words through her mind, trying to make sense of them. Kill or sell her? He was right. Neither of those things would be a good ending to her night.

  “Special Agent Sam Sheridan,” he replied. “I’m with the FBI.”

  “And you just happened to be hanging out in the middle of the woods right at the time when I needed help?”

  “Not quite.” He started walking, dragging her along beside him. She went mostly because she couldn’t free herself from his grip. She still wasn’t convinced his motives were altruistic, and she certainly didn’t believe he was with the FBI.

  “Then how about you explain how you got here at just the right time to help me? Because I’d really like to know.”

  “I’ll explain. After we get out of here.” He stepped into the alcove, pulling her with him.

  It was darker there, but she could see a door on the far wall. Closed. He pulled it open. Cold air wafted in, and she could see moonlit trees and blue-black sky. Freedom. Just a few steps away.

  She didn’t give herself time to think. She shoved into him, using her weight to try to throw him off balance. He was a head taller and probably a hundred pounds heavier, and he barely moved. His grip on her hand loosened, though. Just enough for her to yank free. She bolted, rushing out the door, ignoring his shouted command to stop. One step into the cold evening, and then she was falling. Off a raised platform, tumbling toward the ground.

  * * *

  Sam snagged the back of the woman’s flannel shirt, dragging her back onto the platform before she hit the ground. He didn’t have time to be annoyed with himself for giving her an opportunity to escape. He certainly couldn’t fault her for trying. In her shoes, he’d have done the same.

  Only, he’d have probably succeeded.

  She hadn’t stood a chance.

  Maybe five foot two if she stretched. A hundred pounds. Probably still trying to get feeling back in her hands and feet. She’d been bound tightly. Something he hadn’t noticed when he’d seen her being wheeled off an elevator and into a parking garage at Damariscotta Medical Centre. What he’d noticed was her paleness, her closed eyes, how completely her body was covered by a blanket. He’d also recognized the man who was pushing the wheelchair. Mack Dawson was a low-level member of The Organization. Something Sam knew because he was a member, too. Deep undercover. Cut off from the FBI Special Crimes Unit he worked for, he’d spent the past month posing as tech expert willing to do just about anything for the right price.

  He had a lot to lose if The Organization discovered him with the woman they’d kidnapped.

  Namely, his life.

  He was working alone. No well-trained team ready to back him up. The Organization, on the other hand, was multitiered and multi-membered with plenty of operatives living in and around Newcastle, Maine. Most of them were willing to commit murder if enough money was offered. He’d known that when he’d watched Mack shove the woman into the passenger seat of a small car. He’d known it when he’d made the decision to follow the car. Just to make sure the woman was okay.

  He might be posing as one of the bad guys, but he couldn’t shake the need to protect and serve. It had led him to work as a Houston undercover police officer and then to the FBI Special Crimes Unit. It had led him to Newcastle, Maine, and his assignment—finding proof that The Organization was kidnapping teenagers and shipping them to foreign locations where they were sold to the highest bidders.

  Now, it had led him here.

  To the middle of nowhere, trying to help a young woman who might be The Organization’s next intended human trafficking victim.

  Only, up close, with the moonlight falling on her face, she didn’t look young or desperate enough. The Organization preyed on teenage foster kids. Troubled. Troublemakers. Family-less. The kind of young people who—when they went missing from their foster or group homes—were considered runaways. Currently, the total was fifteen kids in two years. All of them gone without a trace.

  The woman he’d just freed from the shipping container didn’t look like a kid. She looked to be in her mid-to late-twenties. Clean clothes. Professionally cut hair.

  “What’s your name?” he asked, and she frowned.

  “Why do you want to know?” she replied, her voice thick and a little raspy.

  “Because, I’d rather not spend the rest of the night calling you lady.”

  “Ella McIntire,” she murmured, her gaze darting from him to the ground four feet below. “Thanks for not letting me fall on my face.”

  “Getting out of here would be a lot more difficult with you injured. Come on. The stairs are over here.” He turned to the left, walking down five rickety steps and onto pebble-strewn dirt. Several shipping containers stood in the weed-choked clearing, their rusting carcasses blocking his view of the woods beyond. He didn’t like that. He wanted a clear visual of the surrounding area.

  He also didn’t like the fact that the shipping container Ella had been left in had been set on cinder blocks and fitted with a door that had three locks and a dead bolt on the outside. He’d picked the locks easily, and he’d slid the bolt free, but he doubted someone inside could have escaped. Not through the door, at least.

  And that made him wonder if Ella was the first person to be locked in.

  Which made him think that she probably wasn’t.

  And that made him want to call his supervisor, Wren Santino, and ask her to bring an evidence team out. First, though, he had to get out of the woods and back to a place with cell phone reception.

  He eyed Ella, wondering if she was capable of walking to his vehicle. He’d parked a couple miles away, pulling his car off the road and leaving it hidden behind thick foliage.

  The distance itself probably wouldn’t be a problem, but they’d need to stay off the road, traveling through the trees parallel to it. That’s what he’d done on the way in—pushing through thickets and crossing a small stream. Not an easy hike for a someone who already looked exhausted.

  “I guess you have a plan for getting out of here. What is it?” she said quietly, eyeing the clearing. No expression on her face. No emotion in her eyes. Just pale skin and a few freckles, dark hair escaping a ponytail. Flannel shirt unbuttoned, a dark T-shirt beneath. Jeans. Boots. A splotch of what looked like blood on the side of her neck.

  He frowned. “What happened to your neck?”

  “I don’t know.” She touched her nape, and he took her hand, moving it so that her fingers were closer to the spot.

  “There,” he said. “It looks like blood.”

  “I still don’t know.” She shrugged as if it didn’t matter. “You were going to tell me about your plan?”

  “That’s a quick switch.”

  “From?”

  “You wanting to run away to you wa
nting to go along with my plan.”

  “I didn’t say I was going along with it. I said I wanted to hear it. Because this place looks about as remote as anywhere could be.” She turned a slow circle, probably taking note of the abandoned shipping crates, the weeds and trash littering the clearing, the thick forest that surrounded it. “And I’m not foolish enough to think I can find my way out alone.”

  “There’s a driveway in,” he said. “Just that way.” He gestured to the western edge of the clearing. “But walking out to the main road on it isn’t a good idea.”

  “You think the people who brought me here will return?”

  “One person brought you here, and yes. I do think he’s coming back. Probably with help.”

  “Help for what? Disposing of me?” She pulled her shirt tighter around her narrow frame, and he shrugged out of his jacket, dropping it around her shoulders.

  “I don’t know what they intend.”

  “You mentioned killing me or selling me off to the highest bidder. You must know something.”

  “I know neither of us wants to wait around to find out which option they choose. Come on. We need to get out of here.”

  “Do you have a phone? You could call the police. That would be a lot safer than trying to run,” she said.

  “There’s no reception out here. We’re too deep in the mountains. Put the jacket on. Let’s go.” He walked away, acting as if he expected her to follow.

  To his relief, she did, hurrying after him. Taking two steps for every one of his. Dry grass crackling beneath their feet, cold wind rustling the leaves of nearby trees. It was early autumn, but it felt like early winter—a cold crispness to the air that reminded him of winter nights on his grandfather’s ranch. Only back then, there’d been no villains lurking in the darkness. There’d been no hint of danger in the air. Those were the days when he’d been too young to understand how much evil the world contained, or how determined he’d one day be to protect people from it. They were also the days before his mother died and he was sent to live with his father. Forced to live with him. He’d have preferred to stay with his grandparents, but at nine years old, he’d had no say. The court had made the decision, and he’d had no choice but to abide by it.

  The woods fell silent as he led Ella into the thick tree-line that bordered the driveway. He stayed far enough away to be hidden from any vehicles that might come along. Close enough that he didn’t fear getting turned around or lost. The driveway was half a mile of gravel, deeply rutted from vehicles moving through. He’d taken a look after Mack drove away. Before he’d entered the shipping container and freed Ella. He’d wanted to see if there was an easy way to block vehicular access to the clearing and slow the return of Mack and his Organization pals.

  There hadn’t been, and this was the best he could do—freeing Ella and fleeing with her, praying they could get to his vehicle before The Organization’s henchmen returned. Low level thugs. Not the people Sam was after. He was after the top-tier members, the ones who called the shots and made the money. If he could bring them down, he could bring the entire Newcastle cell of the crime syndicate down with them. Blowing his cover wasn’t going to help him do that.

  He glanced at Ella. He’d give her credit, she was moving well, pushing through brambles and late-summer growth with grim determination. She’d done as he asked—putting on his jacket and zipping it to her chin. Her booted feet slogged through dead leaves and trampled dry branches. If she was tired or in pain, she didn’t show it, and she didn’t complain.

  But, alone, he could have moved at double the speed.

  His beat-up Chevy was well hidden. He wasn’t worried about anyone from The Organization seeing it. Not until he pulled out from behind the undergrowth and onto the two-lane road that wound its way through a mountain pass and back to town. Once he was driving, his truck would be easily seen and recognized. The Organization kept track of its members. Where they lived. What they drove. Who they spent time with. He didn’t want his truck seen anywhere near the location of their escaped captive. According to his paperwork, he was IT Specialist Sam Rogers, an old buddy of one of their low-level operatives, a guy who’d run drugs across the Mexican border during high school and college. Someone who might be willing to do anything for a price. He wanted to keep it that way.

  But at the rate he and Ella were going, his cover would be blown before the sun rose.

  “I’m slowing you down,” Ella said as he held a thick pine bough and waited for her to duck under it. “Why don’t you go on ahead? Once you get somewhere with cell reception, you can call the police to come for me.”

  “No.”

  “Why not? It’s a sound plan, and makes a lot more sense than both of us getting caught.”

  “That’s exactly why it’s not a good plan. I’m not leaving you here to face The Organization’s thugs alone.”

  “What organization?”

  “The Organization is the name of a crime syndicate that has cell groups all over the country. Newcastle is one of its newest,” he explained.

  “What would a crime syndicate want with someone like me?” she asked, breathless, struggling to keep up.

  “Funny, I was going to ask you the same question.”

  “I don’t have an answer, Special Agent Sheridan.”

  “Sam. And most crime syndicates don’t mess with people who aren’t of benefit to the organization.”

  “Benefit? What does that mean?”

  “Money. Favors—political or legal.”

  She snorted. “I’m a freelance journalist. I write human-interest stories for local newspapers and a few national publications. I also teach online writing classes for the community college during the fall and winter sessions.”

  “In Newcastle?”

  She hesitated, maybe realizing she was giving away personal information and not sure she should be doing it.

  “Not in Newcastle,” he guessed. “You don’t live in town?”

  “No.”

  “Look, Ella. I’m sure you think you’re helping yourself by keeping information from me, but I really do work for the FBI. I can find out anything I want to know pretty easily.”

  “I live outside Charlotte, North Carolina,” she muttered, and he wasn’t sure if it was the truth or a lie.

  “And you’re in Maine because?”

  “My cousin passed away a couple of weeks ago. I came to clean out her apartment.”

  “I’m sorry for your loss,” he said, offering a platitude that wouldn’t do a thing to ease her sorrow. He knew that, but it was all he had. Unlike the other members of the Special Crimes Unit, Sam wasn’t good or comfortable with the emotional aspects of the job. He’d been brought on board to work assignments like the one in Newcastle—undercover gigs that required someone who looked and acted the part the part of a criminal.

  “Me, too,” she responded. “But Ruby always said death was a beginning. Not an end.”

  “Ruby was your cousin?”

  “Yes.”

  “It sounds like she had the right idea about things.”

  “She did.” She fell silent. Not adding anything to that, her harsh breathing and stumbling steps reminding him that his pace was too fast for her. Too slow for him.

  The soft rumble of an engine broke the silence, and she tripped. He snagged her arm, keeping her upright and pulling her deeper into the shadows.

  “That’s a car,” she whispered, as if her voice might carry through the darkness and drift into the interior of the vehicle that was approaching.

  Gravel crunched beneath tires, and lights illuminated the forest up ahead. Someone was coming down the driveway. High beams on.

  He doubted the light would reach them, but he tugged Ella down anyway, crouching behind thick brush. She was inches away, her face a pale oval in the darkness, her eyes light-colored—blue or gray—and wi
de with alarm.

  “What are we going to do?” she asked, looking straight at him.

  “Wait until they pass.”

  “Once they do, they’ll figure out I’m gone. Then they’ll come looking,” she replied, her voice tight.

  “We’re almost at the road,” he assured her. “Far enough ahead that we should be able to make it to my truck without being seen.”

  “You would be able to if I weren’t with you.”

  It was true, but separating wasn’t an option, so he said nothing, just motioned for her to be still and silent as the lights drifted closer. They passed slowly, a few feet away, sliding across trees and bushes, and casting the world in yellow-tinged color. He could see Ella more clearly now, still just a few inches away, gaze focused toward the oncoming vehicle. Light brown hair threaded with red and gold. The splotch on her neck was dried blood over a purple bruise. A puncture wound of some sort?

  The forest darkened incrementally. Gold to gray to nearly black, and he knew it was time to move again.

  “Ready?” he whispered, but she was already up, sprinting ahead, pushing through foliage and disappearing into the forest. Heading away from the driveway, away from the road, deeper into forest that stretched for miles in every direction.

  He followed, not caring about making too much noise or drawing attention to their escape. He had to catch her before she got lost in a wilderness that was just as dangerous and deadly as the men who were after her.

  Copyright © 2018 by Shirlee McCoy

  ISBN-13: 9781488088049

  Standing Fast

  Copyright © 2018 by Harlequin Books S.A.

  Special thanks and acknowledgment are given to Maggie K. Black for her contribution to the Military K-9 Unit miniseries.

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