“Whatever. Let’s go.”
Georgia lifted her head, watched as the first guy climbed out the destroyed bay window, disappeared over the edge.
She shoved herself to her knees as her attacker approached the window, bracing his palms against what was left of the casing before swinging his bad leg over the ledge. Georgia pushed herself to her feet. She couldn’t let him go. He’d had orders—they’d wanted Parker alive. Odds were the guy knew where they’d take Parker. What they wanted from him.
Before she could think better of it, she charged, slamming into the guy’s broad back and sending them both flying through the window. Georgia had four seconds of air time to regret her decision before she bounced off a compact wall of muscle and slammed her head against unforgiving brick.
An engine revved and tires squealed, the van speeding away as Georgia lay on her side, every breath a painful gasp. She stared at the unmoving form next to her. She didn’t care what it took or what it cost her.
One way or another, she was bringing everyone home.
“Are you out of your mind?” Isaac yelled as he appeared over Georgia, blood streaming from a cut along his hairline. Georgia could do little more than groan. Everything hurt. Isaac pulled her up to a sitting position. “Anything broken?”
Everything? “I don’t think so.” She winced as the skin along her right side tugged and pulled. Road rash had torn up part of her forearm and scraped away the flesh at her hip. Thank God for winter. If she hadn’t been wearing so many layers, the damage would have been a lot worse. “Get me out of these?” she asked, indicating the zip ties still holding her wrists together.
“Yeah, give me a second,” Isaac said, then disappeared through the open back door. Georgia took a moment to sit and breathe through the pain. She was going to be black and blue for weeks, and she was damn straight lucky she hadn’t broken or dislocated anything. But even as her T-shirt stuck to the scraped skin on her arm and her jeans dragged against the destroyed flesh at her hip, she stared at the guy laid out next to her and decided the price had been worth it. Getting to Parker, as fast as possible, had to be her priority.
They won’t kill him, Georgia reminded herself. Not yet.
It didn’t take Parker’s IQ to figure out why Brandt had suddenly switched tactics. The minute Parker disabled his program, the target on his back quadrupled. Brandt had gambled everything on that program—and, according to Ethan, made an awful lot of money. He wasn’t going to give up his cash cow unless he absolutely had to. He needed Parker alive to restore the program’s functionality.
Which bought Georgia some time to figure out what to do.
Cold, hard dread formed a fist in her stomach. Every minute Parker withheld the program was a minute longer he lived. But at what cost? Brandt had to feel the noose tightening—taking Parker instead of leaving the country was an enormous risk. Georgia didn’t want to imagine what lengths Brandt would go to in order to make it pay off.
Isaac strode out the back door, a pair of scissors in hand, then knelt behind her and released her wrists. “I called it in. Feds are on their way.”
Georgia stood, bracing a hand against Isaac’s shoulder when the ground shifted uneasily beneath her feet. “Shit,” she said, pulling away from him when he tried to grasp her forearms and lead her back toward the house. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
“Done what?” Isaac asked, anger tightening his face. “Called the authorities? Or helped you up?”
Georgia rolled her eyes. “We don’t have time for this.” She carefully approached the man on the ground. “Go get my phone. I need to make a call.”
“You need to sit down before you fall down.”
“I’m fine. But we don’t have a lot of time to get answers.”
“Let the authorities handle it, Georgia. They’ll get to the bottom of this, have Parker released and Brandt arrested.”
Georgia shook her head. He didn’t get it. And she didn’t have the time or energy to argue with him. The minute the cops arrived, Georgia lost all opportunity to be the one asking the questions. Reasonably assured her attacker was still out cold, Georgia knelt and removed a pair of plastic cuffs from his belt, looped them around his wrists, and cinched until his hands were neatly secured behind his back. He groaned when she grasped him under the shoulders and hefted, breathing hard and panting through the pain, until he more or less sat upright.
“I need my phone,” she told Isaac, gesturing back toward his office. “It’s in my bag by your desk. You’ll recognize it; it’s the ‘ugly’ messenger you always hated.”
“It wasn’t the bag, Georgia,” Isaac said quietly.
She waved him off. “Whatever. My phone.” She knelt in front of the man she’d secured, watching as dazed eyes blinked open, and his forehead wrinkled in pain. “I need to call Ethan, update him on the situation. So please,” she said, putting all the force she could behind the word, “just get my bag.”
“Fine.” Isaac sighed, striding off toward the house, cursing under his breath as glass, wood, and general debris crunched beneath the bottom of his handmade shoes.
Georgia waited, watching until he disappeared inside. It would take him a minute to find her bag in the wreckage of the office, and though she did need to call Ethan, she needed the uninterrupted time with the man coming around even more.
She had maybe five minutes to get answers before chaos descended and her window closed.
“Hey.” She shook the shoulder beneath her hand, getting little more than a grunt and a string of curses in response. “Hey.”
He mumbled something she didn’t quite catch.
Shit. She needed him coherent now.
Fine. Georgia reminded herself the only thing that mattered right now was finding Parker, and she pressed her thumb against the gunshot wound she’d inflicted.
He jerked to full awareness on a strangled shout, reflexively curling in on himself and drawing away from the pain.
“Where’d they take him?” Georgia asked, easing up the pressure a fraction.
Clear blue eyes looked up at her from an all-American, midwestern face. Blondish hair. Square jaw. He looked . . . nice. The lines along his eyes and mouth indicated he smiled a lot. Her hand slipped, and his face relaxed. God, she didn’t want to do that again.
“Where did they take him?” she asked again, praying he’d just cooperate. Make things easy for both of them.
“Ugh. Go away.”
She squeezed her eyes shut and dug her thumb into his flesh until he squirmed.
“Stop.” He jerked, his legs kicking out and his body tensing.
Doesn’t matter, she told herself. Parker does.
“Just tell me where you were supposed to take Parker.”
“Or what?” The guy panted through heavy breaths he forced into laughter. “You’ll tickle me some more?”
Georgia winced but didn’t let up the pressure. Couldn’t.
“Tell me and I’ll stop,” she said, using the palm of her hand to amplify the pressure even as she dug her thumb more deeply into the wound. “I just want to know where.”
“Yeah. No.” He trembled beneath her hand, his body spasming and sweat breaking out along his brow. “Not happening.”
She narrowed her eyes. “I’ll—”
“What? Torture me?” He grated out something that sounded like a laugh. “Honey, you don’t have it in you. You can’t wait to let go, wash your hands, and pretend this never happened.”
“You think I don’t have the stones?” Georgia asked, grinding her thumb into muscle. Praying that every curse, every jerk, every grunt of pain she extracted was one less Parker would have to pay.
“Not about balls, sweetheart,” he said, jerking his head back and forth. “You bodychecked me out a fucking window with your hands tied behind your back. You got a bigger pair than most. But you don’t have the thirst.” He looked up at her, focused on her face. “You’re desperate but not sadistic.”
“Doesn’t matte
r,” she said.
“Trust me,” he said, his expression slamming into her, pinning her with the absolute conviction of experience, “it matters. Torture? The kind that makes you want to peel off your skin with a paring knife just to escape it? The kind that convinces a man to say anything, everything, just to make it stop?” He shook his head. “You gotta embrace it. Enjoy it. Love every moment, every shudder, every drop of fear.” He smiled at her. “You don’t have it in you. Lucky me.”
“Maybe not,” she said, doubling down on the pressure in his leg. The muscles and tendons of his neck snapped tight, bulging in protest. “But you’re right. I am desperate.”
But desperate enough? She couldn’t lose anyone else. Couldn’t bury anyone else. The grief, the failure, the loneliness, they’d wreck her. There’d be no coming back, not this time. She just wouldn’t want to. She was barely hanging on as it was. So what choice did she have?
“Where did Brandt take him?” she asked, doubling down on her resolve.
Finally, a reaction. Startled brown eyes met hers. “Charles Brandt?”
The question was enough to loosen Georgia’s grip. “He’s the one who gave the order.”
The guy shrugged.
Georgia paused. But if that were true, he wouldn’t have been so surprised when she said Brandt’s name. “Who are you?”
“You mean aside from the guy you’re fingering?” he asked, hiding his pain behind cocksure arrogance and a frat-boy sense of humor.
“Besides that,” Georgia said, holding her hand against his bullet hole, ready to push if he didn’t start talking.
He shrugged. “No one special.”
She didn’t buy it. Not for a second. He’d snapped to attention the moment she mentioned Brandt’s name. But why? Why was he surprised? “I want to know who you are and why you’re here. Now.” She let her fingers dig into the muscles around his wound.
He flinched, his face going white and ashy even as he tried to keep his tone casual. “I thought you wanted to know where we were taking your friend.” He tsked. “First rule of interrogation, babe, one question at a time.”
“Fine,” Georgia said, digging her palm against the wound. “Parker first.” She ignored the way he writhed and jerked beneath her palm. She was done playing. Done hesitating. She didn’t care who this guy was or why he’d been sent. Parker was what mattered. Everything else could wait.
“Jesus, Georgia, stop,” Isaac said, grabbing her by the shoulder and pulling her back. “What the hell are you thinking?”
Georgia jerked away. “I need to know where they took Parker.” She turned to the man on the ground, but Isaac grabbed her by the shoulder and forced her toward the house. Stepping away, she rounded on him—all her fear, adrenaline, and agony surging to the forefront. “I need answers—not hours or days or weeks from now when the feds sort through all the bullshit and figure out what we’ve known all along—now!”
“You can’t have them. Not like this.”
Screw him. Their entire relationship had been one long stream of things Georgia couldn’t do, couldn’t have, or couldn’t be. “You don’t get to tell me who I am, Isaac, or what I can and can’t do.”
“No,” he agreed, shaking his head. “But I know you, Georgia—”
“The hell you do.”
He ignored her. “I’ve known you a long time, since before Will died. Before you forgot what it was like to trust other people.”
“Fuck you, Isaac.” She trusted people. She just trusted the wrong ones.
“You’re loyal to a fault, and I didn’t see that until too late.” He grabbed her by the shoulders, holding her still.
“If you really believe that, then you know why I have to do this,” she said.
“And I know what it will cost you. I know the ways it’ll eat at you, haunt you, destroy you. The cost is too high.”
“Move,” she said, trying to step around him as the first sirens echoed in the distance. “Get out of my way, Isaac.”
“No.” He grabbed her by the wrist, swinging her around until she was back where she’d started. “You’ll get your answers—I’ll make sure of it. But not like this. Not doing something you’ll hate yourself for when all is said and done.”
She wanted to take a swing at him. To drive an elbow into his gut until all he could spew was air.
“Why do you even care?” she asked, anger throbbing through every inch of her, pushing her to do something, anything. “They came into your house. Beat the shit out of you. Destroyed your precious office. So why the hell do you care what happens to him?” Georgia asked, pointing at the guy on the grass.
“Henry,” he chimed in helpfully.
Georgia glared beyond Isaac. Henry sat in the grass, breathing heavily, with a cocky grin on his face he probably thought was charming.
“Don’t do this, Georgia,” Isaac said, drawing her attention back. “Brandt’s not worth it.”
Tears stung the back of her eyes. Not worth it? Maybe not to Isaac. But he didn’t know Parker. Didn’t know his character, his strength, his laugh. Didn’t know all the ways he’d touched her. Couldn’t possibly understand how he’d changed her. Even now, drowning under the agony of Parker’s lie, knowing it would never, could never, be the same between them, she couldn’t let him go. Couldn’t stand the idea of him hurt, scared, or alone.
She hated him, even as she cared about him. And no matter what lies he’d told, no matter how thoroughly he’d destroyed her, Georgia couldn’t stand the idea of someone hurting him. Torturing him. Breaking him down until she didn’t recognize him anymore.
And they would. She knew they would. If Parker didn’t believe in his ability to withstand, to hold out—if he didn’t embrace the idea that the next several hours would test his mental stamina to the very limits . . .
It would kill him, one way or another.
She couldn’t help Will. Not right now, not in this moment. But she could help Parker.
Sirens pulled up outside, wailing from the front of the townhouse. Too late.
“Look, just give it a little time,” Isaac said, pressing her phone into her palm as agents filed through the house and out the back door. “We’ll get answers. We’ll find Parker.”
Just wait. That’s all she’d ever done. Waited for her parents to come home. Waited to be found. Waited to be enough. Waited for answers.
Well fuck that. She was done waiting.
She dialed Ethan’s number. He answered on the first ring. “How’d it go?”
She straightened her shoulders, forced a reply past the heavy weight of the sob lodged in her throat. “They took him.”
But they couldn’t keep him.
“I’m on my way.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
When they’d grabbed him off the street, Parker had known what was coming.
When they’d strapped him down, ankles and wrists bound to the plywood beneath him, he’d prepared himself for the inevitable.
When the black hood slid over his head, obscuring his vision and drawing every sense in close and tight, until all he could hear was the frantic pattern of his own breath, he’d reminded himself that Brandt needed him alive. Needed him cooperative.
Reminded himself that torture, no matter what kind, was meant to break him mentally.
Logic. Reason. Endurance. All things Parker had in spades. All things that should have made the cloying press of the hood, the brutal spray of water, the all-consuming fear of drowning, easier to handle.
Bullshit.
It was all bullshit.
Water hit his face, forcing soaked fabric against his mouth and nose. Like every time before, Parker held his breath and shook his head, thrashing in his bonds until the unforgiving cuffs cut into his exposed and already damaged skin.
When the water stopped, he coughed and sputtered, reaching for the air just beyond the heavy weight of the waterlogged hood. Every breath was thick, wet, labored. A fight to breathe even as the torment relented.
�
�You’re wasting my time, kid,” Brandt said, his voice near. Parker could picture him, leaning against the wall, carefully protecting his suit from the water, wiping his glasses on the microfiber cloth he kept in his pocket—something he routinely did when stuck in a meeting or situation he felt was beneath him.
Prick.
Parker gasped, his chest heaving as his sinuses burned.
“Just enable the program, and this is over,” Brandt said on a sigh, as if Parker’s resistance was little more than an irritant to be dealt with then brushed aside.
Parker shook his head, reminding himself what was at stake.
My tech, my responsibility.
“Go again.” The words had barely registered before the water was back, splashing over Parker’s face in a steady torment he couldn’t escape.
His lungs burned as he struggled and failed not to inhale water.
You’re not drowning. You’re not drowning.
But he was. Slowly. Agonizingly. Drop by drop, he was drowning, but without the relief of unconsciousness or a last, fatal breath to fill his lungs with water instead of air. Brandt’s men were too controlled for that. Too skilled. They’d done this before.
They wouldn’t screw up. Wouldn’t let Parker die.
Instead, they’d let him dangle between worlds, between life and death, consciousness and unconsciousness. Trapped in the moment where everything was heightened—every sense sharp, insistent, and so painfully vivid. Every nerve screamed he was drowning, even as his rational mind insisted he wasn’t, couldn’t. There wasn’t enough water; he wasn’t submerged. It wasn’t real.
The harder he fought the idea, the more he tried to rationalize his way through the experience, the worse things got. Logic and intelligence warred with instinct and primal fear.
A break. Blessed air flooded his mouth and nose and lungs as he gasped.
Then water hit his face, its greedy, clawing fingers snatching away his relief and sliding down his nose and over his tongue, jerking his gag reflex to the fore until he thought he’d be sick.
Over and over again, the fear won, until even the rationalization that Brandt wouldn’t let things go too far, would never kill him without retrieving the program, only fed the frenzied panic of his thoughts.
Defenseless (Somerton Security #1) Page 25