by Angie Martin
When the men had brought her into the room what seemed like forever ago, they removed her blindfold and restraints. After shutting her in the bedroom, Sara explored the room, much as she had when she first woke up after Logan kidnapped her. The bedroom contained the standard, expected bedroom furniture: bed with an intricate, iron frame, large oak dresser with an attached mirror, matching bedside table, and an armchair in the far corner.
She checked the drawers of the dresser and bedside table, but found them empty. The closet also had nothing she could use as a weapon, and trying the mirror trick again without a towel to hold between her and the glass could prove painful. With nothing left to lose, she twisted the doorknob back and forth, but a lock prevented the door from opening.
Sitting on the bed, Sara’s anxious thoughts kept her company, until a key entered the lock on the door. Sara jumped off the bed, ready to face her kidnapper.
Stephen walked into the room and stormed toward her. Before she could get a word out, he grabbed her arms. Shaking her, he asked, “What the hell are you doing with Gabriel Logan?”
“He kidnapped me, him and some other men.”
“That was two days ago! His team is dead, and my understanding is he was very lax on your security. You could have easily gotten away from him.”
“I was scared, Stephen! I didn’t know what to do. He said…” Sara shuddered with her tears. “He said Dad was going to have me killed on our honeymoon and that you knew about it. Maybe you were even involved in it.”
Stephen let her go and walked around her.
“I didn’t believe him about you, but it still frightened me. I’m still not sure what—”
Her words faded at his laugh. “Son of a…” His laughter grew.
Sara’s brow creased and her stomach dropped at the rising pitch of his laugh. “You did know, didn’t you?”
He looked in her direction and smiled. “You are in way over your head here.”
Sara shook her head. Somewhere deep inside, she had held out hope that even if her father did put a hit on her, at least Stephen wouldn’t have been involved. But Logan had been right. Stephen knew all along. He knew while they wrapped up their wedding plans, while he made love to her the morning of her kidnapping, and while he lied to her about loving her.
“How much?” she asked.
“What?”
“How much did you and Dad pay someone to kill me?”
His tongue jetted across his lips as he stared at her. “$50,000.”
Sara’s jaw dropped at his admission.
“If it’s any consolation, that’s a large amount to pay for a hit.”
“Consolation? That you could even put a price on my life at all is…” Numbness crawled over her brain and she wandered away from him. Leaning against the wall, she said, “I can’t believe you were in on it. I thought you loved me, at least I wanted to think that. I was willing to spend my life with you, to try and love you. And you were going to kill me.”
“You weren’t going to die. Yes, Hugh took out the hit and wanted it to happen during the honeymoon, but I told him I could contain you.”
“Contain me?”
“The kidnapping was orchestrated to get to Logan. I told Hugh that we could use the hit to draw Logan out into the open and get him to kidnap you. Then, when he had you at the safe house, we would come in and get you. We didn’t anticipate a few mistakes that the team made or that Logan would get you out. You were never in danger there, though. I wouldn’t have let you die.”
Sara could only focus on Stephen’s earlier words. “Contain me? What does that mean?”
“It means that I could get you to take the teaching job or stay at home as a wife and mother and we wouldn’t have to worry about the accounts you worked on.”
“You paid someone to kill me on our honeymoon.”
“Yes, but I also talked Hugh out of killing you.”
“So, instead you used me as bait to get to Logan.”
Stephen moved over to her and caressed her cheek. “I know it’s hard for you to comprehend, but I never would have let someone kill you. You’re too important to me.”
“I’m only important to you so you can marry into my family.”
“That’s true, but my reasoning doesn’t make you any less important. Now that this is all done, we’re going to forget all of this and go on with our lives.”
“Go on with our lives? You mean get married and start a family, as if nothing has happened? After Dad tried to have me killed, which you knew about, and then you used me as a pawn in your sick little game?”
Anger flashed across his face and he tightened his hand around her arm. “I’m willing to admit I was wrong in helping your dad out with this and I’m talking him into keeping you alive, but you need to watch yourself. After things settle down from your reappearance, we will get married. If you want to live, you have no choice.”
Sara squirmed under his hold, the evil in his eyes terrifying her. She had never experienced that side of him and she didn’t want to keep provoking him.
“I want to live,” she said.
He loosened his grip. “That’s the right answer.”
She lifted her hand to rub her sore arm, and he snatched her wrist.
“Where the hell is your ring?”
“They… they forced me to give it them. I didn’t want to, but they made me. It must have burned up in the fire at the safe house.”
“This just keeps getting better and better.” Stephen huffed. “I guess we’ll have to get you a new one.”
Sara let out a shaky breath, grateful that he didn’t press the issue. “What are you going to do with Logan?” As soon as the question left her lips, she knew she had made a mistake.
The back of Stephen’s hand crashed into her cheek. “Logan is none of your concern. I never want to hear that name come from your mouth again.”
Salty tears crossed over her stinging skin and invaded her mouth. “I’m sorry,” she said, reaching for her cheek.
He stared at her for a moment. “Maybe you should see what we’re going to do with Logan. It will do you some good to understand just how lucky it is that you’re more use to me alive than dead.”
Stephen grabbed her wrist and dragged her down the steps to the basement. At the end of the dimly lit hallway, he opened a door. Bound to a chair, Logan sat in the middle of the concrete room. His hands were cuffed to the arms of the chair, while rope secured his legs to the chair.
Sara’s heart broke at the sight of his bloodied face and the swelling over his left eye. It appeared the men had continued their beating once he woke up here. She wanted to run to him and free him from the restraints, but Stephen’s arm circled her waist and held her to him.
“You see, babe,” he said into her ear, “your little friend here and I have a long history together. He’s been quite the detriment to your dad’s dealings over the past several years. He betrayed us in the worst possible way. These two men are going to make him suffer a lot before they let him die.”
Sara raised her eyes to the two other men, shocked to recognize one of them. “Jack!”
“Hey there, Sara,” Jack said. “Sorry about all the deception.”
Sara flinched at Jack’s matter-of-fact statement. He didn’t seem to care about the gravity of his involvement. Logan believed he had lost his friend, yet he was alive and working for both Stephen and her dad. Logan had told her he thought there was a leak in his organization, but she couldn’t imagine what Logan was going through, knowing his closest friend had betrayed him.
Her eyes fell on the metal tray next to Logan and the instruments sitting on them. “You don’t have to hurt him,” she told Stephen.
“But we do,” Stephen said. “He’s hurt us all and he deserves it. Jack, why don’t you and Xander give Sara a little taste of what he will experience before he dies?”
Sara shook her head as hard as she could. “Don’t do this.”
The large man she didn’t recognize, Xande
r, walked over to Logan’s left side and lifted his index finger. He wrapped his fingers around it and snapped it upward.
Logan gritted his teeth and let out a loud groan. Xander then gripped Logan’s thumb and broke it as well.
The sound of cracking bone and Logan’s outcry resonated in Sara’s ears. “Stop it! Please don’t hurt him anymore.”
“There are so many body parts that can be removed from a person,” Stephen said, as Xander picked up a large pair of cutters. “If done right, one can practically dismember a man before killing them. Fingers, ears, tongue, teeth, nose, eyes.” He pressed his mouth into her ear. “And then there’s everything below the belt.”
Sara’s stomach revolted and she doubled over, but Stephen straightened her up. He wrapped his hand around her face and forced her head up.
“No, no,” he said. “You’re going to watch this. I want you to see exactly what’s going to happen to him.”
Xander moved back to Logan’s left hand and placed the cutters around the bottom of his little finger. Logan tightened his jaw and kept his eyes on hers.
“Don’t hurt him,” she said. “Stephen, please don’t—”
“Hearing you beg for mercy makes me want to hurt him all the more.” Stephen gripped her tighter. “Why don’t you move that up a knuckle?” he asked the man. “Gives us more to work with later when we’re running out of parts to take from him.”
As Stephen directed, Xander adjusted the cutters until they rested between the first and second knuckles. Logan’s chest heaved up and down with rapid, audible breathing.
“No!” Sara cried out. “Don’t!”
Xander squeezed the cutters, severing the finger. Logan cried out, but then clamped his mouth shut and lifted his eyes to the ceiling.
Sara could barely see him through the mess of tears coating her eyes. “No,” she whispered, suddenly drained of all energy. Her weak limbs collapsed into a mass of jelly beneath her, but Stephen kept her standing up.
“I trust you two can handle this,” he said. “I know you’re eager to get through it, but spread it out so that it takes all night. When he arrives in the morning, Hugh will want to see Logan alive, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a little fun until then.” He planted a kiss on Sara’s cheek, lingering for a moment.
“No.” The word gurgled out of her without any forcefulness. She wanted to save him, but even if Stephen wasn’t restraining her, there was nothing she could do with the others in the room.
“I’m going to spare Sara the rest of this,” Stephen said. “I’ll be back to check on your progress in a few hours.”
Sara watched Logan for as long as she could, before Stephen turned her around and led her out of the room. When they reached her room, he said, “You wanted to know the truth about what we did. That’s what happens to people when they cross either me or Hugh.”
She had no strength left in her body, and it took every ounce of it she could find to remain standing. She leaned against the wall with her hand pressed against her nauseous stomach. “You’re a monster,” she whispered.
“That’s no way to talk to your future husband, is it?” Stephen wiped her tears from her face. “What’s happening to him is a long time coming. Once he’s in pieces and dead, Hugh will be happy and won’t mind that I’m letting you live. Logan thought he’d play the hero and save you, so think of it as him trading his life for yours.”
Sara couldn’t think at all, let alone follow his rationale. Fresh tears replaced the ones Stephen brushed off her cheeks. When he pressed his mouth to hers, she didn’t try to fight against the soul-sucking kiss, not after seeing what he had done to Logan. In her mind, she couldn’t stop seeing Xander cutting off his finger, and Stephen’s promise to do much worse to him rang in her ears. The first moment Stephen left her alone, she had to find a way to get to him. Every second she was away from him was one more opportunity for them to kill him a little more. She had to get to him, fast, before there was nothing left of him to save.
Chapter Forty-three
Logan lifted his sweaty head, his eyes following Jack as he walked over to Xander and spoke in a low tone. The pain from his left hand radiated up his arm and into his core. It was nothing compared to what they had in store for him, but he tried to focus instead on his escape route.
Sara now knew without a doubt the evils that lay behind Mathers’s shiny exterior. That she had witnessed them torturing Logan hurt him more than Xander ever could. Her life didn’t cross over into this nasty world of evil and criminals, of pain and greed. Logan wished he could take that image away from her so she wouldn’t be scarred with the sight forever, but the only thing he could do was to get her out of this no-win situation and over to the FBI where she could start anew.
Before he could do that, he had to escape.
The tray Xander left next to him had enough tools on it that he could easily kill both Xander and, if it came down to it, Jack, but first he had to take advantage of the one mistake Xander had made during his short torture session. The only way to do that was to keep Jack talking long enough to give him the opening he needed.
“Tell me something, Jack,” Logan said.
Jack whirled around and fixed a curious stare on Logan. “What’s that?”
Behind Jack, Xander walked away, and Logan smiled inwardly at the sound of the door opening and closing. As soon as Jack let down his guard, Logan could act.
“Why didn’t you kill me in the barn last week?” Logan asked. “You had the perfect opportunity to kill me or take me.”
“When I went to the barn, you were already supposed to be on your way to Mathers. I didn’t expect you to get out and kill my men. I had orders to bring you in alive, and if I took you in, my cover would have been blown.”
“No,” Logan said. “You wouldn’t want anyone knowing who you are. Then how was it that you didn’t find us in the Flagstaff safe house the first time you came?” Logan asked. “We were hiding in the cubby Schaffer had built, which you knew about.”
“I wasn’t there that time,” Jack said. “I was a few hours away in the wrong direction. Otherwise, you would have been found.”
“Guess you didn’t communicate too well with your boys there,” Logan said. “Same way as they didn’t know to find us in the secret bedroom at the first safe house.”
Jack huffed and sat in the chair in front of Logan. “I wouldn’t be talking like that if I were in your shoes.”
Glancing down at his left hand, the pain through his arm, Logan shrugged. “What more do I have to lose at this point? Mathers was pretty clear that I’m not getting out of this thing alive and I won’t die before Hugh comes in the morning.”
“But we still have the okay to deliver a lot more pain to you before the sun rises.”
“You’ve already done your worst. Being in on Karen’s death, working for Langston. The rest is just some body parts that I won’t miss too much when I’m dead.”
“We all do what we have to do,” Jack said, with the swipe of his hand and a snide smile.
“Yes, we do. So, at what point did you decide to jump over to this side? Was there an event, something that made you think it was better over here?”
Jack’s smile faded and his gaze fell down to the floor. “Nothing clear cut, if that’s what you’re searching for. It wasn’t an easy decision for me. It definitely made it much harder for me to stay after Karen died.”
Logan held onto Jack’s words and demeanor as hope he could still be reached. “You can come back, you know. You can always come back.”
“You and I both know that’s not true.” He lifted his eyes. “Who says I even want to?”
Silence filled the room, pushing the men further away from each other. Logan couldn’t find a way to combat Jack’s correct assumption. He could never come back, even if he wanted to, not after everything he had done. He would have to face due punishment, and that alone would be reason for him to stay on Langston’s team.
The door creaked ope
n behind Logan, and Jack lifted his head.
“Mathers wants to see you,” Xander said, as he walked back to his tray of torture.
Jack rose to his feet and went over to Xander. Looking down at Logan, he said, “We’ll begin again when I get back. I’m starting to get bored with the conversation.”
Logan squeezed his eyes shut and pulled in as much oxygen as his lungs would allow. He let out the breath when the door shut. He didn’t have long to act. After Jack returned, he might not have another chance.
“I’m feeling dizzy,” Logan said. “Blood loss, maybe.”
“You’re not in a hospital,” Xander said, “and I’m not your nurse.”
“I realize that, but I’m sure Jack doesn’t want me passing out for round two. How about some water?”
Xander tugged on each of the handcuffs and ensured his leg restraints were tight before leaving the room.
Logan went straight to work. With both his thumb and index finger broken, his hand was a lot more compact. Since Xander cut off half his pinky as well, it made it much easier to wriggle that finger out of the cuff, although much more painful.
With his entire body tensed and lips mashed together to limit the sound of his groaning, Logan jerked his hand back and forth while pulling out of the cuff. The metal clanked against the chair when his hand came out. Pain zapped his body and threatened to shut him down, but he couldn’t give up. Using his middle and ring finger, he picked up a knife from the tray and tucked it into his palm, so the blade rested against his wrist and lower arm. He laid his hand back down onto the arm of the chair, hoping Xander would not notice the missing cuff right away.
Seconds later, the door opened behind him. Hearing only one set of footsteps enter, Logan braced himself to act. Xander moved in front of him and lifted a small cup to Logan’s lips. Logan tilted his head back with the cup, as if drinking, and used every bit of strength he could find to bring the knife around into Xander’s neck.