She glanced up and Ford saw the words on her face even before she said them.
Looked past her. Sure enough, a teenager had his hands on her backpack, carrying it surreptitiously as if the bag belonged to him.
“Hey!” Ford said and shot off after the kid.
Scarlett was right behind him, shouting.
The kid took off, weaving through the crowd, pushing people aside. People turned at Ford’s shouts, but no one stepped in to stop the kid. He wore a fraying red sweater, a pair of jeans, and probably a pair of Nike Air Jordans because he ran like he might be on fire.
Or, of course, being chased.
The kid rounded the end of the corridor, and Ford kicked it up.
Scarlett was shouting not far behind. “Don’t let him get away!”
Right. Because her passport and her ticket were in that bag and—
Ford turned the corner and blasted into a crowd of travelers clogging to get into the metro.
Their thief pushed in next to a turnstile and went through with a departing passenger.
Ford didn’t have time to buy a metro ticket. He barreled up next to a young man, pushing through behind him.
“Sorry,” he said, wishing he’d learned a bit of Ukrainian.
Red Sweater got on an escalator going down, and Ford sprinted for it. It was too narrow to push past people, but he did anyway, getting jostled against the rail. Below him, the skinny kid was having more luck.
“I’ll catch him!”
He glanced over and spotted Scarlett on the parallel escalator, going down, more agile without her pack, not caring who might get a cheap feel as she pushed her way through the crowd. “He’s not getting on that metro train!”
Or the one now shooting through the station, filling the arched corridor with thunder. The low-hanging chandeliers cast eerie shadows as they descended, and Ford fought to adjust his eyes. He and Scarlett hit the platform, and he pushed against the slow-moving traffic—hello, weren’t these people trying to get on that train?
There. Red Sweater, at the end of the platform.
Scarlett must have seen him, too, because she took off through the crowd.
What if the kid had a knife?
Ford slammed into the gap she made, a couple steps behind her. “Scarlett—”
Scarlett was shoving people aside, desperation in her moves as Red Sweater got on the train.
Ford glanced at the clock. One minute in-station, max, and he watched the clock count down.
The doors were about to close.
Scarlett wasn’t slowing. “I’m getting on that train—”
A bell chimed—the warning—and she lunged for the closing doors.
Ford grabbed her around the waist before she pitched into the gap between the tracks.
Red Sweater stood inside the door.
Smiled at them and held up her pack.
Scarlett let out a shout as the metro pulled away from the station.
She spun out of Ford’s grip, stalked away from him. “Idiot. I know better—I know better.” She leaned over, gripping her knees, breathing hard, then stood up and covered her face with her hands.
Ham ran up, also breathing hard. “You didn’t get him.”
Ford wanted to punch something.
“Now what?” Scarlett said. “My visa, passport, and boarding pass were in that pack.” She ran her hand across her forehead. “I can’t believe I just…I practically handed him my pack!”
Ham stood, his hands on his hips, looking down the dark tunnel as if he wanted to keep chasing the kid down the tracks. “The good news is that I still have Scarlett’s old passport, but no visa and no boarding pass. And”—he looked at his watch—“the train is boarding right now. I don’t even know if there are tickets left—but we don’t have any time to try.”
“I’ll stay here,” Scarlett said. “I’ll just…I’ll stay.”
“No.” Ford rounded on her. “You’re not staying here. You have no money, no contacts—I’m not leaving you in Kiev.”
Ham was swinging his pack off his shoulder. “I’ll stay. I can arrange transport to Moscow on the next train or even stay here and solve some logistic issues if we still want to bring RJ out through Ukraine.” He set the pack on a bench and pulled out Scarlett’s old passport, his visa, his ticket. “There’s no name on the ticket, so we’re good there. Here’s my visa—do what you can with it. I’ll get ahold of my contact in Moscow, make sure you’re met at the train by the right people. That way, if you’re detained, you’ll have help in Moscow.” He shoved the papers into Scarlett’s hand. “Go. Run. Both of you, or you’ll miss your train. Up the escalator, platform three.”
“We don’t speak Russian! How will we—” Scarlett said, but Ford reached for her hand.
“It’ll be okay, Scarlett. Let’s go.”
Oh, he wanted to believe his own words as he took off back up the escalator.
She would tell them nothing.
RJ sat in the quiet, sweaty room that smelled of chlorine, a bag over her head, her arms fixed behind her back, tied with flexicuffs, and determined that no matter what—
She would be like Ford. A SEAL. Withstand the torture, the waterboarding, the bright lights. She’d—
RJ froze as a groan lifted near her, hating how her pulse ratcheted to high, wishing she could see something, anything. Only pinpricks of light shone through the bag one of the goons who’d jumped them had thrown over her head.
Another groan. York? She’d call out his name, but duct tape pasted her mouth shut. She’d been working at it, though, moistening the edges with her tongue.
She’d rescue them both.
Poor York. She’d like to scrape from her mind the crazy, strangled sound he’d made when they tased him. Then he went rigid, every muscle constricting before he fell to the floor.
Passed out.
She’d thought he might be having a heart attack.
The men had grabbed her then, pulled her away from him while they turned him over, bound his hands.
Then they’d gagged her, cuffed her hands behind her back, shoved the hood over her head, and made her stumble down the stairs.
A sweat broke across her body as they loaded her into the back of a van. She heard York’s body land beside hers, then doors close.
They’d traveled for at least a couple hours, while her bones turned to glue and every rut in the road bore into her hips and shoulders. But she stayed quiet, nudging up next to York, listening for his breathing. She heard nothing, but she did manage to roll close enough that she thought she felt his chest cavity moving.
I’m sorry, York. She couldn’t help but think he was right—if she hadn’t been so painfully determined to…well, what exactly was she supposed to do? Let a man be murdered? So maybe she would tell the FSB everything.
Why not? She had nothing to hide. And if anyone should know about an international hit on him, it was General Boris Stanislov’s people, the FSB.
Except, that wasn’t exactly the problem. She really knew nothing except what Coco had told them, and she had no intention of ratting out her sister and her hacking abilities.
So yeah. Give her the toothpicks. The bright lights.
A growl of frustration rose from the body next to her.
York? She made a sort of humming noise in response. Of course it was York—who else could it be? She’d been trying to figure out the hood problem for a while now and had a sketchy plan in the back of her brain. So she leaned over, tucking her head between her knees. By pressing her knees together and drawing back slowly, she was able to pinch the top of the hood.
She worked it off.
The bright morning sunlight burned her eyes as she blinked to adjust them. They were in a pool house surrounded by pine trees and greenery. Ten feet away, an indoor lap pool glistened in the morning sun. Beyond that, she spied a manor house on the other side of a courtyard, separated by a tennis court.
Oh goody, Putin’s summer home. Where all the bodies wer
e buried.
York sat on the floor a few feet away. His hood was off, and he was shaking his head. She wasn’t sure what he was doing.
She rolled to her knees and worked her way over to him. Then she turned and got her hands on the tape on his mouth. Peeled it off.
“RJ—are you okay?”
She turned, raised an eyebrow, and he leaned over to her, his mouth on the edge of her tape.
The touch of his lips on her skin sent a strange buzz through her body. So maybe their kiss in the park hadn’t quite left her. Sure, it had been a ruse, but the way he’d kissed her back—the memory of it revived as he worked the tape free.
It came off easily. “I’m okay.”
He looked rough, his dark blond hair mussed, a little bruise where someone must have hit him forming on his cheek. He met her eyes now with so much earnestness in his that it reached down and grabbed hold of her bones, stopping the trembling she didn’t even realize her body had been doing.
“I’m going to get us out of this.” Low. Sure.
She believed him.
Or wanted to, with everything inside her.
“How’d they find us?” she asked, and York shook his head.
She had rolled to her backside, was bent over, trying to move her arms out from behind her, stretching—her skin screamed against the cuffs. But she managed to get one leg through, then the other.
He stared at her, eyes wide. “You’re really flexible. Let’s find something to cut my ties off.”
She was surveying the pool area—a large, long-handled net hung from one wall, a pool hose on another, and a couple chairs tucked in the corner. Nothing sharp or in any way useful.
York was climbing to his feet, as if to help find the answer, when voices emerged from the far side of the building.
He drew in a breath, glanced around. “We need to run.”
Run? Run where?
Away, clearly. She was on her feet, obeying him without thinking, heading toward a doorway in the opposite direction.
Only problem was—he didn’t follow.
When she reached the door, she turned and spotted him running straight for two men now sprinting toward them and shouting.
“York!”
He slammed into one of their pursuers like he might be a defensive back. He knocked the man over, spun, and delivered a roundhouse kick to the other.
Oh. My.
For a second, she was simply stunned by the stellar action hero moves.
The next, she was screaming as the first man found his feet and tackled York into the pool.
Oh—oh—she stood frozen, watching as York and he struggled. Somehow York had gotten his hands in front of him—maybe in the water—and now he surfaced and jumped on the man, his arms around his neck.
The second man went into the pool to help—what, drown him? The fight dragged them into the deep end of the pool, all three men going down for so long RJ ran to the edge of the pool.
Stopped. Oh—
The old, crazy fear reached up to throttle her, hit her in the chest. But this was a pool, not a river—
York surfaced in the arms of one of the assailants, sputtering, kicking. Drowning.
Do something!
She spotted the pool net used for skimming off debris and grabbed it off the wall. Extended it over the pool.
York emerged again, this time with the other man, who slammed his fist into his face. Blood inked the water.
He had his hands around York’s throat, pressing his thumbs in, and RJ threw the end of the net over the man’s head, yanking hard.
The man fell back, away from York, who kneed him in the gut and threw up his arm in time to block the hit from the second man.
Her netted prey turned and yanked hard, and suddenly RJ launched into the pool.
The water sucked her down, cresting over her, thick with chlorine, cold and clammy against her skin.
She sank hard.
Kick, RJ! Ford’s voice from the past, igniting her panic.
But she was drowning, trying to find bottom, trying to kick.
Ford!
Then hands grabbed her arms and yanked her to the surface. She recognized the man she’d netted. She screamed, writhing in his arms, but he turned her and wrapped his arm around her neck. She dug at his forearm, but her feet couldn’t touch the bottom, and her kicks landed ineffectively against him.
York was wrestling with the other man, his hands around the man’s neck, dodging—or absorbing—his punches.
“Perestan!” her assailant shouted. “Perestan!”
York looked over at them, and the look on his face could undo her. Horror. Defeat.
Surrender.
He let go of his victim-slash-attacker and held up his hands. “Let her go,” he growled. “Let her go!”
She wanted to weep as his assailant grabbed him and led him onto the deck. He threw York down, shoved a knee in his back. York lay immobilized, his cheek pressed to the cement.
She closed her eyes as the man zip-tied his legs, then rolled him over to retape his mouth. Her captor brought her to the edge of the pool and pushed her up the steps. Held her captive with his arm around her neck again as York’s wrist ties were cut, then his arms resecured behind him.
His captor stood up, wiped his face, and turned.
Looked at her.
Why hadn’t she run? She was supposed to be at the edge of the forest by now, maybe farther, running for her life. Running for help.
I’m sorry, York.
“Idi Sooda,” the man said quietly. Come here.
York’s eyes held so much frustration, so much lingering fight she had to look away as she obeyed.
The man cut her cuffs and motioned her to turn around.
She held in her grunts when they resecured her wrists, tighter this time, retaped her mouth, and put the hood over her again. She was led over to the wall where they pushed her down to the floor.
Grunting, and the sound of dragging, and York was deposited near her.
He growled, despite his gag.
She rolled over to her side, into a ball. Tried not to weep.
What a fool she’d been to think she could—what? Save the world?
She wasn’t a soldier, wasn’t fierce and brave, and—truth was, she’d probably tell them everything.
For a moment in the darkness, she was right back there at the cave, clinging to Ford’s hands in the clammy darkness. Please don’t leave me. Her cowardice had nearly cost them both their lives.
And now York had put his life on the line for her—and she’d been too scared to leave him. To run and maybe even save them both.
She should stop pretending to be someone she wasn’t and just admit that she was a coward.
And now a good man was going to die because of her.
RJ lay there on the cold cement, shivering as water dripped off her, and with everything inside her, prayed she’d make it home.
She wasn’t sure how long she lay there, listening to her heartbeat, trying to hear York’s. He groaned a couple times, and she wondered if he’d broken ribs in his battle.
The far door creaked again. Footsteps.
She braced herself when they stopped in front of her.
The hood was yanked off her head, and a woman squatted down in front of her. Late thirties, with long, dark brown hair pulled back into a severe bun. She wore a black jacket, a white shirt, and held a gun.
The materialization of RJ’s wildest KGB nightmares.
RJ looked around and spied York lying on the floor beside her. He wasn’t moving.
“Hey! They’re not supposed to be tied up!” A second female voice, speaking in Russian, but so familiar RJ would have recognized it anywhere.
“Coco?” What—?
Her foster sister walked over to her, wearing a pair of jeans, white Converse tennis shoes, and a T-shirt. “Get those cuffs off her,” Coco snapped, again in Russian. Then she met RJ’s eyes. “I’ll explain, I promise.”
RJ watched in silent confusion as Coco walked over to York and worked the hood from his head. He jerked up at her, but she pressed her hand to his cheek. “Shh. Sorry, York.”
He jerked away from her, and she glanced over at the woman sawing away at RJ’s flexicuffs.
“Better leave him tied up until he hears everything,” Coco said.
Huh?
Coco walked back to RJ just as the woman freed her.
RJ brought her hands around. “What’s going on?”
Coco knelt and took her wrists, rubbing the red away. “I’m sorry.” She spoke in English. “They were supposed to subdue York, not taser him, and certainly not tie you up.”
“Who’s they?”
She made a face. “It’s a long story.”
“You know they nearly drowned York.”
Coco looked at the woman, frowned.
“According to my men, he started it,” she said in Russian.
“What, by trying to escape?” Coco said.
York started shouting, probably something that deserved an R-rating, but the tape muffled it.
Coco looked at him. “Pipe down and I’ll untape you.”
York looked at her as if he’d like to turn her to ash.
Coco walked back to York and put her hands on the tape. Paused. “Seriously. No biting, no shouting…”
He narrowed his eyes.
She waited.
He nodded.
She ripped off the tape.
He winced.
“Sorry. But I don’t want you making a ruckus out here. And I knew you wouldn’t listen to them if they waited patiently in your living room. You’d take one look at their uniforms, and bullets would start flying.”
“Not true,” he snapped. “My methods are very quiet. Guns are not quiet.”
Oh. He didn’t sound like he was kidding. “Who are these guys, Kat?”
She sighed. “Former FSB. They work as my father’s private security force now.”
“Your father—?” Her words were just now sinking into RJ. “But I thought he was dead.”
“No. That’s just what my mother—and my father—wanted the world to believe.” She held out her hand, and the woman who had freed RJ now handed Coco the clippers. “I’ll free you, York, but no craziness. You’re safe—no need to run.”
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