by Elle James
The door swung outward. A yellowish light poured through, illuminating a rectangle across the middle of the small cell. For someone on the outside looking in, the cell might as well be empty.
Emily pressed up against the wall, making herself as small as possible, while holding on to her end of the makeshift rope.
A man spoke in Russian. “This is the room?”
“Da,” came the answer.
“They are gone.”
“Nyet. They are in there.” A man stepped through the door.
Emily held her breath and prayed Sachi wouldn’t get excited and pull the rope too soon.
The second man entered the doorway.
About the time the first man turned and spotted her, Emily yelled, “Now!”
Both women pulled hard on the rope as the second man stepped through.
His foot caught and he pitched forward, knocking into the man in front of him, hitting him hard enough that both crashed into the opposite wall.
“Go!” Emily cried as she scrambled to her feet.
Sachi dove for the door.
Emily was on her heels.
The ambassador’s daughter hesitated in the dim hallway. “Which way?”
Emily slammed the door shut and twisted the wheel handle. Then she shoved a metal locking lever into place before her jailers could recover.
Pounding sounded against the door, making Emily jump back. The men inside shouted, their voices muffled by the thick metal walls.
“Help us!” A feminine cry came from another door farther down the hallway.
“Did you hear that?” Emily asked.
“Someone is crying for help,” Sachi said.
Emily ran to the door behind which came the sound of several women crying out for help. She slid the exterior locking lever to the side and spun the wheel handle. Sachi helped her pull the door open. The room was as small as the one they had just escaped. But inside a dozen women were crowded into the cramped space.
A blond-haired, blue-eyed young woman who couldn’t have been more than seventeen swayed toward Emily. “Please, help us.” Her words were slurred and she seemed barely able to stand.
After a quick glance at the others Emily shook her head. “These women have been drugged.”
“Drugs,” the blonde said. “They made us take pills.”
“We’re going to get you out of here,” Emily promised.
“Want to go home,” the blonde said, tears streaming down her cheeks.
“We’ll get you there, but right now you have to think. Are there more of you?”
Three or four of the women closest to Emily nodded.
Emily’s heart squeezed hard in her chest. These women were being shipped out of the US, probably to be sold in the sex trade in some foreign country.
Sachi ran to the next door and shoved the locking lever to the side. Emily helped her spin the wheel handle and push open the door. Ten more women sat or lay passed out on the floor.
They went to the next door and opened it. This room appeared empty until a groan sounded from a dark corner.
Emily hurried in.
What appeared to be a pile of dirty clothes was actually a man. As she neared him, she recognized his pale blue shirt and dark hair. “Tyler? Is that you?”
“Tyler?” Sachi called, muttering a string of curses in Russian as she rushed to his side. “What have they done to you?”
The man lifted his head, exposing a battered face with dried blood from a gash in his cheek and a busted lip.
“Sachi,” Emily said, “we have to get out of here and get help.”
“I won’t leave him.” She stroked his cheek and slipped his head onto her lap. “I won’t let them hurt him anymore.”
“We have to get help, or we won’t be able to help any of them. We can’t carry Tyler out and the women are too drugged to help themselves.”
“Then go,” Sachi said. “Get help. I must stay.”
Emily would get nowhere with the woman and she couldn’t blame her for insisting on staying with the man she loved. But if someone didn’t get off the ship and go for help, none of them would be freed.
Emily squared her shoulders. “I’ll be back with help,” she promised.
She turned and ran down the narrow hallway to the nearest door that might lead to an upper deck and a way off the ship.
The passageways were a maze of twists and turns. Finally she found stairs leading upward. She paused at the bottom, listening for sounds of voices or movement above. When she was fairly certain the deck above was clear, she hurried up the stairs. She swallowed a groan as another hallway greeted her. She ran to the end and through an open door. More steps led upward and she could hear the sounds of motors humming and the clanking of metal on metal.
Emily eased up the stairs until she could see the upper deck and stacks of shipping containers lined in neat rows, filling the top deck of the ship, bathed in stadium lights. A crane lowered another metal box onto a stack. Men shouted and waved to the man operating the crane.
The boom turned back to the shore and stopped, the engine shutting down.
More men hurried around the deck, securing lines, apparently preparing the ship to leave. Some of the stevedores crossed the gangway to the shore, waving to the men remaining on the ship.
Emily slipped out onto the deck, moving among the shadows. She worked her way to the side of the ship and looked over the edge. The ship rose forty feet out of the water. The dock was at least ten feet away and twenty feet below where she stood. If she made a flying leap, she could miss the dock and fall the forty feet into the water. If she landed wrong in the water, it could be like hitting concrete. She could die before she got help for the others in the hold below.
No, she had to use the gangway if she wanted to get off in one piece. She’d be exposed and possibly caught, but she had to do something or they would all be lost.
Emily waited until the majority of the deckhands were looking the other way and then made her run for it. She made it to the gangway and put one foot onto the metal grate when hands reached out and grabbed her.
“I cannot have my guest leaving so very soon,” a man said, his tone deep and threatening.
Emily glanced over her shoulder into the black eyes of Viktor Sokolov, the ambassador’s rogue assistant, and he was speaking English.
Chapter Seventeen
“She’s on board that one.” Mack pointed to the container ship secured at the dock.
Mustang pushed past Mack but was stopped in his tracks when Declan reached out to capture his arm. “We can’t just go storming aboard. We need a plan.”
“Hell, we need to take a page from our enemy’s book and create a diversion,” Mack said.
Clenching his fists, Mustang turned to their slack man, Jack Snow. “What have we got?”
Snow grinned and dropped a duffel bag at the team’s feet. “I’m glad you asked. You’d be surprised at the variety of munitions Charlie’s husband stockpiled in the basement beneath the garage. He has enough weapons to man a small army and enough ammunition to last long enough to survive a zombie apocalypse.”
“I’m not interested in a zombie apocalypse. I want to get Emily the hell off that ship in one piece.”
“You know, we’re not in Afghanistan anymore. Perhaps we should call the police and let them handle this,” Cole suggested.
The other five members of the team stared at him as if he’d lost his mind.
“If we involve the police, they might decide to kill Emily and Sachi and cut their losses.” Mustang tipped his head toward the ship.
“Or there will be a big political standoff with the Russian government and the Russian bad guys might commit murder and suicide to keep from being sent to Siberia,” Mack said.
Mustang shook his head. “We can’t risk it. W
e have to go in, neutralize the threat and free the hostages. It’s what we do. What we’re good at.” He waved his hand. “Show me what you’ve got.”
Snow pulled out four M4A1 rifles, two submachine guns and magazines filled with bullets for both, half a dozen smoke grenades, a small brick of C4 explosive and the detonators to go with it. He’d also brought six K-Bar knives and their sheaths, and body armor.
“Damn, Snow.” Cole laughed. “You don’t happen to have a rocket launcher tucked into that, do you?”
“No, but I’m sure Charlie can get you hooked up with one,” Snow said with a straight face. “Just say the word.”
Declan handed the C4 to Mack. “Make a noise, not enough to sink the ship, but enough to be heard and scare the crew ashore.”
Mack took the C4. “How am I supposed to get on board the ship to do that?”
Snow hefted two of the smoke grenades. “I played outfield on my baseball team in high school. Had the best and most accurate distance throwing arm on the team.”
“Can you get those smoke grenades on board that ship from the dock?” Declan asked.
“Just point. I’ll deliver.”
“We need one at the far end of the ship. If that doesn’t make them think they have a shipboard fire, we can toss the other in for good measure,” Declan said.
“You’ve got it.”
“Mustang, you’re point man,” Declan said. “As soon as the crew bails, you’re first man in. We’ll be right behind you.”
Mack showed Mustang the tracking device. “If this is accurate through the metal hull, Emily is somewhere near the bridge.”
“I’ll cover Mustang’s six,” Declan said. “Mack, you and Cole set the charges, Gus and Snow cover the gangway and keep anyone from coming back on board once they’ve disembarked. Our goal is to get in there, retrieve Emily and Sachi, and get the hell out before we’re caught in an international incident.”
Mack snorted. “What would it hurt? We’ve already got dishonorable discharges on our records,” he said, referring to their refusal to handle a kill that would have involved too much collateral damage during their military days.
Declan claimed a submachine gun and the rounds that went with it. “No matter what the records show, we’re honorable men. As long as we keep that in mind, that’s all that counts.”
“And if the body count mounts?” Gus asked as he buckled his protective vest in place.
“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it. If we get to it,” Declan said, slipping his body armor over his shoulder.
Once the rest of the men had their bulletproof vests on, Declan asked, “Ready?”
As one, the team replied. “Ready.”
Anxious to get started, Mustang checked his handgun in the holster on his hip, grabbed one of the rifles and slipped several magazines into the pouches on his body armor and moved forward through the maze of containers, keeping to the shadows. He wouldn’t get ahead of the plan. He’d been with these men long enough to know the value of teamwork and having someone to cover him when he took point.
The bright lights of the shipyard cast deep shadows alongside the large, metal shipping containers, giving Mustang the concealment he needed to get close to the ship.
When he was as near as he could get without being seen, he waited for the signal to board...that signal being the launch of the smoke grenades.
He didn’t have long to wait. From his position he could see the arch of the grenade as it flew through the air and landed on the ship’s bow, rolling among the stacks of containers. A puff of smoke rose on impact and spread all across that end of the ship.
Shouts echoed in the night and men ran for fire extinguishers. When they couldn’t locate the source of the smoke, some made the decision to abandon ship. A dozen men crossed the gangplank.
In the ensuing smoke and confusion, Mustang tucked his rifle against his leg, walked past the men leaving, and boarded the ship, keeping his head down so that anyone he passed wouldn’t immediately realize he was a stranger.
Once on board, he waited for Declan to catch up, keeping a close watch for anyone who might be a danger to his teammate.
Declan walked on board, the submachine gun hidden beneath his jacket.
With the tracking device in hand, Mustang headed for the tallest part of the ship and the wheelhouse where the captain commanded the operation of the ship.
Several times before he reached the pilot castle, Mustang had to duck back against the containers to avoid being seen by armed men running around in the smoke.
With Declan covering him, Mustang entered the pilot castle and climbed the steps up to the deck where the bridge was located. At the top, he surprised two guards standing watch at a door Mustang assumed led to the bridge.
Before the men could aim their weapons, Mustang swung the butt of his rifle, hitting the first one in the nose at the same time as he threw a side kick into the other guard’s gut. He had them both subdued by the time Declan joined him on the deck.
Wordlessly, Mustang eased open the door to the bridge, holding his rifle at the ready.
Not ten feet from where he was, Mustang spotted Emily standing at the center of the window that stretched from one end of the room to the other.
She was turned to face the door from which Mustang viewed her.
She shook her head imperceptibly and shot a glance to her right.
Mustang’s gaze followed Emily’s to a man with thick gray hair and piercing black eyes, holding a gun pointed at her chest.
“Come in,” the man said. “Please, join my other guest.”
Emily shook her head more noticeably. “Don’t,” she said. “He’s got a gun.”
“Oh, but I insist. And if you do not come in, I will shoot the interpreter.”
Mustang entered, aiming his rifle at the man’s chest. “You must be Viktor Sokolov,” he guessed.
Sokolov dipped his head in acknowledgment. “I am. And you must be our little interpreter’s bodyguard who has made it difficult for us to dispose of her.”
Mustang’s chest tightened. “Why would you want to kill her? What did she ever do to you?”
Viktor’s eyes narrowed. “It is not what she did, but what she witnessed.”
“The journalist you detained in the embassy?” Mustang asked. “Where is he now? Or have you disposed of him, as well?”
“All in due time,” Viktor said. “It is much easier to dispose of a body at sea than on land.”
“And is that what you have planned for Miss Chastain?” Mustang hoped that by keeping the man talking, he’d buy some time to come up with a plan to save Emily.
“Now that she is here, it seems a waste to do away with her, especially when we can get a sizeable sum for a woman with her particular shade of blond hair. And blue eyes are prized.”
Mustang muttered a curse beneath his breath. The bastard was trafficking women to foreign markets, and he planned on selling Emily to the highest bidder. Death was too kind for Viktor.
“Don’t worry about me,” Emily said. “Just shoot the bastard. There are more people at stake here.”
Mustang aimed his gun at the man’s chest, beyond tempted to pull the trigger.
Viktor snorted. “Shoot me, and you are all dead.”
“What do you mean?” Emily asked.
“There are explosives aboard this ship, rigged with a timer. I set it for fifteen minutes...five minutes ago. I am the only one who knows where the explosives are and the only one with the code to disarm the detonator.”
Mustang shot a glance at this watch. Ten minutes wasn’t enough time to do anything, much less search an entire ship for explosives and disarm said explosives. “You’re bluffing.”
Viktor’s lips curled. “Are you certain? Only time will tell. Now, enough talk. You will clear this ship of all of your personnel in fiv
e minutes.”
“This ship is worth more than the cargo it carries. Put down your weapon and give up now and you might not get the death penalty.”
Viktor shook his head. “Nine minutes and counting. You are meddling in something much bigger than the cost of just one ship. An organization that extends beyond my little portion of the operation. There are people all over the world who will not be happy if they are exposed. People in your own country. In your own government.” He chuckled. “I will not give up.”
“Let Miss Chastain go and I’ll see to it that you are free to go,” Mustang lied. “And I’m sure the Russian ambassador would pay dearly to get his daughter back.”
The ambassador’s assistant shook his head. “You are a fool. Eight minutes.”
While Viktor’s attention was focused on Mustang, Emily inched toward her captor.
Mustang wanted to tell her to stand fast, to keep from becoming Viktor’s next victim. But to say anything would divert Viktor’s attention back to her.
He didn’t have to ponder that dilemma. In a flash, Emily dove for the gun in Viktor’s hand and shoved it toward the floor.
The sound of a gunshot blasted through the air.
Mustang aimed at Viktor, but couldn’t pull the trigger for fear of hitting Emily.
She had hold of the man’s wrist, struggling to keep it pointed at the floor, but the man was strong. Slowly he overpowered her, inching the gun toward her chest.
Mustang had to do something. He couldn’t stand by and let Viktor kill the woman who’d come to mean more to him than he’d ever imagined a woman could in such a short time. He aimed his gun and pulled the trigger, praying Emily didn’t shift at the last moment.
Two gunshots echoed across the bridge.
Viktor slumped over, his body landing on top of Emily’s, crushing her beneath him.
Mustang’s breath lodged in his throat until Emily’s hand moved. “Help,” she said, her voice strained and breathy.
Mustang ran to her, shoved Viktor over and bent to Emily. Blood covered her shirt.
“I couldn’t get in to help in case Viktor got spooked and pulled the trigger prematurely,” Declan said, entering the room behind Mustang. “I texted Mack and told him to hold off on the explosives. We don’t know if a small explosion will trigger whatever Viktor has set. Is Emily okay?”