Scarlett had been worried that the intimacy between them would be ruined by her time in the hands of Luftar and his men. But the fire burning between them was intense, and their love for each other had won out in the end.
She moved closer to him, her hands immediately going to his chest. She never got tired of touching him. Never tired of kissing him. He pressed his lips to hers, wrapping her up in his arms and pulling her close to him.
"Em's gone?" he asked.
"Yep. Off to do more shopping before she leaves next week. I can't believe she's going to be so far away."
"You've done good, Scarlett. She's an amazing young woman, and she has you to thank for it."
Instead of answering, Scarlett lifted herself up on her toes, brushing her lips to his. Lucas took the invitation, and Scarlett parted her lips as his tongue swept in to claim her own. His hands moved down to her rear, and he pulled her closer, lining up her body with his. Time seemed to melt away as they kissed, losing themselves in each other. Lucas's hands went to her pants, unbuttoning them and pulling them down her legs. She pulled at the button of his and was happy to see that he had nothing on underneath.
Scarlett let out a squeal as Lucas scooped her up and carried her to their bedroom. He sat her down, lifting her shirt above her head. His hand traced the scar on her chest, his eyes becoming serious.
"Just a few inches," he said.
Scarlett looked at him, puzzlement shadowing her gaze.
"Just a few inches, and you would have been taken from me." He leaned down, kissing the scar, before laying her back on the bed. His eyes roamed over her body, and chills danced across Scarlett's overheated skin at the look in his eyes.
She pulled him down for a kiss, conveying to him what was in her heart. "I love you, Lucas Falco."
"I love you, too, Scarlett Falco." And then he proceeded to show her just how much.
* * * *
Gabriel Sanchez sat in the car, watching the building. It contained the offices of a high-dollar escort service in the heart of D.C. Weeks of planning had brought him to this place, and he hesitated before walking in.
His interview was a formality. He already knew he'd be accepted as a client. It wasn't just his connections to The General that assured him of that, but also the fact that his profile was impeccable. Gabriel knew he was good-looking. All the women said so. With his tousled, warm brown hair that was just a tad too long, and his piercing gray eyes, Gabriel knew that women liked what they saw. Add to that the tattoos that made women wonder just how much of a bad boy he really was, and he had no problems getting dates.
Well, if he’d wanted to date. His life consisted of one-night stands, and names were optional. Sex was just a means to an end. Pleasure. Nothing more. So it should be easy for him to take this job. He'd try out several escorts, learn the system, and figure out where the money was going. The General was sure that Bruno Lopez, the brother of Damon, who had kidnapped Scarlett and Emery, had Mafia connections, and was using this escort service as a front. The Mob had never been able to get a foothold in the district, and it was Gabriel’s job to make sure they never did.
Time would tell. He'd work his way through the women until he found one who knew something—and he guaranteed that someone knew more than she was saying right now.
His hand went to the door handle just as his phone buzzed. Scarlett. Somehow, this woman had gotten under his skin. At one point, he’d thought that maybe he had feelings for her. His friend's girlfriend, and now his wife. But he'd soon realized that all he felt for Scarlett was friendship, the deep kind that had him wishing for things that he knew weren't possible. Not for someone like him.
Lucas deserved the girl. He was a good guy. Sure, they'd all been a little rough around the edges years ago, and it had almost been their undoing. But none of them had the darkness in their souls that Gabriel did.
Ignoring the call, since he didn’t need Scarlett's voice in his head right now, he pushed open the car door and walked to the building. He hated this assignment. Being with women was hard for him, even though he was a red-blooded male and had needs just like the rest of them. But having sex and being close were two different things, and in order to break open this case, he'd have to get close. Real close.
Book Two
Chapter 1
Five years ago
Cate Bradshaw sat huddled in the adobe style home in a small town outside of Sabha, Libya. Tears ran down her face, falling to soak the blue linen shirt she wore. It was covered in stains now—blood, sweat, tears, dirt. She had them all. The last three hours had been the worst of her life.
The door opened, and the man who'd shot Todd Whitfield, her cameraman and friend, walked in. He set a plate of food in front of her that appeared to be couscous with pita bread. Cate's stomach growled, but she wasn't sure she could keep anything down. It had been hours since she'd eaten. Hours since her friend's life had been violently ripped away.
Her informant had told her to be at the tiny house in the middle of the small town around seven p.m. She and Todd had hidden behind the scraggly bushes next to the fence that bordered the back courtyard where the slave auction would take place. A small platform sat in the middle of the space, and instead of the young men they'd been told would be auctioned off, women and children had been sold into sex slavery.
The tears flowed again as Cate thought back to the young woman and her daughter who'd been sold to two separate men. The desperation and hopelessness of their situation had punched Cate in the stomach with the force of a heavyweight boxer, ripping an audible gasp from her. In the end, that gasp had been their undoing.
The guards protecting Tariq Ahmed Ben Ali had heard the sound and, moments later, had seized them. As they tried to take Cate away, Todd had pulled his Beretta from the back of his pants. Not seeing the man behind him, he'd been shot in the head, his blood and brain matter spraying all over her.
Her body shook as the memories assailed her. Todd had been her closest friend in the business. At barely twenty-five, she'd been in the industry for only a couple of years, and he'd been her go-to cameraman for all of them. She was a freelance reporter for the Associated Press, making a name for herself by investigating human interest stories. After hearing that Libyan traffickers were kidnapping people migrating to Western Europe and then selling them to the highest bidder, she'd known that the story was too big not to go after it. She'd seen a Pulitzer Prize in her future, and instead, she'd now lost her best friend and her freedom.
The knowledge that she would be sold, just like the others, rocked Cate's loose grip on her courage. She was terrified. Thoughts of being brutally raped and beaten hovered around her mind like pesky flies, and she batted them away.
She couldn't give up. Not yet. Todd would not die in vain. She would get out of this, and then go on to tell his story. The story of a man who gave his life trying to save hers. The tears that flowed steadily down her face turned to soul-shaking sobs. Her cries turned to dry heaving until they finally came to a jarring stop.
Picking up the small glass of water the man had left for her, she took a tentative sip. Her stomach rebelled at something entering it while it was so unsettled, but she swallowed hard, keeping the water down. She'd need her strength if she was given an opportunity to escape, so she took cautious bites of the bland couscous and flat bread.
A commotion outside her door made her jump. She stood on wobbly legs and pressed her ear tightly against the door to hear the sounds. The rat-a-tat-tat of gunfire pierced the air, and she heard shouting in both a foreign language and English. English?
She pounded on the door, hopeful that one of those men speaking her language would open it and rescue her. More gunfire and pounding feet were her only reply. She beat against the door again.
"Help! Help me!"
The knob on the door rattled, and Tariq pushed it open. Cate fell back and then scrambled backwards towards the far wall. She'd hoped for the good guys, not the bad guys.
"Let's go!" he
shouted.
She shook her head. The man who'd shot Todd pushed past him and yanked her up off her feet, shoving her through the door.
"You're my ticket out of here," Tariq yelled near her ear. The noise around the house was deafening, with gunshots and shouting still coming from the courtyard.
Tariq grabbed her arms and pulled her in front of him. She felt the hard press of a gun to her temple, and she stilled. Would he kill her, just as the other man had killed Todd?
They slowly crept through the house towards the front door. It didn't appear that anyone was inside. The trio passed by a room with pallets lying in a circle around an old TV that was sitting on a chair, and colorful rugs spread out over the hard floor. There was nothing on the walls, and nothing to indicate that anyone lived there permanently. Instead, it seemed to be a temporary dwelling for these men who sold women and children, and who killed innocent men without a second thought.
She darted her gaze back and forth, praying that whoever was out in the courtyard yelling in English would find her before these men killed her or took her with them to wherever they were running. Cate thought she'd rather die than be raped and tortured for the foreseeable future.
"Stop right there," a deep male voice called from behind them. Tariq whirled around, taking Cate with him and using her as a shield. She watched as confusion filled the man's eyes. His face was covered with black paint, and he wore a uniform with the U.S. flag on his shoulder. A dark helmet sat on his head, with something that looked like goggles perched on top. He was staring at them down the barrel of a really big gun. He was a soldier. She wasn't sure from what branch of the military, but she didn't care. The cavalry was here!
"Let her go, and maybe I'll let you live," he growled.
Tariq laughed behind her, still slowly backing up towards the front door. "I'd rather die than go to the great United States of America and live in a jail cell for the rest of my life."
"I'm thinking the death penalty for you," the man said in return. He was taking one step at a time towards them, as if he were being careful not to be too hasty with his movements. "And I'd be happy to deliver that sentence myself if you don't let her go."
"I'll take my chances, thank you very much." Tariq's cultured accent made his words sound polite, but the gun being pressed harder to her head told a different story. She whimpered.
"Just let the girl go," the man said, continuing to stalk them like a predator stalks its prey.
Tariq's gun let up just a little, and then light from the street outside poured into the room, casting eerie shadows across the floor.
Tariq picked up his pace, backing up rapidly and keeping Cate in front of him. The other man, the one that had killed Todd, took up the space next to her, his hands grabbing her other arm. They were both using her as a shield now, and she desperately wanted to look over her shoulder to determine where they were taking her.
She heard the snick of car locks opening, and Tariq said something in his native tongue. Suddenly, he pushed her hard, and she stumbled forward, falling to her hands and knees. The slamming of car doors made her turn to see a black sedan pulling away, clouds of dust filling the air.
"Stay down!" the soldier shouted, and then gunfire sprayed the car behind her, pinging off the doors and windows. Cate wrapped her arms around her head to protect it from any potential bullets that might ricochet off and lodge themselves in her skull.
The smell of burnt rubber from the squealing tires assaulted her nose, as the quiet settled around her. After what seemed like an eternity, but was probably just seconds, hands brushed her back. She sat up, scooting backwards to get away, but then blew out a big breath of relief when she saw it was the American soldier.
"Thank you," she said as she desperately fought off the tears that tried to reappear. Too much loss. Too much adrenaline. She was spent.
The man pulled her to her feet and took her arm, pulling her towards the house. She dug her heels in, stopping their progress.
"Where are you taking me?" she asked.
"We have a rendezvous point we have to get to. Since the target got away, we'll have to let the drones follow him. But we have to get to our extraction point on time."
She started to follow him again and then thought of Todd.
"Wait!" she cried out, and he stopped, the irritation rolling off him.
"My friend. He was—he was…shot. His body. We need to take him home."
The soldier nodded and pressed a button on his shoulder. "I've got an American hostage here. She had a friend. He's dead. We need to recover the body."
She heard nothing but waited patiently for the man to tell her what was going on. "Roger that. Be right there."
He touched her arm, softly this time. "You'll need to ID him. Think you can handle that?"
Not trusting her voice, she simply nodded and followed him to the back courtyard.
There were bodies lying haphazardly all over the ground, blood flowing from wounds in their heads and torsos. Cate choked back the bile that rose to the back of her throat. The women and girls she'd seen being auctioned off just an hour or two before sat huddled against the side of the house, comforting each other.
"What will happen to them?" she asked.
"We have someone coming to help them. They should be here shortly." His replies were succinct. Not unfriendly, exactly, but there was no warmth to his voice.
She looked towards the back fence, where she and Todd had been hiding. She could see his boots just past the gate. Her body froze to the spot, her blood like ice in her veins.
"There," she said, pointing to Todd's body on the other side of the fence.
Her rescuer walked away, stopping to talk to two other soldiers. With weapons in hand, they moved towards the gate. One reached down and pulled something from Todd's pocket.
"Todd Whitfield?" he called out over his shoulder.
The tears brimming at the surface broke through the dam holding them back. Great sobs wracked her body, and she crumbled to the ground. Oh, Todd! Why did you have to die?
* * * *
Gabriel Sanchez watched the woman staring at the sheet-draped body of her dead friend. Or was it her boyfriend? He couldn't be sure. She'd collapsed in the middle of that courtyard, tearing Gabriel's heart out, which was miraculous in and of itself because he didn't have a heart.
He was so shocked to have found her in that house with Tariq Ahmed Ben Ali. He momentarily wondered if she was something special to him, but he quickly realized that she was American, her clothes and lack of headscarf a dead giveaway. When she'd said thank you in that husky voice of hers, he'd wanted to puff out his chest, glad to be the one to have saved her.
At the same time, he was furious with her. What the hell was she doing in the middle of his op? They'd lost the target, but at least they'd been able to rescue the women and girls the bastard had kidnapped and sold. Even Gabriel’s cold, lifeless heart had nearly broken in two when he'd seen those women and children there. They'd arrived at the end of the auction, and had taken out several of the perverts who'd had the nerve to buy little girls for the sex industry. He hated those who preyed on the weak and vulnerable. He'd been preyed on himself as a kid, and there was nothing that got to him more than kids who were abused by the adults who were supposed to protect them.
He glanced over at the woman, not yet even knowing her name. There had been no time to talk and figure out her story. The hike for several blocks to their extraction site in stealth mode, and then being on a helicopter, had kind of made talking impossible. But he was dying to know her story. Why had she been there? Why had her friend been killed?
He glanced over at her. She was strong. Aside from her breakdown in the courtyard, the woman had not complained or shed a single tear since they'd left, her friend's body toted out by his team. After the tears stopped, which he’d stood by awkwardly and watched, she had stood, lifted her chin, looked him in the eye, and said, "Let's get out of this hellhole, shall we?"
He h
ad almost laughed at her feistiness. He'd dipped his chin in acknowledgement, and they'd left the compound, trudging through the streets of the small village with countless eyes peering at them from windows. But no one had bothered them, and now they were safely on the helo, making their way to the base in Naples, Italy.
They started their descent, and Gabe took off his helmet, running his fingers through his hair. His muscles were tense after the action-laced evening, and he stretched his neck from side to side. He felt someone looking at him and turned, meeting the eyes of the woman he'd rescued. She smiled tentatively, but he didn't smile back. Her smile fell, and she looked away.
He knew some people thought he was a cold-hearted bastard, and, for the most part, they were correct. But he had nothing to offer a woman except a quick roll in the hay. He didn't have time for hero worship, and he was afraid that that was what this woman was experiencing. Although she was quite stunning. She had long dark hair pulled back in a ponytail that hung down to her waist—her very tiny waist. She had curves in all the right places and eyes that reminded him of his favorite Irish whiskey. She was gorgeous, but he wasn't going anywhere near her. A girl like that could get ideas in her head, and hero worship would just complicate things.
Several hours later, he was sitting in front of his commander, debriefing the terrible cluster this thing had turned out to be.
No sign of Tariq anywhere. The drone that had followed the black car, lost it once it had driven into a garage. Two minutes later, three identical black sedans had driven out, going in three separate directions. The drone had followed one of the cars, but it had been a dead end. Tariq wasn't in that car.
Dammit! If it hadn't been for the woman, he could have taken out Tariq and his guard. But they'd used her as a human shield, knowing he didn't have a clear shot, and they'd gotten away. Just like a woman to screw up an important op like this.
Castle Investigations Box Set Page 25
