by Dale Mayer
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
About This Book
Complimentary Download
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Epilogue
About Hudson
Author’s Note
Complimentary Download
About the Author
Copyright Page
About This Book
When a yacht crashes into a tanker out in the ocean, it seems to be an unfortunate accident. Yet a gunman is spotted on the yacht just before the crash. What adds to the problem is that the yacht is owned by a US governor out on a holiday with his wife and daughter—and that no bodies were found at the crash site.
Gizella wakes up from the pirate attack on the yacht to find her father injured and her mother in equally bad shape. They are prisoners with no escape in sight. What was supposed to be a trip of joy and hope has ended in devastation. Even worse, an argument is brewing between her kidnappers, with her as the prize.
Baylor manages to whisk her away in the middle of the night, but she’s not out of danger yet. And, if he can’t find the kidnappers, maybe never …
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Prologue
Baylor Clement walked outside the apartment, knowing full well that Axel and Ally had crossed some kind of invisible line into a relationship. Outside, Baylor met Mason and motioned to the one gunman they had in custody. “He’s unconscious, but he’ll be okay. It looks like Axel broke his nose and maybe shattered his jaw.”
“Well, Axel’s got a hell of a set of hooks. He was a boxer in his day and a dirty-ass street fighter.”
“Well, I can sure relate to the street fighting,” Baylor said.
Mason looked up at the apartment. “Are they coming down?”
“Nope, I don’t think so,” he said. “I suspect they’ll go back to bed and not sleep.”
Mason grinned. “Good for them,” he said. Then he chuckled.
“What’s so funny?” Baylor asked, looking at him, completely puzzled.
“Oh, nothing, just the magic again. It still seems to be working.”
“You and your bloody matchmaking,” Baylor said. “Good thing you haven’t started in on me yet.”
“Oh, your turn will come,” he said.
“I’m okay not having a relationship,” he said. “This kind of life isn’t for most women.”
“No, yet the funny thing is, several of us have found partners, and it’s worked out really well,” Mason said, with a smile.
“Yeah, but you’ve got Tesla. That’s different.”
“And what about Ally?” he asked, motioning to the apartment.
“She’s different too.”
“Well, I can name another twenty women, if not thirty more,” Mason said, “who are just as different and the good kind of different.”
“Yeah, but that’s the thing,” Baylor said, with a cheeky grin. “All the good women in the world are gone.”
“Oh, I don’t know about that,” Mason said, chuckling.
“Nope,” he said. “Not happening.”
Mason looked at him with a smile and said, “You know what? I’ve never once intentionally set out to do this,” he said, “but, in this case, challenge accepted.”
Chapter 1
Baylor Clement walked outside the gym, tossed his bag into the front seat of his car, and headed back to his apartment. He lived on base and had done so for the last few years. He was ready for a change though, ready for a chance to do something different. Keeping his job, of course, because there was absolutely nothing in his world that he liked more than this. Being a Navy SEAL had been the epitome of his career, and, even though he knew most generally didn’t last more than eight to ten years in this field, he was only six in and loving every minute of it.
There was so much to like about the type of work he did. Not only was it good for his country and his fellow man but he felt like he was doing something for himself in a way, like a little bit of his soul was being helped by helping others. He knew it was foolish, and it was just a thought that slipped into his brain every once in a while—then slipped right back out again, if he were honest.
He loved the action and the nonstop physical requirements of the work he did. He loved the upgrades in training on a constant basis, whether computer applications or new techniques in self-defense or for weaponry. The physical level that he had to maintain was also something he prided himself on.
This work wasn’t without cost, however. He wasn’t able to support his personal relationships as much as he would like to sometimes. While most women liked a man in uniform, when they learned of the very viable element of death he faced every day, most couldn’t handle it. Even if some discounted that, thinking him almost immortal, being out of the country or off on missions so frequently led to a definite long-distance relationship. That was a death knell for most military guys.
He was also garnering some enemies as he rose in the ranks. Not so much with his coworkers but other countries around the world saw some of the SEALs as being a threat. There were other SEAL teams in other countries all around the world, but he had to admit that his American sector often took the brunt of the hate. He was okay with that because you could always judge a person by the enemies they had, particularly when they were doing things necessary for the security of this country.
His work was also varied, which he liked. He didn’t do the same thing twice any day, and generally, week by week, it was a steady pattern of physical training and advanced learning. He was good with that. He loved parachute days; he loved anything that was a cross between fitness, sports, and defense. As he got into his car, his phone rang. He looked down and smiled, then hit the Talk button. “Hey, Mason. What’s up?”
“You’re moving out,” he said. “Meeting in twenty.”
“Where to?”
“Briefing in Conference Room One,” Mason said, and, with that, he hung up.
Baylor drove home, quickly changed, packed up his to-go bag, then raced down to the meeting. He walked in just as twenty minutes passed.
Mason looked over at him, then smiled and said, “Right on time. That’s good.”
“What’s going on?” Baylor asked.
“We’ve got a collision at sea,” he said.
“Oh? Like what, a tanker?”
“Not an oil tanker, a container ship, and it collided with a yacht.”
“And that has what to do with us?” Baylor asked in confusion.
“Well, supposedly the yacht rammed it on purpose, and now it’s taking on water. A crew’s heading out to salvage it before it goes down, and several people are missing off the yacht.”
“If they’re missing off the yacht, then there’s hardly reason to suspect it was deliberate then, is there?”
“Some sightings of a gunman with a rifle at the helm of the yacht were reported,” Mason said. “And, according to the helicopter pilot, the gunman shot somebody as it all went down.”
“Interesting,” Baylor said, “but still it doesn’t really explain our involvement.”
“It’s an American yacht and a Russian tanker.”
“So, cross-borders, definitely issues between countries, so, yes, that gets a little more complicated. And?”
“The yacht belongs to one of our governors.”
“Of course,” he said, rolling his eyes. “Was he aboard at the time of the collision?”
“The governor, his daughter, and his wife,” he said quietly. “We suspect a speedboat just left the yacht, before it rammed into the tanker.”
“I presume this happened not too far away?”
“Just over one hundred nautical miles off the Seattle coast.”
“When?”
Mason gave a one-arm shrug. “Over the twenty-four-hour mark.”
Baylor winced. Not good.
“We’ll be airborne in thirty-five,” Mason said. “You ready?”
“Always,” he said. With that, they disbanded and headed out to their meeting point for the flight. Baylor had his to-go bag with him, as they headed to the airport.
Mason glanced at him. “We’re only going with our tactical gear.”
“Okay,” Baylor replied. “I would imagine it will be a fairly quick trip in and out.”
“We hope so,” Mason said. “They’re working to shore up the tanker right now.”
“Not oil but goods, right?”
“Goods on its way to the shipyards.”
“Good enough. What do we know about the yacht?”
“It’s taken on a lot of water. We’ve confirmed nobody’s on board.”
“So what do we know about the governor and his family?”
“No sign of them.”
“And the speedboat?”
“No intel yet.”
Baylor nodded, as he sat here on board their transport, quietly thinking about it. “And the gunman? Wait, let me guess. No word on that either.”
“You got it,” Mason said.
“So we don’t have much to go in with, do we?”
“Nope. And you know as well as I do that sometimes we don’t get all the answers. We’ll have to see what we can find.”
“Has anyone checked out the crew of the tanker?”
“In progress.”
Mason’s answers were just short enough that Baylor knew Mason didn’t have much to go on himself. And nothing they hated worse than going into a situation like this where they didn’t have enough information to do the job. Baylor still didn’t understand why they were here, except for strings being pulled due to the fact that a US governor was involved and that his location was in question. That speedboat should have been tracked, but to where?
As soon as they arrived at the scene, they were put on the big tanker ship, where the Russian captain stood with his arms crossed, yelling at them. So much for diplomatic intervention. As it was, the SEALs immediately broke out and did a complete search of the tanker. First and foremost to find out if they were involved in this and if they had taken the governor on board, either deliberately or innocently, and were then trying to turn around the situation into something they could use for political gain. But when they reconvened exactly one hour later, the team stared grimly at each other.
“No sign of them?” Baylor asked.
“None,” Mason said quietly.
Baylor nodded and waited for the two men who had gone to search the yacht. They came back on board within minutes.
“No sign of anyone over there,” Hudson said. “Their personal belongings remain on board, so it looks like they left in a hurry.”
“Still nothing on the gunman?” Baylor asked Mason.
“Nope.”
Baylor turned to Hudson again. “What about lifeboats on the yacht?”
“Two, both are missing.”
Baylor faced Mason. “In that case, I presume we have a helicopter out searching for them?”
Mason nodded. “Yes, and again nothing yet.”
Baylor frowned. “They have to be somewhere.”
“That’s the assumption, but where?”
With no other plan, they headed back to the helicopter, but Baylor frowned as he thought about it. “I don’t really like anything about this.” He turned to look at the yacht, still close to sinking beside them. “I want to take a look for myself.”
Mason looked at him and shrugged. “You’ve got ten minutes.”
Baylor nodded and dropped over the side of the tanker and quickly scooched his way down to the yacht. It took a little bit to maneuver into the boat. As he went on the far side and slipped belowdecks, he navigated through the water slowly coming in. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but something about this whole thing bothered the hell out of him. He saw a notebook floating by and snatched it up. Carefully he took a look at it. As soon as he opened it, someone had written the word Help and a name.
Damn if it wasn’t his own name. On the bottom of the cover it said Gizella, which he knew to be the name of the governor’s daughter. And maybe a woman he had once met.
He lifted the soggy page and turned to the next one. There he saw a quick sketch of a man who made Baylor’s blood run cold. It was clearly a drawing of a well-known terrorist from Russia, who had separated from Russian politics and was now a mercenary. Shit. These guys were slippery, not easily found. He shook his head. Sometimes the bad guys were never caught.
Taking a quick look around for anything else that seemed pertinent, Baylor raced topside, as the yacht continued to sink. In fact, it was going down fast with him on board. He heard shouts from above. As he emerged onto the deck of the yacht, suddenly the yacht slammed against the tanker. He managed to grab the ladder and quickly climbed his way back up again.
Mason looked at the book Baylor pulled out of his shirt and asked, “What’s that all about?”
Baylor opened it up, so Mason saw the Help message, and then Baylor turned to the next page. Immediately the men around them whistled.
“Jesus,” Mason said.
“As far as I’m concerned,” Baylor said, “we need to go after this guy—and now.”
“Is there any other logical reason why that would be noted there?” Hudson asked.
Baylor gave a one-arm shrug and replied, “I don’t know where the daughter would have seen that face unless she’d actually seen him in person.”
“Good point,” Hudson said, studying it.
Baylor looked over at Mason. “I want to go with the rescue team.”
“Well, nobody is going alone anywhere,” he said, “but I have to get clearance for this.”
“Well, we’ve got a young woman’s clues here, indicating a kidnapping. Actually I have no clue how old the daughter is,” he said, then looked over at Mason. “Did we get any intel on that?”
“Yeah, she’s twenty-five. She was here on holiday with her parents. Apparently the mother had just come through several rounds of chemotherapy for breast cancer, and this was to be a recuperative voyage for them.”
“Wow, that’s tough,” he murmured. “So we have a young woman with an uncanny ability to sketch faces, and she left us one hell of a message.”
“She did, indeed. Okay,” Mason said. “I’ll see if I can get clearance for a team of four. We still need a destination.”
“Well, maybe this helps,” Hudson said. “Look here in the drawing, written in very small letters. It says Bern.”
“She only would have noted that if the kidnappers were talking,” he said. “But why Bern?”
“Unless the kidnappers are after what, Swiss banks?” Hudson offered. “Maybe these gunmen have a Swiss connection.”
“Or rather,” Baylor said, “maybe the governor does?”
At that, Mason gave him a sharp look and nodded. “We’ll go with that.”
*
Gizella stared at the gunman in anger. “You didn’t have to hit her.”
“You’ll be next, if you keep it up,” the man said in perfect English.
“She’s just recovering from breast cancer treatment, so she’s hardly a threat to you.”
“Anybody who keeps running their mouth is a threat to me,” he said, turning to glare at her. “So, if you don’t want a dose of the same, shut the hell up.”
She pinche
d her lips together and glared at him. Gizella had seen some assholes in her life, but this guy took the cake. She gently patted her mom, who had crashed on the bench beside her.
They were in another boat, and Gizella had no clue where or why because they had been knocked out in the interim. When she woke up, she was in this boat, just floating along a river. The river part made her think Europe because towns were all up and down on either side. She couldn’t identify any particular landmark to help her figure out where she was. But she had overheard one of their kidnappers say something about Bern, before they were knocked out with some kind of drug.
As it was, she doubted that anybody knew where they were going or where they’d come from. Even if some witness did see their transfer, Gizella and her parents were confined to this small space in maybe a cargo room aboard the ship. Out of sight of any more witnesses. This area had been blocked off with plywood only waist-high. So she could vault it, if she needed to, but wouldn’t push that opportunity right now.
The only thing she could really do was stay alert and try not to open her mouth and piss these guys off any further. But it was impossible for her to sit by while they beat up on her mother, who had been through far too much already. Not only had her father crossed the line and had an affair several years ago but her mother had ended up with a diagnosis of breast cancer just after the two had reconciled. The years since had been fraught with worry, pain, and stress, and now this happened—just when her mother had completed her treatments and they were taking a little vacation to enjoy some family time and to get some distance from the treatments and the fear that seemed to permeate every day of their lives.
Gizella groaned, as she collapsed against the side of the boat. She didn’t know where they were and had only one window, which didn’t give her a decent view of the landscape outside. What little she had seen looked like small communities. Even as she studied the area, nothing seemed familiar, but then she’d never done any European tours. She didn’t even know if she was on a little barge, a converted luxury yacht, or a miniature cruise ship; she had no clue. For that matter it could be a monstrosity of a cruise ship, although it didn’t feel that way. It felt like a smaller craft, which took on every wave, every damn little movement of the water.
