Despite his still aching head, he grinned ruefully at the memory, because that day had tossed his world upside down. He’d been angry as hell with his failure. Her team had been good, all of them, and they’d distracted him with an actual explosion out in the far fields where he’d thought the valuable crops were. But when he noticed none of his client’s personal security rushing to put out the fires, he’d checked back at the main building complex to find several of those resources neutralized and her on the roof with a sniper rifle.
Petite, dark beauty combined with deadly competence. He’d been captivated by her.
He’d confronted her until he saw the captives, the slaves, fleeing. He’d been completely ignorant of what the true property of value was on that plantation. Seeing those abused people had stopped him cold.
Now he had no idea what she was doing in a hospital room with him—months later and on a completely different island—seated as far as possible from both exits but with a clear line of sight out either of them.
“How many nurses have you scared?” At least his voice was working. His throat was raw and he could kill for a beer right about now. Hell, he’d settle for water.
His lady companion sighed and if anything, managed to look even more disgruntled just by drawing her brows together. “One was in here a full five minutes checking your records and fussing with your sheets before she looked around the room. The way she gasped and clutched her chest, I wasn’t sure if we’d need to hit the call button for her cardiac distress.”
He barked out a laugh despite the strain to his aching throat. “I have a few burning questions for you, but we need to get out of here.”
She raised one of those gently arched eyebrows, and her expression brightened. “Yeah? You have a concussion. You need to be under observation.”
Maybe, but it wasn’t a good idea to stick around here. Memories were coming back now, catching up as his brain engaged. Conversation helped. He remembered how long it’d been since he’d seen her, what he’d been up to in the meantime, and why he’d come to Big Island in the first place. Maybe he’d even explain it all to her, later.
“We’re on the ground floor. We both need to not be dead.” He scowled as he reached for his IV and realized the same arm was handcuffed to the hospital bed railing at the wrist. Maybe she wasn’t a companion so much as a keeper. “This is not a good start.”
“There’s only one level to this hospital, so ground floor was the only option.” She came to her feet, though, the motion fluid and graceful. He wondered if she danced. As she moved closer, there was an odd scraping noise and a large black and tan dog came into view, too. He must’ve been lying on the floor, almost under the bed. She glanced down the hallway first, then out the lanai. “This is an interior room, though. The lanai opens into an enclosed garden.”
“Copy that.” He glared at the handcuffs. “Look, I get the reason for these. I’m actually surprised there aren’t police officers in here. But I’m also somewhat surprised to be alive and would like to stay that way.”
“We have teams outside the room.” Now that she was standing, he saw the rifle and scope leaning next to her recently vacated chair. She also wore a shoulder harness with a handgun. “However, if you’re ready to start explaining what you were doing and what we might be expecting, chances of remaining secure in this location would be greatly increased.”
He forced himself to pause and think through the massive headache. It might be good to leave in the IV for a few seconds longer. Hydration wasn’t going to cure a concussion or the accompanying headache, but it could keep it all from getting worse. “You’re last line of defense.”
She didn’t respond.
Security wasn’t a simple thing. It was always set up in layers within layers, starting with some sort of outer perimeter and progressing inward. Sure, the hospital had its own alarm and surveillance systems for everyday safety, but she was here because she was watching him. If she and her team were protecting him, she was the final thing standing between potential attackers and their objective. He preferred that perspective, because the other way around meant she was the first line of defense to keep him from walking out of here. He still planned to leave and he’d like for her to let him. Hell, maybe even come with him for a bit.
“It’s been months, so the story is longer than we’ve got time for. I’m going for the highlights here.” He thought hard about what it would take for him to believe, if their positions were reversed. “Last time we met, you were in a rush. I’m going to point out that I took you at your word, with very minimal details, and I pulled back my team to let you and yours go on your way.”
She gave him the barest nod. “You can start with the highlights and I’ll decide if I need more before we move anywhere. Go.”
Not exactly what he’d asked for, but he’d take it and make the best of it. It was what he always did.
“Meeting you was a wakeup call for me. I told you back then I didn’t know about the captives on the plantation. Withdrawing, then letting the authorities come in, was the right thing to do.” He swallowed against the bitter taste in his mouth as he remembered his frustration. “Afterward, I reported back to my company and they didn’t agree with my decision. Maintaining their relationship with a high-paying client was more important than questionable ethics, as they put it. They considered my actions a dereliction of duty.”
It’d been a load of bullshit. What was worse, he had to admit he’d been inclined to turn a blind eye and give the same reasoning in other situations before that. Throughout his career, he’d been focused on contracts for the money and building his reputation in the private sector. He hadn’t thought beyond the immediate objectives in any given contract, mostly security, to what the client might be trying to secure. His integrity had been about being trusted to fulfill a contract, executing it with excellence. But that’d been for black market goods, inanimate objects or animals. He drew the line at the buying and selling of human life.
“I was reprimanded and demoted.” That’d angered him, too, because he’d worked hard to rise up in the organization.
She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, looking like she wanted to say something, but she didn’t.
He took a guess at what she was thinking and waved it away with his free hand. “I don’t regret it. I did the right thing. Then I gathered intel on you and your team, because I wanted to know more about who broke through my security plan.”
It’d been a point of pride and a warped sort of goal to find the team that’d bested him. He’d also been intrigued by her. He wanted to know more about how she fit into her team—not the lead but a strategic asset. She was a sniper but her team all worked with dogs and her dog hadn’t been with her when he’d first met her. Obviously, the GSD was with her now. Why had a sniper gone into search and rescue? How had she become a working dog handler? It was possible, just unusual, to change career paths that drastically and he was fascinated by the questions she inspired.
“Search and Protect Corporation.” Honestly, he didn’t like the name of their organization at all; too snappy. “You get paid to use dogs for search and rescue. Don’t people usually volunteer for that kind of thing?”
“We are contracted to locate and extract high-value hostages from extremely dangerous situations, the kind that require infiltration and a decent amount of firepower on the way out.” Her response was quick and pointed, but matter-of-fact. “Most of us have also volunteered in the case of major disaster.”
Cool and calm. He liked to poke until he got a glimpse of temper in people, figure out what it took to get them fired up and potentially distracted. She was not an easy target for teasing, and he liked the challenge she posed. “Uh huh. Back then, we never would’ve met if my client hadn’t started it all. I had to backtrack to figure it out since my team wasn’t part of it.”
She didn’t respond, didn’t even move.
He shook his head. “A group of scientists conducting interviews in H
onolulu’s Chinatown, researching human trafficking on Oahu and in the Hawaiian islands, and the client couldn’t keep his cool. He made a bold move, snatching those scientists right off the street. He was lucky Hawaiian police were stretched thin at the time, or maybe he’d set up a distraction somewhere else. Either way, he didn’t take time to find out who any of the scientists were before he had them taken. If he had, maybe he’d have realized one of them had family on the island. And if he’d followed up, he’d have figured out that family was you. If he’d asked my team to look into it, we’d have advised him against that kind of activity. He brought you and the police down on his head and my team had no warning. Maybe it was sheer luck Mali Siri evaded his goons and got to you for help. But even if she hadn’t, I think you’d have come looking for her.”
She interrupted her roving vigilance of the approaches to the room to give him a hard stare.
Oh yeah, he hadn’t been sure this woman was related to the research scientist who’d escaped the client’s kidnapping attempt over six months ago, but now he was. This woman’s glare meant death for anyone breathing wrong in her little sister’s direction. “So the client brought all this on himself. Once you’d extracted the scientists and gave the police the evidence they needed to search the rest of the plantation, you’d damaged operations, badly. My company was intent to make it up to the client by taking a more active role in re-establishing his human trafficking operations, with me assigned to the team in my demoted status. I declined and quit.”
“Might want to choose your next place of employment more carefully.”
It was his turn to glare at her. “What about you? Are you sure your missions will always keep your conscience clear? Do you really think you people will always be the heroes? You work with local law enforcement, plus that task force organized by the Hawaiian government. You do some work with the US military stationed on the islands, too, right? Police, government, a lot of people want to believe they’re always the good guys, but they hire private contractors like us for the work they never want to tell civilians about.”
He expected her to get angry. He wanted to see how she’d handle it, whether she’d lash out at him or get up and walk away. Instead, she only tipped her head to one side as she looked at him, a tired sadness in her eyes.
“It’s not always as clear as ‘good guys wear white.’ I’ve got a thing for the anti-heroes, honestly.” The corner of her mouth lifted in a hint of a smile. “Our backgrounds are accessible for most intel searches so I’m assuming you know I was military in the past. I got myself an honorable discharge so I could make my own choices. The only thing Zu promises me is that I will always have a choice when it comes to the missions we take on. I do what my conscience tells me is right. Can you say the same?”
“I could still be employed with a lucrative income. I’m here instead. Everyone has a choice, darlin’.” And he’d get to why shortly, but with this woman, he thought his motives mattered as much as his perceived actions.
“Your team didn’t respect yours. You were out of a job when you said no.”
Jason shrugged. “Would you want to keep working with a team if they took a mission you decided you wouldn’t?”
“It depends.” Her expression remained enigmatically neutral. “So far, we’ve never disagreed that completely. I guess we’ll see if the day comes when Zu’s ethics have shifted completely away from mine.”
The point was, her commander had given her the ability to choose without the threat of being tossed out of the team. Jason could see there was a difference. He filed it away to chew on later. It meant something, but he wasn’t sure if he was understanding it completely.
“Why do you think you’re in danger here?” She glanced away from him, out the lanai door and down the hallway. She was still keeping watch, keeping in mind his concern for his safety. Even if the background on why he’d come to the island was pertinent, she hadn’t been distracted from her main line of interrogation.
He quit trying to suss her out for the time being and got to the point. “They were happy to let me leave, and if I’d gone back to the mainland or even out of country, there’d be no issues. But I didn’t. I came to Big Island when I heard the client was replaced and the ring’s new boss was assessing his properties here.”
Her gaze returned to him.
He nodded. “Yeah, the organization you damaged is under new management. This morning, there was more security than there should’ve been for a simple taro farm, even with “stock” as part of the work force. I’m guessing his added security caught me snooping around the perimeter. I was too low on sleep and should’ve rested before trying to check out the area, but I didn’t think there was time. I took the risk and it was a bad call. I couldn’t have been unconscious long. They were probably checking back with the main team to figure out what to do with me when you arrived. They can’t just let me go without some kind of retribution for being where I wasn’t supposed to be. Hell, they could even suspect I led your team to them.”
Her lips pressed into a hard line. “So you expect them to come here to shut you up.”
“Possibly permanently, if they think I’ve been talking to you.” He figured the minute she’d taken him into custody he’d become a dead man. He wasn’t angry with her for it. He’d have done the same if their positions had been reversed. It was just a truth and he’d prefer to do all he could to remain among the living.
“Fine. I get how you ended up here. Why did you come?” She crossed her arms. The motion did wonderful things to accentuate her generous bust line.
He carefully kept his gaze up and trained on her face. “It didn’t seem prudent to remain in the immediate vicinity on Oahu, at least in the short term. While I was staying out of sight and out of mind, I figured I’d do some digging.”
He’d grown complacent in his old role with his former private contract organization. He’d thought of himself as good enough. The Search and Protect team had proven back at the plantation over six months ago that he and his team hadn’t been. From that perspective, he’d deserved to be demoted, not because he’d stepped aside after meeting her. “I needed to sharpen up some of my unused skill sets and…I wanted to do something to balance out the karma for contributing to the trafficking our client was doing. I was a part of it, even if I didn’t know. There’s no way I can make it right to those people, so I looked for other people I could help.”
He paused. He wasn’t good at admitting that kind of thing. He did what he did and he usually didn’t bother to explain himself. Arin kept her gaze on the approaches but her mouth relaxed. He pressed on. “One of the first things the new guy did was plan to clean house on a few strategic distribution points that might be particularly vulnerable to discovery by law enforcement. That’s why he’s inspecting each of his properties. I tried to get ahead of that to save as many people as I could. I came out here on my own and figured if I could lead them out, I could call local law enforcement to come get them. I made it past the outer perimeter just fine but I hadn’t acquired line of sight on my objective when I was hit from behind. I woke up here with you.”
Her attention sharpened. She’d been maintaining watch on the approaches via the hallway door and the exit out via the lanai, only sparing brief moments to look at him throughout their conversation. Now she honed in on him specifically and the sheer intensity of her focus brought the world around him to a standstill.
“The people you were looking for. Where are they?”
Cold washed through him. “I was assuming you and your team extracted them already and came across me in the process. You didn’t find them yet?”
Chapter Three
Arin grabbed the satellite phone and called her team lead.
“This is Alpha.” Zu came across curt, his tone sharp. That was a bad sign.
She tightened her stomach, bracing for an impact even if this one wasn’t going to be physical. “Alpha, this is Charlie.”
“Go ahead.”
“Our guest is awake. We’ve got a problem.” In the aftermath of the plantation incursion over six months ago, a brave young woman had given her testimony and intel on the human trafficking ring. In return, Arin had made a promise to look for a specific person on this mission. Among the captives, there was a boy. Lost. Now he might be gone forever and Arin would have to kill the hope in his older sister’s eyes. “Our target’s management may have decided to liquidate our objective. We need to find these people and get them out.”
From his seat on the bed, her guest extended his hand to catch her attention. When she made eye contact with him, he mouthed the words, “South Quadrant. There’s a set of sheds hidden in the tree line.”
She relayed the information. Damn it. South was part of the sector she and King had been searching. She and her canine partner might’ve found them by now if they hadn’t stumbled across this man and had to leave off their original objective.
Frustration and anger smoldered in her chest and she breathed in slowly through her nose to get a leash on her temper. She didn’t let the anger go, though. She’d make use of it later.
“Those sheds might be housing a lot of people.” She hoped not, but humans forced into manual labor weren’t provided much in the way of shelter. They were given the bare minimum to keep them alive and able to work, which kept them too weak to rise up against their captors or run away.
“Copy and confirmed.” Zu paused. “His intel is accurate. We came across the structures.”
She waited. Zu wasn’t a man for many words to begin with and when he was angry, he took his time to get his temper under control, too.
After a moment, Zu continued. “They’re not housing anymore. They’ve become a mass graveyard. The dogs hit the scent trails a few minutes before you called. The teams are looking for survivors. We need to know what other intelligence he can provide.”
Fierce Justice Page 2
