by Janie Crouch
She’d slept through all that? Holy cow. “Sorry.” Sophia felt her cheeks burning.
“Think nothing of it. You needed the sleep. If I had any other business to do here, I’d do it. But this is a tiny county airport and there’s not much happening around here after dark. And I didn’t think you’d like to wake up and find yourself in some strange plane and hangar with nobody around for miles, or believe me, I would’ve let you sleep as long as you liked.”
“Uh, no, I probably wouldn’t. Good thinking on your part. I’d like to get back to my own bed.”
“I’ve got my truck around the back of the main hangar. Let’s get you home.”
Dylan helped Sophia out of the plane and they walked toward the main hangar. As Dylan had told her, there was no one else around, just the two of them. Which, when Sophia caught the reflection of herself in a window and saw how horrible she looked—as she had run down a mountain in the rain and slept in a cave—was probably for the best. She’d hate for anyone else to see her like this.
They stopped to grab a soda and some crackers out of the vending machine in the hangar, all her traumatized stomach could handle. Dylan excused himself to go check on something about his flight tomorrow in one of the small offices and Sophia sat down at the table to consume her meal.
The door at the back of the hangar opened and closed quietly a few moments later. Sophia looked over in the direction of the door but couldn’t see anything in the darkness.
“Hello?” she called out. Had Dylan gone over that way and she hadn’t realized it?
Nobody responded. But Sophia sensed someone else in the hangar with her. Someone who worked there?
Sophia stood up. She’d go to the office and find Dylan. If this turned out to be nothing then they could just laugh about her traumatized nerves.
“No need for you to get up on our account, Ms. Reardon.”
Oh, hell, it was Smith.
Sophia ran. Maybe they didn’t know Dylan was in the office and she could lead them away. She bolted for the door, but one of Smith’s men—Rick—caught her. He threw her against the door hard.
“Now, Sophia, why are you running?” Smith was grinning wickedly as he walked toward her. She could see Fin and Marco with him. Marco was wearing some sort of sling on his arm. “I thought we were friends.”
“How did you find me?”
Smith’s laughter was far from reassuring. “Now, that happens to be a funny story.”
Smith walked all the way up to Sophia until he was standing just inches from her. Sophia tried to back up but Rick was right behind her. Smith reached up and touched her neck. Sophia flinched and tried to move to the side, but Rick wouldn’t let her. Smith’s hand continued its trail to the side of her neck, then her nape, then finally reaching down inside her shirt’s collar. Sophia shuddered at Smith’s touch, struggling to keep down the crackers she had just eaten. Smith flipped up her collar. He brought his hand back out and held it in front of her face.
Some sort of tracking device. Damn it.
“So this—” Smith waved the tracker right in front of her “—was supposed to keep me apprised of everywhere you went. After I had a visit from a very trusted source who assured me that everything you were telling me about Ghost Shell was untrue, I decided I better keep close tabs on you. And since I was providing your clothes, this seemed like the easiest way, yes?”
Sophia tried to shy away from Smith again, but he moved closer.
“But, and here’s the funny part, it seems that when it gets wet, this little tracking device doesn’t work correctly. Quite the defect. So when you were running all over the mountain in the rain, this thing would provide only intermittent, imprecise signals. Not terribly useful. And very frustrating for poor Marco here, who got shot by your boyfriend in the midst of this fracas.”
Better Marco than Cameron. But Sophia kept her thoughts to herself.
Smith continued with a flourish, “Once you were on the plane and your clothes eventually dried, the tracking device began working perfectly again. So here we are.”
Sophia racked her brain for a way out of this. She wanted to protect Dylan, who she knew would be reappearing any moment. But she also knew what Smith wanted: Ghost Shell. And she didn’t have it. And honestly couldn’t even tell Smith where it was, even if she wanted to. It was at Omega headquarters and she had no idea where that was.
Sophia didn’t see any way that she was getting out of this alive, but she didn’t see why she would need to take the brother of the man she loved down with her.
“Well, I guess you found me. Congratulations.”
Smith finally backed away from her the slightest bit. “Let’s just make this easy for all of us, my dear. All I want is Ghost Shell. No need for drama.”
Sophia rolled her eyes, not even trying to hide it. She had no doubt whether she gave Ghost Shell over to Smith or not, he was still going to have her killed. “Unfortunately, there’s going to have to be a little drama, Smith. I don’t have Ghost Shell. Cam does. And I have no idea where he is.”
Sophia didn’t see the blow coming, but Smith’s slap nearly knocked her to the ground. She could taste blood where her teeth cut against her cheek.
“I really don’t have time to play games, Sophia. I believe you when you say Cam has Ghost Shell. What I don’t believe is that you don’t know where he is.”
“I’m sorry, but that’s true. It seems that the bastard has double-crossed both of us. We split up to get away from you, but were supposed to meet here hours ago. Why else do you think I’d still be here at this tiny little airport?”
She could see that gave Smith pause. But then he shook his head. “I think not. I saw the way Cam looked at you at the party. There is no way he abandoned you. Not even for all the money he could make doing so.”
She looked over to see Fin nodding in agreement. Damn. She needed to think of a way to steer them out of the building before Dylan returned.
But she was too late. Dylan stepped out of the shadows. She could see his training—so similar to Cameron’s—as he took out Fin with two short punches and an elbow to the chin. Fin dropped to the ground before Smith or his men could even figure out what was happening. Dylan had Fin’s gun in his hand and was pointing it at Smith in the blink of an eye.
Marco and Rick both drew their weapons and pointed them at Dylan. But Smith only laughed. He pulled out his own gun, but instead of pointing it at Dylan, he stepped behind Sophia and pointed the gun directly at her temple.
“Oh, just look at this.” Smith laughed gleefully. “You just have to be Cam’s brother. You two look exactly the same. Exactly the same.”
“Yeah, that’s right, he’s my brother. Why don’t we all just put our guns down. Everyone can walk out of here without any injury.” Dylan nudged Fin with his toe. “Except maybe this guy here.”
“I don’t think so.” Smith grabbed Sophia’s arm to hold her more closely in front of him. The movement jarred her shoulder and she let out a moan before she could help herself. “Oh, I’m sorry, my dear. Is that the hurt shoulder Fin told me about?” Smith turned to look at Dylan. “I’m going to need you to put your gun down.” Smith grabbed Sophia’s shoulder and dug into it with his fingers. Her screams echoed through the whole hangar. She struggled not to lose consciousness.
“Okay, stop,” Dylan told Smith. “Here.” He laid the gun on the ground and kicked it over to Smith.
“Unfortunately, your brother has something that belongs to me. I need to get that back.” Smith motioned to Rick, who walked over to stand in front of Dylan. At this point Fin was dragging himself off the ground, too. “Bring him outside.”
Sophia saw Rick hit Dylan in the face and then the stomach. As Dylan was doubled over, Fin brought his knee up into his face, knocking him all the way backward. Smith grabbed her arm and began marching her toward the door.
“Please, Mr. Smith.” Sophia was crying now. “I swear I don’t know where Cam is. I would tell you.”
S
mith walked Sophia all the way to his car. She watched as Fin and Rick dragged Dylan outside, taking shots at him when they could.
“Oh, I believe you,” Smith told Sophia. “But if that’s his brother, he knows where Cam is, or at least how to get in touch with him.”
Fin and Rick dumped Dylan’s nearly unconscious form at Smith’s feet. Smith squatted down so he could get closer to Dylan. “Tell your brother he has until midnight tonight to bring Ghost Shell to me at the warehouse from the last weapons buy. He’ll know where that is. Tell him we start cutting her into pieces at midnight.”
Sophia sucked in her breath as both Rick and Smith chuckled. There was no way Cameron would be able to get Ghost Shell to that warehouse. Even if he decided her life was worth the trade—which he wouldn’t—Cameron wouldn’t even have Ghost Shell anymore after giving it to Omega. Plus, it looked as if Dylan was barely breathing. How in the world was he supposed to get to Cameron? A whimper escaped Sophia.
Sophia was so worried about Dylan lying bleeding in the parking lot that she barely noticed Smith’s slight nod to Rick and didn’t pay much attention to Rick when he came and stood right in front of her. She finally looked up at him just as his meaty fist hit her in the jaw.
Sophia felt everything go black around her, as she sank unconscious to the ground.
Chapter Nineteen
“All I’m saying is that it would’ve been better if you had brought in Ms. Reardon, too, so she could be debriefed,” Cameron’s boss, Dennis Burgamy, argued. Again. In his whiny, nasally tone.
“She will be, in a couple of days. She has a wound that needs treating, and then I’ll bring her in.” Cameron wasn’t about to say anything regarding the suspected mole at Omega. Not with this many people in the room.
Exhaustion and coffee flowed through Cameron’s veins. Since his arrival at Omega Sector hours ago, he’d been talking, reporting, debriefing nonstop. Dennis Burgamy was thrilled to get his grubby paws on Ghost Shell. Cameron knew the man would be on conference calls either tonight or first thing in the morning, if he didn’t send out a sector-wide email, somehow taking credit for the whole thing, first. What a kiss-up.
But Cameron’s real problem was that he hadn’t been able to get in touch with Dylan. He hadn’t expected to communicate with him while he was en route, but they should’ve been on the ground now for a while. Cameron told himself there was no need to panic. Dylan and Sophia hadn’t been out of pocket for that long, and a number of things could’ve caused the lack of check-in. Cameron had been without a good sleep for a long time, and under a constant level of high stress since Sophia had walked into that warehouse a few days ago, not to mention the headache he’d carried around pretty constantly since he’d had her clock him. He needed to take all these parts of the equation into consideration and not just assume the worse.
“We have medics here who can treat wounds, Branson.” It was Burgamy again, but damned if Cameron could remember what they were talking about. He stared at his boss blankly. “For Ms. Reardon’s wound?” Burgamy continued.
Oh. Cameron willed his exhausted brain to form a pithy response, but nothing. He just sat there staring at his boss.
“Okay, everybody out of the pool. Party’s over, kiddies.”
It was Sawyer. Oh, thank God. Cameron had never been so thankful to see his charismatic little brother. Sawyer patted Cameron on the shoulder and gave him a friendly wink, then proceeded to herd everyone else out of the debriefing room, including Burgamy. Cameron sat down wearily in the chair behind the table, watching his brother work his magic. Sawyer spoke to everyone jovially, slapping backs and cracking a couple of jokes. People almost always did what Sawyer asked them to do, and with a smile on their faces.
Cameron shrugged as his brother led the last person out, asking the woman about her child by name. Cameron had worked here just as long as Sawyer, but didn’t even know the woman had a child, much less the kid’s name. Sawyer had a way with people Cameron just didn’t have. Hell, hardly anybody had it.
“You’re a popular guy,” Sawyer said to Cameron as he closed the door behind the woman who had just left.
“No kidding.” Cameron leaned his head all the way back in his seat and closed his eyes, stretching his long legs out under the table.
“I just heard you were back or I would’ve been here sooner. So, mission accomplished?”
Cameron shrugged. “Not the way I had hoped it would go down. Smith and DS-13 are still fully active, which pisses me off to no end after what Smith did to Jason. But yeah, I recovered Ghost Shell, so I guess Burgamy considers that a win.”
“And this girl I keep hearing about?” Sawyer came to sit down on the other side of the desk. If there was one thing Cameron could count on it was that Sawyer would definitely be interested if a woman was involved.
“Sophia Reardon.” Cameron peeked out at Sawyer through one eye.
“The Sophia Reardon? The one you have categorically refused to talk about for the last five years?”
Cameron closed his eyes again. “Shut up, Sawyer.”
Sawyer chuckled. “So where is she?”
Cameron opened his eyes and sat up straighter in the chair. “She’s with Dylan. I had him come get her and fly her out separately.” Now he had Sawyer’s full attention. “I didn’t mention this in the debriefing, but I think we have a mole in Omega.” Cameron explained the meeting with Agent McNeil and what had put him on guard.
“Holy hell, Cam. If that’s true, we’ve got a really big problem here.”
Cameron nodded. A really big problem indeed. “So Dylan’s going to take her home and keep an eye on her until I can get there.” Cameron looked down at his phone again. Still no message from either Dylan or Sophia. “He should’ve touched base by now. I don’t know what his malfunction is.”
The door to the interview room burst open, startling both men. A young man whom Cameron recognized, but whose name he didn’t know, was breathing hard, having obviously run from somewhere.
“Um, Agent Branson. You’re needed downstairs in the lobby. Like right now,” the man huffed out.
“Which one of us? We’re both Agent Branson,” Sawyer said.
The man hesitated for just a second. “I guess both of you. But he’s asking for you, Cameron.”
Cameron and Sawyer both stood. “Who’s asking for me?”
“I’ve never met him, sir, but someone said it’s your brother.” He looked over at Sawyer. “Your other brother, who used to work here. He’s down in the lobby and hurt pretty bad...”
Cameron was sprinting out the door at the first mention of his other brother. Sawyer was right behind him.
* * *
DYLAN SAT IN a chair surrounded by security personnel. Although sat really wasn’t the right word. Cameron’s heart dropped into the pit of his stomach when he saw the shape his brother was in. One eye was swollen shut, his nose was most definitely broken and Dylan perched in the chair at a peculiar angle with his arm wrapped around his middle. That pose suggested broken, or at least cracked, ribs. And security was surrounding Dylan as if he was some sort of threat.
Cameron scanned the room and noticed immediately that Sophia was nowhere to be seen.
Sawyer uttered a vile curse when he saw Dylan, and his face echoed the shock Cameron knew lay on his own. Someone had worked their oldest brother over in a way Cameron and Sawyer had never seen. And getting the drop on Dylan was damn near impossible.
Both men lowered themselves beside Dylan’s chair so he wouldn’t have to look up at them.
“You.” Cameron turned back to the young man who had come to get them and pointed toward the main entrance. “Medic. Right damn now.” He turned to the security workers. “And you two, stand down.”
“He came in with no ID asking for you, Agent Branson. We didn’t know who he was. He was barely conscious,” one of the security guards said.
“He’s our brother,” Sawyer told them. “You did the right thing. We’ll handle it now.”
“They got her, Cam.” Every word was obvious agony for Dylan. “Smith showed up with his goons at the airport and they got her.”
Cameron felt the bottom of his very existence fall out from under him. He all but fell into the chair next to his brother. “Is she dead?”
Dylan shook his head gingerly. “No. No, they plan to keep her alive to flush you out.”
Cameron let out a huge breath he hadn’t even known he was holding. He was almost dizzy with relief. She was alive, at least for now. Cameron planned to do whatever he could to keep it that way. He couldn’t lose her now. Not when he had just gotten her back and realized she was the missing piece in his life.
Dylan shifted in the chair and a moan of pain escaped him. “They want you to bring Ghost something.” He tried to shrug but failed miserably. “They said to bring it to the warehouse from the last buy or...”
Cameron finished for him. “Or they’ll kill Sophia.”
Dylan winced. “The main guy said he’d start cutting her into little pieces if you weren’t there by midnight.”
Midnight? Cameron glanced at his watch. That was only an hour from now. There was no time to get a team together and prepped for the site. He struggled to tamp down the panic building inside him. Panic wouldn’t do any good now.
“You do know what he’s talking about, don’t you? The Ghost thing?”
Cameron made eye contact with Sawyer. Yeah, he knew what it was, but getting it was going to be much more difficult. Especially now that his boss was probably taking selfies with it in his office at this very moment. There was no way Burgamy was going to give Ghost Shell back to Cameron. Not even for Sophia’s life.
“Ghost Shell, yeah. I know what it is, bro.”
“Cam, you know this is a trap. Whatever it is they want, as soon as they get it, they’re going to kill you and her both. There’s at least four of them.” Dylan’s voice was getting weaker. They needed that medic quick. A glance at Sawyer told Cameron he was worried about the same thing.
