“What now?” Cord bit out. “We’ve already committed a B&E. Might as well go all the way.”
Damn. Seth had been so sure they’d find something to help locate Devereaux. Bowing his head to his chest, he scraped a fingernail over his brow and the long ago reminder of another hopeless situation he hadn’t thought he’d survive. But he had, thanks to Hunter Christian, another teammate.
For all Seth knew, Sly might have her out at sea on a boat by now—or worse. Did Sly even know Montego was dead? Was this part of Sly’s plan to takeover the bastard’s human trafficking business? Or, judging by what went down at the bar, was Sly already balls deep in the trade? Who exactly worked for who?
“Let’s assume Sly’s working with Montego, that he’s a supplier,” Seth said as the scar under his brow itched. “He’s certainly got the means. How would Sly get women he kidnaps into Cuba? He’d need a boat for that.”
“Or a chopper, something that could get in and out without attracting a lot of attention. Shit, McCray. How would I know?”
And they were back at square one. Seth’s heart clenched as a physical pain lanced through it at the very real possibility of what Devereaux might be going through while they farted around doing nothing at all. Anger swelled and he slammed the trunk lid out of sheer frustration. Then slammed it again when the damned thing popped back up, asking for more. The lid wouldn’t shut, so he hit it again and again, until—
A tiny slip of paper fluttered from inside the trunk, just enough of a glimmer that it registered at the corner of his eye. Slapping the trunk wide open this time, Seth ducked under the lid and latched onto the paper. “You got a flashlight on you?”
“You bet.” Cord produced a slim LED penlight out of nowhere and aimed it at the gas receipt between Seth’s fingers. Exxon in East Rockland Key. Forty dollars cash sale. Date stamped zero-dark-thirty yesterday morning.
“Where the hell’s East Rockland Key?”
“Due east of here, past Naval Air Station Key West, but I know that service station. It’s on the north side of the highway, out in the middle of nowhere.”
Seth cocked his head at Cord. “Why would Sly be there in a limo in the dead of night?”
Cord shrugged. “There’s a helluva lot of swamp and brush north of the highway. If Dev’s there, we’ll never find her.”
Seth’s eyes scrolled from the limo and back to Devereaux’s brother. “Want to bet?”
Chapter Thirty-Five
Prince Bagani liked to talk. A lot. Too bad Dev didn’t like to listen. Yet listen she did, since she had no choice, and every word out of his lying mouth meant one more second of life without pain.
And now she knew precisely who Joachim served. It had taken every last bit of her fury and her strength before he’d managed to get her out of the bathroom. By then, the shower curtain was shredded and the mirror over the sink shattered. She’d clawed his face, arms, and neck until he bled. She’d kicked his privates and cursed him to hell for what he was doing to her.
But the ass was bigger and meaner. Once he’d gotten a handful of her hair and punched her tender jaw again, she’d gone down for the count.
She lay cuffed on her back to the bed on black plastic sheeting, the kind that normal people covered their furniture with when they painted or stored it. When they wanted to protect it. But Bagani was far from a normal human being, and he had no intention of protecting her.
Dev had never felt more exposed or more afraid in her life. She now knew what the plastic was for—her dead body. He’d laid the proof of his deadly intentions on the bed alongside her shivering bare legs. His tools, he’d called them. Scalpels. Delicate surgical hammers. A speculum. Battery cables. Needle-nosed pliers. Something shiny and wicked that looked like a long crochet hook. Something else that resembled an eyeball-sized melon-baller.
God, get me out of here!
“I met a pretty woman on an island once,” he said, gazing past her to a spot on the opposite wall as if reminiscing. “She was almost as pretty as you, but the difference between you and her is that she was and remains the only woman smart enough to escape my, ahem, charms.”
Devereaux stared at the ceiling while Joachim sat waiting in a chair at the foot of the bed, either as a spectator or Bagani’s assistant in crime, she still wasn’t sure. Once Bagani stopped monologuing, she’d find out, but for now, Dev sent her prayers heavenward, just not to the fire and brimstone God of her parents.
They’d told her this would happen, that women who’d kept the children they bore out of wedlock were doomed for hell and damnation. That God would never grant a person like her mercy, and that Satan would catch up with her one day. Just wait and see, young lady. Like it or not, you’ll get your comeuppance because that’s what sinners like you deserve. Suffering. Burning in hell. Stuff like that.
She could almost hear her father’s final curse when he’d bellowed like some fiery Old Testament prophet, “Begone! Never darken my doorstep with your shadow or the product of your illicit sexual affairs again! You are dead to us. Dead. Get thee hence!”
Yeah, right, Dad. Scottie’s no product, you asshole. He’s a sweet, innocent baby boy, and you and Mom could’ve loved him. But no, you self-righteous prick. You’re the one who threw your only grandson and me away. You’re the sinner.
A tear welled at the corner of her eye. She’d never believed in the cruel God her parents yammered on and on about, yet here she was, about to get an almighty comeuppance from their god of wrath and hate. But that wasn’t right, and she knew it. Her parents were misguided, misled, and just damned wrong. So, Dev prayed to the real Man upstairs, the One who’d had her back through the hardest times. If not for God and Cord, she’d still be raising Scottie alone.
Please, God. I need a miracle.
Prince Bagani tapped her forehead with that crochet hook thingee. “Am I boring you?”
“No,” she replied quickly, startled that she hadn’t been ‘ah-huh-ing’ at all the appropriate breaks in his rambling. “You were saying?” she asked, blinking like a fool interested in his depraved stories before he did anything else with the instrument twiddling between his slender fingers.
“You’re a lot like her, you know,” he said as his dark eyes scrolled over her mostly bare body. “Petite, yet strong. Fierce like a shrew, but malleable like copper. Teachable. Bendable. Trainable.” He turned to Joachim. “She does know who her master is, right?”
Joachim ran a finger under his swollen, runny eye, the one Dev had belted before he’d knocked her out. “She does now.”
The Prince grunted as he traced the cold hook of that long metal thing on the sensitive skin at the inside of her arm, from her elbow, down her armpit, and onto the tiny links in the knitted mesh cup over her left breast. He paused there, tapping the tip on the peak of her nipple. “Shea Reynolds was a genius I didn’t see coming,” he murmured, his eyes bright and Dev’s heart racing at what he might do next.
“One moment she was in my bed, waiting and ready…” Yeah, I’ll just bet she was waiting and ready for you to torture her. “…but the next…” His dark brows lifted, and his eyes widened. “Poof. I turned my back, and she was gone. She disappeared just like an angel.”
Dev didn’t dare take her eyes off her tormentor. When he’d first arrived, the prince had worn a charcoal gray business suit, white shirt, and black tie, almost as if he’d come from a day at the office. But that would’ve been normal.
Once Joachim had wrestled Dev onto the bed, Bagani had tossed his suit jacket, then swiftly cuffed her ankles to the metal rail at the foot of the bed, and her wrists over her head to the sides of the headboard. She hadn’t an inch of leverage to wiggle, they’d stretched her body so tightly between the posts.
Now Bagani’s sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing the olive-skin and fine black hairs on his forearms. The man was an attractive male. With his Mideastern heritage, he probably cut a handsome profile that some women would’ve been
drawn to.
Drawn and quartered was more like it.
Repulsed at that very probable outcome in her immediate future, she suppressed a shudder. Falling apart now wouldn’t help, and she was afraid it would excite Bagani into acting out his plans for the evening prematurely. He and Joachim seemed to be waiting for someone, Sly no doubt, to join this macabre party. Up until now, all they’d done was stare at her like she was one of those poor butterflies pinned to a poster board for exhibit. Or dissection. So, she listened, and while she listened, she prayed her heart out.
“Where are we?” she asked, hoping to keep him talking.
Bagani leaned back in his chair, crossed his legs, and folded his hands, rotating the instrument between and over his fingers like a baton. “Does it matter?”
“Y-yes,” she answered, her teeth chattering. “If I’m going to die here tonight, I’d like to at least know where my final resting place is going to be.”
His nostrils flared even as amusement brightened his dark eyes. “Ah, but you’re not going to die, my dear little princess. At least, not yet. But as for your final resting place…” He turned his head to ask Joachim, “You’re sure the alligators are hungry today?”
God, no!
“Sure, I been feeding them rotten chicken. That’s what keeps ’em close to the shallows.”
Dev squeezed her eyes shut as her heart sank. Not alligators. No one would ever know what happened to her then. There wouldn’t be enough of her body left to make a positive identification. Scottie would grow up not knowing how much she’d loved him. Not even Seth would know what became of her. She closed her eyes even as tears trickled down the sides of her head. ‘Help me, Jesus,’ she prayed. ‘Please, please help me.’
Bagani tapped her breast again with that tool, once, twice, then whip! He hit her hard, and God, it stung!
Dev groaned, fighting the scream climbing up her throat. If she started screaming, she’d never stop, and what good would it do? Nothing!
Still seated, Bagani leaned into her and said, “Open your eyes, my dear. There, there. See how easy that was? You do as I say, and…” Whip! “We’ll get along just fine. Now then, who am I?”
“Prince Bag—”
Whip! “Try again.”
Oh, hell, that hurts! “M-master,” she cried, her entire body tensed, hoping that was right. Who the hell knew?
Bagani’s brows furrowed. “Better, but…” Whip! “…next time, be quick about it. A master…” Whip! Whip! Whip! “…hates to be kept waiting on a lowly woman. And who are you?”
“Angelique,” she supplied quickly, staring at him through her tears rather than letting him think she wasn’t an obedient slave. Oh no. Now was the time to take her beating and survive. Later. If she ever got out of here, she’d kill him later. With relish and with every last tool on the bed beside her.
Chapter Thirty-Six
Seth and Cord raced for East Rockland Key. It had been a long night of failed leads, but he had another hunch, and if this one panned out, Devereaux would be in his arms by daybreak. If not? They’d be back at square one again.
They were nearly off the thin stretch of highway between the islands when his satphone vibrated in the holster on his hip. “McCray.”
“Where are you?” Alex bit out.
“Right now, I’m a mile from East Rockland Key. Why? What’s up?”
“Cassidy’s flying out at noon. Thought you should know.”
“Already? Is she well enough to travel?”
“Can’t take the chance she won’t go back to Cuba and start a war, so yeah. She’s going home where Jude can take care of her. What’s at East Rockland Key?”
“If I’m right, one of Montego’s business associates,” Seth answered discreetly. They still had a mile or so to go and there was no sense getting Alex spun up in Alexandria, where he couldn’t offer an assist.
“You were right about the woman you saw in the bar. I alerted the police. They found her unconscious in one of Sly Valentine’s buddy’s vehicles behind the bar, along with another woman. Both had Rohypnol in their systems. The police are looking for Valentine.”
“Thanks, Boss, so are we.”
“You alone?”
“No, Boss, Cord Shepherd’s driving. He’s the Marine I told you about.”
“Which one of Montego’s men?”
“Hopefully, Sly Valentine. Maybe Prince Basheer Bagani.” Seth held off mentioning that he no longer knew where Princess Lianna was.
“Bagani’s there?” Alex asked.
“Not sure, Boss, but I figure he might be.”
That earned him a spiked brow from the driver’s seat. “Who you talking to?”
Seth murmured out of the corner of his mouth, “My boss, Alex Stewart.”
Cord’s brows lifted all the way up to his hairline. “You work for Stewart?” he asked at the same time that Alex asked, “Is Shepherd the idiot who’s been running into Cuba rescuing women from Montego without sufficient support?”
Seth glanced sideways at Cord. “Yes, Boss, Cord is that idiot.”
Both brows spiked that time.
“Put him on,” Alex ordered.
Seth handed the satphone over. “He wants to talk to you.”
“Me?” Cord whispered, and wasn’t that interesting? The big jock fumbled the phone. It nearly hit the floor before it made it to Cord’s ear, and he said, “Yes, sir?”
Seth grinned. Alex might not bite Cord for that faux pas this time, but the day would come Cord would regret having ever addressed Alex with ‘sir’.
“Yes, sir, I mean…” Cord’s head bobbed as Seth listened to him respond to Alex’s rapid-fire questions. “No, sir. I understand. No, I didn’t mean that, I meant…”
Whatever had Alex on edge, it was damned funny to watch him put Cord in his place. Maybe there was some truth to that ‘once a Marine, always a Marine’ bullshit.
“Umm, sir, that might be a problem.” Cord winced as an explosive “Might?” ripped over the connection.
“Yes, sir, you see, she’s… she’s missing and…” Cord’s big head actually ducked into his shoulders. “No, sir, I haven’t contacted the authorities yet, but I will.” He shot Seth a funny as hell grimace. “I won’t? No, sir, I won’t. Yes, sir. Right away, sir. Would twenty-four hours be asking too much…? Yes, sir, it’s just that I’m a little tied up at the moment and… Absolutely, sir.” By the time Cord handed the phone back, he looked stunned and he was out of breath.
“Yes, Boss?” Seth asked, leaned back in his seat and already expecting the G-force of his boss’s wrath. Sure enough…
“When the hell were you going to tell me that Princess Lianna is no longer in your custody?” Alex snapped. “Who else is missing?”
“Actually, she was never in my custody, but you’re correct. Cord’s sister, Devereaux Shepherd, her son, Scottie, and her neighbor, Trish Crawford from North Dakota are missing at the moment, which is why we’re going to East Rockland Key. We’re fairly certain Sylvester Valentine is behind this, and we suspect he’s keeping Devereaux somewhere near—”
“You suspect? You don’t know?”
Seth faced the pavement ahead and met his boss’s questions head-on. “No, Boss, I’m not sure, but my gut’s telling me to follow this hunch. I can’t go to the police, remember? Not unless you’ve smoothed things over with the State Department. Have you?” That would make this day so much easier. Then the FBI would be involved like they should’ve been all along.
“Yeah, about that…” Alex hissed. “Farraq Khadeem’s missing. We suspect he’s fled the country, that he’s in Europe.”
“You suspect?” Seth couldn’t help tweaking his boss’s bad temper.
“I meant the State Department, smartass,” Alex came back with. “Jesus Christ, Seth, I’m not God.”
No, but sometimes, you’re the next best thing. “Understood. Do we have any idea where Khadeem might be hiding in Europe?”
/>
“Let’s get this straight. I said the State Department thinks he’s in Europe, not me. I’d bet he’s on his way to Cuba, maybe the States. The only thing the State Department knows is Khadeem’s no longer in Saudi Arabia. The king made it clear he’ll behead Khadeem as soon as his men find him.”
“So he knows what Khadeem did to Lianna?”
“And to Prince Bagani,” Alex muttered, his voice gone weary. “You need to tread carefully. The king of Saudi Arabia’s after Khadeem, but I doubt he’ll admit to any indiscretions in the royal line, no matter how distantly related Bagani is.”
“Hold a second, Boss,” he said as he asked Cord, “Do you know what happened to Lianna’s hands?”
Cord shot him a dark look. “Yeah. We found her nailed to a—”
“Rape stand,” Seth finished, his mouth gone dry at the thought of the pretty blonde humiliated like that.
“Yeah, if that’s what you call it,” Cord murmured. “I killed the bastards who did it, and I’d do it again. Why’d you want to know?”
“You hear that, Boss?” Seth asked as he rested a hand on Cord’s shoulder.
“Got it,” came back terse and low.
Just to be clear, Seth told Alex, “Bagani dumped Lianna on Montego, and Montego’s men defiled her hands, but Cord got to her before they had the chance to defile her body. You really want me to let Khadeem, or Bagani for that matter, live?”
“No, but you’ve got to be damned careful. The world’s watching us. Make one mistake and we could be at war. Cover your six.”
“I intend to,” Seth answered. “I’ll be in touch the minute this thing’s over.”
Alex disconnected. Seth turned to Cord and whined, “Are we there yet?”
Cord rolled his eyes as he pulled into the left turn lane. “Almost. Your boss is quite a guy, huh?”
You could say that. “Yeah, Alex is something all right.”
“He, umm, he…” Cord seemed to have trouble speaking as he crossed traffic and they headed north. He tried again. “He, your boss, Alex Stewart, umm…”
Seth (In the Company of Snipers Book 17) Page 28
