So did I. “Can we get out of here?”
“Yes, please.” But then she sucked on his bottom lip and ran her short nails over his chest, driving him out of his mind.
“I’d get a room here, but we can’t leave Bear alone.” He was impatient. Anxious. But she was worth the wait. So, so worth it.
“And you’d hate to waste eight hundred bucks on a hotel room,” she said when pulling back, a smile on her lips.
“Being with you—it’d never be a waste.”
“But Bear,” they said at the same time, then stole one more kiss. Then another.
He pulled her to his side and looped an arm around her waist as she clutched the material of her dress to shield her legs, and they started for the elevators in a hurry.
“Oh, good,” Harper said on approach with Roman. “We were thinking of getting out of here.” Harper jerked a thumb over her shoulder toward the ballroom. “Do you need to say goodbye to anyone?”
“No,” Rory said softly. “I already said my goodbyes.”
To Cutter. Chris peered at the “Out of Order” sign on the brass door of the second elevator. That sign hadn’t been there before. It was then he realized that the nagging feeling he’d had all night completely slipped his mind with Rory’s kiss.
But that sign . . . Rory’s unknown past and scars filled his focus, and concern broke through the flood of desire that drove them to the elevators to leave. “We should take the stairs.”
“What? Why?” Rory blinked in surprise. “Because one elevator is broken? I am sure the other is fine.” She clutched the material of her dress together, drawing his eyes. Reminding him she’d have a difficult time walking, let alone going down the stairs, without her dress splitting even more to reveal her panties to Harper and Roman.
When Chris lifted his focus, he found Roman silently observing him. “You think something is wrong?”
I’m being irrational, he told himself as Rory pressed the call button for the elevator.
“You seem tense,” Rory announced when Chris didn’t answer Roman. “You need to relax.”
Right. Chris dragged a hand down the column of his throat.
“I plan on helping you relax tonight,” she said into his ear, and he did his best not to visibly show his desire to his friends standing in front of them.
When the elevator door slid to the left, Chris stepped inside. He looked around, taking in the space. The mirrored wall had him catching his reflection. They’d forgotten their suit jackets, and honestly, he didn’t even care. He wanted to get out of this place and fast.
Rory met his eyes in the mirror as Harper pressed the button for the lobby. Her tongue swept between the seam of her lips. Oh, the woman loved teasing him. And later tonight, that mouth of hers . . .
He had to look away, or he’d grow hard and be unable to hide it. He shifted around as the door closed. His eyes dipped to the floor, and he crouched to reach for a small screw he’d spotted. He held on to the thing, and that nagging feeling returned.
“What’s wrong?” Harper caught his eyes as he rose, still holding the screw.
“Something is—” Chris cut himself off when the elevator came to a jarring stop.
“Shit, we’re stuck, aren’t we?” Rory shook her head as if angry at herself for insisting the elevator over the stairs.
“I think it’s more than that,” Chris said when his eyes traveled to the silver square at the ceiling that began to slide to the left. He went for his gun, but it wasn’t fucking there. They’d come unarmed.
“What’s going on?” Rory asked as Chris pulled her tight to his side at the sight of a hose dropping through the ceiling overhead, but instead of water, out spewed a horrible noxious gas.
“Cover your mouth,” Chris urged as he cupped a hand to his mouth and hit the emergency call button.
Roman went to the door of the elevator as if he’d be able to pry the thing open with his bare hands. They weren’t thinking straight. Smoke filled the space too fast.
Chris brought Rory into his arms, bringing her face to his chest.
Helpless. He felt helpless.
Roman turned back toward them and pulled Harper into his arms as well. His eyes connected with Chris’s, and that nagging, gut-wrenching feeling Chris wished he hadn’t ignored was the last thing he thought about before they fell to their knees and passed out.
Chapter Fifteen
Chris woke up to the odd but familiar feeling of pins and needles in his legs. The tingling in his limbs felt as though he’d slept wrong, cutting off proper blood flow, and now his nerves were waking up again. But it was more than that. His head was too heavy to lift, his mind too foggy to figure out what kind of bullshit dream he’d had this time. Thank God he’d locked away his gun.
He attempted to bring his hand to the back of his neck to help right his head, but his arms wouldn’t budge.
“Chris.”
Was that . . . Roman?
The last place he remembered being was in the hotel ballroom in Georgetown. No, he’d been on his way out of the hotel with Rory.
Shit. The elevator. The smoke. Gas?
“We were drugged.” Roman’s voice was raspy. Like he’d swallowed cotton balls.
Chris tried to lift his head again, which felt like a twenty-pound bowling ball strapped atop his shoulders. What the hell is going on?
“They’re gone, brother. They’re fucking gone.”
The words Chris never wanted to hear had him using every ounce of power in his body to look up to see Roman sitting across from him, his hands strung above his head, cuffed to a rod on the wall.
Chris slowly looked left, then right. They were in a small storage room. Maybe only eight by eight feet in size. The space was empty except for him, Roman, and the bulb overhead.
“No,” Chris sputtered around a cough. “No, no, no.” Tears burned his eyes when reality slapped him in the face.
Rory and Harper. They weren’t there.
There was a grim darkness in Roman’s gaze. In his tone. Regret and fear rolled together. And maybe Chris was still coming to, but it was unmistakable.
Harper was their person. Their everything on Echo Team. And although Roman had yet to admit it, she meant even more to him.
And Rory . . .
His body trembled as he contemplated all the possibilities as to what happened to her. He should have listened to his gut. He’d felt something was wrong, but he’d written it off as stemming from his own personal issues.
He thought back to Rory’s scars and what she said in New Orleans. There are, um, some people that will want to kill me if they find out who and where I am.
Was that why they were taken? Her past? Or was it his job that had endangered them? “Where are we?”
Roman’s eyes tightened on him. “Feels like a boat.”
How in the hell did they get from D.C. to a boat? Were they on the Potomac?
“You think this was Santiago’s doing? Or is this about Rory?” Roman blinked as if searching for memories. Trying to latch on to how the fuck this happened. “I don’t see how Santiago would make the connection to us, but he’s on the loose, and we’re the ones who grabbed him.”
“I don’t think Santiago’s behind this.” Rory. They were after her, but why? Who? “We need to find them. They could be in trouble.” Or worse. He tried to jerk away from the wall he was pressed against, but his hands were linked together and connected to something behind his back. “Our legs are free.” Stupid mistake on their captors’ part.
Roman leaned forward, the veins in his throat and sides of his temples on display as he tried to break the rod free from the wall, using the weight of his body.
“The door,” Chris said, eyes moving to the lock. “We won’t be able to get out.” Surely it was deadbolted.
“We get our hands free from the wall, and then when someone comes in, we make our move.” Roman’s voice was steadier now, but Chris still heard the pain flowing through his tone. The fear of never s
eeing Harper again.
“What if they’re not on the boat?” No, he couldn’t think about that possibility. They had to be there. Safe and okay. If he and Roman were alive, the women had to be alive, too. No other options were acceptable.
Chris bent his knees, arched his back, and shifted forward, doing his best to create tension between the cuffs and whatever they were attached to. His body was completely spent. Weak from whatever drugs had been pumped into him, but he had to do this. Rory’s and Harper’s lives depended on the damn metal breaking free from the wall.
His dress shoes slid against the hard floor, and he fell onto his ass in failure.
“Try again,” Roman urged, and Chris nodded.
“Of course,” he said before trying to fall forward while tightening his biceps and triceps to add pressure to the movement.
He met Roman’s eyes, and they both hissed at the same time for what they hoped would be their last effort.
A snap sounded, and a pipe or rod, whatever it was, detached from the wall and had Chris’s chest practically falling onto his lap. He tried to stand, but his legs were still rubber.
Roman was off the wall as well. Since his hands had been raised over his head, he lowered the broken metal rod, which was about six inches in diameter and about two feet long, in front of him, twisted his hands to the side, and the rod slid to the floor.
Roman fell to his knees, moving closer to Chris to help him get his hands and the pipe under his body and then on top of his lap.
They were still cuffed, but they were a step in the right direction.
Could he get his legs to work yet, though?
When they heard a key in the lock, Roman mouthed, “Valencia,” to Chris. Chris nodded and shifted the pipe out of sight and brought his linked hands behind his back.
Valencia was code for a move they’d performed in Spain three years ago, named after the city they’d been in for the operation.
Roman raised his hands above his head and closed his eyes.
Chris kept his head hung and listened and waited.
The door opened, then shut. The sound of a key going into a lock followed.
Two booted feet stepped between where Roman and Chris sat.
The man slowly crouched to observe Roman, his back to Chris. Chris willed his legs to move, then quickly jerked back and tossed his legs over the man’s shoulders and crossed his ankles around the man’s neck, taking him by surprise.
Roman lurched forward and knocked the man off to the side while Chris pulled his legs back so Roman could pin him beneath his body. Roman circled both cuffed hands around the man’s throat. “Where are the two women?”
Chris searched the man’s pockets while Roman held him down, then found the handcuff keys. He removed his cuffs, then knelt alongside Roman and freed him as well. “Where are they?” Chris asked this time.
The man’s brown eyes bulged as Roman continued to strangle him. “One of the guest staterooms,” he said when Roman loosened his hold. “Aft cabin.”
The man’s hair was light blond. Pulled back into a ponytail. Tan skin. No visible tattoos on his forearms. And his accent sounded a bit New York City-ish. American?
“Are they alive?” Roman leaned closer to the man, and Chris grabbed the key chain from the man’s raincoat pocket. “Did you touch them?”
The man shook his head no.
“Who are you? Who do you work for?” Chris sputtered, and Roman shifted his weight off him and started to stand, but shit, the guy went for a knife that Roman and Chris would’ve normally noticed had they not been recently drugged and unconscious.
The guy went for Roman, but Roman deflected and lifted both hands to hold the guy’s wrists to prevent being stabbed.
Chris looked down at his tie. He worked the knot loose, then flung the material around the man’s neck and pulled. The man gasped for air and finally let go of the knife to go for the black material around his throat.
Chris quickly put the man to sleep, then Roman braced against the wall to stand and extended a hand to Chris to help him to his feet since they’d been mostly operating from their knees.
Chris handed Roman the key chain, then checked the body for weapons. “Nothing else,” he said while Roman tested out some of the keys.
Chris’s phone, watch, and wallet had been taken. Roman’s pockets were empty as well.
“Got it,” Roman announced upon finding the key to their freedom, and he slowly opened the door, holding the knife in his other hand.
They were a few feet from the entrance to the galley. The galley wasn’t too big, but given the boat had a storage room and multiple staterooms, he had to assume they were on a superyacht. At least eighty feet in length.
They ducked back into the hall when a man entered the galley and opened the refrigerator. A sidearm strapped to his side and one to his leg.
Roman held a fist up, indicating to Chris to hold position while he made first approach. With slow steps, Roman crept behind the man and tightened his forearm around his neck. He backed up to the wall with the man in a chokehold and quickly rendered him unconscious.
Roman pointed to the storage room, and Chris helped him drag the body to the other man.
They took two sidearms off the guy, then locked the storage room and quickly moved to find Rory and Harper.
“Starboard or port side?” Roman looked back at Chris when they reached two halls on the other side of the galley. “Or do we split up?” Two halls and two mirror cabins to check. Both beneath what would be the aft deck above their heads.
“Split up,” Chris said, keeping his voice soft, and he started for the port side, but then halted at the sight of the cabin door opening. “Roman,” he alerted, letting him know they had movement.
Roman came up on his left, and they both extended their weapons, preparing to shoot if necessary.
“Shit, guys.” Harper’s eyes widened, and she lowered the two Glocks she had aimed at them. “I could have shot you.”
“You’re okay,” Roman rasped.
“I woke up asleep on a bed next to Rory, and I took out the guard who was in front of our door watching us.” She handed one gun to Roman and opened the door wider. Chris nearly collapsed at the sight of Rory asleep on the bed. “She’s still asleep. I couldn’t get her to wake up.”
“She doesn’t do well on drugs,” Chris said while stowing his weapon and moving past Harper to give her and Roman a moment.
“Rory.” He smoothed a thumb over her cheek, his heartbeat trampling his chest with relief.
But they were still on a boat, who knew where, and he had to get her to safety. It wasn’t over yet.
Rory’s arms were across her chest, and she looked almost peaceful. But when his gaze skirted down the length of her, he realized her underwear was exposed because the slit in her dress had ripped. God help him, he hoped that’d been accidental, and they hadn’t . . .
His shoulders dropped at the memory of Rory attempting to wrap her leg around his hip while they had kissed, and the slit tearing.
“There’s a red bag by the bed.” Harper motioned to a small drawstring bag. “I checked it for weapons, but it’s a travel bag. Basic essentials in there. A couple tees and a few pairs of cotton shorts. Even a toothbrush and toothpaste. Stuff for one woman as if they’d planned only to grab Rory originally. Or me, I suppose. But that’s doubtful. I guess the bad guy cares about hygiene. Go figure.”
“We weren’t their original target,” Roman said in a low voice, stealing a glimpse into the room from the hall. “Why do I feel like you two know something I don’t?”
Because we do, Chris thought guiltily.
Harper exchanged a quick look with Chris. “We’ll catch you up after we get out of here,” she said apologetically, but that wasn’t her burden to carry. Chris had withheld the concerns about Rory, and that was on him. “Regardless,” Harper began, setting the bag on the bed by Rory and unzipping it, “I’m glad they decided to take us, too. I can’t imagine if sh
e’d been taken alone.”
Chris was going to lose his mind as he sorted through the theories and potential shitty what-ifs that could have gone down if Rory had gone to the gala by herself.
He raced a hand over his head, his pulse still flying, and this wasn’t the type of flying he enjoyed. This kind stemmed from a place of fear.
“I’ll change her. Change myself, too.” Harper’s pupils were still enlarged from the drugs, likely how his and Roman’s were as well. “I’d prefer not to fight in this dress.”
That was probably a good idea. “Would you wait down here while we handle whoever else is out there? I don’t want you two caught in the fray.” He’d feel a lot better if he and Roman cleared the boat while Harper watched over Rory.
“Of course. Be safe,” she said, peering Roman’s way next. “The both of you.”
Roman set a palm to the open door as if trying to work through a battlefield of emotions, and then he nodded and tipped his head. “Shit, I have a visual. Someone just came down the steps and turned toward the galley.”
“Probably checking where the two guards disappeared to.” Chris stole one last look at Rory. “We’re going to get you two out of here,” he added even though Rory couldn’t hear his promise. “Wherever here is . . .”
Chapter Sixteen
Rory’s eyelids fluttered against shards of bright light that may as well have been broken glass for how much they hurt. She snapped her eyes shut, blocking out the pain only to be startled by a loud noise, which jolted her into awareness and had her noticing she was bobbing back and forth.
It felt like a repeat of the time she was eight, and her brother had spun her around one too many times on the tire swing in their backyard, and she’d thrown up her lunch—yeah, that was how she was feeling right now.
“What’s going on?” Her throat was scratchy, her voice almost unrecognizable. Hoarse.
Chills swept over her clammy skin, and her teeth began to chatter. Where am I?
“Come on. You need to wake up.” Warm hands firmly cupped her face as the voice urged Rory to open her eyes.
Chasing Fortune (Stealth Ops Book 8) Page 18
