RunningScaredBN

by Christy Reece

  “Seemed to yesterday. Once we finish up this op, I’m going to recommend a few days off. She needs some downtime to recover.”

  A smile tugged at Jake’s mouth. “Good luck with that.”

  Yeah, he’d need it. Didn’t matter. He wouldn’t back down.

  The silence from Jake caught his attention. Justin glanced over to see the man’s head cocked, speculation in his eyes.

  “What?” Justin asked.

  “She know how you feel about her?”

  The question floored him. Not because he wasn’t aware of his growing feelings for Riley, but because he’d worked so hard at masking them.

  “That obvious?”

  “Probably not to her. Or to most people.” Jake’s gaze went to the woman in the truck sitting beside Riley. “Maybe because I happen to be in love with an operative, too. I know what the symptoms look like.” His smile grew. “Not the easiest thing in the world to handle, but damn worth it.”

  “You and Angela make a good team.”

  “Took some work, though. Still does. But like I said, damn worth it.”

  “Riley’s got a lot of baggage.”

  Jake gave a derisive snort. “And you don’t? Give me the name of an operative who says he doesn’t, and I’ll show you a liar.”

  Yeah, he had baggage. Hell, who didn’t? And Jake was right. The majority of people working for LCR had been through their own hell. Still, the hurt he’d seen in Riley’s eyes was something he couldn’t yet reach. Didn’t take a genius to know that someone had damaged her badly. Penetrating that thick veneer was like chipping away at granite with a plastic fork.

  Static crackled in his ear, and then Aidan Thorne’s voice came through their earbuds. “Two trucks headed your way, about a mile back. Two guys in each cab. Can’t tell how many are in the back with the women.”

  “Roger that,” Justin said.

  From their vantage point, he and Jake would be able to spot them from at least a quarter mile away. Still, Riley and Angela would take no chances. Justin watched as they exited the vehicle and then lifted the hood. Angela climbed up on the fender, and within seconds a convincing head of steam rose, billowing through the air. By the time the trucks arrived, there’d be no doubt that the vehicle was disabled and unmovable by the women.

  Would be interesting to see if the men would actually try to help or, being the dirt-wad, perverted creeps that they were, see two vulnerable women and try to kidnap them, too. Didn’t matter really, because either way, these bastards were going down.

  Both Riley and Angela were dressed in traditional Middle Eastern clothing, enabling them to hide their weapons. By the time the assholes realized the two women were anything but vulnerable, it would be too late.

  Adrenaline surged through Justin. This was the reason he’d joined LCR, the reason he risked his life again and again. He couldn’t think of anything he’d rather be doing. Years ago when Lara had been kidnapped, he’d been clueless about human trafficking. He’d heard about it, but he’d been immersed in following his own dreams, his own path. When she had been taken, his entire world had shifted focus.

  When it came time to re-up, he’d chosen to leave the military and work for LCR. He hadn’t regretted that decision for a moment.

  A movement far in the distance caught his attention. “Targets spotted. Everyone, in position.”

  Justin watched as Riley, followed by Angela, went to the side of the road to wait. They looked exactly as they needed to—two helpless women in need of assistance. He’d never known anyone less a victim than either of these two women.

  Riley rolled her shoulders to loosen them. She had been tense all morning while waiting for this op to go down. She’d been involved in dozens of these in her time with LCR. This one should be no different. She knew what to do. Her training was exemplary, and she was working with some of the most skilled operatives in the business. But she knew better than most that one should never take success for granted. Last year she’d almost been killed in what should have been a much less dangerous mission. Since then she’d been hyperalert, anticipating trouble without the slightest indication that anything was wrong. She didn’t expect problems but refused to let her guard down. On an op, it wasn’t just her life on the line, but also her fellow operatives, as well as the victims they were rescuing. One second of inattention could mean disaster for everyone.

  She glanced over at Angela who, as Riley had, had assumed a sad, defeated-looking demeanor. The more helpless they looked, the less likely the kidnappers would suspect they were anything but.

  It was Riley’s opinion that Angela Delvecchio was the epitome of the fearless female. Almost six feet tall, Angela had an exotic beauty that defied description and an energy that could plow over you if you got in her way. She and Sabrina Fox were the Amazons of LCR Elite, confident, strong—valiant in the face of danger. The two women could battle an army and win. Riley fought daily to remind herself how strong she was and how far she had come.

  “Here we go,” Angela said softly.

  The trucks lumbered toward them, leaving a thick cloud of dust in their wake. Hidden in that dust would be Aidan and Sabrina. In the hills above them were Justin and Jake. By the time these men realized this was a trap, they would already be caught.

  And, if anyone dared to check out the back of their truck, they would find a special surprise.

  The lead truck stopped several feet from them. The driver stuck his head out the window and shouted, “Move your truck!”

  Riley felt a lessening of tension in Angela and shared her relief. Though both of them knew the local dialect to some degree, neither of them was fluent enough to carry on a convincing conversation. The man who’d shouted had a British accent, which made communicating much easier.

  “We can’t,” Riley stated with a British accent. “Our vehicle is disabled.”

  Letting loose a very American-sounding curse, a man jumped from the passenger side and stalked toward them. “Move it off the road, bitch.”

  Definitely American, Riley thought. Not only a sleazy human trafficker, but a foul-mouthed jerk, too. She looked forward to seeing him with a mouthful of sand when she kicked his ass.

  “We cannot move it,” Angela said. “We know nothing about repairs.”

  “Where is your man?” The one who’d first spoken to them was noticing the strangeness of the situation. Two women unaccompanied by a man was an unusual enough occurrence to cause suspicion. Fortunately, they had that covered, too.

  “He is in the back of the truck. He is ill. We were on the way to the hospital when our vehicle stopped.”

  The two men glanced at each other, and the Brit headed toward the back of the truck to check out their claim. He jumped up into the bed of the truck.

  Her hand on the weapon beneath her clothing, Riley waited for the noise that would erupt as soon as the man learned that beneath the blankets in the truck was Elite operative Brennan Sinclair, who was in no way ill or disabled.

  A small groan and a thud was the only noise. Frowning, the American called out, “Tony? What’s going on?”

  The sound of a muffled voice made the man walk closer. As he drew nearer, the men in the other truck jumped out and headed toward them. The first man stuck his head into the truck.

  Chaos exploded

  The man flew back out of the truck, a look of surprised horror on his face. Riley and Angela revealed their weapons. Justin and Jake dropped from their hiding place behind the boulders, shouting for everyone to put their weapons down. Aidan and Sabrina ran forward, their weapons drawn. Brennan jumped from the back of the truck. Four men held their hands up as they realized they were surrounded.

  Crying and muffled words were coming from the back of one of the trucks. Riley and Justin pulled the covering aside, unsurprised to see three women with their hands tied in front of them and their mouths taped shut. Riley climbed into the truck. In an instant, one of the women broke free, pulled a gun from beneath her clothing, and aimed at Jus
tin.

  “Kelly, watch out!” Riley shouted and dove toward the woman. The gun went off just before she tackled the woman to the bed of the truck.

  Clocking the woman on her chin, Riley turned to check on her partner. Blood was blooming on his left shoulder. “You’re hit.”

  “It’s nothing,” he growled. “Check and make sure the others aren’t armed, too.”

  Riley did this by rote while her mind went over what she should have done and warred with what she wanted to do, which was go check on her partner and make sure he was telling the truth.

  The two other women were not armed and looked to be as they had assumed, victims of the human smugglers. Neither of them spoke English, so Riley had to explain with her limited vocabulary that they were safe.

  She tied up the woman who’d shot Justin. Leaving the other two women to comfort each other, she jumped from the truck to check on her partner. He was with the other women, four of them, explaining to them what was going on. Since Justin was fluent in Arabic, the women seemed to grasp the situation much easier. They knew they were safe.

  “You sure you’re okay?” Riley asked.

  “Yeah. I’ll get it checked out in a minute.”

  “No, you’ll get it checked out now.” Riley turned and shouted, “Thorne, we need you. Kelly’s injured.”

  In seconds, Aidan appeared. “Let me take a look.”

  “He says it’s nothing, but he’s still bleeding.”

  “He’s also able to talk for himself, Ingram,” came Justin’s wry reply.

  Riley smiled to herself. If he was well enough to be sarcastic and grumpy, he wasn’t hurt too badly.

  She watched as Aidan pulled Justin’s arm from the sleeve of his jacket. Blood now covered his entire arm, and Riley tensed up again. Maybe it was worse than she’d thought.

  “He’s right,” Aidan said. “Got lucky. Just a bullet crease across the top of his shoulder. Probably needs a few stitches, though.”

  “Just slap a bandage on it. I’ll get it checked out once we get this job done.”

  Riley blew out a gusty sigh. The op wasn’t the cleanest on record, but for the most part, it had gone the way they’d hoped.

  Sabrina appeared at the back of the truck. “We’ve got a problem.”

  “What?” Aidan asked.

  “Taylor Vaughn isn’t with them.”

  “Crap,” Riley whispered. “Where is she, then?”

  “The women don’t know. Said when they were taken, a couple of the men grabbed Taylor, threw her in another vehicle, and took off.”

  Sabrina jerked her head in the direction of the handcuffed men lying on the ground. “They won’t say where.”

  “Guess we’ll just have to have a longer chat with them,” Aidan said.

  “And then what?”

  “And then we go find her,” Justin answered.

  Turning over a band of human traffickers to the authorities wasn’t as clear-cut as one would think. With the country being so fractured and sympathies split in various directions, LCR had numerous choices but was limited by one major obstacle—who did they trust? If anyone asked him, Justin’s answer would have been an unequivocal no one.

  Thankfully, McCall had worked out the logistics of who would get the prisoners, but once other people took custody, LCR could forget about questioning them. Getting information out of them would take time and skill. Fortunately, they had a master interrogator on the team.

  “Any suggestions on where we can go?” Riley asked.

  “Yeah.” Refusing to grimace at the ache in his shoulder, Justin pulled a map from the inside of his jacket, spread it out on the truck’s tailgate. “It’s not fancy, but two miles up the road is another road that leads to an old shack. Used to be a lookout for the rebels. Been abandoned for years. It should give us enough privacy to get what we need.”

  Riley looked around at the barren but strangely beautiful landscape. “We’d better get moving. Being in the open like this is making me antsy.”

  “Agreed.” He shot a look at Thorne. “You guys round them up. Ingram and I will head up to the shack. We’ll make sure it’s still empty and report back.”

  “Roger that,” Thorne said.

  Slamming the hood of the truck shut, Justin jumped into the driver’s side. Riley got in on the other side.

  “You ever seen Aidan interrogate before?” Riley asked.

  “No. As far as I know, McCall and Fox are the only ones who have.” He shrugged and then winced. “Whatever he does usually gets results, though.”

  “How’s your shoulder?”

  He moved it again, ignored the deep throb. “It’s fine.”

  “You ever think about doing something besides LCR?”

  He hid his surprise at the question. Riley Ingram asking a personal question was rare as the Houston Astros winning the World Series. It had never happened. Until last night. Had he finally broken through that impenetrable barrier?

  He shrugged, regretted the movement. “At some point I’ll probably want to get out of field ops, but I can’t ever see leaving LCR. How about you?”

  Instead of answering, she turned toward the window. He wasn’t having it. She wasn’t going to get away with shutting him out again.

  “I asked a question, Ingram.”

  When she turned to face him, he expected to see anger. Instead, he saw vulnerability and an odd kind of fear. “LCR is my family. Families are forever. Right?”

  “Yeah, they are.”

  They pulled to a stop in front of the shack. “This place looks worse than I remember. Shouldn’t be anyone around, but let’s check it out before we make the call.”

  Almost dizzy with relief, Riley pushed her emotions aside, her do the job mantra back in place. When this op was over and she was alone, she’d have time to sort through her feelings. And question why she was suddenly being so open when for years she’d been as closemouthed as a corpse.

  Guns at the ready, they exited the truck. Justin headed to the front, Riley went around the back. Justin was right. This place was about as ramshackle as they come. The walls were a crumbling mass of clay and rotted wood. It could barely be called a structure, but it would suffice for what they needed.

  She peeked inside a window, spotting a three-legged table leaning against a wall and two rattan chairs without bottoms. In the corner were a couple of soda cans and what looked like a used condom.

  Scrunching her nose up at the revolting reason someone would have sex in such a disgusting place, she turned around and searched the landscape. Nothing but rocky hills and trees.

  “Looks clear,” Riley said into her mic.

  “Yeah, looks good from here, too,” Justin said, then added, “Thorne, bring our guests on up.”

  Riley stepped around front and watched as the truck holding the prisoners headed their way. She didn’t envy them the next few minutes. She might not have ever seen Aidan conduct an interrogation, but one thing she knew for sure, the man usually got the information he was looking for. She had no clue how he did it, but the few times they’d had to interrogate hostiles, Aidan Thorne went in alone and came out with credible intel. And interestingly enough, not once had she seen a mark on anyone he’d questioned. That took some crazy skills.

  Riley didn’t know Aidan’s background, had no clue what he did before he came to LCR, but one thing was for sure—the man knew how to get results. Fast.

  The handcuffed group, four men and one woman, shuffled toward the small structure. Despite her training, Riley shivered. Sometimes evil was concealed behind a façade. Other times, the wickedness was unhidden and apparent. She had seen and experienced it both ways. These people, with their dark expressions and eyes glittering with hatred, weren’t bothering to hide who and what they were.

  Getting information would not be easy, even for Aidan Thorne.

  The last man in the line, the largest of the group, shifted his eyes to her briefly. She saw something in them, just a flicker. Her training kicked in before
her mind comprehended. Just as the man’s arm swept up, a slender knife in his hand, Riley lunged toward him. Swinging her arm upward, she knocked the knife from his hand, slammed her other fist into his face, and then whirled, finishing him off with a solid kick straight to his groin. Howling, he dropped to his knees, holding his crotch.

  Justin grabbed his wrists and zip-tied them again. Looking up at her, he grinned. “You are one bad-assed, lethal woman, Ingram.”

  Her adrenaline still surging, she glanced around at the other operatives. All were giving her approving looks. She felt the glow all the way to her toes. Justin was right. She was badass and tough. She had not only come through hell and survived, she had become a force to be reckoned with.

  She gave a small nod of acknowledgment and then turned away before anyone could read her expression. She had been focused on moving forward for so long, she had never realized that she had actually arrived. She had achieved what she’d always dreamed. Yes, she still had nightmares, still looked over her shoulder. But the stark differences in what she had been and who she was now were so phenomenal, it was as if she were two different people.

  On the heels of that realization, came another one, even more startling and scarier. But she knew it was time. Time to stop running. Time to confront the most wicked of the wicked.

  Riley Ingram was ready to face her past.

  Chapter Four

  LCR Headquarters

  Alexandria, Virginia

  Noah McCall read the information he’d received this morning from his source at the FBI. Their intel on Taylor Vaughn’s abduction jived with what Aidan Thorne had uncovered from the kidnappers in Iraq. The journalist had not been taken by human traffickers or terrorists. Kidnapping the Iraqi women had provided the perfect opportunity for an abduction of a different kind. This one was all about payback and revenge.

  Taylor Vaughn was an award-winning journalist. She had a reputation for infiltrating the most impenetrable organizations and gathering intel for her articles, making her one of the most admired, and reviled, journalists in the world. She had an incredible talent for deep cover, which had yielded her tons of information for her stories. Most times, the organizations she wrote about hadn’t known they had a mole in their midst until the first headline appeared. Most never knew how they’d been compromised.