Hush

by Cherry Adair

  Zak counted heads, weapons, and attitudes. The odds of breaking free of this lot were slim to none; bound, their odds plummeted. Shit. Where was Barbie? Still in the van?

  He and his brother had their wrists bound with plastic restraints in front of them. Amateurs. Pros would’ve made sure their hands were secured behind them. It was almost a reassuring thought. The sheer size of this operation was grounds for concern, amateur or not. At least a dozen men milled about the vehicle. Nobody was going anywhere. He and Gid shared a quick speaking glance before the woman indicated they should clasp their bound hands on top of their heads. They both did so.

  She had sharp, ferretlike features and soulless black eyes, and a crew cut of greasy black hair. Up close and personal, she stank just as bad as her men.

  She cradled the H & K as if it were as light as a handbag over her arm as she addressed him. “¿Hablas español?”

  Zak gave her a blank look.

  “You come to my country,” the guerrilla leader said scathingly, taking a menacing step forward so her combat boots were inches from his knees. “You Americans! So arrogant. So—American. You come to my country, and you cannot be bothered to learn my language?”

  “A distinct oversight, under the circumstances,” Zak agreed. Beside him, Gid’s breathing sounded labored. He was hurt. How badly? Zak wondered, knowing this fiesta was just getting started.

  THREE

  Zak surreptitiously took in their surroundings. Small clearing. A patch of low underbrush surrounded on three sides by massive trees, vines, and thick vegetation. No road to get to wherever the hell they were. Behind the tires of the van, nothing more than flattened undergrowth. In days, if not hours, the jungle would take even that back, and there’d be no sign that humans had ever been there.

  Piñero snapped her fingers. One of the men came up beside her, handing her two American passports. One-handed, she flipped each open, fanning them so their photographs were exposed. She didn’t even glance down, but maintained eye contact with Zak. “Zakary and Gideon Stark. ¿Sí?”

  Something told him she’d known who they were already.

  “We’ll pay to ensure our safe return to a city or town close by. No questions asked,” Gideon said, using the deep, calm, rational voice that usually pissed Zak off. Today, he could have kissed him. “Take us to a bank and we’ll—”

  “Your ransom is twenty million. Each.”

  “Fine,” Zak interjected sharply, concerned by Gideon’s labored breathing and the gray tinge to his skin. Had his older brother suffered internal injuries when they’d captured him? Had Gideon been stabbed by one of those KA-BAR blades and the son of a bitch was too stubborn to tell him in case the knowledge skewed Zak’s focus? Because, yeah, that’d do it.

  Maybe throwing money at this problem would make it go away. Maybe. “Whatever it takes,” Zak added. Under normal circumstances—whatever the hell those were—Zak wouldn’t sweeten the pot. Not yet. A good player knew when to reveal what was in his wallet without adding that he had shitloads of money shoved in his jockstrap too. But this was now about Gid’s and the woman’s survival, and that trumped anything else.

  “Zak,” Gid warned quietly, but Piñero’s thin lips tightened into a grim little smile as she said swiftly, “Cash. American dollars.”

  Yeah. They’d known exactly whom they’d kidnapped. “Fine. Obviously we don’t carry that kind of cash on us,” Zak told her. “We came to BASE-jump Angel Falls, not make a business deal. As my brother said, take us to a bank in Caracas—”

  “You will be held until the ransom is paid.”

  It would be a fucking long time. Zak and Gideon, much to the concern of their partner at ZAG Search, frequently visited countries that had cottage industries in kidnapping. That, Zak understood grimly, was only the start of the cost of a damned good adrenaline fix. Which was why he, Gideon, and Buck had that no negotiating clause in their insurance policies.

  They had a nonnegotiable, ironclad stipulation in place that no ransom would be paid in the event they were ever kidnapped.

  Didn’t mean they couldn’t negotiate their way out of this, given half a chance. They hadn’t parlayed a small business into one of the leading search engine companies in the world by sitting around waiting for someone else to make the first move.

  Zak was half-tempted to inform her she was as shit out of luck as they were. Gid beat him to it.

  “Contact Anthony Buckner,” he said, and rattled off Buck’s private number at ZAG’s corporate office in Seattle. Buck knew where they were. Fortunately, though as a company they refused to be blackmailed into paying ransom, that didn’t mean they had no provision for such an eventuality.

  The guerrilla didn’t write the number down, merely cocked her hip and stared down at them with those cold black eyes that absorbed light, her scarred fingers loose on the assault rifle.

  “If I do not have forty million dollars cash in three days,” she told them, tone chillingly expressionless, “I will start sending body parts back to your families.”

  Handy. All the family the Stark brothers had was right here, kneeling on the jungle floor with a dozen weapons trained at their heads. Other than a handful of friends and a user base numbering in the anonymous millions, no one would give a flying fuck if they disappeared for good. Buck was too pragmatic to let the death of his partners affect the bottom line. He’d do everything in his not inconsiderable power to find them. But if and when he didn’t, it would be business as usual at ZAG Search.

  Zak gritted his teeth as a sharp scream from inside the van was accompanied by loud scuffling. The commotion was followed by a cut-off cry. Seconds later Acadia was brought to the party and shoved down unceremoniously beside him.

  Her face was dead white and dirt-streaked. As she sank to her knees, the grasses almost obscured her smaller frame.

  “Watch out for snakes,” she warned under her breath, her eyes darting not to the two-legged variety, but as if searching the thick vegetation surrounding them. “There are over seventy species here, and most are poi—”

  “Quiet.” Piñero was not entertained by her captive’s chatty observation. “I talk.” She gave the blonde an unfriendly look. “You listen. ¿Entender?”

  Barbie nodded. Her hair fell in a tangled mess around her shoulders, but matted and sweat-dampened as it was, it still gave off the faint fragrance of jasmine. That pleasant aroma was obliterated when Loida Piñero stepped forward.

  “I have some money,” the blonde interrupted, voice shaking, breathing panic-mode rapid as she looked up at the other woman.

  Guerrilla Bitch’s black eyes flicked to her. “Twenty million for you, too, perra.”

  “T-twenty million what? Dollars? I don’t have nearly that much.”

  “This is unfortunate, ¿sí?” Piñero’s attention slid back to Zak and Gideon as she dismissed the other woman as easily as one would a pesky fly. “And to be—how you say?” Piñero cocked her head, and her dead eyes bored into Zak’s. “Humane? ¿Sí? I will start with the woman.” She fingered the wicked machete on her hip. “She has pretty hands, yes? Such elegant fingers. We will play … ¿como se dice? This little piggy?”

  Jesus.

  “My daddy is head of the CIA,” Acadia said in a cool, surprisingly calm voice. “He’ll pay whatever you ask, but if you hurt us, he’ll kill every friend and relative you have, and then he’ll hunt you down until you don’t have anywhere to hide.”

  The ice in her tone made Zak’s narrow-eyed gaze slide sideways.

  “I love him, but he is not—” She shuddered. “My father is a cruel man. He killed my mother in cold blood because she just looked at the president of the United States at a dinner party.”

  She’d just managed to convey a powerful father, great wealth, and a presidential connection all in one breath. Bullshit. But impressive. Her bluff might protect her. For a while.

  “Asegúrese bien de que están atados.” Unimpressed, Piñero told her men to secure them well. “Vamos al c
ampo.” She turned on her heel and stalked off, leaving her men to haul the captives roughly to their feet and encourage them—with an unnecessary and vicious prod from the barrel of one of the Uzis—to follow her to the tree line.

  Zak staggered forward in Piñero’s wake. “Wie stark bist du verletzt?” he whispered to Gid as they walked side by side through the dense grass and lush foliage, the sun beating a hot brand on the crown of his unprotected head.

  It was unlikely that the two men behind or the three in front understood German, but he kept his voice just loud enough for his brother to hear him.

  “Ribs geknackt.” Ribs cracked. Gid slanted him a look that tried to catalog every ache Zak wasn’t acknowledging himself. “Du?”

  “Ich bin gut.” Barring a few bruises, anyway. It wasn’t anything a damn long soak in a hot tub wouldn’t soothe. More important, he needed to know how badly that cracked rib was going to hamper them. “Kannst du laufen?”

  If Gid wasn’t able to run, they were going to have to start thinking about a plan B, C, and D. Because Zak suspected there weren’t going to be that many chances to make a break for it before these goons realized there was no ransom money coming.

  “Ja,” his brother assured him. “Sprechen das wort.” Say the word.

  He got the point. As the less injured of the two—and not counting Barbie—he’d have to be the one to give the word to roll out. Zak hoped like hell it wouldn’t be the last fucking word he ever said.

  He watched the guards closely, but they didn’t seem too worried that the prisoners would bolt. Why should they? There was nothing for thousands of miles but jungle, flat-topped mountains, and rivers. Stepping off the rudimentary path meant death.

  Every now and then the guards in back fell behind to have a smoke, and Gideon, who’d taken the lead, let more and more space open up between himself and the guys ahead. Zak kept one close eye on them, and one on the suddenly all-too-silent blonde between them.

  Her clever little fingers dipped into another pocket, and she reached forward awkwardly to hand Gideon several aspirin. Zak did his best to block the motion from the guards behind them with his body, and frowned as Gideon chewed the bitter pills dry. That was enough to tell Zak that his brother’s ribs were hurting more than he was letting on.

  Serious problem. The more deeply they penetrated the jungle, the more dire their situation became. Making a break for it now, no matter how inattentive their captors were, wouldn’t exactly be optimal, Zak knew. But given the circumstances, he’d act on whatever opportunity arose.

  He was in the best shape he’d been in his life. So was Gideon, but not with that injury. And Barbie, as valiant as she was, was already flagging. Over the last hour her steps had become slower and slower.

  And the guards, now realizing how much space had opened between them, closed in again. There went any chance for making a break for it. Catching his brother’s eye, he used their own form of sign language and waited for Gid’s nod of acknowledgment. Later. The unique brand of sign they’d learned and developed over the years had saved their asses almost as often as it had allowed them to commit mischief growing up. Barely a year separated them in age. They were as close as twins. People frequently said they looked like twins. But Zak couldn’t see himself in his brother other than a facial similarity. Gid was charming and compassionate, and had a hero complex. Zak was and had none of the above. They were opposite sides of a coin. But there wasn’t a person alive whom Zak loved and respected more than he did Gideon.

  He’d die for his brother. He just hoped like hell it wouldn’t come to that.

  He and Gideon exchanged subtle hand signals until they agreed on a plan; it was half-assed, but it was the only one they had. Zak fell back, angling behind Acadia once more.

  They couldn’t account for every contingency, and most of it would depend on their surroundings at the time, but it would work. It had to work. Failure was not an option he wanted to entertain, not again. Not when it meant the blonde’s terrified gray eyes pleading with him to stop Guerrilla Bitch and her machete from chopping off her fingers one by one.

  He’d already proven to one woman he was no hero, so protecting both this one and his brother from what was about to happen was a tall fucking order.

  THE PLANT LIFE LOOKED nothing like her poor, half-dead Dieffenbachia at home, Acadia thought, glancing around nervously as she pushed her way through the undergrowth. She tried not to let her imagination run away with her. Since she wasn’t usually an alarmist, or that imaginative, she was surprised by the detour her mind took, thinking that if the leaves were this big, then the inhabitants of the jungle were also supersized. She braced herself to be jumped on by something that bit. Maybe a giant snake, or a spider the size of a dinner plate. She shuddered.

  Somewhere in the thick wall of foliage to her left, something snapped. She flinched as a flurry of dry, rasping sounds skittered and moved behind a woven tangle of vines.

  Don’t picture it, she told herself silently, and bit back a groan as a slinky, fanged creature filled her imagination. Catlike. Glittering yellow eyes. Hungry, salivating, stalking—Stop it, Acadia!

  Her wrists were bound with plastic handcuffs. Not tightly, but it was uncomfortable to walk with her hands hobbled in front of her, and her shoulders had stiffened into aggravated knots an hour ago. The rough ride in the van had left bruises in interesting places, and the long, difficult walk through thick trees was making exhaustion and pain mingle into a steady beat pounding from her forehead to her leaden feet.

  She studied her surroundings as they marched through the trees in the hope that, given an opportunity, she could backtrack. But she knew that would be next to impossible. One tree, one tangle of vines, one freaking Jurassic-size leaf, looked pretty much like the last. The lush jungle foliage was a thousand variations on vivid green, the giant leaves unrecognizable as the common houseplants they were related to. It was surreal tromping through a tropical forest. Even though Acadia had planned this trip to the last detail, even though she’d had mental dress rehearsals every day for a month, she’d never actually pictured herself here for real.

  “That was a good save,” Zak said abruptly from behind her. He hadn’t spoken to her in probably half an hour or more. She jumped, heart hammering, as his voice pierced the thick silence. “Keep her on her toes for a while. So which is it? Is your father CIA or military?”

  “He was a staff sergeant, in the army.” Acadia told him, chest aching. “He died a few months ago.” He’d died not knowing who she was as she’d held his hand in that soulless, sterile hospital room. Early-onset Alzheimer’s. Her father hadn’t known who she was for the last six years of his life. She’d always been a daddy’s girl. They’d moved every two years from base to base, like clockwork. She’d lost her mother in her early teens, so it had always been she and her father. She’d adapted to the constant upheaval, and the task of making new friends in new cities. But the slow, terrible way he’d started getting sicker and sicker had hit her hard. They’d stayed in Junction City after his diagnosis. She’d remained at his side, even when it meant forgoing her dreams of a degree in architecture, and Acadia had never regretted putting her life on hold to care for him. She’d treasured every moment. No matter how seeing him like that had torn at her heart.

  Knowing that he didn’t realize who took care of him day in and day out had just about killed her.

  Something must have shown on her face, because Zak moved in closer to drop his voice. “You all right?” His gaze was on her mouth, and he was practically on top of her. His breath moved her hair against her sweaty cheek.

  “If by all right, you mean happy to still be alive, then yes. I’m most excellent.” Her exposed skin itched, from sweat and the bugs that were feasting on her as though she were a long-awaited banquet. She didn’t scratch. There was no point. She did her best to ignore everything. Ignoring the man beside her wasn’t quite as easy.

  “Is your name really Acadia? You told me ‘Candy’ last n
ight.”

  Lovely. He’d done things to her she didn’t even want to think about, and he didn’t even know her name. “Acadia,” she told him stiffly. His brother paced several yards ahead. Zak stuck close beside her. Far too close for comfort, and frankly no easy feat, considering the space restraints on the hacked-out path through the dense foliage.

  He shot her a glance. He had very nice eyes when he wasn’t looking at her as though he wished she’d go somewhere else. A wish they both shared. His eyes were dark-lashed, and a brooding hazel—sometimes green, sometimes a tawny brown that ate the light. And unfriendly.

  Sweat stained the front of his once-crisply-ironed shirt, and he’d rolled the sleeves up over his muscled forearms for relief from the unrelenting humidity.

  Because of the way the sunlight fell through the trees, Acadia noticed a previously unseen hair-thin scar on the corner of his upper lip, and another high on his right cheek. The cut above his right eye was definitely going to give him another scar. If he lived long enough for the wound to heal.

  “So, which is it? Candy or …?”

  “You obviously didn’t hear me.” Some of her friends occasionally called her Cady. But that wasn’t often. She wasn’t a nickname type of person. The pet name had sounded appealing in the bar the night before. He was not, she didn’t need reminding, her friend by any stretch of the imagination.

  “Last night you didn’t even know your own name when we were practically having sex all the way up the stairs, down the corridor and—” She sucked in a hot, humid breath. He’d been there. She didn’t need to do a verbal reenactment. Besides, his brother was not even three feet away, listening in. She blushed again despite the heat.

  “My name,” she reminded him, trying for sophisticated nonchalance, “is Acadia Gray.”

  She could smell him even through the lush, wet scent of the jungle. Hot, sweaty male. Not sweaty like the soldiers. His scent was clean and earthy and brought back every vivid memory of every place on his body she’d kissed and tasted the night before … Her heartbeat sped up, and all her girl parts seemed to have antennae tuned in to him.