Caught

by Jami Alden

  Toni’s hand stroked his cheek, pushing away the cold dark rising inside him. He wanted to purr like a big cat. “I understand,” she whispered.

  “Yeah, I guess you do.” He swallowed past the unfamiliar, unwanted knot of emotion lodged in his throat and leaned down to kiss her. Her lips parted under his, heat surged through him. His cock hardened against the soft skin of her thigh and he ground his hips against her, distracting himself with sex.

  Sex was simple. Sex was easy. So much easier than the complicated emotions boiling and swirling like a typhoon inside.

  But even this wasn’t as uncomplicated as he wanted, not with the way he responded to the tender strokes of her hand, the way her kiss sent heat and light pouring through him. He groaned and slipped his hand between her legs, wishing he could feel the same nothing he had felt for all the other women, wishing he didn’t want to rip himself open and spill his guts to her. That the feel of her sex, so soft and warm and slippery-wet from wanting him, didn’t make him feel as though giving her pleasure was his higher purpose in life.

  She rocked under his hand, threaded her fingers through his hair and kissed him, soft, wet, hungry kisses, hot and sweet, as if she knew exactly what he needed.

  His BlackBerry emitted a shrill alarm, jerking him rudely from his sensual haze. He pushed Toni away and sat up. “That’s the alarm on Kramer’s security system,” he said in response to Toni’s look of confusion. “He keyed in his access code and is on his way out.”

  Within seconds his phone rang. It was Alex Novascelic, the Gemini security specialist who’d been assigned to watch Kramer’s house. “Kramer’s vehicle just exited his driveway,” Alex said.

  “Stay on him,” Ethan said. “No matter what, don’t let him know he’s got a tail.” He made sure Alex could call up the tracking device they’d planted on Kramer’s car so he wouldn’t have to follow Kramer too closely. “Derek and I are on our way.”

  “What’s going on?” Toni sat up and slid her glasses on.

  “Kramer’s on the move,” he said, walking to the closet. “And at two-thirty on a Wednesday morning, it’s a solid bet he’s up to no good.”

  CHAPTER 14

  T ONI SCRAMBLED INTO her own clothes as Ethan pulled on a black T-shirt and black pants and laced up his black combat boots. Her stomach knotted as she watched him shove a semiautomatic handgun in his waistband and strap a mean-looking knife to his calf.

  “You really think you’ll need that?”

  He gave her a look like she was on crack. “I hope not, but I’m sure as hell not going out there unprepared.” He slipped a leather shoulder harness on over his shirt and holstered the pistol he’d removed from a locked gun case. “I don’t know how long this will take,” he said as he slipped on a lightweight black jacket. “I’ll call you and tell you what’s going on as soon as I can.”

  Toni managed to slip on one sneaker and was struggling into the second, hopping on one foot as she chased him down the hall. “Wait a second.”

  He ignored her, swiping his keys off the console table as he hurried to the door. He punched the access code into the alarm system. “I’m arming the security system. Don’t let anyone in, and stay away from the windows just to be safe.”

  She managed to hook the heavy canvas of her shoe over her heel. “You’re not leaving me here.”

  He gave her a sharp look. “There’s no reason for you to go.”

  “If you think I’m going to sit here doing nothing while I wait for you to call, you’re seriously delusional. As soon as you walk out that door, I’m right behind you.”

  His mouth pulled into a smirk. “You can’t unlock the dead-bolt without the access code.”

  She gave him an oh-please look. “Which I’m sure is accessible somewhere on the Gemini Securities system.”

  “You don’t have a car,” he said, opening the door but blocking it with his body so she couldn’t slip past him.

  “I’ll call a cab,” she said through gritted teeth. “Now, are you going to waste time arguing or are we going to find Jerry and figure out what the fuck is going on?”

  A muscle pulsed in Ethan’s jaw as he moved out of the way to let her out of his condo, but before she could take more than one step, he grabbed her and pinned her up against the wall. “You can go on one condition. You do exactly as I say.”

  “I—”

  His big hand smothered her protest, and his laser-sharp blue eyes seemed to glow in the moonlit corridor. “Exactly as I say. I will not put you in danger, even if it means I have to handcuff you and throw you in my trunk. Do you understand?”

  She nodded. He took his hand away and leaned down to give her a hard, fast kiss, then grabbed her arm and took off at a jog down the stairs to his parking garage. He handed Toni his BlackBerry so she could monitor the red dot that represented Jerry Kramer’s car, currently headed north on Highway 101.

  He docked his cell phone and clipped on an earpiece. “Call Derek.” His phone dialed, and moments later Derek’s low, clipped voice filled the interior of Ethan’s BMW. Derek patched in Alex, who was tailing Kramer about five miles ahead.

  “He’s getting off at the Holly Street exit,” Alex said. “I’m about a mile behind him.”

  Toni watched the dot of Jerry’s car head east, toward an industrial park that sat on the bay. He pulled into a building complex and the dot stopped moving.

  Ethan instructed Alex and Derek to park in a lot a quarter mile away. “Alex, as soon as you get there, head over to where Jerry is and give us the lay of the land. But don’t engage. We’re about five minutes behind. After we hang up, radios only.”

  “Got it,” Alex said.

  Derek was already waiting as they turned into the dark lot, a shadowy figure pulling gear from the trunk of his car. Ethan’s radio crackled. “Kramer’s still in his car, hasn’t moved yet,” Alex said. “I’ve got two cars approaching the southwest entrance. License plates 6XJS-626 and 8GHC-439. They’re turning in now.”

  Toni keyed the plate numbers into her handheld and watched as Ethan slipped on what looked like night-vision goggles and Derek slipped extra ammunition into a pocket of his cargo pants.

  She suddenly felt as though she’d fallen down a rabbit hole and ended up in a scene from Rambo.

  “I’ve got an additional seven men exiting the cars. Six are armed.”

  Toni swallowed hard and felt a trickle of sweat snake down her inner arm. She’d suspected Jerry was into something bad, but she hadn’t anticipated this. God only knew what this might mean for Kara.

  “Stay in your position,” Ethan told Alex. “We’re sixty seconds away.”

  Ethan was so intent on gearing up that he seemed to have forgotten about her. He checked the gun in his waistband one more time, then turned to her. “Stay in the car, activate the alarm, and don’t move. If anything happens and you get scared, call nine one one and stay put. The glass is bulletproof, so you should be fine.”

  He got out of the car, walked over to her side, took her hand, and pressed the keys into her cold, shaking palm. Amazingly, his hand was warm and dry, as if he were heading to the grocery store and not going off to face several armed men. His fingers tightened around her hand and he leaned down. “Don’t worry. It’s all going to be fine.” He brushed a quick kiss on her cheek. Before she could react, he and Derek took off across the dark parking lot, swift and silent, like wolves running through the night.

  Ethan and Derek arrived just in time to see Kramer and four other men enter the darkened building through a back entrance next to a Dumpster. The remaining two men pulled the cars around to the side of the building and got back out, circling, watching, waiting to scare off anyone who might stumble across them.

  Alex stayed in position to keep an eye on the two outside, while Ethan and Derek slipped around to the front of the building. Through the dark, Ethan could make out a sign that said “Office Space For Lease.” The door was locked, armed with a security system that required an electronic key card to
enter.

  They did a swift assessment of the square, squat building. They could override the security system, but that would take time. More time than they had.

  Looking up, Ethan saw a roof-level window, open a few inches.

  Pay dirt.

  He and Ethan pried the window open enough to slip through and crept along the steel girding in the high ceiling of the warehouselike structure.

  A light came from the back, and he and Derek climbed across the metal framing for a closer look. Five men, including Jerry, stood in a glass-walled room at the back of the building. The walls didn’t go all the way to the roof, and Ethan and Derek perched in the darkness.

  Unlike the rest of the office space, which seemed to have been given up for dead some time ago, the room was a small but fully equipped lab space.

  Jerry wiped his hands on the front of his pants before using a pipette to drop liquid on what looked like a microscopic slide. Two of the men, one a medium-built blond with muddy green eyes and the other a tall, hunch-shouldered, hollow-chested guy, hovered close, watching Jerry’s every move. Both were in their late forties.

  The other two men were muscle, one a big blond guy with a florid face and a thick layer of fat over muscle. The other was shorter, darker, built like a brick wall. That guy made Ethan nervous, the way his thumb traced the butt of his gun in his side holster.

  Derek shifted his position for a better view, pulled out his handheld, and snapped a few photos.

  “I trust you’re prepared for the demonstration, Jerry?” They had no problem hearing the wiry blond guy’s faintly accented voice. For all his friendly tone, Jerry shot him a look full of venom.

  “Of course,” Jerry said. “I’m sure Mr….” he trailed off and looked at the tall, dark-haired man.

  “You can call me Meester Smeeth.” The man’s fleshy lips pulled into a smile. Ethan guessed the accent to be some flavor of Eastern European.

  “Right,” Jerry said, recognizing the name for the alias it was.

  The blond guy and “Smith” exchanged a few words in what sounded like Russian and laughed.

  Jerry gave them an uneasy look and moved to where a computer monitor sat atop an unfamiliar-looking piece of machinery. “If you’re ready, we can get started.”

  Ethan’s grip tightened on the metal catwalk as he prepared to move in and get this over with. He didn’t like it that Toni was sitting alone in the car—he should have called Danny over to keep her in his condo, by brute force, if necessary.

  He eased forward and caught Derek’s eye, signaling him to move in. Derek shook his head in a short, sharp motion, motioned for Ethan to back off.

  Ethan held himself in check, but barely. Yeah, Derek was probably right. They should figure out what Jerry was up to that had him sneaking into secret labs in the middle of the night accompanied by sketchy foreign characters and their armed bodyguards.

  But Kara Kramer was God knew where, and he’d bet his left nut one these men knew. And the woman he lov—don’t even go there, dude—Toni was alone in a dark parking lot, and one of these men had tried to have her killed yesterday.

  Jerry’s hands shook slightly as he dropped a small amount of liquid onto what looked like a piece of clear plastic. “You’ll see—with a very small sample size, we can synthesize the bacteria and quickly mutate it.” He loaded the chip into a casing and slid it into the machine. He typed in a command and the computer screen showed a complex network of channels and valves, separating off different parts of the liquid. At this magnification, you could see the small organisms being partitioned off into the valves.

  Smith’s smile widened. “Then it’s simply a matter of picking the most virulent strain for cultivation.”

  Jerry’s face was marble white. “Yes.”

  Smith turned to the blond man. “It is as exciting as you promised, William. My colleagues will be most pleased.”

  Ethan and Derek exchanged a look. Bacteria? Virulent strain?

  His stomach flipped at the implications. Biowarfare. And Jerry was putting it into the hands of people who sure as hell weren’t representing the interests of the United States and its allies.

  Jerry slid the casing from the machine and packed it away.

  The blond man, William, motioned for Jerry to pack up the rest of the equipment as he and Smith conversed in Russian.

  Jerry handed the case holding the machinery to Smith’s bodyguard. “There are ten chips and cartridges included. Enough for…” Jerry swallowed hard.

  Ethan wanted to bum-rush him and pound his face into the concrete floor. Fucking weasel.

  Smith and William shook hands, then Smith and his bodyguard exited the room.

  Ethan and Derek froze in the darkness, holding their breath as the men passed directly underneath them.

  “I held up my end,” Jerry said. “Now you do the same. Where’s Kara?”

  Every nerve and sinew went on high alert. Ethan sank back into the darkness and whispered to Alex, “Bring one of the cars over. Park on the street. Be ready to tail the Mercedes. These guys are going to lead us to Kara.”

  “Don’t worry,” William said, taking Jerry’s arm and leading him to the door. “Everything will end as it should.”

  Fear had a taste. Bitter and metallic, it rose up from the pit of Jerry’s stomach, spread into his throat and coated his tongue like a film. Calm down. You did exactly what they wanted. It’s all fine from here.

  Now Connors would release Kara. Jerry would drop her off at Marcy’s and head south. He’d be in Mexico by dinnertime.

  He’d wanted to take Kara and Kyle with him, had planned on it, but he couldn’t do that. He couldn’t expect two teenagers to give up their identities and go into hiding with him. He’d left notes explaining his disappearance as best he could and set up hefty trust funds for both of them. They would never need anything.

  Connors’s hand was like a manacle around his arm. His bodyguard walked behind, close enough so that Jerry could smell the man’s body odor. Or maybe that was his own. He’d been bathed in terror-spiked sweat since Connors had first called him four days ago.

  Connors pushed Jerry outside into the cool night and directed him around to the side of the building, where Connors’s car was parked. He looked around, hoping Kara was already here, or on her way.

  All he saw was Connors’s bodyguard and another thug, his face in shadow as he leaned against the hood of a silver Mercedes. Jerry yanked his arm from Connors’s grip and spun around. “Cut the bullshit,” he said, inwardly cringing at the high edge of fear in his voice. “I came through. Now tell me where Kara is.”

  Connors laughed and shook his head. “Jerry, you didn’t seriously think we’d let her go, did you?” His brow was furrowed as he looked at Jerry with the same condescending sympathy one gave the mentally disabled.

  Jerry felt as if his insides were being sucked out. “You told me—”

  “And you fucked with me.” The smile was gone. Connors was hard, cold, emotionless as granite. “Even if I were inclined to honor our agreement, you and your daughter would prove too much of a risk to my operation.”

  “You sick son of a bitch!” Jerry rushed him. Who cared? He was dead anyway. He took a wild swing at Connors and felt his feet lift into the air as he was grabbed from behind. He slammed into the pavement, the air rushing from his lungs as his head and torso hit the asphalt. He rolled over and pushed himself onto his hands and knees. He was lying on something, he realized. Someone had put down a tarp.

  He looked up at Connors, who stood off to the side, smiling, enjoying the way Jerry gasped and retched as he tried to catch his breath.

  “Now,” Connors said, “I must be going. I have some men waiting to meet three lovely young ladies.” He nodded at the dark-haired thug who stood just behind Jerry. “Make sure there is no mess.” He slid into the passenger seat of the Mercedes while the big blond guy got in the driver’s seat. The car came to life with a low rumble, the discreet German engine barely disturbing
the still night.

  The sedan began to back away, and Jerry felt the cold press of a gun to his back. “On your knees.”

  Jerry sank to the ground, feeling like his life, his soul was already pouring out of him. He’d never been a religious man, but prayers to God raced through his head. Not for himself. He didn’t bother begging for forgiveness. If there was an afterlife, he knew exactly where he was headed.

  Now he prayed for Kara. For someone to rescue his little girl from the horrific fate Connors had planned for her. All Jerry’s fault.

  He heard the metallic slide of the gun being cocked and closed his eyes, trying to visualize his children’s faces. Wetness trickled down his leg as he pissed himself in fear.

  He heard the shot that killed him.

  But wait. He opened his eyes. There was no bright light. He was staring at the Dumpster. The thug was screaming, clutching his arm to his chest.

  “Don’t move!”

  Jerry held up his hands and watched as Derek and Ethan Taggart rounded the corner of the building.

  Ethan skidded to a stop and hauled Jerry to his feet, slamming him against the Dumpster. Jerry’s would-be shooter was down for the count, whimpering as he cradled his wounded forearm. Had to hand it to Derek. He was still a crack shot, even without a scope and a sniper rifle. Running full out, taking a shot where there were inches between saving Jerry and killing him, Derek had nailed the shooter right in the forearm, sending his gun flying and the guy to his knees.

  Derek was still running, chasing down the Mercedes on the off chance he could get close enough to take out a tire. But the taillights receded into the night, out of range of the Sig Sauer .45 Derek carried.

  “Why aren’t you shooting them?” Jerry said, flailing against Ethan’s hold. “We have to stop him. He has Kara.”

  Ethan subdued Jerry with a forearm across his neck. “One of my men is tailing him. You got him, Alex?” he said into the mouthpiece.

  “That’s affirmative. Heading west on Veterans Boulevard. I’ve got my lights off and my night-vision goggles on, hanging back enough so he can’t see me.”