“Here. I think you can handle the rest of it.”
It was the best water she’d ever had in her life. She swore she could feel her cells soaking it up, and her brain expanding. The pounding didn’t stop, but it was already subsiding. She figured she’d been there for over 24 hours at that point. Things were not looking good for the home team. Best case, she had another 24 hours before he finished things. More likely she had 12 hours, tops.
“Where are we?” she whispered.
Tanja shook her head. “I can’t tell you that,” she said, standing. “I’ll come back in a little while with some food.”
“No. More water, please,” Audrey said.
Tanja nodded. “Very well. More water.”
Audrey was alone again. She was making very little headway with the ropes, but some was better than none. Either her wrists were swelling from being down for so long, or they’d re-tightened the knots while she was out. No matter. She kept working at them, wincing through the burn of the rope. However long she had left before Gross killed her, she’d try to get out of this shit.
She just hoped the team found her in time.
***
Chad Gross had a small house in Hereford. Chad Graovac didn’t exist in any land or bank records. Tanja Graovac, however, was quite the entrepreneur on paper, with three properties in the area, as well as one in Italy. Trieste, in fact. Sanders got on the phone with Interpol and requested they check on the property. She waited while they ran travel records for the two, just in case.
The team had split up into groups and went in their respective directions to save time. The Hereford house was empty. Utilities were still being paid, but the small amounts had led them to believe that this house hadn’t been lived in for a couple years. A quick search turned up nothing of any use, just dust and debris from neglect gathering in the corners.
Simon, Charlie, Range, and Drummond had gone to the address that was the furthest away from the post. Simon was betting on Audrey being there, just because of the distance. There was no house at all, only a foundation. Range had seen eyes peering out from behind a curtain next door and went over there. The ancient little woman told him that construction had stopped about six months prior. The neighbor knew nothing about the people. No one on the block did. They’d never seen them. She’d kept an eye out, you can bet on that, she’d said, and what a pity. Good neighbors are hard to find. He thanked her for her time, and gave her one of his cards. Just in case.
Simon visibly deflated when Range came over to relay the information. He’d been so sure. A buzzing from his pocket stopped him from going down that dark thought path. The rest of the team had gotten messages as well. Audrey. Charlie read the message first. “Second site! Let’s go!” she called, already running for the car.
Tanja had come in again with another bottle of water, as promised. Audrey drank as much of it as she could in one go. Straining against the ropes had taken almost all of her reserves, and she was so, so tired. If she couldn’t get out of these ropes, she didn’t have a chance in hell of even dying with a fight. Once Tanja left, Audrey closed her eyes. She breathed deeply.
Breathe in. She pictured Simon’s face. She’d memorized every bit, from the scar that had almost cost him an eye, to the little flecks of yellow around his pupil and the dark brown ring around the whole iris.
Breathe out. His lips. Soft. Firm. His teeth were white and even. Except for that one canine that was turned, just a little. The shiver he made when she traced her tongue around the corner of his mouth.
Breathe in. His mind. Quietly brilliant. He liked games that required logic and analytical skill and kicked her ass at chess. Every. Single. Time.
Breathe out. This couldn’t be the end. Not like this. Not when there were so many things to tell him, to share with him. She needed more time to love him.
Breathe in. The knot on the rope popped open, and she caught the end before it could hit the floor and make a noise. Slowly, she unraveled it from her wrists and flexed them, trying to work some blood up and out. Taking a chance, she lifted her arms quickly, and winced in pain when her shoulders protested. She heard some noises, and dropped her arms quickly, hoping that a close look at her hands wouldn’t alert her captors to her new freedom.
Gross was approaching, and he was walking fast. His footsteps echoed on the wood floor. Tanja was moving about.
He came in to the room and suddenly there was chaos.
A door not too far away suddenly splintered, and lights started dancing around the hall. There was yelling. Cries of “FBI!” and “CID!” filled the air.
Shock played across her captor’s face and quickly turned to anger. “What have you done?” he yelled at Audrey, rushing behind her and lifting her up. She clung to the ropes, but didn’t have to worry. Gross hadn’t seemed to notice that her hands were free.
He grabbed her around the neck and waist. Oddly, he was unarmed. Probably didn’t think they could ever find her. She heard Tanja screaming in the distance; the noise getting further away as they drug her out of the area.
Randall was the first through the door. He had his weapon drawn and zeroed in on Gross’s head. Sanders was next, followed closely by Antony.
“Chad Gross, let Agent Linser go!” Randall yelled.
“No! I have demands!” Chad shrieked. He was shaking horribly, terrified. The gig was up and everyone in the room knew it. “I’ll snap her neck! I swear!”
Audrey looked at Top and nodded slightly. Antony saw the rope, just as it fell to the floor behind her. He lowered his weapon, and the motion caused Gross to turn his head toward him. At that moment, Audrey swung her arms up and grabbed the arm around her neck. The motion startled Gross, and he lost grip around her waist. That’s all she needed. There hadn’t been a chance to untie her feet, so no leverage, but she was fine with using him to break her fall. She threw her body forward, bringing Chad off the ground and over her shoulder. He landed on the chair, splintering it. There was a sickly squishing sound, and blood started pooling underneath him. Audrey stayed upright, though she was wobbly.
But not for long. The pain of movement, and the blood rushing to her feet when she stood, made her crash, hard. Audrey swayed. Antony lunged forward and caught her, scooping her up behind her neck and under her knees. Sanders came and undid the ropes around her ankles.
Sirens sounded in the distance. A lot of them. Antony took her out into the living area and out the door. They’d been in some sort of renovated garage or barn, she saw. Her room was in a built in box that was connected to the rest of the area by a hallway.
By the time Simon got there, Audrey was in the ambulance and on the way to the hospital.
“Go to her,” Top said. “Keep us in the loop.”
His father looked at him. “I’ll drive.”
“I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not. I’ll drive.”
Simon had little argument left in him.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Four hours, thirteen minutes.
Simon and his father had been sitting in the waiting room for four hours, thirteen minutes. Without a word from the doctors, the nurses, or even the police officers who were on site. They’d spent the first couple hours filling in the officers on the case and going over what would need to be done for debriefing. Civilian hospital meant civilian police force. Some officers were familiar with Chad Gross. He wasn’t a popular sight in the local courthouse, and he often brought up lawsuits that were so close to being frivolous, that the judges cringed when they saw his name on their dockets.
But that’s how he made his money, and he had it rolling in. It was one way they’d found Tanja’s holdings so quickly. What Simon didn’t have the answer for was how she was involved in the whole mess. As far as they knew, she worked part time at the PX and lived with Gross. There wasn’t a marriage license to be found, and they didn’t know who she was or how she’d gotten to this area of Arizona. All they had was a birth date that matched one from an audio rec
ording. The thought of what that meant made Simon sick to his stomach.
The rest of the team was at the main house where Audrey was found. It was a large plot, about five acres, on the edge of town where the gates were locked and the neighbors were quiet.
They had kept Audrey in a small room that was built into a barn on the back edge of the property. Beyond that was national forest land. The room was soundproofed on the outside by eggshell foam glued to the board. Cheap, but effective. A hallway had been added, perhaps to give the illusion of being part of a larger house, and to keep her from seeing any details about the surroundings.
The house itself was one of the McMansions that had become ubiquitous with middle-aged, prosperous families. Simon hadn’t gone inside, but Antony’s texts had painted a bizarre image of an illusion of wealth. The last text he’d sent just said, Jackpot. Simon figured they’d found the connections that would tie everything up in a nice bow.
“Simon Carwell?” a gentle voice brought him back to the present.
He looked up. A doctor was standing in front of him. E.J. Grey was blazoned on her nametag.
“Audrey is settled in her room, Simon,” she said. “She’s sedated, but you can go sit with her.”
“Sedated? Why?”
“We were having a hard time getting her to settle down for an examination,” she said. “It was the combination of stress and her injuries. Too much adrenaline.” She smiled. “And she kept insisting on seeing you.”
Simon nodded. Erik put his hand on his shoulder. “I’ll get the official reports, son. Go sit with her. She’ll need you when she wakes up.”
Simon followed the doctor to the elevator. When they got out on the 5th floor, she had him stop at the nurses’ station where they affixed a wristband to him. “This will allow you to use the elevator whenever you need to leave and come back. The elevators and doors will not open without it. You can also use it to escort your team in and out,” a nurse told him.
He walked down the hall and saw officers posted outside of two different doors. In one room lay Chad Gross, recovering from emergency surgery. When Audrey flipped him, he hit the frame of the chair which broke and impaled him. He was down one kidney and his spleen, but would recover well enough to stand trial. They secured his hands to the bed railings with handcuffs. When he woke, he’d be formally charged via closed circuit television. Until then, his only company would be a lawyer, the doctors and nurses assigned to his care, and a television that, unless someone felt nice enough to change, was stuck on QVC.
In the other room, Audrey lay sleeping the sleep of someone helped by strong sedatives. Dr. Grey stopped before she opened the door. “Simon, she looks pretty bad. Looks. She’s in pretty good shape, all considered. They got some X-rays of her head, and she’s got quite the lump, but nothing broken. She has a mild concussion, but that’s not surprising, given that knot. I just wanted you to know so you don’t panic too much when you see her. Most of this is superficial.”
Simon took a deep breath and walked through the door. Sterile white strips covered her wrists, and a line of tape held an IV in place on the back of her hand. The monitors were silenced, and he could see the beat of her heart imaged as a green line spiking across a black screen. It was as steady and as strong as she was. His eyes filled with tears as he pulled up a chair and took in her face. Gross had done a number on her. The worst thing he could see was a laceration over her right eye. It had been deep enough to expose bone, but had been one of the first wounds inflicted, so it was already mending. The bruises across her cheekbones were deep purple and angry. Both of her eyes were black and her hair was short and matted. At some point, someone had roughly chopped her braid off. He reached out and smoothed a strand back from her face.
Her lips were swollen and cracking. He thought for a moment to ask them for some sort of balm for them, when a nurse, apparently reading his mind, came in with a small tin of ointment and gently applied it.
“She’s a strong one,” she whispered, smiling at Simon. “She’s going to be just fine.”
“I know. She is strong,” he responded, turning back to her. “How long will she be out?”
“Not too long, I suspect,” the nurse answered, looking at Audrey’s chart. “They didn’t sedate her heavily. She’s just exhausted.” She looked closer at him. “Like you are. Those chairs recline. Not the best, but they’re not horrible for a nap.” She walked over to a shelf in the corner and grabbed a blanket. “Here. You’ll be here when she wakes, and it’ll all be okay.”
Simon was chilled, and he recognized it as the cold that comes from the body running on fumes. He’d been up for over 48 hours, save for his hellish nap in the office. He kicked back the recliner, flung the blanket over his legs, and fell asleep watching Audrey.
Some time later, Audrey opened her eyes and blinked. Her head felt a little better, like the dwarves that had been mining in it had moved on to better targets, like her face. She tried to raise one hand to rub her eyes and found tubes attached to it. She rubbed anyway, clearing the grit from them, and wincing at the surrounding bruising. Everything came back in a rush. Gross, Tanja, the abduction. She hyperventilated a little, and a nurse came rushing in. The sensors in the room had been silenced, but the ones out at the station were not.
“Shhhh, you’re okay,” the nurse said. “You’re in the hospital. Breathe.”
Audrey looked around. Windows. She was in a bed. Covered. Okay, this was an IV hooked up to . . . she looked up. Ringer’s and something else.
“Antibiotics, Audrey,” the nurse said, following her gaze. “Just in case. You’ve got a couple good cuts. There’s nothing else in there.”
Okay. Good. Audrey nodded and tried to speak. Her throat felt like sand, so she pointed and mouthed “water.”
The nurse handed her a cup of ice chips. “Go easy on these. Slowly. We don’t want you to throw up.”
Audrey took the spoon and shoveled ice chips into her mouth. Oh, this was heavenly. She let the ice melt and then slowly trickle down the back of her throat. After a few more spoonfuls, she swallowed and the sand sensation vanished.
“Where’s the bastard?” she asked.
The nurse chuckled. “Handcuffed to a bed down the hall. He’s not going anywhere.” She did one more quick check on Audrey’s bandages, and as she was walking out, said, “You should look to your left.”
She did and smiled. Well, as much as she could without pain. Simon was sprawled out on the recliner. His legs were about six inches too long for it and were hanging off the edge. The blanket was tucked up under his chin, which left his legs exposed. He was wearing his uniform, the same one she’d seen him in out at the training area. He looked like hell, with two days of stubble growing on his jawline and dark circles under his eyes. His brow was furrowed. Even his scar was redder than normal. Stress. But he was here with her. She was alive. They’d deal with everything else later.
After she finished her cup of ice, Audrey fell back to sleep. This time, it wasn’t the sleep from drugs, but that of rest.
The noise down the hall alerted Simon that the team was incoming. He’d been holding Audrey’s hand for an hour, watching her sleep. An empty cup and spoon told him she’d been awake once, and it mildly irritated him that the nurse hadn’t woken him up for it.
Top’s head appeared around the door. Simon nodded, and he entered, followed by Antony and Charlie. “We won’t stay long,” he began.
Audrey’s eyes opened. “Hey, Top.”
Simon whipped his head around. She met his eyes and squeezed his hand. “Hey, you.”
“Hey, yourself,” he said, bringing her knuckles to his lips.
She turned back to the group. “Thank you.”
Charlie pinched her big toe. “Dumbass. What the hell were you doing that got you kidnapped?”
“I’d wondered that myself. How did he get the drop on you, Audrey?” Randall asked.
Audrey and Simon shared a look. Antony watched the two of them and leaned ba
ck against the windowsill.
“I was getting out of my truck. Pretty sure he had a taser,” she said.
“He did,” Top said. “You’ve got the marks on the back of your neck. We also found the taser. He adjusted it to crank out more than what it was supposed to. That thing would have dropped a linebacker on PCP.”
“But what were you doing out so late?” Charlie asked. “We had dinner, and you were going to bed.”
Audrey kept a level gaze at her friend. “Couldn’t sleep, so I went out for a drive.” Antony coughed a little from across the room, and Simon shot him a look.
Charlie looked at her friend and kept her mouth shut. Some things weren’t worth knowing.
Randall looked around at his team and cleared his throat. “So, you want to know what we found out?”
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Antony came in with a folding chair under each arm. The head nurse followed him with another chair and handed it to Charlie.
“She’s here to heal, not work,” the nurse said.
Antony grinned at her. “We won’t make your job any harder than it is, ma’am. Besides, if we don’t talk to her now, she’ll just be a pain for all of us to deal with.” A wadded up piece of paper bounced off the side of his head and landed on the floor. “See?” he gestured toward Audrey. “She’s horrible.”
The nurse smiled at him and shook her head indulgently. “I’ll be back in to check on you.”
They set up their chairs around the bed and got comfortable.
“What happened to my hair?” Audrey blurted out, rubbing the back of her head.
Charlie grimaced. “Yeah. We found your braid in his car door.”
“What?”
“It got caught, and instead of opening the door, he just chopped it off and left it there.”
“Well, that’s pleasant,” she said, wrinkling her nose. “I guess I was due a new style.” Simon grabbed her hand, and she clutched it. “Go on.”
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