Flirting with Danger (14 page)

Skye breathed heavily, her chest heaving as she struggled to contain herself. Her father looked as if he had been badly battered in a pub brawl to end all brawls. But Jack spoke the truth. Her dad was bruised, beaten, hurt, but not broken. Neither had they truly done irreversible, permanent damage to him. Skye figured they had been leaving that as a last resort and quickly pushed the thought aside.

She didn’t care if she had to kill every one of their enemies here, she was not leaving without her father. He could walk and so she knew he could escape. She refused to even acknowledge there was an alternative ending to this scenario.

As her father and his captor halted a good dozen or more paces behind their nemesis, the bearded man held out his hands as if to prove what a good, friendly guy he really was.

“I know he’s not pretty to look at right now, but trust me when I say we’ve treated him astonishingly well, little Skye. Now, you said I could test my hard drive? If you please?”

Skye ground her teeth together, refusing to rise to the bait and snap back at him. She longed to shoot Jennings just for the hell of it, his reference to how much worse it could have been for her father no comfort at all. She caught her dad’s glance and held it. One eye was swollen fully shut, thin tape held together two bad splits in his face, one on his cheek, the other on the edge of his mouth where it looked like he’d been severely pistol-whipped.

Regardless, his light brown eyes met hers. Even considering the immense pain he must be in, she could swear he was actually trying to reassure her with his gaze. It took everything in her to push down the molten hot hatred she felt for the abuse he’d suffered. Pouring as much love as possible into her eyes, she tried to silently explain to her dad how very much she loved him. She smiled tremulously, as best she could, given the situation.

Breaking her gaze away before she started to bawl like a baby and ruined the image she’d worked so hard to portray, she straightened her spine, injected as much pride into her bearing and walk as possible, and stalked over to the man, the box held out in her hand.

Jennings took a few paces forward and met her, grasping the hard drive with an eager greed. Pulling a hand-sized PDA out of his inner jacket pocket, he plugged the USB cord in and powered the device up. Skye tilted her head and saw the screen light up as it read the various folders on the hard drive. The man flicked through the folders, seeming satisfied with their names—which looked to be in a form of code to her, letters strung together, not making coherent words, like LRFEAGDT3d4.

After a second he powered down his PDA and nodded, satisfied. Skye breathed easier. She’d been worried he’d try to download or open the individual files, not just be satisfied by seeing the data there in the folders. That would have made the encryption programme kick in and things could have got dicey.

“Now here’s just one more, small thing,” Jennings explained.

Skye frowned, thinking it really had been too easy up until now.

“I need to know none of you will impede my retreat, follow me or try to nuke my car on the way out. So Tennent and Dixon here are going to remain with you and guarantee I make my extraction connection. I do hope that won’t be an issue?”

Skye took a step to the side, ensuring she had a clear view of her father and the guard whom the man had indicated as Tennent, who still held his unbroken shoulder. A glance at Jack showed his gun now was trained on Dixon, while the final guard stood protectively in front of Jennings, clearly willing to shoot them to ensure his retreat.

“You have the hard drive and, if Tennent lets go of his shoulder, we will have my father,” Skye tried to stall. “Why don’t you let him go instead of making this more dangerous and complicated?”

“Ah, my dear, while I think it might be that simple for you, things rarely are so when the masculine ego is involved. And just for the record, nothing is ever simple when Victor is in the mix.”

As he spoke he slowly retreated without turning his back to them. Obviously, even with his personal guard, he didn’t trust them a bit. Skye could grudgingly understand. Jennings continued to move and watch them both warily as he did so. Step by step, Skye came closer to her father until Tennant lifted his machine gun level on to her.

“No closer,” he snapped as she was just a bit more than an arm’s length away. A shout from the edge of the park split through the air and all hell broke loose with a roar. The guard who had remained back with the car had shouted, lifted his gun and started to shoot. Jack and her father dived for the grass, as did Dixon. Skye, untrained enough that ducking for cover was not as instinctive, instead pulled her gun out and aimed it at Tennent.

They were all literally caught in the crossfire, out in the open. Skye didn’t like their chances and with her father’s hands restrained it was still two against two, and their enemies could all too easily overpower them or re-kidnap her dad.

Time stood still for a moment as she weighed the decision that burned through her. They could all too easily be killed, here and now. For the first time ever, her dad couldn’t protect her. She needed to defend him. Skye hesitated for a heartbeat, but, as gunshots rang out again, she forced herself to act. She aimed for the upper shoulder and shot Tennent, the short distance making her aim true.

Blood welled in his shoulder. He dropped his gun to the grass and fell like a downed tree.

“Skye! No! Damn it, get down!” her father shouted at her, clearly wild with worry.

Skye fell to her stomach. She lifted her head and could see Jennings crouched but racing for the car, his guard laying down covering fire. Shots came from behind Skye and Jack, Garth, Katherine and Tarek evidently getting in on the action. Skye crawled towards her dad, her body shaking with delayed reaction to everything that had happened.

“He’s got keys in his left-hand pocket and you’d better tie something around that wound or he’ll bleed out and be of no use to us.” Her dad spoke with astonishing calm. The car’s engine revved and tyres squealed as it peeled out of the park. Skye looked up just in time to see Jack punch Dixon out. The man fell to the ground, unconscious.

“Good to see you, Victor. You look like shit,” Jack said with a grin as he moved to Tennent. Jack ripped the fallen man’s shirt, bunched it up into a tight wad and pressed it down hard on his wound to stem the bleeding. The man grunted but she saw Jack just exert more pressure, not fussed by how much it might hurt. Skye dug the keys out of his pocket.

“I’m doing fine. Germany was a bit of a bust, though. I was annoyed to miss Skye’s birthday. How was the Thai, sweetheart?”

Skye levelled an admonishing glare at him.

“These goons turned up and destroyed it. I’ve never seen a rocket launcher before. You have the most unsavoury friends, Dad, I have to say.”

“Rocket launcher?” Victor repeated. His shock only lasted a second, quickly replaced with wry amusement. “I miss all the good parties. Well, sweetheart, you can’t say I never show you a good time.”

Skye shook her head, caught somewhere between laughter and tears.

“I missed that one,” Jack replied as Skye found the key and unlocked the handcuffs around Victor’s wrists. Jack assisted Victor to his feet, the gunshots having ceased when Jennings had made his escape.

“Of course, I got to personally witness the flamethrower out front of Tank’s. I think that almost makes up for it. That was a party you’ll be ashamed to have missed.”

Victor grunted, his shoulder paining him as he stood.

Katherine and Garth raced up to them, guns drawn and cuffs out. Garth cast a fleeting glance at Victor, surmised he was fine for now and crouched to restrain Dixon and Tennent. Katherine appeared shaken, the thin set to her lips showing something had seriously upset her. Skye looked behind them but couldn’t see Tarek.

“Is Tarek bringing the car around?” she asked, puzzled and not understanding why Katherine looked as if she were barely holding herself together. The agent shook her head.

“No, those assholes got him. I don’t think they even meant to. They were shooting as a distraction, to assist in that bastard’s escape. One of the bullets ricocheted off the side of the car and caught him in the side of his neck. We’ve stopped the bleeding, but he’s unconscious. Backup should be here with the paramedics any minute now.”

A stunned silence greeted this announcement.

“I’m so sorry,” Skye replied in a small voice, feeling awful. Katherine nodded, but managed to hold herself together, though her gaze flitted around, unable to rest on anything for very long. With a curt nod to Victor, she bent down and helped Garth pick up the wounded Tennent. Without a word they both carried him back to the car.

Jack wrapped an arm around Skye and she buried her head in his shoulder. They held each other tightly, fiercely for a moment, unwilling to relinquish one another.

“Told you it would be okay,” he mumbled against the top of her head. Skye chuckled and nodded.

“It’s all still a bit surreal.”

“It will be for a while,” Jack informed her gently. They kissed, a soft, fleeting press of lips on lips. Skye’s eyes fluttered and she flicked her tongue out to taste his mouth. He drew her back again, sucking her tongue into his mouth and they kissed more deeply, a promise of what would come later.

With evident reluctance, Jack pulled away and drew out his phone.

“I’ll call for backup—we won’t all fit in the car and I want to take Victor to a medic I know. You fine with seeing Evans?” Jack asked with a glance to her dad. Skye flushed, a little embarrassed to realise the show they must have just unwittingly given him. He didn’t appear fazed in the least.

“Evan’s is good,” Victor replied, “but I’ll be right for a while. Make sure the backup get here for Tarek, Katherine and Garth first. The Agency will want to question the two guards, even though Jennings will be long gone from where they all held me.”

Jack nodded and moved away to make the calls. Skye wrapped her arms around her father’s waist and he hugged her tightly with his good arm. Despite the fact that she wanted to cling to him like she was six again, she carefully made sure she didn’t jostle his bad shoulder or hurt him. He sucked in a deep breath, winced and indicated his ribs.

“Got a few broken, but damn that felt good, sweetheart. I’m so sorry you got dragged into this.”

Skye shook her head and pressed a featherlight kiss to his cheek.

“No, don’t be, Dad. I’d do it all again in a heartbeat. I know sooner or later the Agency would have found you, but I could see you weren’t their first priority and I couldn’t bear to sit back and do nothing. Besides, it led me to Jack. I love him, Dad. We’re going to get married down the track a little.”

Victor chuckled and shook his head.

“He got my postcard, I assume?”

“Oh, no, we found that later. After I escaped from Garth, Tarek and Katherine at the Thai restaurant, I didn’t know where to turn. I’d kept Jack’s card that you gave me. I called him. The rest just fell into place.”

“Fell into place?” Victor laughed. “Sweetheart, you two were made for each other. I’ve been working on a plan to bring you together for the last six months. I was going to instigate it as your birthday present after lunch. This wasn’t quite what I had in mind, but, broken bones and battered pride aside, it still seems to have worked out wonderfully.”

Skye just stared at her father, amazed. She shook her head, not sure she even wanted to question it further.

“We’ve bought a little time for the Agency,” she explained as Jack came back, his gun back in its holster and his phone in his pocket. “When they plug the hard drive in to download it there’s an encryption programme on it. Hopefully the Agency can track it from there.”

“The Agency have a car nearby,” Jack continued. “We’ll have one hell of a debrief to go through, but they shouldn’t be too upset when all is said and done.”

Skye frowned, stared at her father thoughtfully.

“I think we should commandeer the car,” she suggested. “If we can get Dad some medical attention first, Garth and Katherine can give them the big picture. Then we can fill in the blanks once we know Dad’s going to be all right.”

Jack stared at her thoughtfully, then turned to tilt his head at Victor. He nodded and they set off towards the car. Jack hurried ahead to explain their plan to Katherine and Garth, who were soon nodding. Skye helped Victor settle into the back seat. He sighed once he was finally as comfortable as he could be.

“I knew you and Jack would make a great team,” Victor said faintly. His words were slightly slurred from exhaustion and pain. Skye took his hand and squeezed it gently.

“It’s okay, Dad, we can talk later. We have the rest of our lives for that.”

“I want you to know how very proud of you I am,” he insisted. Skye felt tears leak from her eyes as emotion overwhelmed her. “You’ve always been such a precious little girl to me, sweetheart. But you’ve grown into the strongest, most capable woman I could have dreamed of. I love you, Skye. I’m glad you and Jack have found each other, even without my help.”

Skye sniffed and dashed a finger under her eyes to collect the tears falling down her cheeks.

“I love you too, Dad. You’re going to be fine. We’ll take care of you now.”

Victor sighed and fell into an uneasy doze. Jack climbed into the driving seat and had a double take when he saw Skye was crying. His gaze flickered to Victor and fear crossed his features. Skye shook her head and touched his shoulder with her free hand.

“No, no, he’s just passed out—he’s exhausted. I think he must have been holding out until he was safe and now it’s just got too much for him. He’s fine. Let’s go, love.”

Jack nodded and pressed a kiss to her fingers. She traced his lips as he started the engine, but then he turned around to drive. Skye shook gently as the adrenaline continued to course through her body.

It had been one hell of a morning, but against all the odds she was not only safe, but her dad sat beside her, safe and mostly whole. Skye trembled but held on, not willing to let everything go until she was sure things were under control.