Saved by His Submissive (23 page)

Rayna jerked away. “The
hell
it is.”

Though her friend wasn’t looking, Sage jutted her chin. “Ray, you can’t give up now.”

She had no idea where the bravado came from. Maybe she was just fronting it for Josie’s sake. She remembered having that same Little Orphan Annie hope after the tribes had first taken them in Botswana. She’d managed to keep it as the bastards  bargained them back and forth in exchange for fighters taken prisoner during the skirmishes. It had lasted until the day they overheard two of the rebels chuckling about how they could keep she and Rayna as bargaining chips for years, because no rescue team was coming for them. That was when Orphan Annie got replaced with Xena. Ray herself had given her the nickname, as she’d quietly started to plan their escape.

As if her friend had just traveled the same path of memory, Rayna lifted her tear-streaked face. “Save the pep rally, Sage. These guys aren’t a bunch of jungle boonies rebels with no clue what they’re doing.”

“This also isn’t the boonies,” she countered.

Her friend rolled her eyes and let out a dark laugh.

“Damn it, I’m right and you know it.
Look at me,
Ray. You’ve seen it too, haven’t you, in Zeke? The protectiveness that seemed just a little gonzo? The watchfulness that bordered on weird? The looks that were on you but not
on
you, like his mind was somewhere else, and that place wasn’t too pretty?”

The dark green of Rayna’s gaze rustled in recognition. “I just thought he was being a super soldier boy, suddenly without anything to do.”

Josie nodded. “Been there, done that. They get one of those episodes, you either go shopping or find something for them to blow up that’s
not
the house.”
Sage shook her head. “This was more than episodes, Josie. This was pervading. Twenty-four and seven.” She fixed her stare on Rayna again. “It makes sense now, right?” she asked her friend. “Garrett and Zeke…maybe it was just premonition for them, or maybe they got more substantial intel about it. Maybe King bought off people in Thailand and got sprung, or maybe he set the nets back out for us straight from his cell.”

Rayna grimaced. “Anything’s possible with that monster.”

“Unfortunately, he’s a monster with money, who doesn’t like to lose.”

Rayna’s expression crumpled into a wince of understanding. On many nights during their confinement in his warehouse, King and his men would play card games. One night when he’d lost the big winning pile, the asshole shot the winner’s kneecap off. Another losing night had ended with Rayna’s brutal piercing.

Josie emitted a fierce huff. “All right, for argument’s sake, let’s say they knew something. Why the hell didn’t they say anything to either of you?”

Rayna echoed the snort. “Because they’re stupid, he-man chest beaters.”

The older woman nodded. “That’s a good one. Can I borrow it?”

“I may have to do the same,” Sage added. She curled her knees beneath her, so she could concentrate harder on Rayna. “But now you know why I’m not giving up the pom poms, Ray. We’re still in Elliott Bay. We’re not on a barge bound for Bangkok. And even though the guys have pulled a stupid Fred and Barney on us, I have to believe they’ve got a direction to go in. We’ve just got to keep it together until they hone the coordinates a little better.”

Chapter Fifteen

“We don’t know where to start, do we?”

Garrett hated how the words sounded more like an accusation than a question. Even more, he hated the pit of despair in his gut from which they’d formed. Worse than that, he hated what they did to the face of his best friend. Clearly, Z had mentally executed himself a thousand times already for this.

“They fucking disappeared.” His friend beat a figure eight into the sidewalk at the south end of the Market, as if performing a ritual that would open up the concrete and give him a vision about what had happened. Or maybe he was just judging how to best slam his head against the walkway and crack open his skull. Garrett bet on the later, judging by the white-knuckled grip Z had on the back of his neck. “I turned for one second, and then—” He whirled, making even his leather bomber jacket billow. “Goddamnit! Those filthy fuckers!”

Wyatt had dipped into silence during the drive here, when Garrett gave him a fly-over of the situation that was as fast and furious as his driving. He’d started by recounting their bizarre sighting of King at Sea-Tac, filled in with the Cliff’s Notes version of King’s criminal past, and ended with the harrowing update about the asshole’s vengeful vendetta against the girls. The monster’s crusade had finally succeeded this afternoon, with one bonus prize included in the form of Aunt Josie.

After that, Garrett had sucked in a breath for the hardest apology of his life. Before he could get out a word of it, Wyatt had barked one word across the truck’s cab.
Don’t.
If the command weren’t enough, the anguish in his uncle’s eyes finished off the job. After that, the man’s face had barely changed. Until now. Wyatt’s gaze was now afire with alertness, scanning the entire area, including the burned tire marks the bastards had left them as a souvenir. He paced the sidewalk slowly, hands locked on his hips, head sweeping from side to side.

“Bottle it up, Sergeant Hayes,” he finally said to Z. “That anger isn’t going to do you any good until we find these pussies and teach them a lesson. When that happens, I’ll gladly hold them while you get in a little punching bag practice.”

Zeke straightened, and a little of his old fire sparked in his eyes. Despite this gut-muncher of a situation, Garrett nodded a thank-you at his uncle. Z didn’t wallow well. Hell, he barely sat still with any degree of grace. By spinning up a fantasy the guy could focus on, Wyatt restarted Z’s productivity. And damn it, they needed Zeke right now. To catch street thugs, it helped to have a guy on your side who used to be one.

“I would much appreciate that, sir.” Zeke cocked a dark grin at Wyatt. “And I’ll gladly return the favor, so you can fuck up an ass-licker of your own.”

Wyatt straddled the van’s skid marks. “Done deal.” He lifted his head as Z walked over. “Now what can you tell us about the van?”

The question was quiet, but its implication was huge. In any branch of Special Forces, a squad member’s life could depend on his brother’s ability to recall details under pressure. Colors, textures, smells, sounds, temperatures, words, distances, equipment…any or all of it could become a vital game-changer. All three of them knew this, but Garrett exchanged a heavy glance with his uncle as they waited for Z’s response, hoping for the best. Emotions were the memory’s chokehold. And whether he openly admitted it or not, emotions drove the chariot of Z’s brain right now.

“It was a custom job,” his friend began. “Nothing wacky or foreign. It was likely a Chevy or Dodge, though hard to tell because the body was modified and skimmed low to the ground. The rims
were
imports though, blingy Italian shit. But the paint job’s what I noticed the most. It was gorgeous. But it didn’t match. It was…”

“It was what?” Garrett urged it in response to his friend’s puzzled frown. “And what do you mean, it didn’t match?”

An anomaly of any
kind could be their key to busting this open. They were moving on the search without police support, in obedience to Franzen’s orders. Their CO had been part of the information loop since the second Z called him, right after hanging up with Garrett. Since King was clearly still running at least part of the show from prison, enough to get an audio tap into Rayna’s place and insert two fake cops at Pike Place today, the Seattle PD was blacked out on the trust grid right now. Even the Feds would be brought on board once Franz deemed it appropriate. Their sole purpose right now? Gather the facts. Follow up on everything credible. Find out everything they could from whoever they could.

Right now, that meant getting a hell of a lot more information about the damn van.

Garrett clenched back his impatience in order to prompt Zeke as calmly as he could, “What did the paint look like, Z?”

Zeke turned and looked at him. Damn. His friend’s eyes were hollow, his lips tight. Maybe things with Z and Rayna had proceeded faster than he assumed. Garrett felt shitty for his friend, though on a selfish level, misery did love company. And goddamnit, he was sick with misery. He couldn’t lose Sage again. He
wouldn’t.
If he had to, he’d rip this fucking city apart to find her.

“The paint looked…feminine.” The last word left Z like it was the zinger in a whodunit plot. Garrett didn’t get the significance. But Zeke sure as hell seemed to. His gaze ignited like he’d become Fort Lewis’ answer to Sherlock Holmes.

“Feminine?” Wyatt echoed. He was clearly as nonplussed as Garrett.

“Yeah,” Z returned.

“What the fuck?” Garrett muttered.

“I’m serious. It looked like a tampon box.”

“What the
fuck
?”

“It looked airbrushed. Lavender and pink. There was a pair of hands touching along the side, and…” He stared across the street, again pulling the Sherlock Holmes act. “There was a white cat laying across the back wheel well.”

“A white
what?
”

“A white cat. That’s really weird.”

“Thanks for clearing that up, man.”

Wyatt stomped back onto the sidewalk. “This isn’t the time for jokes, son.”

“No, sir.” Zeke began to pace again. This time, his strides were wide and strong—and excited. “No joke at all. Just a lot of pieces sliding together.”

“Awesome,” Garrett inserted. “You want to enlighten
us
now?”

Z spun back toward them, arms folded, determination stamped across his face. “The paint job wasn’t real.”

“Huh?” Wyatt grunted.

Garrett narrowed his gaze as comprehension kicked in. “You mean it was a wrap?”

Zeke nodded. Wyatt threw a frown at both of them. “A what?” the man asked.

“An automotive body wrap, Uncle. They use them a lot around the city, mostly on buses, as advertising gimmicks. They have special machinery that can laser print an image onto plastic ‘wrap’ that’s adhered to the bus, turning it into a rolling billboard.”

“After the campaign or event is over, the plastic is peeled off,” Z finished.

“We’ve been toying a little with the technology on our ops vehicles, but the wrap is still a little prissy. It doesn’t like dirt.”

“Small problem there,” Z confirmed.

Wyatt snorted. “So the pussies were only pretending to have pussies. And that van is sitting somewhere now, decked in a completely different design.”

Zeke snorted. “I’d bet my left nut on it.”

“Fuck,” Wyatt gritted.

“Seconding that,” Garrett added. He looked back to Zeke. “How does this get us anywhere, man?”

Zeke’s face resembled a kid about to go on his first roller coaster. Sheer excitement and blatant nausea warred for control of his features. “Because I wasn’t looking at the hundredth ad for the Balloon Festival on that van. The art was
custom,
hand-painted
.
”

“Still in the dark, dude. There are a lot of artists in this city.”

“And they’re all sitting in their studios with the extra flow to buy one of those big-ass machines that makes the wrap panels, right?”  

A jolt of new energy made Garrett surge forward. “Hell. That sure thinned out the haystack.”

“I’ll give you one better.” Again, that weird mix of feelings rolled across his friend’s face. Zeke looked ready to do a touchdown dance and then puke about it. “I think I can find our needle.”

* * * * *

This was their needle?

Garrett swung fast glances up and down the narrow passageway alley in which they stood. At least that’s what he was calling it for the time being. Truthfully, “alley” would’ve been an upgrade. String a few lanterns and clothes lines between the roofs, add the scent of roast pig instead of impending summer rain, and one could give it another title: East Asian ambush zone. Some instincts were pounded into a guy’s brain cells forever, and his were currently on high alert.

He felt more normal when he caught Wyatt doing his own surreptitious recon. Z didn’t join them. These alleys had been the man’s childhood playground. Beyond that factor, his friend was clearly familiar with this specific address—though like its neighborhood, the word “address” was given a wide berth for definition here. Z reached for a spot behind the grimy door frame and pressed in. The hidden doorbell let off a series of bell chimes inside the building, making the place sound like a cathedral being readied for worshippers.

“Should I have worn a tie?” Garrett cracked.

Zeke let out a dark laugh. “Only if you want her to whip it off your neck, braid it into a whip then beg you to open her up with it.”

Wyatt coughed. “This should be interesting.”

Two seconds later, a toned woman’s arm shoved open the door. Tattooed angels and demons danced their way up it, reaching for another piece of ink that took up the top of her shoulder, a diamond wrapped in thorny roses. Garrett’s gaze was distracted from the artwork by a face that was surrounded by a sleek mane of ebony hair, broken up by silver and lavender streaks. In spite of all the distractions, the woman’s face was striking. She used minimal makeup, which was a good thing. Her huge purple eyes, prominent bone structure and full mouth didn’t need much enhancement.