The Mercenary (10 page)

“Make sure none of that white shows.” He pointed, and she pulled the sleeve down over her cast. He’d

borrowed the clothes and shoes from the son of one of his ranch hands. They looked a hell of a lot

different on Tory than they had on the kid. He handed her a stick of black camo paint.

“Use this on the

part that shows…Yeah, right there between your fingers. Sure you can handle this?” She didn’t misinterpret the question. She handed back the paint stick. “I’ll do whatever it takes to get

Alex back,” she said grimly, tucking her hair down the back of the sweatshirt.

“Whateverit takes.”

AFULL MOON LIT THEIR WAY down the rocks to the beach. Because it was high tide they kept

close to the base of the rocky cliffs. The full moon painted ribbons of silver on the dark water and

reflected off the sand. The scene was like a dramatic black-and-white photograph.

The night was quiet except for the crashing of waves against the rocks and the hissing as water washed

up in foamy patterns on the wet sand.

“When we get into Pescarna,” Marc said quietly, “locate your brother and I’ll bring you back to camp.

I’ll do the rest.” He took her hand to help her over the slippery boulders.

Tory grunted. It was harder going than she’d imagined. Marc was like a cat as he jumped from one huge

rock to another. She knew that she was slowing him down. But she was scared of slipping into the wildly

foaming surf churning among the rocks. The clean, fresh scent of the sea was heady in the warm still air

as she stumbled after him.

He’d told her that Pescarna was only four miles up the coast. It felt a lot farther. She almost ran into

Marc’s back because she wasn’t concentrating. “What?” He put his hand over her mouth. “Shh,” he whispered. “We’re here.” His eyes glittered in the moonlight.

“Turn on your…brother radar so we know which way to go.” Tory closed her eyes and forced her mind to clear.

Alex?

She could hear the pounding of the waves behind them and in the distance the faint sound of someone

singing. Every now and then a fine mist of ocean spray reached them, beading on their clothes.

Alex?Alex. Alex. Alex.

“Hey.” She felt Marc’s arm come around her. “Hey!” He pulled her into the circle of his strong arms and

pressed her face to his damp sweater. He smelled like the sea. “Relax, you’re hyperventilating.”

“Oh, God, Marc. I can’t sense his presence at all.” The pressure of his hand rubbing up and down her back was strangely comforting. “Just relax, honey,

and open your mind. If Lynx is around he’ll know we’re here. I thought you said you could tune him in at

will? Just close your eyes and concentrate.”

Try as she might, Tory didn’t get any response to her desperate mental pleas. She shuddered, her arms

tightening around Marc’s waist. “There’s nothing,” she said in a small voice. “Nothing.” She looked up

into his face. “Maybe I need to be closer. If Alex is badly hurt he might not be able to communicate from

this distance.”

“Damn. How close?”

Very.“I won’t know until I find him.”

Marc brushed the bangs out of her eyes. “Just don’t do anything st—rash.” Tory smiled. “I’m a coward, remember?”

“Yeah. I remember.” Marc took her hand and drew her over the next series of rocks.

“Closer it is. Do

everything I tell you, and stick to me like glue for the duration. Got it?” She wouldn’t want it any other way. “Got it.”

Sand gave way to scrub grass and the lights of Pescarna twinkled against the night sky.

Then she felt the

reassuring solidity of cobblestones under her feet. She followed Marc into the shadow of an overhanging

wrought-iron balcony. The spicy smell of geraniums permeated the air. The street was narrow and the

cobblestones bit into the soles of her shoes as Tory clutched Marc’s hand and continued on behind him,

straining to hear him as he murmured, “We’re going to just keep moving until you get something.”

Soon whitewashed Moorish-style houses rose like cliffs on either side of them. There were no people in

the streets this late at night, but they could hear loud voices coming through the open windows. A canary

chirped, and dishes rattled.

Blood-red geraniums spilled over balconies, and the aroma of garlic and tomato filled the warm night.

The sweatshirt was too hot, but it covered the white of her cast. She concentrated all her thoughts on

Alex.

An hour passed and then another. They slipped up one narrow alleyway and down the next, pausing

often for Tory to concentrate. Nothing. She wanted to cry, but one look at Marc’s stony expression

froze the tears.

The fishing village was small, but by the time they had traversed every street and alley twice, Tory was

beyond tears. They emerged on the far side of the village and stood hidden in the shadow of a small

grove of olive trees.

Clouds whispered across the moon. Everything was still. A dog barked, then it, too, fell silent. Tory

rested her head against the gnarled trunk of a tree. “I’m sorry.” Marc longed to comfort her, but he, too, was frustrated. “We’ll go back to camp and I’ll have Angelo

come and get you.” He put a heavy arm around her slumped shoulders. “Come on. I think you’ve had

enough for one night.”

They circled the village, keeping to the shadows on the beach. The smell of fish was overpowering as

they passed the dark silhouettes of the fishing boats.

Suddenly Tory grabbed his arm and pulled him into a doorway. The windows were dark in the narrow

three-story house, Everything was quiet.

“Alex was here!” she whispered, heart pounding. “But…Oh, God, Marc. They’ve taken him

somewhere else.”

She shivered, her hand clutching his tightly. “They took him away within the last six or eight hours. No

more.”

“How do you know how long—Never mind. Time for you to go home, princess.” The words were

merely a breath in the still, fragrant night air.

“No,”Tory whispered, just as quietly. “Not until we find him.” A window down the street slid open and a man stuck out his head.“Zitto! Se ne vada!” Heart in her throat, she froze. “Was that…?”One of the bad guys?

Marc shook his head. “Local. He wants us to get the hell out of Dodge. Let’s go.” They kept deep in shadow until they reached the end of the street. Tory stopped and tugged on his

hand. “There’s a back way, down this alley. Come on.” She saw Marc’s eyes light up suspiciously. “How do you know there’s a back way?” She stepped over a pile of refuse from the trattoria, still dragging him along. “You don’t want to know.”

They stopped under a small cement balcony. Marc grabbed her shoulder and spun her around. “I sure

as helldo want to know. Look at me.” He held her chin. “There’s something stinking in Denmark and I

want to know what it is.”

“It’s that pile of—Ow!”

“Start talking, and make it quick.” A muscle twitched in his cheek as he pinned her in place.

“I—I had the dubious pleasure of being a guest here for a—for a while.” Christ. He’d been away from the business for too goddamned long when the fact that a woman showing

up on his doorstep, bruised, battered and broken, having been in Marezzo, didn’t warrant immediate

explanation. Marc hadn’t realized just how fucking apathetic he’d become. “When?” he demanded,

knowing he was a day late and a dollar short on the questioning.

“Just before I went to Brandon to find you.

“And you’re only mentioning thisnow? ” He spoke in his normal tone—furious. He practically dragged

her down the alley and didn’t stop until they were back in the small olive grove.

“Start at the beginning and keep going.”

“I told you I came to look for Alex.”

Her troubled eyes met his and Marc forced himself to remain calm. He kept enough distance between

them so that he wasn’t tempted to strangle her. Although to be fair, if he’d asked her the right questions

the other day, he wouldn’t be having to ask them now. Three years of shoveling horse shit had made him

forget the important shitpeople hid. It was his job,his job, damn it, to know things before they reared up

and bit him in the ass.

“I spent a week playing tourist inPavina . Alex wasn’t there. I rented a Vespa and came to this side of

the island. I knew he was close, so I checked into apensione. ” She shivered, although the sweatshirt was

clinging uncomfortably to her sweaty back. “I guess I…I guess I asked one too many questions.”

“Shit, Victoria!”

“Stop cursing me.”

“Get on with the story.”

“Two men came and told me that they had some questions. They weren’t very polite about it, and they

scared me to death. I tried to blow them off by telling them I was on vacation but they got…nasty.”

Marc growled low in his throat like a rabid dog. Damn fool woman. “What did they do to you?”

“They took me to that pink house and asked me what I was doing here poking around. I kept lying to

them. They didn’t take it well. I wished I spoke fluent Italian, but I just caught a few words here and

there. They were yelling and screaming and waving their hands.”

“Cut to the chase.”

“Yes, well, that went on for a while, and then they locked me in a room upstairs and they told me to

think about it. Which I did.” Victoria’s eyes went unfocused. “They came back and I stuck to my story

and the big one in the expensive suit hit me…and the other one got mad and hit him.

And they were

yelling and screaming again. And then a man came and they…they tied me…. And then I started

screaming….” She picked an olive off the ground, grimacing when she bit into it. She spat it neatly in her

hand, then buried the soggy pieces in a hole she made in the dirt.

His jaw ached from clenching his teeth. “How long did they hold you?”

“Thirteen days, seven hours and eighteen minutes.”

“How did you get out?”

“I convinced them I was telling the truth. Besides, they knew that I had to see a doctor about my arm.

That’s what they said. It didn’t ring true but I didn’t care, I was just grateful to be out of there. They took

me to the airport and sent me to Naples.”

It didn’t make sense. Why would they keep her for almost two weeks and then let her go? “Stay here.

I’m going back to check it out. Don’t move, Victoria. You understand me? Don’t budge an inch. If you

see anyone coming, move slowly back into the cover of the trees. If I’m not back in an hour, go to

camp.”

Tory watched him until he blended into the shadows at the edge of the village and faded from sight.

Please God, let him come back within the hour. She had no intention of finding her way across the rocks

alone. She swallowed as she remembered those days and nights in that house.

The last thing she’d imagined was that he would haul her all over God’s creation and bring her back

here. But it was worth it—anything was worth it if she could find Alex.

They had done a little more than “hit” her. By the time she arrived in Naples, she was so weak from lack

of food and the beatings that she’d collapsed at the airport. She’d been taken to the hospital. There

she’d been treated with what she thought was a pretty cavalier attitude. The authorities believed that her

husband had beaten her, and Tory was too scared to tell them the truth. She didn’t want to risk making

matters worse for Alex.

She rested her head against the olive tree and kept her eyes firmly fixed on the spot where Marc had

disappeared. She didn’t want to remember her ordeal. The pain had been excruciating.

The terror had

been worse. It had surpassed her worst nightmare, because never in her wildest imagination had she

conceived of a human being doing what they had done to her.

What had made it a million times worse was that she’d felt Alex close by. Alex had known exactly what

they were doing to her and had been powerless to stop them. Tears welled in her eyes and she gritted

her teeth.

She would do anything to get her brother away from them. Tory pressed the heel of her hand against her

eyes, willing the useless tears away.

“Alex, whereare you?”

CHAPTER SIX

“DID YOU FIND ANYTHING?”she asked eagerly, standing and dusting the dirt off her backside

when Marc returned almost an hour later.

“They have him inPavina .”

“Good.” She took an eager step forward. “Let’s go.” He shook his head. “It’s going to be light in a couple of hours. I’ll wait to go in.” There’d been three men

in the house. Marc had eavesdropped long enough to get a general location on Lynx.

And the fact that

he, or rathersomeone from T-FLAC, was expected and eagerly anticipated. Since he had no garbage

detail for backup, he’d left them alive. Dead bodies had a tendency to set off alarms.

After a moment’s hesitation, she nodded and they silently skirted town before heading to the beach. It

was worse going back. Thick clouds had covered the moon, making it impossible for her to see one foot

in front of the other. Marc, on the other hand, seemed to have perfect vision as he pushed her up one

side of an enormous boulder, then practically dragged her down the next. By the time they got to the

grotto, her legs were shaky and her breathing erratic. She wasn’t used to such strenuous exercise. Marc

hadn’t slowed down just because she was out of shape.

Pulling the Walther from his belt, he checked it before he laid it next to the pallet.

“We’ll go intoPavina

tomorrow.” He pulled his black T-shirt over his head.

Tory couldn’t tear her eyes away from sleek muscles and taut, tanned skin. An arrow of crisp, curling