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I tucked my bent knees closer to my chest as he cocked his head, a smile probably concealed beneath the mask.
“Time to go.” He reached into his pocket, and before I knew what was happening, he jabbed a needle into the side of my neck.
“Wait, where are you taking her?” Bahar yelled as my body immediately went limp. Bound hands or not, she tried to reach for me anyway. “Don’t take her,” she pleaded as he lifted me into his arms, carrying me like a small child.
My arms hung dead at my sides. Eyes rolling back in response to what he’d stuck into my body.
Once in the hall, I sealed my lids tight against the bright overhead lights, unable to handle the sharp contrast.
“Where . . . are you . . .” I slurred, my head lolling to the side.
“One more stop, then off to your next destination.”
22
CARTER
JUST OUTSIDE HAMBURG, GERMANY
“Are we sure about this?” Easton asked from the backseat of the rental SUV. We were parked outside Alyona’s mansion.
Sometimes I couldn’t believe I’d willingly walked into her arms, but she’d been the one to bow to me, not the other way around.
I turned off the engine, catching Easton’s eyes in my rearview mirror. “The plan will work.”
“PACE,” Griffin said, a reminder to Easton who’d been out of both the military and mercenary game for a while now. “We’ll be solid. Don’t worry.”
“Right.” Easton sighed dramatically. “The military and their fucking acronyms. You didn’t use them back when we, well, you know.”
Killed people for a living without government consent? Yeah, I remember. It’s why POTUS has me here now.
But there was a reason for PACE planning, and it’d worked with Delta and would now. A primary, alternate, contingency, and emergency plan to mitigate risk of operational failure. And I would not lose Diana no matter fucking what.
“Just the three of us are really going to walk into this woman’s house?” Easton wrapped a hand over my seat, and I unbuckled to swivel around to better face him. To put his concerns to bed before we entered Alyona’s home.
“Your nerves are unexpected,” Griffin said before I could.
“Too many of us will scare her off,” I pointed out. “But me coming alone would alarm her.”
From the list of twelve names I’d provided Secretary Chandler, he’d managed to pull together four others aside from Easton (and Griffin). Those four, along with Dallas, were parked ten klicks away from our current location waiting for next steps.
Shockingly, Secretary Chandler hadn’t been that surprised when Griffin rolled up at the airport terminal to join me.
“Something told me you worked with him back during his fuck-around-and-find-out days,” the Secretary had said to Griffin, and I was pretty sure that comment was Gray’s dad trying to get back in my good graces.
“It’s been almost seventy-seven hours since Diana was taken,” I tossed out, probably more so for myself; a reminder the chances of locating her became slimmer with every passing hour.
Alyona’s guards patiently waited outside our SUV, giving us time. Respect. That had to be her doing.
“Yeah, okay,” Easton finally relented.
Once we stepped outside, a guard broke forward from the pack of others. “We need to check for weapons.” He stepped closer by one of the lampposts so I could get a better look at him.
Franz. Pretty sure that was his name. He’d seen me coming and going from Alyona’s bedroom back in the day, and she more than likely chose him to make me feel more at ease. (Or to fuck with me, which was probably more likely.)
“I have a Glock holstered at my side.” I shifted my black jacket out of the way to reveal my piece. “Told that to your guys at the gate. We all do.”
Her security guards out front had externally swept the vehicle for explosives and trackers before letting us roll through. Standard procedure, and I would’ve expected nothing less. Hell, I would’ve been worried we were driving into an ambush had they not done a sweep.
