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“Here’s what you’re going to do, Mr. Blake. And you’re going to do it alone. If we see anyone else leave the garage, then the girls die. If you don’t follow directions exactly, they die. If you’re late, they die.”
Melodrama. Fuck, he hated the wait.
“Yeah, I breathe the wrong way and they die. I got it.”
He was aware of Jordan wincing, the looks the other men gave him.
Another chuckle. “Do you know the national park?”
Like the back of his hand. “Not very well. I haven’t had time to do much sightseeing.”
There was silence. Noah waited it out. He let it flow over him, refused to consider the risks. He was a nobody here. They didn’t suspect anything. He was a mechanic, nothing more.
“Do you know where they found the little female FBI agent? I know you been in town long enough for that.”
The canyon was about an hour away.
“I know.”
“You’ll be met. You have an hour after this call disconnects to get there. Would you like to tell your little girlfriend bye?”
“If you want your hunt, I’ll see her alive before it begins. She’s of no use to me dead.”
Laughter again, grating, knowing.
“Sure. You can say your goodbyes in person. You’ll be met. You have one hour.”
Noah disconnected. He dragged his jacket from the back of a chair. He was already outfitted in the chaps. The butter-soft leather conformed and moved easily with him. Hiking boots. Skin tag locator on both shoulders. Belt buckle equipped with a locator as well. All deactivated until needed.
“You’ll have to slip out with the others,” he told Rick as he moved for the door.
“Like hell. If she’s in on this, then I’ll take care of it.” The sheriff’s eyes burned with anger as he caught Noah’s arm.
“Grip my arm again and your throat comes out.” He peeled the sheriff’s hand from his arm. “You’ll come in with the others. And she’s the only way they could have taken Sabella so easily. You know it, as well as I do.”
Rick’s jaw clenched, a muscle ticking furiously at the side.
“We need someone to prosecute, Noah,” Jordan reminded him. “Remember that when the hunt starts. We’ll be in place and ready to move. T will track you from the rendezvous.”
Noah nodded and left the apartment, slamming the door behind him.
He could feel the eyes on him. By time he made the rendezvous, it would be nearing dark. The others could slip into place then. Getting them out of the garage wouldn’t be a problem.
Noah had been a SEAL. He believed in escape routes to hell and back. And Jordan knew them all.
He straddled the Harley and set the motor to throbbing before kicking into gear and tearing out of the parking lot.
The wind whipped through his hair, and he heard Sabella’s light laughter, her passion moans. The sound of tears in her voice when she called.
She was frightened. He could hear the fear. But he heard something else too. He had heard trust. There hadn’t been hysteria. She hadn’t begged him to save her. She had known he would come for her. He had heard that in her voice. Her knowledge, her trust.
She was a woman any man could be proud to call his own. But Sabella was still tender, still vulnerable. She was a woman who loved with everything inside her. And that was how she loved the man he had been.
With everything inside her.
He kicked the gas to the Harley and let it tear down the road. He knew exactly where he was going. He’d tracked the area after the unit moved in and canvassed every inch of it. The female FBI agent’s body had been found at the base of one of the small rises, her body dug up by scavengers. The area had been widely publicized.
For a second, just a second, an image of Sabella flashed in his mind, eyes wide in death, her face white, lips bloodless. He twisted the gas and let the Harley tear down the road. Rage bit at him, hard, fast, before he countered it, before the icy hunger for blood overrode it once again.
