Somewhere above, boots scraped the floor. Muffled, unintelligible voices drifted through the vents in the ceiling.
She closed her eyes and curled into the fetal position. “God, please let Liam find me.”
Shadow Pines, Tennessee – New Safe House
Saturday – 0100 Hours
Call Sign: Charlie One
Three long hoursand still no clue to Raven’s whereabouts. Liam sat on the couch with an ice pack pressed into his eyes. The flashbangs hadn’t helped his concussion recovery. In fact, those two devices had sent his head spinning for over an hour. But the guys had his back. He might not be able to focus on the computer, but he refused to let a little thing like a dagger through his skull stop him from finding the woman he’d fallen in love with. He froze. Love? Yup. He couldn’t deny it. He was head over heels, one hundred percent in love with Raven.
The cushion next to him dipped, and Dax’s hand clasped his knee. “Wewillfind her. You have my word.”
He lowered the pack and shifted his gaze to his brother in arms. “Thanks.” No more needed to be said. The rest of the acknowledgment sat silently between them. “Have wediscovered anything besides how they snuck up on us by blocking the existing security system?”
“That took talent.” Boone handed everyone a bottle of water, then straddled a chair backwards. “From the way Rafe explained it, not many could have pulled off Raven’s abduction.”
“And this wasn’t the same crew from Mexico. These guys were strategic and plain good,” Xander added from his spot at the dining room table near Rafe.
“The whole thing with Echo team doesn’t sit right.” Liam pinched the bridge of his nose. “Run it down for me.”
Boone rested his arms on the back of the chair and leaned forward. “The bad guys captured Echo Team due to the black market sale of the GPS codes on the experimental technology in the vests.”
“Raven found them, and we rescued them without Washington’s knowledge because Raven’s concern was squashed when someone buried her report.” Dax picked up where Boone left off. “Then she went on vacation to Mexico, and someone abducted her.”
“But they didn’t kill her immediately. They brought us in.” Xander ran a hand over his mouth and chin. “What if things went sideways for them and they needed us to find her?”
“As in they lost her?” Dax asked.
Xander wavered his hand back and forth. “Kinda. More like the losers they hired decided to see if they could get more money. Benefit from figuring out why someone wanted her so badly.”
“It’s possible, considering Agent Scott told us to stand down not long before we found her in that hut.”
“That makes me seriously question if he’s in on it.”
Had they chased the wrong theories? Liam pieced together the information they had. What if…? “We made an assumptionthat Echo Team’s capture was a test. What if it was, but not the way we thought?”
Rafe’s head jerked up. “Explain.”
“Who has been the constant person throughout everything?”
“Well, us and Raven.”
“True, but we were brought in after the fact. Raven found the code problem and Echo Team.Shetried to get the director’s attention, but someone inside suppressed the report.Shewas abducted and chased.”
“We knew the person was after her, but you’re thinking a more deliberate target.” Boone rubbed the back of his neck. “But why?”
“That, I don’t know.”
Rafe’s eyes narrowed.
Liam could see the proverbial wheels turning in his second-in-command.
“Dude, you think any harder and smoke will come out of your ears.”
Rafe ignored Xander’s tease and drummed his fingers on the table. “What if they were assessing her? Not to see if she would catch their attempts to sell codes, but for her brain. Testing to see how smart she actually is.”
“We all know she’s smart,” Dax said.
