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In my hiding spot up in the rafters, I laid my head on my forearm and focused on my breathing for a moment. Terror swept through my body as my mind filtered through every horrible explanation. I shook my head. No, there had to be a reasonable explanation for this. Maybe she took a taxi. I texted her again.
Me:Emma? You there?
Still no response.I quickly cross checked her phone's location, and was further horrified to find that it was at the apartment. She was in a car, and she didn’t have her phone.
I dragged a hand over my mouth and picked up the rifle once more and eyed Armeen through the scope. I couldn’t hear a damn thing they were saying, and they were moving towards the door like they were finishing up, anyway.
Suddenly, I heard several gunshots outside, and I tensed, finger on the trigger of my own gun. I peered through the scope, watching the door. The warehouse door slammed open, and a man stepped halfway through it and fired two shots in rapid succession. Armeen went down, and so did the man he was meeting with. I stayed still, just watching, observing. The man dragged one body out, leaving a trail of smeared blood, and then returned and dragged the second out, firing an additional shot into Armeen as he struggled before going still.
I heard a car engine start, and I swiftly came down from the rafters, as a car with no plates sped away.
Fuck.
I sprinted to my own car, and when I saw where Emma was on the GPS, I thought I might vomit. She was miles away from the apartment and headed into the middle of nowhere. Where she’d be isolated in the desert.
I sped past the city and into the desert as I followed her. I was thirty to forty minutes away. It was too far. It was too long to leave her without help. I gripped the steering wheel and tried to focus on what I would do when I got to wherever she was. I tried to ignore thinking about what might happen to her if I couldn't get to her quickly enough.
She was traveling withme, and if anyone knew that, it was a risk on its own. But she was a young single woman, and that was reason enough for not going unescorted here. I pounded the steering wheel until my palms ached, angry with myself for even bringing her here. Angry at myself for not protecting her better. For not making the risk crystal clear. I hadn’t wanted to scare her, and if she would have just stayed in the room, she would have been fine. But as my palms ached from slamming them into the wheel over and over, I realized that I should have scared her. I should have made the risk clear as daylight. What might happen to her if she was spotted alone? Here.
I roared at no one as I floored it to where the dot had now stopped on the GPS, and I counted the minutes and the miles until I reached her. If anyone had laid a finger on her, I would do terrible, terrible things to them.
* * *
My heart thunderedin my ears as I pressed my back against the wall of the long single story concrete building. I stood in the shadow and gathered myself, settled my mind for what I might find inside.
I had instructed Arash to come after us if he didn’t hear back from me. I had to ensure I could get Emma out, even if I couldn’t get myself out.
I peered around the corner and watched the man guarding the door. He mindlessly paced back and forth, not alert, not ready for what was about to hit him.
I closed my eyes for a moment and breathed out. As I breathed out, I emptied all the emotion out of myself; I shoved the panic about what I might find inside into a tight box that I sealed the lid on.
I flicked my eyes open and moved quickly and softly, coming up behind the guard. Before he could make a sound, I slit his throat and softly lowered him to the ground. Dragging him around the corner to bleed out, I carefully kept an eye on my surroundings and then used my boot to kick dirt onto the trail of blood I’d left, effectively covering it.
I wiped my knife on my pants and pulled out my gun as I slipped inside, willing my eyes to adjust to the darkness more quickly, willing my senses not to betray me. Not here, not now.
I breathed in a slightly foul smell, not quite placing exactly what it was, but knowing it was not a good sign. I blinked as I worked my way down a long, wide hallway, pausing at the first doorway to listen. I knew from the tracker I had placed in Emma’s shoulder that she was about halfway down this end of the building.
I quickly scanned and worked my way past several doorways. In some, I spotted various metal tools and instruments laid out on tables, much like the ones I’d used to extract information many times before. The sight of it made my stomach roll, and I steeled myself, clenching my jaw as I kept moving. I couldn’t think about it, couldn’t think about the possibility of Emma being in this place, where they used those types of things.
I moved past a few more doors with cell bars imprisoning limp people, cowering on cots, facing the wall, away from their doorways. Avoiding eye contact and attention, no doubt. I swiftly scanned each cot as I slipped by, looking for Emma, and that’s when I heard it… and my blood ran cold.
A guttural, desperate scream.
Emma’s scream.
My pulse thundered in my ears.
The screaming was followed by gasps and weak coughs, and then, what I didn’t think could be worse than the screaming… it went silent.
The silence was a dagger through my heart.
Fear like I’d never felt before consumed me, overtook me.
Terror shredded through me as I quickly approached where the source of the sound had been, and as I rounded the corner, gun drawn, eyes like a scope, that’s when I saw it.
Saw what they were doing to her.
In the moment that I realized she was still alive, relief flashed through me, but the moment was almost too brief to count, because it was immediately suffocated by blind rage. Rage so hot and purpose driven that it snuffed out everything else.
