Chapter 15
15
JACKSON
J ackson Savage was pissed off. He wanted to throttle his fool brother. He wanted to kick Nathan’s ass up and down Russia until he figured out he couldn’t just up and leave and take a fucking vacation.
Okay—well, said like that, it sounded unreasonable, but, fuck, Jack had told him not to go unarmed. But had he listened? No. No, he hadn’t and now here they were in bum-fuck middle of nowhere Russia retrieving his ass. Jackson was well aware that his stupid brother was going through some shit, but getting himself caught and tortured was not the way to go about solving those problems.
Not that Nathan had done it on purpose. Or shit-sticks. Maybe he had.
Well, fuck, that thought was an unsettling one.
Jackson could do nothing but internally growl as that idea settled its claws into his brain and froze his blood.
If Nathan had gone to Russia with the sole purpose of getting himself... punished, was the only word his brain was supplying, then they were in more trouble than he’d thought. Jackson had thought his brother’s mental health was... well, fuck, he’d thought Nathan was just fuckin’ fine. Definitely not to the point of seeking out punishment like some damn monk.
But then again, maybe he was just thinking too much about it. Surely, he or one of the fifty thousand people in the Savage clan would have noticed the signs of depression or PTSD. Fuck, they all suffered some form of that shit and no one was exactly shy about what they needed or what they thought someone else needed in their family. In fact, everyone had an opinion about every-fucking-thing under the sun and they would gladly shove their opinions down the throats of anyone within earshot. Nate’s possible depression would not have escaped the notice of his parents, his six brothers, and that of the fifteen other people employed by SI. There was just no fucking way Nathan was that far gone.
Or maybe he was just really good at hiding it.
Jackson remembered the scrawny, angry kid that Nathan had once been. Back before Ellen and Bobby had gotten a hold of him. He’d been all elbows and knees and rage. Kid Nathan had not been good at hiding his emotions or controlling them. Adult Nathan was much better at the emotional shit but just as crap at hiding what he was feeling. Jackson racked his brain for any instance where that didn’t hold true.
Nathan was by far one of the most emotionally stable Savages. The man laughed easily, channeled his rage into healthy outlets, and voluntarily talked about the shit that bothered him. And then turned around and forced his brothers to do the same. Nathan cried every single time he watched Steel Magnolias , and didn’t try to pretend like there was something in his eye when Holden made fun of him.
Which had to count for something when considering mental stability, right? So, his adopted brother was mentally sound.
Right?
Fuck, he didn’t know. He was so swamped with work from all fronts. It was a fucking miracle if he could discern his ass from his hat at any given point. Maybe everyone else was just as self-involved and just didn’t realize Nate was slipping.
“You okay there, Jackie-pooh?” Maddox’s question shook him out of his reverie and back to the present.
“What?” Jackson hadn’t meant to sound that snappy and pissed.
Or maybe Nathan just did what Nathan did best and found trouble. It was a well-known fact that Nathan was one big walking disaster attractor. If a stray bullet went off in a hundred-mile radius of the man, it would invariably defy all laws of gravity, reverse its trajectory, and hit him. If there was a dog within that same radius, it would go rabid, find him, and bite him.
Goddamned Nate and his goddamned inability to stay out of trouble.
“You’re all but foaming at the mouth.” Maddox kept his face forward and focused on the sky. “You’ve been growlin’ like a damn dog for last the thirty minutes.”
“I have not—it’s been five minutes tops. Where is he?” Every word he spoke came out as a growl, but that was normal now. He barely even flinched at the sound of it anymore.
“It’s not that big of a plane, Jackie-pooh.” Maddox didn’t bother to glance over at him, just kept piloting the plane like it was his job or something. “Just follow the sounds of Holden ripping him a new one for daring to take a vacation.”
The accompanying eye roll had Jackson feeling all kinds of indignant and defensive. Maddox well knew how much he, Jackson, had not wanted Nathan to leave the safety of the compound. And he also knew just how much Jackson had been against Nathan’s little jaunt to Russia in the first place.
And he’d been right, dammit!
He’d been so incredibly right about everything that they’d had to infiltrate Russia, without attracting the notice of the Russian government or with the blessing of the United States government, and invade a whole goddamn compound. All because he’d been so right and Nathan had refused to listen to him.
Maddox said something in Cajun and Jackson couldn’t help but roll his eyes. How hard could he smack the pilot without endangering everyone on the plane? Daisy was a better pilot anyway. They could survive with just one.
“Don’t be getting all spitty and angry and whipping out the Cajun like I don’t know that you’re threatening me. I can get pissy in my native tongue too—” He jerked his head around and narrowed his eyes before pitching his voice low and all intimidating-like. “?Querrías bailar conmigo?”
“Pfft.” It was only then that Daisy, Maddox’s co-pilot, decided to speak up. “You can try.”
“What?” Maddox glanced sideways at her, grinning like an idiot. “You got something to contribute, D? Did I not threaten him correctly?”
“You asked him to dance—that’s a weak ass threat if I ever heard one.” The petite woman giggled and Jackson suffered a small sense of disorientation at the sound. “Unless it wasn’t a threat? Maybe I should leave you two alone and see what I can do for three minutes while you... dance .” Maddox threw his head back and laughed outright. Jackson only growled some more.
Daisy looked like sunshine and flowers and everything that was nice in the world. It was such a contradiction to her skill level and the sheer lethality of the woman that Jackson always had to remind himself that she was a warrior. Her guileless smiles and sunny demeanor did not equal soft innocence and complacency.
“Three minutes? Oh, you wound me, woman! Four minutes at least. You know how long it takes me just to unlace my boots?”
“Two minutes.” She nodded solemnly, and Maddox laughed out loud again.
“Okay, well, you can play out whatever twisted fantasies you harbor for me—I know there’s a lot, but I said it all menacing-like. I went old west on his ass.”
It was at that point Jackson decided to take his leave. They were doing the witty, sexual innuendo, bantering thing again. Which were three things Jackson didn’t do. Well, maybe couldn’t was the better word.
“Jackson.” Maddox finally turned around to face him. “Wait.”
“What?”
“Just admit that the only reason you’re on the warpath is because you’re emotionally damaged and don’t know how to tell him you love him and that you’re happy he’s safe.” He said it like it was the truest thing in the world and it would be madness if anyone disagreed with him. Dick.
Unfortunately, all Jackson could think to do in rebuff was to mimic the asshole in the highest falsetto his damaged vocal cords could manage.
“Nice comeback, Jack.” Maddox’s deep, stupid laugh followed him out of the cockpit and into the lounge area.
“Shut up.”
Jackson didn’t think he was being unreasonable.
Nathan attracted trouble. Was it too much to expect that knowing it, Nathan would live accordingly? Like maybe, and this was just a thought, he wouldn’t vacation alone and unarmed to a country where he was well known as an American G-man?
Granted, there weren’t a lot of places left available to him to visit, but fuck, what was wrong with staying home? Or at least staying within the continental borders? No brutal torture there and it was a hell of a lot less likely that he was going to get shot in good ol’ Redhawk Ridge, Texas. Standard shit, right?
Kade was sprawled in the cushioned seat with his head thrown over the headrest, an ice pack plopped on his face. He was favoring his right side, and to all accounts, he looked asleep. Kade was charged with watching the woman, and Kade was a man that took every one of his duties seriously. So Jackson knew the man wasn’t asleep. Kade, no matter how tired or beat, would never fall asleep on the job.
“You gonna live?” Jackson examined his brother with a critical eye. Kade looked bruised and battered, but alive.
“No,” was the grunted reply.
“Reid give you something for the pain?” At the sound of his brother’s disgruntled voice, Jackson couldn’t help but grin. It was almost funny. Kade hadn’t gotten his ass so thoroughly handed to him in a long time.
“Nah, he’s seeing about Nate.” His normally deep voice was now all nasally and hilarious.
“Where are they?”
“In the back. If you listen real hard, you can hear the dulcet tones of Holden yelling at him. Although Nate’s so high right now, he’s probably seein’ pink elephants. Why, you want your turn at him?”
Sure enough, Jackson could detect the sounds of deep growls and consonants in the air. He couldn’t decipher any actual words. Knowing Holden, there was lots of cussing, colorful phrasing, and ranting going on.
“I’m not being unreasonable.” So what if his voice was all defensive and squeaky? He was not being unreasonable. Kade only let out a tired sigh, but otherwise remained silent. “What? You think it’s ridiculous to expect Nathan to go to a foreign and hostile country armed?”
“No, I think it’s unreasonable that ya’ll need to jump up his ass for doing normal Nate things. The mission was a success. No one’s dead or wounded—well, not fatally. And Nate’s alive.”
“I’m not jumpin’ up his ass. Nate knows that he is a trouble magnet—it’s not unreasonable to assume that the idiot would live his life accordingly.” What was unreasonable was how many times he’d said the word unreasonable in the past three hours.
“Pfft.” Kade snorted and then moaned in pain, obviously forgetting about his broken face and how vibrations in his nose could hurt like a bitch. “Every fucking one of us is a disaster magnet—it comes with the last name. It’s only more obvious with Nate because he can’t help but get shot every six months. Now stop acting like he’s some newbie and start treatin’ him like an adult who’s capable of making decisions and accepting the consequences of those decisions.”
“I treat him like an adult.” Okay, so maybe that was only half true. When Nate was shot full of holes and looking like he was gonna keel over any second, it was easy to forget that he was thirty-something and capable of being an adult. “And shut up—since when do you spout pearls of wisdom?”
“Only when asses and heads are indistinguishable, grasshopper. You really oughta jot those pearls down.” He grinned and rearranged the ice pack on his face.
“You oughta jot your ass down.” Jackson knew, and was reminded frequently, that he was shit at comebacks. It was something he’d embraced long ago.
“God, Jack.” His tone was pitying and ashamed all at once. “It’s embarrassing that people know we’re related.”
“ You’re embarrassing.” In his experience, ‘witty’ was just another word for being a dick. He could be a dick without all the frilly words just fine.
“Stop. Just stop.” Kade was groaning again.
“She woke up yet?”
The woman in question was on the couch, curled into a tight ball, protecting herself even in sleep. She was a big ol’ ball of blood and bruises. Baggy clothes hung off a too-thin frame. Long, dark locks were matted with blood and mud. Her face was all but indistinguishable with its multitude of colors, puffiness, and open wounds. Her nose was broken. Her left arm was positioned at such an awkward angle that made Jackson think it was broken as well. Long stripes of red colored the back of her gray-green shirt and it didn’t take Jackson much effort to discern what that might be.
“Nope.”
“Ya know,” Google and his brothers could collectively kiss his ass, Jackson could manage being a dick all by himself, “she doesn’t look like much.” Which was an outright lie. Sure, she looked broken and bloodied, but that just added to the whole assassin vibe. Unlike Daisy, this woman looked capable of extreme violence.
The slight, happily, didn’t go unnoticed. Kade’s head jerked up, the ice pack slid off his face and into his lap.
“You sure this is the same woman?” Jackson watched in satisfaction as Kade’s lip curled and his eyes narrowed into slits.
“Yes, I am fucking sure, asshole.” He all but seethed each word.
“All I’m sayin’ is,” Jackson very deliberately scanned the woman and then arched an eyebrow in Kade’s direction, “that she don’t look like much.”
It had the desired effect. Ten shades of offended and defensive, the man came out of his seat and jabbed a finger at him.
“Really? Do you think I did all this,” he gestured to all of himself, “to myself? You think I fell down some stairs?”
“Well... I mean, is she even tall enough to land a punch? And how much damage could it really do?” For the life of him, Jackson couldn’t keep the smirk off his face. Kade, of course, noticed and realized he was being played.
“You’re such a jackass,” Kade grunted and returned to his seat.
“Has she woken up yet?” Reid, lugging his pack and looking mildly annoyed, stepped into the cabin and made a beeline for the woman. Holden was on his heels and scowling.
“Where’s Nate?”
“Reid knocked him out with lots of drugs,” Holden grunted and flopped into the chair beside Kade.
Jackson didn’t want to sit and wait for Nathan to regain consciousness. He wanted to get to the ass-chewing pronto. But from the sounds of it, Holden had already done such a good job. Jackson decided he’d bide his time and strike when conditions were optimal. Maybe he could get his hands on a megaphone.
“What is her name?” Reid didn’t glance up from his examination of the woman, but then Reid rarely made eye contact.
“Caden, I think,” Kade volunteered, gently placing the ice pack over his face again. “That’s what Nate called her.”
“Caden?” Reid’s tone was clear and firm. A tone he saved only for the battlefield and patients. “You’re safe here. Can you hear me, Caden? You’re on a jet headed for the States. You’re safe here, Caden. Can you hear me?”
Everyone went silent when Reid paused to let her answer. She remained curled in a ball on the couch, breathing shallowly but evenly. Her eyes still flickered under her lids and her face was tense but relaxed in the way only sleep could do.
“My name is Reid Savage. We’re not in Russia anymore. You are safe. I’m going to help you out the best I can and to do that, I’m going to have to touch you, okay? Nathan told me about most of your injuries; unfortunately, I can’t do much about any of them until we get home and back on solid ground.”
“Reid, she’s out, she can’t hear you.” Holden sat forward and watched as Reid settled on the floor in front of her and started pulling things from his pack.
“What I can do is clean up your back and all the cuts on your arms and legs. Alright, Caden?” Reid ignored him and kept on talking to the comatose woman. “I’m just going to be looking for infections and doing what I can for the smaller cuts. I’m going to have to remove the back of your shirt. Holden, he’s Nathan’s brother too, he’s going help me out, okay, Caden?”
“I love how comfortable you are volunteering me for things, Reid,” Holden grunted and stood, stretching, and waited for direction.
“Heat me up some water. We have to get this shirt off her. It looks like the wounds reopened and then dried to the shirt. We’re going to have to soak the shirt to get it off her without ripping chunks of her skin off.” He blinked and glanced back at the woman, as if just realizing she was within earshot. “It only sounds scary but we can do it without hurting you, okay, Caden?”
Holden was already heading towards the bathroom. Kade removed the pack from his face and went to help Reid remove the pieces of clothing that weren’t stuck to her skin. Reid just kept narrating, like the woman could hear him.
The SAT phone had rung every hour on the hour since they’d landed in Moscow. It was all Jackson could do not to chuck the damn thing on the ground and stomp the shit out of it.
“Fuckin’ fuck.” Jackson loathed cell phones and the convenient way they made him available at any time and anywhere. What sadistic asshole invented with phones?
SAT phones in particular pissed him off. They just ensured his availability no matter what hellhole he was camped in or far away from people he was.
People.
Fucking people.
The very word made him shudder in terror. Okay, that was a wee bit exaggerative, even for him, but close enough.
If only he had someone to field the calls, or fuck, take all the calls and do all the stupid paperwork and deal with all the people. Now that was an idea Jackson could get on board with. Dax would agree; he was worse at the people thing than Jackson was.
The phone rang again, eliciting another colorful metaphor.
Maybe he could put an ad out in the paper when he got back to town. Were there people who liked that kind of shit? Answering phones, talking to people, and doing paperwork? His common sense told him no, but people were weird, so who knew?
Jackson decided as the phone rang in his hand that he would find that weird-ass individual and pay them anything they asked.
This call, however, was a call he could not avoid. He’d seriously pissed off certain high-ranking officials with this mission.
Though Savage Security didn’t contract out exclusively to anyone, there were some problems that might come back to bite him in the face if he didn’t handle this correctly. He had a few connections in the government, connections he wanted to keep. There would be no financial difficulties if some contracts were terminated and certain contacts lost, but Jackson liked to keep the contacts and contracts Savage Security did have.
So regardless of his hatred for cell phones and talking to people in general, he could not let the phone ring. Ignoring it would not make his problems disappear. He was gonna have to man up and press the stupid green button.
With one last growled curse, Jackson quit his mental bitching and answered the goddamned phone.