17. Chapter 17
Chapter seventeen
Day 7 Coronado, California
By the time Demi reached the door, her heart was racing, and her skin felt like ice. The pep talk had sped up, rather than reduced her fear. She sucked down several deep breaths, but the effort to calm herself had no effect on her racing heart or clammy skin.
Another thunderous knock sounded, followed by a loud voice. “Ms. Barnes. We need to speak to you. This is better done face-to-face.”
Now, that sounded ominous.
She stirred, forcing herself to take another deep breath. Ignoring them wouldn’t work if they planned to pick her lock and let themselves into her home.
“Just a second,” she yelled at the door.
How was she supposed to distract them until Aiden’s friends arrived? Her frantic mind locked on the primary source of her frustration over the past few days. The furry demon. The seed of an idea unfurled. The little monster would make an excellent distraction. She’d just have to make sure he didn’t get hurt. Although the people caring for the feline demon were the ones who ended up bleeding, not that stinker of a cat.
Which felt like karmic justice. Let the animal slice and dice the men at her door. It would serve them right. Squaring her shoulders, she rubbed her sweaty hands against her jean-clad thighs and reached for the door handle.
You’ve got this, Demi. No problem. Just pretend you were distracted by the cat.
After one final deep breath, she unlocked the door. As she jerked it open, she assumed an annoyed expression. “Did you have to make so much noise? You scared Trident—” she tossed the name out. Huh. Looks like the cat has a name now. “—off before he swallowed his medication.”
The tall, gaunt man standing directly in front of her door stared at the blood trickling down her scratched-up arms. A startled look flickered across his long, lined face. After a moment, he shook himself. Basset hound eyes rose to meet her gaze and his face folded into a mournful expression.
“Ms. Barnes?” He didn’t wait for her confirmation, just plowed right into fake introductions. “I’m Lieutenant DeLeon with Coronado Naval Base, specifically SEAL Team 7, and this is Father Darien Grant, the base chaplain.” He tilted his head to his left, indicating the dark-haired, muscle packed guy with dead eyes standing to his left.
That second introduction convinced Demi Aiden hadn’t been exaggerating about the danger. Those empty eyes didn’t belong to a priest. They belonged to a serial killer.
“May we speak with you?” The stick of a man asked, putting enough sympathy in his voice to make her teeth ache. “It’s about Aiden Winchester.”
She drew in an exaggerated, sharp breath and strove for a worried expression. “Is he alright?”
This seemed like the appropriate question for someone who was in a relationship with a SEAL and had a base officer and chaplain unexpectedly show up at her door.
“I’m afraid not,” stick man said, his voice excreting copious amounts of saccharine sympathy.
“Oh, no! Oh, no!” she added the second exclamation for effect. “What happened? I just talked to him and—”
“When was that?” muscle man interrupted; his voice flat.
“I don’t know. A week ago, I guess.” Since signs of agitation were in order, she wrung her hands and rambled on, trying to sound as scattered as possible. “He Zoomed with me from some tent in God knows where. He never said where he was. He never tells me anything.” A hint of genuine anger touched her voice. She forced it back. Someone in fear for their boyfriend’s life wouldn’t be expressing resentment. “Is he okay?” She instantly shook her head and pressed her hands to her cheeks. “He’s not, is he? You already said he wasn’t okay. What happened to him? How bad is he hurt?”
She didn’t hide the shake in her voice or her trembling hands. They’d attribute the reaction to the bad news they’d just delivered.
“It’s bad.” Mr. Muscles’s voice was as dead as his eyes. “He’s not expected to survive. He’s asking for you.”
Stick man pasted on a fraudulently sympathetic smile. The sugary tinge to his fake compassion was discomforting, like fingernails raking down a chalkboard. She hoped he attributed her slight recoil to the news he’d delivered.
“Of course…of course…” She stumbled back and turned, leaving the door wide open. “Let me get my purse and phone—”
“Ms. Barnes, we don’t have time—”
“Oh! No!” She stopped abruptly, filling her voice with dismay. “Trident has a vet appointment today.”
“You can cancel it on the way.” Impatience rang in Stick Man’s voice. “Winchester could die at any moment. You don’t have time to dally.”
“Aiden will never forgive me if his little warrior got sick. He loves that cat. He was furious with me when Trident snuck out of the complex and he got hit by that car.” She turned around and widened her eyes, hoping they looked full of entreaty instead of terror. “Can you help me get him in his carrier? He can be a little rascal sometimes.” Make that a complete asshole . “But with your help, I’m sure we can get him corralled and into his carrier in record time.” Both men’s gazes dropped to her scratched up arms and widened in alarm.
“We really can’t afford the time—”
“I’m not leaving without Trident. Who knows how long I’ll be sitting by Aiden’s bed. Trident can’t be home by himself. He needs daily doses of anti-inflammatory medicine and antibiotics. We can drop him off at his vet on the way to the hospital. They’ll take care of him while I’m with Aiden.” When neither man looked thrilled with this prospect, she doubled down. “I’m not leaving without him.”
Muscle Man’s eyes turned the color of mud. Deadly threat laced the brown irises. Stick Man just looked calculating.
She forced steel into her spine and faced them down. She needed to get her overlord into his travel carrier. Trident, which appeared to be his name now, actually did need his daily medications and care. She couldn’t leave him behind, nor could she imagine Aiden bringing her back to the condo to pick the animal up. But with some help from these two assholes, she’d have the demon safely locked in his travel cage by the time Tag showed up. When she escaped, the cat would come with her.
Down the hall came the murmur of voices. The fake Navy guys glanced down the corridor. Tension flashed across their faces. Muscles bunched in their arms. She tensed, certain they were about to leap at her, shove her backwards, then follow her into her condo. Which meant this charade of theirs would be over. God only knew what action they’d take then.
Acting on instinct, she leaned out the doorway and peered down the hall. Megan and Elise, her neighbors across the hall two doors down were headed her way.
“Megan! Elise!” She waved, catching their attention.
The fake priest swore beneath his breath. The guy was a terrible actor. A real priest wouldn’t swear like a sailor. He glanced at his crony. Stick Man offered a slight shake of his head and the two men blocking her door eased back a couple steps.
Megan and Elise picked up their pace when they saw the two men dressed in Navy whites. Alarm touched their faces—which still sported scabby scratches from their encounter with Trident four days ago.
“Hey.” Megan peered at Demi’s face. “Is everything alright?”
“Aiden’s been hurt.” Demi forced the lie out. It felt wrong to lie to her friends like this, even if the lie was for a good reason.
“Actually,” Stick Man turned, flashing the women behind him a mortician’s smile, “Ms. Barnes is needed at Aiden Winchester’s bedside, but she’s worried about her cat. Apparently, it needs medication? Perhaps you two would be good enough to take care of the animal while she’s gone.”
The concern on Megan’s face collapsed into alarm. She took a huge step back and sidled to the right.
“I’m so sorry, Demi, but we have a…a…thing. In fact, we’re headed out of town ourselves.” She slid a meaningful look in her wife’s direction, who nodded emphatically. “If it were any other time, but—” Megan shrugged apologetically and turned, rushing down the hall like the Grim Reaper was behind her with a raised scythe.
“I hope Aiden pulls through,” Elise offered, before turning and hurrying after Megan.
Demi didn’t blame them for their hasty retreat. Trident had leaped for their faces, barely missing their eyes, when they’d helped her administer the medication the morning after she’d brought the cat home.
Frustration flashing across his hang-dog face, the mortician wannabe turned back to her. “We really need to leave now, Miss Barnes. I’ll send one of Aiden’s teammates back to care for the cat. If you’ll—”
Ignoring him, Demi turned, marching down the hall between her front door and the living room. They wouldn’t shoot her while Megan and Elise were within earshot. “Look, the longer you argue, the longer this will take. I’m not leaving without Trident.”
A whispered conversation broke out behind her. She was halfway across the living room when she heard muffled footsteps follow her. Now that they had her alone, with no witnesses, would the two men continue with this pretense, or would they launch into threats and fists to force her to leave with them? Her head went light at the possibility.
Her heart galloping, she rushed down the hall and into the spare bedroom. She closed the bedroom door behind her, more to keep the animal contained than her would-be kidnappers out.
“Miss Barnes?” Stick Man’s voice came from outside the bedroom door.
“In here,” Demi shouted back.
There was no use hiding her location. She needed her would-be kidnappers’ help to get Trident into his carry case. It had taken three veterinary assistants to get him into the cage when she’d retrieved him from the clinic. He was smart enough to remember that incident and do everything possible to avoid a repeat.
“Close the door so he doesn’t get out,” Demi said when the two killers, with their fake smiles, stepped into the room.
She grabbed the kennel by its handle, lifted it from the bed, and pushed it into Stick Man’s arms. He took it reluctantly, with deep revulsion, like helping her with the cat was far below his paygrade.
“Trident is under the bed.” She picked up the fleece blanket that was lying next to the cat carrier.
She shook the throw out, noting the multitude of shredded holes that hadn’t been there five days prior. The cat certainly knew how to use his claws and teeth. She almost asked one of the men to crawl under the bed and toss the blanket over the furry asshole, but there was a steep learning curve to that maneuver, one that produced blood and shredded skin. These guys would go for their guns the moment Trident attacked. She didn’t want the cat dead, just contained. She’d have to be the one to crawl under the bed after him.
“Get a good hold on the cage and make sure the door is open.” She dropped to her knees.
“Remind me why we’re doing this again?” the pretend priest asked in an empty tone. Almost like he was more curious than annoyed. “We’d have her out to the van by now, if we used some 9mm persuasion.”
Stick Guy made a shushing sound. Demi pretended she hadn’t heard them. Going down on her belly, she crawled under the bed while pushing the blanket in front of her. It was a tight fit, the wooden slats of the frame snagging her hair.
Trident was at the head of the bed, huddled against the wall next to one of the bedframe’s legs. She lifted the fleece, holding it as far up and out to the sides as she could, while letting it droop slightly in front of her eyes so she could see.
Arrgggglll! The cat warned in a low, guttural growl of doom.
“Good kitty.” Demi lifted her voice into that chipper chirp she despised.
Errgggowl! Arrggggowl! Stiff bodied and vibrating with rage, the cat shifted closer to the leg of the bedframe. Demi sidled that way, too, the blanket held up and out. She’d gotten to know the animal’s eccentricities and judging from its rigid body and blazing eye; it was about to attack. Sure enough, in a blur of movement, it launched itself at her head.
Demi caught the cat in the blanket. Before he could disengage his claws and escape, she rolled him over and over in the throw, until he resembled a writhing lump of fleece. Once the whirling dervish of claws and teeth was safely wrapped up like a burrito, she took a second to catch her breath. Wow, that had been the easiest capture yet.
“I’ve got him. That cage better be ready. He’s pissed.” The blanket wiggled beneath her hands as the demon she’d captured fought to escape.
“I’m coming out. Put the cage on the floor but keep the door open.”
She carefully crawled backward, the blanket clamped to her chest, while the cat squirmed and wiggled and howled in fury. A paw, claws extended, reached through one of the shredded areas in the blanket and tore a new furrow into her forearm. A burning sting engulfed her arm, followed by wet warmth trickling down her skin.
“Here.” Stick Man thrust the crate toward her head as she squirmed out from beneath the bed. She rolled onto her butt. Horror filled her as the blanket unraveled. A whiskered nose and glittering emerald eye peaked through a loose edge of the fleece.
Shit!
She shoved the cat, blanket and all, into the carrying case. Slamming the door shut, she engaged the locks as the blanket unraveled completely and a bomb detonated inside the cage.
Errgggowl! Arrggggowl! The plastic kennel rocked beneath the cat’s fury. Claws attached themselves to the grated door and rattled the metal.
“You shouldn’t have bothered catching that thing.” Muscle Man’s voice was laconic. “That cage ain’t gonna hold it.”
He was right. At its current level of ferocity, the furry demon was going to dismantle its carrier. Hopefully, a couple miles of duct tape would prevent the crate from disintegrating.
“There’s duct tape in the kitchen.” She shouted to be heard over the screeching and growling. “It’s in the drawer to the left of the sink. Could one of you get it for me?”
Muscle Man looked toward Stick Man, who shrugged. With a roll of his eyes, the pretend priest turned and stalked out of the bedroom.
“Better grab some scissors too,” Demi called after him, doing her best to keep the cage intact while keeping her fingers away from the slats along the side of the crate and the metal bars across the door. “They’re in the same drawer.” She held her breath as the cage rocked violently within her grasp. “Hurry!”
More yowling. More rocking of the crate. The sound of claws skittering against plastic. Demi held her breath and silently urged Muscle Man to hurry.
She caught a shimmy of movement at the bedroom door. That was quick. The dude must have raced to the kitchen and back. Stick Man was bent at the waist, peering into the rocking crate, like he was fascinated by the demon inside. She looked over his stooped shoulders, ready to grab the tape from the fake priest’s hands.
Only it wasn’t Muscle Man sliding into the room.