Chapter 18
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Thanks to the lighter Chris had grabbed from the yacht before disembarking, they were able to relax by a fire after cooking.
They’d eaten the grouper and flounder Chris and Roman had managed to catch with an improvised spear.
They were close to the coast, though, so they’d be putting the fire out soon to prevent any new assholes catching sight of their location with the sun beginning to dip from sight.
But now that they’d eaten, it was time to peel back her layers.
Show her cards.
Explain what she’d so unceremoniously dropped on them earlier. Elaborate on what they’d patiently allowed to hang in the air until she was ready to talk.
Rory stood in front of the fire and turned her back to the others. She let go of a deep breath, then lifted the hem of her shirt to reveal her back.
“Rory.” Chris’s voice sounded choked with pain as if he hadn’t already seen the scars Friday night. He lightly, almost reverently, skated his fingers over the welts.
“There’s no doubt in my mind this is about me.
” A thick knot formed in her throat. “Those modern-day pirates I mentioned, well, they kidnapped Andrew and me nine years ago. They wanted the coordinates for a treasure we’d planned to salvage in the Caribbean.
The whip tore my skin pretty badly, and, um, as you can see, the wounds didn’t heal properly.
” She relaxed at the feel of Chris’s hand still on her back.
“Andrew offered them a million dollars to let us go, and the man who brought the money . . . I’m almost positive he’s at the bottom of the ocean on that yacht right now.
” She lowered her shirt and faced Chris but found his eyes glossy as if on the verge of shedding tears at the sight of her back.
He’d had that look in his eyes Friday, but she’d forced a distraction by way of a kiss and then an orgasm.
“The men who did that to you,” Chris spoke around a hard swallow, “are they dead?”
The soft look of compassion on his face instantly transformed to one of sheer fury. The same fury she’d tried to break through in his bedroom in Virginia.
“Yeah, they’ve been handled. Jesse rounded up some of his friends after I told him what happened, including A.J. This was before A.J. joined Scott and Scott. They took off for a week, and when they came back, Jesse told me I’d never have to worry about those men again.”
Chris set his hands on his hips, his gaze moving to the fire dancing in the gentle breeze. A touch of relief at some justice flashed in his eyes.
“And what do you remember about the man from the yacht you recognized?” Harper sat on top of her rain jacket with her legs stretched out alongside the fire. Her hair hung in messy strands around her face, same as Rory’s.
Roman had his back to a nearby “tourist tree”—arms folded over his chest, eyes on the flames. Quiet since they’d finished eating.
“I don’t know his name. I just remember the jagged scar in the shape of a seven by his right eye and the tattoo on his neck.
A green serpent. And you know how I feel about snakes, so it was hard to forget.
But I’m fairly certain it was him. I just don’t know why he would have abducted us Friday.
” Having been connected to Cutter, it made no sense.
“He helped negotiate the rescue and paid the pirates a million in cash from Andrew’s bank account to get us free.
We still had to give up the location of the sunken ship, but we knew if we didn’t also buy our way out of there, they would have killed us. ”
“Back then, did Cutter say who the man was? A friend? Colleague?” Harper inquired. “And did anyone notice him at the party on Friday night? I don’t remember him or anyone from the yacht, for that matter.”
Chris and Roman both shook their heads to Harper’s last question, then focused back on Rory, waiting for her answer.
“No, I don’t remember him from the gala, but when I asked Andrew about that guy nine years ago, he told me not to worry about him. And that was the last time I ever saw him. But if Andrew trusted him with his bank account and a million dollars, he must have been important to him.”
“Cutter wanted you at that event. He said he would have reached out to you even if you didn’t come. What was the special project he needed your expertise with, the job you refused?” Chris asked, his voice gravelly. Anger still evident in his tone.
Rory thought back to Friday. “He didn’t tell me. Just said it was the biggest find of his lifetime, and he needed me on the job because I was the best.”
“And when you said no to his job offer, did he push back?” Harper stood and folded her arms across her chest, moving closer to Roman, but she kept her focus on Rory.
“He was insistent, but I said goodbye and went to find Chris right after.” Then we made out and got gassed in the elevator. I mean, because why wouldn’t that happen to me?
“Someone went to a hell of a lot of work to take us. The elevators. Smoke and gas.”
“Requires a lot of prep to nab someone who never RSVP’d to the event. Cutter didn’t know you were gonna show until you were there,” Chris finished Roman’s line of thought. “Maybe someone planned to kidnap several people for ransom.”
Why are you still trying to let me off the hook?
“The fact Rory recognized that guy on the yacht and that he’s connected to Cutter can’t be a coincidence,” Harper countered their argument. “You both know that.”
“Plus, I did RSVP. I called on Wednesday, the day Elaina said I should go, figuring I’d cancel at the last minute if I had to, but I wanted to mark myself as attending in case I decided to show up.” Why the hell did I do that?
“Cutter seemed surprised to see you, though.” Chris folded his arms. “But it could have been an act. And fuck, he wanted you alone in that hall. If I hadn’t been right there, he might have taken just you.”
“There was only one toothbrush in that travel bag.” One person.
That was the original plan, right? Andrew was ambitious, but kidnapping?
“Andrew wouldn’t force me to help him on a job.
And also, why would he take you all?” She chewed on her lip for a moment in thought.
“Shit, he asked if we worked together, but we never responded. Maybe he just assumed . . .”
Cutter worked with people from all over the world. And Chris said he’d heard multiple languages spoken on the yacht, which would make sense if Andrew employed those men. Could Andrew have done this?
“Then maybe it is Cutter, and he decided to take all of us at the last minute to distract from the fact he was only planning on taking you, throw people off his scent, so to speak,” Roman spoke up.
“If it’s Andrew who wants me, I guess that’s better than the alternative. I can deal with my ex. He’s not as scary as”—she looked to Chris—“as someone else who wants me dead.”
Chris’s eyes narrowed on her, and she’d swear she nearly saw his pulse throbbing at the side of his neck in anticipation of what she was about to say.
Or maybe it was her pulse racing.
She clenched her hands into knots at her sides and edged closer to the fire to dispel the sudden chills on her skin.
“What happened five years ago?” Chris’s tone was so low it could skirt the equatorial line.
Rory glimpsed over at Harper, who stood rigidly beside Roman, and Harper gave her a slight nod of encouragement. A woman-to-woman “it’s okay” in her eyes.
“While working with Andrew, I discovered that the black market for antiquities was much bigger than I thought. The number of artifacts smuggled and sold, and not just by criminals, but by powerful organizations as well, is staggering.” She looked at Chris again.
His jaw was set in a hard line as he observed her, but his eyes were a warm and consoling contrast. “You dealt with ISIS while in the military, maybe even now, and well, even terrorist groups like ISIS traffic art and other relics as one avenue to help fund their operations. Tens of millions of dollars in revenue a year.”
Chris’s blue eyes widened at her mention of ISIS, clearly not what he’d been expecting to hear.
“I hated it, hated seeing priceless artifacts sold on the black market to a bunch of rich dicks willing to pay top dollar regardless of the fact they were supporting terrorists.” Rory set a hand to her stomach and took a steadying breath.
“I know this because I ran into some treasure hunters who were hired to raid and plunder for criminals and other groups. Andrew told me to let it go, but I was pissed. And well,” she continued, drawing her hands together in front of her, “I left Andrew’s team and started my own crew, and we used my research skills to hunt down the illegal sales.
I couldn’t stop ISIS, but I could steal back what they sold and return the artifacts to their original owners. ”
“Red Robin Hood.” Roman’s words had Rory releasing an involuntary gasp. “That was you?”
“I always wore different red wigs, so I guess that’s where the nickname came from.” Better than being dubbed a thief, she supposed. “I, um, broke into their homes and took back what didn’t belong to them.”
Chris swiped a hand over his head, then gripped the back of his neck and looked at the ground.
“But you stopped doing that. It was only two or so years before Red Robin Hood—I mean you—changed gears, am I right?” Roman asked, and how he knew so much was beyond her.