Chapter Eighteen #3
“No,” Nathan shouted over his shoulder, clearly not worried about being overheard by any neighbors or staying quiet. “You heard Tyrone. We need to get out of here. We were compromised when you let her escape.”
They were on the move then. It seemed as if he’d arrived just in time.
They must know about the phone call Summer made, and it spooked them, forcing them to leave their hideout.
He should call this in. But he was too close; they might overhear him, and he wasn’t backing away. He needed to hear what they had to say.
“Me! That wasn’t my fault,” Paige countered.
“You started it. You were the one who decided to call Tyrone and tattle on me.” Paige put her hands on her hips in the age-old action of a woman scorned.
The pair were arguing like a married couple, and M?rten turned his thoughts to working out if it was possible to get closer without being seen.
He needed to find out if Summer was indeed inside the house.
If she’d escaped into the forest, then he would have a decision to make.
Stay and try to arrest the abductors, or retreat and try to find her instead.
If he ducked back into the scrub, he could circle around behind the barn and come out near where the car was parked.
But beating his way through the long grass and bushes was risky because of the noise he might make.
“If you hadn’t been such a goddamn pussy and tied her up like I told you to, none of this would’ve happened,” Nathan shouted back, picking up both bags and jamming them into the trunk.
“And if it weren’t for me, she might’ve actually escaped for good.
And I made bloody sure that Tyrone knows that as well. He knows what a fuckup you are.”
M?rten stopped his perusal of the area and stared at Nathan’s dark form.
The dilute light filtering from the open doorway barely reached him, so it was hard to make out his features.
At least Nathan had just answered his question.
They had recaptured Summer. Which hopefully meant she was inside the house.
They were still fighting like cat and dog, and so M?rten dived into the long grass, ducking down low and making a beeline for the rear of the barn, attempting to navigate as quietly as possible through the overgrown pastures.
Fuck! He swiped at his face while trying to stay quiet.
He’d just walked right through an orb-weaver spiderweb.
He tried not to think about whether there’d been an actual spider in the web and kept going.
The pair bickering in the background was still audible, a good thing as he hoped it was masking any small noises he made.
But then something Paige said caught his attention.
“You promised you wouldn’t kill her.”
What? That made him stop in his tracks, straining to hear.
“I never promised you any such thing,” Nathan fired back.
“I said we needed to keep her as a hostage until Tyrone had completed his mission; that was all.” M?rten’s palms were suddenly damp as a cold sweat broke out between his shoulder blades.
Did that mean Nathan meant to kill Summer before they left?
Or take her with them and then dump her body in some other secluded spot?
Either way, he had to move. Now. He doubled his speed, not bothering about keeping his head low this time as he continued to listen to them argue.
“No, you said we’d let her go. You said we’d let her go unharmed after we finished with her. You can’t just change your mind.” Paige was panicking now, her voice rising almost to a screech. And so was M?rten, the adrenaline spike at the thought he might be too late making it hard to remain still.
“No, I didn’t. You’ve had it your way for far too long. Now we’re doing it according to my rules,” Nathan snarled, and M?rten heard a slam as the weedy guy closed the trunk with force.
M?rten kept going, at last reaching the cover of the rear of the barn, where he straightened and jogged down the side of the back wall, careful to avoid a stack of rotting wooden pallets, a tangle of fencing wire and part of an engine all stashed behind the barn.
Reaching the far corner, M?rten stopped and peered around the edge.
He could see the car parked up close to the side of the barn, with Nathan still standing behind it, facing away from him.
In the distance, Paige remained a blurry shape in the doorway of the house.
“She’s done nothing. She’s innocent,” Paige continued. “Why don’t we just leave her tied up in the house? She won’t be able to escape, and if no one finds her in a few days, then…” Paige was clearly grasping at straws now.
“Not going to happen,” Nathan replied flatly.
Paige took a couple of steps toward Nathan, still pleading with him to let Summer go. Telling him she would make Summer promise not to tell the cops anything about them. Nathan just laughed in her face. M?rten weighed up his options, absently stroking his gun holster as he did so.
He couldn’t take on both of the kidnappers at the same time.
Nathan was closest but partially obscured by the car, while Paige was over fifty meters away by the house.
If he drew his weapon and took out Nathan first—and it’d have to be a bloody good shot, he wouldn’t get a second chance—that’d possibly give Paige time to escape.
Or he could make himself known, bluff his way through by pretending he wasn’t alone and try to intimidate them both into giving up.
Paige might be an ally; she was trying to save Summer’s life.
But he couldn’t guarantee that if he stepped out into the open and declared himself, she would take his side, or at least do nothing to harm Summer.
She could just as easily turn back into the house and use Summer as a shield.
Hurt her or even kill her if she felt threatened.
Experience told M?rten that self-preservation was a strong motivator.
Nope, he needed a plan C; he just wasn’t sure what it was yet. And he needed to do it now, while they were still preoccupied with each other.