Chapter 13
B lue woke disoriented and groggy. What had happened to him? Something…something strange and bad, but what? Something about Jane. He couldn’t quite grasp it at first, but his heart hammered hard with anxiety as he tried to remember.
The room around him was dark. His head was on something soft and good smelling. He tried to touch it with his fingers and realized his hands were bound behind his back.
“Are you awake?” It was Jane. She was the soft, delightfully scented thing beneath him. The thought brought him no pleasure, only fear, but why? I’m sorry. Her words floated back to him from the same moment the men drugged him. She had done this, she had tricked him, trapped him. He jerked away from her as fast and as far as possible, until he butted into the wall behind him.
“It’s okay,” Jane said in a soothing voice. She reached out a hand, feeling for him, honking his nose by mistake. “You’re safe, you’re all right. Everything is fine.”
“Don’t touch me,” he hissed. Her fingers froze. He turned his head away from her grasp, and she withdrew her hand.
“Are you all right?” she whispered.
“Am I all right? Of course I’m not all right. Are you insane? Where are we?”
“I think somewhere on the wharf. I smell fish and kind of hear the water,” Jane said.
“Who took us?” he growled, not because he meant to but because his voice was heavy with sleep and sedation. He cleared it, wishing for water.
“I have no idea,” she said.
“Drop it, Jane. You don’t have to pretend anymore.”
There was a pause, and then she spoke again. “Pretend about what?”
“Is Jane even your real name?” he asked.
“What are you talking about? What did they give you? Are you having some kind of memory problem?”
She sounded almost convincingly alarmed. He laughed humorlessly. “No, I remember everything. I remember you saying you were sorry and then the men showed up. What was that phone call, really? Was it the signal for them to come get me? You pretend to call your dad and say a series of things to let them know you had me where you wanted me?”
“Huh?” she said.
“Stop, okay, stop pretending. Be honest about this whole thing. You set it all up, and you’re the forger.”
“Seriously, what?” she said. He could hear her shifting, and he braced himself in case she touched him again. He didn’t think he could stand it, not after he had almost fallen for her, not after she had kissed him so freely, had urged him to believe they had a chance at something real. “You think I’m the forger? Why?”
“Because it all makes sense,” he said.
“None of it makes sense. Why would I work with you?”
“To deflect attention,” he said.
“Why would I say they were forgeries? Why wouldn’t I authenticate my own work?”
“In case we get a second opinion.”
“Let me get this straight—you think I’m not only a forger, but a talented criminal mastermind who somehow lured you into my web, made out with you, and kidnapped you in the middle of it? Riddle me this, Columbo, why did I kidnap myself?”
That gave him pause. “To get information out of me,” he said triumphantly.
“So the last ninety minutes of cradling your unconscious form on top of me until my arms went numb and useless, that’s all part of my master plan to interrogate you. Wow, I’m really good. I have to say, I’m impressed by me. I didn’t think I had it in me.”
He squinted, beginning to doubt the validity of his thought processes. He had been suspicious of her from the beginning. She had fed those suspicions with a few little things she’d said, but mostly with her complete lack of virtual footprint, something he found too odd to accept. “You apologized, and then the men took me. There’s no way out of that one.”
“Except there completely is,” she said, and now she sounded irked.
“What?”
“I’m not telling,” she said.
“Why would you not? Because it’s a lie?”
“No, because it’s embarrassing and you don’t deserve to hear it,” she said.
“You might as well tell me,” he said. What else did they have to do alone in the darkness of wherever they were?
She was silent for so long he didn’t think she would continue, but eventually she did. “I was trying to say I was sorry for spraying you in that elevator. I was going to say I wish I had kissed you instead. But then I saw the men. They knocked you out, apparently before you heard my screams. They gagged me and loaded us into the trunk of a car. You were unconscious; I was not. You were bound; I was not. I screamed and fought them, but there are two of them, and I weigh a hundred pounds. And they told me if I didn’t stop fighting them, they would kill you, that it was me they were after, and you were expendable. So I stopped fighting, and here we are.”
Oh. Uh-oh. It seemed he had made a huge mistake, but he only had her word for it. For all he knew, people could be in the room with them right now, watching through night vision goggles, waiting for him to crack, to confess. He was in possession of a mountain of secrets, missile sites, codes, online security, hacks he had personally perpetrated on other countries, on other world leaders, viruses he had created and distributed to take down entire networks of known enemies. In terms of sensitive information, he was a treasure trove. Was he really supposed to believe this was all about Jane? That she was the intended target of the kidnapping?
“What’s in your pockets?” she asked.
“What?” His brain was still sluggish from whatever they’d given him, his tongue thick and furry with it.
Jane sighed, her annoyance with him in every molecule of carbon dioxide expelled from her body. “Did you empty your pockets before you came to my room, or is there anything in them that can help us?”
“See, it’s things like that that make me suspicious,” he said. “We’ve supposedly been kidnapped, and you’re a civilian. Why aren’t you in freakout panic mode? Why are you the one thinking of ways to get us out?”
“Because someone has to do it, and you seem unwilling or unable.”
Ouch. She had a point, though. Technically, he was a trained agent. But outside of mandatory training, he had never been tested, never been put in a situation where he had to use his training. He could load, shoot, and clean a gun, but he did it twice a year to qualify. He had memorized the basics of self-defense, but he’d never been in a compromising position where he needed to use them. And now that he was, an anthropologist was the one concocting a plan to get them out.
“I still have stuff in my pockets. There’s a flashlight on my keychain, on the right side.”
She reached for him, feeling around until she located him, but couldn’t get her hand inside his pocket. “Lie flat,” she directed. He lay down. She tried contorting her hand, but the angle was wrong, Eventually she had to lay on him in order to slip her fingers into his jeans to reach the keys.
Blue closed his eyes, breathing through his mouth. Why did she have to smell so good and feel so soft against his chest? Either she was a terrorist and couldn’t be trusted or she wasn’t, and he had ruined things with her forever. It was a lose-lose situation.
“Stop enjoying this,” Jane said, pushing against him to sit up again, keys in hand.
“Can’t help it,” he croaked. “You smell really good, and you’re wearing silk pajamas.”
“That’s the required dress code for all the terrorists in my cell,” she said, her tone dripping sarcasm. She located the flashlight on his keychain and shined it around the blackened interior where they were being kept. It was a large, cavernous space, far bigger than the reach of the flashlight. They were on a mattress on the floor, next to a wall. Across the room eyes peered at them, but they weren’t the eyes of people. For one thing they were too low to the ground, and for another they gleamed golden in the flashlight’s beam. Rats. Jane shuddered. She had spent years living in countries where rats were more than a nuisance; they were a danger. They had to get out of this place before the rats discovered them and came closer for a taste.
“Can you stand?” she asked.
“I won’t know until I try,” Blue said. “Hold on a sec.” He wriggled his bound hands around his legs, bringing them to the front. It wasn’t as good as being untied, but it was better. Somehow he knew that if Ridge or Ethan were in this position, they would already be out of the ropes and in charge of the scene. They would likely break their thumbs to get out of the bindings or some other super spy nonsense. Blue wasn’t willing to go to those lengths to prove his masculinity, but he did want to have his hands available in case he needed them. Tentatively, he scooted off the bed and wobbled to a standing position.
Jane stood beside him, cocking her head to listen. “The water sounds like it’s behind us, meaning we should go the opposite direction.”
“Right,” Blue agreed, though he hadn’t given it a thought. He felt confused, disoriented, unable to focus. He hoped it was because of the drugging and not because he was inherently bad at this aspect of being an agent. Jane, on the other hand, was taking charge as if she were the female Jack Reacher. Or like a spy who’s had training. He pushed that thought aside. Following her was better than remaining on the mattress and, for the moment, she seemed to be on the level and trying to get them out.
“I’m going to hold on to you so we don’t get separated in the darkness. This is merely a precaution and not some terrorist tactic to try and overtake you,” Jane warned, grasping his forearm.
“Should I expect everything you say from now on to be tinged with anger and sarcasm?” he asked.
“Absolutely,” she replied.
Their progress was slow in the darkened warehouse. The space was massive so that even the addition of the tiny flashlight did nothing to help. And they had no idea what might be waiting in the darkness. It seemed likely that if someone was there, they would have sprung at them by now. But it was still an insecure feeling, not knowing what might lie a few feet in front of their faces. The sounds of water lapping outside and tiny feet scurrying inside did nothing to ease their anxiety.
Eventually they proceeded far enough to the opposite side of the warehouse that they saw a tiny speck of pale moonlight eking through a hole leading to the outside.
“There must be a door on this wall somewhere,” Jane reasoned. She was still holding on to Blue with her left hand. With her right, she scanned the wall of the warehouse up and down as they moved forward. When her light glinted on something metal, she knelt and picked up an old screwdriver, adding it to her right hand along with the light.
After about twenty feet of walking, they reached a door and tried the handle. It turned but had been bolted shut from the outside.
“Stand back, I’ll kick it,” Blue said, feigning more bravado than he felt. Could he kick down a door? He had never tried, but he had the sense he probably should at least attempt it.
Jane had other ideas. “How about if I take it off the hinges instead,” she said, using the found screwdriver to pop the pins free from the hinges.
“That’s one way to go,” Blue said. He stood uselessly by while she worked.
“Now kick it,” she instructed. He did so, and the door popped easily free, the sound echoing loudly in the darkness of the wharf. They waited a while, hearts hammering, to see if anyone would come to check, but they had seemingly been deposited on their own to wait for who knew what.
Outside a light breeze was blowing, but it did nothing to dispel the smell of rotting fish. “It wasn’t a long drive,” Jane whispered. “We’re somewhere in the vicinity of the city, possibly New Jersey.” She scanned the area, and so did Blue. The moon was a sliver, not adding much light. And wherever they were wasn’t well lit, as if begging for illegal and nefarious activities to take place.
They walked for what seemed like a very long time, until the wharf was far behind them and a neighborhood loomed up ahead. Blue tried to think of a plan. They would need to find a pay phone, if such a thing still existed anymore. He would call Ridge and have a contact from New York come get them. Or maybe Ridge would prefer to involve the police, given the precarious nature of their current situation. Blue’s hands were still tied, they were both barefoot, and their kidnappers could come looking for them at any moment.
Jane began peering into car windows.
“What are you looking for?” Blue asked.
“An old car, something before computer chips,” she said.
“Why?” he asked, but she didn’t answer.
Eventually they landed beside an old Toyota. “Now what?” Blue asked. Jane didn’t reply. Instead she began to shimmy out of her pajama shorts.