9. Gwen
Gwen
FIVE MINUTES BEFORE
My life has never flashed before my eyes, complete with a soundtrack playing in the background along with my “greatest hits,” not even when Easton and I crashed.
Yet here I am, preparing for my movie montage to begin.
Because I gave her what she wanted, and the damage she can potentially do with any number of my programs is endless.
She’s smart enough not to connect to a network, and only powers on my rig for thirty seconds to confirm I gave her the right password, before killing it.
Where are you, Easton? I need him to stop this woman from getting away with my rig.
A tremor of finality shoots through me as she calls the guards back into the room and announces, “You’ll escort her to the final destination. Take Todd with you, too.”
“So, we’re letting her live?” the blue-eyed guy who had the audacity to touch my leg earlier asks, folding his arms. He peers at me, then back at her, an uneasy look crossing his face.
Yeah, you’re about to become a loose end. She’s going to blow us up on that plane. It’s the only thing that makes sense since she knows who Easton and Zoey really are, and she’s yet to kill them.
She must not know Easton won’t sit around and wait to rescue me. He’ll risk his life to get to me now.
“She’s valuable. Boss needs her alive. You don’t get paid enough to know more than that.”
“She’s lying.” I finally remember my voice works. “She plans to take down the plane. Kill all of us. You’ll be collateral damage.”
“Oh do I, hmm?” She comes back over, and if she holds me by the chin one more time, I’ll . . . what? Spit on her? “You don’t think I’d set the world on fire and let you miss out on the—”
“You’ll never get away with this, because you know exactly who you’re up against.” Dad. Easton. Carter. All of them. They’ll come for me. I don’t need to spell that out for her. She knows. And yet, she’s still here and going through with this. Why? How can she be so confident?
“This isn’t a movie, sweetheart.” She takes my cheek this time, her nails digging into my skin. Her breath touches my ear as she rasps, “Or is it?”
I jerk in my chair side to side, trying to fight the restraints. “I’m going to kill you myself.”
A slow smile crosses her lips as she lets me go. “I’ll certainly enjoy watching you try.” She picks up her bag with my rig in it and pats the blue-eyed one on the shoulder twice on her way to the door. “Don’t let her out of your sight.”
“What do you think?” the other guy asks once it’s just the three of us.
“About what this bitch said?” the blue-eyed one asks. “Or about what the bitch in charge said?”
“Do you think that plane is going down or what?”
“No, Jezebel’s right. She’s too valuable. We know who her dad is. Who her stepmum’s father is—he’s running for president, for fuck’s sake.” Blue-Eyes walks around the table, thumbing the tail end of his belt.
“What about the pilot and his fake wife?”
Fake wife? You know about that, too?
Blue-Eyes reaches into his pocket and removes a small key. I stare intently at the object as a new fear unlocks.
Oh no. No, no, no.
“We do as we’re told. If we get orders to kill them when we land, we’ll do it.
Until then, we stick to the plan.” He sits on the edge of the table, rolling the key between his fingers.
“But she said nothing about keeping our hands to ourselves.” Blue-Eyes rolls up his mask just above his mouth and hits me with a lecherous smile.
“And I’m not about to miss an opportunity to fuck Wyatt Pierson’s daughter and be the one to tell him I had my cock inside her before I kill him.
” Bile rises, and noticing what’s about to happen, he reaches out and slams a hand over my mouth to cover it. “Swallow.”
I nearly choke to death on my own vomit before the fight in me kicks back in, and I sink my teeth into his finger and bite him.
He curses and pulls his hand away. “Feisty, aren’t you?” He sets aside the key. “I need you to hold her down so I can get her out of this chair.”
“And if the boss wants her for himself? Or hell, Jezebel?”
He drags the back of his gloved hand across my cheek and down my neck. “What they don’t know won’t hurt them.”
I stiffen and turn my head. Tears stream down my face. For the lives lost at the hotel. For the future ones thanks to my rig being compromised. And for what’s about to happen to me . . .
“You have to screw her, too. I can’t have you holding this over my head.
And don’t act like you don’t want her. I saw the way you looked at her on the plane when we forced her to strip.
” He lets me go and undoes his belt buckle, leaving the leather in the loops.
“You’re going to take her, and I’m going to watch you. ”
The other guy stares at me, his chest lifting and falling with deep breaths. “One of us needs to stay in the hall and keep an eye out so no one comes in.”
Blue-Eyes picks up the key. “Fine. But prove to me you’ll go through with it after I’m done. Take off your mask so she sees you.”
I’m about to plead for mercy, hoping I can talk some sense into the semi-hesitant one, but when he removes his mask, revealing his messy blond hair, realization dawns on me.
“You were at the hotel bar Friday night.” I close my eyes, my world spinning.
Was he also one of the guys Natasha clocked by the pool Saturday? One she assumed was a tail sent by Dad?
When I force open my eyes, he’s standing on the other side of my chair.
“Hold her down,” Blue-Eyes commands while freeing my first wrist from the chair arm.
I take the chance to swing. If I’m going down, it’ll be with a—
My thoughts die and I shriek as the blond asshole catches my arm and twists it behind my back with too much force. Everything becomes a blur of hot tears and quick movements after that. It’s like my mind is trying to protect me from the evil about to happen.
They finish freeing me from the chair, only to cage me to the wall. Cold air stabs my skin as the zipper of my jumpsuit is wrenched down, and my teeth chatter uncontrollably as I burst into a sob while they strip me. My wrists are bound behind my back with the rope, and my ankles are cuffed.
Blue-Eyes removes his gloves, cups my breast, and rocks against me. My stomach turns at the feel of his crotch pressed against my naked body. His fatigues are all that separates us from—
“Go in the hall,” he orders the blond one.
I try to headbutt him but miss.
When the door clicks shut, the man’s fingers close around my throat until the edges of the room become blurry.
I shut my eyes, and my pulse roars so loud I can’t hear anything.
But then . . . the pressure at my throat eases.
I open my eyes, and . . .
Easton, oh God.
Rage is carved into every line of his face as he moves in.
My attacker’s wrist is bent at an angle no bone can tolerate, his forearm locked tight in Easton’s grip as he wrenches the bastard off me.
Oxygen slams back into my lungs. I suck in a sharp breath through my nose and slide down the wall to the floor, drawing my knees protectively to my naked body.
Easton is on top of the man now, and he glances at me for a heartbeat. But the look in his eyes is a whole sentence. Relief. Terror. Anger. All fighting for dominance.
Before I can scream a warning, he takes a hit to the jaw.
He grunts, then zeroes in on the man with deadly focus.
He slowly slits his throat, and I enjoy watching him die.
Does that mean something is wrong or broken inside me?
And do I care? He was going to rape me. Threatened to kill the people I love.
He earned it, and I don’t begrudge myself the satisfaction. I’ve earned that, too.
Easton’s hands find me next. They’re warm, shaking, and real.
You’re here. You saved me.
He frees my wrists, and the blood rushes back so sharply I nearly black out.
He’s saying something. I think I respond? I don’t know.
I’m okay. I’m okay. The words circle like a panicked bird.
Once my cuffs are removed from my ankles, I forget my nakedness and straddle him, needing to be as close to him as possible. I give in to a sob as he holds me, shielding and protecting me with a hand in my hair and one at my back.
Zoey’s here, too. She says something about . . . time? Probably that we don’t have much. And at some point, Easton mentions the fact we need to leave, and I should cover up first.
“You can look. I really don’t care.” Nothing matters at this point but getting away from here. Certainly not my nudity.
Zoey winds up trading places with him, because despite the urgent nature of the situation, he refuses to look at me naked. She helps me into the jumpsuit, then into the sandals those assholes gave me to wear on the plane.
Before I know it, Zoey’s guiding me to the doorway where Easton waits for us. He gives her the rifle and promises me, “I won’t let you down ever again.”
I’m blinking my way through everything, still in shock and now also confused, as he lets me go and picks up a firearm from the table.
“You never let me down before,” I say in a daze.
His brows knit, and he looks like he wants to argue—or maybe hug me—but there’s no time. “Stay here for a second. Don’t move.” He plants himself between me and the hall as he and Zoey open fire in opposite directions. He takes the left, Zoey the right.
I glance over at the bloody knife on the floor, and it takes all my restraint not to go castrate the animal who attacked me. Not that he can die twice, but murderous rage fills me as I remember everything that’s happened.
When Easton turns and holds out his hand, I catch sight of Blue-Eyes’s blood on his cargo pants. There’s even some on the palm that’s extended toward me now. I bet there’s blood on me since he touched me right after slitting his throat. “Gwen?”
I continue to stare at his open hand, stuck in place. Startled and stunned.
“I’m carrying you. Okay?”
He doesn’t wait for me to answer. He throws me over his shoulder and anchors me in place like we’re one body as we go out in the hall. My ass is parked next to his head, my hands hanging limp near his butt, arms flapping around as he runs.
And everything fractures into pieces after that.
From the muzzle bursts and lunging shadows to the way Zoey moves behind us, like she’s truly been engineered for war—low, fast, and lethal.
Even though the shots are suppressed, the sounds detonate in the enclosed space, punching the air from my lungs, sending knives of sound into my ears I try to ignore.
Zoey’s M4 barely rests before she takes out a guard who pops around a corner. The deep, violent thump-crack hits clean in his head, and he drops instantly.
We continue on. Another corridor. Another surgical shot. This time, by Easton’s handgun.
They’re both like death on autopilot, cutting us a path with terrifying efficiency.
When we hit a branching hallway, the lights sputter and die. Darkness folds over us as Easton whispers, “We’re almost out. If we can’t see them, they can’t see us.” His arm somehow remains wrapped snugly around me as we move. “Hang on tight and don’t let go.”
Don’t let go. Those three words become my world. I cling to them, refusing to sink back into that room and what almost happened. Not to mention what did happen at the hotel.
I have no clue how they do it, but between the two of them, Zoey and Easton manage to get us outside unscathed. The rain is just a drizzle now as they keep moving until we’re at the jungle’s edge. Only then does Easton lower me to the ground.
The three of us crouch low in the foliage. “Time to split up,” Zoey advises. “I’ll create a distraction. Meet me at the rendezvous. If I’m not there in five, go to the safe house without me.”
She’s fearless. Maybe a little crazy, too.
“Hell no,” Easton objects, grabbing her arm. “Not a chance we’re leaving without you.”
She’s quiet for a beat before relenting with a reluctant, “Okay.” Then she vanishes into the thick of the woods.
Easton rises, tugging me up with him. He’s still holding my free hand like he refuses to lose me again. “How’s your vision? Adjusted yet to the dark?”
I look around. Shadows, branches, and a thousand tiny night noises. But better than being in that room. Better than that belt unbuckling. “I’m okay,” I lie.
“How’s your hearing? No ear protection, so—”
“My ears are the least of our worries.” Always thinking about everything, even now.
He nods. “Just stay close.”
“Nowhere I plan to go but with you,” I cry, and he grips my hand even more firmly before pulling me deeper into the brush.
Not even a minute later, he stops short, then yanks me behind a tree. He steps out and fires twice. I don’t see a body fall, but I hear something hit the ground.
Since when was Easton like this? I’ve always pictured him safely behind a yoke, not wading through hell on foot beside Carter and the others.
I mean, sure, I knew he occasionally operated from the ground, but I had no clue this man could turn into a human blade.
He’s slashing the world apart to save me.
“Good?” he breathes out, fingers curling around my wrist.
“I don’t understand any of this.”
“Same.” He tightens his grip on me. “But we have a safe house a couple miles away. Think you can make it on foot?”
“Ye—yes.” But guilt keeps me bolted in place.
Why is it okay for me to survive when others didn’t?
“What’s wrong? I mean, aside from—” He cuts himself off, spins away, and fires at someone I never heard or saw coming.
“I need to stop distracting you.” Everything else has to wait until we’re out of here.
He takes hold of my face with one steady hand and gently brushes his thumb across my cheek. His voice goes low, soft, and almost intimate—even in the chaos—as he rasps, “Distract me all you want once we’re out of here . . . okay?”