Vengeful Lies (Prey Security: Charlie Team #4)

Chapter 1

Chapter

One

September 1 st

8:51 A.M.

This felt wrong.

Cade Charleston sensed it down to his bones.

He shouldn’t have come.

Knowing they had no other options right now, that the danger surrounding their family was only growing, and if they didn't find some answers soon things were only going to get worse, meant he’d had no choice but didn't make it any better. He should have found another way. Would have if he’d had more time.

So far, he and his family had been lucky. His younger brother, Cooper, and his now girlfriend, Willow, had been lucky to survive what happened to them in Egypt, and without the intel they’d managed to gather they’d be no closer to proving their mother was innocent. That she was no traitor who had betrayed her husband and her country.

But the price of those answers had almost been Cooper and Willow’s lives.

Now, the men behind the conspiracy to frame his mother and stepfather had made attacks on his brother Cole’s neighbor, who they mistakenly believed was Cole’s girlfriend, and his brother Connor’s ex-girlfriend. Luckily, both Susanna and Becca had survived, and each time they gained a tiny piece of intel they hadn't had before.

Not enough though.

Never enough.

Which was why he was there even though every cell in his body screamed at him that this was wrong. That he was making a mistake, one that might not be easily rectifiable.

What choice did he have though?

Allow Becca, whose family had lived across the street from his when they were children and who had practically been part of their family, to come?

Alone at that?

Because those were the instructions she’d been given in the phone call she received last night.

A man who had briefly worked at her charity while living and working in a small village in Cambodia had called her out of the blue. She’d told them that the man had replaced someone else at the last minute and she’d never had a good feeling from him.

That alone would have put them all on edge.

But it wasn't all the man had told her.

He’d claimed he was the half-brother of Cade’s baby sister, Cassandra, and he had information on their father that he wanted to pass along to her.

Only a few weeks ago, they’d learned that Cassandra had a different father. Their mother had been gang raped on what would have been her last CIA mission. That one of her assailants had impregnated her and the men responsible for that rape were determined to cover up their crimes by whatever means necessary.

Including having their victim’s husband’s Delta Force team ambushed and slaughtered then setting her, and the only survivor of that attack, up to take the fall to silence them. Then going after his family when it became clear they were starting to get close enough to find the proof they needed to exonerate their deceased mother’s name.

They couldn’t pass up the opportunity to meet with him just because they had no way to corroborate whether this man, who called himself John Jones, was telling them the truth . If he really was Cassandra’s half-brother, they’d either have the name of her father or, at least, in the event that John was another product of rape, more intel to put together with what they had.

If the man was lying, then hopefully, Cade could interrogate him and find out who he really was and who had sent him to Cambodia to watch Becca and told him to call her.

Answers.

They were desperate for them.

Desperate enough for him to sit in his car watching the busy parking lot of a local mall where John Jones had told Becca to meet him.

Although Becca had been willing to meet with the man she’d known in Cambodia, even though he’d asked her out several times and made her uncomfortable, the entire family had vetoed it. She was only just recovering from her and Connor’s ordeal a week ago, no way were they throwing her right back into the line of fire.

Connor couldn’t handle putting the woman he loved, who he’d been missing for twelve long years, in danger again, and honestly, she wasn't the best person to interrogate this John Jones guy anyway. Even if she wore a comms unit and they were in her ear telling her what to say and how to respond, it was much easier for one of them to do it.

Since he was the only single guy left of his four biological brothers he’d volunteered.

Watching Cooper, then Cole, then Connor fall in love had been painful. It dragged-up memories of his beautiful wife. The woman who had seen past his gruff exterior and loved him even when he wasn't all that lovable.

There was a lot of anger inside him, but Gretel hadn't seen any of that.

All she’d seen was him.

She was the best thing to ever happen to him and losing her had almost crushed him.

If he hadn't had a tiny baby girl, not even a year old yet, who was depending on him for literally everything, he very well may have given in to the grief and anger raging inside him.

But Esther was his world, and he had to go on for her.

Right now, what Essie needed the most from him was to clear this threat hanging over the entire family’s head. He didn’t want his tiny little tornado of energy to grow up under lock and key, kept separate from the rest of the world for her own safety.

He wanted his baby girl to be able to spread those big wings of hers and fly high.

So, he had to sit there, had to fight through the anxiety gnawing at his gut and wait.

There had been no sign of John Jones at the point where Becca had arranged to meet him. Since they had all agreed Becca couldn’t go and he would meet with the man who claimed to be Cassandra’s brother himself, he had a photo of him so he could recognize him and he was sitting in his car with a clear view of the front doors of the mall where the meeting was supposed to take place.

Minutes ticked by.

His tension mounted.

Nine passed with no signs of the man who was supposed to meet with Becca.

Was John Jones sitting in one of the many cars waiting to catch a glimpse of Becca? Was he unwilling to get out before he saw her in case they played the exact switch-up they had, sending someone else in her place?

Debating whether it was worth it to call Connor and Becca, asking them to go down there, and have Becca pretend she was going to be the one to meet with John long enough to lure him in, he decided it was worth the risk. After all, it wasn't like John could try much of anything with so many people about anyway. Cade pulled out his cell phone and was just about to bring up his brother’s number and call it when his phone dinged with a message.

The number was the same one that had called Becca last night.

They’d used their Prey Security resources—one of the benefits of working for the world-renowned company as part of Charlie Team—to try to trace the number. While they’d been able to ping the location as close to this mall where John Jones had asked Becca to meet with him, they hadn't been able to get anything else from the phone. It was one of those prepaid throwaway things that only hinted further that whoever this John guy was he was somehow involved in this whole mess.

How had the man gotten his number?

He’d had Becca’s because they’d worked together in Cambodia, and as an employee of her charity he’d had access to her number, but why was John texting him now? Did he somehow know that Becca hadn't come but he’d come in her place?

The sense of foreboding that followed him since Becca got the call last night suddenly surged until he could barely breathe.

Something was wrong.

This was a trap of some sort.

Whether to get their hands on Becca, which they’d been trying to do for the last couple of weeks or because they’d decided to move on to a new target, he had no idea.

Nor did it matter.

Because the words running across his screen as his eyes scanned the message shattered his entire world.

You should have backed off when you

had the chance

Now it’s too late

You’ll never see her again

What happens next is up to you

Your daughter can either be killed

quickly and painlessly if you stop looking

for answers, or she can be sold and you’ll

wish you stopped while you had the chance

A second after the message came through there was a photo of Essie’s nanny Gabriella Sadler’s vehicle. It was sitting at a red light, surrounded on all sides by other vehicles.

Cade didn't need to see what was about to happen next, he already knew.

Essie was about to be abducted, Gabriella would likely be killed, and there was nothing he could do to stop it from happening.

September 1 st

9:00 A.M.

Gabriella Sadler hesitated as she left the house where she lived with her boss, Cade Charleston, and his four-year-old daughter, Esther.

Something felt wrong.

Only she couldn’t put her finger on what exactly it was.

Some might find the choices she’d made for her life unusual, given her age and the vast resources at her disposal. Growing up in the foster system after being taken away from her biological mom, who was an abusive druggie, she’d always wanted a family of her own. While foster care was tough and she’d been bounced around a lot, only adding to her desire to find a place to belong, she had an advantage a lot of other kids in her situation didn't have.

An IQ that tested off the charts.

Something she’d used to her advantage because she firmly believed that in life you had to take what you were given and find a way to work with it.

So she had.

After graduating high school at thirteen, she jumped into college and wound up designing a program that was now part of every major cell phone company in the world. Her program allowed anyone, whether they were the owner of the phone or not, in the vicinity of a phone to call out for help, and her voice-activated program would allow the phone, so long as it was turned on, to automatically send an alert along with a location to the closest emergency services dispatcher.

Of course, some people had abused the system, shouting for help just to see if it would work, but that was to be expected. Her system had also saved thousands of lives, and she was proud of it.

The millions she made selling it had also helped.

Well, helped her financially, but it hadn't given her what she really wanted. Her ex-husband had dumped her after several miscarriages when it started to become clear she probably couldn’t give him the heir he so desperately craved.

Alone, still longing for a place to belong, she’d decided to do something completely different with her life and, at twenty-one, had answered an ad to become a nanny for a one-year-old girl whose mom had died from cancer and whose dad needed someone to care for her full-time.

Finally, there she’d found her place.

With Cade and Essie, and the entire Charleston Holloway family. Their fights, struggles, and goals had become her own, and she would always support them any way she could.

Just because her feelings for Cade weren't reciprocated didn't mean she didn't love him, gruff and standoffish though he could be. He loved his baby girl fiercely, and his love for his wife hadn't diminished in the four years since she’d been gone.

She hesitated because she loved this family like they were her own.

If there was one thing she’d learned from being part of this family it was to always trust your gut. Right now, her gut was telling her she should go back inside, lock the doors, and skip the visit to the indoor pool that she’d had to work to convince Cade to let her take Essie to so the little girl didn't have to skip the swimming lesson that she loved.

“Come on, Gabby,” Essie complained, tugging at her hand.

“Hold on a minute, cuddle bug,” she said, scanning the street.

There didn't appear to be anything out of the ordinary. It looked like it always did, the older couple across the street were out working in their spectacular front yard, there were a couple of kids riding bikes, and a few cars driving up and down the road.

Nothing out of the ordinary.

“It’s fine, Gabby, you're just being paranoid,” she muttered to herself, a bad habit of hers.

“What's pamanod?” Essie asked, looking up at her with wide gray eyes.

“Not a word for little girls,” she replied as she hurried them both down the street, anxious now to be within the relative safety of the car. It was silly, but she didn't want to be out in the open any longer than she had to be, it wasn't safe.

Although she supposed nowhere was really safe for anyone in this family right now and she was part of this family. All the guys were like brothers to her, and she had quickly accepted Willow, Susanna, and Becca as sisters. While the little girl holding her hand might not be her daughter by blood, she’d helped to raise her since she was a year old, and she couldn’t have loved Essie more if she’d given birth to her.

“Morning, Ms. Sadler,” Gavin greeted her as he opened the backdoor for her and Essie to climb in.

Gavin was one of the bodyguards assigned to her and Essie. They had four who worked in pairs for twelve-hour shifts before clocking out. Since Gavin and Dave did the day shifts, she was better acquainted with them and liked them both, although Dave was rather quiet and didn't say much.

“Good morning, Gavin,” she returned with a smile as she helped buckle Essie into her car seat. “And I've told you at least a hundred times to call me Gabriella or Gabby.”

“Sorry, ma’am,” he said with a grin that told her he wasn't going to do that any time soon.

She was chuckling to herself as she sat down and did up her own seatbelt. It was weird having bodyguards. It did make her feel safer as she tried to keep Essie’s life as normal as possible while also being sensible and keeping her little charge safe. The threat continued to escalate, and she was sure it wouldn’t be long before Cade decided to send them both away somewhere no one could get to them. Most likely that would be to the Delta Team guys where Cade’s little sister Cassandra was currently hiding out. Those Delta guys were scary, but they could also be sweet, she’d witnessed that herself with how they treated Essie the handful of times they’d met her.

“Gabby, what game we playin’ today?” Essie asked, looking at her expectantly.

Usually, they passed away car trips, even short ones, playing games since she preferred to limit screen time as much as possible. There was a whole wide world out there to explore, so driving in the car was always a time to talk and play games.

“How about we count how many red cars we can spot,” she suggested.

“Okay!” Essie enthusiastically agreed.

So that’s what they spent the next ten minutes doing. They were up to six when they stopped at a red light. There were only another five minutes to go until they reached the pool, and she could relax a little. It was too busy a place for the men after Cade’s family to try anything, and she’d be in the water with Essie while Gavin and Dave watched over them.

“Look, Gabby! Right next to us is a red car,” Essie squealed in delight.

“How many does that make now?” she asked.

The four-year-old scrunched up her nose as she thought. “Umm … nine?”

“Not quite. Let’s try again, we’ll use our fingers.” When she held up both hands Essie copied her. “Okay, so we already had, one, two, three, four, five, six,” she said, putting up one finger for each number. “Now let’s add one more. How many does that make? Count them again if you're not sure.”

Looking at her little fingers, Essie counted. “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven. Seven red cars,” she said excitedly.

“That’s right, you're getting so good at addition,” she encouraged. While she had no formal degree in childcare and no idea what had prompted Cade to hire her when she was sure there were more qualified candidates, she’d worked hard to learn about child development and ensure she was the best nanny Essie could have.

Leaning over to tickle the little girl’s tummy, she caught sight of a car stopping in the middle of the street crossing theirs that currently had the green light.

“What a terrible place to break down,” she said absently.

“Stay in the car, Ms. Sadler,” Gavin instructed, his tone hard and unyielding.

Before she could ask what he meant, he climbed out and pulled out his weapon.

Four men spilled out of the large SUV she thought had broken down. They were all dressed in black, their faces were covered with ski masks, and they held weapons.

A kidnapping attempt.

The people after Cade’s family had decided to come for little Essie.

In a panic, she realized there was nowhere for them to go as she looked around. They were in the middle lane, three cars were ahead of them and at least a few behind them. They were trapped and outnumbered.

Gunfire erupted around them, car horns honked, people screamed, cars took off, some hitting each other as drivers panicked and tried to get away.

Outside the car Gavin dropped, blood covering his body and spreading, his eyes already wide and vacant in death.

Dave cursed as he got out of the car, returning fire.

It did no good.

He dropped too.

Leaving her and Essie all alone.

Gabriella reached over and unbuckled Essie, wondering if she could slip away with the little girl in the chaos around them.

“Stay with me, don’t make a sound, and do what I say,” she told the little girl staring in shock at the carnage around them. The poor child was going to be traumatized for life.

Opening her door, Gabriella climbed out, taking Essie with her. Eyeing up their options, she decided they would head back down the line of cars behind them and then head into the nearest store.

They made it three cars down before the men in black were there, surrounding them. Grabbing Essie and ripping the child from her arms.

She screamed and fought.

She couldn’t let them take the girl.

Essie was only four, so young, so small, so vulnerable.

A blow to the side of her head stunned her, but Gabriella shoved aside the pain and dizziness and kept fighting with everything she had.

“Bring her with us,” a voice ordered, and she was snatched off her feet and both she and Essie were carried back to the SUV.

Inside, she was shoved down in the space behind the passenger seat. With the man who had grabbed her sitting on the back seat, it left her barely any room, even less when the door was slammed closed beside her. On her other side, a sobbing Essie had been shoved down between the backseat and the driver’s seat, two other large men sitting side by side on the backseat as the last jumped into the passenger seat and the SUV sped off, tires squealing.

In less than two minutes her entire life had changed.

Had ended.

Because she feared neither she nor Essie were getting out of this alive.

But if there was a chance, even a small one, that she could save the little girl she loved, she would take it. Cade had already lost his wife, and she would do everything within her power to make sure he didn't lose his daughter as well.

No matter the cost to herself.