Chapter 11
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E lizabeth hoped to God that Masters didn’t come back. Yet she couldn’t stop thinking that maybe, just maybe, he was her light at the end of this tunnel, and whoever the hell was doing this would be stopped. Then she remember that scary assed gunshot. She glared at the two men in front of her, both with hoods over their heads so she couldn’t identify them. She didn’t recognize their voices either. So far, they hadn’t said anything, except to ask her when Masters would return.
Since she had no answer for them, she hadn’t been able to tell them anything. They’d made fun of her, telling her that she couldn’t be much of a lay if he didn’t even give her a time for when he came back for the next round. She just glared at them, refusing to react to their nasty innuendos. They were just hoping to get a rise out of her, and she wouldn’t let them succeed. She didn’t know what the hell was going on, but obviously something had taken a turn.
In a moment of daring, she asked, “Do you have my brother?”
The two men looked at each other, then started to laugh. She winced, knowing that this wouldn’t be the way to get any information that she could trust. She sagged back in her chair, stared at the window, willing Masters to just arrive and not get in touch with her ahead of time. She didn’t want to give these guys any warning. And yet, as she listened to them talk, antsy and upset that their prey hadn’t arrived yet, she realized this was quite likely a hired job.
They didn’t seem to know a whole lot except that they were to pick up Masters. The fact that they were after Masters at all amazed her. What could he possibly have that they wanted? Unless it had to do with the USB key he had walked away with, and anybody surveilling her brother’s home would have known that. She never even considered that somebody had been in there. She’d been so adamant that her brother’s place had been untouched, looking precisely the way it had when she last left it.
Her two intruders had been in her house waiting for her, throwing a hood over her head and subduing her instantly after she’d arrived home. Eventually they had removed the hood, making it easier to hit her. She’d been sitting here ever since, desperately in need of a bathroom trip, yet pretty sure it was only because of the panic she felt. And they just sat here, waiting for Masters to return. The fact that he was planning on returning at all had terrified her because that meant he would walk into this mess without warning. She had no way to tip him off, and these guys were just too rough, too ready, and didn’t appear to give a damn.
“Where the hell is he?” snapped one of the guys. He turned and glared at her and, without warning, smacked her hard across the face once more. Her head snapped back, and she saw stars for several minutes, instantly crying out in pain. She’d tried so hard to not even let them know that she was rattled. Yet the more they hit her, the more she knew that she could not withstand much more. She desperately wanted to be that person who could, but she was sure that, if they sent any more beatings her way, she would give in.
And yet she had nothing to offer them; that was the thing that got her. She had absolutely no information. She didn’t know when Masters was coming back, or if he even was. Just because she thought he was didn’t mean it would work out that way. She didn’t know what his schedule even looked like. So, here she was, captured by these assholes. Just thinking about how easily they’d taken her made her furious all over again. She slowly straightened her head and glared at them.
The guy who hit her scoffed. “You think you’re so damn tough.” He took a step toward her, but his partner held him back.
“If you beat her up too much, Masters will take one look at her, and he’ll never help us.”
The other guy snorted. “He’ll never help anyway. We’ll have to kill the bastard. This won’t end up any other way.”
The other man got a look in his eye, as if murder wasn’t necessarily his first wish for this job. Too bad she couldn’t see the rest of his face.
She glared at the one who kept hitting her. “That’s all life is to you, absolutely nothing?”
“It’s only money,” snapped the first man. His voice was gravelly, as if he’d been a lifelong chain smoker.
The other one, a small rat-size guy, added, “No, we’re not murdering anybody.”
But Gravelly turned to him with mocking laughter. “Just because you don’t want to doesn’t mean that’s not the way it will end up. I told them that right from the beginning. So don’t go getting scared balls now.”
Rat gave a nervous laugh. “That wasn’t part of the deal.”
“I don’t give a shit whether it was part of the deal or not. This is a job. We do the job. We get more jobs,” he snapped, “and then we have a decent life. Without the work, we got nothing. We talked about this.”
“Sure, but you’re not allowed to sit here and beat everybody up and kill them just because,” Rat replied, as if pacifying his friend, who didn’t appear to have any interest in being pacified.
“Why not?” Gravelly asked, as he looked back over at her. “It would make me feel better. I’m tired of waiting for this asshole.”
“Tired of it or not, beating her up won’t do anything but make our life harder, not easier.”
“That’s the only reason I’m holding off,” Gravelly explained in disgust, as he looked over at Rat. “You and I both know that, if the bosses were here, none of this would happen.”
“If the bosses were here, we wouldn’t be in this position, and we would most likely both be dead,” Rat pointed out.
That seemed to subdue Gravelly for a while, and then he just shrugged it off. He walked around, paced for a bit, and then flung himself onto one of the kitchen chairs hard enough that it rocked in place. Obviously this waiting was something he didn’t like to do. When a racket came outside, he bolted to his feet and raced to the back door, but no other commotion was heard. He looked over at Rat.
Rat shrugged. “Probably the local dogs getting into the garbage can. I told you that we should have brought the garbage can in. At least then we don’t have to worry about things like that.”
“Go bring it in then,” Gravelly snapped.
Rat laughed. “I ain’t going out there. You just want to use me as decoy, so you can take out this guy.”
“I need to knock him out first,” Gravelly muttered. “Everybody says he’s wily, though I don’t know how anybody even knows him.”
“His service record. All that information is everywhere,” Rat stated, with a smirk. “We would be foolish to ignore it.”
Gravelly stared at his partner in disbelief. “Seriously? We’ve ignored so much other information on this job that we shouldn’t have, right from the beginning.”
“Whatever,” Rat said. “Not a big deal.”
And the garbage cans rattled again.
“Goddammit,” Gravelly snapped. He walked to the back door, peered out the window, and shook his head. “Nobody’s out there.”
“Of course not, and, besides, if this Masters guy is coming, what are the chances that he’ll just walk right in? No lights are on. Nothing says she’s even here or still up.”
“They told us to keep the lights off, remember?”
“Sure, but doesn’t that tell him that something is wrong?”
“No, you idiot. It probably tells him that she’s in bed, waiting for him,” he replied, with a sneer, as he turned around to face Rat. “Although why he would want her, I don’t know.”
Sitting here listening to the insults flying back and forth, with Gravelly hitting her occasionally, was an odd experience. It seemed these two guys did this all the time, yet they had no care or concern about the effects on anybody else. They were completely focused on themselves. She wanted to say something, wanted to sneer at them or to insult them. She knew that would only end badly, and she was already dealing with a pretty rough headache from the blows she had taken so far.
She knew that Masters would be beyond furious when he saw her and realized they’d been using her for a punching bag. He didn’t think very much of women being attacked. When she stopped and thought about it, she didn’t even know how she knew that or why she was assuming that to be true, but it felt right. It felt like something he would be upset about. If he found somebody beaten up by assholes, Masters wouldn’t hesitate to take some revenge.
That’s exactly what part of her hoped he would do, while another part of her hoped he would stay away and not get involved. Yet still another part of her hoped he would get his ass in here damn fast and get her the hell out of here. If anybody could do it, it would be him.
She shuffled back in her seat, then closed her eyes. The blow came out of nowhere. She cried out in pain, her eyes stinging with the hard tears and sweat. She wasn’t even sure where the sweat was coming from, but such a strong odor came with it. She looked up at Gravelly, who was glaring at her.
“If we can’t sleep, you can’t sleep. You close your eyes again, I’ll smack you again.”
She didn’t say anything. She sniffled back the tears, as she tried to hold in the panic, wondering just how she was supposed to get out of this. Nothing she did was right, and everything she did seemed to set off Gravelly.
He turned suddenly and glared at her. “And stop sniffling. I can’t stand snifflers.”
She sucked in her breath several times, trying hard to stop the tears threatening to overwhelm her.
“Just leave her alone,” Rat said. “The more you hassle them, the worse off they are. And the more they go to pieces.”
“I know that,” Gravelly spat. “I just—it would be nice if women wouldn’t be such pieces of shit.”
She stared at him in shock. How many women had they done this to, and why the hell should he be upset or surprised at women being afraid for their lives in a situation like this? It was just too much to even contemplate that an asshole like this was running loose out there. She looked over at Rat to see him studying her carefully. She wasn’t sure what the deal was, but something was off in his gaze.
In a sudden moment of insight, she realized that instead of being the smaller and the more reasonable of the two, he suddenly looked to be the most lethal. Maybe it was the cold glare in his eyes. Maybe it was not that he wanted to punish anybody, but that he didn’t care. Just a job to be done. He wasn’t into the bullying and the torture. He was all about getting the job done and getting out. That could work in her favor. However, if anything went wrong, she knew without question that he would take out anybody in his way. So, in this situation, it would potentially be her. He wouldn’t even think about it. She would be done and gone.
She managed to control her tears, just sitting and waiting, with her eyes open. She didn’t dare take too many more blows like that last one because her brain surely had to be impacted in some way. Yet it was less about that than the damn headache that grew every time Gravelly punched her. She’d lost count of how many blows. Six maybe at this point? That she was even still conscious amazed her, though, in some ways, it would be nice to be unconscious, not enduring this and whatever else was to come. She didn’t like the way Gravelly looked at her. She didn’t like anything about this asshole, but the fact that Rat couldn’t care less if she even existed scared her even more. She didn’t care to look at them but was too scared to look away.
Her gaze flicked past the window and froze. Then she quickly switched to look at the men. She wasn’t sure what she had seen but couldn’t risk another look. Still she took another quick glance at the window, but the image she thought she had seen was gone. Defeated, she sank back in a dazed stupor, resigned to wait for whatever came next.
*
Masters wondered if Elizabeth had seen him. He thought maybe she had, but, when she looked away again, it was almost as if she didn’t see him. Even from outside, he could see her face was swollen and discolored, and he felt that immediate sense of wanting somebody to pay for having hurt her. He wasn’t planning on killing these guys. Yet, when they obviously had no respect for life, he highly suspected there would be a fight to the finish before this night was over.
He’d already texted Jasper about what he’d found and was waiting for a response, as he checked out to see just how many men were involved. So far, he only saw two, but that was an easy mistake to make, and he didn’t dare underestimate the situation, not with Elizabeth’s life on the line. They were waiting for something or somebody, and Masters highly suspected it was him. He frantically cast around in his mind, figuring out why they would want him, and the only thing he could come up with was that stupid USB key. He wondered if still something else was on it that they hadn’t found.
He sent another message back to Jasper about the key. He finally got a text back.
On my way. Stay out of it until I get there, if you can.
He sent an affirmative back, aware that waiting wouldn’t be easy. However, it could improve the outcome if things would stay as they were for the time it took Jasper to get here. It looked as if things wouldn’t go to hell and back in the next few minutes, but, if that changed, Masters would have to intervene. No way he would leave her to be beaten, when she’d already been through so much.
He knew she was terrified, but she was also holding, and that was huge. She was clearly injured, but he didn’t know how badly, and he didn’t know if she could make a run for it. She was tied up in a chair, so Masters had to assume that she was bound at the ankles and tied up with her hands behind her. No telling how long she had been held there. With her circulation cut off to her legs, she couldn’t walk, much less run.
Instead of relaxing with her eyes closed or staring at her kidnappers in an absolute and utmost panic, she was searching, as if trying not to let anybody know what she was doing. It was an interesting response from a civilian taken captive in her own home. One he appreciated because it also meant that she was thinking, that she wasn’t in full panic mode. She was still sorting out what was going on and how to get out of this, and that was worth everything.
He walked around to the other window, checking to make sure he hadn’t missed anything, hoping that Jasper would get here soon, when he heard one of the men speaking again.
“Screw it. I don’t like this. I suggest we just go now.”
Masters didn’t hear what the response was, but a lot of yelling ensued, yelling between the two men. He knew that, if things got ugly, they could either take her with them or shoot her as being too much baggage. However, if this was the same group connected to her missing brother, they’d already kept him in captivity for a long time, so that was a good thing for Elizabeth right now.
What was a bad thing was even contemplating losing her at this stage. That wouldn’t happen. Suddenly gunfire blew out the window near him, and one of the men took off running for the front door. Masters bolted in the back door to see the bigger man on the ground, moaning, clutching his bleeding belly. Masters kicked the gun free of his hand and looked down at him. “Where did your buddy go?” Masters asked in a hard voice.
The other guy looked up at him and spat, “Fuck you.”
Masters kicked him hard in the gut. “That’s for Elizabeth.” Then he quickly undid her. “What happened?” he asked.
She stared at him for a long moment. “I’m not sure. They had an argument, and this guy on the floor had always been pushing a little too much, a little too far. Then I think his partner just snapped under the pressure. Or maybe he just decided to cut his losses by shooting his partner. I don’t know,” she stated, staring at him in disbelief. “That was you out there, wasn’t it?”
“Yep, it sure was. The thing is, we need to know if he’s still around.”
She winced. “Go then. Go after him.”
“No, I’m not leaving you alone,” he replied.
She picked up the big man’s gun and announced, “I’ll go lock myself in my bedroom. You go after that other asshole but make sure you identify yourself when you come back.” He hesitated, and she glared at him. “Go. He might have information about my brother.”
Wincing at that, he booked it down the street, knowing that, by rights, the other guy should already be long gone. As he made it to the alleyway, he turned and kept on going. He hadn’t heard a vehicle leave. He hadn’t heard anything yet. Aware that he could be running straight into open gunfire, his instincts had him slowing, as he approached the corner of the neighbor’s fence. He wasn’t sure what was going on, but, as he crept closer, he heard a laugh.
“I figured you were there,” the other gunman said in a conversational tone.
Masters replied, “Come around the corner and get yourself five in the belly.”
“Only if you shoot better than I do,” the gunman stated, his voice hard.
“Somehow I doubt that,” Masters said.
At that, the gunman laughed and laughed. “You military guys always think you’re so damn tough. You’re not tough. You’re just pieces of shit. Y’all think you’re self-righteous do-gooders, but you don’t know the half of it.”
“Is that why you shot your partner?” Masters asked.
“God, he just went on and on. Besides, I knew that his beating up your girlfriend was gonna get us in trouble,” he noted. “So I just took the short way out. You’re welcome by the way.”
Masters’ eyebrows shot up. “What did you want with her?”
“I’m not gonna get anything out of her now,” he admitted.
“And what about your partner?”
“Shoot him. Finish him off,” he suggested. “I gut-shot shot him, so, if you wait long enough, chances are he won’t make it anyway, which is a good thing. The guy’s a menace. He just wants the murder and mayhem.”
“And you, what do you want?” Masters asked.
“The paycheck,” he shared cheerfully. “That’s all I’m in it for. Give me the paycheck, and I’m a happy camper. Screw me over on that paycheck, and I will get it back.”
“And who’s paying you?”
He laughed again. “I’m not stupid. Just because I’m a hired gun doesn’t mean I’m missing brain cells,” he said, with a sneer. “Letting out that information will be the end of me.”
“You don’t think this will be the end of you anyway?”
“Maybe. It could be. I don’t know. I haven’t worked with these guys before. But that is an interesting concept, so I’ll have to keep it in mind.”
“They’ve already killed several local hires,” Masters murmured, “so you may want to hop a quick train out.”
“You would like that, wouldn’t you?” he asked. “One less to kill.”
“One less to hunt down, yeah,” Masters agreed.
“I don’t know that you would let it go though because we did hurt your girlfriend,” he noted. “However, she’s alive, and she’s not badly hurt.”
“That may be true. Good thing I got here when I did.”
“I saw you at the window. So, I knew where you were at. I just didn’t know how many you’d brought with you. You better put a stop to all this pretty fast. They have what seems to be unlimited money,” he murmured.
“Yeah, you wanna help me with a little more information than that?”
“No, I don’t, not unless you got money to pay me.”
“You probably want bigger money than any of us have.”
“That’s why I work with these kinds of people,” the gunman pointed out. “They’re the ones with the big bucks. So, if you ain’t prepared to pay that money, I can’t—”
“What was the job?” Masters interrupted him.
“Bring you in.”
“Just me?” he asked.
“Yeah, you. She was collateral damage.”
“So, this has nothing to do with her brother?”
“Don’t know anything about her brother,” he replied. “Got nothing to do with a brother, as far as I know.… Unless it’s that Nicholas guy. If that’s her brother, then, yeah, it’s got something to do with him, but I don’t know what.”
“Okay. Thanks for that much anyway.”
“Oh, it’s not like it’s gonna help. Besides, the brother’s almost dead.”
“Did you see him?”
“I saw him. He’s not doing so good, but then they haven’t been treating him all that well.”
“Do you know what they want?”
“No, I sure don’t. Not my business and above my paygrade, at least until somebody gives me a promotion. I don’t wanna know either.”
Masters winced at that but understood the guy’s philosophy, as it was common within the mercenary world. “I suppose you don’t know why they’ve got Nicholas, huh ?”
“Nope, sure don’t.”
“And you don’t know why they wanted me?”
“Nope, sure don’t. Explanations don’t get me a paycheck.”
“No, they might not get you a paycheck,” Masters clarified, “but you’re not the guy to go into something without knowing how to get out of it.”
A silent moment of surprise came over the gunman. “Aren’t you clever?”
“No, but I’ve met your type. You do this for money, but there’s no paycheck if you don’t have a way to escape the cheaters in the world.”
“Cheaters in my world get themselves killed,” he declared. “Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but you can bet they’ll pay at some point in time.”
“I hear you,” Masters noted, keeping the conversation going in some direction that might give him some information. “You do realize that Nicholas was looking into another guy’s case. A guy who had been wrongfully convicted, had served time, and then was killed in jail.”
“Sounds like a setup to me.”
“Exactly. And now that Nicholas found evidence proving that people, likely higher-up brass,” Masters added, “might have had something to do with it, Nicholas has been taken, kidnapped. What we don’t know is what they want from him.”
“They’re gonna want whatever evidence he had obviously,” the gunman said, with a laugh. “But what’s in it for me?”
“I won’t come back and kill you,” Masters declared. “That might be worth something.”
After a moment of silence, the guy muttered, “You’re gonna hound this to the very end, aren’t you?”
“Oh, I’m gonna hound it,” Masters confirmed. “I don’t know whether this has to do with Nicholas or somebody else we’re looking at, but you can bet that we’re gonna hound this right to the ground. So, if you’re part of it, you’re a dead man walking. You just don’t know it yet.”
Masters waited a beat, then sensing a change in the air, he peered ever-so-slightly around the fence corner, only to find that the gunman was gone. On the ground though, he’d left something. Masters picked it up and looked at it. His eyebrows shot straight up, and he hurried back inside to Elizabeth.