Chapter 5 Ryan
RYAN
Ryan started to come awake slowly, like swimming up through murky water toward a distant light. His head felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and there was a persistent ringing in his ears that made it hard to focus on anything else.
He tried to open his eyes, but everything was fuzzy. Blurred shapes and shadows that refused to resolve into anything recognizable. He blinked hard, trying to force his vision to clear, but it was like looking through frosted glass.
When he tried to move, panic spiked through the fog in his brain. His arms were restrained behind his back. His legs were bound at the ankles. And he was lying on his side on what felt like a leather seat.
A car. He was in the backseat of a car.
Ryan's military training kicked in through the haze of whatever they'd used to drug him. Assess the situation. Gather information. Don't let them know you're conscious.
He kept his breathing steady and his eyes mostly closed, watching through his lashes as much as his blurred vision would allow. But he was too late.
"Oh, dear, he's waking up," a voice said from the front of the car. Female, but distorted somehow. Like someone was speaking through a voice modulator or a filter that made it sound mechanical and wrong.
Then a hand reached back from the front seat and stroked his head, fingers running through his hair in a gesture that felt way too intimate.
Ryan instinctively tried to pull away, but his body was sluggish, uncooperative.
The drugs in his system made his muscles feel like they were moving through syrup.
"I told you he's highly trained," the female voice continued, that hand still stroking his hair in a way that made his skin crawl. "You needed to give him a higher dose."
"If I gave him any more, I would have killed him," a man's voice responded. Also distorted, but in a different way. It sounded... weird. Really weird. Like what Chewbacca in Star Wars would probably sound like if he actually spoke words instead of just moaning and growling.
Ryan tried to focus past his Star Wars references—really not the time for his love of Star Wars—and concentrate on gathering useful information. How many people were in the car? Where were they taking him? How long had he been unconscious?
But then that hand was back, stroking his hair again, and he fought the urge to recoil.
"Such a pity you had to choose her to be unfaithful with," the woman said, her distorted voice taking on an almost sad quality. "So disappointing. If you were going to be a cheat, you shouldn't have chosen her. I just don't understand it. I'm a lot prettier than her."
What? Ryan's foggy brain struggled to process what she was saying. Choose who? Unfaithful? He wasn't even in a relationship. Hadn't been for quite a while now.
He tried to focus, tried to make sense of the woman's words, but his mouth tasted like he'd been chewing on pennies and his nostrils burned with the lingering chemical smell of whatever they'd used to knock him out. And his eyes weren’t cooperating with his brain as they just wouldn't focus properly, no matter how hard he tried.
And then that hand, that awful stroking hand that wouldn't leave him alone, suddenly closed a cloth over his nose and mouth. He smelled that sickeningly sweet chemical smell again, stronger this time, and he was too weak to resist.
Ryan tried to hold his breath, tried to fight it, but his body betrayed him. He gasped involuntarily, and the fumes rushed into his lungs.
The world slipped away again, pulling him back down into darkness.
Tessa
"Let me get this straight," Dr. Simons said, sitting cross-legged on her cot and looking at Tessa with an expression that suggested she thought Tessa might have lost her mind.
"When they bring the meal, we are going to lace part of your meal with not only some of the sleeping powder, but also a huge amount of pepper. "
"Right," Tessa confirmed, pacing the small basement room they'd been locked in for…
She gave her head a shake as she'd lost track of how long.
Days? It felt like days, though she knew it was a lot less.
Time moved strangely when you were a prisoner.
"And when he chokes on the pepper, because, let’s face it, nobody, not even that mountain, can eat that much pepper without reacting. I'll offer him my bottle of water."
"Which will be laced with the pain pills and the rest of the sleeping powder," Jackie finished, shaking her head. "This is either brilliant or completely insane."
"Let's hope they bring pepper this time," Tessa said, trying to inject more confidence into her voice than she actually felt. "They did when they delivered dinner."
"They did," Jackie confirmed. "Little packets of salt and pepper, like those you'd get from a fast-food restaurant."
"We can also throw pepper in his eyes if the water doesn't work fast enough," Tessa suggested. "That would at least disorient him long enough for us to make a run for it."
"Let's leave that as a last resort," Jackie said with a slight wince. "Pepper in the eyes is not nice. Trust me, I had a patient once who accidentally rubbed his eyes after handling jalapenos, and he was in agony for hours."
"We may have to if we want to—" Tessa's words were cut off by the sound of the bolt sliding on the other side of the door.
Both women fell silent immediately, their eyes fixed on the heavy metal door as it swung inward.
The giant walked in, and Tessa felt her breath catch in her throat the way it did every time she saw him.
He was massive. Easily six foot eight. Possibly more, with shoulders so broad they nearly touched both sides of the doorframe.
Tessa had never seen such a tall man before.
He wore all black and a hood that obscured his face, making him look even more intimidating.
But what made Tessa's heart stop wasn't the giant himself. It was what he was carrying.
Slung over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes was a person. A man, from the size and build. Unconscious or dead. Tessa couldn't tell which as the person was completely still.
The giant moved into the room with surprising grace for someone his size and unceremoniously dumped the body onto one of the empty cots. It landed with a heavy thud and a groan that told Tessa whoever it was was at least alive.
Then the body shifted slightly, and Tessa saw his face.
Ryan.
Her heart lurched so violently in her chest that she actually stumbled backward a step, her hand flying to her mouth to hold back the scream that wanted to escape.
No. No, not Ryan. Not him too.
"You have a new cellmate," the giant said in that strange, gravelly voice of his. He turned toward the door. "I’ll bring you breakfast in twenty minutes."
Then he was gone, the door slamming shut behind him and the bolt sliding home with a finality that made Tessa's stomach drop.
For a moment, both women just stood there, staring at Ryan's unconscious form on the cot. Then Jackie was moving, crossing the room quickly to kneel beside him.
"Ryan?" Jackie's voice was sharp with concern as her hands moved over him, checking for injuries with the practiced efficiency of a doctor. "Ryan, can you hear me?"
Tessa rushed over to the cot, her legs feeling shaky beneath her.
Her mind was reeling, spinning through the implications of Ryan being here.
Going over and over the last time she'd seen him. It had been in the park. He’d been angry and hurt, walking away from her after she'd essentially told him she didn't trust him not to break her heart and Maggie's.
And now he was here. Because of her? Had they taken him to get to her?
Her heart was racing, her stomach clenching with fear and guilt. "Is he okay?" The words came out strangled, barely above a whisper. "Jackie, is he okay?"
Jackie's hands continued their assessment, checking Ryan's pulse, lifting his eyelids to check his pupils, and running her fingers gently over his skull to check for injuries. "Is he okay?" Tessa asked again, louder this time. "Please, tell me he's okay."
"Give me a minute," Jackie said, her voice calm but focused.
A minute felt like an eternity. Tessa knelt on the other side of the cot, her hands hovering uselessly above Ryan's still form. She wanted to touch him, to reassure herself that he was real and breathing, but she was afraid to interfere with Jackie's examination.
Eventually, after what felt like forever but was probably only a few minutes, Jackie sat back on her heels and let out a long breath.
"He's fine," she said, and Tessa felt tears of relief prick at her eyes. "But he's been heavily drugged. Very heavily. They must have used a significant amount of sedative to keep someone like Ryan unconscious for this long."
"What do you mean, someone like Ryan?" Tessa asked.
Jackie glanced at her, then back at Ryan.
"I've known Ryan since he was a kid. I’ve treated him for everything from broken arms to the flu.
And I know about his military service, even if he can't talk about the specifics.
" She gently brushed Ryan's hair back from his forehead in a maternal gesture.
"Special Forces operatives go through extensive training to build up resistance to various forms of chemical incapacitation.
They're taught techniques to fight through the effects of sedatives and to maintain consciousness longer than the average person would.
They even receive controlled exposure to certain substances to build up a tolerance. "
Tessa's stomach clenched. "So for him to be this out of it..."
"They had to give him a massive dose," Jackie confirmed.
"More than would be safe for most people.
The fact that he's breathing steadily and his heart rate is strong is actually a testament to both his physical conditioning and resistance training.
Anyone else might have... well, let's just say it could have been much worse. "