Chapter 26
Chapter Twenty-Six
“Happy now?” Hugo bit out as blood poured from his broken nose and busted lip. He glared at Ryan.
No, Ryan was not happy. “She screamed.” That had been Simone’s scream, right before the line went dead.
“She was supposed to be safe. Logan was supposed to keep her safe.” He’d sent Simone away with Logan because the prick should only have allegiance to her.
She was Logan’s family, after all. Family first. But Logan—he’d betrayed her?
I sent her off to die.
Rage and fear nearly splintered him apart.
Hugo spat blood at him.
Ryan punched the jerk again. Hard. Right in the face. After that prick had come at him with a blade, Ryan had unleashed on the fool.
He’d pummeled the bastard into the floor, only to be hauled back by Jamar and Charlotte.
And, even as Ryan’s fist connected with Hugo’s face again…
Jamar hauled him back once more. “Focus!” Jamar blasted.
Oh, he had focus. The focus of his fist hitting Hugo’s face.
“Control,” Jamar snapped as his grip tightened on Ryan’s shoulders. “Get your control back so we can deal with this clusterfuck.”
It was a major clusterfuck. They’d forced all of the customers and staff out of the restaurant. Now it was just filled with CIA and MI6 operatives. Even Jezebel was on her way over.
Everyone was there but…
Where the hell is Harry? He hadn’t seen that green agent anywhere. What was Harry off doing? Shoveling more updates to the pencil pushers back at MI6’s main office? Ryan shook free of Jamar’s hold.
“Told him what you wanted…me to say…” Blood dripped down Hugo’s chin. “Happy?” Hugo sat in a chair right in front of Ryan.
Ryan leaned forward so that he could be on eye level with the bastard. “You came to kill me.”
Hugo’s mouth curled into a half-smile.
“You are working for Konstantin.” Obviously. “Were you doing that shit all along? Were you running behind Frederick’s back the whole time?” Where the hell was Frederick?
Unfortunately, Ryan had a bad suspicion about Frederick’s location. What had Hugo told him…that he could be seeing Frederick soon? Considering that Hugo had come to the restaurant intending to kill Ryan, then he must have meant…what, exactly, about Frederick’s location?
That I’d see him in hell?
Hugo hadn’t answered Ryan’s questions. So he pushed, “He’s dead, isn’t he? You killed Frederick?”
Not a half-smile any longer. A full smile stretched across Hugo’s face. Dammit. Ryan’s head whipped toward a watchful Charlotte. “Get a crew out to Frederick’s country estate. Search the place. Top to bottom.”
She whirled away, already pulling out her phone.
And, speaking of phones, Ryan tossed the one he still held at Jamar.
The phone that Hugo had brought into the restaurant.
Hopefully, he hadn’t damaged it too much when he’d closed his fist around the damn thing.
“We just called Konstantin. Try getting the bastard again. Triangulate signals. Track the prick. Find him.”
Jamar closed his hand around the phone. “On it.”
But Ryan knew it wouldn’t be easy. Hell, if he’d been Konstantin, he would have immediately trashed the phone after that call.
“We need to trace Konstantin.” Ryan’s mind was racing. “We need to trace Simone.” Simone. “I gave her a phone.” Excitement surged within him. “We can track her that way.” He rattled off instructions and details about Simone’s phone to the agents around him, and they sprang into action.
Have to find Simone. Konstantin took Simone. She screamed. I have to find her. Ryan’s breath shuddered in and out. In and out. “You know where he took her.” Ryan glared at Hugo.
“Sounds like you think you can find her.” Mocking laughter rolled from Hugo. “Good luck with all that. You don’t need me.”
Ryan turned back to the table and he swiped the knife there—the knife that he’d taken from Hugo.
He recognized the particular weapon. He’d seen it before with the British Special Forces teams. Now he studied the knife with narrowed eyes.
Ryan was pretty sure he could see traces of dried blood near the tip.
Oh, yeah, Frederick is dead. The poor, dumb sonofabitch.
“You think I’m scared of you?” Hugo suddenly challenged. “I can handle a fool like you in my sleep. You are not going to get me to break down in some interrogation. You won’t get me to—”
In a blink, Ryan had the tip of the blade pressed against his enemy. “It’s good for slipping between the ribs, isn’t it?” His voice was low, carrying only to Hugo.
Hugo had gone dead still.
“You think you’re the only one who knows that trick?
I can slide it between your ribs. I can kill you before you can even draw the breath to scream.
But, I won’t.” It was his turn to smile.
“Because your death does not benefit me. Not yet. Instead, I will torture you. Moment by moment. Piece by piece. Bit by bit. Believe me when I say that Alexei had nothing on me.”
“Y-you’re bluffing. I was Special Forces, I won’t—”
“Cry me a fucking river. I don’t care what you were. You need to be more concerned with what I am.” Ryan pressed the tip of that blade into him. Other agents had already zip-tied Hugo’s hands behind his back. “I’m the man who will destroy anyone who is between me and my goal.”
Hugo tried to ease away from the blade.
There was nowhere for him to go.
“You know what my goal is?” Ryan demanded, voice still low.
“K-Konstantin?”
“Konstantin has someone important to me. My goal is Simone. If anything happens to her before I get her back…” The blade pierced Hugo’s skin.
Hugo sucked in a breath.
“You’ll be begging for death before I’m done with you,” Ryan swore.
“Ryan!” Jamar’s booming voice.
He left the blade in Hugo.
“Dammit, Ryan, stop!” Jamar tried to haul him back.
“Oh, my bad.” Ryan stepped away from Hugo. For the moment. “Didn’t realize I was so close to him.”
Jamar glared at him, nostrils flaring and gaze hard. Aw, Jamar. One of the truly good guys. A guy who was lucky enough to have a wife and twin boys at home. A family that loved him. But even good guys could break, and Ryan knew that if anyone ever touched Jamar’s family…
There will be hell to pay.
Because you did not fuck with family.
Family.
The word whispered through his head. He’d trusted Logan because the guy should have been Simone’s family. Yet Logan had still betrayed her. Why? Why would Logan do that to Simone?
Family.
“We’ve got her!” Another agent suddenly called out. “Found her phone! We’ve got Simone!”
Hell, yes.
But they didn’t find Simone. They found Harry. Or rather, the bleeding, tangled mess that was the MI6 agent.
Simone’s phone had been discovered near the agent. Stomped. Shattered. And as for Harry…
Ryan watched as the guy was loaded into the back of an ambulance. The authorities had closed off the street, making the entire area a crime scene. The pounding of Ryan’s heart echoed in his ears.
Jezebel had joined them on the scene. She was in the back of the ambulance right then, leaning over Harry’s form.
Barking out orders to the EMTs. Ryan stood about five feet from the ambulance, his hands clenched into fists at his sides as he tried to keep from stumbling straight into the pool of rage that wanted to suck him under.
Harry left for dead.
Simone gone…gone…
In his mind, he could hear the endless echo of her scream.
“Ryan! Ryan, dammit, get your ass in here! He’s talking!” Jezebel shouted.
He bounded into the ambulance. Not like there was a ton of room in there, and, oh, no, but Harry looked like hell. Face swollen. So much blood. Broken bones.
“Simone was here,” Jezebel said.
Well, yes, he got that. Her phone had been found at the scene. The phone Ryan had given her. I was supposed to call her when it was safe. Supposed to meet up with her again and then we were going to—
“Tried…” A strained whisper from Harry. “H-help me…”
“We are getting you help,” Jezebel assured him as she squeezed his right shoulder. One of the few parts of his body that did not seem injured.
“No…” Harry’s eyes cracked open. “She…help…”
Simone had tried to help him? Was that what Harry was attempting to say? “Who did this to you?”
Harry’s eyes opened a bit more. “K-Konstantin.”
Jezebel stiffened. “You think it was him or you know?”
“S-saw him…right in f-front…”
Jezebel’s gaze cut to Ryan. “The bastard is too confident and far too sloppy. We’ve got an agent who can testify that Konstantin tried to kill him. That means we have the man, dead to fucking rights.”
Dead was the operative word. Konstantin had clearly thought Harry would not survive and live to tell anyone about the attack. As brutal as it was to think, Ryan was surprised that Konstantin hadn’t finished off the job and ended Harry then and there.
“Sh-shot…”
What? Ryan and Jezebel both leaned closer to Harry because the word had been so low.
“K-Konstantin…told the guy to shoot me…”
“What guy?” Jezebel demanded. “And you’re shot?” She grabbed the arm of the nearby EMT, a woman who’d been working on Harry’s left leg. “Are you treating a bullet wound? Why is this vehicle not flying to a hospital? Get us going!”
Harry shook his head. “H-he missed…deliberately…” A gasp. “Konstantin…he thinks…I’m…dead.”
The siren wailed. The ambulance seemed to vibrate around them. “Who missed?” But Ryan had a suspicion.
“Was…with S-Simone.” Harry’s lashes fell. “He…pulled her…”
“We’re leaving, now,” the ambulance driver barked from the front.
“I’m staying with him.” Jezebel pushed Ryan. “You go find Simone. You find Konstantin. You take that bastard down, you understand me?”
He was already leaping from the ambulance. He cleared it right before another attendant slammed the rear doors shut.
Charlotte rushed toward him, with her phone held near her ear.
The ambulance roared away.
“We have a body!” Charlotte cried.
Not Simone. Not—
“Frederick Bradwin was just found in his bed. Stabbed multiple times. Someone tossed covers over him and left the guy there.” She shook her head in disgust.