35

 

 

“I’ve got to go.” His gaze never leaving Vic, Gary edged toward the wide hall of the mud room that led to the outside—and freedom.

Makmoud once more turned his penetrating gaze to him. “I want you to take Victor to the room on the third floor.”

“I need to—” Gary quelled under his intense scrutiny. He swallowed hard as those dark eyes burned into his and once more seared his soul like they had years before.

“You will take him upstairs.” The leader’s eyes narrowed. He took a step toward the FBI agent. “Musa, I want you to tie the other hostages together on the floor against the hearth.”

The man Makmoud had called Musa wasted no time in securing Vic’s hands behind his back. He hauled him upright and shoved him to Gary, who escorted him up the first set of stairs.

“Why’d you do it?” Vic’s question cut into Gary’s heart, his soul.

Gary marched him around the walkway to the stairway leading upward. “Do what?”

“Betray me.”

They reached the top. Keeping one hand around Vic’s arm, Gary pushed open the door to what appeared to be a master suite. He pushed his friend inside.

Vic stumbled. He swung around to face him. “Why’d you do it?”

Gary dragged over a stool to the middle of the room and pointed to it. “Sit.”

“Not until you answer my question.”

“You wouldn’t understand.”

“You’re right. I don’t. I trusted you, and you did the worst thing possible.”

“I had no choice, all right?”

“He broke you, didn’t he?”

Gary flinched. The buzzing flared as if to reprimand him for thinking about his captivity.

Vic eased onto the stool. “Don’t think I missed what he said about breaking people. Or your reaction.”

“You remember ten years ago?” Gary glowered at him. “How my team drew the short straw on that mission? It was Makmoud and his gang who ambushed us. Him and that brother of his. We all got shot up. They killed our comms guys.”

“I remember.”

“I took two bullets, one to the shoulder and one to the leg. When they nursed us back to health, the fun began.” More images flashed across his mind.

His lying on the floor of the torture chamber.

The last shots he fired before he passed out.

Mary’s farewell kiss before they deployed.

Makmoud kneeling beside him and showing him a photo of Mary’s painting they’d hung above the fireplace in their house.

They sped up into a blur that faded. On the heels of that came the headache that always joined the buzzing.

“Makmoud set to work breaking us. The torture was awful. One by one, the other guys broke. I guess he thought they were weak because he executed each of them. I lasted eight weeks.”

“Everyone breaks. We all know that.”

“And then...” The headache strengthened. He winced and rubbed his temples. “I don’t remember what happened. Or I can’t remember.”

He paced and clenched his head between his hands. “There’s this…buzzing, like a swarm of bees. It shows up each time I try to remember or when…when he wants me to do something. And…this headache.”

He wagged his head as if the motion would disperse it. “For a while I couldn’t even remember who Makmoud was. And I can only remember the name of my handler when I’m—”

He flinched as the buzzing nearly deafened him.

Vic’s low voice finally broke through the noise. “You didn’t have to do this. People could die you know. Deborah could. And her—”

“Deborah was the one who started this mess.”

“Don’t you blame her—”

“For what? For this unfortunate position I’m in?” Gary stopped and bent, his hands on his knees, their noses inches apart. “If she’d backed off, laid off her mission, then you and I wouldn’t be sitting here now. But no. She had to keep looking, didn’t she? Had to keep pressing the issue—”

“Because you’re Murdock.” Vic’s eyes widened. “You’re the one who killed Nasser al-Saad. And several others.”

Gary straightened. His hands clenched. “I had to.”

Vic quirked an eyebrow at him.

“Don’t you get it? One thing you don’t know about Makmoud is that he is very, very good at what he does. They’d call me with a phrase.” As if to agree, the buzzing rose to a crescendo. He grasped his head with his hands. “I hate this! That…that phrase triggered a name and a number I was to call to get my assignment. I’d carry that out. Then that information would disappear. Poof!”

Gary moved his hands to simulate a small explosion. He shook his head. As if thrown into a corner, the buzzing receded. “Then I’d get fifty grand. You know my little gambling addiction? He fed that. At least those payments got Mary off my back.”

Vic glared at him. His jaw flexed. “I—I can’t believe you. You sold out completely, didn’t you?”

“I told you I didn’t have a choice.”

“Don’t you realize what you’ve done? You’ve sentenced a woman and her four children to death. And what about this team you put together? You betrayed us in the deepest way possible. Betrayed me, your best friend. I trusted you completely.”

Gary’s face flushed with anger. His hands balled into fists. “Yeah? Well, trust is highly overrated my friend. Like I said, I had no choice.”

“You always have a choice. What is Mary going to think when all of this comes to light?”

His fist flashed out and caught Vic across the face.

His former best friend tumbled from the stool. He landed heavily on his side. A groan escaped him. He struggled to sit up.

“You’d like to think that. You weren’t in my shoes. You never were. You didn’t suffer like I did and still do!” He jabbed his toe into Vic’s solar plexus.

His friend moaned and crumpled to the ground.

“You didn’t hear three comrades slowly die. Their screams, their pleas for mercy. You didn’t suffer from malnutrition and lack of hygiene and sleep. And they knew everything about me. They were even in my house!” He kicked him in the side.

The air whooshed out of Vic’s lungs.

“And you didn’t get pictures from your handler showing scenes of your family, didn’t get the messages like I did threatening to kill them if I didn’t obey. Don’t you dare preach to me like I had a choice in the matter!” He reared back for a final, punishing kick.

“Enough.” Makmoud’s voice cut into Gary’s rant like a samurai sword.

Gary whipped around. His handler stood in the doorway, his hands hooked in his belt, a smirk on his face as he observed the meltdown of a friendship. Something in his dark eyes made Gary swallow hard. Chest heaving, he backed away from Vic.

The accusation in his friend’s eyes said it all.

Their friendship of fifteen years had crumbled in the span of an hour.

“What time is your flight, Gary?”

He broke eye contact at Makmoud’s question.

“Red eye. Ten o’clock.” Pain in his hand made him glance downward. His knuckles swelled from where he’d hit Vic.

“Then I suggest that you be on your way to Phoenix. Have yourself a nice supper at the airport and relax before you return to your family. Shadow Box and Deborah? We’ll take care of them.”

Gary cast another glance at Vic, who remained on the floor, his struggles now weaker.

“Go on,” Makmoud urged. “No one will be any the wiser.”

Finally, Gary turned away.

Vic was right.

He’d betrayed his best friend in the worst way More than that. He’d sentenced his friend to die alongside the comrades who’d also trusted him.

Anguish filled his heart and bled into his soul.

Gary fled downstairs, out the back door, and to the Commander. He’d take it to the airport and retrieve his own car.

Then he’d set about rearranging his life in an attempt to forget the treachery he’d committed.

 

 

“Get up, Victor Chavez.”

Makmoud’s low voice breached the pain blazing through Victor.

Finally, he regained his wind enough to push himself to a sitting position. His abs protested. He got a foot under himself. A wince coursed through him as he stretched his jaw and rotated his shoulder. The pain receded in both, and he eased onto the stool.

In front of him, Makmoud eyed him and chattered into his phone in Farsi.

Victor thought he heard Gary’s name mixed into the foreign language, but he couldn’t be sure.

Makmoud lowered his phone and slid it into an outside pocket of his desert camouflage fatigue pants.

“Now that my little conversation is finished, my apologies.” He shut the door, sealing Victor from any chance at escape. “You had quite a setup here, didn’t you? You thought you were safe. But you forgot about what the Greeks called the Trojan horse, yes?”

“I’m not sure I follow.”

Hands behind his back, Makmoud began circling Victor like a professor lecturing his class. “Tell me something. Did you ever wonder how Liza Murphy escaped so easily?”

“I figured she outsmarted your dimwitted minions.”

The blow across his head startled more than hurt him.

“Hey!”

“Fool.” Makmoud’s voice lowered. “You see, Gary had no idea of where you were based. Absolutely none. I must applaud you for keeping him from finding out. I knew I needed other methods. Other, better methods. Jibril and his comrade kidnapped Liza and took her to our safe house.”

“North Charleston.”

“Correct.” Makmoud stopped in front of him and folded his arms across his chest. “Believe it or not, I did not give permission for her mistreatment, but it played right into my hands.” He lifted his chin and smiled. “She got raped and beat up, and I played her savior. I fed her, protected her, and let her sleep. With the help of a heavy sedative, that is. And once she did? Then it was simply a matter of injecting a tracking device into her. You’ll find it in her right calf muscle if you look.”

He resumed his walk. “Of course, that won’t matter soon, now will it? And once I’d completed that task? I let her go. I let her go because I knew your first instinct would be to reunite her with her sister.”

Victor bit back his groan. He’d played exactly into Makmoud’s hands.

“It’s so very interesting that Gary chose you to lead this team. You, a washed-up former Secret Service agent. One who had been played for a fool for years, yes? By none other than the woman you loved.”

Hot, boiling anger that would get him into trouble if he weren’t careful rose in Victor’s chest and worked its way to his neck. His hands balled into fists. “I loved her.”

Makmoud paused behind him. “Oh, I know you did. Just as I loved Rachel long ago. You know, Victor, I taught her everything she knew. I learned about this little weakness she had. And then when we reconnected? I fed that addiction. It was never about love between us in those later years. She wanted something. I gave it to her in exchange for information. Until you proposed to spend the rest of your life with her.”

Agony exploded in his kidney from Makmoud’s fist. Victor moaned and sagged forward onto the floor. He gritted his teeth and panted to alleviate the pain. Slowly, he drew his leg up and climbed to one knee.

Makmoud stood near him, his feet shoulder width apart, his arms still folded across his chest.

The strength began rushing back to Victor.

The sneer crossed his foe’s face. “You left me with no choice. I was going to have Maggie McCall one way or the other. So I took Rachel’s sister to force her to do my will. And now? Susanna is my concubine.”

“You…” Victor pushed off and charged him.

Makmoud batted him away with an open palm.

Off balance, Victor stumbled.

With one move, Makmoud swept his feet out from under him.

Victor hit the ground hard. Pain exploded in his skull as he rapped his head on the stool.

“Get up, you fool.”

Gritting his teeth against the agony, Victor rose to his knees.

He collapsed onto his side.

“Yes, Gary was right in his tale that I broke him. I have to admire his tenacity since he was indeed the last one standing. Then, with him pliable, I rebuilt his psychological profile into someone I could use. Just as I’ll do with all of you.” Makmoud nudged him. “You see, when Deborah and her children arrive with the rest of your team, we’ll execute her and leave her body. Your team and her children will disappear. Gary will claim he had no idea that you’d gone rogue.”

He grabbed him by the collar of his shirt and his belt loop and dumped him onto the stool. “And when we reach our destination? We’ll see exactly how tough everyone is as I break all of you, including Deborah’s son. Jibril also said something about wanting Sana as his own. And Anna?”

Makmoud stepped to the door. “Perhaps I’ll make her mine. Something to think about, yes? Enjoy your last few hours of freedom, Victor Chavez.”

With that, he shut the door.

Victor groaned and hung his head. They were trapped with no way out. He could only watch time ran out for them.