When Molly awoke, she was tied to a chair, with something nasty-tasting over her mouth. The side of her neck stung, possibly from the drug Victoria had given her. Victoria.
She struggled against her bonds, looking around the dimly lit room. No, it wasn’t a room, it was more like a warehouse. She was tied to a chair in a freaking warehouse. Her brain shifted for a second as if she was watching a movie. She was in a movie. That was the only explanation for this level of craziness.
She blinked several times. Nope, she was still there. And she needed to pee like whoa. And nausea rolled in her stomach. She took a deep breath through her nose. Must not puke, must not puke. With tape over her mouth she’d probably drown in it. Her whole body was rejecting the scene in front of her, and she couldn’t blame it at all. So Victoria was Russian? But she’d had such a normal accent. Nothing about her suggested she was anything other than what she’d said she was.
Molly wondered if she was a plant just to sit next to her on the plane, or if she was a real Russian spy who worked for a news show in America. But why was she wondering about Victoria when she should be wondering how she could get out of here alive?
She tried to see how she was tied to the chair. Looked like a mess of duct tape on her wrists and probably over her mouth. So why would they gag her if she was alone here? If they’d gagged her, there must be someone close who might overhear her.
There was a bang of metal on metal, and Victoria and the Russian man entered the warehouse from a door on the far side. It took them forever to walk to her, and in that time, her heart and stomach started pumping pure terror through her. She could feel herself shake, but she couldn’t do anything about it.
Victoria ripped off the tape on her mouth. Her eyes were sad, somehow. Molly had been expecting some kind of viciousness that…well back to the movies again. In the movies, Victoria would have shot out a kneecap by now.
Why did her brain keep insisting that this was some kind of movie?
“I’m sorry, Molly. But you really should have come to the Media Club with me. We could have avoided all this.”
“What? I don’t understand,” she rasped.
The Russian passed Victoria a bottle of water, who in turn held it to Molly’s lips. As she sipped the water, she continued.
“It was a shame you got involved in our—I suppose you could call it—our strategy for a new Europe.” She crouched next to Molly.
“I can get you out of the country in a matter of hours, if you give me what Doubrov passed you.”
Molly’s heart raced. “I don’t understand. He didn’t pass me anything.”
Victoria leaned in close to her ear and whispered. “I don’t have time for this. This isn’t a negotiation. You tell me, or you don’t tell me. The latter would be no good for you.”
“I’m telling you the truth. He didn’t give me anything.”
Her captor said nothing, just stood and turned her back to Molly. She spoke Russian to Mr. SVR who shrugged and walked back to the door through which they’d entered. It banged.
Victoria turned back to her, and Molly expected her to make some kind of plea. Some woman-to-woman request that would make Molly confess. But instead she just pricked her with a needle again, and before Molly could say anything, the world went black.
David scoped out the rendezvous point. First from the alleyway in which he and Molly had hidden from the Russian, and then from as many vantage points as he could manage, including from the roof. Peterson didn’t seem to have sent an advance team. Maybe he could be trusted after all. God knew he needed someone he could trust right now. He needed to find Molly before Victoria found her.
He waited for Peterson, berating himself for not piecing this all together before now. She’d said her boyfriend was a policy wonk, and what the fuck “tri-cities” were there in DC? He’d been so stupid. So fucking slow. Jesus. If he couldn’t get to Molly in time, he didn’t know what he would do with himself. He figured his future at Barracks Security was over. He couldn’t even trust himself to keep an innocent woman safe.
He stood with his back to the wall watching all ways at the small crossroads until he saw Peterson come into view and advance up toward the meeting point. He seemed nervous, checking behind him every few paces. David stepped forward to meet him.
Peterson acknowledged him with a slight nod.
Five steps. He’d taken five damn steps before Peterson’s eyes widened and his pace stuttered.
Ice seeped into David’s veins. He didn’t need to look around to know he was about to be taken, and that Peterson probably knew nothing about it. He felt the heat of a large van behind him, and he knew he was too late to run, and clearly was at a disadvantage. A gun cocked.
Shit.
He held his hands out by his waist to minimize any tough-guy heroics these people might decide they need to perform. He took a breath and turned, hoping to see police as the lesser of two evils.
Nope. Three sets of eyes behind three balaclavas looked back at him from the sliding door of a van. Semiautomatic guns aimed at him. Yup. Nothing to see here. He turned back to Peterson, who was looking at his phone in disbelief.
Hands grabbed him and pulled him into the van. David went limp, hoping to keep from getting hurt in a way that might incapacitate him. As he was wondering if Molly was safe, and if he was at least being taken to her, a pinch at his neck filled him with warmth and tiredness.
“David. Wake up. David,” a voice said, over and over. His shoulders hurt, not an unusual occurrence. His mouth burned as if he’d had really bad heartburn. Tasted terrible.
He tried to open his eyes, but couldn’t manage to get them all the way open. And then he was lost in sleep again.
The next time he woke, a sharp pain ripped him from sleep. His shoulders felt like they were being ripped from his sockets.
“You like that?” a male voice asked.
Fuck. What was going on? David opened his eyes. He was in a warehouse, hanging from his hands. He twisted to see who was winching him up. He spun around on the chains. The Russian fucker. He was suspended so high that he could only touch the ground with his toes. And only if he got his shoes in the right position.
He’d been in this position exactly six years ago during his SERE training. He’d been captured, as they all had been, and subjected to questioning by the instructors. In that situation though, he knew they were supposed to hurt him, but not too badly, or with any lasting consequences. Just enough to make it real.
Not so much here.
He tried to kick out at the tall man, but he easily avoided David’s attempt. All the KGB guy did was nod over to the corner.
He spun around again. Molly. His heart clenched.
“What did you do to her?” he growled. She was tied to a chair with some kind of tape, head lolling to one side as if she was asleep. He forced his brain not to consider the possibility that she might be dead. But his heart went there anyway. It was as if his heart was being gripped and wrenched out of his body. Pure anger and frustration poured out of him in a howl of rage.
Before he could test his binds, Molly roused, unfocused and bleary-eyed. “What? Who’s there?” She shook her head several times as if to clear her vision. “What…? David?” She moaned. “I thought it was a dream. I wanted so much for it to have been a dream.”
Relief spiked through him, bringing a calming influence on his body. He still wanted to fucking rip that guy’s head off. Fucking Russians. But at least Molly was alive.
The man in the gray suit popped his cuffs and rolled his neck. “I’m going to leave you two to get reacquainted.” He sauntered to the door as if he didn’t have a care in the world. He probably didn’t.
“Are you okay? What happened?” David tried to see if she’d been harmed. He couldn’t see anything obvious.
“I’m fine. They just keep sedating me with something. I don’t know what it is. One prick and I’m out of it. Are you hurt?” Her voice sounded normal but tense.
“I’m fine,” he said, trying for his own normal voice. “Just, you know, hanging around.”
She choked a laugh, and then reprimanded him. “That’s not funny.”
“Sorry. How did you get here?” He wasn’t going to mention her escape, he didn’t want to remind her that she didn’t trust him…because trussed up like a dead cow on a hook, he probably didn’t instill trust now either.
“Victoria. My reporter friend? She offered me an escape route when the police were closing in on me, and when I opened the car door, he was holding a gun on me.” She nodded toward the door he’d disappeared through. “Are you really all right? You look like hell.”
He shrugged and then winced. “My shoulders is all,” he said, trying to position himself on his toes to relieve some of the strain.
“This is bad isn’t it? They can’t let us go now. Victoria has basically outed herself as a Russian…what? An agent? Collaborator?”
“I suspect she’s an SVR operative, like the suit. Probably deep undercover. She’ll either have to go back to Russia, or yes, eliminate anyone who knows who she is.” There was no point sugarcoating it. “But I’m going to get us out of here. So don’t worry about that.”
Her expression was blank, and he suddenly saw what she saw. A helpless washout, hanging from a meathook in a disused warehouse. How could she possibly have faith in him?
He hoped he could prove her—and maybe himself—wrong.
Hoped.
“I’m so sorry to get you involved in this, David,” she said. “This is all my fault.” She couldn’t even look at him.
“It’s not your fault, it’s Peterson’s fault. And the fucking Russians’ fault. But don’t worry, we’re going to take the whole outfit down when we get out of here.” He hoped he sounded confident, but the frown didn’t fall from her face, so probably he didn’t manage to convince her.
The door slammed again, but he didn’t have the energy to spin around and lose his tenuous grip on the floor with the toe of his shoes.
He looked inquisitively at Molly who mouthed “Victoria” at him.
“You’re both awake. That’s great,” she said in her perfect East Coast accent.
David wondered how long she’d been undercover. He wasn’t going to say anything unless pressed. Chatty Cathies never won the day. Made it too easy for their captors to get what they wanted.
“So,” she continued, as if they were all at some kind of cocktail party. “My people tell me that Doubrov passed you something before he was shot.” She paused for a second as if collecting her thoughts. “He asked to see you, didn’t he?”
Molly started, and David went still. Doubrov asked to see Molly? She hadn’t told him that. A bad feeling wafted through the warehouse like an unwelcome draft. What else hadn’t she told him?
Victoria noticed her response. “I see I am right.” She also seemed surprised. Molly needed to learn a poker face or she was going to give Victoria everything she needed.
“I’m not telling you anything,” Molly said. Her voice wavered but her gaze didn’t. She was one hell of a woman. He looked around for something to use as leverage. Anything that would get him free.
“You have to, sweetie. We don’t have much time. If you tell me what I need to know, I’m going to let you go. Leave you here, obviously, but you’ll be free eventually. I think the warehouse workers start work at seven a.m. on Monday.
David shook his head at Molly from behind Victoria’s head. Don’t believe her. It was a convincing effort from Victoria. Hardship, pain, starvation, but no death. It sounded plausible, but he didn’t believe her for a moment. He willed Molly not to fall for it. But in all honesty, half of him wanted to know what she knew too. Obviously she’d been keeping things from him too. More evidence that she didn’t trust him. Okay. He steeled himself. He probably couldn’t ever persuade her that she could trust him. But he could persuade himself that he was trustworthy.
The only thing he knew was that if the Russians wanted information, he wasn’t going to give it to them. Wait, what had she said? Time was running out? That didn’t sound good. Not good at all. There had to be a larger picture. The big operation that Russia was planning at the G20 meeting? Had to be something huge. Devastating.
David ran through everything he knew. Victoria becomes Peterson’s girlfriend to get the in on the DOS end of their diplomacy. Maybe she gets drunk, and says enough to tip Peterson off. Peterson taps Molly to pass Doubrov a note warning him that the Russian finance minister was going to be taken. But by whom? Why? It all sounded too Cold War to be plausible.
The engraving on the pen that had been used as the connection point of the improvised explosive. Victoria was the hardcore operative he and Mal had discussed. She’d killed Doubrov… His mind stuttered. He remembered what he’d been thinking about when he’d been drugged. The second shot. The first shot had taken Doubrov out, but only because Molly had bent down to pick up the note.
Molly had been the target. Victoria had been trying to kill Molly.
Jesus, the pain was really focusing his mind. “Don’t tell her anything, Mol. She’s the one who tried to kill you, but got Doubrov instead.” He needed to get Victoria’s attention on him.
“Did you get into trouble when you accidentally killed Doubrov instead of Molly? Are you tying up loose ends by killing us both? Will you also kill Peterson? Your boyfriend? You want to know how I knew it was you? You used your own monogrammed pen as your trip-wire contact blocker.”
It worked. She snapped open a baton and wacked him across his stretched ribs. His feet gave way and he swung, the pain humming though him like the echo of a choirboy’s last note.
“That wasn’t my fault. I had to improvise. My target spotter couldn’t spot his own ass in a mirror. I know who you are, Sergeant David Church. Explosive Ordinance Disposal. If it had been anyone but you, my bombs would have gone off as planned and none of this would have happened. It’s all your fault. It’s all your fault.” She punctuated each word with a lash of her baton.
He grit his teeth and shouted through them, not giving her the satisfaction of seeing him groan or fucking whimper in pain, which is what he wanted to do. SERE training. Don’t give the enemy the psychological advantage. If you’re scared, in pain, or weak, act angry.
“Don’t!” Molly said. “I’ll tell you anything you want. Just don’t hurt him. He didn’t have anything to do with this. I just met him here. I’m the one you need to talk to. Although I’m afraid it’s too late for you.”
David’s head snapped up. What the fuck was she talking about? Victoria’s attention was one hundred percent on Molly now. He looked up at the binds around his wrists that were attached to the chain. When she’d hit him and he’d weighed down on them, he’d felt them rip a bit.
“I knew you weren’t just the innocent bystander my boss thought you were,” Victoria said, leaning in satisfaction against a wooden table and folding her arms across her pink jacket. “Tell me more.”
“I want some water first. For me and David. Then I’ll talk,” Molly said, coughing for effect.
Victoria screwed her face up for a second, and then shrugged. “Okay. But if you don’t talk…what am I saying? Of course you’ll talk. You really have no choice.”
She made the long walk to the door of the warehouse and slipped out. “What are you doing? She will kill you once you’ve given her what she wants. It was you she was after in the first place.” His heart was racing at the little time they had.
“I know. I just don’t want you here when that happens. I dragged you into this, and I’m so sorry. I had no idea this would get so…”
“Fucked up?” he asked between his teeth.
“Yeah. I’m going to give her enough information to let you go. Then, I guess, we’ll see what happens.” She was numb. She knew she should be petrified, but she couldn’t gather enough emotion to feel anything. Every part of her wanted him away from this. She had no idea how seeing her die would affect him, but given the last year, she had her suspicions. If she could just save him from this, she would be okay. She would die with no regrets. Well, that wasn’t really true, but she was trying her hardest to hold it all together.
“You’re sweet,” he said. “But you really don’t have to do that for me.” Suddenly there was no strain in his voice at all. It was like they were having coffee somewhere. “Just shuffle yourself over here a bit.”
She used her body to jump her chair over to David.
“Sorry about this,” he said as he put his feet on her thighs. He was using the extra height to try to flip his chains off the hook hanging from the ceiling. “I need more height.”
Crap. She used all her energy to shuffle over to the big wooden table that Victoria had put her case on. When she’d laid it there, Molly imagined it was full of torture devices.
“We have to hurry, sweetheart.” Still his voice held no tension.
She pushed the back of her chair against the table and shoved it. The effort was wearing her out. She felt weak and she didn’t know if it was from the drug they’d kept giving her, or the fact that she’d been strapped to the chair for…how long she didn’t really know. She pushed, and shoved. Willing herself to find the energy to move the table to him.
“Just a bit further, you’re doing great.” As he said the words, the door slammed open.
Shit. She gave one more shove, mustering all the energy she could. The momentum moved the table about a foot or two, and left Molly hanging in midair for a second before she crashed to the ground. She rolled on to her side to get her eyes on David.
From her prone position, she saw Victoria’s legs running toward them, but couldn’t see David’s legs, which hopefully meant that he was on the table. A crash of chains echoed around the room. Molly took a breath and tried to figure out how she could help him.
She rolled to try to get some leverage and heard the chair creaking. Maybe she could break it. She was sure she’d seen Black Widow do this in a movie. She rolled against the back of the chair. There was a snap as one of the chair arms detached from the back. Nice.
She rolled harder, slamming the chair against the concrete. Pain radiated through her bones as the back splintered away from the arms. She heard grunts, and the rattle of chains. Frantically she beat her bent legs down hard. Again and again, trying not to notice the shots of pain that radiated through her. One last crash, and the legs of the chair had broken. They were still attached to her, but they’d broken off the seat.
She leapt up. David was standing, barely. He was slumped as if he couldn’t stand up anymore. Victoria lay on the floor, one of her legs pointing in a very unnatural direction, unconscious. Maybe dead.
She got to David just in time to put her hands on him before he fell to the ground. She managed to brace his fall. “You were awesome,” she said. “You saved us.” She kissed the side of his head and held him, doing little more than rocking in relief. Her brain went fuzzy, and she closed her eyes, just wanting to be anywhere but here.
She roused herself to untie David’s wrists, and then her own when David just groaned. “We have to go. Can you stand?” she asked. The fight must have really taken it out of him. She pulled herself to her feet leaning on the table. She leaned down to pull David up, and for the first time, saw blood on the floor. Sticky dark blood. A pool.
She sank to her knees. “David? Are you hurt?” She tried to check him, but it wasn’t until she held him that she realized he was bleeding from his side.
“Go, sweetheart. They want you. You have to run. Go to the embassy. Ask them to call Sadie Walker. She’s a friend of Harry and Matt’s. Tell her everything. Everything you haven’t told me. She’s…” his voice faded.
“Fuck that all to hell. I’m not leaving here without you.” Suddenly immune to her own injuries, she looked around for something to help him.
Victoria’s case. She opened it. Torture devices? It was the suitcase she’d arrived with. Just freaking clothes, a wallet and…an iPad. She frantically rifled through her wallet and plucked out a credit card and pressed it against his wound to make the gaping hole airtight. She grabbed one of Victoria’s silk shirts and wrapped it around him, tying the arms around his waist to hold it in place.
He was barely conscious now, and as adrenaline pumped through her she knew she needed to get him away from the warehouse before the Russian came back with the water Victoria had requested. Otherwise David wouldn’t get the help he needed.
She was about to lift David on to his feet, when her brain registered a ringing sound. “Can you stand?” she asked. He waved his hand at her, in what would be a convincing shoo-away if it hadn’t been for the table he was leaning against scraping back on the concrete floor.
Victoria stirred at the sound of the phone, but didn’t come to. Thank God. Molly wasn’t sure if she could knock her out, although she was fairly certain she could outrun her. She made sure David was upright and likely to stay that way for a second, and went back to Victoria’s things. Phone. She had a phone. Where the hell was it?
She looked through the whole bag, and then started on the zipper pockets. There. Front pocket, along with a gun. She took the phone and left the gun.
A car door slammed outside, and without hesitating she went for the gun, tucked it into David’s back pocket, and wrapped his arm around her shoulders. “Gotta walk now, okay? Come on.”
She half dragged him to the opposite side of the warehouse, behind some large wooden crates, to a window. Shit. There was water out there. She sat David down on the concrete, “Shhh.” She laid her fingers across his mouth and felt him nod beneath her hand.
She took the phone and dialed the only number she knew by heart. Her boss’s—Harry’s.
Harry picked up the phone immediately. “Hello?”
“Harry, it’s me,” she whispered.
“Who? I can’t hear.”
Molly looked at the phone. It had all the bars.
“Molly,” she ground out, peeking through the crates. The Russian was in the building now. And the whole place suddenly seemed like one big echo chamber. She hung up the phone, and texted Harry instead.
It’s Molly. Kidnapped by Russians with David Church in warehouse by the sea in Athens.
God, she hoped they were still in Athens.
He’s injured, but told me to get Sadie Walker on it?
She waited for a reply, and then realized that the text notifying ring would echo all around the warehouse basically identifying where they were. She fumbled for the settings, but it was too late.
Shit. She stuffed the phone into her pocket without reading the reply and looked for somewhere to run. She considered pushing David out of the window, but worried that he wouldn’t be able to stay afloat without her there. They sat in silence as the minutes ticked by. She was worried if she waited much longer to make a decision he’d bleed out in front of her.
She made her decision. She would leave David there, and give the Russian what he wanted, and try to buy some time. She held her hands up and stepped out from behind the row of shipping crates.
What?
The Russian was gone.
So was Victoria, and the broken chair, and her suitcase. It was like nothing had happened there. Even the pool of David’s blood had gone. Had she imagined the whole thing?
A noise came from behind her, she turned to find David, holding a gun out, leaning against one of the crates.
“They’ve gone,” she said.
He slumped, and she ran the few short paces to his side and slipped his arm around her shoulders again. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”
It took forever to cross the warehouse with David barely able to stumble, let alone walk. Every step that echoed around the building worried Molly that someone would come out of the shadows and kill them. She didn’t care so much about herself, but she needed to get David to safety. Get him a doctor.
After about ten minutes, her own legs started wobbling under both their weight. She was sweating hard. She hoped it was a side effect of the drug she’d been jabbed with, but the exertion was killing her. At least that’s how it felt. She was cold, sweaty and shaky. Just a few more steps to get out.
Just a few more steps.
Just a few…
She reached for the door handle, but it was farther away than she thought.
A few more steps. Her fingertips scraped the metal of the door. She pulled it open with the rest of her energy.
Daylight.
And the metal-on-metal cocking of a lot of weapons.
“Hold it.”
“Hands up!”
“Show me your hands.”
She slumped to the ground, her last action was to try to make sure David fell on her, and not the hard ground. He did.
She didn’t care about the guns. Relief was the last emotion her consciousness registered.
They had American accents.