Dangerous in Training (Aegis Group, #2) (22 page)

She was changing him. Making him a better person. Now he just had to get her back.

In short order Travis and Mason were bumping across town in a newer four-door sedan. They didn’t speak, but then again Travis wasn’t big that kind of thing. He seemed to save all his words for his wife.

Where was Hannah now? Was she okay? What was she doing?

He wished he would have thought to go through some training with her. Teach her something. Either she was scared out of her mind...or she was fighting back. He didn’t know which he’d prefer. If she was too docile, she’d get the wrong attention. If she fought back, they might hurt her. He had to cling to his theory she was more valuable unhurt than otherwise.

“Look for this place, will you?” Travis’ words brought Mason into the present.

He sat forward, eyes peeled for the hotel.

They rolled down a wide street with darkened windows and little traffic. It was the kind of place that saw more activity later at night.

“There. Pull around back.” Mason pointed to a two-story building painted maroon with white trim. It showed its age in the chipped exterior and dilapidated porch.

Travis steered the car into the alley behind the building. The car barely fit between the piles of garbage on either side.

“No cameras or security,” Mason muttered.

“You think a place like this would have cameras?”

“You never know what kind of business he’s doing inside.”

“I’d guess it’s the hourly kind.”

Mason’s gut rolled. It was one thing to choose prostitution, it was another to be forced into it. He almost prayed they ran into the owner, because there were some kinds of people the earth didn’t need—but it wasn’t his call to make. He wasn’t the law here, and that wasn’t why they’d come all this way.

“I’ll go around front, see what they’re selling. If I can let you in through the back I will.” Mason pulled his hat down a little farther on his head. It still had the faint scent of Hannah.

They got out of the car, and Mason circled the building. It was too early for the working girls to be on shift, but there was plenty of evidence that a lot of people hung out along the street.

Mason pushed open the front door and entered the smallest hotel lobby he’d ever seen. The front desk was empty, but a TV played loudly in the background.

“
Hola
?” he called out.

An older man squeezed himself through the opening to the front desk. He was so thick he didn’t even have a neck. His head sort of sat on top of his shoulders and his small, beady eyes darted around, measuring Mason.

“An American,” the clerk said in Spanish.

“Yes,” Mason stuck to Spanish. “I was told this was the place to come for a room and—services.” Mason tasted bile at the back of his throat. Even pretending to be a customer was enough to make him sick.

“The girls don’t start until after lunch.”

“Enough time for me to take a nap.” Mason grinned. “Let me take a room for the night.”

The clerk named the price and Mason paid after a little haggling. In a place like this, the first price was never the real price and paying the initial sum would only be cause for suspicion. He took the room key the clerk offered and strolled toward the rear hallway.

Mason checked the number to the sign. His room was to the right.

He turned left. Ten feet and the rear emergency entrance stood open. Travis leaned against the alcove’s wall.

“Door’s off its hinges,” Travis said.

“Well, quick exit.”

“So?”

“He’s not offering anything right now. I say we search the place, see what we find.”

“Sounds good to me.” Travis pushed off the wall and nodded down the hall.

Travis took the left wing while Mason strolled the other direction. He passed the opening to the lobby entrance and caught a whiff of cigarette smoke. Mixed with the odor of sweat and stale beer, it completed the holy trinity of cheap hotel smells.

Mason passed a door with OFFICE scrawled on it in marker. Four doors down was another door that sported several duct tape patch jobs and EMPLOYEES ONLY.

He glanced back the way he’d come, but Travis wasn’t anywhere to be seen. The knob to the EMPLOYEES ONLY door wiggled in his hand, but turned without too much noise. He held his breath and paused, but no one came to investigate. The hinges were silent, allowing the door to open up to a steep staircase that descended into near darkness.

What could go wrong?

He tiptoed down the first three stairs before pulling the door shut behind him.

With the TV mostly muted, he could hear music playing softly below. Some sort of living quarters or crash space?

He crept down the flight of stairs, drawing his gun as he went. He hardly dared to breathe.

A long, low squeak reverberated off the concrete walls. The stupid stair.

Below, a chain rattled and fabric rustled.

Fuck. No.

Mason took the last six stairs faster, needing to see.

Whatever happened would happen.

Mason reached the bottom of the stairs and pivoted, gun up.

Light filtered in through long, narrow, dirty windows near the ceiling. It was an open single-room apartment. Chains circled the base of a metal post going up to the ceiling. The rest of the length stretched away into the shadows. He could see shapes, the light reflecting off eyes.

His stomach nearly revolted. He’d seen some horrors in his time and he prayed he never lost his disgust for them. This was wrong.

The owner had to be the clerk.

The place smelled of him.

Mason lowered his gun and took one hand off the firearm, holding it up.

“I’m looking for friends of Abraham. Do you know him?” He spoke slowly, enunciating his Spanish carefully.

One of the women whimpered.

“My name is Mason.” He switched to English. “I’m friends with Abraham. Do you know him?”

He crept a few feet into the room and did a visual sweep. The L-shaped apartment was empty, save for the three women forced to live like dogs chained in a yard.

“Abraham is very worried about his friends.” He switched back to Spanish. “I’d like to help.”

A chain scraped across the floor. One of the women leaned forward into the light.

“Where is he?” Her voice cracked, as if she hadn’t drank anything in days.

“Are you friends of his? He’s been looking for his friends. He asked me to help find them.” Mason crouched so he was on their level, doing his best to be smaller. Less intimidating.

“He won’t let us go.” The woman retreated back into the shadows.

“I don’t care what he says.” Mason thumbed up, where the clerk’s desk would be. “Do you want me to take you to Abraham?”

“Yes,” another voice said.

“No. Hush.” The first woman wrapped a hand around the second’s head, covering her mouth. “We can’t trust you.”

“I know that it’s hard for you to trust right now, but I mean you no harm. I just want to help.”

Mason eyed the chains and the distance from him to the pole. He was outside their reach now. If he got too close, what would they do? The women Abraham hired were not the ones in front of Mason now. They were changed. And there was a very real risk they would attack him in an attempt to defend themselves against a perceived threat. Or perhaps they’d come to believe this was where they belonged, or were safe. He could not leave them here. Not once he’d seen them.

“I’ll let you go.” Mason holstered his gun and pulled out his lock-picking set.

None of them responded.

Mason crept across the open space. Everything in the sphere of their reach was clean. It was outside that where squalor reined.

He knelt next to the post and selected one of the locks securing the chains in place. The picks were tiny in his hands, small things, but he’d done this act a hundred times. All locks had the same pieces and these were nothing fancy. It would only take a moment, but a lot could happen in a short span of time.

“Abraham has been looking for you. The same man who took you? He took someone I care about, too. Abraham is helping me get her back. So my friends and I are helping him.” He spoke softly, mostly about Abraham, hoping some of his words penetrated the women’s fear.

The first lock opened. He unwound the chain and pushed it toward the women.

“There.” He held his hands up again. “Two more to go, okay?”

The door banged open and the stairs groaned under heavy, thudding footsteps.

Shit.

H
annah gripped the fence with both hands.

Sixty-three sets of eyes were locked on her.

Around them, bunk beds, chairs, anything not cemented down had been torn up and fashioned into some kind of weapon.

They’d waited for this moment, when it was the quietest. Dad had always told her the prime time to hit a military target were the early morning hours before dawn. It only made sense it would also be the best time to stage an escape.

“Okay, one more time. Everyone listening? I’ll count to three and everyone push.” Hannah paused while Rachel translated her words into Spanish. “We all know where the fence in our cell is weakest. Focus there. Some will be able to crawl out and they can hold the opening for others. When everyone is out—we don’t leave anyone behind—we send the elevator up to the top floor as a distraction and take the stairs. From there, we go through the side entrance, not the front.”

Her heart pounded. This could work. It was a good plan. Between all the women, they’d been able to map out not only the building, but the area around it. Where the entrances were, how many people Cruz was likely to have on staff. The women outnumbered them if they escaped as a group. But they all had to work together. One hiccup, and the whole thing could fall apart.

Rachel finished the translation and paused, waiting for Hannah to make the next call.

“Once we’re outside, get in your groups and get home.” She patted the fence, jangling the metal to drive home the point.

They didn’t know who they could trust in law enforcement. The best plan was for the local girls to take as many home with them and lie low, until Hannah could get Mason and the others here. From there the plan was sketchy, but girls would be able to call home, get help. Someone in the American government would hear about it. They’d help, wouldn’t they? This many women, kidnapped, had to stir up some support. They couldn’t be ignored.

She couldn’t focus on what came after. Only now.

The first step was getting free. They couldn’t be rescued if no one knew they were missing, and in the case of many of these women, no one knew to look.

“Are we ready?” Hannah asked.

Rachel translated, but already most were nodding.

“Okay, get your weapon, be careful not to hurt anyone. Positions, everyone.” Hannah braced her hands against the fence, already prepared.

Women scuttled around, getting their makeshift weapons. Others wound strips of fabric around their arms to protect them from the fence. Some weapons were just the leftover pieces of chairs, but it was something to hit with. It took a few moments, but soon women were jostling, bumping, and pushing to get closer to the focus point in each cell.

“On three,” Hannah said.

Rachel repeated.

“
Uno
.” These words at least Hannah could say. “
Dos
.”

The women on the farthest side of the room began pushing.

“
Tres
!”

Hannah and a dozen other women shoved forward, focusing all their efforts on the one spot. The metal links cut into her hands, the press of bodies made it hard to breathe. The fence shifted a little.

“Come on, come on,” Hannah chanted.

Pop!

The fence across the room gave way. Rachel’s group sprawled forward as the fence recoiled.

“Keep pushing.” Hannah doubled down. The girls in her cell might be the prettiest, but they weren’t the strongest bunch. It was going to take help from the others to get them lose. Hannah couldn’t do it all herself.

A woman wiggled out from under the second cell’s fence.

“They’re leaving without us!” A woman next to Hannah stopped pushing and pointed.

“Wait, remember—we won’t make it by ourselves,” Hannah said as lout as she dared.

Rachel clung to the arms of two women straining to get through the open doorway.

No. No. No.

They escaped together or not at all.

“Push harder!” Hannah couldn’t control the others, she could only focus on her group.

Rachel turned, her expression horrified.

They were doomed.

The plan was gone. The free women sprinted, making a break for it, while the others struggled to liberate themselves, no consideration for the others still captured.

Rachel’s pained expression said it all. She could either stay—and get caught—or she could make a break for it. Hannah understood. She nodded. So long as someone got free, they could warn others. Rachel held up her hands, a helpless gesture.

The last woman grabbed Rachel by the arm and hauled her to the elevator.

Women trickled out of the second cell, one or two at a time sprinting for the entrance.

None of them paused to help Hannah’s group. The same ones who’d mocked her for even thinking about escape, now didn’t bother to lift a finger to help.

One by one, the women at Hannah’s side stopped pushing. The fence was misshapen, the rings securing the fence were bent, but it’d held. They were still prisoners.

“No. No. No!” Hannah kicked the fence, though it did her no good. “God damn it.”

She paced the enclosure, listening, straining to hear over the remaining women’s tears and wails.

A scream silenced the complaints.

More screams.

Yelling.

She didn’t dare breathe.

“Damn it.” Hannah stalked across the cell to the beds piled up haphazardly.

The men would come next, with the girls. And then what?

She shoved the shiv under a mattress and continued to pace, waiting for what would happen next. The minutes dragged on, the silence broken by yells, a crash, the sound of sobbing.

The women were gone—what? Five, ten minutes? It was hard to gauge the passage of time.