Deceived (36 page)

Reeves asked, “You have a boat?”

“Yes,” Brandon said, “a fast one.”

“You know the waterways?”

“Yes.”

“I can’t condone vigilante action, and,” Reeves said, “as a matter of fact, I can take steps to keep it from occurring. However, we need local knowledge. I’m not familiar with that area and none of the other agents who are working with me are boaters. My concerns regarding your actions would fall to the side if you accept an offer of myself and another agent to accompany you and let me take the lead when we’re there.”

Brandon nodded, while thinking,
like hell
.

“Back up will meet us once they’re able to secure the necessary equipment.”

“Orleans Marina, A Dock, slip 16,” Brandon said. “I’m headed there now. If you’re not there when the engines are fired, I’m leaving you.”

Joe was ahead of Brandon and let him know that Victor was not at the boathouse, but there was a black Mercedes sedan parked there. Brandon pulled away from the marina in his go-fast boat, with Sebastian, two Black Raven agents, Reeves, another FBI Agent, and George. He used every bit of the boat’s seven hundred and fifty horsepower.

Within twenty minutes they were about a hundred yards from the camp, with the engines barely a notch above idle speed, and as near to silent as the engines could be. The camp stood on high pilings. Lights were on. Sebastian’s two agents had stripped down to their underwear and had slipped into the water. Brandon’s depth gauge indicated that they were in thirty feet of water. A flat boat with two engines that powered the boat with five hundred horsepower was on the far side of the camp. Brandon didn’t see a ladder or any other way up to the camp.

When they were fifty yards out, someone hit a switch on a spotlight. Brandon’s blood turned to ice. Taylor was tied to a column that cornered the second-story porch. She was on the outside of the porch, without her feet touching any part of the structure. She was suspended in the air, her back to the wooden column, stabilized, it seemed, by only a rope that snaked around her legs, her torso, and her arms. The rope was cutting into her skin. Blood was dripping from gashes in her wrists and falling into the dark, murky water that surrounded the camp. Lead weights were tied to her arms and feet. Where the red dress wasn’t anchored to her by the rope, it hung, limp and lifeless. She lifted her head. Wide-eyed with fear, she met Brandon’s gaze.

He locked his gaze on hers, communicating with her with only a look.
I’m here. You’ll be fine.
As soon as I figure out what the fuck to do,
you’ll be fine
. The tear streaks that ran down her face made him insane with fury.

Victor stepped from behind the column, his body partially blocked by Taylor, with a handgun in his hand that was trained on the occupants of Brandon’s boat. Brandon didn’t feel one ounce of brotherly anything for this lunatic. All he wanted to do was kill the fucking bastard.

On their approach to the camp, Sebastian and the two FBI agents had lifted their weapons. In a calm, loud voice that the quiet night air easily carried over the water, Victor said, “Weapons in the water, gentleman.”

“FBI,” Reeves yelled. “Drop your weapon.”

“You don’t have a good shot. You’re more likely to kill her than me, and you know it. So drop your goddamn weapon, or you’re dead,” Victor said, his tone quiet.

“My guys are going to have to shimmy up a piling,” Sebastian whispered, as he threw one of his pistols into the water. Brandon reached for a hand-held radio, one that he knew would sink, instead of his Glock. He threw the radio into the water.

“He’ll see them,” Brandon whispered.

Agent Reeves hesitated before lowering his weapon. Victor shot him, in the forehead. Where there had been smooth skin, there was a red hole and the bullet went through, making it rain guts and bone on its exit. Reeves wasn’t three feet from Brandon and the boat rocked as the agent’s body coiled back. Sebastian grabbed Reeves before he fell overboard, then laid the body on the floor.

George Bartholomew yelled, “Good God.”

Jesus
. Brandon thought. From the vantage point that Victor had above their heads, he could pick them off, one by one, and there was nothing they could do about it.

Victor said, “The good professor alerted me that you were coming.”

George said, “You son of a bitch. Let my daughter go.”

A slash of silver shone in Victor’s non-pistol hand. A six-inch gash appeared in Taylor’s forearm. She screamed, then sobbed. Victor said, “Now say something else that’s equally stupid.” There was silence. “Hello, Brandon.”

Brandon said, “What do you want in exchange for her?”

“Now that is exactly the right question you should be asking. I’ll trade Taylor for George Bartholomew, on my deck, with twenty-five million dollars wired into my account, then a free exit,” he said. “And by the way, she’s losing blood.”

The remaining FBI Agent whispered. “This is against protocol. We need reinforcements.”

George said. “He’ll kill her. Let me go up there.” Dark, intense eyes leveled on Brandon. “I’ll give him anything that he wants. Save her. Please.”

Victor said, “There’s a ladder that I’ll drop on the third piling to your left. Guide the boat there and let George climb the ladder.”

Brandon guided the boat to the piling. The ladder was remote controlled. As George climbed the ladder, Victor hit the switch that pulled it back up. “Move that damn boat where I can see all of you. Now. Or they’re both dead.”

Brandon guided the boat about twenty feet from the camp, to a spot where he felt they’d have a better shot at Victor. Victor smiled at Brandon, shook his head, and held his blade against Taylor’s neck. “If I hit the carotid, she’s gone, baby brother, so don’t get smart. Move the fucking boat to the left about ten feet. If anyone lifts a hand, George is dead, Taylor is dead, and so are you.”

Brandon’s heart raced as Victor trained the handgun on Taylor, which Victor kept there until Brandon had the boat positioned where Victor wanted it.
Damn it
. He had to do something, or she would die. He was powerless. His mind flashed to when he held Amy’s broken body in the hospital. He couldn’t let this end the same way.

He could see everything that was happening on the porch, but neither he nor Sebastian could get a good shot at Victor, and neither one of them wanted to show that they had a weapon unless they were certain they had a kill shot. He felt a glimmer of hope when he saw Sebastian’s two agents surface on the far side of the camp. With hand signals and barely perceptible nods from Sebastian, they stayed in the water. Brandon agreed with Sebastian’s call. Shimmying up the piling would make noise, and Victor was too tense.

Victor stayed with Taylor. He told George, “Sit at the table.”

George complied. “Please let her go.”

“The money. There’s a phone on the table. The wire instructions are with the phone. I’m not releasing Taylor until my banker calls me and tells me that he has the money.”

George shook his head. “I don’t have bankers on call at this time of night.”

“Well, if you want Taylor to live, I suggest you find one. Twenty-five million. Now.”

“It’s going to take time.”

There was another flash of silver and another gash on Taylor’s arm. This time, she didn’t scream with the pain, and the silence for Brandon was worse than her cries. She was unconscious, either from pain or from loss of blood.

“You’re running out of time,” Victor said.

George made a call. He spoke for a minute, then was silent, then yelled. “You are not understanding. This is a life or death situation. Transfer me to someone with authority.” Finally, George nodded, read Victor’s wire instructions into the phone, and held onto the phone, silent again. He nodded, then glanced at Victor. “The transfer is happening now.”

Victor said, “Tell your banker to call mine and have my banker call me when the transfer is complete.”

Minutes later, Victor received a phone call. He mumbled a few words, then glanced at George and said, “Come closer to me.”

Victor looked at the boat, at Brandon, and pointed his pistol at Brandon. “Don’t move.”

Brandon tensed. Not because of the pistol, but because he could see that Victor was using the blade to slash the rope that held Taylor to the column. He was going to drop her into the water, and let George see her sink. The weights at her hands and ankles guaranteed that she was going to drop straight to the bottom. It was deep, dark, murky water.

Hell
.

He’d never find her if he didn’t get a head start. Brandon didn’t think about the consequences. As he dove off the boat, to where he thought she would fall, he threw his pistol to Sebastian. He heard gunfire, knowing that he was his brother’s target. Searing pain ripped through his shoulder and his leg. He heard a splash as Taylor hit the water. He ignored the pain as he swam in the direction of the splash, and got there in time to grab her arm.

The weights that were tied to her drug both of them straight to the bottom. Through the water he heard muffled sounds of gunfire. He couldn’t see anything. He was a strong swimmer, but he couldn’t pull her up.

Hell
.

He had to cut some of the weights off of Taylor before he could pull her up. He pulled out his switchblade. Tightness in his chest told him he needed air.
Damn it.
Letting her go wasn’t an option. He’d drown with her. He managed to cut one ankle weight off, but he couldn’t kick hard enough to pull her up, and he was choking. He found her arm, cut another weight off of her, then tried, again, to kick. He couldn’t do it, not with the arching pain in his shoulder that almost immobilized his left arm and with the gunshot that seemed to rob his left thigh of strength. He felt others around him, pulling him, and Taylor, up. The water muffled the pops of gunfire. He heard an engine roar to life, then he and Taylor both broke the surface, aided by the Black Raven agents. She choked, then gasped for air. Her eyes found his and she whispered, “Brandon.”

“I’ve got you,” he said, then, as he cut the remaining weights off of her, he realized that her eyes had closed.

He held her head above the water. Victor was in his boat, using George as a human shield. A boat with flashing blue lights had rounded the bend and was speeding towards the camp. Brandon thought he heard a chopper. The fact that reinforcements were arriving gave Brandon energy. He lifted Taylor by the waist and, with the help of the Black Raven agents, swam with Taylor to his boat. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Victor fire a shot at George, then turn to face Brandon’s boat. Brandon reached his boat in time to see Victor cock his arm back, ready to throw something.

Brandon knew what Victor was doing, even before one of Sebastian’s men yelled, “Grenade.”

Sebastian yelled, “Go underwater. Now.”

Brandon inhaled as hard as he could, then pulled Taylor to him. She had slipped into unconsciousness. Before he pulled her down with him in the water, he looked over his shoulder, to where Sebastian was aiming his pistol at Victor. He heard a shot, and Victor, for a second, slumped. Brandon didn’t have time to wait and see if Sebastian’s shot was lethal. Taylor was going to die if he didn’t get her underwater. He breathed in deep. He exhaled into her mouth, and said, hoping to God that she could hear him, “Hold your breath, baby.”

Brandon pulled Taylor underwater with him as the grenade exploded.

***

Taylor drifted in and out of consciousness, never awake enough to remember details of what had happened, but knowing that she was getting help because, after a while, the pain wasn’t as bad. By mid-morning, she dreamed, and, in a flash that was faster than lightning, she remembered details. She remembered her hands shaking as she read the Hutchenson letter, she remembered when her eyes fell on Brandon, and she remembered the cold metal of the pistol as Victor pressed it against her flesh. When her mind seized on the moment that Victor had cut the ropes off of her and she’d fallen into the water, her ability to breathe left her. She was drowning, bleeding, and too weak to swim to the surface. She sat up in bed, pulling IV lines with her, gasping for air.

Strong arms wrapped around her. “Hey. You’re all right. It’s over.” Jade-green eyes held hers, but all she could do was shake her head as panic gripped her. “You’re safe. Just breathe. It’s over. All over. Breathe. One breath in. Come on.”

She tried, but she couldn’t get her breath past the hard knot in her throat.

“Breathe, Taylor,” Brandon said. He was calm. He was close. Panic’s iron grip started to loosen as she focused on the feel of his arms. “Just breathe. You can do it.”

The first breath was the hardest, but it brought delicious, Brandon-scented, fresh air.

“That’s it,” Brandon said, holding her. As he rested his forehead on hers, she found strength in his gaze.

The second breath came easier. After a few more breaths, she nodded. He eased her back, so that she was reclined against pillows. She watched him sit down, hard, in the chair next to the bed. “You’re getting a blood transfusion and your IV drip contains a painkiller, which is helping you sleep,” he said. “The doctor ordered anti-anxiety meds. Would you like me to ring the nurse?”

She shook her head as she studied him. Now that he was sitting and she wasn’t having an anxiety attack, it occurred to her that something was off about him. Aside from a worried expression, his face was pale. “Are you hurt?”