Elemental Pleasure (18 page)

Whirling, she looked up. There were two small windows in the wall, near the ceiling. They were so dirty she barely noticed them. She’d assumed all the dim light came from the bare bulb above the TV. As she watched, the shadow passed again.

It could be
Felix or the other man outside
or it could be a car going by on the street. Her heart raced as she tried to decide what to do. If it was Felix and he thought
she was trying to escape, he might
kill her. Then again, now that she could speak
,
she might be able to talk him out of it by promising him money.

If it wasn’t Felix, this might be her only chance to get help.

She climbed onto the couch, then onto the sturdiest stack of boxes, bracing herself with her still bound hands.
She was high enough she could look out the window, bu
t
it
was too dirty to allow her to see anything. She rubbed it with her elbow, cleaning away some of the inside grime, but the window was filthy outside too. Because it was at street level, there was garbage gathered in the re
cess. She rubbed
until she’d cleared a small patch.

A man walked by
wearing wing tips and gray slacks. For a moment, her heart clenched, thinking it was Preston. Of course it wasn’t, but now she knew it wasn’t Felix or the other man out there.

Raising her hands, she tapped on the glass. She did it quietly, not wanting the men upstairs to hear. The feet passed again and she tapped a bit louder. Inspiration struck and she started drumming out SOS.

Tap, tap, tap.
Tap, tap,
t
ap. Tap, tap, tap.

The feet stopped. Her heart leapt. A second pair of feet joined the first. This man wore sneakers and jeans. Carly shrank back, suddenly unsure. Had Felix been wearing tennis shoes? She couldn’t remember.

A hand pressed against the glass and Carly let out yelp. Her heart leapt as the hand cleared away some of the grime. If it was one of
her kidnappers and they
saw her up here…

Holding on
to the wall, she stretched out a leg, lowering herself back to the couch. The hand was still on the window and a shadow blocked the light as someone looked in. She flattened herself against the wall, f
ist
pressed to her mouth to stifle the sound of her shaky breath.

Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap. Tap, tap, tap.

Carly looked up. The hand was on the window, the palm pressed flat against the glass as one finger tapped out SOS. Stretching, she peered at the hand. T
he man wore a large silver ring,
which was turned around so the
face of it was against the window
.

The image in the center was a trinity knot.

Carly let out a sob of relief, her fingers finding the
Trinity Masters
pendant around her own neck. Scrambling back onto the box, she slammed her hands against the glass. “I’m here! I’m here!” she cried, no longer caring who heard her. She didn’t know how, but they’d found her.

“What the hell are you doing? Fucking bitch!”

Felix was down the stairs in a few leaps. Carly screamed and kicked out as he reached for her. He grabbed her leg, yanking her off the boxes. She fell to the floor with a thud that knocked all the air out of her body. He jerked her up by the hair, slamming his fist into her stomach when she tried to knee him in the balls.

Gasping, she bent over, helpless to stop him as he threw her back on the couch. He reached for her legs, jerking them open once more. She parted her lips to scream, but didn’t have the breath.

Something moved on the stairs.

She looked over, expecting it to be the other man.

A tall, muscled form came silently down the steps, moving quickly. One minute he’d landed on the bottom step, the next he was across the room.

Lance’s face was set in grim lines. His eyes were as dark as Pre
ston’s and his jaw muscle
clenched. He grabbed Felix by the neck, squeezing. The other man’s eyes bulged as he thrashed, raking Lance’s hand with his nails. Lance lifted him from the floor and Felix’s feet kicked out as he hung suspended in Lance’s grip.

Carly let out a cry of relief. She rolled to her feet and stumbled over to Lance, hiding against his back. She was shaking, dr
agging in great gulps of air
that now smelled of warm man and fresh laundry, not a dirty basement. Clenching her fists into the back of his shirt, Carly pressed her face against him. Another man came downstairs. When she saw Preston, she lost what little composure she had left. Preston took her in his arms as Lance dropped
the now unconscious Felix. Then
Lance turned, sandwiching her between them, caging her in their protective embrace.

Carly sobbed against Preston’s chest as Lance stroked her hair.

“You came, you came,” she whispered between sobs.

“Of course.” Lance’
s words
were
a warm vibration against her back. “You’re ours. We’ll always come for you.”

“I’m
sorry, Carly. I’m so sorry for everything.” Preston kissed the top of her head.

Nothing mattered now that they were here. Carly gave in
to exhaustion,
closing her eyes, trusting
they’d take care of her.

“Please, just take me home,” she begged.

Together, they carried her upstairs and out into the sunlight.

~~~~

Chapter
Ten

They didn’t take her home. They couldn’t.

As soon as they heard her yelling, they’d moved. Lance had broken down the front door and raced into the house. Preston had followed, hot on his heels, but had the presence of mind to call 911. He told them who he was and that he’d found Carly, giving the operator the address. By the time they made it back upstairs, the police were already there.

While Lance held Carly, Preston opened the broken door and went outside to explain what had happened. Police streamed by him, searching the house as Lance carried Carly out. They found the man who owned the small house
hiding in a
bathroom and the kidnapper unconscious on the basement floor.

Carly was taken to an ambulance. The medic took one look at Carly and declared she needed to go to the hospital. Preston wasn’t surprised. His heart had nearly shattered when he’d first seen her clinging to Lance’s shirt. The kidnappers had beaten the hell out of her. His fists clenched at the thought.

“Sir?” The medic stood at the back of the ambulance. “Are you riding with us?”

Preston nodded and climbed in with her. When the medic tried to stop Lance from doing the same, Lance stared the man down until he relented.

They stayed out of the way as the medic covered her with blankets and gave her a sip of water. With a shaky voice, she asked the paramedic for something for the pain. He gave her small shot of painkiller, explaining he couldn’t give her anything else in case she needed surgery.

Carly turned her wide eyes on Lance and Preston before looking back at the medic. “Surgery?”

Preston didn’t
have the heart to tell her
one side of her face was swollen to twice its normal size with a huge cut along her cheek. They rode to the hospital in silence. Preston used the time to gather his wits. Since her disappearance this morning, he’d been running in
fast-forward
. Sitting in the ambulance with her, having her back, relatively safe and sound, the strength drained from him.

He slouched a bit until he felt Lance’s hand on his shoulder.
“Hang in there.
She’s going to need us to be strong for a little while longer.
”

Once they arrived at the ER, Carly was
whisked away. The detective had followed
behind the ambulance, and she pulled Lance and
Preston aside to question them
while Carly was attended to. As they told their story, the S.F.P.D. det
ective swung from relieved
Carly h
ad been found to pissed off they’d found her,
using information they hadn’t given to the police.

They hadn’t had time to come up with a cover story so Preston confessed that
once he had a minute to stop to
think about the kid
napping, it occurred to him
the whole attack had likely been focused on him and what he was carrying. Then he explained that Lance
had
helped him look into the possible embezzlement he’d discovered. Lance told the detective he worked for DARPA and that he used a program to help
him identify likely accomplices
based on the information they had.

“Let me get this straight.” The detective looked
at
her partner who had joined them. “A
fter yo
u talked to us, you decided
the men who kidnapped Ms. Kenan had something to do with a financial irregularity you’d found in your company’s reports, and that it had nothing to do with who she was.”

“Yes,” Preston said.

“And how did you figure out who’d kidnapped her?”

Lance sat forward. “That wa
s me. I checked Preston’s email
since he’d sent one last night to the company president. That was the only way someone could know he’d figured it out. I was able to follow an email diversion to David Momens. Preston was sure it wasn’t him, so we kept looking.”

“I remembered his
son worked for the company
though I’d never met him.”

“So we looked into Brian, and when we found pictures of him and his cousin Felix
,
we knew it was them.”

The detective scowled. “You should have called us.”

“Of course, you’re right,” Preston agreed, though he feared his face wasn’t reflecting remorse. He shuddered to think what the kidnappers would have done to Carly if they hadn’t found her when they did.

Lance shrugged
. “You couldn’t have found her faster than I did.”

The detective glared. “Who are you again?”

Lance pulled out his wallet and gave her a business card.

“DARPA.” The detective’s eyebrows rose and she exchanged a look with her partner. “What do you do there?”

“I’m a mathematician.”

“A mathematician who breaks down doors and chokes people?”

“I’m also in the Marine Corp
s
Reserves.”

The detectives whispered to each other, giving Lance a suspi
cious look. Finally
,
they left
to deal with Felix and Brian, both of whom they had in custody. Two hours later, Lance and Preston found themselves in the waiting room seated side by side. They were under strict orders to go to the police station to sign their statements, but they weren’t leaving until they saw Carly.

“Did you see what they did to her?” Lance’s voice was hoarse. It was the first thing either of them had said in over an hour. Reality was setting in, kicking them both in the teeth.

“Yes.
” Preston closed his eyes.

“When I walked in, he had her down on the couch. He was holding her legs open.”

Bile rose to Preston’s throat. “Jesus.”

“What if they raped her?”

“Then we’ll deal with it. We’ll help her heal.”

Lance made a sound low in his throat.

Preston
laid his hand on top of Lance’s clenched fist. “Lance,” he said. “Look at me.” The other man met his gaze. “We did it. We saved her.”

“We sa
ved her.” Lance’s hand uncurled
and
he
tentatively he laced their fingers together.

They sat that way until the doctor came in.

“Are you the boyfriend?” he asked, looking at Preston.

With a sideways look at Lance, Preston got
to his feet. “I am.
”

The doctor looked at Lance. “You must be the black ops guy?”

Lance raised a brow. “Black ops?”

The doctor seem
ed
impressed
by Lance’s credentials
. “The detective told me.”

Preston ignored the doctor’s mistake. “How is she?”

“She’s pretty banged up. There’s a hai
rline fracture to her cheekbone
and one of her knees is injured quite badly.”

Presto
n sat down heavily
. Lance clapped him on the shoulder.

“We’ll need to do some more tests on the knee. She’s waiting to go in for an MRI now.”

The doctor continued detailing her injuries, most of which were
scrapes and bruises.