Mastered By The Mavericks (42 page)

Adler leaned on the desk, folding his arms in a smarmy preen. “I had no idea I was
so notable.”

“
Very
notable,” Brynn crooned.

“Goodness.” He spread his bony legs a little—then a lot. “I’m sorry I don’t have a
signed photo or something. A…souvenir of sorts.”

Brynna cleared her throat, clearly in place of having to comment on the “souvenir”
he referred to. “Maybe we’ll find some­thing…interest­ing…on the tour.”

Rebel couldn’t tamp a low growl. “A little too convincing,
minette
—which means it was fucking perfect. Now get him out of that damn office, before he
decides the undersides of those shoes might be more interesting than the top.”

“Christ,” Rhett grumbled. “Thanks for
that
mental.”

“Left.” The interjection on the line told them both to shut up at once. Even in hushed
tones, Zeke’s voice packed one hell of a commanding baritone. “You want to make him
go left, Little B.” He used the honorary call-sign they’d all come up with for her.
“Hawk just completed the close-quarter thermography on the building. There’s a room
at the end of the hall, bottom floor, with a signature reading a lot like a petite
pregnant woman.”

Rebel traded an incredulous glare with Rhett, who barked, “How the fuck did you get
that reading?”

Garrett’s trademark snort burst on the line. “With the help of Mr. Tumbleweed.”

“Well, shit.” Sure enough, no more than twenty feet from the storage hut, a tumbleweed
the size of a baby rhino inched across the dusty ground. The two guards bracketing
the loading dock, as well as the goon strolling the yard, actually looked at the thing
three times each and never noticed that it slid instead of—well—tumbled. Thank God
for the late afternoon breeze. And Mr. Tumbleweed. “Great job, Hawk. Little B, you
copy that intel?”

Brynn’s phony sneeze rang in his ear: their established code for a yes.

On the screen in Rhett’s palm, Adler turned right.

Damn it
.

“Oh, poo.” A descending hitch of the camera. The woman was going for broke on the
cleavage contingency plan. “We’ve already been that direction. What’s over here?”
A swing back to the left—down a long, nondescript hallway—with no discernible door
at the end.

“What the fuck?” Rhett rasped.

“No shit,” Rebel concurred.

“What’s going on?” Shay broke in.

Rebel joined Rhett in gaping at the footage Brynn captured for them, showing the entire
length of the hallway. The images showed up as a weird mix of green tones due to the
tint from the passage’s fluorescent lights, renewing the permit for the acid party
churning in Reb’s gut.

Finally he said, “You solid on that intel about the room on this hall, Hawk?”

Garrett grunted. “As sure about it as my own nuts.”

“
This
hall?”

“For fuck’s sake, Stafford.”

Rebel shot a long huff. “For fuck’s sake yourself. There are no doors to the damn
thing.”

“
What
?”

“We’re looking right at the feed,” Rhett rejoined. “There are a couple of bathrooms
three-quarters down the corridor, and no other portals beyond that. At the end, the
hall turns to the left without another interruption.”

Rebel cocked his head toward his friend. Rhett’s gaze was jolted with the same new
comprehension. “Unless…the room is accessed differently.”

“Pressurized entrance?”

“Even a hidden panel?”

A thousand shades of blue gave away the rapid shift of Rhett’s thoughts. “Wouldn’t
put anything past the bastard. Your theory makes the most sense, Moon. It’s probably
operated with a second door inside the first, so the first wall only opens far enough
to let a man through.”

Rebel’s teeth locked. “This is why the mouse cam never returned anything to us.”

“Nothing we could use or see.” Rhett returned the feed to the live stream. His face
was clamped in tension as he stated, “Try to get as close to that wall as possible,
Brynn. Pretend your shoe broke, or fake a fall.”

Brynna sneezed again, before stepping forward.

With every tap of her heels on the tiles, he couldn’t get over the intuition that
they were sending her to her doom—at the hands of that sick fuck.

Suddenly, the image whipped around again. They caught a glimpse of Brynna’s wrist,
with Adler’s hand clamped around it, before the front of the man’s wrinkled shirt
filled the view. “There’s
nothing
that will interest you down there, Miss Diamond. Now come with me, if you please.”

“But—”

“
Now
.”

“I have to pee!” As she readjusted her shirt, Adler punched the air with a rough grunt.
A couple of catsup stains on his shirt looked like congealed blood—or maybe it
was
congealed blood—as she stepped all the way into his personal space. “And perhaps
take care of a few…other things.”

Adler’s growl instantly went all appeased hound dog. “Well, why didn’t you say so?”

Rebel was about to question Brynn’s punt from the ninety, when he saw her clear at
least half the hall’s length before dashing into the ladies room. He let her hear
his complimentary hum. “Very nice move, Little B.”

“Yeah?” She disguised the whisper by whapping the stall door closed. “Well, what the
hell do I do now? Walk out of the bathroom naked?”

“Don’t you fucking dare,” Rhett gritted.

“You guys…I’m getting nervous.”

Her voice trembled. Her helplessness jerked hard at Rebel, transforming the bile in
his stomach into a strange sensation through his whole body. The feeling was so foreign,
he had no identifier for it. He was frustrated, furious, and close to dizzy from the
agony of containing himself to this hiding place. Uselessness wasn’t his goddamn forte,
especially when his very bones craved to rush the complex at a full run, guns blazing
like a fucking cowboy.

“Stay calm,
minette
.”

“You’re doing really great, sweetheart,” Rhett added.

Her wince was soft but sharp. “Homer baby’s been shooting me some weird looks. The
boobs aren’t working their magic anymore. Do you think he’s figuring something out?”

“Brynna Cosette.” Rebel knew if his growl didn’t work, the middle name would. “Listen
to me, all right?
Breathe
. Keep your eyes open and your thoughts clear. We’ll make this work.”

“That’s right,” Zeke concurred. “Stay calm and stay safe. If you think things are
hinky, get the fuck out of there. Don’t jeopardize yourself for this. We’ll just go
to Plan B.”

“Then Plan C, if we have to,” Rhett emphasized.

“Try to get him upstairs.” The suggestion came from Garrett. “The scan didn’t detect
as many heat signatures up there.”

“Which might just mean the bodies up there aren’t warm.” Brynn’s soft giggle was sprinkled
with enough hysteria to stress the fuck out of Rebel. Well, more than he was. He caught
Rhett’s new glance, filled with a strident message.
We have to calm her down.
And yeah, if that meant resorting to Dom tones in voices, then that was what would
happen.

“No.” Rebel went for it. “That means that more of Adler’s team might follow him there,
making it easier for us to get inside the building undetected.”

“Okay.” Her voice still shook but the lilt on the second syllable was all confidence.
Good. That was damn good—because the orders he had for her next would demand it.

“Brynna, I won’t cover this in pixie dust. The second we’re in, we might not be so
incognito. Make sure that pistol I gave you is at the top of your purse—and be prepared
to use it if you have to.”

“On his
head
.” Rhett leaned over the monitor, as if she’d be able to see the urgent lines on his
face, the anxious glints in his eyes. “You put that bullet right between his eyes,
peach.”

“Yes, Sir,” she whispered.

“Just save his balls for me.” The slow, furious snarl was Shay’s alone. “I’m going
to filet them, barbecue them, then feed them to the coyotes out in Red Rock.”

“And Zoe’s going to help you.” Her heartfelt assurance to the man, even from the middle
of a situation where her next steps would take her deeper into danger, tempted Rebel
to roll over in the grass, stare up at heaven, and implore the angels,
How did you get it so right with this woman
?

She was, singlehandedly, the most incredible woman he’d ever met.

The woman he’d fallen hopelessly in love with.

Staying motionless in the grass sure as hell wasn’t a problem now. The realization
struck him like fucking Saul on the road to Damascus, blinding and paralyzing, sucking
every molecule of air from his lungs. Thank God Brynn didn’t need him on the comm
during the thirty seconds it took to act out her bathroom break excuse, flushing the
toilet and washing her hands.

And thank fuck all he received from Rhett, once he could lift his head again, was
a stare of complete agreement.

He narrowed his own gaze, hoping the guy read his return message.
As soon as this is all over, the three of us are going to talk. About everything.

Thank God he hadn’t squandered the moment.

Because in the next one, coherent thought fled his brain—

Just as all semblance of logic fled his senses.

As terror like he’d never known flamed through his body.

On the monitor, Adler awaited her in the hallway—with a lord’s polished posture, a
gentleman’s sedate smile—and a monster’s evil glare. Before he even spoke, one conclusion
was horrifyingly clear:

Brynn had been blown.

Her gasp betrayed how thoroughly she understood the reality, too—right before Adler
made a brief motion with his hand, ordering a pair of men forward who looked recruited
right out of the WWF. He still didn’t seem to know about the camera. A good thing,
since it gave Rebel the precious seconds he needed to reach into his bag for his RPG
launcher.

On the monitor, Adler smirked at a now-squirming Brynna. “You know, Miss Diamond,
we live in an age of such amazing technology. Even from a hidden security camera,
one can generate a high-quality image within seconds, then run it through facial recognition
software. And then—
Voilà
! One has the naked truth about their seductive little…guest.” The man’s face darkened
again. “Hmmm. No. That’s not right, either.”

Adler motioned again. A loud rip distorted the audio, along with what sounded like
Brynn’s scream. The monitor was black for a second. When the visual feed returned,
their view was a drastically different angle.

They looked at everything from the floor—including the two huge guards dragging a
flailing—and nearly nude—Brynna down the hall. Somehow, they’d let her keep her panties
and stockings. The corridor was strewn with the garments that didn’t make the cut.

“Ahhh.” Adler’s voice was still disgustingly clear on the audio feed. He’d remained
behind, chuckling at the destruction he’d ordered. “Now
there’s
the naked truth.”

Rebel mounted the RPG gun to his shoulder. Squeezed the trigger tighter…tighter…

“You can barbecue the bastard’s balls, I-Man. I’m going to spit-roast his dick.”

‡

N
oise.

Noise, damn it.

Scream, Brynna. You have to scream
!

Her mind bellowed it from somewhere beyond her body, almost like a sensei evaluating
a student. She’d kicked and screamed and twisted against the meat slabs who’d grabbed
her, even landing some blows that had them resorting to language more colorful than
their grunts—but that had justified them to pinch and squeeze in very specific places.
Locations that didn’t require imagination about what Adler had permitted them to do
with her.

Oh, God.

What they were going to do with her…

Because of that, she couldn’t reconnect. Couldn’t reach far enough to grab her mind
and shove it back into her body. Maybe she didn’t dare. Letting go of her mind…it
didn’t have to be such an awful thing. She’d learned. She’d been damn stubborn about
it, but she’d learned. Rhett and Rebel had been the teachers with the strength, determination,
and patience to bring her into the light of that recognition. Caring for her enough
to make her really see…to let her really fly…

To give her the beautiful wings of her submission.

A sob spilled from her as the truth finally ripped into her.

Rhett.

Rebel.

They’d called her the gift but
they’d
been the gifts. Their faces burst across her vision, confirming it to the point of
pain. Their lips, infusing her skin with their passion. Their eyes, the dual oceans
of their adoration. Their bold jaws, set with the same resolve: to make her scream
as she succumbed everything she felt and everything she was to them…

And she had.

And with the admission, knew she’d never feel the same way in her life again. Not
with anyone
else
again. Certainly not these two monsters, who hauled her into a room that had weirdly
just…appeared. Holy shit. Rhett’s theory was right. The room-that-wasn’t-a-room was
hidden behind a secret panel, concealed behind the hall’s real wall. So did that mean—