Operation: Endgame (33 page)

***

Cassie was once again in handcuffs. This time, though, she was being hauled around as Ricky paced. Her hands were cuffed in front of her body and Ricky was taking great joy out of knocking her off balance as he moved dragging her with him.

Ricky’s entire operation had been moved out to an abandoned warehouse out on the East side of town. Ricky was furious with her, but so far he hadn’t done anything to retaliate for their attempted escape. She glanced over at Chris who appeared waxen and pale. He was also handcuffed although his hands were cuffed behind him in the chair where they’d sat him. He looked close to passing out and Cassie wasn’t sure how much more stress his body could take tonight.

Ricky turned suddenly and caught her looking at Chris. He quickly reached up and backhanded her hard enough across the side of her face it sent her sprawling across the floor, with the back of her head slamming against the cold cement. “You’ve lost the privilege of looking at him,” he bellowed at her.

Chris lunged out of his chair and tried to tackle Ricky to keep him from Cassie, but Ricky just spun around and kicked Chris dead center in his bad knee. Chris screamed in horrific pain as his leg crumpled beneath him. Ricky stepped back and nodded towards his men as he reached down and hauled Cassie up. Two men stepped forward to pull Chris back up, each one holding one of his arms. Cassie was still seeing stars from where her head had cracked on the hard cement floor, but Ricky reached up and pulled her head back by her pony tail. “If you love your brother as much as you say you do, you will never pull another stunt like you did today, do you understand me?”

“Y…yes, I’m sorry. Please don’t hurt him anymore.” Cassie looked across at Chris whose eyes were still rolling back in his head. She tried to stifle the sob rising out of her chest.

Ricky turned her around so they were chest to chest. He pulled her so she was pressed up against him. She could feel his erection pressed into her stomach as he reached up and caressed her cheek where he had just hit her. His voice was menacing when he said, “You’ll learn to obey me if you want your brother to stay alive and whole.” He grabbed her face with his hand, yanked her to him, and gave her a punishing kiss and then thrust her into the waiting arms of another of his men.

Ricky slowly walked up to where Chris was still being held up by the two men and sent a fist flying into his sore ribs, once, twice.

Cassie started screaming, “No! No, please stop!” as she struggled to get out of the arms of the man holding her tight.

Just then another man rushed into the room and went quickly over to Ricky’s side. “Boss, we have an issue outside. A police cruiser just drove up.”

“Dammit! We don’t have time for this. Lock them in the back room.” He looked menacingly at Cassie. “I don’t want to hear a peep out of you or what I just did will look like a day at the spa.”

Cassie could only nod as she tried to keep from sobbing. It appeared Chris had finally passed out. They were both drug to a room at the back of the warehouse where they were dropped on the ground. As the men left, they slammed the door behind them and Cassie heard the key turn in the lock. There weren’t any windows in the room and no one had turned on the light. It was pitch black as Cassie scrambled across the floor in the direction she had seen them drop Chris.

She quickly reached his side. His breathing was harsh and uneven. She knew his ribs had probably been cracked before today. The odds were now they were broken. She just hoped he hadn’t punctured a lung. Her hands were still cuffed, but luckily they were in front of her body. She felt Chris’ arm and quickly reached up to his face. He was warm again and definitely running a fever. She brushed the hair off his forehead, and whispered, “Chris? Can you hear me? Come on, Chris, I need you to wake up now.”

He groaned deep which caused him to start coughing. He curled into himself in the fetal position with a shudder to try to control the pain as Cassie leaned over him and tried to soothe him. “Shh, take shallow breaths.” She rubbed gently across his brow trying to get him to focus on what she was saying. She could feel the tremors of pain racking his body. “I think you probably have a couple of broken ribs, so just slow down your breathing and take shallow breaths. Come on Chris. I need you to do this for me. I know it hurts. I’m so sorry. Shhh.” Slowly she could feel Chris’ body and breathing start to relax a bit as he concentrated on her words.

“Cass?”

“Shh, don’t try to talk. I know it hurts. It’s going to be okay. Jake’s going to come get us. Don’t worry. Just relax so you don’t hurt anything else. Shh.” Cassie could feel the tears rolling down her face.

“Cass, you have to go.” He was still gasping for air. “If you get the chance, you escape. Don’t worry about me. Please just go. I love you Cass. You need to just go. Forget me. Please.”

“Shh, relax. Remember, shallow breaths. Come on Chris, I need you to do this for me. Stop talking. Just relax.” She simply ignored what he was saying. She wasn’t going to debate with him when he was struggling for every breath. “Shh.” She continued to brush her fingers across his brow trying to get him to relax. His breathing continued to be harsh, but she could feel his tense muscles slowly start to release.

She didn’t know how much longer he would be able to handle this type of torture. He’d obviously already suffered months on end of it. She knew he had to be hitting the limit of what his body could survive. She had to figure out a way to get him out of this.

She continued to talk to him, trying to get him to relax. She told him about Colton and what had been happening in his life for the last six months. She told him about Jake and her. How happy he made her and how happy she was Jake had finally accepted their love for each other. Chris never said anything, but she knew he was listening and taking it all in as she talked.

She squeezed his shoulder and laid down beside him. “I love you, Chris. I never truly believed you were dead. No matter what they said. We’re going to get out of here. Jake’s coming and he’ll get us out and we’ll all be together again.” His breathing finally evened out and Cassie was pretty sure he’d fallen asleep. “I love you, Chris. Don’t give up yet. I still have the knife tucked into my boot. I just have to find the right opportunity to use it.”

***

“Cassie, wake up. I think someone’s coming and I need your help.”

Cassie awoke to Chris whispering in her ear and the events of the last twenty-four hours came crashing over her like waves. She sat up quickly and reached for Chris. Her head and face were pounding, but she knew that was nothing compared to the pain he must be feeling.

“Chris, are you okay?”

“Yes,” he answered although his breathing was still a little harsh, “but with my hands cuffed behind me, I can’t sit up. I need your help.”

She reached under his arms and helped to pull him in a sitting position. She heard a sharp intake of breath as she pulled on him. “I’m so sorry. I know this hurts.” She whispered to him.

Before she could say anything else, she heard the key in the door and it swung open. Ricky was standing outside the door with three of his men. “Go get them and bring them out here.”

Cassie scrambled up and tried to help Chris stand, but two of the burly men pushed her out of the way and grabbed him by his armpits. The other man grabbed her by her upper arm and they followed the two men carrying Chris. They deposited him into a folding chair in the middle of the room while she was handed off to Ricky. Seated next to Chris in another folding chair was a police officer. He’d obviously taken a beating, but his head was bowed so she couldn’t tell anything else about him.

Ricky turned her to face the two seated men. “Tonight is very important to me.”

When Ricky started talking, the police officer looked up and gave her a subtle shake of his head so she wouldn’t acknowledge him. It was Officer Pete Larson, one of the uniformed officers who had regularly watched her house.

Ricky continued, “How you behave tonight will determine whether these two men live or die.” Cassie gave him a startled look and then turned to meet Chris’ eyes. She felt her stomach churning at the pleading in his eyes. She knew he wanted her to leave him to whatever happened, but there was no way she could live with that. She’d just gotten him back and she’d do whatever she needed to if it meant keeping him safe. “I need your full cooperation tonight. The entire time we’re gone there will be two men standing here monitoring what’s happening with us. If there’s any indication at all of you betraying me, their orders are to kill them immediately. If that happens, their blood is on your hands.” He reached down to her cuffs and unlocked them. “I’m assuming I can trust you without these.”

Cassie gave a curt nod. She didn’t trust her voice enough to use it. How the hell were they going to get out of this? Ricky planned to move Chris and her to Columbia with him tomorrow after he took care of Jake tonight. She didn’t know what exactly Ricky had planned for tonight, but knowing Ricky’s ego in all this, he wanted her to witness Jake’s downfall. She only knew Ricky didn’t plan to let Jake live through it. She also knew once he had Chris and her out of the country he would continue to use Chris to manipulate her, until one or both of them died. All their lives were hanging in the balance and she couldn’t see a way to get them out of this. Her only hope was one small knife in her boot, Jake, her brother who was in no physical shape to fight, and a beat-up police officer against six heavily armed men with guns.

Jake parked his truck in front of the Administration building and started the quick jog across the street to the heart of Memorial Circle. He did a quick perusal around the dark campus, but couldn’t see any movement coming from anywhere. He still had on his body armor and had his pistol tucked into the back waistband of his jeans. He was sure he wouldn’t have it for long, but he had to try. He also had a knife tucked into the top of each of his boots and one hidden in the lining of his leather jacket.

It was cold tonight and he tucked his hands into the pockets of his jacket as he stood there. He glanced at his watch and looked around the abandoned circle once more with no sign of anyone around. He was getting a bad feeling about this. The prickling was starting at the base of his neck as he felt his adrenaline kick up a notch.

Then he realized what was causing the bad feeling as he saw the approach of a low-flying helicopter coming from the East. It was coming in fast at only about 50 feet off the ground. When it reached the middle of the circle, it lowered its altitude even more and Jake could see the side door slide open. His stomach dropped when he saw Ricky standing there with one arm around Cassie’s neck and the other holding a gun to her temple. Ricky nodded to one of the men standing on the other side of the door and he lowered down a harness rope attached to a winch mounted to the exterior of the helicopter.

Obviously, Jake was supposed to use that. Being an Air Force PJ meant he was no stranger to helicopter extractions, but he knew as soon as he got on that helicopter, the chances of him seeing the sunrise went down dramatically. But that didn’t matter when there was a gun to Cassie’s head. He’d do whatever he had to, including forfeit his life if it meant saving hers. He quickly rubbed at his left eye with his right hand to signal the SWAT team to stand down and looped the extraction harness around his body.

Cassie held her breath the entire time they were pulling Jake up the harness. It would be so simple to just drop him and kill him now. Cassie hoped Ricky’s sense of honor and competitive nature was such he wouldn’t choose that route. She breathed a small sigh of relief when Jake was finally pulled aboard the helicopter and the door was shut. He immediately sought out her eyes while they searched him for weapons. When he saw the bruise marring her jaw, his eyes darkened in fury and his jaw clenched. She wiped the outside of her eye with her right hand and could see he read the signal from their childhood. He gave a small imperceptible nod. Ricky sat down in one of the plush chairs within the large helicopter and pulled Cassie into his lap. “Welcome Captain Madsen. We’re so glad you could join us. Now strip.”

They continued to hover over Memorial Circle and Cassie didn’t understand what Ricky was planning. Jake kept complete eye contact with her while he took off his clothes under the watchful eye of two of the gunmen standing beside him. When he got down to his boxer briefs, he halted, but Ricky waved the gun at him. “All of it. We can’t have any pesky little trackers on you, now can we?”

Jake lowered his underwear and stood there naked and arrogant, while the man gathered up his clothes and boots, opened the door, and threw them out. He didn’t even flinch with the cold air whipping through the helicopter. He just stood there proudly with his hard body straight and tall while he glared at Ricky. It obviously cowed Ricky some as he nodded towards his men who punched him in the gut and then threw a pair of scrubs at him. “Put those on.” Then he turned to the pilot and signaled for them to go.

They were only a short ride from the warehouse so within minutes they were setting back down on the ground. Ricky pulled Cassie off first. Then his two henchmen pushed Jake out the door, followed by another guy holding a rifle closely behind. As soon as they’d all disembarked, the helicopter took back off.

As they headed towards the door, Cassie looked around scrambling for a plan. She had to figure out how to get the knife out of her boot. They’d only have one shot at this and if she failed, Ricky would kill both Jake and Chris. Cassie felt the weight of making this decision settle in the pit of her stomach like a lead ball. The guard who’d been following them stayed outside the doors of the building, so that left Ricky, the two guards pulling Jake along, and the two guards on each side of Pete and Chris…five men, all with guns.