Rescuing Isabelle, page 23
“If we’re going to make noise,” I say, “let’s start off with a bang.
I pull out a stun grenade and wait for Brady’s response. Also known as a flashbang, its a non-lethal explosive meant to temporarily stun and disorient our enemy. Unfortunately, it’ll do the same to Izzy, but that’s okay. I’ll get her out.
Voices rise in the dining room. An argument between a man and a woman. Not Izzy, but someone else. It’s the perfect distraction.
Brady gives a nod and counts us down. “On one…two…three…”
Twenty-Seven
Izzy
If looks could kill, I’d be dead ten times over with the way Carmen glares at me. Beneath her false smile and piercing eyes, the woman wants me dead.
Why?
It’s not like I’m here by choice. Maximus says she’s strong-willed, but the woman is wicked-smart. There’s no way she doesn’t know what’s really happening here.
Maybe she’s in league with her father?
But they argue in front of me. That’s weird.
“So, you’re one of the doctors that were kidnapped?” Her caustic tone burns right through me.
If I close my eyes and click my heels together three times, will I wake from this living nightmare?
“No.” I shake my head.
“But Papa said…” She turns accusatory eyes toward her father.
“I’m a pharmacist. Not a doctor.” I wipe my mouth with my napkin and lay it back in my lap. My dinner lies before me, essentially untouched. “Our entire medical team was kidnapped.”
“A minor difference.” Maximus waves off the error as if it’s nothing.
Despite what Maximus says, I don’t trust my food isn’t drugged. My water and wine glasses remain untouched. Everything about this turns my stomach and the evening only gets worse with the derogatory stares and not so veiled insults Carmen throws my way.
Either she doesn’t know I’m not here by choice, or doesn’t care.
I imagine a thousand and one ways to give her a message, a desperate plea for help, but abandon each and every one as images of my mother’s severed fingers fill my mind.
Maximus’ threat is brutal and effective.
Not that Carmen will help. The woman hates me on sight. Why, I have no idea. I’ve done nothing to her. I wither under her accusatory glare, hunching my shoulders as I desperately try to disappear.
“And how did the two of you meet?” She turns suspicious eyes on me, but then suddenly shifts her attention to her father. “Was it before, or after, you had Miguel killed?”
I gasp.
She turns to me. “The man who died was my cousin. Shot in the back of the head. Murdered by my father because he dared to disagree.” Tossing her napkin on her plate, her attention swings back to her father. In that harsh gaze, victory shines. “Take that lesson to heart. Bad things happen to those who don’t do as my father says.”
“I had nothing to do with Miguel’s murder.” Maximus struggles to control his tone. “It was the men who rescued Isabelle who murdered him. They will pay for that.”
I look from Carmen to her father and back again, rendered speechless.
“I highly doubt that. You’ve been after Miguel for years about his territory.”
The servers clear our dinner plates, then retreat, leaving us alone.
“My father is not the man you think he is. There’s no nobility in what he does. Be very careful jumping into his bed, although it’s probably too late for that. Fair warning, it will be the last decision you make. Women in this household are not free to make their own decisions.”
“Another word and…” Maximus slams his fist on the table.
“And what?” She gestures at her dress. “You’ll give her away like you did me?” She taps her polished fingernails on top of the table.
“I did not give you away.” His voice rises, filling the room.
“You arranged a loveless marriage against my wishes. That’s the very definition of giving me away. What did Artemus do to secure my hand in marriage?” Carmen directs her next comment to me. “Tread carefully with my father. You won’t be the first woman he’s ruined.”
“Mind your tone with me, girl. You’re dangerously close to crossing a line you don’t want to cross.”
“I’m not marrying him.”
“You will.”
“You promised me to a man nearly twice my age, consigning me to a holy union that can’t be broken, and for what? What did my hand in marriage cost the great Maximus Angelo? I have a right to know my true worth.”
Fury sweeps through Maximus. His face turns beet red and those eyes of his rage with thunderous intent.
My heart slams against my ribcage, trying desperately to escape the confines of this body and run away. I wish it luck. I’d like to get out of this horrible place. I’d love to not be in the same room with Carmen and her father as they argue.
But I’m trapped with no way out.
“You will learn your place, daughter.”
“I know my place, Papa. You never let me forget it.”
Like me, she’s trapped. I may be able to use her after all.
He shouts while she screams back. Their conversation turns heated, switching from English to Spanish as the volume increases.
My Spanish is barely passible, meaning I don’t follow what they say. I push back from the table, not wanting to get caught between these two. The moment I stand, Maximus points at me.
“Don’t you dare move.”
Carmen yells at her father, speaking so fast I barely understand one word in ten, but I pick up a few words: a fiancé, marriage, and wedding she wants no part of.
I want no part of this whole, weird, conversation and look longingly at the open door leading out of this miserable place.
Movement catches my eye.
Something fist-sized sails through the air. Arcing overhead, it drops to the floor behind Maximus. For a second, I try to figure out what it is, but a blinding flash and a deafening blast force me to the floor.
Twenty-Eight
Izzy
Blinded by the intense light, pain rings in my ears. Metallic smoke and caustic fumes fill the air. I choke after swallowing the smoke, and an intense wave of disorientation forces me into a fetal position.
Maximus drops beside to me. He cups his ears and curls in on himself. Through the smoke, I can’t see Carmen, although she was on the other side of the table from me.
Spots dance in front of my eyes, compromising my vision. It takes a second before I make out the dark shapes swarming into the room.
One of them comes at me.
I can’t see his face, but my body recognizes Booker on an instinctual level.
I cry out, but don’t hear my own voice, and reach frantically as tears rush down my face.
Booker bends down and takes me in his arms. While I cling to his broad shoulders, he places his gloved fingers over Maximus’ throat.
The leather thong of the rabbit’s foot catches my eye. I blink several times, trying to clear my vision. Spots continue to dance, disorientating me. Booker seems to be fine with whatever he’s checking, because he pulls back from Maximus.
When he tries to steady me on my feet, I squirm, until I’m free and kneel over Maximus’ body. Reaching inside his shirt, I wrap my fingers around the rabbit’s foot and yank it free.
The damn thing may have caused nothing but trouble, but I want it back. If Maximus wants it, that’s enough reason to take it from him. I curl my fingers around the stupid thing as Booker lifts me into the air and carries me out.
My ears ring. My nose crinkles at the acrid smoke clinging in the air. Another wave of dizziness overcomes me and I bury my face against Booker’s chest.
He came for me.
Booker shifts me in his arms.
It’s hard to see. I blink, but it doesn’t help.
When I try to look at Booker, there’s nothing to recognize. A helmet with a full shield covers his face. Beneath that, black fabric covers what’s left.
His jaw moves, making me think he’s trying to say something, but I shake my head and point to my ears. Hopefully, he’ll get it. The only sound is that buzzing from the blast.
There are other men in the room.
The rest of Bravo team is here and I want to cheer.
One of them goes to the door leading into the kitchen. He pulls the pin on something that looks like a grenade and tosses it inside. The door closes and less than a second later another explosion goes off. I feel it more in my chest than hear it in my ears.
We appear to be done in the dining room because Booker carries me down a long hall. We pass two men crouched in the hallway. They have weapons at the ready. They fall in behind Booker and we all rush down the hallway.
Pops of gunfire sound somewhere behind us. The ringing in my ears continues, and while I try to say something, I can’t hear my own voice.
For the next few minutes, chaos reigns. Men rush us from behind. Booker’s teammates take them out. Another group assaults us from in front. Booker shields me with his body as something I can’t quite see takes them out as well.
There appears to be a brief discussion between the men, punctuated by vigorous nods. Their deep voices make it to my ears, but are still too muffled from the flash grenade. The pounding in my head gets worse as Booker takes me in his arms again and carries me down another hallway. Waves of dizziness surge and subside, a never ending torment disorientating me.
On the move again, Booker carries me at a good clip as we navigate through the residence. I assume we’re headed out, but Booker leads me into the oddly empty courtyard I passed on my way to the room where I showered and cried.
He moves into the courtyard and heads to one of the corners. There, he sets me down, and holds me while I find my balance. He speaks, but I shake my head, letting him know I still can’t hear. My vision is better, recovering at a fast pace.
I know the men of Bravo team, but the six men decked out in black tactical gear make me suck in a breath. They’re impressive. Silent and deadly. Ferocious warriors on a mission to save a life.
My life.
Booker reaches into one of his many pockets and pulls out a tangled mess of one inch straps. He takes my hands and places them on his shoulders. I almost topple as he bends to one knee. All around us, his teammates take up position, weapons ready, but there is no pursuit.
Booker grasps one of my ankles and gently lifts it. When I do, he places my foot through the mesh. He does the same to my other leg, working efficiently. When he stands, I wobble again. The disorientation fades, but is still there.
He works the straps up my legs then pauses to fumble with the dress. When he yanks up on the silky fabric, he works the straps up and over my thighs. I nearly jump out of my skin when the back of his hand brushes against the bare skin between my legs. He jumps too, perhaps surprised by my lack of panties underneath.
I just got groped by Booker and I didn’t get a chance to enjoy it.
There’s a bit of a pause, while he sorts things out. Meanwhile, a low thump, thump, thump beats at the air.
My brows tug tight as Booker finishes securing what I now realize is a harness. Up in Booker’s arms again, he gently walks to the center of the courtyard, then places me on my feet again.
He reaches between us and clips my harness to his with two locking carabiners. My brain moves at a sluggish speed, trying to figure out what he’s doing and why we’re not hightailing it out of this place.
A thick rope drops out of the sky.
My head tilts back. My jaw drops. And my heart thunders inside my chest. A helicopter hovers overhead.
One of the men grabs the rope and brings it to Booker. He clips another carabiner around a loop, then takes a step back.
The downdraft of the helicopter kicks up dirt, making a mess of my hair. It forces my eyes closed to protect them from the grit. When I blink, the rest of the men hold various sections of the rope. Like Booker, they’re clipped in.
With a flash of thumbs up from them all, the rope yanks me off my feet and lifts me into the air.
A blood-curdling shriek tears free of my throat as the ground disappears beneath my feet. Booker wraps an arm around me, pulling me tight against his chest while I scream in holy terror.
Shots fire from the ground. I barely hear them, but the bright flashes accompanying them are impossible not to see. Booker’s team dangle below us, and aim back at the ground. Something bright red streaks toward the last man still on the ground, but I spin on the rope, screaming my head off.
The helicopter flies higher than I’ve ever been in my life. When I peek, all I see is certain death hurtling below me. I cling to Booker, holding on for dear life as the helicopter speeds us away and out of sight.
I don’t think I’ll ever stop screaming.
Twenty-Nine
Booker
The moment I have Izzy in my arms that constrictive band around my chest finally eases. I hold her to me, breathing in her unique scent along with her overwhelming fear.
CJ made last minute changes to our extraction plans while we infiltrated the building, sending the helicopter to extract us directly from the residence rather than completing the two click run to the original exfil point.
Not sure what he saw, but it won’t matter until we debrief. All I care about is Izzy is finally in my arms. She’s back where she belongs.
Where she’s always belonged.
As we fly through the air, Izzy’s panic intensifies. Howling at the top of her lungs, she’s beyond frantic. She’s out of her mind with fear. I yank at the black fabric covering the lower half of my face and try to reason with her.
The flashbang doesn’t help, nor do the rotors overhead. The noise they make is deafening all on their own.
A nonlethal device, flashbangs overwhelm and incapacitate without wounding, but that doesn’t mean they don’t hurt. The concussive wave from the blast can injure lungs and contuse the heart. For most, temporary hearing and vision impairments is the worst of it.
Since she screams at the top of her lungs, there’s no reason to worry about lung injury. Her hearing will come back. The temporary deafness will fade over the next few hours. Her vision is likely already back, cleared up from the blinding flash and the intense after images it causes.
She keeps her lids pinched together. Each time she opens them, the first thing she does is look down at the ground. Knowing her fear of heights, I do the only thing I can think of to distract her.
It’s the one thing I promised myself I would do when I saw her again.
I kiss her.
Dangling from a rope beneath a helicopter may not be the perfect place for our first kiss, but it’ll do. This has been destined from the moment Brady handed Izzy to me in that clearing in Nicaragua so many weeks ago.
I may not have known it at the time, but that when I took her hand, something powerful shook the foundations of my world.
This kiss… It’s rough.
Not my best effort, but in my defense, there are extenuating circumstances.
My lips mash against hers, forcing her terrified screams to stop. My hands tighten the hold I have on her, unwilling to let go for a second lest I lose her again.
Initially, her entire body goes still. The screams stop. She pushes at my chest, forcing me to reconsider my actions, but a moment later that push becomes a pull and my senses soar.
Her mouth opens, tentative at first. Her soft lips press against mine. They part, unsure perhaps, but allow me to sweep my tongue inside. The moment the tips of our tongues touch, her mouth opens as if unlocked as she melds my desire with her own.
Rough and desperate, our teeth chatter against each other as her tiny fists grip my shirt. While I devour her mouth, she works hers against mine. Our tongues battle back and forth, vying for dominance.
But this isn’t a battle.
I’m not interested in winning. Instead, I’m here to stake my claim and bind us together into one breath, one beating heart, and one timeless moment that joins us together from this moment to the next, and onward from there.
Our first kiss is brutal and raw, furious and determined. It’s everything I imagined it would be.
As our tongues tangle, we grow more frantic, more determined, more curious about this new sensation we explore together.
Knowing she’s securely clipped to my harness, I dare to release one hand. This, I cup behind her neck, fingers gliding through her hair. Her soft exhale heats my blood and tickles the hairs in my nose. I tilt her head, moving her lips where I want them and kiss her deeper than before.
All around me, sensation beats at me. The helicopter’s blades cut through the air, chopping it into a buzzing drone that thumps deep in my chest. The humid air we fly through, parts and flows around us, whipping her hair against my exposed skin.
But those sensations are nothing compared to the explosive feeling of holding Izzy in my arms, locking my lips over hers, and tasting the mingling of flavors that is uniquely her, me, and us.
My chest fills with joy as she embraces the kiss. I could get lost forever in the feeling that comes from kissing Izzy. I draw her into me one breath at a time until the only thing I feel is her unique essence becoming a part of me.
Why did I never do this before?
What the hell was I thinking?
I don’t know and chastise myself for the time we wasted, but this…this is perfection.
I hold my breath, too enraptured by her sweet taste, to be bothered with breathing.
This is what I’ve been missing in my life. I close my eyes, desperate to fully experience this kiss and sear the memory of it into my soul.
Holding her, kissing her, it’s like finding a piece of me I never knew was missing before now.
She steals my breath and I slake my thirst, devouring her sweet taste as shivers of sensation rush through me from head to toe. I never want this to end. When it does, I’ll only want more.
