Criminal Instinct (23 page)

Ray returned to the room, giving him a nod that everything was okay. Everyone accounted for…except Ana.

“I’m not all that sure that I care at all.”

Silence followed his statement.

“If that’s the case, you can stay on the line while I put a bullet in her head and end her misery.”

“You know—” Jonas gripped the receiver so tightly, it shook against his ear, “—I wouldn’t just let anyone die, Tyler.”

“Yes. A sense of honor about you. What a waste.” Abruptly his voice altered from calm to severe. “Await my call tomorrow night. I’ll give directions for you and Brooks. Follow them, and come alone. Otherwise you’ve killed her.”

The line went dead.

Jonas slowly set the receiver back onto its cradle. Dazed. And damn it, scared. What was happening to Ana now? He should have asked to speak to her and found out if she was all right. What had Tyler said?

…end her misery.

He clenched his hands into fists at the thought of Sal Tyler laying one sickening hand on her.

Unless Tyler was bluffing.

In a rush, he picked up the phone, dialed Ana’s cell, and got a recording telling him to leave his number. It wasn’t the first time. He’d thought she’d been avoiding him. He’d hurt her; he’d seen it on her face even through his anger.

Ana could be home safe. If she was okay, he’d have to get her under protection whether she wanted it or not. He knew the kind of evil Tyler wielded. He killed without a qualm. Hurt with a clear conscience.

Sitting in the stillness of his office, Jonas stared at his phone, willing it to ring.

Vaguely, he was aware of Ray standing a few feet away, waiting for Jonas to tell him what the hell was going on. But Jonas needed a moment to settle his nerves. He needed a clear mind to think what to do.

If Ana was killed…

“It must be Ana,” Ray finally said.

Jonas nodded once. “He’s threatened to kill her if we don’t follow his instructions. He’ll call tomorrow night.” He paused. “I thought he had Kara or Elliott.”

“No, they’re fine. I’ve instructed Kara not to leave until you’ve told her it’s okay. She’s not happy.” He paused. “Does it take off some of the edge that it’s Ana?”

Jonas looked him straight in the eye and answered Ray with his gaze, let him see the unsteady emotions he couldn’t quite control twisting inside his mind. Let him understand what he just realized himself. Ana meant a hell of a lot more than he ever wanted to believe.

Ray nodded. He understood.

A commotion sounded outside his door.

Jonas bolted to his feet.

The door flew open. Ana’s biker friend stepped into the room.

Ray immediately stood in front of Jonas like a shield.

Annoyed, Jonas nudged him aside.

“Where is she?” the biker said, his tone cold, detached.

Kara came in behind him, chest heaving, looking as if she was about to explode into one of her tantrums. Diego followed, blood dripping from his nose.

“Jonas,” Kara burst out. “He just barged in!”

Jonas instantly shuttered his face and walked clear of his desk. He didn’t need anyone to see his worry right now. “Kara, go back downstairs.”

Kara released a huff, looked as if she wanted to say more. Instead, she stalked away. Jonas nodded at Diego and he trailed out behind her.

Jonas met the biker’s eyes. “What do you want?”

“Ana,” he answered. His body was completely still, his breathing normal. He’d obviously knocked a fist into Diego before running up the stairs, but there were no signs that he had done either. “Where is she?”

“I don’t know.”

“Bullshit.”

“Are you saying she’s missing?” He’d hoped Tyler’s threat hadn’t been real.

Something flared across the biker’s face before it was gone. “She can’t be found.”

Jonas made himself smile, even as the truth drilled a hole in his gut. “Maybe she doesn’t want you to find her.”

In a flash they were toe-to-toe. Ray hung back, ready to spring.

“Anything happens to her and I find out you’re behind it, you’re dead, Saven.”

Jonas didn’t flinch, didn’t let his stare waver. He let the anger from the threat course through him. “You need to understand whatever’s between Ana and me is our business.”

“There’s nothing between you.”

“Is that what she told you? We’ll leave it at that.”

Again they eyed one another, each radiating hostility. Maybe even wishing the other would make the first move. Yet they were both experienced enough not to make it themselves.

“If I don’t find her, I’ll be back,” the biker warned, letting the threat linger before he turned and left. He didn’t take any precaution against the possibility Jonas could attack him from behind.

Jonas spun his body and slammed his fist full force into the wall. Plaster gave way to dry wall. Running his throbbing fingers over his head, he inhaled deeply.

“Feeling better?” Ray asked.

“Not until I know Ana’s safe and I get my hands on Tyler.”

Cold. So cold
.

Ana shivered uncontrollably. The pain had been awful…now it was smothered under the chills racking her body.

Darkness surrounded her, closing in.

She could hear the pulse of her heart in her ear. Faint, distant.

With each moment it seemed farther away.

Somebody…help me
.

Something wrapped around her. Thick, rough.

A pinprick in her shoulder.

She gave in to the darkness.

Tuesday
9:10 a.m.

Miles paced in front of his desk in the SIDE’s meet room. Jax, Digit and Romeo occupied seats before him, their body language implying gross discomfort. He knew what was going through everyone’s heads.

Eagerness. Anticipation. Concern.

About tonight. He knew because he felt it all himself.

Right now Jay should be picking up Switch and bringing her in for questioning. Though it didn’t matter what she said about Saven. They knew for sure the Garcia brothers were behind the lethal Ecstasy. But it was one more base to cover.

Miles made damn sure to cover all his bases.

At ten-thirty this morning, he and Jax would meet with Donald Petry at the Oakland DEA Domestic Office to discuss the takedown and to hook up Jax with surveillance.

Anything could happen tonight; anything could go wrong. With Garcia’s reputation for violence, it was likely lives would hang in the balance, and some might even be lost. But it wouldn’t be anybody from Miles’s team. Not if he had any say about it.

Jay strode in. Alone.

Christ. Where was Switch?

“Ana wasn’t there,” Jay-man said.

Miles’s jaw clenched. Son of a bitch, he didn’t need this now. He scanned the team’s faces. “Where is she?”

“What do you mean?” Digit asked.

“She was given orders to keep her ass home until Jay picked her up.”

Jax straightened in his seat. “I think she’s been missing since last night.”

Miles scowled. “Missing?”

“I went to her apartment after leaving here yesterday. She was gone. I checked her usual hangouts. No dice. I thought she would come home during the night.”

Miles met Jay’s eyes.

“There’s something else,” Jay said.

Sarge frowned as he watched Jay pull something from his pocket. A blade with flames carved into the wooden handle. Switch’s blade.

The room fell as quiet as a tomb.

“I got the manager to let me in. I found it half hidden under her bed with her purse and pager.” Jay’s expression turned worried. “Ana never leaves anywhere without it.”

“Saven’s fucking got her,” Jax said. “Or the Suits.”

Miles rolled his shoulders, trying to get the tension out. “We don’t know anything until we check the tracker.”

Billy shifted in his seat, trying to contain his impatience. Sarge had left to call Petry and tell him they would be late for the meeting.

“You know the rules,” Jay-man said to the team. “Everyone stays seated while I track. You sneak around behind my back, you’re written up. Now’s not the time to mess around. I’ll find out where she is.” He left the room.

Only Sarge and Jay-man knew the location of the tracker and they wanted to keep it that way.

“Why do you think Saven has Switch?” Romeo asked Billy.

“Last night I went to see him. He lied through his teeth, saying he didn’t know where she was.”

“You really think something’s happened to her, don’t you?” Digit asked. Her blue eyes were wide, and for the first time that he could recall, uncertain.

He nodded.

The phone rang and Digit rose to answer it.

Jay-man returned with a ten-by-ten-inch digital tablet under his arm. He sat down at a desk with a computer terminal and gently opened the electronic notebook like a laptop. Which it was, except this laptop cost ten times the normal portable PC. A genius programmer from the Silicon Valley, who had been commissioned by the government to build its prototype, had designed it.

Billy wasn’t sure how many more existed in the world, but he was certain that in the future prisons would be using them to keep track of their inmates. SIDE recruits happened to be the government-sanctioned guinea pigs for a bigger tracking operation.

Jay-man hooked the tablet into the main computer terminal with satellite access. Then, as they’d seen him do many times in the last six months, he keyed in information and codes, likely asking the computer to search out SIDE member Switch.

Digit returned to her seat. “That was Skates checking in. I told him about Switch. He says he’s coming here to help.”

Romeo lifted his eyebrows. “Can he even get out of bed?”

“He said Switch would do the same for him.”

At that moment, Jay-man cursed.

Everyone turned to him. Foul words never crossed Jay-man’s lips. He shifted in his seat and rubbed a hand over his suddenly damp bald head.

An itch started between Billy’s shoulders.

Jay-man’s eyes widened and he sprang from his seat, heading toward Sarge’s office.

Billy scrambled from his seat, toward the system. He heard Digit and Romeo do the same from behind him. Grabbing the tablet, he spun it around. Bright red letters flashed across the screen:

***ALERT***

CODE NAME: SWITCH, NUMBER: 0502. CANNOT BE LOCATED.

SIGNAL IS NOT RESPONDING.

* * *

“I ran her signal twice. A search on the rest of the team worked fine. But…the system can’t locate her. There’s not even a malfunction error coming through. It’s as if her tracker has disappeared.”

“I see,” Miles said to Jay, his voice quiet. The tracker inserted in each recruit was state-of-the-art. The digital locators were just over six months old, monitored and checked for glitches on a weekly basis.

If Switch wasn’t giving off a signal it meant the mechanism must be severely damaged or destroyed. Someone would have to have cut it out…or have done something unthinkable to her body.

“Last night we were focused on Billy’s meet.” Jay shook his head. “I hadn’t performed a search since yesterday, midmorning—”

“Put an A.P.B. out on her,” Miles interrupted. It wasn’t Jay’s fault. Miles hadn’t thought to do a search either. All he’d cared about were the details for the bust. “Talk to Rodney Morales at the 157 Precinct, tell him one of our recruits needs to be found. Give him her description. He’ll check the morgue for any recent Jane Does or unidentifiable bodies and get back to me. Damn it, I hope this doesn’t screw up Jax’s concentration. Don’t sugar coat it for the team. After tonight we’ll find out who did what to her.” After a pause he continued. “I
will
find out what happened, Jay. She was my responsibility, and you know I don’t take that lightly.”

“Yeah, Miles. I know.”

“Call Morales.”

Jay nodded and walked away.

Miles stood staring down at his open files on Operation Deadly Adam, taking in the near certainty that he’d lost one of his team. He’d always known casualties were a high probability, and even though he’d try to prevent a loss, he’d been resigned. The SIDE recruits knew the risks coming in when they signed the contract.

Running a hand over his face, he realized that he hadn’t thought it would be Switch. He’d believed her to be too tough, too street smart. No matter what situation she got herself into with her impulsive actions, she thought quick on her feet and found a way out.

But everyone had a limit.

The guilt began.
Another life on his hands
. He hadn’t even made up for Charlie’s loss yet, how would he make up for another? And tonight he had to worry about Jax.

No telling how the kid would take the news about Switch.

As if conjured by thought, Jax filled his office doorway.

“The tracker can’t get a location,” Jax said.

Miles nodded.

“She’s probably dead.” His tone was flat.

“That’s my take.”

No indication of how the kid felt. He said, “After this operation is over, I’m going after Saven. And I’m going to force out of him what he won’t tell me.”

Miles narrowed his eyes. “Was there something going on between you and Switch I should know about?”

“I’d do the same for any of the team.”

Miles grunted.
Not so sure about that.

“I won’t let anyone stop me from finding out what happened to her. And if it wasn’t Saven, I’ll do what has to be done to find out who was involved.”

“That goes for me.” Skates’s voice. Battered and bruised, he walked into the office and stood behind Jax, his movements stiff.

“And me.” Digit followed. Her eyes were sad and bloodshot. She’d been crying.

Romeo followed and gave a nod indicating that he felt the same, as they all squeezed in to the suddenly too small office.

Christ.

Voices. Murmuring.

Ana tried to open her eyes. One opened slowly, the other barely a slit. Her vision was blurred until she blinked a few times.

Pain throbbed in every part of her, tiny hammers under her skin. Water. Her mouth felt as if she’d swallowed a handful of powder. Needed…a drink. A dull ache centered in her temples.

Her body slouched uncomfortably in the heavy, wooden-framed chair. Her neck angled sideways.

The voices moved closer, along with the tap of footsteps.

Her chest tightened. Straining not to move, she feigned sleep.

“Is she alive?”

Tyler. Crazy bastard.

“She’s breathing, Mr. Tyler.”

“How much longer will she be out?”

“I tranked her last night after she went shocky. Should be coming around soon.”

Last night?
Why hadn’t anyone come after her?

“Good, good. Now do to her what I told you to.”

Ana’s stomach twisted into a hard fist, sweat breaking through her pores.

Footsteps again, this time going in the opposite direction. She could only catch a few words.

“…show our guest…two hours…the boat…”

Steps came toward her. Ana didn’t move even as her heart pounded a furious beat.

Something hard and cold slid against her raw wrists. She gritted her teeth against the pain.
Don’t move, don’t move
. The rope loosened, fell away. Oh shit. He was removing the restraints.

Dropping her arms off the arm rests of the chair, her body sagged, and she feigned unconsciousness. She heard him walk away and then opened her good eye.

He stood about ten feet away at the patio table, his back to her. A gun stuck out of the back of his pants waistline.

This was her chance. What if he saw her first? What if he overpowered her?

Just do it
.

She didn’t get a chance. He walked out of the room. Relief nearly swallowed her.

No time for doubts. Gripping the arms of the chair, she shoved herself to her feet. She took one awkward step.

And fell to the cement on her hands, her stomach hitting the floor.

Her legs and feet were numb. She’d been strapped to the chair for too damn long! Her right hand brushed the area of her chest where they’d pounded on her tracker. She rolled to her back in agony, biting back a scream. A tear slid from her eye.

She tucked in her chin and peered down her chest. Her breath caught in her throat.

Purple and red bloomed over her breast like a distorted bouquet of splattered bruises.

She shut her eyes.
Don’t think about it. Just go.

She needed a weapon, fast. The Suit would be back any second.

Gritting her teeth against the pain in her raw wrists and her legs, she rolled back onto her stomach and used her arms to push shakily to her knees. Sharp tingles danced inside her limbs. She wiggled, trying to get her blood to circulate.

Then she crawled.

The wounds on her thighs had dried and scabbed. The skin stretched as she moved. Some of the wounds reopened. She swallowed the whimpers that built in her throat. Half dragging herself, half pushing, she struggled toward the patio table. Sweat broke across her face, down her back.

Nearly there
.

She gripped the table, pulling herself to a sitting position.

So tired.

Hurry!

She struggled to her knees. She could see what was on the table.

Instruments of torture.

Knives in all different shapes and sizes, chains, nails, hooks. Some kind of Taser gun. Handcuffs, rope. Beating sticks, pipes, brass knuckles. She found her dress. It had been cut.

Nausea turned her stomach. She heard footsteps.

She was too late.

Fuck it
. She reached for the Taser, gripping the plastic handle like a lifeline. And it was. If she let go without pulling the trigger, she’d die.

The footsteps sounded closer. A curse pierced the air—she whirled.

She had only a few seconds to aim and fire.

He ran toward her.

She pulled the trigger.
Nothing!

He dropped something, reaching behind his back.

Her right thumb scraped against a small notch.
Safety
.

The Suit was almost to her.

She slid the tab up and shot.

Twin lines of wire shot out, hitting the Suit straight in the chest. His arms flared out, his eyes flashed wide, and his mouth gaped with no sound. His body convulsed like a dangling puppet on a string before he crumpled like dead weight.

She released the trigger, but didn’t dare remove her finger. If he so much as twitched she would zap the asshole again.

Her vision began to blacken. She blinked, realizing what was wrong. She gasped, struggling to fill her lungs with air. She’d been holding her breath.

She didn’t have much time. Someone would come. She grabbed the handcuffs from the table, shoved the rope over her arm, and using her hands against the concrete, she slid over to him, scraping her wounds against the floor.

He opened his mouth. She pulled the trigger.

He convulsed and went frozen again.

Setting down the Taser and rope, she gripped his hand and slid the cuff around one bony wrist as tightly as she could, then the other, settling his hands on his crotch. Grabbing the rope, she wrapped the length three times around his ankles and tied a severe knot. His dead eyes were on her, but he hadn’t tried anything else. Sarge had told the team that getting hit with a five-second interval of fifty-thousand watts once was pure hell. No one wanted it to happen a second time; the one targeted had to be too doped out of their mind to care. The Suit had caught on quick.

If she didn’t tape his mouth, once she left he’d scream for help. She looked around and spotted her dress again. She struggled over, grabbed it and tore a large section, then stuffed it in his mouth, wrapping the rest around his head so he couldn’t see.