Lost in Shadows (7 page)

“Really?” He leaned forward, his body pressed between her legs. 

As he whispered his ideas into her ear, his hands ranged over her body, knowing just where to caress and stroke for maximum effect. KC had to laugh. 

There were advantages to being in love with a man who not only loved her in return, but who also wanted to spend every waking moment with his hands on her, finding new ways to give her pleasure.

“Yes, to one and two, maybe to three—if it’s dark chocolate, and,” she gave a shiver of anticipation, “definitely number four.”

“Your wish is my command,” he said, kissing her once more. Then he scooped her into his arms, ready to carry her to the bedroom.

The doorbell rang before he got two steps. “Damn, who the hell could that be?”

“Probably Lucky or Jay. I told them to come early if they needed help with their tuxes.”

“They’re grown men,” he groused, “let them dress themselves.”

“Chase, it’s ten degrees out there, go answer the door.” He spun on his heel, taking her with him as he moved to the foyer. “Put me down!” 

She barely had time to close the robe when he didn’t comply. He shifted her weight higher into his arms, freeing one hand, and opened the door with a fake growl, “Come back later!”

He froze when he saw Rose Prospero and Billy Price standing on the stoop. Both wore serious, mournful expressions.

Chase released her, and KC dropped to her feet. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

She wrapped an arm around Chase, felt his body stiffen with fear. 

“It’s Jay,” he said, “something’s happened to Jay.” 

“No,” Rose assured him. “Your brother is fine. Can we come in?”

KC ushered them inside. Both were dressed for the ceremony, Billy in a tux she was certain was custom tailored and Rose in a long, crimson dress that suited her exotic coloring. The STR leader was a mysterious figure. The only things KC knew for certain about her new boss was that she was ex-CIA, had roots in the now-renegade country of Razgravia—where KC’s grandfather had known Rose—and that anyone on the Team would willingly lay down their life for Rose. 

Chase closed the door, but the room still felt chilly. KC wrapped her arms around her, snugging the belt on her robe tighter. Chase moved to stand behind her, his arms over hers, sharing his warmth and support.

“It’s Lucky,” Rose said. “He’s missing.”

KC’s fingers coiled into tight fists. 

“Damn it, I told him not to leave the Team,” Chase said. “He’s too vulnerable at ATF.”

“The Preacher has him?” KC asked, preferring facts over speculation. 

Every federal agent now carried a copy of the computer generated image of The Preacher that Lucky had helped to create after Lucky had been captured and tortured by The Preacher last month. And lived to not only escape, but tell the tale to his fellow law enforcement agents. Even though the damage was done, they all knew Lucky was at the top of The Preacher’s hit list.

Billy answered. “We don’t know. He and another ATF agent went out to set up a buy and they haven’t reported back.”

“Why would Lucky go out on an undercover deal? That was the whole reason he left our Team, he wanted to work in his lab.”

“Seems the rest of the agents available were out securing the stadium for the game today. Lucky went in on his day off to check on some projects he was overseeing and,” Billy shrugged, “I guess he couldn’t say no.”

“Have you told his family?” KC asked.

Billy and Rose exchanged glances. 

“Not yet. We thought we’d get the Team working on it, see what we’re up against so that we can give them some meaningful information,” Rose answered. KC saw the muscles around her eyes tighten and knew that Rose dreaded facing the Cavanaughs. 

“I’m in,” Chase said, “just let me grab my coat and shoes.”

“Give me five minutes to get dressed,” KC said, moving to the bedroom. “Call Jay and the minister, will you, Chase?” she shouted over her shoulder. 

Chase stepped into a pair of Timberlands that sat beside the door. “Helluva day for a wedding.”

CHAPTER 8

Lucky and Ryan hadn’t taken two steps when he stopped. “Damn, my gun.” 

He couldn’t believe he’d almost left the Glock behind. He had his backup piece still in his boot, unfired, but if they encountered any of The Preacher’s men, they’d need all the firepower they could get. He opened the car door, grabbed the forty caliber semiautomatic.

“You know anything about guns?” he asked Ryan who stood beside him, looking down at the semi as if it were a snake or something worse. “I need to clear the chamber, see how many rounds I have left, but I can’t do it with one hand.”

Wordlessly, she took the Glock from him. Keeping the muzzle aimed away from them, she ejected the magazine, popped the round from the chamber and counted the bullets left after she replaced the solo round. “How many does it hold?” she asked, nodding to the magazine.

“Seventeen.”

The light of the interior lamp clouded her face in shadow. “There are six rounds missing.” She looked up, a question in her eyes.

Lucky met her gaze. She was a cop’s widow, he knew what she wanted to know. 

“There were four of them, three with guns. They killed Tillburn right off the bat, he didn’t even have time to draw. I hit one of them, saw him go down, don’t know if he’s dead or not. I think I grazed another—there was some blood on his shirt sleeve—but it didn’t slow him down much.” Ruined Whitney’s fancy silk polo, though, he thought with satisfaction.

“Michael never had to fire his gun outside of the range,” she said, re-inserting the magazine and handing the Glock back to him. Her hand was shaking. What did he expect? He kept reminding her of her dead husband. 

“Thanks.” He swallowed hard. “This was the first time I ever had to shoot at anyone. But I’ve had people shoot at me before and I killed a man, last month.” 

Lucky couldn’t believe he was talking to her about this. He hadn’t even told Chase the whole story about what happened to him Christmas Eve when The Preacher held him captive. 

They made him go see a headshrinker down at Quantico before they let him come back to work, but he’d given the guy a watered down version, just enough to get him cleared for duty. 

None of his family ever killed anyone in the line. Kevin once shot a man in the leg, that was the most violence any of the Cavanaughs ever had to perpetrate. Until last month.

She closed the car door, and they were alone in the dark again. They began walking down a trail, at least she seemed to think it was a trail, to Lucky’s eyes it was just a few feet of clear space between some trees.

“That must have been difficult,” she said. “Even with all your training, nothing can prepare you for the real thing. The shock, the adrenalin, the lingering doubts and guilt mixed with the feeling that you’re glad to be alive even if someone else is dead.”

He looked up at that. She did understand. “Last month, my cover was blown. The Preacher and one of his men took me from my bed at night, questioned me, they wanted to know who I was working with.” 

Lucky didn’t go into the details of how they questioned him, tortured was the more accurate word, but it didn’t matter what you called it. What mattered was the end result. He hadn’t broken, hadn’t betrayed Chase. And, although his heart had stopped and he’d been clinically dead for several minutes, he had survived.

“When they were finished, ready to kill me, one of them came to…” He trailed off, remembering the sour taste of fear and the fierce determination to live that had consumed him during those awful minutes. “I fashioned a homemade knife, and I used it to kill him.” 

She didn’t need to know how he’d taken the boots from the dead man’s feet, it was either that or make his way through the snow, down a mountain in nothing but his boxers. “I escaped,” he finished. “But so did The Preacher.”

Ryan reached out a hand, touched his arm. “You lived. You’re going to make it out alive this time, too.” The gleam of her smile was the only bright spot in the darkness that shrouded them. “Lucky.”

They’d covered a lot of ground, he noticed, the car was long out of sight when he looked behind them, his eyes now accustomed to the darkness. His shoulder didn’t seem to hurt as much either.

“Thanks,” he said, but she gave no sign that she heard. 

She continued leading the way, her steps sure and confident over the irregular, snow-covered terrain. She moved like a wild animal, as if she belonged out here in the wilderness.

They came to a small wooden box mounted on a post. Ryan stopped, waited for him to catch up. “Here we are, the Lost River trail,” she announced.

Lucky looked at her. “Weren’t we already on the trail?”

“That? No. That path is shared by the handicapped accessible nature trail and a short, three mile loop. It just leads here to the trail head, the real trail.”

He looked back the way they had come. It had been fairly flat, free of obstacles beneath the snow. Handicapped, huh? He’d barely kept up with her. Lucky had a sinking feeling that this was going to be a lot harder than he thought. 

“This is why I hate the country,” he muttered.

She ignored him, turned the beam of her flashlight toward a marking on a tree. A blue horizontal line had been painted across the trunk. 

“If we get separated, follow the blue blazes down the mountain. Don’t try to cross the gorge without me.” 

Lucky nodded, sure whatever. The tiny ribbon of light seemed so puny against all this utter blackness. 

Snow spun through it, almost drowning the faint illumination. For the first time he wondered if they’d even make it through the night. Wouldn’t that be a kick? The Preacher’s gang chasing through a blizzard only to find two popsicles, frozen stiff out here on the side of mountain. 

“Two blazes,” Vinnie continued and he yanked his attention from the gruesome image of the two of them locked into an eternal frozen embrace, snow surrounding them. “One on top of another means the trail is taking a turn, so look for the next blaze, be certain you’re heading in the right direction.”

“Won’t gravity pretty much take care of that?” he asked. They were on top of a mountain, after all.

“Gravity will also get you headed down into the gorge. It’ll be days before you could get back out of there. So what do two blazes mean?”

Ah jeez, this wasn’t kindergarten. “The same as a middle-fingered salute during rush hour traffic on DuPont Circle—get the hell out of my way, ‘cause I’m turning. Can we go now?”

She shrugged her pack into better position and headed north on the trail. He trudged after her and immediately regretted leaving the path they were on previously. Even following in her footsteps it was tough going, and he wasn’t the one having to break through over a foot of snow. 

“I hate to ask,” he huffed, his breath turning into a cloud of vapor, “but aren’t we headed the wrong way?”

“Not if you want a roof over your head tonight. Have I steered you wrong yet?”

Lucky frowned at that. Great. Not only lost in the woods, lost in the woods with a civilian that he was going to have to depend on to get back out. No way. 

Once they stopped for the night, he was going to force her to show him the map and the way out. He could take care of himself, but shape he was in right now, he didn’t want to have the responsibility of watching over a civilian as well.

Of course, if he didn’t make it off this mountain and get his information to the right people, there might be thousands of civilian lives he would be responsible for.

Lucky sighed, the throbbing in his shoulder revving up to a nine on the Richter scale.

CHAPTER 9

Billy sat, waiting for KC to get changed. She took less than the five minutes she’d requested. When she emerged from the bedroom and saw that the others had left, he expected the flash of fury that crossed her face.

“Man couldn’t give me five minutes, had to rush off. I’ll bet he didn’t even take his coat.” She shrugged into her own parka and grabbed Chase’s from the rack. “C’mon, Price. Guess I’m driving.” 

He followed her down to the single car garage, smiling as she continued her diatribe against her husband-to-be. Most women would be devastated by the sudden change in plans on their wedding day. Not KC. She was more upset with Chase, it seemed.

“He’s going to get himself killed one of these days,” she muttered as she slid into the driver’s seat of the Jeep Renegade and started the ignition. “Rushing in without thinking—damned fool.”

Billy coughed to cover his laugh. Chase had used those exact words about KC last month when describing her riding a Harley into the middle of a firefight. These two were meant for each other—and made for an unstoppable team.

“He’s going to want to go after Lucky,” he said once they were on the road.

She nodded as if she’d already gotten there herself. “I know, I’ll take care of it.”

KC was new to the Team, but Billy liked how she didn’t need everything drawn out in triplicate, she could cut to the heart of the matter quickly. A lot like Rose that way. “There’s more going on than just Lucky.”

“At the briefing on Friday it seemed like things were heating up all over.”

“Has Rose mentioned anything to you about Razgravia?” He tried to keep his tone neutral. Rose would kill him if she knew he was talking about this.

“She knew my grandfather over there. And we both know the language, so it’s fun to have someone to practice on.” She cut her eyes over to him. “You need me to make a trip? We’d have to work it out with Chase—no way he’d ever fit in over there.”

“If we did, do you think you could handle it alone?” That was as close as he could get to broaching the subject closest to his heart.

They stopped at a red light, and KC turned her gaze on him. “Does she know?” 

“What?” his voice came out sharper than he had intended. 

Billy avoided her eyes. Maybe KC was too good. The light turned green, and she focused on the road, giving him a chance to compose himself. 

“Look, Price, I’m new to the Team, but I speak my mind plain and simple. That’s just how I am, so if I’m off base, say the word. Does Rose Prospero know that you’re in love with her?”