Vendetta (15 page)

“Geneva,” she said. He held up his hand, “she will be unharmed.” He couldn’t guarantee she would be safe from Sabian’s men. The men he was sending with her were not the search and rescue kind. They were lethal, ready to kill, and that’s the only mission that would be on their mind as they hit Sabian’s compound—that, and keeping her alive.

“Everybody else dies,” he told his men. She hadn’t seen her father this angry, this blood thirsty, in years. The last time he had ordered a hit was when a man from the mainland had tried to kill her mother. He was a man from her mother’s past, somebody she had helped the government put behind bars and when he escaped the first thing on his mind was vengeance. He had killed three of the federal agents before coming to Hawaii to go after her mother. He hadn’t succeeded, and he had paid with his own life for trying. That look of vengeance and rage that she saw in her father’s eyes then was the same look she saw now and she knew there was no talking him out of what he had just ordered done; she wouldn’t even try.

“Stay with my father, Harrison. You’ll be safe with him.”

“You come back to me,” he kissed her softly. “If you think you’re getting out of marrying me that easily you’re wrong.”

She laughed the best she could as her brother went to work on fixing up her wound. “I have no plans of getting out of being your wife, Harrison.” He was ready for this, he could handle it. If he could see her bleeding and then see what came before stitching her up without any type of anesthesia, then he could deal with the life she lived, with the family he was going to become a part of, and she knew that now more than she did the day he showed up at her door with a ring in his pocket.

“I’m ready she said to the men who would accompany her.

“No prisoners,” her father said. “No mercy.” They all knew what that meant. They all knew he had declared war.

Chapter Twelve

D
rake wrapped his arm around the bastard’s neck, placed one hand on his head and twisted until he heard the bones snapping, breaking, and ending the life of just another one of Sabian’s men. He didn’t care. What he wanted was his woman, and they all better pray he got her back alive and unharmed. He heard the overhead vent shaft gate crashing to the floor and he turned just in time to see another one of Sabian’s men with a gun pointed on him getting taken out by some Japanese man dressed in black and carrying a long sword.

“Who the hell are you?” Drake asked as he pulled his spare gun from his ankle. He had lost the other one while fighting the other bastard.

“Drake Daniels?”

“That would be me,” he said flatly. The man nodded at him. And then, just as quickly as he had descended into the room he secured his sword to his back and crawled up the wall, almost like a spider, before vanishing back into the airshaft.

He didn’t have time to formulate events in his head he needed to keep moving. He used his communication device to alert the others. “There’s some bad ass Japanese man crawling up the walls,” he said. “He appears to be on our side so don’t shoot him.”

“Saw one of those myself,” Sully confirmed. “Must be one of Valencia’s.”

“Anybody seen her?” Thomas inquired.

“No,” was the unanimous reply that prompted a low growled curse from Thomas.

“Anybody got a position on Sabian yet?”

“No,” another unanimous reply.

“I’m working on it,” Thomas’ voice was low and lethal.

“I don’t have Geneva yet,” Drake confirmed. “Don’t kill the S.O.B. until I have my woman back.”

“Roger that,” Thomas said. “There are other things I can do to him while I wait,” he said in a tone that told Drake that Thomas was ready to torture, maybe even mutilate, Sabian. He understood his rage. Not only had he killed an entire team of military men, Marines—good ones; he had also gone after Eve, and now Thena. There was no way Thomas was going to let the man’s actions go without a serious beating. He wanted to kill him himself for going after Geneva.

Her father was alive. The tranquilizer dart hadn’t killed him. Drake wondered why Sabian had changed his course of action. He usually just killed people without thought. But for some reason he had left her father alive. Why? On some level he didn’t care about the why part of the equation. What he cared about was getting Geneva back alive and unharmed. He knew what men like Sabian could do when it came to torture and he prayed Geneva hadn’t suffered any of his tactics.

Drake was on a mission. He was going to rescue his wife. Anybody who got in his way would die.

Sully had seen a couple of those “Japanese bad asses,” Drake had mentioned. He knew almost immediately they were on their side. What he didn’t know was if Valencia was alive or dead because none of the men who had dropped in to take out one of the men playing for the wrong team had bothered to stick around long enough to answer questions. He didn’t mind that they hit and then moved on because he understood the need to keep moving, but he wasn’t sure if they were helping them because Valencia wanted them to, or if they were there on a mission of their own—if they were there because they were avenging her death. Like Thomas, he had grown attached to the petite warrior and he would be pissed beyond belief if she wasn’t still breathing. It didn’t pay to get on his bad side. From what he had seen of the men silently helping them, he was sure it didn’t pay to get on the bad side of her family either.

“Help!” Geneva yelled loudly once more. It wasn’t as if yelling had gotten her any help before, but she heard gunfire now which meant somebody was out there somewhere and maybe that somebody was one of the good guys. “Is anybody out there? Can anybody hear me?” She hoped they could. She had her hands cuffed at the wrist around a pole and the room was steadily filling up with water. She was holding on—for now—but her legs were getting tired of supporting her weight above water, and with the steady rise of the water she wasn’t sure she had much longer before the cold fluid reached the top of the ceiling. There was a gate above her, not far from where she was anchored. That gate meant there was a way out—if only she weren’t cuffed. Plus, while Drake had tried to teach her to swim, she wasn’t very good at it. She could get from one point to another, but she hadn’t mastered that flipping over thing that he tried to teach her—the thing that would help her get her head above water in a vertical, not horizontal, position. She had tried; she just wasn’t good at it. She could float to the surface, but floating wasn’t going to help her here. Not that she had that option right now either.

“I’m down here!” She started shivering. The water was like ice and she was soaked in it. “Please help me!” She heard a loud pop before the gate above fell inward. Either the man who had been sporadically taunting her with verbal awareness of her impending death had come back and was tired of hearing her yell, or somebody was up there, ready to save her. She knew it wasn’t Drake. That man, Sabian, had already told her they had killed him this morning. Her heart had broken and she wanted to give up, but she couldn’t. Drake wouldn’t want her to.

“Hey down there,” she heard the woman’s voice clearly. “Can you swim?”

“A little,” she admitted. “But I’m cuffed.” She wasn’t going to try to turn to an angle where she could get a complete view of her rescuer because the last time she tried to shift positions she found herself submersed completely. She didn’t like that feeling of cold isolation; she didn’t like it at all and she wasn’t eager to experience it again.

“I’m going to come down and get you.”

“It’s freezing,” she said. “And I don’t think you’ll be able to get back up if you come down here.” She wanted help, but she didn’t want anybody else to die with her.

“I have a cord we can use to get up.”

“I’m still cuffed.”

“I can take care of that. Drake’s going to be glad to see you.”

“He’s dead,” she said. “That man told me they killed him when he dropped off his blood brother.”

“He didn’t handle a drop so that part of the statement isn’t true. And unless Drake has gotten himself killed here, I’d say he’s still alive.”

Geneva felt her heart leap with joy. He was still alive. She knew he had to be. He wouldn’t have come this far to get himself killed. He wouldn’t dare die now without telling her.

“Who are you?” She couldn’t see her.

“Nobody important,” she said. Geneva heard the splash in the water and she knew whoever it was had came in to get her. When the body gliding through the water finally reached her and submerged she saw who the woman in question was.

“Valencia! Why didn’t you tell me it was you?”

Valencia smiled. “Still don’t know my voice. I’m going to be your sister-in-law and you can’t tell me from any other woman.”

Geneva tried to laugh, but she couldn’t. Her teeth were starting to chatter. “I thought you would have stayed in Hawaii with Harrison,” she trembled. “How are we going to get me out of here?” She shivered once more, her teeth clanking together feverously.

“With this,” Valencia pulled a small silver tool from her hair.

“What’s that?”

“Knife,” she said.

“It’s so small.”

“Great things come in small packages,” she fiddled with the lock expertly freeing the cuffs from Geneva’s wrists. “Let’s go.”

Geneva let go of the pole and she felt herself sink below the water before a firm arm wrapped around her and pulled her back up. “Sorry, you’ve been in that position too long I should have known you wouldn’t be ready. Just relax and let me get you over to the rope.”

Geneva relaxed the best she could. She could feel her body shaking. She was so cold, but up there, up above her hole in the ground prison, she knew it was warm—it had to be. When they reached the rope Valencia positioned her so that she could hold on to it instead of her body. “Can you hang on here?”

“I can climb up,” she said. She was sure she could, or at least she would try. Anything would be better than drowning in freezing cold water.

“I need to go first, just in case.”

She understood immediately. They weren’t out of danger. There were still some of Sabian’s men running amuck up there. She nodded her understanding and watched as Valencia effortlessly made it to the top.

Geneva heard one gun shot. Valencia wasn’t carrying a gun. She was sure of that—well, almost sure of that. Then she heard a man’s voice. “No rescuing our prisoner,” he said before another shot rang out. Geneva felt her heart sink. She couldn’t believe…no, she wouldn’t believe that Valencia was dead. Harrison had talked so much about Valencia and how skilled she was that she had started to think she was a real life version of Wonder Woman and there was no way she was going to believe that rescuing her had been the cause of the death of not only a good bodyguard, but also the love of Harrison’s life.

“Thanks,” she heard Valencia say.

“What are big brothers for? Besides, I can’t let you always have all the fun now can I?”

Geneva heard the laughter in his tone. Brother? Leo, she thought. Harrison had mentioned a man named Lucky Leo. Although she wasn’t sure that was his actual name. She had known people named their dog Lucky, but she didn’t know any who named their kids Lucky, but…well, that was so not important right now she decided. She was still freezing, and she didn’t know if it was safe to try to climb up.

“Help me get her out of there and I’ll cover you.”

“Typical, make me do all the work,” he chuckled. “Hold on down there,” she heard before the rope started sliding upward, her body going with it.

It wasn’t until she was out and on the ground that she managed to look up into the most beautifully shaped hazel brown eyes she had ever seen. “Hi,” she said.

“Good Lord the Mainland has some beautiful women.”

“She’s Drake Daniel’s wife, Leo.” Valencia said with a hint of annoyance in her tone.

“She’s still fine,” he said. “Got any sisters?”

“No,” she laughed. “Sorry. But thank you both for saving my life.”

“We’re not out of here yet,” Valencia reminded them. “So if you two can hold off on the family reunion here we can get moving.”

Leo looked at her. “Family, huh…” he grinned.

“Drake Daniel’s wife. Harrison’s sister,” Valencia said slowly as if educating a child on the family dynamics. “You do remember Harrison talking about his sister right? You do remember the man who almost exploded when he found out they had his sister? We’re on the same page here right?”

He shrugged. “He never said his sister was hot. I would have paid more attention if he had. And while we were standing by JJ’s lifeless body I really wasn’t paying much attention to your fiancé, sis. I had bigger things to think about, mainly getting your wound burned and stitched.”

“Okay, I’ll give you that.”

“My God, you’re beautiful,” he said to Geneva once more.

“Leo! Focus!”

“That’s your job. I’m going to keep the damsel in distress next to me.”

Valencia shook her head. “Take your gun back,” she shoved it in his hand and he laughed.

“So,” Leo said conversationally. “How do you like my sister? I think she needs to relax a little. You know, have some fun.”

“Seriously,” Valencia snapped. “Men with machine guns waiting to kill us and you’re picking now to chit chat.” She looked as if she wanted to slap him. “You know, Dad always said you needed to work on your focus.”