Mackenzie's Pleasure (6 page)

some details, though, and discern his movements. He wore a black T-shirt, and as silently as he

had removed his gear, he now put it on again. He peeled back a flap on his wrist, and she caught

the faint gleam of a luminous watch.

"We have exactly two and a half minutes to get out of here," he murmured. "Do
what
I

say,
when
I say it."

Before, she couldn't have done it, but that brief moment of understanding, of

connection, had buoyed her. Barrie nodded and got to her feet. Her knees wobbled. She

stiffened them and shoved her hair out of her face. "I'm ready."

She had taken exactly two steps when, below them, a staccato burst of gunfire shattered

the night.

He spun instantly, silently, slipping away from her so fast that she blinked, unable to

follow him. Behind her, the door opened. A harsh, piercing flood of light blinded her, and an

ominous form loomed in the doorway. The guard—of course there was a guard. Then there was

a blur of movement, a grunt, and the guard sagged into supporting arms. As silently as her

rescuer seemed to do everything else, he dragged the guard inside and lowered him to the floor.

Her rescuer stepped over the body, snagged her wrist in an unbreakable grip and towed her

from the room.

The hallway was narrow, dirty and cluttered. The light that had seemed so bright came

from a single naked bulb. More gunfire was erupting downstairs and out in the street. From the

left came the sound of pounding feet. To the right was a closed door, and past it she could

see the first step of an unlit stairway.

He closed the door of the room they had just left and lifted her off her feet, slinging her

under his left arm as if she was no more than a sack of flour. Barrie clutched dizzily at his

leg as he strode swiftly to the next room and slipped into the sheltering darkness. He had barely

shut the door when a barrage of shouts and curses in the hallway made her bury her face

against the black material of his pants leg.

He righted her and set her on her feet, pushing her behind him as he unslung the weapon

from his shoulder. They stood at the door, unmoving, listening to the commotion just on

the other side of the wooden panel. She could discern three different voices and recognized

them all. There were more shouts and curses, in the language she had heard off and on all

day long but couldn't understand. The curses turned vicious as the guard's body, and her

absence, were discovered. Something thudded against the wall as one of her kidnappers gave vent

to his temper.

"This is One. Go to B."

That toneless whisper startled her. Confused, she stared at him, trying to make sense of the

words. She was so tired that it took her a moment to realize he must be speaking a coded

message into a radio. Of course he wasn't alone; there would be an entire team of rescuers. All

they had to do was get out of the building, and there would be a helicopter waiting somewhere, or

a truck, or a ship. She didn't care if they'd infiltrated on bicycles; she would gladly walk out—

barefoot, if necessary.

But first they had to get out of the building. Obviously the plan had been to spirit her out

the window without her kidnappers being any the wiser until morning, but something had

gone wrong, and the others had been spotted. Now they were trapped in this room, with no

way of rejoining the rest of his team.

Her body began to revolt against the stress it had endured for so many long hours, the

terror and pain, the hunger, the effort. With a sort of distant interest she felt each muscle

begin quivering, the shudders working their way up her legs, her torso, until she was shaking

uncontrollably.

She wanted to lean against him but was afraid she would hinder his movements. Her

life—and his—depended completely on his expertise. She couldn't help him, so the least

she could do was stay out of his way. But she was desperately in need of support, so she

fumbled her way a couple of steps to the wall. She was careful not to make any noise, but he

sensed her movement and half turned, reaching behind himself with his left hand and catching

her. Without speaking he pulled her up against his back, keeping her within reach should he

have to change locations in a hurry.

His closeness was oddly, fundamentally reassuring. Her captors had filled her with

such fear and disgust that every feminine instinct had been outraged, and after they had

finally left her alone in the cold and the dark, she had wondered with a sort of grief if she

would ever again be able to trust a man. The answer, at least with
this
man, was yes.

She leaned gratefully against his back, so tired and weak that, just for a moment, she

had to rest her head on him. The heat of his body penetrated the rough fabric of the web vest,

wanning her cheek. He even smelled hot, she noticed through a sort of haze; his scent was a

mixture of clean, fresh sweat and musky maleness, exertion and tension heating it to an aroma as

heady as that of the finest whiskey.
Mackenzie.
He'd said his name was Mackenzie, whispered it

to her when he crouched to identify himself.

Oh, God, he was so warm, and she was still cold. The gritty stone floor beneath her bare

feet seemed to be wafting cold waves of air up her legs. His shirt was so big it dwarfed her,

hanging almost to her knees, but still she was naked beneath it. Her entire body was shaking.

They stood motionless in the silent darkness of the empty room for an eternity,

listening to the gunfire as it tapered off in the distance, listening to the shouts and curses as

they, too, diminished, listened for so long that Barrie drifted into a
light doze, leaning

against him with her head resting on his back. He was like a rock, unmoving, his patience

beyond anything she had ever imagined. There were no nervous little adjustments of position, no

hint that his muscles got tired. The slow, even rhythm of his breathing was the only

movement she could discern, and resting against him as she was, the sensation was like being

on a raft in a pool, gently rising, falling—

She woke when he reached back and lightly shook her. "They think we got away," he

whispered. "Don't move or make any sound while I check things out."

Obediently she straightened away from him, though she almost cried at the loss of his

body heat. He switched on a flashlight that gave off only a slender beam; black tape had

been placed across most of the lens. He flicked the light around the room, revealing that it

was empty except for some old boxes piled along one wall. Cobwebs festooned all of the

comers, and the floor was covered with a thick layer of dust. She could make out a single

window in the far wall, but he was careful not to let the thin beam of light get close to it

and possibly betray their presence. The room seemed to have been unused for a very long

time.

He leaned close and put his mouth against her ear. His warm breath washed across her

flesh with every word. "We have to get out of this building. My men have made it look as if

we escaped, but we probably won't be able to hook up with them again until tomorrow night.

We need someplace safe to wait. What do you know about the interior layout?"

She shook her head and followed his example, lifting herself on tiptoe to put her lips to

his ear. "Nothing," she whispered. "I was blindfolded when they brought me here."

He gave a brief nod and straightened away from her. Once again Barrie felt bereft,

abandoned, without his physical nearness. She knew it was just a temporary weakness, this

urge to cling to him and the security he represented, but she needed him now with an urgency

that was close to pain in its intensity. She wanted nothing more than to press close to him again,

to feel the animal heat that told her she wasn't alone; she wanted to be in touch with the

steely strength that stood between her and those bastards who had kidnapped her.

Temporary or not, Barrie hated this neediness on her part; it reminded her too sharply of

the way she had clung to her father when her mother and brother had died. Granted, she

had been just a child then, and the closeness that had developed between her and her father

had, for the most part, been good. But she had seen how stifling it could be, too, and quietly, as

was her way, she had begun placing increments of distance between them. Now this had

happened, and her first instinct was to cling. Was she going to turn into a vine every time

there was some trauma in her life? She didn't want to be like that, didn't want to be a

weakling. This nightmare had shown her too vividly that all security, no matter how solid it

seemed, had its weak points. Instead of depending on others, she would do better to develop her

own strengths, strengths she knew were there but that had lain dormant for most of her rife.

From now on, though, things were going to change.

Perhaps they already had. The incandescent anger that had taken hold of her when

she'd lain naked and trussed on that bare cot still burned within her, a small, white-hot core that

even her mind-numbing fatigue couldn't extinguish. Because of it, she refused to give in to

her weakness, refused to do anything that might hinder Mackenzie in any way. Instead she

braced herself, forcing her knees to lock and her shoulders to square. "What are we going to

do?" she whispered. "What can I do to help?"

Because there were no heavy blackout curtains on this grimy window, she was able to see

part of his features as he looked at her. Half his face was in shadow, but the scant light

gleamed on the slant of one high, chiseled cheekbone, revealed the strong cut of his jaw,

played along a mouth that was as clearly defined as that of an ancient Greek statue.

"I'll have to leave you here alone for a little while," he said. "Will you be all right?"

Panic exploded in her stomach, her chest. She barely choked back the scream of protest

that would have betrayed them. Grinding her teeth together and electing not to speak,

because the scream would escape if she did, she nodded her head.

He hesitated, and Barrie could feel his attention focusing on her, as if he sensed her

distress and was trying to decide whether or not it was safe to leave her. After a few moments he

gave a curt nod that acknowledged her determination, or at least gave her the benefit of the

doubt. "I'll be back in half an hour," he said. "I promise."

He pulled something from a pocket on his vest. He unfolded it, revealing a thin blanket

of sorts. Barrie stood still as he snugly wrapped it around her. Though it was very thin, the

blanket immediately began reflecting her meager body heat. When he let go of the edges

they fell open, and Barrie clutched frantically at them in an effort to retain that fragile

warmth. By the time she had managed to pull the blanket around her, he was gone, opening the

door a narrow crack and slipping through as silently as he had come through the window in

the room where she had been held. Then the door closed, and once again she was alone in

the darkness.

Her nerves shrieked in protest, but she ignored them. Instead she concentrated on

being as quiet as she could, listening for any sounds in the building that could tell her what was

going on. There was still some noise from the street, the result of the gunfire that had alarmed

the nearby citizenry, but that, too, was fading. The thick stone walls of the building dulled any

sound, anyway. From within the building, there was only silence. Had her captors

abandoned the site after her supposed escape? Were they in pursuit of Mackenzie's team,

thinking she was with them?

She swayed on her feet, and only then did she realize that she could sit down on the

floor and wrap the blanket around her, conserving even more warmth. Her feet and legs

were almost numb with cold. Carefully she eased down onto the floor, terrified she would

inadvertently make some noise. She sat on the thin blanket and pulled it around herself as

best she could. Whatever fabric it was made from, the blanket blocked the chill of the stone

floor. Drawing up her legs, Barrie hugged her knees and rested her head on them. She was

more comfortable now than she had been in many long hours of terror and, inevitably, her

eyelids began to droop heavily. Sitting there alone in the dark, dirty, empty room, she went to

sleep.

Pistol in hand, Zane moved silently through the decrepit old building, avoiding the piles

of debris and crumbled stone. They were already on the top floor, so, except for the roof, the

only way he could go was down. He already knew where the exits were, but what he didn't

know was the location of the bad guys. Had they chosen this building as only a temporary

hiding place and abandoned it when their victim seemingly escaped? Or was this their regular

meeting place? If so, how many were there, and
where
were they? He had to know all that before

he risked moving Miss Lovejoy. There was only another hour or so until dawn; he had to get her