Wings of the Raven (5 page)

“I think my cover is compromised,” he said. “I was getting close to the centre of La Rosa Blanca, and had a meeting with one of the lieutenants yesterday. Unfortunately, there was another drug dealer from
California
present at the meeting—a real one. We’ve crossed paths back home. While I don’t
think
he recognised me, the possibility exists. Which means you have got to get out of here. Now.”

“Okay.” Normally I’d have argued that he needed me here for back-up, but determined as I’ve always been to pull my weight with the company, even I wasn’t crazy enough to risk the life of my child by getting mixed up with a drug cartel. “Call in your friend from the agency that has no name, and let’s get the hell out of Dodge.”

He twisted his lips into a half-smile and shook his head. “You know I can’t do that. I have one more meeting with them tomorrow. If I can get that GPS tracker and the listening devices planted, Charlie will have all he needs to bring his team in on an official basis.”

Charlie was actually Carlos Rivera, who had been on the same special ops team as Will and my cousin Vaughn in the Marines. I’d only met him once, but he’d seemed pretty competent.

“Are they even here?” I nibbled on my lower lip, far more worried about him than I wanted him to know. “Do you have any back-up at all?”

“He’s here. He and a handful of his men are supposedly on vacation. They rented a beach cottage just a mile or two up the coast.”

“And he knows about this meeting tomorrow, and is going to make sure you survive it?”

“He does.” Will kissed me then, distracting me from my worrying. Long moments later, he pulled away with a sigh. “Now, let’s see about getting you out of this hell hole.”

* * * *

Will refused to let me out of his sight, so after I showered and packed my single suitcase, I walked back to his room with him, so he could shower and change. Then, he was determined to personally put me in a limo to the airport. He’d even called while I was showering, and gotten my flight changed to noon today.

“Charlie is sending one of his guys over to escort you to the airport,” Will said. “He’ll pick you up at my room in half an hour.”

“Fine.” I wanted to argue, but there was no point when Will was in this mood. The man had stubborn down to an art form. Besides, disagreeing with someone who had visions of the future was pretty impossible even on a good day. I just wished Will was coming home with me.

When we reached his door, Will leaned my suitcase up against the wall while he pulled his key card out of his back pocket. I stood a few feet behind him, content just to watch him move. Now that he knew about the baby, even seemed happy about the idea, my whole outlook was lighter, more optimistic. He hadn’t yet said he loved me, but I was sure he did. And he had said we were getting married. I hadn’t realised just how badly I wanted that commitment until he’d offered it.

I didn’t hear or feel anyone behind me until the moment the needle punctured my arm and someone grabbed my hands, holding them behind my back. The world swam in front of my eyes, but as I fell, I saw a man move from another doorway to hold a gun on Will, while another stabbed a syringe into his shoulder. And then there was nothing but darkness.

* * * *

The next thing I remember was waking up in a moving vehicle. There was a lot of engine noise as we bumped along very rough roads—or even tracks. We could be in the middle of the rainforest for all I knew. I couldn’t see anything, which caused a moment of panic until I felt the band of cloth tied around my forehead. My wrists hurt where my hands were tied or cuffed behind my back. My feet were asleep, but I soon realised they were bound as well.

Next question. Was Will here too? I focused on blanking out my fear and utilising my senses other than sight. The road noise made it impossible to hear breathing, but I did pick up a few phrases in Spanish from some distance away. That let me know which direction was the front. Good. A small bit of information, but anything could be useful.

Okay, touch. I was lying on my left side, facing the front of the vehicle. I wasn’t cramped or squished, so I didn’t think I was in a trunk. The surface below me was cushioned, and there was another right behind my hands. Okay, I was on a seat, and it was long enough that I wasn’t hitting the end with my head, though I was with my feet. Either a luxury sedan, or a big SUV. Given the road quality, I guessed SUV.

The drug, whatever it was, hadn’t disappeared from my system. I tried to stay conscious, to listen in and gather what I could from the men’s conversation. But sleep tugged at me, and soon I’d drifted back into the darkness.

* * * *

The next time I woke I was on a much harder surface, except for my head, which was pillowed on…a thigh? My hands and feet were free, too, and I blinked, groaning a little as the harsh sunlight struck my retinas.

“
Carys
?” Will’s voice was a harsh whisper. “You awake, sweetheart?”

“Will?” My eyes adjusted to the sunlight and I looked up at him as he bent over me. The sunlight streaming through a window high on the adobe wall cast a halo around his striking face. “Where are we?”

“I’m not sure. Somewhere in La Rosa’s compound, I’m guessing.” His eyebrows scrunched together as he studied my face. “How do you feel?”

“Groggy,” I admitted. “Whatever they gave us packs a real punch.” With Will’s help, I slowly managed to sit. “How about you? All in one piece?”

“Nothing that couldn’t be fixed by shooting the assholes who grabbed us.” I’d never once heard Will this pissed off, and if I hadn’t loved him, even I might have been intimidated by the venom in his icy tone. “What about you? Anything hurt?” His gaze flickered down to rest on my stomach, which lurched as I realised that whatever drug they’d given me could have done irreparable damage to the baby.

Now I was furious myself. I paused a moment to take an inventory of my body parts and to examine our tiny prison. The room was about eight foot by ten foot, of crumbling adobe, with a hard packed dirt floor. A wooden cot with a dubious-looking canvas top was pushed against one wall, and a bucket—the sanitary facilities?—sat behind the door. Will had taken up his position in the corner farthest from the heavy wooden door. The only window was a narrow opening at the very top of one wall, maybe ten inches by twenty. It must have faced due south, or close to it, because the full afternoon sun was pouring through the gap. That appeared to be the only source of either light or ventilation in the room.

I checked my wrist, somewhat surprised to find my watch was still there, as was the raven pendant around my neck. It was mid-afternoon, so the sun should be slightly to the west, but mostly south. My purse was gone, which had my cell phone and my passport—getting that back would be a priority after we were free. Both of us were also missing our shoes—probably to make it harder for us to run if we happened to get free.

I looked over at Will, and an oily trickle of dread ran down my spine. His jaw was clenched, he was sweating, and his dark skin had gone nearly white.

“Will, other than the obvious, what’s wrong?” Besides the fact that I had to pee, and the thought of using the bucket made me want to hurl.

“You need to get out of here,” he said, without unclenching his teeth more than a hair’s breadth. “You need to change into your raven form, go out the window, and notify Charlie. As soon as you feel good enough to fly.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” I hedged. “We don’t know what they want, or anything.”

“I’m not suggesting,
Carys
. I’m telling you, flat out. You. Will. Leave. Now.”

I sighed. “I don’t think I should. There aren’t a lot of females in my family, and nobody’s sure about what happens if you shift when you’re pregnant.” It was one of the hardest things about being the only girl for two generations—nobody to talk to about how the gift reacted with the female physiology. “We know my grandfather’s sister lost a baby after shifting, but she was sick before that and didn’t live long after, so we’re not sure about the causality.” Popular opinion had been that she gave up hope and died after losing her husband to tuberculosis, but no one was entirely certain.

“Shit.” He buried his head in his hands. “Fuck, fuck,
fuck
.” He kicked hard at the cot, shattering one end of it to pieces, even though he was barefoot.

I could see the pulse throbbing in his neck and hear his shallow breathing. The trickle of dread turned into a fucking waterfall. “Will, what do you
know
?”

He swallowed hard, as if he was trying not to throw up. Of course, that thought made me nauseous, too. Finally he shook his head. “I’m sorry. I hate asking you to take the chance, sweetheart. It kills me to think of you risking our baby, but you have to. It’s the only option.”

“Tell me.” I bit hard on my lip to keep both tears and stomach under control.

He inhaled deeply through his nostrils, his lips a thin white line.

“I’ve seen this place.” His voice was so low I almost missed it. I leaned closer to catch his words. “That last night in
San Francisco
. The dream that woke me up.”

“The nightmare.” The one that had shaken him so badly I’d been afraid someone was dead.

“Yeah. Worst nightmare ever.” He laughed hoarsely and wiped his forearm across his face. Horrified, I realised his eyes were damp. Good gods, Will was crying. “I saw you die,
Carys
. Three men walked in through that door, right there. One grabbed you, the other two got me cuffed to this wall.” He jerked his thumb, and for the first time I noticed an iron ring set into the adobe over his head.

“They doped us with something else—something that kept us from moving, but didn’t knock us out. Then they took turns with you, while one of them kept hitting me to make sure I watched.”

“Oh, Will!” I went to my knees in front of him. “I’ll go, honey. It’ll be all right.” I hoped to hell I was telling the truth, but Will’s visions were never wrong. They could, however, be subverted.

“There’s more.”

Apparently once he’d started, he needed to get the rest off his chest, though I didn’t really want to hear it.

“Go on.”

“After they’d all…raped you, they left, laughing, saying they’d be back for more, later. I still couldn’t move, couldn’t go to you. As soon as I could, I started yanking on the ring, hoping the adobe would give. I could see the tears rolling down your cheeks, and then the blood…”

His voice broke then, but he took a few deep breaths and kept going. “I thought they’d torn something inside you, you were bleeding so badly. Now I think it was the baby. But by the time I yanked the ring out of the wall and got to you…” He took one more shuddering breath as I held him tight. His voice dropped to a ragged whisper, “You were gone.”

“Goddess.” I clasped him close in my arms, rocking him as we both wept. “I’m so sorry, Will. No wonder you were so freaked out.” I couldn’t imagine having to watch him bleed out in front of me. And I was sure that he’d been a battered, bloody mess by the time he’d freed himself, which had to hurt, even in a vision. Now I understood why he hadn’t been happy to see me when I arrived.

“That’s part of why I left so abruptly,” he said a few minutes later when we’d both gotten our emotions back under control. “I thought if I just stayed away from you, then it might not happen. I didn’t count on you coming to find me.”

“Sorry.” I kissed his damp cheek, rasping my lips on the black stubble growing in. “I’m going. Promise.”

I moved to stand, to start taking off my clothes, but he stopped me with a kiss, so loving and sweet I almost started crying all over again.

“Be very careful,” he whispered. Then he unfolded himself from the floor and stood, drawing me with him. He touched my abdomen with the palm of his hand. “We’re both depending on you.”

“I’ll fly due east to the coast, then up the coast to find Charlie. Do you have an address, or a description of the house?” While I was talking, I unzipped my khaki Capri pants and dropped them to the floor.

As I stripped off the rest of my clothes, Will described the house and its location in enough detail that I thought I could find it from the air. “Tell him I’ve activated my GPS tracker—then you won’t have to lead them here.” He took off the big, gaudy ring he’d been wearing as part of his salesman cover and pressed something on the inside of the crown before putting it back on.

I stood before him, stark naked, and unclasped the chain of my raven necklace. “Hang onto this for me,” I told him. Going up on tiptoes, I fastened it around his neck. “Don’t let them kill you before the cavalry gets here.”

He hugged me so tightly I could barely breathe, but I didn’t care.

“Remember that we’re officially engaged,” he murmured as he slowly, reluctantly let me go. “Just in case anything…happens.”

I swallowed and nodded. Will picked up my clothes and leaned back against the door.

Just before I changed, I whispered the words I couldn’t hold in any longer. Just in case. “I love you, Will.”

Then I closed my eyes and let the magic do its thing. Moments later, I looked up at Will from my eighteen-inch height and squawked.

His laugh was rusty, but his smile was blindingly beautiful. “I love you too,
Carys
. Stay safe.”