Wolf (23 page)

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Sylvie didn’t think she would’ve been quite as anxious if she hadn’t been left alone to wait. It was so unlike the guys to leave her completely alone that she knew that whatever they were up to had to be something big—and that translated to dangerous. Beau hadn’t said anything but that they were leaving and to pack one bag. He’d waited until dark to leave with their bags. Drawing her close to kiss her before he’d left, he’d held her afterwards just long enough to stir uneasiness inside her and then had told her that Hawk would be by to pick her up in a ‘little while’.

That had been a couple of hours earlier, though, and she’d begun to be uneasy even before he’d left. Nervous energy had been building inside of her ever since, completely ousting the little bit of gladness she’d felt at the announcement that they were going to be heading for the US when they moved out.

She’d had mixed feelings even about that. She’d become increasingly anxious to see a doctor and yet she didn’t know what to expect when they got home. Would the military police be waiting for her or agents from some other government organization?

They would if they’d managed to track her stepfather’s yacht down. Her stepfather had always been pleasant to her, had even kept in touch after her mother had died and, of course, had allowed her to take the yacht out when it had never actually had it’s maiden voyage. She didn’t even know why he’d kept it afterwards ….

In any event, she couldn’t imagine him refusing to tell the authorities that she’d been the one with the boat and she was pretty sure they’d want to question her if nothing else. She felt damned uneasy about it considering the way they’d pursued Mac and the others. Could she expect them to respect her rights? Or to use similar strong-arm tactics? She decided she was uneasy enough about it that she wasn’t really all that
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anxious to find out.

She didn’t know what she was going to do, but she thought she should approach the situation cautiously, not just head for home like a homing pigeon.

Beau had told her before that he was taking her home, but even at the time he’d seemed to indicate home ‘in general’ not her home specifically. She hadn’t really known what to think when he’d said ‘our’ home. It had made her imagination run wild, but her feet hadn’t entirely left the ground. She’d hoped he meant something really significant by it, but she didn’t really believe he did and she hadn’t wanted to pursue it because she’d been afraid he’d remove all doubt and she would be unhappy about it.

There’d been a hint that had her hopeful. However unlikely, she didn’t want to lose that.

She finally reached a point of nearly explosive nerves and got up to pace, checking the little apartment again to see if there was anything she didn’t want to leave or shouldn’t leave. The sound of a car stopping outside set her nerves to jangling and made her heart pound uncomfortably. Even though they generally walked everywhere they went, she rushed to the window to peer out. Hawk was leaning in at the cab window.

She was fairly dancing when he came in. She rushed to him before he could even get the door closed behind him. To her delight, he immediately swept her into a tight embrace. She went up on her toes to hug him back with enthusiasm. “I’ve missed you!

I’ve been so worried!”

He kissed her. It was more than reassurance. She felt it as a confirmation that he’d missed her, too. He drew away more quickly than she’d expected. “We need to get out of here.”

Sylvie swallowed with an effort, struggling with dozens of questions. The most frightening one rose to her lips first. “Is someone after us?”

“Not yet,” he said grimly.

“Oh god!” she exclaimed in a quavering voice as he hustled her out of the apartment and down the walk. “What happened?”

“We’ll talk about it later.”

She wanted to talk about it
now
! Especially if someone was about to be after them and Hawk was worried about it! She didn’t know if the cab driver could speak and understand English, however, and since she realized they were close enough for him to hear, she bit back the questions.

When they’d settled inside again, Hawk gave directions to the cab driver, drew her into his arms and picked up where they’d left off inside the apartment. Sylvie couldn’t say that the conversation they’d had had exactly dulled her enthusiasm, but it was certainly distracting. As much as she wanted to cling to him, she didn’t actually
want
to be distracted from potential danger. She wanted to have her wits about her.

Apparently Hawk realized after a few minutes that she was having a hard time focusing. He broke the kiss, heaving a sigh that seemed equal parts resignation and irritation. Before he could pull away, though, she burrowed tightly against him. He almost seemed to shrug, but he held her close and that was what she needed at the moment, to feel sheltered in his arms.

The drive was a relatively short one. They’d only been riding just long enough for Sylvie to begin to feel a little less shaky when the driver pulled over and stopped.

Sylvie sat up and looked around as Hawk leaned forward and paid the man.

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She was bewildered by what she saw and more than a little unnerved. The area was poorly lit, but she could see enough to tell that it was probably the worst side of town. Actually, it didn’t even look like it was
in
town. There were only a couple of buildings that she could see in any direction and they were separated and surrounded by large stretches of cave-like darkness.

When Hawk helped her from the cab, Sylvie discovered her knees were wobbly.

She waited until the cab had turned around and left and looked up at Hawk. “Where are we?” she whispered, too unnerved to speak any louder.

“Still a good ways from where we need to be.”

Sylvie ground her teeth as he caught her arm and began walking at a brisk stride she had trouble keeping pace with. “Where do we need to be?”

“Closer to the docks.”

That caught her attention. Lifting her head, she glanced around again, trying to pierce the darkness. She certainly didn’t see any sign of the ocean! She couldn’t smell salt in the air. She didn’t hear waves crashing against a beach.

A river?

“Everybody’s at the docks?”

He grunted. “You need to be quiet.”

Sylvie felt her stomach knot. Questions boiled in her mind, but she was too afraid of being overheard to voice any of them. She had no idea who might overhear or what might happen if they did and she didn’t want to find out. They walked about twice as long as they’d ridden in the cab and stopped.

Sylvie was more bewildered than she’d been when they got out of the cab. She couldn’t see anything. Hawk caught her arms and drew her down into a crouch near the ground. She jumped when she felt the brush of his face against her cheek. “This is very important, so listen carefully and do
exactly
what I say,” he said in a low voice next to her ear. “Understand?”

She nodded, holding her breath, struggling with the shivers raking up and down her spine.

“Stay low and stay put. You should be safe here if you do what you’re told.

Don’t move from this spot until someone comes to get you—no matter what you hear.”

She gripped his arms when she felt his hold on her loosen.

He hesitated and then gathered her into an embrace. “It’ll be aright, baby. I promise. Just don’t move from this spot and if you hear any gunfire, get on the ground.”

Oh! That
was
reassuring. She gripped him tighter when he began to draw away again, but he refused to be held that time. Squeezing her arm reassuring, he straightened and left.

She knew he was gone. She felt alone, felt cold and terrified, afraid even to breathe for fear it would be too loud. Shivering, she huddled lower, clasping her arms around her knees. Her ears were pricked for any kind of sound, however, and after a little while she heard something faint in the distance. She tilted her head, listening intently. She couldn’t decide what she’d heard, though.

She’d just decided the sound was coming from behind her somewhere when the night suddenly seemed to explode with sound. A man screamed and then she heard more of them, high pitched with terror, interspersed with exclamations and machinegun-like bursts of chatter, thuds of every description—flesh to flesh, flesh to dirt or wood,
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clanging sounds like someone beating metal objects together, splashing, running feet, deep beast-like roars of fury and snarls. She’d just shot to her feet in mindless terror, whipping her head around in an attempt to figure out which way to run, when she heard gunfire. Uttering a whinny of fear, she dove for the ground again and began scrambling on her belly.

She ran into something lumpy and climbed over it, dimly identifying it as a bag.

Beyond that, however, she didn’t encounter anything but brush—no walls to hide behind.

She was still searching frantically for something to hide behind or climb into when she heard a rhythmic pounding that seemed to be coming directly toward her. It took a few moments for her mind to interpret the sounds as feet pounding against the ground, but she couldn’t tell which direction they were approaching from.

Someone slammed a foot into her side hard enough to knock the breath out of her and then fell over her. Uttering a string of Spanish, the man scrambled to get his feet under him, stomping her in the process. Something bellowed almost directly over her and the man abruptly vanished. She heard the rattle of brush and then a heavy thud some distance from her.

Something hairy grabbed her, snatching her up from the ground. “Damn it, Sylvie! I told you to stay put!”

Uttering a mindless whimper of terror, Sylvie whirled toward the sound of Hawk’s voice and climbed up him, clawing frantically for a tight grip on any part of his anatomy she could get hold of. She found his neck and tightened her arms around it in a chokehold, burrowing her face against a furry neck.

“It’s ok, baby,” Hawk said in a rumbling growl of a voice that was only vaguely recognizable as his. Curling his arms around her, he turned and walked a little way and then bent over and picked something up from the ground. He began running then, lumbering leaps that would’ve shaken her loose despite her grip on him if he hadn’t been holding her.

She clung tighter, squeezing her eyes shut.

“You’re choking me, baby. Ease up!” Hawk said, amusement threading his voice.

The amusement was enough to spawn anger, which manifested itself in tears. She burst out crying, burrowing deeper to try to smother the noise.

“She alright?” Mac asked sharply from behind her.

“No!” she answered.

Mac peeled her off of Hawk and set her on her feet and she discovered that she was standing in the middle of a massacre. In the near blinding beam of the flood light, she saw bodies everywhere, lying in dark, damp patches that she was afraid to look at very closely. Shock instantly shut off the tears, but the moment Mac saw the expression on her face, he lifted her into his arms and began striding rapidly along a wooden dock.

He paused to leap from the dock onto a boat deck and then crossed it and leapt the stairs leading down into the main cabin.

A bizarre sense of déjà vu swept over Sylvie as he set her on her feet and she looked around.

Mac met her gaze fleetingly. “Stay put. We need to cast off and get the hell out of here.”

Shivering, Sylvie turned and watched Mac disappear up the stairs to the top deck.

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When she couldn’t see him anymore, she looked around the cabin she found herself in.

Beams from the floodlight on the beach shot through the portholes, hampering her efforts to examine the cabin as much as it helped, but she saw a booth and table set along one wall and moved to the bench. Clambering into one corner, she drew herself up into a tight ball, dimly aware of the sway of the boat as the men moved around the deck and the sound of splashes.

Trying not to think what the splashes might be, she sat staring at her toes, her mind curiously blank. In a few minutes she heard the engine roar to life and felt the boat move away from the dock.

Mac came back down and glanced around. Spying her, he moved toward her.

“Come on, baby.”

She stared at his hand a moment and finally uncurled, reaching for his hand.

When he’d pulled her up, he settled an arm around her and walked her to the sleeping quarters. He caught the blanket on the bed and snatched it off and then helped her onto the bed and covered her up. “Warmer?”

She hadn’t realized her teeth were chattering until she tried to speak. It felt like her jaws were locked. Mac settled beside her, pulled her against him and rubbed a hand along her arm. “Are you hurt?”

“I don’t think so,” she said after thinking it over for a few minutes.

He released a pent up breath. “Just scared half to death,” he muttered.

She didn’t argue with him. She discovered, though, that he was radiating heat like a heater and she was freezing. She snuggled closer, trying to absorb some of his heat. After a few moments, she began to feel like she was thawing. “What happened?”