J.R. Ward the Black Dagger Brotherhood Novels 1-4 - J. R. Ward [357]
And then he heard it. A soft whimpering sound.
His head snapped around to the left.
In the corner, on the ground, there were three cylindrical metal lips protruding from the earth, and they were capped by mesh plates that were the dark brown color of the dirt floor. Which explained why he hadn’t noticed them.
He went over and kicked off one of the covers. The whimpering got louder.
Suddenly light-headed, he fell to his knees. “Bella?”
Gibberish rose from the earth to answer him, and he dropped his gun. How was he going to…? Ropes—there were ropes coming out of what looked like a sewer pipe. He grabbed onto them and pulled gently.
What emerged was a dirty, bloody male, about ten years out of his transition. The civilian was naked and shivering, his lips blue, his eyes rolling around.
Z dragged him free, and Rhage wrapped his leather trench coat around the male.
“Get him out of here,” someone said as Hollywood sliced the ropes.
“Can you dematerialize?” another brother asked the male.
Z paid no attention to the conversation. He went for the next hole, but there were no ropes leading down into it, and his nose detected no scent. The thing was empty.
He was stepping over to the third when the captive yelled, “No! Th-that one’s booby-trapped!”
Z froze. “How?”
Through chattering teeth, the civilian said, “I d-don’t know. I just heard the l-lesser warn one of his m-men about it.”
Before Z could ask, Rhage started walking the room. “Got a gun over here. Business end pointed in that direction.” There were the sounds of metal clicks and shifting. “It’s not armed. Anymore.”
Z looked above the hole. Mounted on the exposed rafters of the roof, about fifteen feet from the floor, there was a small device. “V, what have we got up there?”
“Laser eye. You break it, it probably triggers the—”
“Hold up,” Rhage said. “I got another gun to empty out here.”
V stroked his goatee. “There must be a remote-control activator, although the guy probably took it with him. That’s what I would do.” He squinted up at the ceiling. “That particular model runs on lithium batteries. So it’s not like we could kill the generator to turn it off. And they’re tricky to disarm.”
Z glanced around for something he could use to push the plate off and thought of the bathroom. He went inside, whipped the shower curtain down, and brought the pole it had hung from back.
“Everyone clear out.”
Rhage spoke sharply. “Z, man, I don’t know that I’ve found all the—”
“Take the civilian with you.” When no one moved, he cursed. “We don’t have time to fuck around, and if someone’s getting shot it’s going to be me. Jesus Christ, will you brothers leave?”
When the place was cleared out, Z approached the hole. Standing with his back to one of the guns that had been removed, so that he would have been in its line of fire, he nudged the cover off with the pole. A gunshot rang out with a popping sound.
Z caught the slug in his left calf. The searing impact brought him down on one knee, but he ignored it and dragged himself to the neck of the pipe. He took hold of the ropes that led down into the earth and began to pull.
The first thing he saw was her hair. Bella’s long, beautiful mahogany hair was all around her, a veil over her face and shoulders.
He sagged and lost his vision, partly passing out, but even through the full-body wobble, he kept pulling. Abruptly the effort became easier…because there were hands helping him…other hands on the rope, other hands laying her gently on the floor.
Dressed in a sheer nightgown that was stained with her blood, she wasn’t moving, but she was breathing. He carefully pushed her hair back from her face….
Zsadist’s blood pressure took a nosedive. “Oh, sweet Jesus…oh, sweet Jesus…oh, sweet—”
“What did they do…” Whoever had spoken couldn’t find the words to finish.
Throats cleared. A couple of coughs were smothered. Or maybe they were gags.
Z gathered her in his arms and just…hugged her. He had to get her out, but he couldn’t move for what had been done to her. Blinking, dizzy,