Whispers in the Dark - Maya Banks [109]
“What the hell is going on?” Ethan demanded. “Will someone tell me what the fuck I’m missing out on here?”
“It’s Kyle Phillips,” Steele bit out. “He led the team that assisted us in Del Rio. One of Resnick’s pets if I’m not mistaken. He’s missing the tip of his left ring finger.”
Sam’s lips curled into a snarl, his eyes blazed with rage. “What the fuck is Resnick’s man doing in Shea Peterson’s home?”
Garrett and Donovan looked at each other at the same time. “Get Nathan and Shea back in here now,” Garrett barked.
SHEA smiled as Nathan disappeared from view and she turned to stare out over the lake while she waited for him to return. It truly was a beautiful spot and secluded from the others. It afforded Nathan privacy while still being close to his family.
She took another step toward the lake, inhaling the scent of pine, honeysuckle and the slight damp in the air from the mist blowing in.
What if she and Nathan really could have a life here? Together? Now that one of KGI’s team had gone in search of Grace—well, if they found her, brought her to Shea and offered them their protection—what was to say that they couldn’t live here? Under the protection and umbrella of KGI?
It was pretty fanciful and she was way jumping the gun, but how else were she and Nathan ever going to have a life together if Shea didn’t factor in everything into the equation?
Sometimes things just weren’t simple, and this was just such a case. Maybe she and Grace would forever be running. Maybe they’d never be truly safe. Did Shea dare throw caution to the wind and settle here with Nathan and trust that KGI could handle any problems that arose?
She sighed and started to turn back toward the house. It did no good to dwell on the future when the present was still so up in the air. One day at a time. What mattered now was that Grace was found and that both of them stayed out of sight until Nathan and his brothers could determine who wanted them and why.
She hadn’t fully rotated when she was knocked off balance by a hard body from behind. A strong arm snaked around her, preventing her fall, while a hand was clamped tight over her mouth.
Fear and panic exploded through her. She kicked, struggled and tried to scream, but the grip only tightened.
Nathan!
“Easy with her,” a second man barked from behind her. “Resnick’s orders were that under no circumstances was she to be harmed.”
Oh God. Resnick. He was the man Donovan wanted to talk to—had already talked to about her and Grace. Son of a bitch. She’d known it was a mistake. A huge mistake to trust anyone!
She tried to focus her mind, to make that connection to Nathan, when a sharp prick in her arm had her making a muffled sound of pain from behind her captor’s hand.
“Sorry, Miss Peterson. It had to be done. I can’t have you using your telepathy to alert anyone to our presence.”
The world did this crazy swinging thing, and black spots floated in and out of her vision.
The hell of it was, the man actually did sound regretful. The grip eased around her body, and then she was simply swung over the second man’s shoulder and he ran toward the drop-off as if her weight was negligible.
She was too drugged to scream when a helicopter suddenly appeared, hovering at the very edge, so close that it would only take a small jump to clear the space between the cliff’s edge and the inside of the chopper.
Oh God, no, surely he wasn’t going to…
He never hesitated. He ran and then they were airborne for the briefest of moments before they hit the floor of the helicopter with enough force to knock the breath from her.
He tore off his mask and stared down at her, his eyes clouded with worry. He was young. And handsome. And there were at least three of him.
“Are you all right?” he shouted as the helicopter swooped away.
She wanted to kick him right back out of the helicopter. Of course she wasn’t okay. But she couldn’t speak. It was all she could do to even keep her eyes open. Her tongue was dry and stuck to the roof of her mouth. She was so damned