His accent was the Dutch lilt that Colleen had recognized from when she’d arrived at the camp and had been trying to convince them to let her go on the assault. In the dark and with the NVGs obscuring the top half of his face, she hadn’t realized that Magnus Jensen had ice-blue eyes, black hair, and a stern handsomeness that was absolutely startling.
He continued, “Anjali and Jian, it is your choice whether to stay here and talk to the police or leave with us. You can talk to them later. However, my operators would prefer not to be here when the police arrive.”
Another guy leaned in from the other side of the door and said with the Irish accent she recognized from Eian Summerhays, “How are you now, then? Are you ready to leave?”
Eian was another absolutely gorgeous specimen of a man with high fae features, gold hair curling around his face and bound at the back of his head, and sage green eyes.
Colleen must be reading too much romantic fantasy. All Eian was missing were pointy ears and the crown of the Spring Court.
Where had all these gorgeous guys been when Colleen was single, though?
Not that she wasn’t single now.
Jeez, she and Tristan should talk about what the hell was going on.
But for just then, Colleen rested her arm around Anjali’s shoulders. “Honey, what do you want to do?”
Anjali had stood up and buried her face in her hands. “I don’t know. I don’t want to talk to anybody.”
Tristan said, “Then you’re coming with us. Jian, do you want to give your statement to the police or leave with us for the time being?”
“I want to leave this hotel room,” Jian said.
Tristan took over. “Then let’s go, everybody. We’re taking these two and going down the elevators and through the lobby. Come on.” He turned to Magnus Jensen. “How are you planning on taking your people out?”
Magnus told him, “Bravo Team, the ones in civilian clothing, will escort you back to our base camp where Ms. Frost left her car. The others are going down the ropes. We’ll get you out before we evacuate.”
Eian added, “I’ll go with the targets.”
Before leaving the suite, Jian opened the safe hidden in the closet and retrieved his and Tristan’s passports and other documents. Tristan found Jian’s and Anjali’s cell phones on the coffee table and snagged them.
Anjali was staring at Sergey lying on the floor. He looked like a nasty blood sausage someone had dropped, with his hands bound behind his back and his ankles cuffed with plastic zip ties. He snarled at her.
She trotted over and kicked him with her bare foot, landing a nice soccer-style kick with the boney top of her foot to his ribs.
Sergey thrashed on the floor, trying to grab or kick her.
Colleen moved to pull her back, because while she supported kicking Sergey in the ribs while he was down, she didn’t want that cretin to touch Anjali or anyone else ever again.
But Eian Summerhays appeared right there, his legs spread wide, with a pistol pointing at Sergey’s head and a wicked grin for Anjali.
Leaving the hotel room was tense. They got some side-eyed looks from the reception desk staff as they passed.
Another problem was that Anjali’s shoes had gone missing. She walked down the hallway to the elevator and then across the lobby well enough, but she started hopping when they got to the still-hot sidewalk outside and then placing her feet carefully as they started across the asphalt parking lot.
Eian Summerhays, the High Lord of the Spring Court Fae look-alike, saw Anjali mincing across sharp asphalt and was right there. He sort-of-asked her permission with, “If I may,” and then swung her up in his arms.
Which was probably the best turn of events because Anjali would’ve protested that she could make it if he’d asked her and slowed them all down. Instead, she looped her arms around Eian’s neck and rested her head on his shoulder.
Behind her, Jian watched and sighed, his shoulders hunching lower. He rubbed his neck and plodded along while Tristan spoke quietly with him.
At the turn-off for the field where Colleen had parked her car, the other teams who had rappelled down the ropes and hiked overland had beaten Colleen and the people she was with back to the camp. They’d erected floodlights and were tearing down the few domed tents, throwing the field boxes in huge pickup trucks parked near the rear of the lot.
Eian set Anjali down next to the car, and she blushed while she thanked him.
At least it had given Anjali something else to think about. Colleen squeezed her hand.
Tristan was helping Jian into the back seat of the car behind the driver, and he whispered to Colleen, “We need to get Jian to a hospital. His shoulder is dislocated and may be torn, and I think some of his ribs are broken. He might have more serious injuries, too.”
She said, “We’re fifteen minutes away from Good Sam. We can take him directly there.”
Tristan said, “Let me talk to Magnus, and then we can go.”
Colleen turned as Tristan took a few steps closer to Magnus Jensen, but Magnus held up a finger because he had his cell phone pressed to his ear.
His jaw bulged, and his eyes narrowed. Magnus looked up at Colleen and Tristan as he said, “No.”
42
Rogue Security Refuses
Tristan
Tristan stopped walking. He held his arm in front of Colleen to stop her, readying himself to throw his body in front of her if this went as badly as he suspected it was going to.
Floodlights blazed like triplet moons over the camp. It seemed like the Rogue Security operators were bugging out a lot faster than he would’ve expected.
Something was wrong.
Magnus Jensen was speaking into his phone, and he was staring directly at Tristan with an occasional glance at Colleen. In the blazing floodlights, his pale blue eyes appeared colorless and alien.
He said, “Absolutely not, Dr. Bell. Rogue Security specializes in hostage rescue, but we are not and never will be kidnappers. I understand that you would like to motivate Tristan King, but Rogue Security refuses to take Colleen Frost, Anjali Iyer, and Jian Laio hostage for you. If you would like to discuss an expansion of the mission in any other ethical manner, you should contact our commanding officer, Operator Dieter Schwarz. There will be no further communication between us.” He hung up the phone and continued staring at Tristan.
A flush crept up Tristan’s face. No wonder Mary Varvara Bell had so readily agreed to rent mercenaries to rescue people who were important to Tristan. “Jesus, Magnus. Did Bell tell you to kidnap us?”
Magnus held up one finger and spoke into his shoulder microphone again. “Codenames Gabriel, Zadkiel, Camael, and Metatron, there is no change in mission. This mission is hostage recovery only and is now ended. Repeat, no change in mission. Continue with bug out. You are to have no contact with the client at this time. All contact with the client must go through Codename Raphael.” He clicked the mic off. “Yes?”
“Who were—is Mary Varvara Bell personally heading this operation?”
“No. All communications with the client are supposed to go through our headquarters. I don’t know how she obtained access to my communications, but she asked for updates twice yesterday.” His jaw set more firmly. “And now this. I don’t know if our CO gave her my number, but I am now suspicious of all my communications with her.”