And then Cruce’s gaze moves to me for a brief instant—to my exposed body bent over a table—and rage fills his expression.
His eyes snap back toward Paul. Without an ounce of hesitation, he fires his gun once.
Paul doesn’t make a sound, but I feel something warm splatter across my backside. By the time I twist the other way to see better, I’m able to catch Paul falling to the ground in my peripheral vision.
I turn back quickly to Cruce, who now has his gun pointed in Munford’s direction. He advances on him. I bolt away from the table, jerk my pants up, and pivot to face Cruce so I can watch what he’s doing.
“You fucking son of a bitch,” Cruce growls as he storms toward Munford, who leans back in his chair and raises both hands in surrender.
I focus on Paul, who is sprawled lifelessly on the floor with open, vacant eyes and a round hole in the middle of his forehead.
Told you Karma was a bitch.
Returning my gaze to Cruce, I see he has reached Munford and now has the gun pressed to his forehead.
“Please, don’t,” Munford whines, and I can’t believe how pathetic and weak he sounds. Just moments ago, he’d been casually watching a woman about to be torture-raped and now he’s practically crying like a baby.
“Cruce… don’t,” someone says from the doorway, and I whirl to see men swarming in. I recognize Saint, but not the others. All wearing black utility pants, black t-shirts, and armed with weapons.
It’s my rescue team from Jameson, along with others proclaiming FBI in bright yellow letters on their black jackets.
Saint had called out to Cruce, who is ignoring him. He glares down at Munford. “You don’t deserve to live after what you’ve done. In fact, treason is punishable by death. I’m sure I’d be doing the taxpayers a favor by taking you out, you piece of scum-sucking shit.”
“Cruce,” Saint says again, softly this time, but it seems to carry more authority. “Can’t kill a man in cold blood.”
Too bad Saint wasn’t in here just a few moments ago. Otherwise, he’d eat those words.
Still, I won’t lose a moment’s sleep about Paul dying.
I hope Cruce doesn’t either.
CHAPTER 24
Cruce
One bullet into his brain and Barrett will be avenged. I ended the sick fuck who was getting ready to rape her and probably worse. She looks rough, and there’s no telling what he did to her before I got here. Maybe he’d already raped her, and it was done at this sick fuck’s behest.
I start to squeeze the trigger and Munford flinches, clamping his eyes shut tightly so as to blot out his executioner’s face.
“Cruce… Barrett needs you,” Saint’s voice manages to penetrate the haze of red fury and vengeance swirling in and around me.
Barrett needs you.
I ease my finger off the trigger to glance over my shoulder. Christ, she looks just fucking awful. Hair sweaty and matted to her head, dried tears on her face, and eyes red with exhaustion and pain. Her wrists are tied in front of her. I didn’t miss the hook suspended from the ceiling, nor the cattle prod on the table.
She’d probably been tortured for hours, and I start to put pressure on the trigger again.
“Go to her, brother,” Saint urges me. “Take her out of here, and we’ll clean up this mess.”
I hesitate.
“She needs you,” Saint once again says, and those proves to be the words that work. I pull the gun away from Munford, engage the safety, and place it back in my holster.
In three strides, I’m across the room, my hands on Barrett’s face so I can try to determine from the depths of her eyes just how bad it was before we rescued her.
“You’re alive,” she says in awe as her eyes roam over my face. Tears spill from her eyes. “I mean… it’s really you. You’re alive.”
Christ… she’d thought I was dead.
Of course.
Why wouldn’t she?
And she’d had that hanging over her heart and her conscience as she took the torture these people bestowed upon her.
“I’m alive,” I say, then dip my head to put a grateful kiss on her lips. “We’re both alive.”
When I pull back, she’s freely crying. While I just want to pull her into my embrace and hug all her trauma away, I need those ropes off her more.
“Let me get those off your wrists,” I say, letting my fingers work at the knots while I periodically glance at her face.
Eyes shining and filled with tears—with a mixture of anxiety and relief—yet… she has a dopey smile of wonder as well, and I think it’s because I’m very much alive and standing before her. Talk about emotional overload.
As soon as the ropes loosen, I can see her skin has been rubbed raw, bleeding in some areas.
“Where else are you hurt?” I ask, vaguely aware that as I check her out, Saint and crew have pulled Munford out of here while a few FBI agents stand off to the side of the man I’d shot, presumably waiting for the crime scene folks to get here to process stuff.
“I kind of hurt all over,” she murmurs, and I snap my gaze to hers.
“Did he… um…”
“Rape me?” she inquires bitterly. When I nod, she shakes her head, and I want to cry in relief. “No… you couldn’t have timed your arrival any better.”
“What did he do before?” I ask.
Barrett grimaces, her brow furrowing deeply. “Let’s just say as an energy scientist, I have a deep aversion to electricity right now, which could be problematic in my career.”
God, I want to fucking laugh—bringing humor into such a dark situation—but I can’t. Knowing he tortured her with that cattle prod has me wanting to pump a few more bullets into his lifeless body.
“Come on,” I say, putting my arm around her shoulder to turn her toward the door. “I need to get you to a hospital—”
“No hospital,” she says as she pulls away from me. “I just want to go home.”
“Hospital,” I reply adamantly. “You need those wounds on your wrists treated, and we need to check out if that prod did any damage. You probably could use some hydration, too.”
“No hospital,” she replies adamantly. “I’ve got the betadine, bandages, and Gatorade at home. I just want my own bed, and… I want…”
Her words trail off.
“What do you want?” I ask.
“You,” she replies, her eyes locking on mine. “I want you beside me so I can be assured you’re real and I’m not hallucinating all of this. And I want a big fat burger and some onion rings. I’ll be fine if I can have those things.”
I stare a moment before giving a capitulated nod and a short smile. “Okay… I’ll take you home.”
I lead Barrett up the staircase and out of the basement. Our team had stormed Munford’s house not fifteen minutes after we’d arrived, the Marine One helo having landed about a half a mile east. We watched from a copse of trees about fifty yards away, but we really couldn’t be sure about anything. We saw two armed men patrolling the grounds, but beyond that, we couldn’t tell much else.
With the possibility Barrett was inside and being tortured, we simply couldn’t wait. Kynan made a command decision to breach someone’s private property without any factual evidence we’d find Barrett there. If he’d been wrong, we’d all face criminal prosecution.