Page 32 of Saving Their Forever

I choke out a laugh, then regret it when my cheek, jaw, and ribs send pain crackling through my body. “Pull a…Ryker? Don’t let him hear you say that. We’ll never live it down.”

“You’re assuming we’re going to live more than another hour,” he says.

Gingerly, I touch my left wrist. The deep welt is sticky with blood. “We might. They untied us, didn’t they?”

Rip snorts. “No. That was me. Took for-fucking-ever to break the chair. Even longer to punch through the zip ties with a rusty nail I found on the floor. If we do get out of here, we need to update our tetanus shots.”

Fuck. “You did all that?”

“I’m broken, Dax. Not useless.”

A tidal wave of guilt crashes over me at the hurt in his tone. “Rip, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean?—”

“Yeah, you did. And it’s my fault. I’ve been so stuck in my own head since we rescued Hope, I didn’t see how worried you all were. I lost my confidence. Not my skills.”

“Well, those skills are fucking impressive.” I pinch the bridge of my nose. “Any idea what time it is?”

“Sometime around six? One of those assholes was wearing a watch. They left around 5:30.”

“Fuck. Ramin told Ry to be here at seven. We’ve got an hour to find a way out of here or he’s going to give himself up.”

Rip snorts again. “Ry’s not going to give himself up. Not without a plan. I’m sure Sampson’s on it. But if we’re still stuck in here, we’re nothing but two sad sacks of liability.”

“I’m not sad. I’m fucking pissed. This was one of my favorite shirts.”

“You’re blind. You can’t see it. How do you even have a favorite shirt?”

“It’s a Royal Oxford. Evianna gave it to me.” I touch my wedding ring. Thank God they didn’t take it. “You said you broke the chair? Any planks big enough to do major damage?” I ask.

“Not really. Though yours is still in one piece.”

I rest my head against the wall. It’s cool, and it helps soothe my headache. “What else do you see?”

“Not much. Two plastic kiddie pools. A couple of dead rats. They took the car battery, cables, and pipe with them. There’s a camera over the door. Blinking red light and everything.”

I turn, staring at him though I can’t see much more than a dark-haired blur. “There’s a camera. Watching us. And you broke the chair, busted through four sets of zip ties, and no one’s come to beat the shit out of us again?”

“Fuck.” Ripper gets to his feet and shuffles halfway across the room. He’s silent for a full minute. Maybe two. “It’s not blinking. It’s…communicating. ‘Be. Ready.’

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I ask.

Rip’s bare feet make little sound on the cold concrete floor. But when he grabs the chair and drags it over to me, I push up on to my knees. “Guess we’ll find out. Let’s see what we can do with this chair.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Ryker

The Blackhawk’s blades pick up speed, the whoop, whoop, whoop almost comforting. Raelynn adjusts her headset, and next to her, West checks the pockets of his tactical vest. The SEAL has his rituals. We all do. But mine don’t bring me any comfort. Not now. Not with Wren out there. Alone. With Dax and Rip gone.

Graham hauls his rucksack over his shoulder and heads for the bird. Inara’s already on board. Griff and Connor too. The former FBI agent motions for me to hurry up. I check my watch. Sixty minutes until they expect me to show up. Sixty minutes until I can see Wren. Less than that, because I won’t get close to them unless I get proof of life. For all of them.

Ford’s plane will land at Boeing Field soon. Once Raelynn drops us three miles from Fort Worden, she’ll hightail it back and pick up the rest of the team. If we’re lucky as fuck, they’ll make it before those assholes kill me.

I climb on board, and Inara passes me a bulky headset with built-in mic. “We’re patched into the comms system,” West says. “Griff, your glasses keeping up?”

“Don’t worry about me. Second Sight’s tech is solid.” He flexes his fingers slowly, and it’s almost impossible to believe they’re not real. Pritchard hooked him up with the most advanced prosthetic in the world. One that allows him to feel what he touches. The glasses were a joint project. Royce worked with Dax for a year to perfect them. Speech to text at its best.

“Hold on to your butts,” Raelynn says. She flips a couple of switches, and we rise smoothly from the helipad. “Until we get out of the city, keep the chatter to a minimum. We ain’t got a legal flight plan here, and I gotta watch for other birds in the air. Also…legit birds.”

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