Page 23 of Wrecked
Sam’s vest had likely saved most of his back.
“What happened to your shirt, Cuz?” Nitro asked on his way over to him.
That’s right. He’d handed his T-shirt to the woman.
“First, did you find any survivors?” Sam had to know if she’d escaped.
“No.” Nitro squatted down next to him. “The two guards left unconscious outside didn’t make it through the blast. After we found you in the pool, we searched the debris and found body parts under rubble in the middle of the house.”
“Probably the basement.”
“No one mentioned a basement.” Nitro frowned, no doubt thinking through the intel they’d received. That wasn’t the half of how many things they had to sort out from this clusterfuck.
Sam swallowed hard. “Pretty sure it’s the body of the guy I walked in on torturing a prisoner.”
“The senator?” Nitro tensed. “We didn’t find a second body.”
“No second body. It was a woman.” Sucking up his courage to move his head again, Sam pushed to his feet, glad his stomach hadn’t revolted.
Nitro stood with him as Sam elaborated. “She’s the one who told me the building was set to blow.”
At that announcement, all movement ceased.
Blade and Angel joined Sam and Nitro.
“Who was she and what happened to her?” Angel asked, sounding as surprised as Nitro looked.
Sam wished he knew the answer to both of those questions. “She’d been hung by her wrists from the ceiling with her feet submerged in a tub of water. Bastard had wire leads from a power source ready to go. Looked like he might have used them on her once already.”
Disgusted sounds oozed from the trio.
But they didn’t know everything yet. “The basement entrance was on the second floor. Yeah, crazy location I found by accident and that basement didn’t fit the house. Looked like it’d been there for hundreds of years. Her body blocked any clear shot of him from the top step. Before I could slip all the way down, she goaded the goon into raping her.”
“What?” Blade’s jaw dropped. More shocked expressions joined his.
Sam held up a finger. “By the time I got to help her, the fool had jumped at her offer. She made a badass move, jerking her legs up to knee him under the chin then used her heels to slam him in the face. Smashed his nose.”
Admiration wiped away their shock. Nitro muttered, “Damn.” Then his gaze lifted to Sam. “Where is she?”
Sam washed a hand over his face, still frustrated at losing her. “Once she told me the place was wired to blow, I took a second to alert all of you first then headed for the stairs. That’s when I realized she’d vanished and not by the stairs. No way she could have gone up two levels by then. I got to the top and looked around one last time, but she was in the wind. I called to her and got no reply. I’m thinking she had better intel on that building than us, which included an escape tunnel from the basement.”
Nitro’s mood went south. “That’s why you almost didn’t make it. Youwaitedfor her.”
Like Sam could deny that. “Only for a moment.”
“After you said we had less than ninety seconds to get out. If you had not exited through that window in front of the pool and if I had not been close enough watching for you to show up and dove in after you, you’d be dead right now. You know to treat a female operative like a male in these situations.”
Sam’s blood boiled. This was not the same as that last mission. “Don’t start that crap with me, Nitro. You sayin’ you wouldn’t have taken a last look?”
“Not with my life on the line and my team at risk of dying.”
That just pissed off Sam even more. He leaned in. “I put my team first by contacting all of you before anything else.”
Friction shot through the air.
Angel and Blade found something else to do, leaving those two to go at it.
Nitro opened his mouth then caught himself. Raising his voice was out of character, especially on an op. Nitro held a steel grip on his emotions, joking and picking at everyone before he’d devolve into shouting.
