Reclaimed (Hostage Rescue Team Series Book 10) (7 page)

“I bought a little something to go with the bra,” she added coyly, shaking her shoulders slightly, holding back a laugh at the way his eyes followed the bounce of her breasts. She wasn’t well-endowed but the way Adam looked at her made her feel like the most beautiful and desirable woman on earth. “Wanna see? I thought I’d—”

Her words cut off abruptly when a face suddenly appeared over Adam’s shoulder. She had only an instant to recognize Trevor and his goofy grin. “Hey, Sum—oh, shit.”

Horrified, Summer squeaked in alarm and automatically clapped her hands over her breasts, eyes flying wide.

Trevor’s eyes widened too and then he quickly backed out of view.

“Oh my God!” she cried. Adam was glaring at Trevor now, saying something over his shoulder, but she was too busy burning with embarrassment to give a shit what it was. “Oh my
God
!”

Mortified, she scrambled off her bed, well out of camera range, and cowered there in a heap on the woven rug next to the bed. “Adam!” she shrieked in accusation.

A strangled laugh answered. Adam’s. Then Trevor’s distinctive Tennessee twang came. “Hell, sorry about that. Might wanna put a sock on the door or something next time you guys wanna get your freak on.” A door closed somewhere in the background.

Summer closed her eyes. This was horrifying.

“He’s gone now,” Adam said with a chuckle.

“It’s not funny!”

“Come on, it was a little funny.”

Outraged, she reached for the first thing she could find on the bed—her bra—and flung it at the laptop screen. It hit with a splat and fell to the keyboard.

Adam’s laughter rang in her ears as she sat huddled there, mortified. How the hell was she supposed to show up at the homecoming now and face Trevor? He was a total perv and would absolutely make a comment about how he barely recognized her with her shirt on.

Getting mad all over again, she picked the bra back up and threw it at the laptop screen a second time. “Why the hell didn’t you warn me that he walked in?” she demanded, still huddled out of range.

“Because I was too busy drooling at the show you were putting on. I didn’t even hear him.”

Whatever. The man woke from a dead sleep if someone dropped a pin in the room. There was no way he’d been so distracted that he hadn’t heard Trevor open the door. “I’m so embarrassed,” she moaned.

“Don’t be. Biggest thrill he’s gotten since we’ve been over here, trust me. Maybe even before that.” A pause. “Come on, come back up so I can see you.”

She glared at the computer, even though Adam couldn’t see her. “No.”

Another chuckle. “Summer. Get back up here. We’re alone.”

Shielding her bare breasts with her hands, she got to her knees and craned her neck to poke her head around and check. Adam was there, grinning at her like an idiot. She shot him a glower, put her bra and shirt back on before climbing back up on the bed.

Adam gave her a pout and opened his mouth to protest.

“Nuh-uh, don’t even,” she told him. So much for her sex-kitten routine. “God, I’m never going to be able to look him in the eye after this.”

“I wouldn’t worry about that. I can pretty much guarantee he won’t be looking at your eyes after this.”

Summer groaned and crossed her arms over her chest while Adam’s deep chuckle sounded in her ears. It was a good thing she loved him more than life itself.

Present Day

Exhaustion clouded her brain like a fog.

Huddled in the back of her cell, Summer scrunched her knees tighter to her body in a futile effort to retain warmth. Her weary muscles shuddered with each shiver, her teeth chattering from the cold, and her hands and feet had long since gone numb.

She had no idea how much time had passed since they’d dumped her in here but it must have been hours. Her entire body was stiff, she was hungry, and she had to pee.

But at least she was still alive and unharmed. Mostly.

She was starting to wonder if she’d be forced to just relieve herself there in the dirt, through her clothes, when muted male voices reached her. Concern over her full bladder disappeared instantly, overridden by her body’s automatic fight-or-flight response. Her pulse sped up and her mouth went dry.

Whoever it was, the men continued across the space in front of her, some distance away. A moment later their voices became muffled, as though they’d stepped behind some kind of divider. Soon after, another male voice added to the mix. She couldn’t hear any of them well enough to overhear what was being said.

Sometime later, just as she was beginning to doze off, a pained cry rang out. She tensed and held her breath, straining to hear, to figure out what was happening. Had to be Jim. Were they hurting him? What were they doing?

Unbidden, a flood of images bombarded her, all the terrible things they might do to her when they came for her. She locked the thoughts away and gave herself a stern talking to.

This was not the time to allow her imagination to run wild. Panicking about what might happen was only going to make the situation worse.

She mentally shook herself, dug down deep for her diminishing reserves of courage. Whatever came, she had to be strong if she was going to survive this.

She’d already overcome so much. She
had
to get through this and find her way back to Adam somehow.

It made her think of his surprising reaction one day after a counseling session a few months ago, back when everything had looked hopeless.

I’m not letting you
go, he’d told her fiercely, holding both her shoulders as he stared into her eyes.
Ever. I’ll fight for you, no matter how long it takes. I won’t ever give up.

The words had surprised her so much, part of her hadn’t believed him at the time. She’d dismissed his vow, telling herself he’d only made it out of some misguided sense of loyalty to her and their marriage.

There was too much hurt on either side. Why would he want an emotionally traumatized wife who couldn’t give him a child and couldn’t even be intimate with him, when he was the kind of man who could have anyone he wanted?

Logically she knew the child part was more an issue for her than him, but the sex part definitely bothered him. Why would any man put up with that, let alone someone like him?

But now she realized he had fought for her the whole time, at least in his own way. He’d stuck by her, giving her space to find herself again and he’d gone to counseling both alone and with her. He’d hung in there while she struggled and scraped and battled to drag herself out of the bottomless pit she was in and for the longest time hadn’t seen a way out of.

In hindsight she recognized that no one could have pulled her out, not even him. She’d had to do it herself. After she’d done it, the hardest part was putting everything behind her, letting it all go. Forgiving him for his mistakes.

More, forgiving herself for hers.

The bulk of the damage had been done by the stillbirth. She’d retreated into herself, falling into an endless depression. Adam had tried to pull her free and she’d just retreated more. Then he’d become frustrated and angry, not understanding why she couldn’t “snap out of it” after the first few months had passed.

After that things had slowly improved, for a while. She’d forced herself back into the land of the living.

And then she’d suffered the third miscarriage.

She laid her cheek against her upraised knee and let the memory wash over her. Looking back, she’d made a big mistake in choosing to have their final embryo implanted. It had been way too soon for her emotionally, but she’d been so desperate to have their child and she couldn’t bear the thought of leaving that last embryo in the lab. With Adam’s support, she’d done it, and the pregnancy had taken.

For a few short weeks.

A little into her second month, she’d miscarried. And it had broken the will she’d struggled so hard to find again.

Logically it didn’t make sense. Even now, she couldn’t really explain it. Having a heavy period a few weeks after finding out she was pregnant was far less traumatic than what she’d gone through when she’d lost and delivered A.J. the year before.

And yet, for some reason it had extinguished the inner fire she’d managed to regain since the stillbirth, triggering all those terrible memories and sending her spiraling back into her own private hell.

After that she couldn’t even look at Adam without reliving it all. She couldn’t handle him touching her, let alone intimately. He’d been angry and frustrated by the setback and things had simply fallen apart.

He still waited for you
, she reminded herself, still awed by it.

He could have bailed, walked out and served her with separation papers. A lot of men in his position would have. But he hadn’t.

Instead he’d waited for her to find her way back to him again. And in doing so, he’d won her back.

It galvanized her. They hadn’t gone through all that for nothing. There had to be a reason and she refused to accept that she might die now that they’d finally found their way back to each other. Her husband had fought for her then and he’d be fighting for her today. She knew without a doubt he’d be out there right now, searching for her.

And she also knew he wouldn’t give up. Not Adam. Accepting defeat wasn’t in his DNA. No matter what happened, he would find her and bring her home, one way or the other.

She just prayed he found her alive.

The thought choked her up so badly she had to bite the inside of her cheek to keep from crying.

More voices brought her head up. Two men, headed her way. She swallowed hard. What did they want? Her heart rattled in her chest as they drew near.

Keys jangled. The cell door squeaked open.

A hand grabbed the hood, ripped it off her. She flinched at the sudden brightness and squinted while her eyes adjusted.

When she managed to pry her eyelids apart the pearly quality of the light told her it was early morning. They’d left her in her cell for the entire night without even so much as a blanket.

She focused on the two men before her, both dressed in black tunics and pants, with black kerchiefs tied around their heads, each of them holding a pistol. One was slightly built and appeared to be in his early twenties, his beard scraggly and thin.

The other was older, harder, and much bigger, his mouth a thin slash in the midst of his heavy, dark beard. And his eyes—

She sucked in a breath as recognition crashed through her, bringing with it a wave of terror.

Tarek Hadad. Known member of the ATB who had risen to considerable power in recent weeks. She’d done a report on him just two weeks ago. He had a reputation for being ruthless, someone you didn’t want to cross.

And she was his prisoner.

There was no hatred in his black eyes as he stared down at her. Just a cold, calculating gleam that turned her blood to ice. “Summer Blackwell,” he said in heavily accented English. “What do you do for your agency?”

As much as she hated looking at him, hated that he stood towering over her while she sat cuffed and helpless, she refused to break eye contact. She may be helpless but she was no coward. “I’m an analyst.”

“What does that mean?” he demanded in a hard voice. “What do you analyze?”

There was nothing wrong with answering that and she didn’t want to risk having him torture her merely because he suspected she was holding something back. If she fed him enough information, maybe he’d be satisfied without her actually having to give anything important away. “Information.”

“Information,” he repeated in an annoyed mutter. “About what?”

She swallowed, fought to stem the shivers rolling through her even though her muscles shuddered periodically. “Terror groups. Logistics. Capabilities. Funding.”

At that his gaze sharpened. A flare of pride and satisfaction lit them up, as if a fire had suddenly blazed to life deep inside him. A sneer distorted his mouth. “Terror groups. So you report about what American soldiers and their allies are doing, then?”

She didn’t answer that one.

“No, I thought not,” he murmured, folding his arms across his chest.

She’d seen pictures of him before but seeing him now up close, she had a whole new respect for his sheer physical power. He wasn’t as tall as Adam, but he was almost as broad through the shoulders and chest, his torso heavily muscled, and he had a commanding presence. She could see why his men wouldn’t dare cross him. They’d be too afraid to.

Regarding her with that eerie stare, he tilted his head. “You know who I am?”

There was no point in denying it. “Yes.”

He gave a satisfied nod. “Good. Then you know what I’m capable of.”

Her stomach knotted even tighter. Not wanting to answer that aloud, she simply looked at him.

Those black eyes continued to bore into her, glowing with that strange inner light that made her skin crawl. He was scary as hell. “I have your boss. And your coworker.”

Mark? He was here too? Oh no…

“And I have your laptop.”

She sucked in a breath at that, hid a wince. Most of what was on her hard drive was encrypted, but not all. If he accessed the data on it he’d see the intel they had on him and the ATB groups in the region. He’d be able to warn his fellow ATB members about upcoming U.S. counterterrorism operations near the Syrian-Jordanian border.

Another smirk. “If you don’t give me the password and reveal what I want to know, your friends will suffer for it.” He paused a moment. “And so will you.”

Oh God… If she gave him the password she’d be putting American and allied lives in danger. But if she didn’t…

Her guts churned at the impossible situation she faced.

A cold, cruel smile twisted Tarek’s mouth, telling her he saw her fear and was pleased by it. “You’re going to be very useful to me in the coming days, Summer.”

She hated that he used her name.

Breaking eye contact with her, he nodded at the man beside him and spoke in Arabic, either not realizing or not caring that she might understand. “Take her outside. We’ll get started soon.”