Abandoned (2 page)

Marshall nodded outside as he cleared his throat. “Let’s get out of here.” He glanced at Allison and then back out the opening to the outside. “When do you expect your captor to return?”

“No idea. He’s been gone longer than usual. I was beginning to think he’d left me for dead.” She stared at Marshall’s back, attempting to keep her breathing steady. She was scared out of her mind.
They offered you water and gave you a coat. Surely they don’t intend to kill you.

“Is there anything you want to take?” Chuck asked.

Allison glanced around. “No.” She wouldn’t mind having at least her purse with her identification, but she had no idea where it was or even if it still existed. “Who are you guys? You don’t look like police.” Was she trading one problem for another? She’d been held captive for a year by one man. There were three here now. They weren’t official by any means. Just three men who thought they’d swoop in and take her to another location.
Shifters
,
though
. That had to mean something.

But three men had come in several times and taken her to another location and then returned her. She could hardly remember the details of any of those encounters.

“We aren’t with the human police. We’re hired by The Head Council.” Chuck stepped closer to the door and then turned from her to Marshall. “Ready?”

“Clear.” Marshall pushed the door all the way open and eased outside.

“I’ll explain better in the car,” Chuck continued over his shoulder. “I know you’re scared and I don’t blame you, but I swear we’re the good guys. And we don’t want to be anywhere near here when your kidnapper returns.”

Allison didn’t think he would return at all, but that wasn’t going to stop her from getting the hell out of there. She couldn’t imagine a fate worse than staying right then. “He wasn’t my kidnapper. Another man took me from The Gathering and brought me here. I don’t know who either of them were.”

“I’m so sorry, ma’am.” Bill ducked his head. “Our mission is rescue. Someone else will come behind us to investigate the scene.”

Allison looked down at her feet. “How far do we have to walk? I’m not very strong.” She hadn’t eaten anything in days and not enough for a regular person in a year. She spotted her tennis shoes by the front door and slipped them on. At least her feet would be protected.

“We have an SUV very close. We didn’t want to pull up to the door, but close enough to walk.” Bill set a hand on her shoulder and she flinched.

“Let’s go.” Marshall took off. He scanned every direction and kept low, his knees bent as he jogged away from the cabin.

Chuck followed on his heels. “Stay right behind me.”

Allison stepped outside. Her legs wobbled after so long crouched in the closet and not enough use for months. She hadn’t even been outside in a long time. When her captor was home, she was permitted to use the tiny bathroom in one corner of the cabin, the only separate room it contained. When he was away and she was locked in the closet, she peed in a bucket in the cramped space. She always knew when she was dehydrated because she no longer needed to pee.

She soon saw the black SUV they’d mentioned among the trees about twenty yards away. Her legs threatened to buckle, but adrenaline pulled her along.

She couldn’t imagine anyone was watching them or following them, but she felt the palpable concern of the three men flanking her.

Allison scanned in both directions. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled
,
and she tripped over a tree stump. Chuck reached back and swept her off her feet before she hit the ground.

And then all hell broke loose. A shot rang out. And then another, coming from the opposite direction. It happened so fast, Allison couldn’t tell for sure where the noises came from.

Chuck flattened her against the ground, lying on top of her and covering her head. Her knees hit the dirt hard, and then her face. She took a deep breath and dust filled her nose.

More shots. So many she couldn’t count them. She could see Marshall’s boots to her side where he crouched down in front of her face and mowed the area with his machine gun.

Her chest pounded. She couldn’t breathe. Chuck was pressing on top of her with too much weight. And she blinked, but dirt clouded her vision, making her eyes burn.

A loud grunt followed by a thump filtered into her awareness. Bill. Had he been hit?

Allison pushed against the ground with both hands, trying to free herself of Chuck’s overpowering pressure on her back. She couldn’t get him to budge.

“Go,” Marshall whispered. He glanced back at Chuck and then down at Allison. She squinted to see him. “Get her to the SUV. I’ll be right behind you.” He motioned with his chin toward the tree line.

Chuck whisked her off the ground as though she weighed nothing. He held her against his chest, one arm wrapped around her middle. Her feet didn’t reach the ground.

“Go with them,” Marshall said. He must have spoken that last part to Bill. “Hurry.”

When they reached the car, Bill stepped around Chuck and whipped open the back door. Chuck swung her inside. “Get on the floor,” he muttered before he slammed the door. Within seconds all three men had circled to the other doors and jumped inside. Someone started the SUV and gunned the engine so fast, Allison had to brace herself against the front seat. She squeezed into a tight ball on the floor and ducked her head, expecting the glass to shatter all around her any moment.

The ride was rough at first as the SUV bounced around on the uneven ground. There were no more shots. She held her breath for several minutes it seemed, worried about a tire blowing or the gas tank exploding. Whatever sorts of things might happen to a car in a gun fight.

When she finally tipped her head up, she saw Bill in the seat across from her. His gaze kept shifting from one window to another, scanning the area behind them as they sped away. He held his left arm tight with his right hand wrapped around his bicep. Blood trickled between his fingers. He didn’t seem to notice.

With a huge bounce, the SUV went over a large bump and then the drive smoothed out. They must have hit the pavement.

“I think we’re safe now,” Marshall said over his shoulder. “You okay, Bill?”

“Yeah, just a flesh wound. I’ll live.” He unwrapped his fingers from his arm and peeked at the damage, making Allison’s stomach revolt. She’d never seen a gunshot wound before. And she couldn’t see anything but blood on his jacket now. But the idea of what lay beneath made her swallow back bile.

“Who was that?” Allison asked, dipping her gaze down so she could avoid staring at Bill’s wound.

“No idea,” Chuck said from the front. “But they didn’t like the idea of us taking you, that’s for sure.”

She breathed a giant sigh of relief. Whatever the fuck that chapter in her life had been, she hoped it was over. She lifted her gaze back to Bill. “Where are you taking me?”

•●•

Henry paced next to his car while he listened to the phone ringing on the other end. He’d pulled into a deserted parking lot to make this call.

He exhaled when the line connected. “Sir?”

“How many times have I told you not to call me during the day, Fairfield?”

Henry braced himself. He’d known this would happen. “It’s an emergency, sir.”

“What?” the older man barked.

“Something’s gone terribly wrong. Several women were seized all across the country at the same time.”

“What the fuck? What are you talking about?”

Henry took shallow breaths. He rubbed his forehead. “I don’t know anything else, sir. It appears someone was onto us
,
and they organized an ambush.”

“Any men?”

“No. Just the women.”

“How many?”

“Not sure yet. Maybe a dozen. I’m still waiting to hear from all the guards.” Henry lifted his face to the sky. “Allison Watkins was one of them. J.T. was nowhere to be found when your men showed up to pick her up. They got caught in a shootout.”

“Shit.” The man paused. “Was anyone harmed?”

“No, sir. They think they hit one of the men who took Allison, but when gunfire was returned in an effort to mow them down with a machine gun, they ran for safety. They think the North American Reserves were involved.”

“NAR?”

“Looks that way, sir.”

“Damn.”

Henry waited for his boss to say something else.

“Well, keep me posted when you know more and hang tight. I’ll do some investigating on my end.”

“Okay.”

The line went dead. Henry climbed back into his car and tossed his cell on the passenger seat. He banged his head on the steering wheel.
Fuck
.

“They’re on their way.” Evan set the cordless on the counter and turned to his mate.

“I don’t know why I’m so nervous.” Ashley wrung her hands and then wrapped them around her mug of coffee to keep still. Her nerves were getting to her. She set her elbows on the table and couldn’t stop tapping her feet. “We’ve known this day would come for months.”

“True, but it’s understandably nerve-wracking.” Evan approached his mate and leaned over the table to kiss her. “Are you okay? You can still back out if you want.”

She shook her head. “I would never do that. I’m sure Allison needs me. I want to be helpful. It’s just stressful.”

“I know. I’ll be right beside you.”

“What time will they arrive?”

“In about an hour. They drove all night from Minnesota. We’ll see how she’s doing and decide when to leave for the ranch.” Evan sat next to his mate.

“Has The Head Council contacted her parents?”

“Yes. They’re flying directly to the ranch in Texas. They’ll meet us there.”

“God, they must be so worried.”

“I’m sure they are, baby.” Evan grabbed her hands and squeezed them.

It had only been a year since Evan had rescued Ashley from the man who took her from The Gathering five years ago. She could remember the frantic way her parents reacted when she first arrived back home.

Evan and his team of private investigators spent months tracking and locating other missing shifters. The Head Council for the North American shifters, located in Seattle, had provided the manpower from NAR to extricate a dozen shifters simultaneously. Their hope was that by doing so, whoever was behind this elaborate scheme of kidnappings would be caught off guard and unable to move any of the women before they were rescued.

With the exception of the altercation extricating Allison from Minnesota, the plan had been flawless. All twelve people involved had been successfully recovered. None of the shifters organized to perform this elaborate sting had been killed. Several of the abductors had been taken into custody and were on their way to Seattle for questioning.

If the men holding each of these shifters were anything like the man who’d taken Ashley, Damon Parkfield, they probably wouldn’t know much.

“You’re deep in thought.” Evan lifted one of Ashley’s hands to his lips and kissed her knuckles.

“Do you think they’ll be able to find out who’s behind this insanity?” She lifted her gaze to Evan. “Damon was a rogue wolf. He didn’t seem to know anything about who was supplying him with the drugs he used on me. What if all the others are the same?”

“It’s a possibility. Hopefully there was a breach somewhere and at least one of them knows something. From my research, it seems all the shifters involved in this were loners when they were approached by whoever is leading this operation. If any of them knows more than we already do from surveillance and phone taps, it’ll be a miracle.”

“There could be hundreds more out there. Missing. Kidnapped. Exploited.” She swallowed over the lump in her throat as she pondered the number of women who’d been taken under the pretense of mating.

Evan wrapped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her to his side. “We’re doing everything we can to ensure that isn’t the case. Right now I’m more worried about all the rogue wolves out there being lured into the scheme than anything. The families who frequent The Gathering every other year are easy to contact. We’ve called every family who’s been to The Gathering in the last decade individually to ensure no one was mysteriously mated and not heard from again.