Sleeping With Danger. Wendy Rosnau

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СКАЧАТЬ Hector dwarfed her, but he would never be as frightening as Holic Reznik. He was a gentle giant with none of the qualities it took to be a ruthless guard in her father’s camp, or an assassin for hire.

      “No, I had no luck. No one in the village will help me. It’s a lost cause.”

      “Why did you ring the bell?”

      “Holic Reznik saw me. He knows I’ve been to the village. And he knows why. He…” She stopped before she spilled the rest of what had transpired between them. Hector wasn’t violent, but he was protective of her. She didn’t want him doing something stupid.

      “I’m afraid he intends to tell my father,” she confessed.

      “I’ll deny it. I’ll say your early-morning walk was to pick flowers and visit the goats. That I was with you the entire time.”

      She slipped the bell back into her pocket. “The question is, who will my father believe?”

      “You picked flowers and played with the goats. That is our story. Stick to it. Now go inside, and get that frightened look off your face or he’ll read the truth the minute he sees you.”

      Melita looked up into Hector’s kind face. How he had come to be in her father’s employment she didn’t know, but he didn’t belong here any more than she did.

      She glanced around, spied the lavender growing in the garden and plucked a handful, then hurried inside.

      Sully scratched another mark into the leg of the wooden table with his fingernail. He’d been on the platform thirty-six days. Still shackled like an animal, he’d put on weight and started to regain his strength. It was due to three meals a day, and Argo’s determination to return him to the man he used to be. The question was why.

      Physically he was winning the fight, but emotionally he was raw and heartsick. He was surrounded by pain and misery, his dying audience a constant reminder that he had become their enemy.

      Argo was right, they hated him now. If he was tossed into the cage with them they would rip him apart and feast on his remains.

      Like he did each evening after supper, he washed at the sink, then went to bed early. Lying on his back staring at the dark ceiling, he was constantly aware of the men ten feet away. Eyes closed, he could still see their skeleton faces and misshapen bodies—bodies that continued to grow weaker as his grew stronger.

      He’d planned to share his food with them. How would anyone know? But they would know, Argo told him, pointing to a camera on the wall. If he tried to toss food to anyone, they would be taken out and killed.

      The men haunted him day and night. His nightmares were his reality—and sometimes he would startle and realize his own cries had awakened him.

      He jerked awake now, but this time it wasn’t due to the men moaning, or a nightmare. He angled his head and listened, picked up the sound of heavy footsteps moving down the corridor.

      When the light came on, he swung his legs off the bed, the chain around his ankle rattling on the concrete.

      Argo entered the dungeon. He pulled a key from his pocket and stepped up on the platform. “It’s time,” he said, then unlocked the manacles on Sully’s ankle.

      “Time for what?”

      “Your taxi just arrived.”

      Sully didn’t get up.

      “Don’t tell me you’re going to miss us here?”

      That would depend on where Argo was taking him, Sully thought. For the past month he’d felt like a cow being fattened for slaughter. He was no longer hungry every hour of the day, or crawling with parasites. But there was no comfort in it.

      Argo slid his gun off his shoulder and aimed it at his chest. “Get up.”

      Sully eyed the weapon as he stood. He recognized the make. It was a Czech Skorpion M-84. The design had been deferred, then later buried altogether. At least that was the story.

      Now who could be manufacturing bad-boy Skorpions?

      It didn’t take a genius to figure that out. The Chameleon was involved in everything from contraband to global anarchy.

      “Let’s go. Take it nice and careful, pretty boy. You wouldn’t want my finger to slip on this trigger.”

      Sully stepped off the concrete platform, then stopped to glance one last time at the circle of men huddled naked and hungry in their iron death trap.

      Three men had died last week.

      He searched out Roth Erwin and found him lying on his side with his knees curled up into his chest. He hadn’t moved from that spot in two days. Sully looked for some sign of life. Suddenly, as if Roth could feel his eyes on him, he opened his, then Argo nudged Sully in the ribs with the M-84.

      “Move out.”

      Sully left the dungeon and walked down the corridor. Weeks ago he’d been worried about his legs collapsing beneath him, but tonight there was no fear of that.

      He hadn’t been outside in a month, so when he stepped into the moonlight he embraced the warm night breeze on his face. He took a long, deep breath—the clean air better than the best sex he could remember.

      Again Argo nudged him with the gun barrel. “Head for the dock.”

      Barefoot, Sully followed the uneven path that went up a rocky knoll. When he reached the craggy summit, he spotted a cruiser riding the water a hundred yards offshore. The sleek cigar boat was a badass smoker that no doubt had enough horsepower to outrun anything on the water. Its lines were similar to the Halmatic VSV used by the British for seaborne covert insertions, and the American Rigid Raider interceptor. It also resembled his own cigar boat that he’d used when he was a gunrunner in Ireland.

      A small fishing boat was waiting at the end of the dock, Pedro seated in the stern. He climbed in and sat down on the middle seat. Argo covered the bench across from him in the bow.

      The M-84 still pointed at him, Argo said, “The boss man wants you alive, but accidents happen. Stupidity could get you killed tonight, pretty boy.”

      Sully had no intentions of making a stupid move. Not with a gun aimed at his chest and nowhere to run. He was a good swimmer, but his endurance was questionable. He’d survived too long in hell to throw it away on a futile escape attempt.

      Argo would pick him out of the water like a rubber duck floating in a carnival pond.

      Pedro sent the boat out to sea and headed for the cigar boat. Once Sully was handed over to the crew, his wrists were cuffed and his ankles were shackled. In irons once again, he was shoved into a seat and locked down, and then the cruiser took off, skimming fast and furious over the water.

      The four-man crew were armed with Czech Skorpions, and yet they were dressed like fishermen.

      Sully kept his ears open, and his eyes out to sea. He had traveled the Greek Isles over the years, and although he couldn’t speak the language fluently, he could speak some and had no trouble understanding the men’s conversation on the boat.

      Before СКАЧАТЬ