Reunions, a Sentinel/Professionals/The Chief
crossover by Sue Castle.
Rated NC17 for adult situations, violence and homoeroticism. No copyright
infringement intended. This story is a completely revised and much expanded
version of my Intersections, separate and distinct from the story of
that name. Special thanks to Carole for motivating me to tell the rest of the
story. Previously published in Love & Guns 2 (a Sentinel zine).
Cast:
From The Sentinel;
Detective James Ellison,
an officer with the Major Crimes division of the Cascade (WA) Police
Department, a genetic throwback with enhanced senses.
Blair Sandburg, a doctoral student in anthropology
who is Jim's Guide and who is writing his dissertation on Sentinels (nickname :
Chief). They are partners, friends, and in this universe, lovers.
Naomi Sandburg, Blair's mother.
Captain Simon Banks,
Det. Ellison's boss and friend, head of the Major Crimes division.
From The
Professionals;
W.A.P. Bodie, ex-CI5 member, now bodyguard in
private security work. 
Ray Doyle, his partner, best friend, and (in
this universe) lover while in CI5.
Colin Murphy, once an A Squad member with Bodie
and Doyle, now Controller of CI5.
George Cowley, the original Controller of CI5
(now deceased).
Jax and Mac (McCabe), senior CI5
agents who were active A squad members with Bodie and Doyle.
From The Chief;
Chief Constable Alan
Cade, head of the Eastland Constabulary (rank : Chief).
Wes Morton, the Deputy Chief Constable.
Inspector Rose Penfold,
a member of Cade's personal staff.
Diana, his secretary.
Elena Belinsky, his daughter, a
student at
Yvonne Belinsky, her mother,
residing in
The Honorable Pietro
Donati (deceased), an Italian judge famous for his tough stance against
organized crime who was assassinated while in Eastland speaking at a law
enforcement conference.
Other characters
original to the author.
Blair Sandburg shifted the
loaded backpack to a more comfortable position and tromped happily along behind
his partner as the larger man forged a path through the crowded SeaTac
International airport. He'd had to practically barter his soul and he now owed
favors to half the teaching fellows in the anthropology department, but the two
weeks he'd managed to carve out of his teaching schedule had been well worth
it. He hadn't had the opportunity to see
Three paces ahead,
concentrating on dialing down his senses so that the crowd didn't overwhelm
him, the object of Blair's affections was caught by the accelerated heartbeat
coming from behind him. Knowing Sandburg's natural reaction to new places and
new people, coupled with his anticipation of the things to come in the next few
days, the quickened pulse didn't overly concern him. When the younger man's
breathing began to get a little ragged, he slowed and glanced down behind
himself. A slight flush had settled along the high cheekbones and the full lips
were moist where Blair had been licking them. Jim glanced back to follow his
Guide's fixed gaze and realized where those big blue eyes were fastened. He
flushed himself and cleared his throat, fighting his own instinctive reaction
to his partner's arousal. The eyes widened even more, but they did at least
turn from slightly south of Jim's belt level in the back to the detective's
profile. Blair bit his lip to keep from laughing. Speaking in a whisper,
knowing Sentinel hearing could pick it up when no one else could, he murmured,
"Sorry, big guy, but you know what those jeans do to me. I can't wait to
get you to the hotel, man." Laughter and lechery fought for ascendancy in
the promise.
Ellison fought back his own
grin and glared down at his partner, not scaring him in the least. "Save
it, Chief. We've got work to do, first. I want to be ready for that
Blair raised his hands in
mock self defense. "Okay, okay, okay, man, I should've known better than
stand in the way of the details! We'll get to the hotel, register, get our ton
and a half of paperwork, find out what panels we're supposed to be at and when
we're supposed to be where--" He shook his head and grinned, glancing up
and sideways at his lover through long dark curls. "Work before pleasure,
the Ellison Credo, I hear that." Ignoring the muffled chuckle coming from
the man at his side, he scuttled closer to the big, warm body and muttered,
"But when the work is done, your butt is mine, baby."
Clearing customs went with
fewer snags than he had anticipated. Watching the executive assistant hand over
the appropriate forms to make sure the Browning never left his side, William
Andrew Philip Bodie scanned the crowds milling by the international reception
area like a hawk scanning for field rats. His current boss was a man with many
enemies, and a number of highly efficient criminal organizations both within
his native
His eye settled momentarily
on his current charge. The Honorable Eduardo Cimbrone was a national treasure,
or so the beleaguered Carabinieri claimed. Bodie hadn't been in Italy long
enough himself to see the judge in action on the bench, having only taken on
this position the previous month. But he did his homework, especially on a job
that paid as well as this one did. And it was a damned good thing. There had
been three assassination attempts and one attempted kidnapping in the past
three weeks, and that was on his home turf. True, a convention of coppers was
probably the last place an assassin might be expected to be found, but with any
crowd as large as this one it was too easy for the possibility of a slip-up.
Bodie had seen too many people die too easily to let his guard down. Flexing
his gun hand unconsciously and slipping past the small ring of officious people
gathered around his charge, he deftly inserted himself in the small space next
to the judge and touched his sleeve to gain his attention.
"Time to go,
sir," he suggested quietly, the words more an order than either man would
admit. Cimbrone smiled sweetly at the professionally pleasant young man handing
him back his papers and nodded just as quietly. Four minutes later they were
safely in a nondescript navy blue sedan rumbling through the dark tunnels under
the airport toward the Four Seasons Olympic Hotel. Forty seven minutes later
they were comfortably ensconced in the best suite in the most elegant hotel in
the city, and Bodie finally relaxed. As he unclipped the shoulder holster and
rolled his tensed neck muscles, trying to ease the strain and wishfully
remembering strong fingers rubbing out the stiffness, he sighed. It was going
to be a very long week, and he was tired before it even began.
Paperwork. It felt like the
last five years ... no, nearly the last decade of his life could be summed up
in that one nasty word. Chief Constable Alan Cade signed yet another official
document, then heard the chime of the warning bell with relief. It had been a
very long flight, and a restless night before, and he was exhausted. He had a
sinking feeling he would be facing a hostile audience when he got to Seattle,
and while he believed fiercely that his program was an important, if radical,
idea of how to approach drug traffickers, there were times when he got
extremely tired of trying to explain it to people who just didn't want to know.
His dual concept of educating the users and targeting the suppliers was far
from popular even in his own patch of East Anglia.
It was heartening to be
invited to present a speech on his program to an international conference on
illegal drugs containment strategies ... but a large part of that invitation,
he thought cynically, could be laid at the door of the public relations people.
It would look good on the reports to the various governments involved, but
would he be able to sway any of the people who really mattered? The ones who,
like himself, made and carried out the policies at the street level? Or would
they shake their heads, as his own Police Authority Board did, as the people of
influence in society did, at his wild ideas, and continue to fund only those
projects that sounded tough and were completely ineffective, while more young
people died and the hemorrhaging of the nations' lifeblood continued?
Aware that even in his own
thoughts he was beginning to sound like The Grand Pontificator, he stifled the
urge to laugh at himself and shuffled his papers into his briefcase. He'd
concentrate on the basics, now, get into Seattle, settle into the hotel, try to
make up for the previous night's restlessness ... and think about tomorrow when
he had to -- tomorrow. He had a week to try to make a difference. And if this
attempt was as futile as the last several had been, he might just chuck the
whole bloody business and retire to someplace remote in the Brecon Beacons to
raise rabbits.
That thought brought
another immediately to mind, and he tried to stifle it as thoroughly as he had
his laughter, with lamentably less success. When he had tamped the loneliness
and the need back into the darkest recesses of his mind once more, he took a
deep breath. No laughter, no light. No love. Above all, no remembering and no wanting
what he could not have. Vaguely, he wondered when the last time had been that
he had actually felt alive, but he feared the answer too much to consciously
formulate the question. Carefully blanking his mind as completely as his
expression, he tightened his lap belt and prepared for landing. It was going to
be a difficult week and he could do without the distractions that memories of
the past invariably brought.
The lines were just as bad
as he'd expected them to be. Used to stakeouts and, further back, standing at
attention for mind-numbingly long periods of time, Ellison let his thoughts
drift back to the previous night. His lover had been his usual inventive self, with
the added buzz of the unusual surroundings spurring him on to even greater
heights of ingenuity. The pleasant ache in his hamstrings and the heaviness
coiled low, spreading from the small of his back down the crease of his
buttocks and centering around his well-exercised opening brought a reminiscent
smile to his sculptured mouth. It wasn't often Sandburg let himself get that
wild. Yeah, he wasn't the restrained type, but he didn't usually pound his
partner through the floor like he had last night. God, that had been
incredible.
Keeping up unconsciously
with the flow of bodies around him, trying to distract himself from the nearly
overpowering odor of so many human beings packed in like sardines, he shuffled
forward another inch and settled back down to his memories. Maybe if he turned
his scent dial all the way down, he'd be able to get their conference packets
and get back to their room without getting a splitting headache. He most
certainly didn't want to tell Blair 'no thanks, honey, my head hurts' -- the
younger man would try to dose him with witch doctor potions, and he wasn't in
the mood for drinking anything with twigs floating along the top. On the other
hand, solicitous sex was a wonderful cure for the headache. His mind drifted,
helplessly, back to the previous night once more.
They had barely cleared the
door when Blair had unceremoniously dumped his backpack on the floor by the
table and pounced on him. He'd known it was coming and made no effort to evade
his amorous partner's advance. Strong hands caught him around the waist and a
solid body hit him in the middle of the back, with just enough force to take
him off his feet and land them both on the bed. Sandburg ended on top, and
wasting no time with preliminaries, he immediately attacked the buttons
straining across the front of Jim's jeans.
"Enough is enough,
man, and this is just too much. You've been flashing that hind end of yours in
front of my face for hours, and my tolerance is at an end. I am so ready for
this I'm about to explode and I haven't even gotten my hands on you. Yet."
Jim was laughing too hard to fight back by this point, and Blair had his jeans,
underwear, socks and shoes stripped off him before he could regain his breath.
Running long, elegant fingers down the buttons on the front of the green cotton
oxford shirt, the wild haired imp grinned wickedly up into Jim's face, then
flicked each button open. Skin extraordinarily sensitized, he could do no more
than gasp at the sensation as those clever fingers finished the job of stripping
him naked. Suddenly realizing that his Guide was severely overdressed for the
occasion, he gathered enough of his mind together to remedy the situation.
Pulling his tormentor away
from his nipples, groaning at the loss of contact, he managed to grunt out,
"Naked." Blair nodded encouragingly and reached for his groin. He
stifled the urge to just give in and be ravished, and was able to grind out,
"You!"
"Oh!" The teasing
note was back, full force. "You trying to tell me you want company at this
little party, here, Jim?" But at least he got the message, inarticulate as
it had been, and stripped himself as quickly as he had stripped Jim moments
before. The Sentinel moaned aloud as the softly furred, muscular chest came
down gently across his own, each springy curl seeming to raise a spark as it
skimmed across his skin. He was a triangle of fire from his nipples to his
navel, and the much-anticipated torture was just beginning.
Blair treated him to a full
body workover, running questing hands along his muscles, scraping his nails
with a feather light touch on all the places that turned Jim to quivering
jelly. By the time the young dervish took pity on him, he was unable to make a
single coherent noise. He just raised himself to his knees, pillowed his forehead
on his crossed wrists, clenched the spread until his knuckles turned white, and
whimpered. Blair responded well to the unspoken invitation, working him with
tongue, fingers and finally cock until both men had exploded and neither could
move. When they eventually came back to themselves they'd barely had energy to
cuddle together, but he had a distinct memory of his Guide stroking his chest
and turning his head to place a single kiss at the hollow at the base of his
throat before he drifted off.
As his mind drifted, he
moved forward another inch, then another. Finally a sound impinged on his mind.
Even with enhanced hearing, the low, accented voice had to repeat his name
three times before he registered it.
"It is Jim Ellison,
isn't it?"
Turning to meet the voice,
a wide smile split his face, bracketing his eyes with deep laugh lines.
"I'll be damned! Sergeant Bodie!" He thrust out his hand to take the
offered handshake, eyes sweeping over the elegant, fit man before him. The
years had been kind to his one-time special forces instructor. The ebony hair
was silvered, but the pale, handsome face was still smooth, and the solid build
was in excellent shape. His handshake was just as firm, and the gun calluses
were still hard, so he was active in the business, in some manner. The only
real indication of his age were the shadows in his deep blue eyes. They had
always been a distance there, walls up to keep intruders out, but now there was
an underlying hint of pain that he didn't remember seeing there before.
A white-toothed smile
answered his greeting. "Not sergeant any more, lad. Just Bodie." The
handclasp was brief, but warm. They'd not been close friends, fifteen years ago
when they'd known one another, but they had respected one another's abilities,
and something about the younger man had struck a responsive chord in the older
one.
"Don't tell me you're
a cop, now," Jim responded. Bodie's disdain for the police force had been
very evident even years before. It hadn't changed much, given the instinctive
wrinkle of his nose.
"No, doing a bit of
minding. Private security." Jim nodded. That sounded more like what he'd
expect. It paid well, and Bodie had always had a taste for the finer things in
life. The older man gestured casually at the controlled chaos swirling around
them. "Had to pick up some papers for my guv'nor."
A not-particularly-polite
jostle reminded Jim that they were holding up the line, and he cast an
apologetic smile at his old acquaintance. "Any chance of taking a break
and getting together later? I'm here with my partner and I think he'd like to
meet you." Would he ever, the detective grinned to himself. Sandburg would
get an adrenaline rush just from meeting a part of Ellison's closely held past,
and maybe the garrulous anthropologist could get Bodie to open up a bit about
his own. It would make for a fascinating dinner, he'd bet. Blair could get a
clam to talk, so Bodie didn't stand a chance.
"I'd like that,"
Bodie answered, and it sounded as if he meant it. "I've some time later
this evening, after the last of the presentations are over. How about
1930?"
Ellison nodded assent.
"That'd be great." Another ungentle shove interrupted him, and he
threw Bodie a helpless glance. "See you then!"
The Englishman grinned back
at him, tossed him a casual salute, and disappeared into his own line. Jim
found himself at the table, staring down at a myriad of folders and colored
papers presided over by a harried looking clerk, and settled in to figure out
what he needed so that he could get it, escape, and pay Blair back for the
previous night.
The resulting mental images
brought such a wicked smile to his face the clerk dropped her folders and,
dazed, smiled back, hoping to get lucky. Unfortunately for her, the lucky one
was already upstairs waiting. The man standing behind Jim in line was repaid
for his impatient jostling by having to deal with a very grumpy and sadly
disappointed clerk.
The preliminary panel on
opening day had gone well, Alan thought, but the proof would be in the second
day's presentation. He was scheduled to be the keynote speaker on the
alternative approach panel, and he was feeling somewhat nervous. He'd
championed unpopular causes in the past -- often -- but never in such a
high-visibility international arena. He hoped the changes in his appearance,
along with his official biography, title and name, would be enough to carry him
through the experience unscathed. Staring moodily through the window at the sunset
painting the sky in vivid rose and deep purple, his undisciplined thoughts were
interrupted by the chirp of the telephone. Settling into the floral patterned
armchair next to the small end table, he caught up the handset by the second
ring.
"Cade."
"Chief Constable Alan
Cade?" He murmured an affirmative, trying and failing to place the lightly
accented voice. "My name is Eduardo Cimbrone."
His mind instantly supplied
a face and a sketchy background to the name. Highly placed, highly regarded
Italian judge, uncompromising in his sentencing no matter the clout of the
criminal in question, with many enemies who would be more than happy to see him
dead. "It's an honor, sir. What can I do for you?"
"It is rather what I
might do for you, Chief Cade. We shared a good friend, Pietro Donati."
Memories flashed behind his
eyes, of a good man dying by treachery in what should have been a safe place,
of his own abortive attempt to protect him and the bullet through the left
wrist he had suffered as a result. "He was a good man. I'm sorry."
Gruff words, laden with pain both from losing a friend and failing in his duty.
"As am I. Please, do
not blame yourself , Chief Cade. What was done was beyond anyone's control to
avoid, even the unfortunate guard used so badly. He himself was only attempting
to protect his family. It is a confusing and saddening place, this world we
live in. But there are good people in it as well. Pietro spoke very fondly of
you, with great respect. I was one of the executors of his will, and he left
you a small bequest."
Cade was unable to stifle
his sound of surprise. Cimbrone politely ignored it and continued.
"It is a personal
journal, containing delicate and potentially volatile information, and he left
instructions that I should give it to you in person, not to allow it to leave
my possession except to place it in your hands. Would you be available to meet
with me?"
Swallowing past the lump in
his throat at the thought of his late friend and with his mind rapidly turning
over the possible ramifications of the information in the book, Cade made a
quick decision. "I'd be honored, sir. Where would you like to meet? And
when would be convenient?"
A rustle of papers in the
background caused Cade to cast a rueful glance at his own stack of paperwork.
He had a pile of it to go through before he could meet with the honorable
judge. He was looking forward to the meeting, however. He needed something to
take his mind off the next day's efforts, and he was intensely curious to
discover what Donati had left for him.
"It is a fine night,
and I am feeling cramped in this room. Perhaps the verandah of the hotel
restaurant, after dinner this evening? At, oh, eight o'clock?" The
hesitancy in the older man's voice was underlined with anticipation. He
undoubtedly wanted to rid himself of the journal as soon as possible.
Considering the myriad threats against him, it really wasn't much of a surprise
that he should wish to rid himself of at least one potentially dangerous cache
of information.
"I look forward to it,
sir." A sincere "until later" and he cradled the receiver
thoughtfully and picked up the room service menu. If he was going to spend as
much time as he would like to talking with Cimbrone, he'd better get the rest
of his work done. Bearding the lions in the den was one thing ... bearding them
unprepared was enough to make his palms sweat.
Part of him felt a little
apprehensive about leaving the judge with the night shift, but the old man had
assured him that he would be settled in his room for the rest of the evening,
so Bodie ignored the little voice in the back of his mind that was cautioning
him to stay close. With one last round of instructions to the night shift he
left the suite to meet Ellison and his partner for dinner.
He told himself he was
over-reacting -- he'd been on-duty for nearly three weeks without a single day
off, and the strain was beginning to show. A man could only stay alert for so
long, getting by on nights of half-alert sleep, before his reflexes gave. And
he wasn't getting any younger -- he'd admit that, if only to himself. He'd
always been relentlessly honest with himself about his own abilities, even as
he'd lied -- or at least embellished greatly -- to others around him. Kept them
on their toes.
All except Doyle. Ray'd
known better. After the first two weeks he hadn't been able to slip a single
lie past his partner, and after a month he hadn't wanted to. By the time three
months had passed he was too busy trying to keep Doyle's back covered during
the day and get into his bed at night to keep up the facade. After the fourth
month he'd been too shagged out from both bed and back-up to worry about the
fact that his golli could (and did) read him like a book. They'd had eleven
years. More than some marriages. It had been eight since they'd been forced to
split. He had fought his heart and his memories every single day of the full
eight years.
Before he could sink into
the melancholy he felt lapping at his thoughts, he caught sight of Ellison,
forging across the crowded restaurant. Just to his side and half a step at his
heels trailed a young man who, for some reason Bodie couldn't identify, made
his breath catch in his throat. As they drew closer and he stood to greet them,
he isolated his reaction and tried to analyze it. True, the young man was a
beauty, and he wasn't so bloody old he couldn't appreciate lustrous sable curls
and huge blue eyes fringed with thick dark lashes, or broad shoulders topping a
strong, gorgeous body. The relatively diminutive stature couldn't hide the
strength inherent in the sturdy frame. Strong thighs, narrow waist leading to a
surprisingly broad chest and wide shoulders, all perfectly proportioned, topped
by a stunningly beautiful face, all high cheekbones, large eyes and succulent
mouth. But it wasn't the beauty of the man, or even the nearly visible energy
surrounding him as he practically bounced across the room. Something ...
indefinable was catching Bodie's interest, arousing him and interesting him in
a way he couldn't remember being caught in a very, very long time.
By the time he realized how
turned on he was, Ellison had come to a stop by his table and was staring at
him intently, a frown in the crystal blue eyes. Bodie managed to stop himself
from looking down at his groin to see if he was giving himself away, and cocked
his head encouragingly. He concentrated on trying to look friendly, not as if
he wanted to jump on the young stranger and fuck him senseless.
"Bodie, this is my
partner," Ellison stressed the word oddly, and Bodie caught the meaning
immediately. A fair warning -- this one was taken. "Blair Sandburg. Blair,
this is Bodie, an old friend from the army." From the hard edge in the
detective's voice, the friendship, such as it was, was close to being
forfeited. Bodie blanked his face and banked the fire running through his
system, more than a little astonished at his own reaction. He couldn't blame
Ellison for getting territorial. He hadn't been this immediately randy in ages.
Sandburg reached out to
shake Bodie's hand, shooting Jim a questioning, concerned glance as he did. The
younger man sensed the unexpected tension, and instinctively tried to ease it.
"Mr. Bodie, it's nice to meet you. I'd like to say I've heard a lot about
you, but you know Jim, he is so not into talking about the past. Mister
motormouth he is not. Actions speak louder than words, you know how it
goes."
Bodie found himself
grinning at Blair's cheerful exuberance. Feeling his pulse start to slow and
the tightness in his groin fade to a manageable level, he was relieved to see
Ellison relax fractionally and ease up on the glare. This was supposed to be a
friendly dinner, and he'd have to watch his own unexpected desire to spread
young Sandburg across the table and treat him like the buffet if he wanted it
to stay friendly. Shaking his head slightly to rid himself of the lingering
daze of lust, he put himself out to be charming.
No one could out-charm
Bodie when he made a real effort.
After the initial rocky
start, conversation flowed freely. Sandburg unobtrusively led the conversation,
telling some raucous and far-fetched tales of his unusual experiences with
various field expeditions into South American jungles. Bodie responded in kind,
sharing some of his own experiences in Africa, keeping to the funnier side of
the past and avoiding the harsher episodes. Jim listened intently, enjoying the
exchange of adventure stories, and offering a few of his own from his time in
Peru. An hour into dinner, stuffed prawns and cheese rolls out of the way and
the first delicious bottle of wine nearly emptied, the trio was tucking into
their main course when a sudden disturbance out on the verandah made Ellison
stand abruptly and focus through the French doors. Bodie broke off in the
middle of tale about a Nganguela priest speaking to the ancestors of a village
man and instinctively reached for his gun. Blair immediately diverted his
attention to his Sentinel, asking calmly, in an unusually gentle but very direct
voice, what it was that Jim saw. Before the big man could answer, someone threw
open the doors and the sound of the action outside made it quite clear.
Gunshots. Men swearing,
loudly, threatening in a mixture of English, Italian and German. High pitched
squeals, not all of them feminine, from the surrounding bystanders. The
distinctive wet muffled thud of bullets tearing into human flesh, and the
corresponding rustling thump of bodies hitting pavement. Bodie was around the
table and at the doors in a heartbeat. He was one step behind Ellison and right
on the heels of Sandburg, who moved together as if they were choreographed. The
detective drew his weapon with one hand and displayed his shield with the
other, bellowing, "Police! Drop your weapons!" while simultaneously
managing to shield his partner from possible return fire. Bodie slipped around
the side of the duo and cursed, filthily and at length, at the scene that met
his eyes.
Three men were down,
another half dozen wounded, four seriously. He recognized Judge Cimbrone's
minder among the dead. Two men in dark colored business suits were being thrust
forcefully into the back of a wagon of some sort, one of the four wheel drive
off-road vehicles so favored in the Pacific Northwest, a muted tan job with a
swing-out door that easily accommodated the old man and the unidentified man
being stuffed into it. Bodie managed to draw a bead on one of the bastards
kidnapping the judge, unexpectedly aided by a sideways kick from the second
kidnapping victim, but it wasn't enough. By the time he got another clear shot
the door swung shut and the wagon veered off into the traffic, causing several
other cars to swerve and collide with one another. For an instant, under the
adrenaline pounding in his head, Bodie thought he recognized something familiar
in the long legs ruthlessly kicking at the abductors. Then the press of people
surrounded him and the all-too-familiar routine of the police at the scene of a
crime boxed him in.
Staring at the lax body of
the guard who had been killed in the abduction, he listened to the excited
chatter around him and took a deep breath. Now would be a good time to draw on
those old unilateral CI5 powers ... if he still had them ... and if they were
in Britain ... which they most definitely were not. As it was, he looked up to
see Ellison approaching with a subdued Blair at his side and took another deep
breath. It was going to be a long night of questions, answers, more questions,
wasted time and breath and energy. And while the useless questions were being
asked over and over again, the bastards who'd stolen his charge out from under
his nose would be getting further and further away. This would be a political
hot potato and, seeing the local representatives of the Federal Bureau of Investigation
who were in town for the conference begin rounding up witnesses, he knew it
wouldn't be long before he would be completely out of the loop. God help the
poor bastard who'd been snatched along with the judge. Eduardo Cimbrone was not
long for this world, and whoever'd had the bad luck to be standing next to him
was a walking dead man.
Or a kicking one, he
thought on a note of black humor, before two FBI agents zeroed in on him and
began to bark questions at him. Pulling out the papers that allowed him to
carry the gun he had discharged and identifying himself as an off duty
bodyguard of the judge's, he began to answer questions. So much for a nice
relaxing dinner with an old acquaintance. At least he had an alibi. Not that he
needed one ... but it never hurt to be prepared.
Three hours later he was
drained dry, officially not under suspicion, and bone tired. But something was
nagging at him, and he couldn't put his finger on it. Watching from the
sidelines as the FBI agents asked the same questions from the same witnesses
and got the same answers for the fifth time, Bodie turned around slowly and
headed for the restaurant. As he entered the dining room he leaned against the
door frame and glanced around the room. Ellison and Sandburg, who had been questioned
and given leave to go two hours earlier, were hunched over coffee at one of the
side tables, whispering fiercely to one another. Bodie's left eyebrow slowly
arched and he peered measuringly at the two men. He wasn't one to give up, and
his professional pride was dented that the judge had been taken from
practically under his nose. It pissed him off royally. Besides, there was
something about the Kicker that was really nagging at his brain.
Ellison was a copper. Maybe
he'd have some ideas. He shifted himself from his near-sprawl in the doorway
and went over to join the others.
As usual, Jim was non-verbally
beating himself over the head for not responding fast enough to a crisis, and
equally the norm, Blair was talking a mile a minute to try to pull his partner
out of the trough of the guilts he had dropped into. Even knowing that the only
things that would help were time and objective distance didn't stop the ritual
dance. After three years, neither of them expected it would. In a strange way
it was reassuring to go through the motions, add some normalcy to the
situation. Or at least as much normalcy as they usually had in any given
situation, which wasn't a hell of a lot.
Finally managing to
pinpoint the one weird moment that stood out over all the other weird moments
in a violently weird evening, Ellison laid a gentle finger across the rapidly moving
lips of his Guide. Blair stilled immediately, lapis eyes fixed unwaveringly on
the man attached to the finger.
"His scent," the
detective finally said, with no small measure of satisfaction.
Blair stared at him a
moment longer, then caused him to lose his train of thought completely by
opening his full lips and closing them around the finger, lightly bathing the
captive with his tongue. Jim managed not to moan out loud, even tried his best
to glare at his unrepentant lover, but it didn't do any good. Eventually, when
it felt as if every nerve in his body had been alerted to the gentle suckling
of his fingertip and every neural pathway in his brain was cross-wired, Blair
took pity on him.
Letting the finger slip
from his mouth, he cocked his head slightly and stared at Jim. "Whose
scent? What about a scent? You're not making a whole lot of sense here, big
guy."
And whose fault was that?
He stared at the younger man, trying to remember how to talk. When they got
alone Sandburg was going to pay for that little stunt. Ruthlessly suppressing
his body's natural reaction to plans of just how he would make his lover pay,
Ellison ground out, "The kidnapping victim. The one who was kicking, not
the judge. He ... his scent was familiar."
Bright interest sparked the
eyes holding his, and Blair's curls practically quivered. "You recognized
his scent? With that little bit of time you actually had and such little
exposure, over the combined scents of, what, like forty or fifty people all
wearing perfume or cologne or whatever, and you could pick this one guy out?
Incredible, man, just incredible." The mobile face went completely still
as the possibilities sifted through the anthropologist's busy mind, then what
Jim privately thought of as Blair's Darwin-look pulled the generous features
into a serious mask. Taking a deep breath, Blair started to shoot questions at
him. Before the stream had a chance to build into a flood and wash them both
away, Jim held up both hands in an 'I surrender' gesture and broke in firmly.
"I recognized
it." He was certain he had, but he couldn't for the life of him place it.
"So, you've smelled it
before. This is great, Jim, we could really use this. Was it a particular kind
of aftershave, maybe, or deodorant or-"
"His scent," Jim
interrupted absently. "It was his natural scent, Chief. I don't know where
I've smelled it before, but it was definitely familiar."
"That's even better,
Jim. Listen, that means you can use his scent to track him. It won't fade over
time, like the gunpowder did that time when you were tracking the gun, and it
won't wash off him like an artificial scent applied topically would with sweat
or water or whatever. No matter how long these guys have him, you'll still be
able to track him! Now we just have to figure out a way to get included in the
investigation, so you can get in there and do your stuff. It's not like it's
gonna wear off. As long as there's life, there's hope, or in this case, smell,
right?"
"There won't be for
very long," a cool English voice broke in. Both men looked up to see Bodie
standing at Sandburg's shoulder, looking exhausted and frustrated.
"What do you
mean?" Jim got in, before Blair could chime in with something to try to
cover their previous conversation. Ellison's Sentinel abilities were a very
well kept secret. "Did you recognize the men involved in the
kidnapping?" It might at least give them a starting point.
"No, not specifically.
But I know the sort of enemies Eduardo Cimbrone has. They don't want a ransom.
They want him dead. If they ransom him he'll just go right back to the bench,
and that's not the kind of message they want to send out. They want fear, not
money. They want to intimidate, not extort. They want to send a message to the
rest of the lawmakers that they are capable of eliminating anyone who stands in
their way. And the other man is a witness. He can't be left alive." He
visibly gathered himself before going on. "Those men will be dead very
soon."
"Not if we find them
first," Jim answered before he even realized he was going to say anything.
Two pairs of sapphire eyes pinned him to his chair, and he shrugged helplessly.
"We have to try."
"Bit out of your
jurisdiction, my son," Bodie said slowly, staring at his one-time student.
"And I don't have any, anywhere. Not anymore."
Jim stared back at him for
a moment, then swiveled to search Blair's face. The calm certainty he saw there
confirmed that this was the right course of action, and that he would have all
the back-up he would ever need. "Anyone can make a citizen's arrest."
Without another word being spoken, it was decided.
The hunt was on.
It had all blown up around
them so quickly, Cade hadn't had a chance to defend himself, much less the
elderly gentleman who had just moments before been reminiscing quietly about
absent friends. He'd been somewhat taken aback by the absence of obvious
bodyguards, but his sharp eye had picked up a hulking shape looming
protectively in the shadows and he'd relaxed slightly. They'd spoken for a
little while, Cimbrone had handed him the small, cloth bound book, which he'd
placed carefully in his inner jacket pocket, and they had lingered for a
moment, enjoying the temperate breezes lightening the evening.
Then hell had erupted
around them.
At the squeal of tires and
sound of semiautomatic gunfire he'd instinctively pushed the judge down, hand
scrabbling for a shoulder holster he no longer wore, fingers clawing for a gun
he hadn't carried in years. The instincts, which had saved his life so many
times in the past, failed him this time, costing him precious seconds in which
he could have raised more of an alarm. Or so he castigated himself, much later.
At the time, there was no chance to think, only react.
The bodyguard fell first,
but not before taking down one of the attackers. Cade took another down with a
lethal chop to the throat, kicking out in a desperate attempt to keep the
others from surrounding the judge. He failed. Someone barked out a sharp order
in Italian, countered by another bark in what sounded like German, and he found
himself pinned by two bruisers who must've been weaned on steroids. Dizzy from
a blow to the jaw and with his arms twisted behind his back, he was unable to
counter the swift punches to his midsection that drove the breath from his body
and turned his vision black. Disorientation hit as he was lifted bodily and
shoved into some sort of truck or wagon, managing to land only one more vicious
kick before something hard bashed into the side of his skull and he sank
unwillingly into darkness.
When the light came back,
it brought throbbing pain with it. Bile surged in his throat, and his stomach
felt as if it was bashed inside out. When he tried to open his eyes vertigo
struck, leaving him whimpering softly, unable to stifle the sound completely. A
small part of his brain, still functioning somewhat objectively, cataloged the
symptoms of shock and concussion, then a booted foot connected with his bruised
ribs and he gasped in pain.
At least the room stopped
spinning. Turning his head cautiously to look at his captors, he decided that
that wasn't much of an improvement. Darkness might just be preferable. At least
then he wouldn't see the bullet coming.
A tall, swarthy man in
ratty blue jeans and a well-worn sweatshirt was pointing a Walther at his head.
Cade took a shallow breath, the best he could manage in the fetal position he
found himself in, and stared up into his would-be executor's eyes. What he saw
there chilled him completely. No warmth. Not even the warmth of hatred, or
rage. Just ice. If there had ever been a soul in the man, it had withered and
died years before. Cade swallowed dryly and tried to relax his muscles. He
wouldn't give the bastard the satisfaction of seeing him beg.
As the man's forefinger
began to curl around the trigger, someone spat a sharp order at him. He
immediately eased off the trigger, looking down at his captive for a long
moment with no expression, before turning and heading away from him. Cade took
a moment to close his eyes and thank Whoever was watching over him for the
mercy of sparing his life, then gingerly turned his head until he could see
what was happening in the adjoining room. His head throbbed alarmingly, but his
vision was clearing.
What he saw made him feel
sick all over again.
Cimbrone was strapped to a
chair, blood flowing freely from numerous scrapes and cuts along his face,
chest and arms. He had obviously been beaten, thoroughly and methodically.
Opposite from the chair sat a videocamera on a tripod, and a harsh light
mounted on a collapsible pole threw the evidences of mistreatment into sharp
relief. Cimbrone was saying something, his words trembling and his voice
breaking at times. Just out of the harsh spotlight a man, dressed similarly to
the thug who had been standing over Cade when he awoke, watched Cimbrone
closely. Eventually, the old man's voice stumbled to a stop. Someone behind the
camera rapped out a question, and his head fell forward for a moment before he
straightened his spine. The effort to sit proudly showed in the white tension
of his face, but the quiet dignity of his bearing was unimpaired. As Cade
watched the calm profile, nearly holding his breath from the tension in the
air, the silence was broken by a single word.
"No." There was
no quaver in the judge's voice now.
Cimbrone's lips had
scarcely closed over the word before the man in the shadows extended his arm,
placed the barrel of the handgun less than an inch from the side of the old
man's skull, and pulled the trigger.
Cade closed his eyes
involuntarily, but not quickly enough to avoid seeing the shower of blood, bone
and brain matter that sprayed into the doorway. Forcing himself to open his
eyes again, he saw the ruined head slump forward onto the gaunt chest. Then the
spotlight blinked out, leaving afterimages on his corneas that made it hard to
focus until they faded. By the time he could see clearly again, two of the men
had cut through the ropes and allowed the corpse to fall ungracefully to the floor.
Cade found himself staring helplessly, unable to fight or escape, trussed as he
was. Two men, one the man who had been standing over him when he woke and the
other hidden in the shadows behind him, came forward.
The gunman pulled his
pistol out and calmly aimed directly between Cade's eyes. The Chief found
himself unable to look away from the end of the barrel, which suddenly looked
three inches across. The would-be killer queried the man behind him, his voice
harsh in the stillness, something in Italian Cade couldn't make out over the
rushing of blood in his ears. He was surprised, then, by the unequivocal
negative the man in the background returned. It was enough to tear his
attention away from the gun pointed at his head. When the second man stepped from
the shadows, he felt the world tilt sideways on its axis again.
"Hello, Mister
Doyle."
Bad had just gone from
worse to worst.
"My name is Alan
Cade," he managed to force out past constricted throat muscles. "I'm
the Chief Constable of Eastlan-"
Before he could finish the
sentence, the criminal struck like a snake. Kneeling swiftly beside him, he
yanked the back of Cade's collar into one clenched fist, pulling Cade's torso
up from the floor sharply. The threat of strangulation and the pain in his ribs
from the awkward position cut off the rest of the Chief's words. As he gasped
for breath, the other man slowly ran one hand up his throat, spanning it,
gripping his jaw and tipping his face up to the light. He leaned his face in
toward his captive, staring into the defiant emerald eyes, before brushing a
feather-light kiss over the slight rise of the implant in Cade's right cheek.
"Raymond."
Cade looked up into the
dark gray eyes above him and suddenly recognized who was holding him. The years
had not been kind to the terrorist. Still, he kept silent, forcing himself into
an unnatural patience, waiting to see what would happen next. A smile carved
the spare features so close to his own, and his eyes widened of their own
accord.
"Of course, I may be
mistaken," the voice continued, a faint German accent adding a slight
emphasis to the consonants. "You might be a ghost. You may be a
doppelganger for a dead man. In which case, Chief Constable Alan Cade, I have
no use for you, and I will allow Antonio here to put a bullet in your
brain." Staring up into the black ice above him, Cade knew that he would
do it without a qualm. "If, however, you happen to be one former CI5 agent
by the name of Raymond Doyle, who disappeared eight years ago when the majority
of my people were arrested in an effort to save his miserable, worthless life
from just retribution from the rest of my group, then I will have some further
use for you."
As he spoke, the other man
had moved closer, until their faces were only centimeters apart. Wide green
eyes met hazy gray for what felt like eons, but could only have been a few
moments. Finally, Cade lowered his eyelids and wet his lips. Opening them
again, he felt the carefully constructed facade crumble, and the terrorist
smiled again, triumphantly.
"Hello, Hofnan,"
Doyle growled up at him.
"Hello, Raymond,"
the other man crooned softly. "This is an unexpected pleasure. It is going
to be such fun."
It wasn't.
The party had to divide
before the main entertainment began, at least as far as the German was
concerned. The men he had been assisting, for a fee, had obtained their
objective when they had executed Judge Cimbrone, with the videotape to prove
it. They were anxious to leave the vicinity, and he was equally anxious to go
somewhere more ... private for his own little discussion with Ray Doyle. He
directed Antonio to place the still-restrained ex-agent, now-Chief, into a
nondescript sedan stolen earlier to provide his escape after the assassination.
They drove until he found a place that looked deserted enough for his purposes.
The area between Seattle
and Tacoma was a welter of tiny lakes and patches of woodland, with small
communities in isolated pockets along the southeastern edge of the Sound. As
they pulled off the main highway onto a twisting mass of side roads, Doyle was
jolted out of the painful doze he had fallen into as his head bounced against
the side window. He curled his hands into tight fists, digging his nails into
his palms to force himself to stay alert. His chances for escape were slim to
none, but his chance of survival if he stayed under Hofnan's control was nil.
And he'd never been a quitter. So he'd have to try his damnedest to find a
chance and take it.
From past experience, Jim
Ellison knew better than to waste time getting the local officials to listen to
him. In a situation like this, with the Seattle PD, the FBI, and
representatives of half the law enforcement agencies in the free world milling
around, it was too insane to even try. He didn't even know who was in charge.
He didn't think any of the people who thought they were in charge knew who was
in charge.
Stopping just long enough
to pick up extra ammunition for his gun and all the loose cash he had, plus two
extra books of traveler's checks, he, Blair and Bodie were in a rental car
within twenty minutes. Blessing the concierge's eagerness to please and
slipping easily through the confusion of bodies still milling about, they set
out into the darkness to find the missing men.
"Do you have any idea
where we're going," Bodie's slightly sardonic question floated over from
the back seat, "or are we just heading nowhere in particular and hoping we
get lucky?"
Blair risked a quick look
backward, but before he could come up with an acceptable explanation, or at
least one with a modicum of a chance at being bought, Jim surprised him by
answering.
"Just putting some of
those tracking skills you taught me to good use, Sarge." A snort from
behind them was the only answer. Ellison began to follow in the direction he
had seen the wagon leave, then stopped at the corner and focused his eyes,
picking up an irregular series of burnt rubber patches on the pavement that
were only discernible to Sentinel vision. Softly, he murmured, "Stay with
me, Chief," then pulled out to follow the phantom trail.
Sandburg responded
immediately. Too low for Bodie to hear, he began to murmur encouragement and
guidance. His deep, calm tones kept the detective from zoning out on the faint
burn marks, keeping him aware enough of the early morning traffic to be able to
navigate it safely, and allowing him the freedom to concentrate the majority of
his attention on tracking the kidnappers without losing himself in the hunt.
The younger man was invaluable as a Guide, and had saved Ellison's life more
times than either man could count with his anchoring presence. The magic of
Sentinel and Guide worked once more, and it was just a little over an hour
before they pulled up in front of a small track house. By the time the burnt
marks had faded, Jim had memorized the tread mark, and was able to follow it
through the light film of road grease the rain had brought to the surface of
the street. He silently thanked his partners in the hunt for getting them on
the trail so quickly, before the tracks had had a chance to fade.
Bodie had stayed remarkably
silent throughout the drive. Peering from one profile to the other, he was
caught by the intensity of concentration and the almost palpable link between
the two men. Ellison's eyes never left the road, and Sandburg's eyes never left
Ellison. The younger man was talking continuously, but he couldn't make out
what he was saying. It was all very intriguing.
He'd seen many different
types of partnerships in his life. He'd even shared a special link with a mate
in all senses of the word, had lived with one for years, in a partnership with
a man who could practically read his mind, as he could read the other's. But
there was something different at work here.
As he watched, an errant
memory rose to the surface of his memory. In the bush in Angola, watching a
tribe of Ovimbundu prepare for a battle, waiting on the sidelines for his own
part in the local war. Two men crouched together off to the side of the main
gathering, one a warrior, one a priest. The priest spoke softly, too low for
other tribesmen to hear, as the Protector and his Shaman decided which way to
pursue their enemies. The way Blair spoke to Jim now, the strange intensity in
Jim's manner, the nearly visible connection between them, were all eerily
familiar. He'd heard tales of Protectors with some of the tribes, mythical men
who could do things no ordinary humans could do. He'd seen too much to dismiss
it out of hand, choosing instead to use whatever advantages he could find,
wherever he could find them. If his erstwhile student had somehow managed to
harness some of this strange power, he was more than willing to sit back and
let him lead the way.
Ellison cut the lights
before turning into the side street, and cut the engine a moment later to glide
silently to a stop in from of the house. Reaching up to turn off the dome
light, he stared at the house for a long moment before nodding to the others.
There was a stillness about the building that spoke of abandonment, but all
three men approached cautiously, sliding from the car and closing the doors
gently. Bodie signaled once and Ellison nodded, keeping Sandburg to his side
with one hand against his forearm.
As the older man
disappeared around the side of the building, the Sentinel focused his hearing
and his smell. There was no sound of movement within the house, no heartbeats,
no sound of breathing. But something violent had happened here, very recently.
The coppery tang of blood along with the putrid scent of burned flesh was
strong in the air.
Motioning his partner
behind him, Jim scanned the front area through the narrow window beside the
door. Focusing his vision, he saw a body on the floor, crumpled in an untidy
heap, the top portion of it covered with dark blood. The dark stain spread out
from under the head in a wide pool. There was no indication of any other
occupants, so he lowered his shoulder and jammed the door open. At the same time
both men heard the sound of glass breaking, and the back door squeaked open
shortly afterward. All three men came into the house with every sense on alert,
until a thorough and rapid reconnaissance of the building showed them to be
alone with the corpse.
Bodie's face was grim as he
examined what remained of his employer. Blair stood back slightly from the
crime scene, looking faintly ill, and kept his eyes glued on his partner.
Ellison prowled around the perimeter of the room, stopping here to stare at a faint
indentation in the carpet, there to reach out and hold his hand a few inches
above the puddle of blood under the remains of Cimbrone's skull. A pulse beat
in his jaw at the evidence of sudden death and the wanton violence of the
murder.
Blair took a steadying
breath and inched around the body to stop at Jim's side. Swallowing heavily, he
managed to ask, "What is it, big guy?"
"It hasn't been
long," Ellison answered. "The blood's still warm."
"Well, the body
isn't," Bodie cut in with disgust, wrapping three fingers around an
outflung arm. "But something's missing."
"Yeah, half his
head." Blair responded, staring at the corpse in sick fascination and
taking shallow breaths through his mouth to try to calm his stomach.
"Not that," Bodie
gestured toward the empty front room. "The other man."
Ellison immediately scanned
the room again, paying closer attention to the carpet. With a muffled
exclamation, he turned and hurried into the foyer, stopping by the doorway.
Kneeling next to some small splashes of dried brown fluid on the floor, he ran
his fingertips delicately over the carpet fibers, turning up his sense of touch
and mapping the contours of the crushed material. To Bodie and Sandburg, he
appeared to be reading the carpet in Braille. He found a few dark hairs, the
imprint of a body curled into a tight ball, and the dried blood in a deeper
indentation marking where the back of the victim's head had lain.
"Well, he's not dead.
At least, he wasn't killed here," the detective finally decided.
"Not enough blood,"
Bodie agreed. He gave Ellison, then Sandburg, a searching glance. The bigger
man didn't notice, caught up in feeling the impressions on the carpet. Blair
gave him such an incredibly innocent look from those big blue eyes that Bodie
knew not only was he not going to tell him anything, the boy was going to
adamantly deny there was anything to tell. Bodie gave a mental shrug and tried
to gather his tired thoughts enough to figure out what to do next. They'd all
been up at least twenty four hours straight, and none of them had had much
quality sleep in the days before that. Staring at Sandburg who was staring at
Ellison who was staring at the carpet, he came to a decision.
"He'll keep."
The detective looked up
from the pile under his fingers, forcing his attention toward Bodie. Blair
turned to look at Bodie and his eye was caught by the corpse behind the older
man. He had a somewhat harder time tearing his eyes from the bloody mess that
had once been a judge, but he managed, swallowing several times to keep his
dinner on his stomach. Licking his lips, he asked, "Why? I mean, this is
not real encouraging, man. These guys are so not into the sanctity of human
life, obviously, so what makes you think they're not going to waste the other
guy?" There was a distinct wobble in his voice, but his gaze was
determinedly steady.
"They didn't yet, and
none of us are in any shape to keep looking. We need a few hours rest. And we
need to figure out why this other man is important enough to keep alive. It's
not like they needed a witness, for an assassination. Damnit, I wish I knew who
the bloody hell this guy is!" Bodie was showing his fatigue, the words
starting to slur together slightly.
Blair looked over at his
partner, who was practically zoning on the texture of the carpet, and had to
agree with the need for a break. Tracking and concentrating so fiercely for
such a long period of time without lessening the focus had been draining to his
Sentinel. He nodded agreement. "You think you can pick up his scent again,
Jim, if we give it a rest for a couple hours?"
The soft question
penetrated Ellison's haze of concentration, and he looked up to meet worried,
slightly distraught sapphire eyes. That snapped him back to the present, and he
took a deep breath. "Yeah, maybe, I don't know." Aware of how
disconnected he sounded, he shook his head hard, trying to gather his
fragmenting thoughts. "We may have to risk it, but first things
first." Two pairs of dark blue eyes connected with his and he pointed to
the body. Blair automatically followed the pointing finger and choked back a
gag. Jim winced, automatically muttering an apology at him, but remained
insistent. "We have to call it in."
"Yeah, but Jim,"
protested Blair, "if we do that then we'll be sitting here answering
questions for the next three days instead of getting the bad guys, man! And
whoever the other guy is, he'll be dead long before we get to him."
"He's right,"
Bodie chimed in. "Too many explanations, too much time lost."
"Hey, how about an
anonymous tip? You know, like with the car jacking you told me about, when I
was off driving the truck and you were with the other two and the guy had the
heart attack and you stayed there and called 911?" Sandburg looked happy
to find a compromise between hunting the kidnappers and doing his civic duty.
Hopefully his by-the-book partner would run with the idea. A pursed lip, raised
brows and pleading eyes added to the persuasion. Blair didn't care, at this
point, how they did it, but he wanted to get away from that corpse. It was really
starting to freak him out. Bodie nodded, and Jim reluctantly agreed.
A phone call to 911 from
the car as they left to find a motel, and the judge was covered. Jim was
careful to give the bare minimum in detail, and he severed the connection as
quickly as possible. Blair had a point -- if they were going to rescue the
second victim, they couldn't take the time to hand over the crime scene
properly. But first things first, too, and that was to get a little shut eye
before they all collapsed.
The car jolted across a
gravel road and pulled to a stop in front of what looked like a summer cabin of
some sort. Details were difficult to make out in the dim early morning light,
but the sense of isolation from civilization -- with its hope of rescue, fading
rapidly -- sent a shiver running down Doyle's spine. Antonio turned off the
ignition and, with permission signaled from Hofnan, exited the car for a quick
but thorough reconnaissance. Nodding the all clear to his boss, he raised his
leg and planted a hard, focused blow at the side of the lock in the back door.
The jamb broke cleanly.
Doyle's field of vision
abruptly narrowed to nothing as Hofnan opened the door and pulled him from the
car. Concentrating on finding an opening, thankful that at least the throbbing
headache had calmed during the night, he was dismayed when Antonio returned and
hoisted him over one broad shoulder. With his arms tied behind his back at
elbow and wrist, and his ankles tied together, one of Antonio's arms bracing
his knees and Hofnan's gun in the back of his neck, he didn't have a chance to
do a damned thing but breathe steadily through his nose and try not to black
out again.
Doyle's luck was running evenly
that night -- bad from beginning to end. The absent owner was a fitness
enthusiast, and he had a chin-up bar on a free standing, heavy iron frame in
the back room, with a matching sit-up toe bar across the bottom of the frame.
The whole contraption was bolted to the floor, making a perfect strap up cage
for a prisoner. Hofnan actually laughed aloud when he saw it. Complimenting
Antonio on his excellent, well furnished choice of a hideaway, he watched, gun
ready, as his henchman dumped Doyle beside the frame. Before he could react and
even try to roll out of the way, or get his feet into position to kick out
again, Antonio casually batted the back of his head against the wooden floor,
hard, stunning him once more.
He felt the bonds on his
wrists loosen, but before he could shake off the effects of the most recent
blow to his head he was propped against the frame and efficiently tied to the
crossbar, arms spread above his head, a wrist at each corner. Grasping at the
rope, trying to get leverage to bring his feet up for a kick, he was soundly
cuffed again. Determinedly trying to shake off the effects, not sure whether to
pass out or throw up, he felt the restraints on his ankles give way. His legs
were roughly yanked apart and each ankle was tied securely to the bottom
corners of the frame. When his vision finally cleared, the tears slowly stopped
leaking from the corners of his eyes, and his stomach stopped trying to crawl
out his throat, he tugged experimentally.
He wasn't going anywhere
any time soon.
Managing to turn his head
enough to see his captor, Doyle was chilled to the bone at the stark enjoyment
on the man's face. Antonio turned to Hofnan and demanded of him, in broken
German, to be paid so that he could take his leave. The older man nodded, then
gestured toward the front of the house with his chin. As Antonio turned to go
out to the car, Hofnan took a Sig Sauer P229 from a belt holster at the small
of his back. Without hesitation, he shot his erstwhile helper cleanly, through
the back of the head. As the large body fell to the floor, Hofnan gave it a
disinterested look, shoving it aside with one foot and walking further into the
room, eyes intent on his hostage. Doyle forced himself to meet those cold gray
eyes again, and then found himself wishing he hadn't. This wasn't about
information, or hatred, or even solely about revenge. It was about power. He
had none, and Hofnan ... well, Hofnan had a knife.
Albert Hofnan was very good
with a blade. He didn't leave a mark on Doyle's skin as he cut away every
stitch of clothing. With meticulous attention, Hofnan continued until Doyle was
completely nude, even stripping off his shoes and socks. When the finely
tailored suit jacket fell away, it gave a dull thud as it impacted with the
floor. Intent on his task, Hofnan didn't hear it, and Doyle drew a shaky sigh
of relief. Even if he didn't survive this, the evidence would, and from what he
had been able to see in the brief time before the kidnapping, it was imperative
that the journal get into the right hands. Of course, it would do a hell of a
lot more good for him personally if he was alive to reap the benefits. At the
moment, given his past history with Hofnan and the bastard's known proclivity
to kill for the sheer pleasure of it, that was not a particularly hopeful
prospect.
Hofnan stood for several
heartbeats, watching his victim, enjoying the anticipation, building the fear.
He tapped the flat of the knife blade gently along Doyle's limbs, solid little
thumps, as if testing the firmness of the flesh and muscle, a butcher testing
the stock to decide where to begin his task. Doyle kept his eyes on Hofnan's
hands until the terrorist stepped close to him. He could feel the other man's
breath against his chest, but bound as he was he had no way to shy away from
him. He forced himself to breathe steadily, recognizing how badly Hofnan wanted
him to panic, needed to see his terror. He had fought his way to an unsteady
calm when he saw the muscles in Hofnan's shoulder move.
The first cut took his
breath away. It curved along the lower edge of his rib cage, over the fresh
bruises, and at first he didn't feel the slice through the other, deeper pain
of the contusions. Then the stinging began, and with every breath it got worse.
He held himself as still as he could. It didn't help.
The second cut followed the
line of his hip. The third, a trail of fire along his sternum, carefully
skirting the old scars from surgery to remove bullets from his heart so long
ago. The fourth blazed over his shoulder to his back, as his tormentor moved
slowly around him, whistling under his breath, enjoying his work. The fifth
scored across the midpoint of his spine, a little deeper than the ones before,
flirting with the idea of crippling him. The sixth cut across the top of his
buttocks, a lighter touch again. The blade lingered there, the point slipping
teasingly into the top of the cleft between his buttocks, scratching across the
delicate skin, not quite breaking it.
He whimpered, unable to
keep back the small sound of pain and protest that was tearing at his throat.
His mind mapped the pain and supplied images of what he could not see, and he
was incapable of completely stifling his moan.
The blade stopped.
Slowly, obscenely, he felt
fingertips trace through the blood running freely now over his shoulder, chest,
back, across his ass down onto the top of his thighs. They pressed at irregular
intervals, the fire from the wounds igniting with each unexpected touch. Caught
up in a skein of fear and anticipation, not knowing when the slicing would
begin again, he didn't realize Hofnan had stepped back until he heard a
whistling noise cut through the air. Not having enough warning of the change in
the form of his torment, he was unprepared for the first blow.
It felt like some sort of
leather strap or belt. The first lancing pain of contact was across his
shoulder blades, where the skin was thin and sensitive, and he arched away from
it, feeling the blood drip stickily from the cuts in that area. With greater
rapidity, the blows began, crisscrossing his back, buttocks and thighs with
careful precision. The cadence was deliberate, and he found himself timing the
blows in order to be able to take a clear breath. When the strap lashed across
the backs of his knees, the scream that had been clawing at his chest ripped
free. The sound acted as a catalyst for the terrorist, who sped up the blows
until the sound of leather slapping against flesh was a nearly constant tattoo,
reversing his direction and overlaying a new set of welts in a cross hatch to the
first pattern as he worked his way back up until he reached Doyle's shoulders.
By now the screams had died to pained moans, as Doyle's voice gave way.
Finally, when he was almost to blessed unconsciousness, the blows stopped.
Unaware of the tears streaming down his face, the ex-agent instinctively
managed to pull himself as upright as possible, taking some of the strain off
his wrists. Then he froze.
The fingers were back,
tracing the welts now, painting them with blood. They drew random patterns on
his skin, the touch almost tender, if not for the pain in the abused flesh
under the wandering fingertips. Doyle shivered uncontrollably as Hofnan stepped
very close to his back and began to whisper into his ear.
"You did more than
destroy my operation, did you know that, Raymond? I was stupid, I admit, and I
trusted you, and that mercenary partner of yours. That was my mistake. But you
made a mistake as well, Raymond." The fingers dipped, digging into his
hips, causing him to cry out in pain as they dug into fresh welts and open
cuts. "You did not kill me when you killed Terrell, and Frederick, and the
rest. You should have killed us all."
"I tried." He
didn't recognize his own voice in the rasp that answered. For a scant second he
wondered at his instincts, wondered when he'd lost his sanity, to be baiting
the mad bastard like this. Vaguely, his mind catalogued the names, and put
faces to them. Terrell he remembered -- he'd pulled the trigger on that son of
a bitch himself. But Frederick ... Hofnan was wrong about that one. He'd
wriggled through the net and escaped. Frederick, and Julia, and another he
couldn't bring to mind in his present state of pain and confusion. But Julia he
remembered. She and Hofnan had been close. The mad general and his most trusted
lieutenant. The fingers tightened further, yanking him painfully back to the
present, and he moaned in response to the vises on his flesh.
"You failed." The
hands pulled backwards, and he yelped at the searing pain of rough material
against his abused back as Hofnan pulled their bodies tightly together.
"You betrayed me." One hand slid around his hip and grasped his
genitals, squeezing tightly. This time, Doyle couldn't wrap his mind around any
words to protest. And trying to stay calm was a waste of effort. He froze in
fear. "You humiliated me." The other hand, the one with the knife,
curved around the opposite side of his waist. He felt his eyes go huge with
panic. "You destroyed me."
"No," he managed
to whisper past fear-frozen lips. "No, I -- we didn't -- we had to run --
had to hide -- you won --" Anything, anything to get that bloody knife
away from his balls. As the flat of the blade slid slowly under the weight of
his scrotum, he sobbed, once, then froze again, afraid to move. Instinctively
spreading his thighs as far as he was able, desperately trying to move away
from the sharp edge of the blade, he found himself whimpering, "no, no,
no, no, no" over and over again. The hand holding his penis suddenly
dropped the heavy flesh, and Doyle screamed as his own weight obeyed gravity's
command and pushed his sac against the edge of the knife. The hand that had
been holding him buried itself in the thick hair at the crown of his head and
pulled his head back viciously, so that panic-stricken green eyes stared helplessly
up into the German's face.
The bastard was laughing.
Doyle lost his breath as
the hard face came down to meet his own, lips forcing his mouth open, a thick
tongue forging its way past his teeth. Suddenly he aware that he was choking,
unable to breathe for the tears running down his face, his nose clogged, his
throat filled with his enemy's tongue. He felt warm liquid running down the
inside of his thigh, and he began a gasping cry, small uncontrollable hiccoughs
of fear and rage and helplessness. As he suffered the rape of his mouth, he
felt the knife move. The hand between his thighs turned slightly and he felt
the flat of the knife trace the bulge of his sac, before running lightly along
his penis. It tapped, twice, against the head, then traced its way back upward
until it parted his pubic hair.
Unable to move, blind to
what was being done to him, aware only of the fire in his back, the pain in his
skull, the fear that he had been gelded and the desperate need to breathe,
Doyle began to lose consciousness. With one last bite at his upper lip, Hofnan
broke contact. Dizzy, sick, and scared half to death, Doyle hung, not knowing
whether he was going to faint or regain full consciousness, and not sure which
to hope for. Praying that this was a nightmare and knowing that he wasn't going
to wake up.
"Where is Bodie?"
The hissed question broke through the haze of pain and slipped under his
defenses. Unable to think of a convincing lie, not knowing if Hofnan knew or
only guessed that Bodie was still alive, Ray stared at him in mute agony. The
terrorist yanked his head further back, bowing his spine, taking him to the
edge of sanity before releasing him with an oath.
The pressure at his back
finally eased, and his head dropped forward in relief. Then he whispered,
"please, no!" as the knife found its way unerringly to his back
again. Feet still widespread, he was open to anything Hofnan chose to inflict.
The flat of the knife was a cold line of pressure up the inside of his thigh,
along his perineum, nudging at the back of his sac. He fancied, for a moment,
that he could literally feel his balls trying to curl up into his body. Then
the knife reversed course, heading for his anus. He held his breath again,
hoping against hope that this time he really would pass out.
No one was listening to his
silent pleas.
"You will tell me, you
know." Cold metal circled on flinching flesh, and he whimpered deep in his
throat. "Easily -- or with difficulty. For yourself. Either way I shall
enjoy it."
Doyle tried to say that
Bodie was dead, but he couldn't get the words out. Then he tried to mumble that
he didn't know, they wouldn't let them see each other, no direct contact
allowed, eight years of hell with no Bodie, but thankfully the only sound that
rent the air was an incoherent muttering. The clearest word he could still
enunciate was "No!"
The knife was suddenly
withdrawn, and he heard the snick of metal against leather as it was sheathed.
Then the warm metal handle was suddenly running along the wounds across his
buttocks. He screamed, shockingly loud in the quiet room, as a rough hand
clutched at his cleft, forcefully spreading his buttocks. The long handle,
slick with his blood, was thrust without warning into his anus, tearing him
slightly, frightening him half out of his mind. To his horror, he felt it being
drawn slowly in and out, an inch at a time, as Hofnan fucked him with the hilt
of the knife. Dimly, he was aware that the terrorist was talking to him again,
but as the knife was forced deeper and deeper into him, the last of his
strength gave out and he finally, thankfully fainted, escaping the rest of the
nightmare, for a little while at least.
Things at the Convention
Center in Seattle had just started to settle down, and the program of events
was back on schedule. The air was buzzing with gossip, rumors, theories and
ideas when the word filtered down through the grapevine that CNN had received a
videotape of the judge reading a prepared statement. Less than an hour later,
an announcement was read.
Eduardo Cimbrone had been
murdered. The body had been discovered, thanks to an anonymous tip from an
untraceable cell phone call, at an abandoned house just north of Tacoma.
A hiatus was held in
scheduled programming, and the CNN broadcast was shown on monitors in the main
meeting hall of the Center, as well as in hallways and meeting rooms throughout
the building. After warning viewers of the graphically violent contents of the
tape, the newscaster fell silent and the voice of a translator could be heard.
The videotape showed the judge, battered and bruised, reading from a plain
white piece of paper. He stumbled over a few words, and the translator stumbled
in turn, but the gist of the statement was that Cimbrone had been tried on
behalf of those in Italy who would deem their own power to be greater than that
of the people. Mutterings in the crowd made it clear what the members of law
enforcement thought of these 'people' -- a poor euphemism for crime lords. Then
with appalling suddenness, the judge dropped the paper, looked with utter scorn
into the lens, and said, "No!" A moment later, the muzzle of a gun
appeared from the shadows, the loud report of a shot was heard, and Cimbrone
fell sideways out of the frame. The newscast cut back to the anchor, who was
pale under her makeup. She announced that a second man had also been kidnapped
along with the judge, but that there was no word as yet on his identity or any
possible explanation for his abduction.
The mood of the gathering
was subdued. After the initial broadcast, meetings were back on, and men and
women were chatting quietly amongst themselves, speculating on the events of
the previous night. In one large meeting room, a panel and an packed audience
waited impatiently for the keynote speaker to arrive. Fifteen minutes passed,
then twenty. When the speaker didn't answer his page, and the telephone in his
room went unanswered, a gopher was dispatched to bring the man down personally.
The young man reported back that there was no sign of Chief Constable Alan Cade
in his room, and no one reported seeing him at all that morning. He had not
been in the dining room for breakfast and no room service had been requested.
Further questioning brought forth the information that none of the panel
participants, or anyone else for that matter, could remember seeing him all
morning.
After a minor flurry of
activity, someone finally thought to check the internal phone logs. Upon receiving
the information that Chief Cade had gotten a room to room call from Judge
Cimbrone the previous evening and that the Chief hadn't been seen since dinner,
a connection was finally made, and the second victim had a name and a face.
Sandburg and Bodie stayed
in the car as Ellison went into the Motel 6 and asked for two rooms. The
disinterested desk clerk spared a thought for how handsome the big bruiser was,
counted back his change, handed over the keys, and went back to the latest
Amanda Quick novel. Lost in the joy of well written Regency romance, she paid
no further attention to the car full of tired men who fell into adjoining rooms
and slammed the doors behind them.
Neither room had a working
television set, since a recent windstorm had taken out the cable and no one had
bothered to call the problem in. Bodie took just enough time to lay his clothes
neatly across the back of the single chair before falling naked into bed. He
was asleep almost before his head hit the pillow. It had been a long, tiring
three weeks and he needed to recharge. He wouldn't have seen the news broadcast
even if the television had been working.
Next door, Jim lay across
one of the double beds with Blair curled up beside him, long sable curls
nestled into the juncture of Jim's thighs as Blair lay with his head in the
bigger man's lap. Long fingers carded through the curls, giving Blair a scalp
massage, trying to bleed some of the tension out of the Guide's body. It had
been a tough night. So much for their anticipated night out in Romantic
Seattle.
Sandburg tossed the remote
onto the unused bed with disgust. Not even anything on the tube to watch, to
replace the grotesque visions that kept playing across his mind with something
mindless and bright and repetitive. "What I wouldn't give for the cartoon
channel, man, just something loud and crazy. I'm feeling loony tunes anyway, so
I might as well have company." The teasing grumble in his voice didn't
quite disguise the residual shakiness.
Knowing how Blair felt
about guns, and how the gruesome murder must have affected him, Jim set about
distracting his partner. The smaller man felt it immediately, in the purposeful
way the fingers in his hair changed motion. From strong, mind-soothing strokes
to lighter, teasing swirls, Jim's fingers telegraphed his intent. More than
happy to be distracted, especially if that distraction came in the form of
seduction, Blair squirmed slightly and rubbed the back of his head against the
incipient erection he found there. Yes. Indeed. That was the way to put his
mind on other things. Or at least stop him from thinking all together. Couldn't
brood if he couldn't think.
Closing his eyes, the
better to enjoy the sensations, Blair felt the strong fingers slide from his
hair down the side of his neck, framing his jaw. He sensed rather than felt the
approach as Jim lowered his face until their mouths met in an upside down kiss.
Blair immediately relaxed his jaw, opening his lips for his lover to explore,
enjoying the feeling of possession as Jim proceeded to stroke every surface of
his mouth, lapping at his teeth, twining around his tongue, thrusting into his
throat. When the need to breathe finally broke them apart, the urgency of
arousal was strong on both of them. Forcing his heavy eyelids to open, he
looked up into a sight he would never tire of seeing -- Jim Ellison, caught in
the throes of arousal, a wild, wanting look in crystal blue eyes, a flush
staining the high cheekbones, the sensitive mouth parted with need. Knowing
that his lover could smell and hear and feel every evidence of his own arousal
merely notched Blair's need even higher.
Reaching up with one arm to
pull that face back down again, Blair murmured a protest when Jim shook his
head and put both hands under Blair's armpits, pulling the slighter man into a
better position against the pillows. Silently, as was his wont, the Sentinel
proceeded to uncover his love, one button at a time, covering every tidbit of
skin with tiny licks and bites as it was bared. Clenching his fists in the
cover, trying to cooperate, trying to reciprocate, Blair was steadily driven
out of his mind with lust as Jim used every one of his senses to ascertain
Blair's most vulnerable spots and exploit them. With one last try at coherent
thought, before he gave up thinking as a lost cause, Blair decided that Jim was
determined to drive out all the bad thoughts by simply causing every neuron in
his brain to fire randomly from pure excitement. Deciding that this was not a
bad thing at all, he stopped thinking and sank into sensation.
Nimble fingers pulled the
rest of the intrusive clothing off and piled it alongside the bed. Jim and
Blair worked perfectly together in this as in everything else, ignoring the
occasional fumble, going around the occasional blockage, until they were nude
and breathless, twined around one another. Jim turned them both until Blair was
sprawled against the pillows, open to his touch, ready for anything and
everything the Sentinel would do to him. Faced with a feast, Jim decided to go
with the urgency. Take the edge off. They were both too tired and too strung
out to be able to handle any kind of extended foreplay. They did need rest, but
first they needed to rid themselves of the horror they'd seen earlier. Burning
it from their minds with lovemaking was as close to spiritual cleansing as
either could imagine.
Running large hands along
the velvet fur on Blair's chest, pausing only slightly to tease at the curve of
a pectoral muscle, pluck at a nipple, dip into the navel, Jim headed directly
for his partner's erection and swallowed it. Blair came up off the bed with a
satisfying moan, words spilling out in no understandable order, a mixed plea to
'stop' or he'd come and 'it was so not fair to do that without any warning man'
and 'oh god whatever you do please don't stop.' Jim let that voice wash over
him like a benediction, carrying them both away to a place of their own making,
inviolate by anything destructive or painful. Wrapping large hands around his
partner's hips, kneading the soft flesh and hard muscle, he settled in to a
strong suckling rhythm. Blair didn't have a chance, the need and its
fulfillment wracking him, tearing him from his moorings, tossing him up in the
air and shattering him in his lover's arms. The climax caught him by surprise,
but not Jim, who had felt it coming in the change in pulse and body temperature
under his hands. When the initial explosion subsided, Blair tried to pull his
partner up where he could reach him to kiss him, but the most he could manage
was to run his fingertips over the soft cropped hair and over the fine bones of
Jim's face.
"Please, babe. I need
to ... I gotta ..." I have to remember how to talk, Blair thought with an
inward chuckle, as soon as I remember how to think. And breathe.
As always, Jim seemed to
read his mind, following the mandate in those trailing fingers. His own
breathing erratic, his need unfilled, he lowered his body over the smaller body
of his lover and kissed him deeply, sharing the sweet taste with the source. As
Blair spread his legs, relaxed, offering whatever Jim wanted to take, the
Sentinel contented himself with settling between those muscular thighs. Running
his palms along the outside of Blair's hips, he pushed in gently but firmly,
creating a channel between his Guide's legs for him to plumb. As he pumped in
and out, he felt the soft sticky weight of Blair's genitals cradled against his
pelvis, the springy force of his inner thigh muscles contracting to create
friction for his own thrusts, and his partner's strong arms wrapped as far
around his own broad back as they could reach. One long arm slipped lower,
curving down into his cleft, seeking and finding the hidden heat. A finger
slipped in, probed, sought and found, rubbing the small bump of Jim's prostate
and driving him even higher. Losing himself in the scent and feel of his lover,
Blair murmuring encouragement and love in his ear and urging him on with his
hands, Jim sought his own oblivion and lost himself in his Guide. Reaching
completion with a soft moan, he retained consciousness long enough to roll to
the side and pull his Blair up against him, nuzzling his face into the soft
curls, and falling into sleep.
Blair snuggled contentedly
against his sleeping Sentinel, hands wrapped possessively around his flanks,
content to have the nightmares held at bay once more. Tomorrow would be soon
enough to face the real world again.
Doyle's short respite
didn't last. Sharp slaps alternating between each side of his face roused him,
and he gasped as full consciousness returned. Part of Doyle had hoped that by
now Hofnan was tired of playing, but it didn't look like the power games were
quite over yet. Perhaps that wasn't such a bad thing. As badly as he hurt, at
least he was still alive. When the fun of hurting him was no longer enough to
keep Hofnan's interest, he would be dead. He knew this with a certainty that
chilled the blood in his veins. He had to escape. Had to, had to. No one was
going to help him. No one was looking for him. No one left, no one there.
Gritting his teeth and wrenching his mind away from the self-defeating
thoughts, he swallowed painfully and took stock of his situation.
Experimentally, keeping his
eyes locked on the bastard in front of him, he lightly clenched his buttocks,
biting the inside of his cheek at the pain. The lack of obstruction gave him
some relief. At least that goddamned knife was gone.
Unfortunately, Hofnan was
only mildly distracted. Sometime while Doyle was out of it, the terrorist had
found Donati's journal. He had been using it to slap Doyle back into alertness.
Now he flicked through the pages, stopping to read a page every once in awhile.
His face darkened as he read, and Doyle was dismayed to see that the rage,
barely banked before, was back, stronger than ever.
"The old son of a
bitch. Where did he get this information?" He looked up from the book and
glared at Doyle. The utter lack of sanity in his expression compounded Ray's
feeling of hopelessness. No one knew where he was. No one would be looking. He
was a dead man. Screaming at himself in the privacy of his own mind, he knew he
had to fight back. Somehow. Psychologically, if no other way. At least he
wouldn't go without planting some thorns of his own in Hofnan's mind.
"It's evidence,"
he croaked out, his voice broken from screaming and dry from the remnants of
his fear. "On you, and the few of your gang that managed to escape. He'd
been collecting it for me."
A spark of interest
flickered over the harsh planes of the other man's face, and he moved closer,
waggling the book in front of Doyle's nose, running the spine down the side of
his cheek and jaw. "Why? Why would he do such a thing, risk himself like
that, for you?"
Ray cleared his throat
painfully. "Donati was an old friend of my father's. He knew me from when
I was a lad, and he hated that I had to go into the witness protection program
to get away from something like you."
His head snapped back as
Hofnan clouted him across the cheek with the spine of the book. Shaking his
head to try to clear it, he ground out, "It's not the only copy. He gave
the original copy to Cimbrone, and put second copy in a safe place. If Cimbrone
wasn't able to get this one to me, or I couldn't act on the information, the
second copy goes straight to CI5. 'Cause Donati knew the only way either of us
would fail is if we were dead. And if that was true, then Murphy would take the
case and whatever way it went, you'd be dead." His voice broke completely,
and he hacked, unable to stop the muscles of his throat from spasming. The
whole story was a fabrication, of course, but Hofnan had no way of knowing
that. And with the only copy of the evidence now in his enemy's hands, Doyle
found a slow burning anger start in his gut and spread up toward his heart.
This was not how it was
supposed to end. Hofnan had no need to keep him alive anymore, other than as a
plaything, to torture, to make him pay for breaking up the gang. And time was
running out, even on that diversion. Hofnan would have to leave soon, which
meant that Doyle would have to die. Leaving Hofnan free to roam, free to find
Elena, when Doyle could no longer protect her. Free to keep looking, now that
he knew Doyle had survived, until he found Bodie, and free to kill him, with no
Doyle to give warning. His anger spread as his focus shifted from his own
survival to that of his loved ones. Some of his strength began to seep back, a
last desperate surge of adrenaline, and with it came an insane plan.
Hofnan stared at the
journal, weighing what he'd heard. Doyle watched him, through a growing red
haze, trying to fight back the animal urge to kill that was slowly destroying
his ability to reason. He had to keep a cool head. He had to escape. Had to
warn Bodie. Had to protect his daughter. So many things he had to do, and he
could do none of them if he was dead. Emerald eyes locked on the madman holding
his life in his hands, Doyle found himself doing something he hadn't done in
years, playing his last card, preying on the only weakness he could remember
Hofnan ever showing. The man was a predator, with a weakness for dominating
others. Physically, emotionally, sexually, any way he could. Drawing the last
reserves of his strength, relying on his rage to help see him through it, he
went into action.
His slowly relaxed his
body, until he was almost slouched in the restraints. His head fell back and
slightly to the side, baring the expanse of his throat. Ignoring the burning
pain in his wrists and his bleeding skin, he arched his chest, throwing his
hips and groin into sharp relief. Every inch of him screamed silent submission,
the beta wolf baring his throat to the alpha wolf. Hofnan couldn't miss the invitation.
Dark gray eyes lifted suddenly, alerted by the subtle movements in his captive,
and locked on the man posing for him in the soft light through the window. The
terrorist's entire body went rigid.
"Are you asking for
something, Raymond?" he managed to ask disbelievingly, smiling icily,
moving forward. Interested in spite of himself.
Using his eyes to best
effect, parting his full mouth as invitingly as he could under the
circumstances, Doyle responded roughly, "Will it get me anywhere?"
Invitation was painted in every line of his body. Watching closely, he saw
capitulation and anticipation in the cold face of his enemy. Tossing the
journal carelessly onto the pile of clothing he'd cut away from Doyle earlier,
Hofnan moved closer still, framing the rounded face with his hands, running his
fingers through the short hair at Doyle's temples, cupping his chin and raising
it to the light. Ray stayed completely still, telegraphing acceptance with his
expression and his stance, waiting for any kind of an opening.
Closing his mind completely
to what he was doing, acting on survival and protective instincts stronger than
any he had ever felt, he allowed Hofnan to tilt his head to the side and kiss him,
relaxing his mouth to allow the bastard full access. At the same time, he
pulled against the restraints on his ankle, running his right knee as far as he
could up and down the outside of Hofnan's thigh, doing his best impression of a
bitch in heat. Somewhat to his surprise, the ruse worked.
Hofnan drew back just far
enough to see Doyle's face, seemingly satisfied with what he found there.
"You always were a whore, Raymond!"
Refusing to answer, Doyle
simply dropped his head further back, and rubbed a little harder with his knee.
Unfortunately he couldn't will an erection to go along with the rest of the
pantomime, but judging from the prominent ridge of flesh Hofnan was pressing
into his belly, the kidnapper had more than enough excitement for both of them.
Hofnan chuckled, the sound grating on Doyle's ears, and lowered his left hand
long enough to slice through the rope binding Doyle's right ankle. Sliding his
hand back up the abused skin on the back of the knee and thigh, he pressed
deliberately, enjoying the flinch of pain on Doyle's face. When he got to the
softly rounded buttocks, he traced the welts there, clawing at the broken skin
as he lowered his face into the bend of Doyle's shoulder and bit deeply at the
side of his neck.
Doyle gasped at the sharp
pain, and reflexively curled his right leg around Hofnan's hips, fighting his
own instincts in order to pull the terrorist closer. Hofnan jerked in pleased
response and ground his erection into Doyle's groin, bruising the soft genitals
there. Doyle ignored the pain as well as he was able and concentrated on
shifting his weight. The timing had to be perfect, and he would only get one
chance. Swallowing hard and forcing the words out, he rasped, "Let me
touch you." He nearly vomited, but he articulated his demand clearly
enough. The only immediate response was an increase on the force of Hofnan's
humping into his groin, and a deeper bite along his neck, drawing blood this
time. Then the terrorist stopped, pulled back, and looked at him consideringly.
A cruel smile curved his mouth as he slid the point of his knife along the
underside of Doyle's arm, tracing his biceps, across the tender skin at the
inside of his elbow and along his forearm, leaving a thin trail of blood in its
wake. When it arrived at the wrist, it flicked sideways, and Doyle's left arm
was free. It fell, deadened from bearing Doyle's body weight for hours, and
Hofnan began to massage it roughly, smearing the blood along the skin as if it
was lotion.
As the feeling returned,
the pain intensified, until it felt like his whole arm was on fire. Doyle
closed his eyes against it, fighting to hold on, then jolted and yelped with
pain when sharp teeth bit him on the outside of the wrist. He instinctively
tried to escape the bite, writhing away from the pain, but Hofnan held him
fast. As his yelp died away into gasping pants, he felt his captor nip the full
length of his arm, along his shoulder, up the side of his throat, over his jaw,
until his lips were caught again. Haplessly allowing the tongue to force its
way into his mouth, Doyle nearly vomited again at the taste of his own blood,
gathered on the trip up his arm. He felt himself spinning away into blackness
as Hofnan reached down between their bodies, and forced himself desperately to
remain conscious. Bodie's face, and Elena's, floated in front of his closed
eyelids, and he willed himself back to alertness. It wouldn't be long, now. One
way or another, it would all be over soon.
The sound of a zipper
rasping down was accompanied by a sweaty hand clutching at his penis. He felt
the slimy heat of Hofnan's erection forced against his own flaccid length, and
made himself curl his face down into Hofnan's shoulder, biting gently. The
added caress broke the terrorist's control, and he began to thrust hard against
Doyle's body, jerking him in his bonds, causing the iron frame to sway against
its bolts. With a bitten-off oath, he climaxed, grinding himself hard against
Doyle, clenching his arms around the bound man's body in a grotesque parody of
a lover's embrace. It was exactly what Ray had been hoping for, the one
opportunity he wouldn't waste.
Lifting his right heel and
bringing his leg forcefully around the back of the German's knees, he
simultaneously wrapped his left arm around Hofnan's neck and clutched his chin
with his left hand. Pulling opposite directions with his arm and leg, he took
advantage of the momentary relaxation of orgasm and snapped Hofnan's neck in an
instant. As the terrorist's body seized, then slowly slid down his own, he
screamed at the agony of a hundred and eighty pounds of dying man pulling
against every cut and welt on his body. The pain, on top of what he had already
suffered, nearly made him lose consciousness again, but his panic and need to
escape held the darkness at bay. Ripping at his bonds with fingernails and
teeth like a wild animal, he finally succeeded in getting first his right
wrist, then his left leg free.
Panting from the effort,
exhausted from the beatings and lightheaded from the concussion and the stress,
he slid to the floor in an ungainly heap and tried to collect himself. He knew,
in the back of his mind, that he had to get up. Had to find clothing, a
telephone, some help from somewhere. But the urgency was muted, now that the
immediate threat was past. The strain of the previous day and his accumulated
injuries, as well as the relief of killing Hofnan after eight years of hiding
from him, caught up with him and he slumped over, unconscious.
It wasn't his usual
nightmare, more like a combination of several. Bodie tossed in the rumpled bed,
trying to escape, half afraid to wake up. This dream started like the others,
Ray being shipped off to France, his own departure for New York, no time for as
much as a good-bye in private, their eyes having to say what their words could
not. A foreign land, again, a foreign name, again, a new life, but for once,
soul deep pain at leaving the old one behind. They'd resisted being separated, fought
the bureaucrats who had insisted, until three CI5 agents had lost their lives
in attempts on them. Attempts that they knew were linked to the Hofnan gang,
but couldn't prove that linkage, and couldn't catch the bastards behind the
bombs. Then the news from Canada -- someone was stalking Yvonne Belinsky and
her teenage daughter Elena. At the pain in Doyle's eyes, Bodie felt his resolve
crumble. Too many losses, too many threatened, for them to insist on staying
together. Cowley had put his foot down.
In his nightmares, he
relived that loss, over and over. Scant contact through triple blinds routed
through a dozen different networks and relayed through faceless agents at
switchboards in nameless places. When Cowley's heart finally gave out and
Murphy, his hand-picked successor, had taken the reins, the contacts continued,
but it wasn't enough. They needed to see one another, hear one another's voice.
Touch. And they couldn't. Bodie's dreams grew darker, the fears he wouldn't
consciously admit taking over his nighttime hours, breaking his rest with
visions of shadow figures killing his Ray while he was thousands of miles away,
unable to cover his back. As always, they were shadows with no discernible face
or form, nothing to strike back against. And as always, this one felt real.
There was a force to the fear, an urgency that pulled him from his sleep and
brought him to wakefulness covered in sweat, heart racing with adrenaline,
fingers clawing under the pillow for his gun.
Finding himself in a darkened hotel room, heart racing, mind fully alert, not in the middle of a crisis situation, he fell back against the pillows and trie