Deadly Silence (Blood Brothers #1)(107)

Ryker punched Todd in the face and jumped up, turning for her. Todd kicked out, nailing Ryker in the ankle, and he stumbled. Todd pushed up and jumped at Ryker with a snarl, throwing them both into the room and right toward her. Zara screamed and ducked her head just as Ryker pivoted to the side and smashed into the cinder blocks, taking the brunt of the impact on his forehead. His head smashed the block with a loud thud.

Zara sucked in air, concentrating on him.

He fell and then instantly bounded up, turning and punching Todd in the neck. Todd grabbed his neck and fell back, his eyes widening. Ryker followed the punch with a kick, and Todd flew out of the room to smash onto the ground and send snow spraying.

“You okay?” Ryker coughed, reaching behind her to slice the ropes with a knife.

“Yeah.” The circulation returned to her hands, and she bit her lip to keep from crying out. The blood rushed back into her skin like needles.

Todd hissed and grabbed the door frame. Blood flowed down his head, and his nose was bent toward the side of his face. Slowly, with hate in his eyes, he lifted a gun toward her.

She gasped.

The first shot came from behind her, and she jumped. Blood bloomed from the center of Todd’s head, his eyes widened, and he fell directly backward into the snow.

She slowly turned her head to see Ryker setting down a gun. He gently took her face in his hands. “Jesus.”

Bruises and blood marred his handsome face while snow and blood coated his shirt and jeans, but he’d never looked better to her. Everything she would ever need was there in his eyes and his gentle touch. Tears filled her eyes, and this time she let them fall. “You came.” She’d breathed the words, her chest filling with him. She’d trusted him, and he’d come for her.

He leaned in and kissed her lips, the touch reverent. “Yeah.”

Her head jerked. “Did you find Greg?”

“Not yet.” Ryker pulled her gently from the chair by the shoulders. “Can you run?”

She nodded and found her balance.

His gaze darkened, and he drew her arms toward him by the elbows. “Holy shit.”

She glanced down at her raw and bleeding wrists. “They’re fine.”

“They are not fine.” Fury sizzled across his angled features, and tension swelled, heating the cinder-block room. “Too bad he’s already dead.” Ryker drew her out of the room and helped her over the dead soldier. “Any clue where Greg is?”

“No.” Too many emotions blasted into her, and she averted her gaze from Todd. Apparently Ryker was a good shot. “Thanks for coming to get me,” she said through numb lips.

“Always.” He drew her from the outbuilding, his solid body between her and any danger. A firefight sounded toward the lodge, and an explosion roared through the night from over the hill, sending fire, light, and debris high into the air. “Fuck. I hope that wasn’t our helicopter.” Ryker ducked into a run. “Stay right behind me, sweetheart.”

She nodded and tried to keep her balance through the thick snow. Her wrists pounded in pain and her face ached as bruises formed, but she kept right behind him, her gaze sweeping the area. They had to find Greg.

Something dark caught her eye. “Ryker.” She grabbed his arm and pointed. “There.”

He turned and followed a barely there path to another outbuilding made of cinder blocks. He set her to the side of the door and kicked it open. It flung inward and hung awkwardly. Zara hurried after him and looked around the empty room. “He’s not here,” she whispered. There had to be other buildings. Where the hell was Greg?

A gun cocked behind her, and a barrel pressed against her neck. She stiffened. “Ryker?” she whispered, her voice shaking.

Ryker turned and faced her fully, looking over her shoulder. “Don’t shoot her.”

“Drop your gun, sweet boy,” came a feminine voice. “God, I’ve missed you, Ryker. Look how grown up and handsome you are.” She almost sounded like a proud mother.

Zara shivered as nausea attacked her. “Dr. Madison. Where’s Greg?”

Ryker dropped his gun and kicked it over to the right.

“No!” Zara coughed out a sob.

Madison tapped her weapon on Zara’s head. “Go toward him and turn around. Both of you get against the back wall. On your knees.”

Zara stumbled toward Ryker, feeling that gun trained on her. The second she reached him, he shoved her behind him and backed to the wall. She tried to move to the side, but he pressed her against the hard blocks.

“Well, then. I guess I shoot you,” Madison said almost conversationally.

*



Ryker faced the woman from his past. “You won’t shoot me, and we both know it.” He crossed his arms, careful to keep all of Zara out of a bullet’s path, just in case. “Where’s Greg?”

Isobel Madison smiled, and those deep blue eyes sparkled. “Greg is mine again, and I’m not giving him up. Why don’t you and your brothers come with us, shackled of course, and we’ll do some tests?”

Do some tests. He remembered those words from that mouth, and he wanted to puke. “Fuck you.”

“Oh, the things I could teach you.” She kept the gun pointed levelly at his chest—center mass. “Have you missed me, sweet boy?”

He gagged. “No.”