The voices were getting closer. “Gwenny, come on, baby girl. I’m not mad now, but if you keep this up, I will be,” Will said.
“She’s not going to come out willingly,” another male voice said.
Panic began to well up inside her. She closed her eyes.You are a kickass operator.Troy was waiting for her. Opening her eyes, she cleared her mind and focused on the task at hand.Neutralize the enemy.
When flashlights circled around her, she raised her weapon. A ray of light passed over her again and again.
“I’ve got her; she’s in the tree.” Desmond approached her.
The second his hands connected with the first branch, Gwen squeezed the trigger. He fell back. A perfect kill shot.
“Hold up,” Billings called out. “She’s a sniper.”
His voice gave her a location. Her second shot hit him in the left chest. He too dropped. The eerie light from his flashlight and a drip of blood from the corner of his mouth made a macabre picture.
“You’re a bad girl, Gwen,” Will snickered.
“You’re a dead man walking,” she hollered. A third man tried to climb up from behind. Another shot took him out. “That’s three, Will. Are you next?”
“No, Gwenny. You are,” George Stacy said.
Three men circled the tree. She managed to get two rounds off before a shot from below grazed her right leg. Losing her balance, she tumbled to the ground.
Will Cook stood over her, shining his flashlight directly into her face. “Damn, you look like shit.”
“Always good for a compliment,” her words slurred. She wished she had one of the ice pops she used to bring to Troy.Concentrate. Until your heart stops, there’s always a plan.Troy said that during a lecture he gave to the teams when she first joined Chase Security.
Two men picked her up and carried her back to their hovel in the mountain. They tossed her on their torture table. “Mitch, clean up this mess so we can have some fun,” Cook ordered.
“Bring me a couple of buckets of water,” he said.
She looked at George Stacy. “I thought you were one of the good guys.”
“You got in the way, Gwenny. Desmond and two others stole the test. Morons, they couldn’t memorize Marine Corps history. Cook snapped the professor’s neck, but we’d all be put away for her murder. We did a great job concealing the body and providing alibis. At the time, we didn’t realize Cook took her jewelry as a trophy.” Stacy looked at Cook and shook his head from side to side.
“When we started in the Corps, every time we saw some twat getting away with something or getting something special because she was a woman, we got angry. By then you were attached to Cook. He picked you as another trophy. Daddy an army general. Baby brother, a flyer on the Nimitz. And best of all, you, his Naval Academy graduate. You were proof he liked women in power. It didn’t take long for him to take advantage of your insecurity. The motherless child.”
“You bastard.” She struggled to get free, anger buoying her energy. Then her mind flashed back to her SERE training.Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape.Her eyes deadened, and her breathing slowed as she brought her heart rate down.
Okay, resist until your chance. Fear will keep you farther away from Troy.She realized Stacy was still speaking.
“He let us play too. You scratched an itch, his and ours. When we found out you were trying to run away, that was bad enough. Then Cook realized you had the pin,” he growled. “We got lucky—we had El-Saab and Patterson, the agent you met in Mosul.”
“It was incredible; I sat across from you, detailing your mission, and recognition didn’t dawn on you,” Patterson said.
“We went through training in the CIA together. The minute el-Saab was able to, he made a trade with Patterson, who, at the time, was working the interrogation site. He’d drawn up the paperwork. Originally, the real operatives there were told you were a traitor. Four of us took leave at a time and took over the interrogation. You never broke,” Stacy said, a touch of admiration in his tone.
“I had the most time. I watched. Every time I thought they were close, you seemed to rally. At that point, our psychiatrists, Mitch Ackers, and the good Dr. Jay Acosta, wanted you for one of their scientific experiments. The cuts broke you, but you never disclosed. The group voted, and we dumped you in that cell to die and headed home. We were stunned when we heard they were flying in a missing American soldier. After your family took you away, we thought you were gone and done with.
“Two years later, Billings reaches out and tells us about his new XO. Imagine our surprise. Then you walked into the NCIS office. Shit, Gwenny, if you’d just stayed away,” Stacy said.
Acosta, one of the psychiatrists, came up behind George and tossed a bucket of cold water over Gwen. First shock and then pain. “Fuck!” she cried out.
“Bring me a light,” the other doctor, Ackers, yelled. “Let’s get this clothing off her so we can see the damage.”
Gwen fought using the little strength she had.You don’t have to do this alone.Troy’s voice floated around her. “Stop!” she cried.
Will Cook moved to her side. Lowering his head, he placed his mouth against her swollen lips. Gwen clamped her teeth against his lower lip, biting him and drawing blood.
