Page 94 of Lock ’N’ Load

Heavy rain had dampened his shirt, and water dripped down his face. Soon there’d be nothing for Sheba to follow. Another gust of wind tore the scent away, and she circled back, hitting again on something and charging ahead. Again he tightened up on the leash. If he let her proceed too quickly, she could overshoot the track and lose it. But she didn’t.

Matt thanked God for his steadfast partner. If anyone could find Trista, it was Sheba.

Minutes later, she led them to a building covered in vines. Fifty yards back, his friends followed, two of them with their leashed K-9s. Too many dogs could be a clusterfuck.

Sheba led them around the corner of the building. A flash of lightning lit up a sedan parked on the grass next to a door.

Bingo.

His heart slammed as he unhooked the leash and drew his weapon, aiming at the darkened vehicle. Sheba bolted for the car, standing on her hind legs and pressing her snout to the driver’s side window.

Nick and Saxon approached from another angle, while Eric and his K-9, Tiger, covered them. Markus, Dayne, Jaime, and Kade hung back, awaiting orders.

Sheba whined then dropped back to the ground and ran to the other side of the vehicle, repeating the same process on her hind legs. Based upon her reaction, Matt already knew the vehicle was empty, but out of caution, he clicked on his flashlight and swept the car’s interior. Sure enough, it was empty.

With his free hand, he urged Sheba to the door where he holstered his weapon to hook the leash back on. He glanced over his shoulder to see his friends moving forward, readying to follow at a distance that wouldn’t interfere with Sheba’s track.

He turned the doorknob, praying it wasn’t locked, then wincing as the door creaked. Pausing for barely a second, he aimed his flashlight through the opening and pushed it open the rest of the way with his foot.

With her nose to the floor, Sheba led him inside and down a long hallway. She continued past a mural of an American flag on the wall, past room after room. Other than the faint glow of his flashlight, which he’d set on low beam, the hall was pitch black. Luckily, the floor was so pitted and littered with debris and paint chips that the scrabbling of Sheba’s claws and his boots were well-muffled.

Up ahead a faint glow came from the last doorway on the left, then he heard a low sob, followed by a scream.

Trista.

Reeling Sheba in, he unhooked her leash then drew his weapon and ran down the hallway after his dog.

Sheba bolted into the room. Matt couldn’t see inside yet but heard a bloodcurdling growl followed by a man screaming.

At the open doorway, he dropped the flashlight and went in blind. Trista’s scream shot tactics down the toilet. What he saw nearly stopped his heart. Trista was strapped to a chair, her head lolled forward.

He aimed his gun point-blank at the man holding a syringe just above her arm. A killing rage, the likes of which he’d never experienced, rolled through him, and it took every ounce of restraint not to pull the trigger. “Police! Drop it!”

Trista didn’t move. Jesus, am I too late?

The syringe clattered as it fell onto the metal tray and the man—Lukashin, he guessed—threw his arms in the air, as did the other guy standing beside Trista.

Booted feet pounded into the room behind him. Sheba made a gruff snort, and the guy on the floor screamed again. “Get off! Get off!”

The man beside Trista looked at Sheba, then reached to his belt, pulling out a gun.

Matt swung the barrel of his duty weapon and double-tapped the guy in the chest. Gunshots reverberated in the room. The thug staggered backward, then fell sideways to the floor, his gun skittering a few feet away.

“Zadrrz,” Nick shouted behind him, and Matt caught a blur from the corner of his eye as Nick’s enormous black German shepherd bounded into the room. The man on the floor screamed again as Saxon clamped his powerful jaws around another limb.

Matt refocused on Lukashin, who stood calmly, his arms still raised in the air, a smug half smile on his face. He wanted to drill the bastard. Instead, he jammed the barrel of his gun in the asshole’s face. “What did you give her?” Fury nearly drove him to the brink of doing something stupid. Like blasting this fucker to hell. But he needed to know what he’d injected her with.

Dayne and Jaime now also had their guns pointed at the rezidentura while Eric, Kade, and Markus helped Nick control the other two men, one of whom he was pretty sure was dead.

Matt glanced at the metal tray, noting the syringe the rezidentura had dropped appeared to be full. But there were other syringes on the tray. And one of them was empty.

Jabbing his gun harder on Lukashin’s face, he gritted his teeth. “What did you give her, asshole?”

“Easy, Matt.” Kade’s deep baritone somehow penetrated the blood-red fog blinding him, and he eased the pressure off his trigger finger. “If you wanna live, I’d wipe that shit-eating grin off your face and answer the man’s question before he drills you in the head.”

The smile disappeared, replaced by a vicious sneer. “Sodium pentothal.”

Matt slipped his finger from the trigger and glanced at Trista. When her head moved and she moaned, he blew out a breath. “If you’re lying, you won’t leave this room alive.” No need for him to sic Sheba on the guy. He’d rip the man to pieces with his bare hands.