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“Keep your gun on her,” he ordered his assistant, and pulled her toward the building.
Like pieces of a puzzle finally clicking into place, she began to see the truth. He could have killed her as soon as they escaped the docks, but he needed a distraction.
Mason and his team would put all their effort into locating her. But they couldn’t track Ryan at the same time. He was going to disappear.
But he’d leave her to die first.
How could she have been so wrong about him? How could she have trusted him, worked beside him all these years, and never suspected a thing?
The old cabin was listing, the floor beneath her feet slanting downward at a sickening angle. She looked around, her eyes widening in horror as she realized that the back corner of the room was already filled with murky, brackish water.
Ryan pushed her roughly into the shack, his gun trained on her head. “Sit,” he ordered, shoving her hard across the tilting floor.
She stumbled and fell to her knees, scraping her palms on the rough planks. Before she could right herself, he grabbed the back of her shirt and hauled her toward the far corner. The floor there had already disappeared beneath a foot of dark water, as if the entire structure was sinking, corner first, into the sea.
While his soldier trained his handgun on her, Ryan secured her arms behind her back and her feet at the ankles. He raised his booted foot.
Avery flinched away, ducking her head to protect herself for the coming blow, but his kick landed on the wooden slats of the wall next to her. Again and again he kicked the wood until it broke away from the thicker stud. Then he yanked her back against the rotting back wall, wrapping the remaining line around the stud over and over again before securing it with strong knots, leaving no play in the line.
“I’m not going to kill you,” he said, his voice almost gentle. “What would be the point? I just need to keep your SEAL friend and his team busy until I can make my escape. Once I’m clear, I’ll get word to them about your location.”
Avery looked into his dead eyes. Killer’s eyes. He was lying. He had already murdered so many people, what was one more to him?
But she kept her face blank, her voice steady. “You can’t kill everyone who knows what you did.”
He shrugged, a cold, dismissive gesture. “Don’t worry. I’ll make sure they find you. Eventually.” He paused. “One more thing. I’ll be taking this.” He plucked the comlink from her ear, holding it up to the light with a triumphant smile.
Ryan crushed the device beneath his heel, grinding it into the dirt with a sickening crunch. Then, with a final, mocking smile, he and his accomplice walked out of the shack, leaving her alone in the rising water.
Avery listened to the sound of Ryan’s footsteps fading away. She had to find a way to let Mason know where she was.
But as she struggled against her bonds, the rough rope biting into her skin, she knew it was hopeless. Ryan had tied her too tightly, the knots too complex for her to unravel on her own.
She was trapped, helpless, with no way to escape.
As her eyes adjusted to the gloom, she saw something else that made her heart stop in her chest. Algae-covered waterlines, running along the walls like some kind of twisted, green graffiti.
And the tide was rising. Living on a houseboat had ingrained the natural swings into her very being. High tide would be in four or five hours. And it would be a big one. Autumn tidal swings were large. Three to four feet.
Panic surged, her breath coming in short, sharp gasps. Water marks, oily lines and patches of algae, striped the walls like nasty bathtub rings. The highest of them reached almost to the ceiling at the lowest corner.
At even a moderate high tide, her corner of the room would be completely submerged.
She felt a scream building in her throat, a desperate, primal cry for help.
If Mason didn’t find her, she was going to die here, alone and afraid, with nothing but the sound of the water lapping at her to keep her company.
A single tear rolled down her cheek.
Mason’s rugged features flashed before her eyes. The dark blond curls she’d been so tempted to wind around her fingers.
Too late now.
I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
45
Hands on his hips,Mason stared at the empty space recently taken up by the SUV Goshiro and Avery drove off in.