Page 41 of A Time & Place for Every Laird (A Laird for All Time #2)

Ten minutes earlier

“Did you find her?”

“Aye,”

Hugh answered slipping into the seat of the small sedan, a vehicle considered the “nicest”

available to any of Danny’s minions. If he had understood the dark-skinned Indian—this time a young man truly native to that country—correctly, it belonged to his mother. It wasn’t as luxurious as Sorcha’s ‘Goose’, but the nondescript vehicle had served its purpose in delivering them without incident past the Bainbridge terminus.

Sorcha’s car remained undisturbed where they had left it the previous night, which meant either that she had been apprehended and taken away or that she was still in the area. It was Danny, with his knowledge of the twenty-first century, who had recognized the significance of the large black van parked on the street about a block away, and it had been Hugh who had directed Danny farther up the street as he scouted the area, determining the number and location of the guards assigned with its protection.

Danny’s tense features relaxed into a smile as the nervous tapping of his fingers against the steering wheel subsided. “Thank God. I thought you’d been busted for sure, and I was sitting out here for so long I thought for sure that some cop would think I was the getaway driver for some bank robbery and haul me away. I don’t think I’m cut out for fieldwork,”

he added. “My place is definitely at a keyboard, but at least it all worked out okay, right?”

Aye, Hugh had found out what he wanted to know with incredible ease. No doubt it had been far simpler than convincing an officer at a Vancouver Metropole station that a strung-out junkie hoping to finance his next high could successfully rob a man of Hugh’s height and breadth might have been. “She’s in a rear compartment of the van wi’ two men,”

Hugh said. “I counted a half dozen more guarding the vehicle.”

Danny swore. “How are we going to get her out, then?”

Hugh grinned. “As I said, there are only six of them. If their resistance proves to be as laughable as in every other confrontation I’ve had wi’ them in the past day, there should be no difficulties.”

Jameson’s underlings were skilled to an extent but they were not experienced in true combat. He doubted any of them had ever fought for their lives, for their homes, or for anything greater than their own self-interest.

“In broad daylight?”

Danny asked. “Well, if you’re sure.”

“Aye,”

Hugh nodded. “I will retrieve yer sister and impress upon them the necessity of ceasing their pursuit in the future.”

Danny laughed at that. “Well, don’t impress them too much. It is a federal offense to assault a federal agent in this country.”

“But this isnae my country, is it?”

Hugh patted the pocket of his sport coat, where the new passport Danny had given them rested to confirm his identity if needed, just in case the agents were somehow able to recognize him as the escapee from Mark-Davis.

“Still, don’t get too close,”

Danny warned. “I know I won’t. Call me when you’re done.”

“Yer nae coming?”

“Oh, hell no. I like to keep my distance from the NSA.”

“I daresay they feel the same.”

Hugh pushed open the door and strode back down the street to where the van housing Sorcha was parked. The plan was a simple one, and he could only hope it worked.

The first agent standing sentry at the corner went down without a sound as Hugh took him out in a manner similar to the one he had employed near the market a few days past. Given that the attack was unexpected, the man went down without a struggle before Hugh tucked him safely among the hedgerow lining the street. The next one was far more aware of his surroundings and turned upon Hugh’s approach. The fight was brief but served to get Hugh’s blood pumping pleasantly.

Hugh flexed his fingers as he approached the van. Here things would get thornier if he were not to simply kill the men, which would have been more expedient but would also certainly offend Sorcha’s sensibilities. There were two agents remaining outside and pair more within before he would find Sorcha ensconced with the two older agents at the rear of the van. He needed to defeat the remaining quartet efficiently enough to silence them for a prolonged amount of time without rousing suspicion from within.

There was a challenge in that at least.

It was good to know that his Highlanders who lost at Culloden would have found victory in this time if the fight were in hand-to-hand combat. These men were not raised and bred to battle as his own were, and they did not have a cause worth shedding their blood.

They did have guns, though. One of the agents turned, pistol in hand, as Hugh neared and raised it defensively. Hugh spread his arms wide in supplication before lowering his shoulder and charging into the man’s abdomen, driving him to the ground as he wrenched the weapon away while blocking his blows. He was just about to slam his fist against the agent’s jaw when he felt the weight of another man on his back, pulling at his arm.

Hugh wrested his arm back, flinging the new opponent to the ground before driving his fist into the first agent’s jaw once and again quickly until his head listed to the side. Leaping to his feet, he faced the man he had shaken off. It was his opponent from the previous night. The agent’s nose was bloodied, perhaps broken, but he stood warily, awaiting Hugh’s attack with far less cockiness than at their last confrontation. “You needn’t do this,”

Hugh warned softly. “You know what I am capable of.”

“I do,”

Jackson answered. “Unfortunately, I have a duty.”

“All I want is the woman. Let me have her and I will leave you unharmed.”

Jackson only shook his head. “I wish I could, man. I really do.”

He looked over his shoulder at the rear opening of the van a score of feet away. “Simms, get out here! We’ve got company.”

The other agent from the previous night appeared and paused in surprise. “What the fuck?”

Simms spared a nod for his partner and the pair charged Hugh in unison, determined to take him down by force. But Hugh was prepared for their attack and had even practiced what to do in such a scenario with his cousins. When they were lads, Keir and one of his brothers would often launch such a surprise offensive, much as Hugh had in turn. Lads would be lads after all. It had honed their responses, kept them agile.

Thankfully, it wasn’t a skill lost to years in a more civilized court.

The fight was violent but thankfully brief. Hugh was able to use one man against the other, making one agent into a shield and the other into a weapon, deflecting blows until the agents were doing more harm to one another than they were to him. Finally, Hugh trapped Jackson’s head beneath his arm, bracing himself against the struggle, and was fortunate enough to catch Simms across the cheekbone with a raised knee as he turned, rendering the man unconscious. Jackson followed him into oblivion a moment later.

Hugh cracked his neck to the side as he climbed the stairs into the back of the van, finding the remaining agent standing nervously to the side, wringing his hands. He was a young fellow, barely a man at all.

“You-you can’t go in there,”

the lad boldly announced, stepping forward to impede his progress, but Hugh simply took the young man by the neck and slammed his head into the bank of monitors mounted across the inside wall of the van, and the lad slipped silently to the floor.

All that remained was behind that door. Two agents, one presumably the tenacious Special Agent Jameson, and Sorcha, his bold, defiant lass who would be in need of a sound scolding when he got her out of there.

The door opened like magic beneath his hand and Sorcha was there, haggard, surprised, and utterly bonny as she stared at him. Flames of joy licked at Hugh’s but burned to a cinder when he noticed one of the agents had a tight grip on her arm. His eyes shot up hotly to meet the astonished gaze of her assailant.

“Who the hell are …”

The low, protective growl came from deep within Hugh and served as the man’s only warning before Hugh’s rock hard fist lashed out and took him down with a single blow.

Sorcha sagged with relief almost indiscernibly before she straightened once more. “What is this? What are you doing here?”

“It is my turn to remind you that much can be excused if it’s done for the right reasons,”

Hugh said softly. “I am here tae save ye.”

“From what?”

A grin jerked at the corner of his mouth. “From yerself.”

Hugh caressed her cheek with the back of his fingers before he opened his hand and dangled the little Tokidoki Thor USB from one finger. “Ye forgot this.”