Page 31 of Edinburgh Escape (Brotherhood Protectors International #5)

As soon as Callum realized Maggie and Bryce had gone missing, he’d notified Dmytro and Lucie. They’d promised to get back to him as soon as they knew anything. Dmytro had insisted his contact had something in the works.

With no idea where to start looking for Maggie and Bryce, Callum was forced to stand fast and wait for further information. He paced in Drummond’s study, then down the hallway and out the front door, where he stared down the drive leading off the estate.

While waiting for Dmytro to come up with a location, Ewan spent the time in the stable working with Montana in an attempt to save the horse for his little brother. The veterinarian was with him and Alastair.

Since Callum and Peter Atkins were only in the way, they returned to the manor and awaited the information they needed to stage a rescue.

An hour passed.

Callum was ready to climb a wall. He was a man of action. The wait was killing him, one minute at a time.

Ewan appeared in the doorway of the study, drying his hands on a towel. “We think Montana will make it. The veterinarian thinks he has come into contact with a toxin. He gave him something to counteract it. Time will tell if he pulls through.”

“The horse is in a stall. How would he get hold of something toxic?” Callum asked.

“I don’t know. Maybe a mouse that had eaten rat poison got into his stall, and the horse ate the mouse…?” Ewan shrugged. “We’ve done what we can. The vet will stay with him until he either dies or shows signs of improvement. What do you know about Maggie and Bryce?”

“Not a damn thing.” At that moment, Callum’s cell phone chirped. Dmytro’s name flashed across the screen. Callum answered. “What have you got?”

“I have good news and bad news,” Dmytro said. “The good news is that I know where they’ve taken them.”

A rush of relief washed over Callum, followed quickly by a sense of impending doom. “And the bad?”

“You know how I said the Kholdov Coalition was operating in Donchenko Bratva territory?”

“Yes,” Callum bit out impatiently. “So?”

“You might want to get to where they have taken them before the men of Donchenko Bratva arrive. They were angry to learn the Kholdov Coalition were operating on their turf. They are armed and likely to kill everyone in that warehouse. It will be a blood bath.”

Callum met Ewan’s gaze. “Where are they?”

“In Edinburgh, at a warehouse along the wharf. Sending coordinates now.”

Callum’s phone pinged an incoming text.

“We’re on our way.” Callum motioned for the others to follow as he ran for the door.

“Wait,” Ewan said.

Callum stopped halfway out the study door.

Ewan went to a panel on the wall and pressed his finger to something.

The panel slid back, exposing a large safe.

He quickly rolled the tumbler right, then left and then right again, slowing to a stop.

He cranked the handle and pulled open the door.

Inside the safe was a collection of handguns in shoulder holsters, neatly hung on the back wall.

Ewan handed one to Atkins, one to Callum and took one for himself. He reached into a metal ammunition box and extracted several magazines filled with bullets and handed four to each man.

Callum slammed one magazine into the handle of his pistol and shoved the spares into his pockets. He shrugged out of his jacket, slung the holster over his arms and buckled it in place and then slipped his jacket over the holster and gun.

Once they had their weapons, they left the study.

Fiona stood in the foyer, wringing her hands. “I’m going with you.”

Ewan shook his head. “No.”

“But he’s my son,” she said. “He’ll be scared.”

“You’ll be more of a liability to this mission, putting Bryce at further risk,” Ewan said sternly. Then his tone softened, “We’ll let you know as soon as we get him safely away from his abductors.”

She clutched Ewan’s arm, her eyes filling with tears. “Please, bring back my little boy.”

“We will.” Ewan hugged the woman briefly while Callum and Atkins passed him in the hallway and ran toward the rear of the house.

“We’ll take the big car,” Ewan said. “Alastair can drive.”

“If it’s all the same to you, I’ll take my rental. I would explode letting someone else drive,” Callum said. “Besides, Alastair should stay with Gregory to protect Fiona and Cook in case the Russians circle back while we’re gone.”

Ewan nodded. “Agreed. Besides, he’s not combat-trained. I don’t even know if he can handle a gun, other than for hunting rabbits like we did when we were children.”

The three men ran for the garage and climbed into Callum’s rental car. Within minutes, they were out of the gate, racing for Edinburgh and the wharf where a Russian mobster was holding Maggie and Bryce.

Twenty minutes into the travel time to the coordinates, Ewan’s phone chirped.

“It’s from Rory,” Ewan said. “Bloody hell.”

Callum’s breath caught and held. “What?”

“He says, You must transfer five hundred thousand pounds to a specified account in two hours or they will kill Maggie, Bryce and me. If you try to find us, they will kill us. If you involve the police, they will kill us. Just transfer the money .”

“That’s not enough time,” Ewan said. “I can’t get to that much money. It would have to come from my father’s estate. The bank won’t release the funds since it’s still in probate.”

Callum’s jaw tightened. “Then we have to find Maggie and Bryce and extract them before any harm comes to them.”

“And the cousin?” Atkins asked.

“That bastard is on his own,” Callum said through his teeth.

Clouds blocked the setting sun, making the day turn to night earlier.

As they neared Edinburgh, light rain fell, making the roads slick and the traffic move at a glacial pace, forcing Callum to slow as well.

Zipping in and out of traffic wouldn’t get him there faster, but could cause him to wreck. He couldn’t risk that.

Callum’s cell phone rang; he handed it to Ewan. “Answer and put it on speaker.”

“It’s Hammerson,” Ewan said as he received the call and hit the speaker button.

“Just landed,” Ace said. “We have the coordinates to the warehouse and are loading into a car now. We’ll be there in twenty minutes.”

“Good, that’s about what time we’ll get there,” Callum said. “If the traffic keeps moving. We can’t park close to the warehouse. The kidnappers threatened to kill Maggie and Bryce if we tried to find them.”

“Got it. Will ditch the car a couple of blocks from the warehouse and go in on foot. We have weapons and comms. Whoever arrives first, wait for the rest to get outfitted. We’re tracking your phone location so we’ll know where you are.”

Callum prayed they’d arrive at the same time. He’d be hard-pressed to wait for the other, knowing the clock was ticking for Maggie and Bryce.

Two blocks from the coordinates, Callum pulled into an alley.

Moments later, another vehicle pulled in behind Callum’s.

No sooner had the vehicles stopped than everyone leaped out. A tall man with dark hair and dark eyes approached Callum, Ewan and Atkins.

Atkins stuck out his hand to shake the other man’s. “Ace, glad you made it.” He turned to Callum. “Callum, Ace Hammerson, Regional Director of Brotherhood Protectors International.”

Callum quickly shook hands with the man he’d spoken with on the phone a number of times but hadn’t met in person until that moment. “Thanks for coming.”

Ace nodded and quickly turned to the man beside him, who looked vaguely familiar and a little taller than the others. “You might know former SAS operative, Fearghas Gordon. He was the one who recommended you for our team.”

“Good to see you, mate,” Fearghas said with a decidedly Scottish accent, as he shook Callum’s hand. “Heard about your last mission. I’m sorry it ended the way it did. We lost some of our best.”

Callum gripped the man’s hand hard, his heart constricting in his chest. He remembered serving with Fearghas on several missions early in his career with SAS. The man had known the men who’d died on Callum’s last mission. “Good to see you,” Callum said, a lump forming in his throat.

Fearghas backed a step and waved toward the man beside him, “This is Jack Collins, a former US Army Ranger. He met us at the airport, having flown over from Dublin.”

Ace moved to the side and waved a hand toward the man on his left. “This is Dax Franklin, former Marine Force Recon, and last but not least is Bennett Ramsey, former SAS, another one of our new recruits. Glad to have you both aboard.”

Callum quickly shook hands with the men.

Introductions over, Callum helped Ace lift a duffel bag out of the trunk and lay it on the hood of their car. Inside were three semi-automatic rifles, a submachine gun, ammunition, bulletproof vests and a bag filled with communications devices and an assortment of knives.

Each man took a radio headset. One by one, they tested them. All the while, a clock ticked in Callum’s head. He needed the ability to communicate with the team, but all this was taking time they needed to assess the situation, get in and extract Maggie and Bryce.

He shrugged out of his jacket and the shoulder holster, the heavy drizzle quickly soaking his shirt before he could slip into the bulletproof vest. Once he had it in place, he settled the shoulder holster over the vest, adjusting the straps, and slid two of the extra magazines into the vest pockets.

Dax took one of the semi-automatic rifles. Callum grabbed the submachine gun, and Jack commandeered the last semi-automatic. Each man clipped a sheathed knife onto his belt, locked and loaded their magazines and gathered close for instructions.

“I’ll take Ramsey, Dax and Jack around the front of the warehouse,” Ace said.

“Fearghas, go with Callum, Ewan and Atkins and approach the building from the back. Report what you see: number of sentries, doors, windows we might sneak through, anything relevant. They can’t know we’re there until we get to the hostages. ”