Page 3 of Justified Fear (TFH Team Bravo #2)

Two

R yan turned onto Tantalus Drive and headed to the address his captain had texted them. He had been almost home when the call had come through. That niggle never let him down.

When he was stopped by a patrolman, Ryan flashed his TFH badge and was waved in. There were cops everywhere. Lights flashing, with a few unmarked vehicles lining the narrow drive.

He parked and stepped out of the car, then went around to retrieve Maya. She paid no attention to the activity around her; although, he could sense she was agitated. She understood the job at hand, and she was ready to get going.

When he arrived at the front door, he once again had to show his badge, and then he was let in.

Even with all his years of experience as a cop in LA and now here in Hawai’i, he had to swallow some bile.

There was blood everywhere. The place was littered with dead bodies, now covered with white sheets.

“Be careful of the glass,” Seth called out.

Ryan nodded and headed in their direction.

Seth stood talking to Rome Carino, HPD’s liaison to Task Force Hawai’i.

Their teams did not operate within the Honolulu Police Department.

They handled the bigger cases that crossed jurisdictional lines.

While TFH were dressed in cargo pants and t-shirts, Carino was wearing a pair of jeans.

It was Saturday night, so, apparently, he’d gotten called in on his day off, too.

“Hey,” he said. “Do we know who the target is?”

Rome nodded. “Keely Templeton, private chef. She called in the attack and stayed on the line until the call dropped. She was running around the forest reserve out back.”

“I need a scent point.”

He was handed a chef jacket, similar to the ones he had seen people wear on the Food Network’s competition show.

“We found it a few yards out,” Rome said.

As they walked out onto the lanai, he realized just how dark it was out there. There were no clouds in the sky, so the moon was bright, but he knew that it would be hard to find one's way in the forest at night. Even people who had been trained could get turned around.

Just as he was ready to head out, the rest of his team showed up.

“Do we know if there are any unfriendlies out and about?” Nikki Kekoa asked. The former Coastie and only Hawaiian on the team was the toughest of them, in Ryan’s opinion.

“No. They seemed to have scattered from what we can figure out. HPD is canvassing to see if there is any security footage from the neighbors.”

“Didn’t they have something set up here?” Kap asked.

“We can’t figure out why, but it was shut off tonight,” Carino said.

There was some muttering amongst their group. That always spelled something bad. As they always said, coincidences take a lot of planning.

“Yeah, I feel ya.”

Maya whined, ready to start the hunt.

“If they aren’t hunting her, there’s still a chance that she could get hurt. There is a ridge up there she could fall down, plus there are wild boar in the area.”

Wild boars were hunted in Hawai’i, and they could be vicious if they felt threatened.

Another whine from Maya.

“We'd better get going then,” he said, heading toward the forest. His team joined him, fanning out. He knew HPD officers were looking for her, but Maya was the best tracker on the island.

Keely paused in her running to suck in a deep breath.

She thought the bad dudes had left, but then she started to hear people running around the forest again.

At first, she thought it was another feral pig.

One of those big bastards had chased her up a tree about an hour earlier.

Or what she thought was an hour. She’d dropped her phone in a muddy puddle a while ago.

Rolling her shoulders, she tried to figure out where she was.

She usually had a good sense of direction.

Still, after what felt like hours running around a dark rain forest, she was pretty sure she had gotten confused.

On top of that, she knew this forest backed up to a ridge.

She’d been deathly afraid that she would end up falling to her death trying to get away from the people trying to kill her.

She cocked her head to the side. Did she just hear someone else?

Dammit, she knew that there were a lot of critters in the forest. Just as that thought passed through her brain, she felt something scamper over her foot.

Biting back a scream, she moved again. More than likely, it was what a lot of people called B-52s, or the large flying roaches Hawai’i had.

It was not her first encounter with them tonight.

It wasn’t even her second. That second time had involved one of them getting tangled in her hair.

It had taken every inch of control she had not to freak out when that happened.

The bad dudes were still running around the area when that happened.

The one thing she did not want to deal with was a centipede.

Those buttheads stung or bit…she wasn’t sure which.

All she knew was that it hurt like hell and sometimes people ended up going to the hospital.

Thankfully, she had avoided them so far.

But even as she had that thought, she heard more noise.

“Keely Templeton!”

Oh, shit, they knew her name, and they were really close.

Her shoulders sagged. She thought for sure HPD would show up and save her.

It was disappointing that the bad dudes had found out her name.

Or was that HPD? They would have figured out her name.

Still, as she heard a group of people approaching, she decided not to take a chance.

Instead, she looked at the tree to her left.

It had good notches for her to use as she climbed. It wasn’t her first time up in a tree.

Drawing in a deep breath, she straightened her spine. Morning would be here soon—she hoped. All she had to do was evade these bad dudes a bit longer.

She started to climb up the tree, her hands slick with sweat. She pulled herself up on a branch and prayed that help would arrive soon.

Thirty minutes into their search, Ryan wanted to curse.

He felt as if they were going around in circles, and if they were, that meant this woman was doing the same thing.

She was definitely lost. She had been in the forest area for hours.

He just hoped she hadn’t been hurt. The only thing that gave him hope was that they had yet to find any kind of signs of blood or a body.

Hopefully, she was holed up somewhere. A bead of sweat slipped down his spine.

It was humid, and the trades had died down.

Thanks to that, it felt as if the entire forest was closing in on him.

Maya stopped in a clearing beside a massive tree and looked up. Ryan frowned and followed her line of sight. For a second, he didn’t see anything, just dark leaves and bark. Then…something shifted. He blinked.

“Keely Templeton?”

There was a long beat before someone said, “Nope.”

For a second, he didn’t know what to say. Did the woman just claim she wasn’t Keely? Did she think there were lots of lone women running around the forest? Maya whined.

“Keely, I’m Ryan Morrison with TFH.”

“Good for you. Now move along.”

What the…

“The HPD called us in to help find you.”

Silence.

“Keely? I promise I’m not here to hurt you.”

“I’m not Keely, but if I were, there would be a good chance that she would be stupid to accept that just some dude traipsing around the forest was here to save her. I bet she’s not that stupid.”

“Seeing as how you’re having an argument with someone you think is here to hurt you, I would say you aren’t that smart.”

This was the most insane conversation he had had with someone he was rescuing. And he had rescued a guy who had taken a bad acid trip and who thought Maya was some kind of alien dog.

“Oh… damn !” Then there was some movement above him. It was all the warning he got before she came hurtling out of the tree at him. He reached out to catch her, but they both fell to the ground. Damn, that was going to hurt.

He blinked up at the woman as she tried to disentangle herself from him. As she pushed herself up, he realized that she was straddling him.

“I’m sorry. So sorry. Don’t kill me.” Fear laced every syllable as she tried her best to get away from him. She was wiggling on top of him, and he needed her to stop. He settled his hands on her hips.

“Eep!” The woman made the strangest noises.

When he finally got a good look at her, his world seemed to tilt. He found himself staring at the face of an angel with golden eyes. The picture he had glanced at before heading out had not done the woman justice.

“I told you that I’m part of TFH. I’m here to rescue you.”

The sound of running footsteps—quite a few of them—rushed toward them. Her head lifted, and he instantly felt the loss of connection. He liked it better when she was staring at him.

“What do we have here?” Rami asked.

“I fell on top of him.”

“Are you okay, Ms. Templeton?” Nikki asked, walking forward. He heard Rami talking on his comms to let them know they’d found Keely.

“Keely, and I’m not sure. People were shooting, and I ran.”

Shit, she was probably going into shock. Her pupils were dilated. While she was making sense, the way she was talking made Ryan think she couldn’t keep her thoughts straight.

“Guys, help her up.”

The other two did just that, and he could see that Rami was assessing her. He had been a SEAL before joining TFH. All of them knew how to look for the signs, but he was the best at it.

“Oh, aren’t you the sweetest baby,” she said, looking at Maya. Then she looked down at him. “I’m sorry I fell on top of you.”

Then she shivered. It was humid out, but she was wearing a sleeveless shirt. Definitely a little shocky.

He rolled to his feet. “No worries, Keely. Come on. We’ll get you something to warm you up.”

“What were you doing up the tree?” Nikki asked.