Nguyêt was roughly pulled off her bunk but managed to land on her hands and toes.
“See! She’s like a cat!” the security goon who pulled her from the bed laughed to another.
“Get up! The boss has a job for you,” the other snapped.
She stood quickly and kept her face tipped forward to not look directly at them.
Getting a task in the middle of the night wasn’t the norm, so her nerves were on edge.
They went up the stairs until the security team took her above the guest level. Now her nerves were on high alert. She’d never been on Sadik’s personal level.
When they stepped out of the stairwell, one of them opened a closet, and she tensed up. He turned and handed her a broom, wisk, dustpan, and a garbage bag.
The grunt who pulled her from the bed chuckled. “She looks relieved!”
The other shoved the items into her hands and pushed her forward toward the stern end of Sadik’s quarters. They knocked, and the door opened.
“Collect all the pieces, quickly!” Kaan barked at her.
Nguyêt moved inside and froze for a second as she laid eyes on Harper for the first time since their mission failed so catastrophically. The change in the confident, lively woman was terrifying. Feeling Kaan’s eyes on her, she quickly moved closer, set down everything but the broom, and swept up the fragments of what must have been a chair.
Harper wouldn’t look at her, and they couldn’t speak to each other, with Kaan watching them so closely.
She couldn’t leave her in this state, but she had no choice. She went back to the wisk and dustpan and collected the pieces to dump them into the garbage bag with the larger chunks. Then she went back and knelt next to the woman.
“What are you doing?” Kaan snapped, and Nguyêt turned to glance back at him.
“Pieces in her hair?” she asked but didn’t move.
Kaan’s eyes bored into her, but she didn’t move or look up from the floor. “Fine,” he huffed. “Quick!”
She picked the little pieces of plastic from Harper’s hair and set them in a pile next to her. She leaned over the woman and braced herself against the woman’s hand, pressing a stiff shard of plastic into her palm. It was roughly five inches long and tapered to a sharp and hard point. She might get one use out of it, but she could use it on Kaan or herself if she needed the escape.
Nguyêt leaned back and saw Harper pull her hand under her. Collecting the bits, she moved to the bag and dumped them in. She picked up the tools and followed the guards out. She didn’t bother hiding her shivering as they expected to see it, and Kaan smiled as he followed her out.
He was a truly disgusting specimen she would not mind dissecting to see how deep the evil went.
The guards took the garbage bag from her and took her back to her bunk. They didn’t rape her tonight, so that was a relief.
As she laid back on her bunk, she thought about Harper and her desperate condition. She knew better than to pin her hopes on a man, even one with his reputation, but something needed to happen, and soon!
-=-
General Davis was standing next to his Lieutenant in the situation room, getting an update from the officer. Both had managed to get some rest, but both were beginning to feel a sense of unease about their chances.
“The Truman has reached the position where they should intersect with the course of Sadik’s yacht if we can trust the report from the spooks about a meeting in the Black Sea,” the Lieutenant said. “The carrier has been sending out planes to spot the ship, but none have reported a sighting. It’s dark there now, and the yacht may be running dark.”
“How likely is it that they’ve received word of the carrier’s position?” Davis asked.
“We believe it is highly likely they were spotted, and if Agent Russo was correct about their spy network, they would have received word about the carrier. Your instructions to the captain to remain on a direct course for the States until they were out of visual range of shore may have been enough to convince the watchers their departure from the Mediterranean was coincidental. As this course would still intersect with theirs, the likeliest course of action for the yacht would be to simply slow down or stop until the carrier passed by. They’d run dark and silent to be invisible at night. Also, weather conditions indicate dense cloud cover in that region, so it would be full darkness,” the man suggested.
Davis pondered that for a moment. It made sense to him. “What is the forecast for the next day?”
“Blue skies and perfect visibility,” the Lieutenant said.
“Send a request to the captain to have them remain at the coordinates, and once there is sufficient light for visibility to commence a series of sorties with their aircraft to locate the yacht,” the General said.
“Yes, sir!”
After the General’s own meeting with the President to fill him in on the situation, the POTUS ensured him the Director of the CIA would give Davis his full cooperation. They’d shaken the tree and returned with the most likely course Sadik would take after his visit to Morocco. Based on the subtle trembling of their web of contacts, it appeared the arms dealer may have come into possession of some very nasty weapons which he would have to offload quickly. There were hungry and very dangerous buyers waiting for these items. Certain activity in the Black Sea suggested a rendezvous was expected.
It made the hairs on the back of Davis’ neck stand on end to rely on such insubstantial evidence for his rescue efforts, but that’s all he had. That and the President’s full support.
Which was quite a bit, in truth.
Ben woke with soft hair tickling his nose, and for a second, he thought it was Tina’s. Then the ship’s gentle bob brought it back to him, and his smile faded.
The hair belonged to Yvonne Guillebeaux, a woman he barely knew who was sleeping against him, naked. Their skin-to-skin contact meant they were both sweaty, and Ben felt the need to shower.
“Yvonne. Time to wake up,” he said gently. He glanced toward the windows and saw it was still early, but the skies were a very pale blue.
She made some undecipherable noises then her eyes fluttered open. She looked up at him and smiled timidly.
“I’d like to take a shower. We’re a little sweaty,” Ben said.
“Could-could I join you?” she asked quietly.
He gave her a cautious look, then nodded. “But no hanky-panky.”
She snorted. “I didn’t know people still used phrases like that.”
He eased himself away from her and stood next to the bed, his morning wood waving good morning to Yvonne. He saw she was staring at it, so he cleared his throat to draw her eyes back up to his face.
“Please ignore this. It has a mind of its own and doesn’t care if it’s being rude,” Ben mumbled, then turned to walk toward the bathroom. He suddenly stopped halfway there as he suddenly became aware of the absence of the constant hum of the ship’s motor.
“We’re not moving.”
Yvonne walked up to him and paused as she recognized the quiet, as well. “I wonder why we stopped.”
Ben felt a sudden unease. He wanted to find out what had changed, which would only happen once he joined the others. Perhaps Kaan would give them some idea or not.
He continued into the bathroom, and Yvonne followed him into the shower stall. It wasn’t huge, but it easily fit them both. Ben got the water running and soon felt hands rubbing soap over his body. He glanced at her with a frown.
“Just washing. No hanky-panky.” She admired his body as she soaped his chest. “You’re more muscular than anyone I’ve… slept with before. And you have more scars.”
He did his best to ignore how good it felt, but when her hands slid down his stomach, he stepped back. “You can get my back, but I’ll do the rest, thanks!”
She pouted but nodded. He cleaned himself down there without lingering as he turned his back to her.
“More scarring here too. You really have seen more than your share of violence,” she said, running her hands over the bullet scars on his back.
Ben frowned. “Not by personal choice.” He stepped under the water and rinsed the soap off.
“Aren’t you going to return the favor?” she asked.
Ben watched her for a moment, then turned her so he could wash her back. He did so with quick, efficient movements as he spoke to her. “You just spent the night with me without giving in to any urges. Just two people comforting each other as we slept. We shouldn’t ruin that with a casual mistake.” As she washed her front quietly, he got some shampoo and massaged it into her hair. She moaned quietly at the scalp massage, but it wasn’t sexual. It was just comforting.
He rinsed her hair, and she glanced back at him in question.
Ben raised a curious eyebrow.
“Did Noah tell you why I’m here? Is that why you won’t touch me?” she said with a tight throat.
Ben frowned. “Noah said nothing about you, and I didn’t ask. I explained last night why we weren’t going to have sex. We’re strangers, and I’m done complicating my life that way. We can be good friends. We can share a hug and a kiss on the cheek, but for both our sakes, that’s where it ends.”
He shut off the water, guided the silent woman out of the stall, and grabbed a fluffy towel to dry her off. He recalled how Tina liked to be dried off and smiled gently as he rubbed the towel over Yvonne’s head and down her body. When he stood once more to begin drying himself with a fresh towel, he glanced at her and saw tears running down her cheeks. His expression dropped as he quickly wrapped the towel around his waist.
“Hey, what’s wrong?” he asked as he pulled her into a hug. This just triggered her tears to burst forth. He held her in his arms as sobs tore through her. He made soothing sounds and just held her close as her arms went around him to cling to him desperately.