She had no idea why, but it allowed her to get a better look at the man who had so annoyed her earlier. He appeared to be extremely good-looking, with dark hair, fine features, and eyes that appeared an arresting silver-blue in this light. As she recalled, he"d been tall and well built too. In the looks department the man fit the James Bond image of a spy, she thought. It was just a shame that he was missing the "intelligent" from the Cute, Strong, Intelligent, and s.e.xy quota.
"Don"t be too hard on Decker," Justin said suddenly, obviously reading her expression and guessing where her thoughts had led her. "After all, the man was in shock."
"Shut up, Justin," Decker snapped.
Dani ignored the driver and glanced to the other man in question. "Why would he have been in shock?"
Justin hesitated, and when he spoke she suspected it wasn"t what he"d intended to say. "He was shot when he ran out into the line of fire to pull you back onto the cliff."
"Ah h.e.l.l," Decker muttered as Dani"s head swiveled sharply back to him. She noted absently that he sounded annoyed and embarra.s.sed, but ignored that as she leaned farther forward to peer at his chest. Her eyes widened when she saw that there was, indeed, a bullet hole in the shoulder of his shirt.
"You are shot," she said with dismay. "Why are you driving? You should-Have you bound the wound or anything?"
It didn"t look to her as if he had. His short-sleeved b.u.t.toned shirt was black so she couldn"t tell if there was blood on it, but the cloth lay flat on his upper chest without any bulk to suggest a bandage beneath. Dani reached out to pull the shirt away from his skin to check. What she found was a hole in his shoulder with dried blood crusted around it... and a whole lot of naked male chest. Forcing herself to ignore the naked male bit, Dani concentrated on the wound. It looked like the bullet had gone through the muscle below his shoulder blade, missing any bones. That was good news at least. There should have been more blood from the wound, though, and Dani could only think that he"d done at least something to stop the bleeding. But it really needed to be cleaned, the bullet removed, and bandaging applied.
"Stop that," Decker muttered, knocking her hand away so that the shirt fell back into place. "I"m driving here."
"Yes, well, you shouldn"t be," she said firmly. "Stop the vehicle so I can have a look at it. Your friend here can drive."
"Justin," the friend said, reminding her of his name.
Dani ignored him and tugged on Decker"s shirt. "Pull over."
"No. I"m fine. The bullet just grazed me."
Dani snorted. "It didn"t just graze you, it went through your subscapularis."
"His sub what?" Justin asked with amazement.
"His subscapularis," Dani repeated, and when he looked blank, explained, "It"s a muscle that starts under the shoulder blade and runs to the front of the upper arm. It rotates the arm inward."
Justin"s eyebrows had risen up his forehead in amazement, and he now asked, "What are you, a doctor or something?"
"Yes." She turned back to Decker. "Pull over so I can tend your shoulder."
He merely shook his head. "We need to get to where we can get cell reception. We need backup and we need to track the SUV. Remember your sister?"Dani bit her lip, torn between insisting he stop and keeping her mouth shut. On one side of the argument, he was injured.
Gunshot wounds were nothing to mess with, and untreated could result in infection and even septic shock, which had a fifty percent chance of killing the victim. On the other side of the argument was her sister, who was still in the clutches of one of the men who had kidnapped them and who might even now be suffering h.e.l.lish abuse.
"I"ve got a signal," Justin said suddenly, saving her from having to make a decision.
"Good," Dani said with relief as Justin held the phone up, his gaze concentrated on the screen. She turned to Decker and pointed out, "Now you can stop and let me look at your shoulder while he makes the call to track your vehicle and tell us where it is."
"How strong is the signal?" Decker asked, ignoring her.
"One bar," Justin answered. "But we"re getting there."
Decker nodded.
"You might want to speed up," Justin suggested. "You"re not going to get away without her tending to the gunshot. She"s a doctor. That being the case, it may be better to let her see it sooner rather than later."
Dani frowned at the meaningful way he said the words. It felt like there was a silent message in there. If so, she didn"t understand it. Decker seemed to, however, since he put his foot down and urged the van to a swifter speed. It made the ride much b.u.mpier, and Dani found herself bouncing backward on the metal floor. When her foot knocked into something, she caught at both men"s seats to steady herself, and glanced over her shoulder to see what she"d b.u.mped into. Her eyes slid over lumpy shapes covered with some sort of tarp.
"What-?" she began, and then snapped her mouth closed after nearly biting off her own tongue as they hit a rut in the road.
Rather than risk losing her tongue, Dani decided to find out for herself what lay beneath the tarp, and reached back to lift the closest edge. The old van"s small overhead light cast shadows across the small pile of bodies revealed, but she had no problem recognizing the men who had kidnapped her and Stephanie. She was slower to understand what was sticking out of the chests of the ones that she could see and presumably the others too. It looked like lengths of a thick branch had been punched through their chests where their hearts would be.
"Two bars," Justin announced, and Dani glanced to the front to see that his head was still bent over the phone, watching the screen. He hadn"t noticed her checking out the bodies in the back. She let the tarp drop back into place and shifted back to where she"d originally been, her mind in chaos as she tried to sort out the meaning behind what lay under the tarp.
The sight of the bodies didn"t upset her; Dani had seen a lot of dead bodies while in medical school and she knew they"d been shot and most likely killed in the shootout in the clearing. It was the branches through their chests that had her mind running around inside her head like a small dog chasing its tail. What had been done to those bodies was not standard police procedure. Dani doubted defiling a corpse was standard procedure for an organization like CSIS either, and it suddenly occurred to her that she really had no idea who these men were except for what Decker had told her. She"d seen no badges or identification of any kind.
For all she knew, they could be a couple of nutcases as dangerous as the first six men.
"What"s under the tarp?" she asked suddenly, and didn"t miss the way the two men glanced to each other, exchanging a silent message before Decker cleared his throat and admitted, "The men from the clearing."
Dani was silent for a minute and then asked, "And what about the women in the ravine?"
Another silent exchange occurred, and then Decker said, "We had to leave them behind for now. Lucian, our boss, will arrange for the local authorities to find them after we talk to him."Dani stared at his profile for several moments, considering his words. Arrange for the local authorities to find them seemed an odd way to frame it, but she merely asked, "Who is the man who chased after my sister and her kidnapper in the other van?
Is he CSIS too?"
Interestingly enough, that question brought about a very long pause indeed before Decker said, "He used to be one of us."
Before Dani could ask another question, Decker slowed the van, and she glanced out the windshield to see that they"d reached the end of the street.
"How many bars now, Justin?" he asked.
"Three," came the grim response.
Decker turned the corner going left and drove up this new road, steering the van up a steep hill before slowing to a stop.
"Now?"
"Four out of five bars," was the answer.
"Good enough," Decker decided, and steered the van off the road to park on the small stretch of gra.s.s between the pavement and the row of trees that sided it. "Give me the phone."
"Maybe I should call while Dani tends to your shoulder," Justin suggested quietly, and then pointed out, "She"s a doctor. She"s just going to pester you until you let her look at it, and it really is better if she does it sooner rather than later." He allowed a moment for that to sink in and then added, "Unless you"d like me to"-his gaze slid to Dani before he finished-"do my thing."
"No," Decker said sharply, and then glanced warily to Dani. Seeing that she was listening, he turned back and added, "I can make the call while she tends my shoulder. It was my decision to leave the keys in the SUV, I"ll take the flack."
Justin shrugged and handed over the phone and then turned to Dani. "I didn"t find a first aid kit when I searched the van earlier, so you"ll have to make do with what we have. I have a pocket knife you can use to dig out the bullet, but I don"t know what you"ll use for a bandage and there"s nothing to use to clean the wound."
Dani merely shrugged and accepted the pocket knife he dug out of his pocket and handed to her. She no longer really had any interest in looking at Decker"s shoulder. There was something wrong here, and she was suddenly positive the two men weren"t with CSIS or any other law enforcement organization. Dani was now afraid that she"d escaped one group of crazies only to land in the hands of two more.
However, she"d been insistent on tending to Decker"s shoulder earlier, and demurring now would look suspicious, which was the last thing she wanted. It would be easier to get away if they thought she still believed she was in safe hands and was perfectly content to be there, so Dani merely glanced to Decker and asked, "Where do you want to do this?"
He hesitated and then shifted out of the driver"s seat and moved to join her in the back. The bodies under the tarp took up most of the cargo s.p.a.ce, leaving a very small area for the two of them. Dani turned and moved backward until she came up against the side door to make as much room as possible for him, and Decker shifted to kneel facing her.
When he began to unb.u.t.ton his shirt, she found her eyes following the action, running over every inch revealed until Dani realized what she was doing and turned her attention to the knife she held, occupying herself with opening the blade. She then stared at it, her medical training reminding her that it wasn"t sterile, and poking around in his wound with an unsterilized knife might do more harm than good.
Her gaze slid to the tarp, but Dani glanced back as Decker turned slightly so that the wounded shoulder was closer to her. She peered reluctantly at the bullet wound then, and found herself frowning and leaning closer for a better look.
"What is it?" Decker asked, tension in his voice."I-Nothing," she said quickly, but had trouble schooling her features. Dani didn"t see a lot of bullet wounds in her practice. In fact, she had never seen one, but if she didn"t know better she would have said the man had been shot at least twenty-four hours ago rather than the fifteen minutes or so since the Shootout in the clearing.
"Why are you looking like that? Is there something wrong with the wound?" Decker asked before she could delve too far into the confusing questions plaguing her.
"No," she lied. "It just doesn"t look as bad as I expected."
"I told you it wasn"t bad " he reminded her.
"Yes, you did," she said quietly, her eyes refocusing on the wound. The glow cast by the overhead light wasn"t very strong, but she could see the bullet just inside the wound. That couldn"t be normal. Surely it should have traveled farther in than that?
"Just dig out the bullet and bandage it," Decker said when she simply sat there staring for another moment. "It will be fine."
Dani hesitated and then admitted, "I"m reluctant to use the knife to dig it out. It"s not sterile."
"Neither was the bullet," he said with a shrug, and then turned his attention to punching numbers on the cell phone. Putting it to his ear then, Decker added, "Just dig it out and I"ll have it cleaned up and get some antibiotics later."
Dani sighed and then picked up the knife again, but paused once more and glanced to Justin. "You don"t happen to have a lighter or something, do you?"
"No, but I saw one in the glove compartment, hang on." He disappeared from view, and Dani heard him rummaging around in the glove compartment. After a moment she heard a satisfied grunt, and then Justin leaned around the seat and held out a small, disposable lighter.
Dani accepted it with relief. It wasn"t ideal, but it was certainly better than nothing. She flicked the lighter and ran the flame it produced repeatedly over the blade, trying to move quickly enough that it wouldn"t leave any carbon behind, but slow enough it would kill any germs or bacteria present. When she"d done the best she could, Dani turned to Decker, braced one hand on his shoulder to steady herself, and leaned in. Her mind was on what she was doing, but she couldn"t help but inhale his natural scent as she worked. It was a spicy, woodsy smell that was quite pleasant and made her unconsciously close her mouth to inhale it more deeply through her nose.
"Lucian, Nicholas is up here," Decker said suddenly, nearly startling her into slicing his chest open.
He really should have left Justin to make the call, she thought with irritation, taking a deep breath to steady herself.
"No... there were complications," Decker said into the phone, and then glanced to her and nodded to his chest, saying, "Go ahead."
Dani pressed her lips together, thinking it would be better to wait until he finished his call, but shrugged and leaned in again. She soon found she"d been right and it was the bullet she could see just inside the wound.
"He was-he claimed he was tailing some ro-real bad guys," Decker said, his voice tight as she set to digging out the bullet. It was just below the skin and quick and easy to remove, which just didn"t seem right at all. What kind of gun lodged a bullet just under the skin?
"Yes, you heard me right, he says he"s still hunting down... bad guys even though he"s... retired," Decker said.
Dani set the bullet on the floor of the van, but her attention was on what Decker was saying. It seemed obvious the man was editing his side of the conversation and she would have paid a lot to hear what he really wanted to say, Dani thought as she turned back to the wound. She had expected to find that it had started bleeding freely now that the bullet was out, but there was very little blood at all. It was enough to make her think she needed to go back to school and take a couple of trauma courses. This wasn"t anything like she expected.
"Before I explain that, there are a couple of things I need you to get started on," Decker said as she glanced around for something to use to bandage the wound. While it wasn"t bleeding, it did seem best to bandage it to at least make an effort at lowering the risk of infection. Unfortunately, there wasn"t anything to use to bandage it.
"I need you to have Bastien track the SUV and see where it"s headed," Decker said, and her gaze skittered to him. Tracking the SUV meant finding her sister, something she very much wanted to do, but she was also wondering if bad guys were organized enough to do something like that. It made her think that she might have been wrong and they weren"t bad guys too, despite the odd treatment of the bodies in the van.
Decker suddenly covered the bottom of the phone and said, "That"s good enough. Why don"t you get out and stretch your legs a bit while you have the chance."
It was more an order than a suggestion, and there was no mistaking it. It seemed he wanted privacy for the call. Dani didn"t hesitate; she nodded, turned to open the door behind her, and then slipped out of the van.
It seemed obvious he wasn"t going to say anything revealing in front of her anyway, and she needed time to decide if she should be trying to escape or sticking with them.
Justin didn"t follow her out of the van, but stayed to listen to the conversation, and Dani found herself standing at the side of the road without anyone to stop her from walking away. The problem was she wasn"t sure she should.
Frowning, she began to pace up the road, considering the situation. It seemed obvious that things weren"t as they seemed. It was doubtful these men were with CSIS. She was pretty sure they"d lied to her, and were withholding information.
On the other hand, Decker had risked leaving the cover of the woods and making a target of himself to pull her back up onto the cliff... taking a bullet in the process. That just didn"t seem like the actions of a villain. And then there was the fact that Stephanie had been taken away in their SUV and these men had a way of tracking it. They were her best bet of finding her sister. Perhaps even her only hope of finding her.
She would stay with them for now, Dani decided... but she was going to proceed very very carefully with these men, watch and listen and learn what she could. Her life, and Stephanie"s, might depend on it.
Chapter Three.
"G.o.ddammit, Decker, what the h.e.l.l is going on? What do you mean track the SUV? You lost it? How the h.e.l.l did that happen?
And how could you let Nicholas get away?"
Decker grimaced at that roar in his ear as he watched Dani move a little away from the van, and then said, "It all got a little more complicated than expected."
"Explain."
Decker winced at the sound of grinding teeth that came over the line. The man was p.i.s.sed... to the point that he was in danger of snapping off a fang if he wasn"t careful. Clearing his throat, he relayed his conversation with Nicholas and everything that had happened.
A moment of silence followed when he finished speaking, and then his uncle slowly said, "Let me get this straight, Nicholas is still chasing rogues even though he"s rogue himself?"
"So he said," Decker answered noncommittally.
"And you two helped with this nest?"
"Yes." Decker"s gaze slid to the tarp-covered bodies. "There were six. They had a campsite in the woods and there"s a little ravine next to it with two bodies in it. From the quick look I took, they"re in a bad way. These guys butchered them... slowly."
"Tell me where it is and I"ll have a cleanup crew go out and see if anything needs doing before the authorities can be led to them," Lucian said wearily.
Decker quickly told him the name of the road and gave directions to the ravine. When he finished, Lucian asked, "What about these rogues? Did you catch them?"
"Only four," he admitted grimly. "They had two new girls they"d just s.n.a.t.c.hed and we managed to rescue one of them, but the sixth man got away using the second girl as cover. He-" Decker paused and cleared his throat before admitting, "I"d left the keys in the SUV in case Nicholas made a run for it and we needed to give chase in a hurry. The sixth rogue took advantage of that and stole the SUV for his getaway. Nicholas took off after them in his van while Bricker and I were taking care of the others."
Lucian cursed on the other end of the line and then snapped, "What about the other rogue? You say he got away too?"
"Yes. There were five down when I rushed after Nicholas. When we went back to the clearing, there were only four. Either the fifth one faked being hit, or we got bullets coated with a weak batch of tranquilizer and he recovered enough to get away in the few minutes we were gone."
"What did you do with the four still there?"
"We staked them to be sure they didn"t recover and have them with us right now. It seemed better than leaving them for someone to find."