Going Dark Read online

  She knew that it had worked when after a pause, he cursed. “Get in the damned boat, Hanoi Jane.” She bristled at that. “But as soon as we hit land, you are on your own. Got it?”

  “Aye-aye, Captain,” she said with a mock solute. “Anyone ever tell you that you’d make a great drill sergeant?”

  She’d meant it as a joke, but his expression suddenly sobered. It would be an improvement over the anger if it wasn’t tinged with that grim sadness.

  “Maybe once or twice.” He held out his hand to her. “If you’re coming, make it fast.”

  “What about my bag?”

  He gave her a look. “Good riddance. It’s too girlie for you anyway.”

  Ignoring the fact that she thought the same thing when her mother had given it to her, she said, “What is that supposed to mean?”

  “It means that the whole ‘pink is for girls, blue is for boys’ gender color conventions probably offends your feminist sensibilities.”

  They did. But the fact that he’d guessed that was mildly annoying. “Let me guess. Your favorite color is blue?”

  His mouth quirked into something resembling a smile. “Get in the boat, Bambi.”

  Bambi? She couldn’t decide whether the stripper name was better or worse than the slam at Jane Fonda’s regrettable photos on an antiaircraft gun on a visit to Hanoi during the Vietnam War.

  To get to the ladder, she had to climb over the gunwale. There was usually a step stool, but she couldn’t find it, so she started to lift her leg to roll over only to be grabbed from behind.

  She recognized the stench of leather and cigarettes even before he spoke.

  It was her turn to swear. Cutting the engine or dropping the anchor must have woken him.

  “Going somewhere, mademoiselle?” Jean Paul asked, mock laughter in his voice. The single arm wrapped around her waist was surprisingly strong as he swept her around to look down over the side. “Get out of the boat, Captain.”

  Annie looked at Dan, and oddly it was his expression and not the fact that she was being manhandled and threatened by Jean Paul that made her heart stop.

  Maybe she should reconsider the psychopathic-killer thing. The captain looked cold, deadly, dangerous, and utterly in control. That “you don’t want to fuck with me” air was back with a vengeance.

  “Let her go,” he said in a voice as hard as steel. “Annie is coming with me.”

  “Neither of you is going anywhere.” Jean Paul had barely finished when he backed up his words by pulling something from his coat pocket.

  Oh God, it was a gun. A SIG Sauer semiautomatic pistol to be specific. Her father had carried a similar weapon—a SIG P226—as his service sidearm as a Ranger and later when he’d been recruited for Delta. The Beretta M9 had been standard issue, but he’d preferred the SIG. Why she thought that was important right now, she didn’t know.

  Unfortunately, if the way Jean Paul was holding it was any indication, he knew how to use it.

  He had the gun aimed at the captain, but when it didn’t make him move fast enough he moved it to her head. She’d been struggling to get free, but at the sensation of the cold metal kissing her temple, she stilled. Her heart was thumping like an out-of-control freight train, but her mind seemed to open—as if she could see everything in extraordinary detail.

  “Wait!” Annie heard Julien’s voice from behind her. He must have just come up from below. “What are you doing? You said she wouldn’t get hurt.”

  “She won’t,” Jean Paul said. “As long as the captain doesn’t do anything stupid.” He looked back down at Dan. “What’s it going to be, Captain?” He seemed to be reading Dan’s mind aloud. “Take your chances in the boat, and the girl is killed either before or after I fire at you. You might get away—you might not. We’ll both have to live with her death on our hands. I assure you it will mean nothing to me, but can you say the same?” He smiled smugly. “Maybe I was wrong about what I saw, but I don’t think so.”

  Whatever he meant, Dan didn’t argue the point. “What’s to stop you from putting a bullet in my head as soon as I’m up there?”

  “Nothing,” Jean Paul said with an indifferent shrug. “You’ll just have to trust me. But until I’m sure that Claude can captain the boat, I do have incentive to keep you around.”

  “Fair enough,” Dan said.

  Annie didn’t know what was more surreal: that she had a gun pointed to her head or the way that they were calmly talking about murder.

  A moment later, Dan was standing by her side. As glad as she was for the company right now, she wished she hadn’t gotten him into this.

  Jean Paul moved the gun from her head, and she exhaled, not realizing until that moment that she’d been holding her breath. It wasn’t quite with relief, however, as the gun was still pointed in her direction. He was eyeing the captain as if he were a dangerous animal that could attack at any time.

  “There are some plastic zip ties in my bag,” Jean Paul said to Claude, who’d suddenly appeared next to Julien. “Go get them.”

  Neither man looked happy about the situation, but Julien was the only one staring at her with big puppy dog eyes, pleading for understanding. To keep the analogy going . . . he was barking up the wrong tree.

  Claude returned a moment later with the entire bag.

  “Secure his hands first,” Jean Paul instructed, nodding toward Dan.

  The captain didn’t protest and held out his hands. He seemed oddly complacent. Maybe too complacent. It didn’t seem to go along with what she knew of him. She would have said he was a born fighter.

  Obviously she’d watched too many Tom Hardy movies—she was confusing Dan with one of the characters portrayed by the actor.

  Or maybe not. Jean Paul must have picked up on it as well. “Use two,” he said after Claude finished securing the first. Waving the gun toward the gunwale, Jean Paul ordered Dan to “Get down against the side.”

  The captain sat as instructed, and a moment later, Claude was securing one of the ties around his ankles. It wasn’t easy to do with the captain’s boots, but the tie was just long enough.

  It was her turn next. Jean Paul finally released her and pushed her toward Claude. Her hands were secured—with only one tie—and she was ordered to sit next to the captain.

  She was happy to do so and might have sat a little closer to him than was necessary. But she couldn’t deny that the heat and press of his powerful body against hers were comforting. Maybe big and muscular did have their time and place. Sadly her education and PhD hadn’t prepared her for being taken captive by ecoterrorists. She would allow herself this Tarzan/Jane moment of awareness, but when it was all over, she would go back to independent and strong on her own.

  While Claude was securing the tie around her ankles, Dan asked, “You okay?”

  She nodded. “I’m fine.” She looked at him, her heart suddenly in her throat. “I’m sorry.”

  He nodded in acknowledgment. “Don’t worry. It will be all right.”

  She wanted to believe him, and oddly enough she did. Maybe it was the certainty in his voice or the utter calmness of his demeanor, but she felt her spirits lift.

  “Claude,” Jean Paul said. “See if you can get the boat running again.”

  Claude headed to the wheelhouse while Jean Paul and Julien stood guard. Jean Paul was leaning against the opposite side of the boat, smoking a cigarette while holding the gun on them. He’d given himself plenty of room to react if the captain tried anything. Julien stood a few feet away at the rail, also smoking, looking out to sea with his back to her—almost as if he couldn’t bear to meet her gaze.

  Weak.

  Maybe her father hadn’t been all wrong.

  The weather had turned since they’d left Stornoway, with the sun disappearing behind a gray cloud of the famous Scottish mist, the temperature dropping by at least twenty deg