edge of his cot and twisted the crick from his neck. Squinting into the dust motes that filled the rays of morning sunshine, he wondered what kind of hell awaited him today.
Especially after he’d gotten an unexpected glimpse of heaven last night.
Tasiya Belov was a damn sight prettier than that scraggly Bristoe fella with the dirty hands and playground taunts who’d brought his bread and water the past seven nights. The insults and tough talk didn’t faze him—Bristoe was a misguided kid trying to prove himself a man. But it sure was nice to finally get a taste of food that was clean and water that was fresh.
It was nicer to get a look at Tasiya.
Bryce rubbed at the skin chafing beneath his wrist manacles and thought himself twelve kinds of fool. He should have come up with something decent to say to her, or kept his big mouth shut the way he usually did. Then, at least, he could have enjoyed the view a little longer. All that curly hair—blacker than the night around them—falling nearly to her waist. Skin that was as pale and pearlescent in the moonlight as her lashes were thick and dark. Lashes that surrounded wide, slightly tilted eyes the shade of rich, robust coffee.
Or maybe that was just the scent he got off her. Homey. Normal. Like his grandma’s good cookin’. Far removed from any of the crap that was going on around here. Something about Tasiya’s fairy-tale beauty and quiet ways had breached the cool reserve he wore like a suit of armor. He didn’t allow himself to be attracted to many women. By age thirty-three, he’d wised up to that futility. But Tasiya Belov, with the exotic eyes and accent, had gotten to him before he could distance himself from a man’s basic, male reaction to a beautiful woman.
So, of course he’d warned her off.
His chains jangled as he crawled onto the floor and squared off to do a set of push-ups. For years he’d used physical activity to dull the aches and longings and regrets of his life. What he couldn’t burn out of his system this way, he tried to ignore.
Bryce knew he wasn’t any great shakes to look at. The burn scars were old news; he’d had them since he was a kid, from the car accident that had killed his folks. The shrapnel scars that marked the end of his military career were more recent, more shocking to the unfamiliar eye. And the condition he was in now made his appearance even less appealing than usual.
It was a fact of his life. He was a big, scary-looking man. It made him a formidable enemy, a boon to his second career as a bounty hunter working for his former military commander, Cameron Murphy. He used his intimidating countenance to his advantage; few of the criminals he’d brought in expected the big guy to be so smart, or so good with his hands. And yeah, if it came down to it, he could out-bust just about anybody in hand-to-hand combat.
He’d had years to learn to accept his fate. It shouldn’t bother him.
But when Tasiya had looked at him with those wide, frightened eyes, he’d felt like a monster.
Yep, she’d had to muster up some real guts to hold out that cup of water. As if treatin’ him like a human being was some kind of apology—like she’d done this to him. Or maybe it was defiance that had made her reach out to him. But what was she taking a stand against? Him? Boone Fowler? Her own fear?
And what the hell was a beautiful woman from Lukinburg, of all places, doing here on this godforsaken island? The Special Forces unit he and his buddies from Big Sky had been ambushed with had been secretly prepping for a covert surgical strike into Lukinburg. The UN wanted to oust their despotic king and restore democratic rule there. Bryce’s former unit was supposed to be the first team in—to gather intel and remove a few key leaders.
So how had Boone Fowler’s militia gotten wind of that attack when the team had been under a communication blackout for days?
He did one last push-up, shoving himself up and bracing his weight over his arms. An image of a willowy woman with frightened eyes blipped into his thoughts. Surely not. A Lukinburg spy on the militia’s payroll? They’d never go for it. The whole point of Boone Fowler’s life—beyond his quest for vengeance against Cameron Murphy and the Big Sky team who’d put him in prison before his escape a few months back—was to cleanse America of any foreigners. And to keep Americans off foreign soil and out of foreign business.
So where did Tasiya fit in?
Dammit. He was thinking about her again. He was curious. Worried. Swift one, Sarge.
Bryce clapped his hands together as he pushed to his feet to do a round of squats. The noise startled some movement in the corner of his cell. He slowly sank to his haunches and smiled.
His little mouse friend was back, scoping out the nooks between the stones, scrounging for crumbs. Bryce’s empty stomach growled right on cue.
“You’re outta luck, buddy,” he teased his furry roommate. They both were.
He was doing his best to stay in peak physical condition in case the opportunity for escape presented itself. But his insides felt as if they were rubbing together. A little extra food would go a long way to maintain his strength and keep his thinking sharp. If there were any crusts of bread around, he’d have gone after them himself.
Bryce stilled as the mouse scurried between the steel bars and disappeared into the darkness of the passageway beyond.
Smart mouse.
Crossing to the locked cell door, Bryce wrapped his fists around the cold, unyielding steel and pressed his forehead to the bars to peer into the shadows.
That’s what he should be doing, searching this place.
But not for bread crumbs.
Let’s replay this escape scenario again. He needed to get outside to get the lay of the place. Scoping out the location of the other prisoners and ascertaining a sense of schedules, the number of militiamen at the compound and security protocols could secure a way off the island. Bryce had no doubt they were somewhere off the eastern coastline of the U.S. They hadn’t been transported by air, and after he regained consciousness on the boat they’d been tied up in, they’d traveled only a couple of hours. Not long enough to get them out of the country.
And it had to be the ocean. He recognized the smell of the salt in the air. In the still of the night he’d identified the pummeling of waves hitting land with a force too powerful to be a lake or river’s edge.
But knowing he was on an island in the Atlantic was hardly enough information to mount an escape attempt. And if he couldn’t get out of this hole to investigate for himself, then he needed to make a connection with someone who did have the freedom to move about the place.
Tasiya Belov.
A tight fist gripped his stomach and squeezed. He hated the idea of using her. But it made better sense than digging the mortar from around the bars at the window and climbing out into who knew what kind of situation.
He’d spotted the armload of keys around her wrist and suspected they could get him into nearly every place he needed to go. They could get him out of these chains, at any rate, and that would give him the ability to move about the compound with less chance of being detected.
That had been his first thought, grab the keys. But, short of using brute force against the woman—which wasn’t his style—that wasn’t gonna happen.
That left convincing her to befriend him, to run a few errands for him. Of course, he had no idea whether or not he could trust that she’d bring back the truth. Skittish as she seemed, she might run straight to Boone Fowler and tell him what the monster had asked of her.
Yeah, that’d go over real big in the escape-and-bring-these-murdering-bastards-to-justice department.
That left charming the woman.
A nearly impossible feat.
Long days out in the hills of the Missouri Ozarks where he’d grown up—hunting, fishing, camping—and quiet evenings spent on the porch with the grandparents who’d raised him didn’t go a long way toward developing a man’s sweet-talkin’ ways.