“I don’t know what you want,” she said in a pleading voice. Then she realized what they meant. Oh, God. They wanted the SOS device, the thumb drive…and it was packed far away from her in some lost and found storage facility. “I don’t have it.”
As her captor dropped his beefy hand, the mustached man backhanded her across the face. “You know where it is. Tell me now, or I’ll dispose of you.”
The stinging in her cheek was nothing compared to her potential outcome as a slain woman dumped into a trash bin in a foreign country where she knew no one. Using the moment to her advantage, she screamed, “ISAAC!”
Within two second, she heard a fist beating at her door. “Mindy, are you okay? Answer me, honey.”
Without regard, her captor flung her against the wall. Her head hit hard, and she slumped down. The two escaped out the window to the fire escape.
Holding her head, she whimpered, “Isaac?”
A second later, the door crashed in. “Mindy?”
“I’m here.”
“Oh, God.” He crouched beside her, brushing her hair from her red cheek. “Oh, hell. What happened?” It took him three seconds to figure it out. He glared at the window where her curtains blustered. “Those sons of bitches.”
Isaac lunged for the open window and swooped down the fire escape after them. But they had too much of a head start on him. He watched them escape down the alleyway, knowing he had two choices. Go after them. Or go to Mindy.
Without knowledge of how Russian authorities worked, having only lived in the country the first six years of his life, he chose Mindy. He climbed back up the fire escape and crawled through her open window.
“Oh.” She flinched, hunching against the wall.
“It’s okay, sweetheart. It’s me, Isaac. They can’t hurt you now.”
Approaching her on the floor, he scooped her into his arms and held her. His heart broke as she curled against him for protection against an enemy he couldn’t slay.
“C’mon honey. Let’s go to my room.”
Her pale face contorted as grasped at his collar. “What if they come back?”
“It won’t matter once we get you to my room.”
“Wh-what about my things?” Her gaze darted around to the mess those men had created. “They’ll come back. I know they will. They’ll destroy everything.”
Considering the recent incident, he could understand her attachment to the few familiar items that gave her comfort, via her carryon. “It’s okay, sweetheart. I’ll get your things. From now on, you’ll stay in my room. With me.”
Chapter 4
Clearly in shock, Mindy looked around her room as if the shadows would come alive and strike her. He needed to reassure her before he uprooted her from the space. “Sit down, sweetheart. You’re shaking.”
Though she took a step toward the bed, her hands seemed unable to let go of his shirt.
Clutching her tight, he moved with her to the edge of the mattress and sat down with her. He smoothed a hand down her hair, loose and tangled from the encounter with the thieves. “You’ll be all right. Take a deep breath.”
The air she inhaled sounded like a cross between a gasp and a sob.
It wrung his heart. “Did they say what they wanted? Why they were here? Could you understand them at all?”
Slowly she lifted her shell-shocked gaze to him. He hated seeing fear in those innocent pastel eyes. “They wanted the security device.”
“The SOS thumb drive?”
As she nodded, a tear shook loose from her lashes.
“How the hell would anyone else know about it?” he muttered more to himself than to her.
Two reasons struck him. Either the Markovs were shady and they wanted to steal the technology instead of paying for it. Or a rival with a grudge had learned of their security alliance and planned to one-up the Markovs by getting their hands on the device first. A third possibility left a bad taste in his mouth—a personal connection higher up in the Markov crew was stabbing them in the back and using a vulnerable woman as a means to an end. Possibly one of the men who’d been at the table tonight.
Come to think of it, Marcus had been talking with Mindy much of the night until she revealed she didn’t have the device on her. Soon after, he’d left the table to take a phone call. To take one—or to make one updating a third party to look for the device in her room?
This deal concerned him more by the minute. Except his family had vouched for the Markovs, had put Isaac in touch with them. While his extended family had its share of spats and disagreements, they were a tight group. No one would set Isaac up like this. Not knowingly, anyway.