“W-what?” Harry choked but I was already racing into the dorm.
“Get up!” I yelled and instantly, five heads poked up from their respective beds. “Get up and get armed.”
Pandemonium broke loose as the men jumped to attention, the concern and confusion on their faces evident.
“What the hell happened?”
“Who did this?”
“What’s going on?”
I ripped open Sasha’s pajama top to look at the wound and exhaled.
“Bash, get me the medical kit. It’s a through and through.”
She was losing a lot of blood, her milky white skin almost translucent but the angle of the bullet seemed to have taken out only tissue. I prayed she wouldn’t have any mobility issues.
“Dammit, Dan, who did this?” Graham yelled, hovering over me as I applied pressure to the wound. I cast him a sidelong look as I continued to work.
“Her team,” I said flatly. “The woman, I think.”
“I told you!” Graham roared, kicking the foot of the bed. “Didn’t I tell you?”
“This isn’t the time for you to lose control, Graham,” I told him in an even tone. “If you’re not going to stand guard, then get out of my way.”
“I’m going to kill them both!” Graham raged and I grabbed his arm before he could move.
“I already told you once tonight,” I hissed. “Don’t do anything stupid. I’m going to patch her up and—”
“She’s waking up!” Graham interrupted and I whipped my head back toward her.
“Hey,” I said quietly. “How are you doing?”
“She’s trying to kill me!” Sasha squealed, trying to sit up. “Amanda Queenie—”
“I know,” I told her soothingly. “It’s all right. You need to be still. No one’s going to hurt you here.”
I shot the others a nervous look. I didn’t know how true that was. We could hold them off for a while, sure but if they came back with reinforcements…
“Why don’t you tell us what happened,” I said soothingly, my hand firmly on the wound to stop the bleeding.
“It’s Mirror, Mirror,” Sasha gasped. “They’re evil! They’re a danger to the environment and they’ve been covering it up. She’s been trying to kill me. She’s the one who sent me out into the storm. She’s the one who shot me. I don’t know who else knows…”
She wasn’t making a lot of sense but from what I could glean, she’d stumbled upon some form of corporate espionage.
And that was never good.
If the secret is worth killing for, we’re all in trouble.
“We’re going to get you out of here,” I promised her. “I’m going to cauterize the wound and we’ll fly you out on the chopper—tonight.”
“I’m going with her,” Graham said firmly.
“Me too!” Bash cried.
“Yeah, me too,” Harry offered and I nodded.
“I think we should all go with you,” I told her. “It’s the safest thing for everyone.”
Sasha looked at me dubiously before gazing around the room.
“You can’t just pick up and leave in the middle of a contract,” she murmured. “You’ve got work to do.”
Her gaze returned to me.
“You’re stressed enough as it is.”
I almost laughed.
She was bleeding from a gunshot wound, on the run for her life and she was worried about my stress levels.
“We’re doing this,” I told her, glancing up at my companions. “Unless anyone has any objections.”
“Nope.”
“No way.”
“We’re going.”
She raised her head weakly and stared at us gratefully.
“I should have never left you guys,” she muttered weakly. “I shouldn’t have left…”
“Shh,” I murmured, gently dropping her head back onto the pillow. “I’m going to give you something for the pain now. It’s going to hurt like hell when I cauterize the shot but if I don’t, you’ll bleed out.”
“Do what you have to do, Doc,” she mumbled and I could see she was losing consciousness again.
I needed to work fast and I signaled for the others to help me.
“Stevie, get the chopper ready,” I instructed. “We’re getting the hell out of here within the hour.”
22
Sasha
It was my first time on a helicopter and I found myself wary about the eight of us traveling in such a small vessel but Graham assured me it was perfectly safe.
And if Graham was claiming it was safe, I couldn’t really be worried, could I? He was the biggest alarmist out of all of them.
We rose into the blackened sky and I looked down at the frozen landscape with bittersweet emotions.
It seemed like a lifetime ago that I’d wanted to come on this trip, so young and idealistic, so full of hope and inspiration.
That wasn’t even a week ago.
Now, I was running for my life in a helicopter with a bunch of stranger-turned-lovers, wondering where the hell it had all gone so wrong.
Or had it gone right?
To say I was confused was an understatement. I couldn’t settle on a single emotion. In one moment, I was staring around the chopper with adoration dripping from my eyes. My gaze darted from one concerned face to another and a part of me wanted to strip off my clothes and have my way with all of them in the helicopter, thinking about how hot it would be.
I quickly decided against it, simply for safety’s sake, no matter how tempting it was.
Then, I I’d peer down into endless waters of the North Atlantic below us and I would realize how close I’d been to death.
In those moments, shudders would encompass my body. Bash and Dan would sandwich me between them until I was still again.
“Where are we going?” I asked. We’d been flying for over an hour and again, the rush of fear seized me.
“We’re going to stop for fuel in Scotland,” Graham explained over his headset. He was piloting the chopper. “We can figure out a plan from there.” I wondered if there was no end to the talents of my men. Drillers, accountants, helicopter pilots, sexual deviants. What else would I learn about them?
I looked forward to finding out.
“How long until we get there?” I asked.
“A couple hours,” came the reply and Bash squeezed my hand.
“Just relax,” he murmured and despite my overwhelming anxiety, I found his nearness soothing.
“I’ll try,” I agreed, dropping my head against his shoulder.
We arrived in Inverness before dawn but the sky had already lightened enough by five a.m. that I realized I was going to see dawn at its proper time for once since I’d left home.
Speaking of home, I’d need to get in touch with Alex ASAP. I’d promised to call her today and she’d be in a panic if I didn’t. My phone was still on the bathroom floor at the research facility where I’d dropped it. What was it with me losing phones? First I’d left one the day the storm had started and then I dropped my backup. Maybe if I wasn’t in mortal danger all the time, I’d be more careful.
In any event, I’d need to pick one up in town, just to keep in touch with Alex. After the scares I’d given her, she’d be on the phone with Interpol if I went a day without being in touch.
“We should stay here for a couple days and figure out a plan,” my ever-sensible Dan said when we gathered at the helipad. “We’re off the radar here but we need to work out where we’re going to stay.”
There was a nod of consensus.
“Let’s find a hotel,” Harry suggested and I looked at him gratefully. There was nothing I wanted more than to have a hot shower and curl up in a warm, comfy bed with my guardian angels.
“Shouldn’t be too hard,” Jim mused. “This is a bit of a tourist location.”
I wouldn’t have guessed it, being in the Scottish Highlands but it turned out that Jim was right and we found ourselves at the Kingsmill Hotel, a reverted mansion turned inn.
“It’s not the cabin but it will do,” Jim chuckled and I felt a stab of guilt for uprooting their lives.
We were piled into the room the men had reserved for me and I sank onto the bed, shaking my head.
“It’s not too late for you to go back,” I told them earnestly. “You’ve gotten me to safety now. I can fend for myself.”
There was a simultaneous scoff and like a sea of testosterone, they surged toward me, falling around me.
Seth slipped off my shoes, a gift Harry had bought me when we landed. I’d been still wearing pajamas when we left and the moment we’d left the helipad, my boys treated me to a new wardrobe.
“We can’t very well walk into a hotel with you in socks and pajamas, can we?” Dan teased me.
Seth massaged my toes and I sighed, sinking back against Graham’s broad chest behind me.
“We’re not going anywhere,” Jim told, me, dipping my face toward him for a kiss and I returned it eagerly. How could I have missed them so much when we’d only been apart a few hours?
As I wrapped my arm around Jim’s neck, Bash’s hand slid against my breast, reaching beneath the thick angora to tease my nipple.
The kisses started then, along my calf and thigh, and Seth took my big toe in his mouth.