Cutthroat: Sutton Capital Series, Book Eight Page 15

  “Yeah. Like I said, maybe he’s older than he looks. She was high on all kinds of pain pills and shit when she died.”

  Jarrod shook his head. They’d seen that shit all too often.

  “And get this, her dad is William Tyvek.”

  Jarrod glanced at the pages Cal had given him moments before. “As in Tyvek Technologies?”

  “Yup. That guy. Started the company and built it from nothing. She was his only daughter. Apparently, he raised her on his own after the mom died of cancer when she was a little girl.”

  Jarrod raised a brow at Cal, who simply shrugged in return. “It was in the articles I read. Sad story.”

  Jarrod agreed, but he wasn’t going to sit here and hash it out like some soap opera. “So, that means Tyvek Technologies, the memorial fund, and Simms Pharmaceutical are all linked? And all of them are major funders for the clinic?” Jarrod shook his head.

  “I’m not sure if Branson Medical is tied into them somehow or not.” Cal lowered his frame into the ancient chair in front of his desk and leaned back.

  “Jax overheard Carrie Hastings talking to Staunton. He said Jonathan and the CEO of Branson Medical were friends. It’s a loose connection, but it’s enough to keep them on our list of people to look at in my book.”

  “Agreed,” Cal said, with a nod. “I’ll find out who the major players at Branson are. See if that leads us anywhere else.”

  * * *

  Mia watched as the doctor walked into the old factory complex. She checked her door locks once again and glanced around. The area was abandoned. Apparently, the rumors about development taking place here either weren’t true, or the development wouldn’t be happening for a while.

  She looked at her phone again and put it on vibrate. She wanted to wait for Jax, but she also didn’t want to lose track of where the doctor was. Slipping her phone in her back pocket, she unlocked the doors and crossed the street, her head on a swivel checking behind her the whole time.

  Her dad had been taken away due to a series of horrible events. In her mind at that moment, everything was building up inside her, screaming at her to seek justice for a man who’d lost his wife and children. She’d lost not only her father but a brother she’d never have the chance to know. Her mother had lost her husband and son.

  Her father had lost everything.

  The thought that this doctor might have taken her dad away just when they’d had a shot at somehow having a relationship again fueled her anger and her actions.

  She slipped into the complex, looking around at the rusted fire escapes and the broken windows.

  What the hell is the doctor doing here? For once, she didn’t voice the words aloud. She didn’t make a sound as she pressed herself against one of the buildings and waited, watching the door the doctor had gone through.

  She took out her phone again and checked the screen. No texts. No calls.

  Mia heard shouting. Dr. Coleman was fighting with someone. Damn. She looked at her phone again and moved closer to the door he’d gone through. She could hear the shouting.

  Need to hurry. Doctor arguing with someone.

  She tapped the message out, then stood and waited. She shifted on her feet, checking over her shoulder again. This was stupid. She needed to get back to her car with its locked doors. She was safe there. If anyone came at her, she could drive away and get to help.

  She turned to walk back, but stopped. There was still the sound of the raised, angry voices, but there was something else as well. Someone crying out. Muffled, as though the person’s face or mouth was blocked, but definitely there.

  Mia strained to hear it. The sound was gone. She’d imagined it.

  She turned again, before spinning back.

  “I didn’t imagine that,” she said to herself, almost a whisper.

  Her phone pinged a text alert.

  Wait for me! Wait!

  Mia switched her phone to silent and looked back toward the building. She couldn’t ignore those cries. She just couldn’t.

  She entered the building the same way she’d seen the doctor go, and carefully made her way up a flight of stairs toward the sound of shouting.

  No. When she got near enough, she could tell it was more than just shouting. There was a physical fight going on now, too. The sound of flesh and bone being hit reverberated through her ears. It sickened her and she turned to run, but heard the crying once again.

  A woman crying. No doubt about it.

  She cursed under her breath. This was crazy. Her memory of being attacked came back to her and she thought she might be sick as her whole body seemed to tense for flight. She needed to run. To get out of here and get help. But how could she when she had no doubt in her mind someone was in trouble there?

  Mia followed the stifled sounds down several doors. “Stupid, stupid, stupid.” She was that stupid girl in the horror movie. The one you couldn’t help yell at.

  She turned the doorknob on the room it was coming from as quietly as she could. Indecision and fear tore at her, but she couldn’t leave. Not without trying to help.

  There were still voices coming from the other end of the hall, but they weren’t raised now. Whoever was fighting in there, they seemed to have stopped for the moment. As though one had won the fight and now held the fate of the other in their hands.

  The thought sent a chill through her.

  She opened the door and looked inside.

  “Oh God.” Mia rushed forward, dropping to her knees. “Darla,” she whispered as her hands tore at the tape on the woman’s ankles first. It was duct tape. She couldn’t get it to tear in anything other than thin strips.

  Mia looked around as Darla began to whimper. She had a large gash on the side of her head that was oozing thick blood at a slow pace. There was dried blood on her shirt, as though the wound had bled more profusely at some point, and dried over time. Her face was swollen and bruised, and one eye was nearly shut.

  “Shh. You have to be quiet, Darla. They’re close by. Just let me find something to cut this with.” Mia crawled to the other side of the small closet that was Darla’s prison.

  She found an overturned bucket, a few rags, and empty boxes. Whatever this closet had once held had been rifled through and pilfered a long time ago.

  A rusted piece of one of the metal shelves held the most promise. She picked it up and turned it over in her hands, hoping the slightly sharp corner on one side might be enough.

  It seemed to take hours as she cut through the tape, bit by bit. Her hands slipped several times as her heart raced and sweat beaded on her face. When Darla’s ankles were free, Mia turned to the tape on her hands. The last to go was the tape across her mouth, which Mia pulled off in one fast swipe of her hand. Darla grunted but kept her lips pressed together to silence herself as she brought her hands up to her face and covered the stinging skin.

  Mia whispered. “The stairs are at the end of the hall. Can you walk?”

  “I’m not sure.”

  Mia draped her arm under the other woman’s arms to help give her leverage and lift her to stand.

  “I’ve been here all night,” Darla said, limping forward in a slow shuffle.

  “We don’t have time.” Mia could hear the panic in her voice, but she knew they had only minutes to get out of the building. Something about the way the men had been fighting told her this was about to be a very bad place to be.

  She moved awkwardly to the door, with Darla leaning heavily on her.

  “I’m sorry. Body’s half asleep.”

  “Listen Darla,” she whispered, “we have to move now. Lean on me. We need to make it to the stairwell at the end of the hall.”

  Mia held her breath as they moved. The room where the men had been fighting was all too quiet now and fear like she’d never known flooded her body.

  Twenty more feet. She focused on the stairwell, Darla’s weight too much for her to hold.

  A shout behind her. Dr. Coleman.

  Mia looked toward the stairw
ell and focused on getting them to the door. They weren’t going to make it.

  Chapter 31

  The sound of the gunshot was enough to make Mia jump and she lost her hold on Darla.

  “This way.” Darla tugged at Mia’s hand and pulled her into a room. She was walking better now and Mia hoped that meant the circulation was coming back into her legs. Either that or adrenaline was pushing the woman onward regardless of her condition.

  Darla shut the door behind her and pushed a chair under the door knob. Broken abandoned furniture littered the room.

  “The fire escape.” Darla pointed as if she’d been in this building before and Mia realized it was probably a place where homeless people could get out of the elements at night or during cold weather.

  Mia didn’t like Darla’s plan at all. She’d seen the state of the fire escapes on the old building when she’d come in. Rust covered the metal and she wouldn’t be at all surprised to find gaps in the steps. She looked over her shoulder as they heard a man curse loudly.

  She had a feeling Darla’s captor had just discovered she was gone.

  The two women went out the window, Darla leading the way. Mia tried not to look down. They were only four stories off the ground. If she didn’t look down, just put one foot in front of the other, she could make it.

  God, she hoped Jax was on his way. This was the dumbest thing she’d ever done. Hands down.

  Then again, if she hadn’t done it, she had a feeling Darla would be dead. She didn’t know yet why that man had Darla or what his plans were for her, but a woman trussed up in an abandoned building was never a good thing.

  Rusted metal cut into her hands as she clenched the stair rail, and her stomach swirled. They were almost at the bottom, where they’d have to go down the last bit on a ladder.

  Neither woman talked, but it seemed to Mia that their breathing would give them away. It sounded so loud in her ears. Surely Darla’s captor could hear them and know exactly where they were.

  The door to the building flew open and a large man came barreling out of it. He looked around wildly as Mia and Darla froze, not daring to breathe. Her heart felt like it would break through the wall of her chest at any moment. They were sitting ducks if he looked up.

  Mia held tight to the railing trying to make herself as small as possible. Trying not to move.

  In the end it didn’t matter that they didn’t move. The man scanned the courtyard in all directions, before looking up. As he raised his gun, Mia shouted.

  “Up Darla! Up!” She began to climb, straining to move faster and faster. A shot rent the air and something hit the metal next to Mia. Her arm stung, as though she’d been bitten by something much stronger than a mosquito, but her legs continued to churn. She stumbled and fell on the steps, but righted herself and kept moving. She could hear Darla behind her, but the woman was falling behind.

  Mia turned back, grabbing at Darla’s jacket to try to pull the woman along with her. Shots continued, but she wasn’t able to tell how close they were coming. The man seemed to be firing wildly and all she could pray for was that he was a bad shot.

  Would the police even come if shots were reported in this area? Would it matter?

  The police couldn’t possibly arrive in time to help them.

  Mia saw movement out of the corner of her eye. Jax.

  She didn’t have time to process the wave of relief that hit her at the same time that dread hit. She was both relieved he was there, but also now more fearful for his safety than for her own.

  Jax flew at the gunman, taking them both down to the ground. Mia screamed. She watched in horror as the two men grappled on the ground.

  Jax had the gunman’s arm and looked like he was trying to break it as the man struggled to hold onto the weapon.

  Jax was on top, but the other man was so much bigger than him. So much that it scared the daylights out of Mia. The man’s movements were awkward and clumsy, but sheer size gave him the advantage.

  “Stay here,” Mia said to Darla as she started back down the ladder. She had to do something. She couldn’t just stand by and watch Jax get hurt. Or worse.

  The gunman let out a scream that could only be caused by pain and Mia saw the gun fly from his hand. Jax hit him and the crack of bone reverberating through the air was a sickening sound she knew would never leave her.

  The gunman recovered too quickly, as she scrambled down the steps, finally getting to the ladder part of the fire escape. She’d forgotten to be frightened of the rusted steps and the height. She saw only Jax as the tides turned and the large man began to strike back with giant meaty hands.

  She knew those hands. They’d pinned her to the ground, struck her. This was the man who’d attacked her. Her hands shook, but she moved forward.

  Jax lost his footing as the larger man rolled, punching Jax again and again. Mia felt sick.

  She all but slid down the last rungs of the ladder, before dropping to the ground. She looked frantically around for the gun.

  There.

  She picked it up but realized she couldn’t shoot at them. She had no idea how to fire a gun, and she was a lot more likely to hit Jax than she was to hit the other man.

  Jax rolled the two again, hitting back as the other man went down.

  Mia looked around the courtyard. It was strewn with garbage and junk.

  She hefted a large piece of metal that looked like it had once belonged to the fire escape. How that thing had held her and Darla, she would never know.

  Mia cursed as she realized she couldn’t heft the weight of the bar without putting down the gun. There wasn’t time to think the options through. She gave up the gun for the bar and came around behind the two men.

  Jax was on top of the gunman. He yelled something to Mia but she didn’t know what.

  The gunman kicked out from under Jax. Mia watched in horror as he dove for her, grabbing her before she could swing the metal bar.

  He had her around the throat and was moving with her suspended like a rag doll before she knew what had happened. Pain shot through her neck and shoulder.

  The gunman stopped, hitting a dead end where he’d corralled himself in the courtyard with no way to get to any of the exits.

  She felt his hot breath close to her ear and a violent tremor raced through her as she remembered being pinned to the ground beneath him. Remembered his tongue on her face.

  “I think I’ll take you with me this time, baby,” he said, nuzzling at her neck. His face was rough with stubble and she wanted to shove him away, but it was all she could do to stand on her tip toes and keep her airway open.

  “Let her go,” Jax said, an eerie calm to his tone as he squared off with the gunman. Time seemed to slow and the courtyard grew silent, save for the blood rushing in her head and the battered breathing of the man holding her hostage.

  Jax leaned over and picked up the metal bar she’d dropped, moving slowly closer to her and her captor. The gunman was backed up against the building and Mia could hear the faint sound of sirens in the distance. Too far in the distance.

  His grip on her throat tightened and her vision blurred. He lifted her higher and she dug her nails deeper into his skin, clinging to his forearms as her toes kicked for the ground. She gave up trying to reach the ground and kicked at her attacker’s legs but her kicks were weak. It took all her strength to hold on to the man’s arm in an effort to hold herself up.

  It was an effort that was failing.

  Her eyes were locked onto Jax’s calm gaze as a garbled sound came from somewhere. No, not somewhere. It came from her as her body screamed for oxygen, crying out.

  “Let her go,” Jax said again, but the words were almost a growl. He was favoring his left leg and she could see he was slightly off balance, but he moved steadily toward the man holding her.

  With a start, Mia realized she could make the gunman more off balance than Jax. She locked eyes with Jax and tried to communicate with him, looking from his face to the ground again and ag
ain.

  Did she imagine the slight nod of his head? Had he dipped his chin on purpose because he understood?

  It didn’t matter. The grip on her throat was closing, tightening. The pain was nearly blinding. The panic suffocating.

  It was desperation that caused her to act. She dropped her arms and let all her weight hang in a single motion. The man cursed and dropped her. Jax swung, a nauseating crack sounding as the man dropped on top of Mia.

  * * *

  “Mia! Mia!” Jax ignored the pain sluicing up his residual limb and through to his hip as he pulled at the dead weight on top of Mia.

  Blood flowed from a cut in the man’s head, but Jax didn’t care. He just wanted to get Mia away from him.

  Darla came up beside him. “The police are close,” she said panting in rough gasps that would have worried Jax if he hadn’t had all of his focus on Mia for the moment. Darla went around behind the gunman and shoved as Jax pulled. They rolled the unconscious man to the side, freeing Mia.

  She lay still on the ground. Too damned still.

  “No, baby. Please.” Jax prayed like he’d never prayed before. Not even when he was overseas. The sight of Mia lying so limp and pale made his chest go tight. She was here because he’d pushed and pushed, insisting something had happened to Leo. If it wasn’t for him, she wouldn’t be hurt.

  He heard more than saw police vehicles pull into the space and hoped it was Jarrod responding to his message.

  “Mia.” Training kicked in more slowly than he’d like it to. He put his hand to her neck. Her pulse was strong and steady. Airways clear. She was breathing. He ran his fingers along her neck and shoulders, checking for breaks. “Mia, wake up, sweetheart.”

  Uniformed officers entered the courtyard, coming at them, weapons drawn. Jarrod shouted instructions as the officers narrowed in on the gunman. Jax was never happier to see the detective.

  “Ambulance, Jarrod.” Jax called out. “She needs to get to the hospital.”

  “Two minutes out,” was Jarrod’s response.