Moon Called (Mercy Thompson #1)(64)
Author: Patricia Briggs

Although we weren’t getting Jesse and Adam out for a few hours, I could go in with them and do my best to get Adam ready to be rescued.

We’d argued about that. David had wanted me to wait until his man was on guard duty near dusk, but I didn’t want to leave Adam and Jesse alone any longer than they had to be. David thought the risk of discovery was too high.

Samuel settled the argument. "Let her go. She’s going to do it anyway, and this way we can reduce the risks."

David hadn’t been happy, but he’d bowed to higher authority-and better judgment. Samuel was right. I wasn’t about to let Adam and Jesse wait around without protection when I could be there with them. Gerry was the only wolf who would know my scent, and he was staying away from the warehouse. All the other wolves would just assume I was a coyote, and there were lots of coyotes around.

I still had to wait for escort, though, which might be a long time coming, but it was safer than having me wander around looking for where they were hiding Adam and Jesse.

It is impossible to stay in the state of readiness while waiting motionless. Eventually I fell into a light doze that lasted for maybe an hour before the newly familiar smell of John-Julian woke me.

I crept out cautiously, but he was alone, with my pack over one shoulder. He didn’t talk to me, just turned and threaded his way through the crates to a section of the warehouse that looked as though it had been offices. Like the crates, they were stacked one atop the other, three high.

He climbed the stairs to the middle tier, where the far door had a bright and shiny dead-bolt lock that made it stand out from the others. When he turned the bolt and opened the door, I darted inside and stopped.

No wonder Gerry left them with only one guard at a time. There was no chance either Jesse or Adam would escape on their own.

Jesse was lying on a bare mattress. Someone had wrapped duct tape around the lower half of her face, covering her mouth, hair, and neck. Getting it off was going to be nasty business. Handcuffs held her wrists together, and a climber’s rope secured the handcuffs to the two-by-four bed frame. Her ankles were bound together and tied to the foot of the bed, making it impossible for her to do much more than wiggle.

She stared at John-Julian with dull eyes-and didn’t seem to notice me at all. She was wearing pajamas, probably what she’d been wearing when they’d taken her, those soft cottony plaid things with a T-shirt top. On the white underside of her left arm was a bruise so dark it appeared black rather than purple.

Adam was seated in a chair obviously made by the same style-impaired carpenter who’d thrown together the bed frame. It was crude, made of two-by-fours and lag bolts, though I don’t suppose they were worried about style. Heavy manacles, just like something you’d expect in a wax museum or medieval torture chamber-held his wrists onto the chair arms and a second set held his ankles to the chair legs. But even destroying the chair wouldn’t free him because there were enough silver chains wrapped around him to have funded the local school system for a year.

"Gerry won’t come here," said John-Julian to me. Adam opened his eyes, just a bare fraction, and I saw that his irises were yellow gold and blazing with rage. "His presence has the same effect on Adam that my grandfather’s does. Not even the drugs are enough to keep Adam calm-so Gerry will stay away. Our man is only on guard for another five minutes. The next one is the enemy; but after that, Shawn, one of our men, takes over for a two-hour shift."

John-Julian continued giving me information I already knew, repeated to make sure I understood. "Shawn’ll come in to help you as he can. The guards are supposed to stay downstairs, except when they first come on shift. But you need to leave both of them bound until Shawn takes over guard duty in case they don’t. There’s one guard watching the prisoners, and there are four men on patrol over the property. One of those is supposed to just walk around the outside of the warehouse. There’s electricity and satellite TV in the house, so most of them are in there when they’re not on duty. No one really expects Adam’s pack to find them this soon, so they’re not on high alert."

David’s men were doing the lion’s share of guarding the prisoners because Gerry didn’t have many people he could trust with a helpless fifteen-year-old girl-that not being a talent much in demand in the world of crazy mercenaries and lone wolves. David said that Gerry had paid them to stay and work guard duty. Gerry seemed to believe that David wouldn’t work against him as long as he was paying them.

While John-Julian was talking, I glanced around the room, which wasn’t exactly bursting with places to hide. As long as they didn’t come all the way in, I could conceal myself behind the door or in the big, sliding-door closet- some cliches are cliches because they work. There was no reason for the guards to search the room as long as Adam and Jesse were still there.

Jesse finally stirred as she realized he wasn’t talking to her. She twisted awkwardly until she got a good look at me, then made a harsh noise behind her gag.

"Shh," he told her, then said to me. "You’ve got about four hours. We’ll create a diversion-not my job, but you’ll know it when you hear it. Your job is to get these two down the stairs and into the room nearest the big garage door. Grandpa will find you there, and we’ll escort you out."

I nodded, and he set the pack he carried on the floor.

"Good luck," he said quietly, and left, locking the door behind him.

I shifted as soon as the door closed and opened the pack, pulling out underwear, a dark T-shirt, and a pair of old sweats. I dressed, put on my shoulder harness and slid my SIG into it. It was chambered and ready to go. I’d brought my foster-father’s Smith & Wesson, too. It was too big for a shoulder harness, and I couldn’t fire it as often, but the. 44 magnum bullets packed more punch than the 9mm. If everything went right, I wouldn’t have need for either.

I heard someone coming up the stairs and realized that I hadn’t heard John-Julian go down-which was pretty good for a human. Assuming that this was the new guard, I grabbed my pack and hid in the closet, the SIG back in my hand. The closet had a sliding door, but I left the side farthest from the door open, just as it had been.

I could see Jesse jerk against her ropes as someone turned the bolt and threw open the outer door.

"Hey, pretty thing," said the guard. I could smell the garlic he’d eaten recently, and something unhealthy and sour. He wasn’t a werewolf, but he wasn’t anyone I particularly wanted around Jesse either. "I’m here to take you to the bathroom. If you’re nice to me, I’ll even let you eat something. I bet you’re hungry by now."

He walked over to Jesse and I had a perfect shot at his back. The temptation to take it was made stronger by the panic in Jesse’s eyes and the smell of fear that washed off her.