Repairing doors and locks is like riding a bike. Once you learn how, you never forget.
—HAMMER GIRL BLOG
When Mackenzie opened her eyes, she saw nothing. Total blackness pressed in on her from every side. She bit back a groan as she struggled to sit up. Her head throbbed in time with her heartbeat, and she touched a warm, sticky substance at her temple and found the skin stitched together at her hairline.
The springs underneath her squeaked a protest as she swung her legs over the side, and she ran her fingers along the surface of the mattress and down the bed frame. She appeared to be lying on a narrow metal cot. How long had she been here? Days or hours? She thought it might be days.
She forced herself to stand and groped along the wall in the dark. She smashed her shin against cold porcelain. A toilet. She skirted it and continued around the next corner where she came to a door. She tugged on the knob, but she was so weak she could barely turn it. By her calculations the space seemed to be the size of a small bedroom, but the lack of windows and the dank smell told her she was likely in a basement.
This wasn’t the way it was supposed to happen. She and Tarek were supposed to be together, and she’d intended to talk him out of his plans. But the attack had come out of the blue. Had he found out what she’d done?
Her throat and chest tightened, and she forced herself to take slow breaths. Calmer, she ran her fingers over the latch and doorknob, both old and crusty with rust. She pressed her ear to the latch and heard the faint trickle of water. No amount of screaming would lift her voice out of this deep hole, so she didn’t waste her strength.
She touched the wall on the other side of the door and felt a light switch. She flipped it on, and light flooded the room. She flinched and closed her eyes until they began to adjust, then lifted her lids and peered around the room. A bare bulb swung from an open socket above her head. Cracks spidered across the concrete floor, and the only furnishings in the space were the cot and the old, stained toilet.
Only then did she look down at herself. She wore a hospital gown, but there were still traces of blood on her skin. Her arm ached, and she saw a puncture and the stickiness left by IV tape. Her head swam a bit, and she tottered to the cot and sat down with a thump, then put her head between her legs until her vision cleared.
Did she have anything she could use to pick the lock? When the dizziness abated, she stood and saw her jeans hanging over the end of the bed. She stuck her hands into the pockets of her jeans but came up with only lint. The cot felt a long way down as she dropped back onto its hard, lumpy surface. She had to get out of here.
Her head continued to throb, but the light-headedness began to ease. She slid off the cot onto her knees and looked the bed over. The legs screwed onto the frame, and she tried to twist the one at the bottom right side. The rust had it stuck fast, so she tried the other bottom one. It moved slightly under her fingers, but before she could get it loose, she heard footsteps outside the door.
She scrambled back to the cot and sat waiting with her pulse galloping in her chest. Her vision blurred again, and she put her head between her legs for a moment. When the hinges on the door screeched, she lifted her head. She clutched her hands together in her lap and tried to compose herself as a beautiful Asian woman entered the room.
She wore a deep-blue dress that complemented her figure. “Your meal.” She spoke English but with a slight Korean accent, and her gaze flickered over Mac and dismissed her.
Mac staggered to her feet. “Please, I need medical attention. I’ve lost a lot of blood.”
The woman shook her head and backed toward the door. “You aren’t dying, if that’s what you think. You’ve received the best of care, a transfusion and IV nutrition. It’s not up to me what is done with you.”
What is done with you. Mac swallowed, then wet her lips. Could she rush the woman and overpower her? Even as her muscles tensed for an attack, a fresh wave of dizziness blurred her vision, and she sank back onto the mattress. “Who are you? My name is Mackenzie.”
“I know who you are. And why you’re here.”
Mac switched to Korean. “Why am I here? I don’t know you. Are you Hyun?”
The woman Wang loved answered in Korean. “Ah, you’ve heard of me. I know what you tried to do to us, to Wang. He was wise to your ways, and I’ll do anything I can to make sure you don’t hurt him.” She clamped her lips shut and stepped through the door, then slammed it behind her. The lock clicked into place.
Mac exhaled and blinked back the moisture in her eyes. Crying wouldn’t help her now. Her worst fears were realized, and she was helpless to warn the authorities.
A Beatles tune blared from the jukebox as Grayson held open the door for Ellie at Harvey’s Pier. The place was along the waterfront, and from the scent of fish and lobster inside, the food was going to be good and fresh. For a second he wished he could just sit across the table and look at Ellie rather than talk to a dirtbag like Trafford. He liked catching the expressions that flitted across her expressive face. He thought about hiding her glasses from her way too often.
He did a quick scan of the place. Fishnets draped from the wood walls painted the color of driftwood, and the wide plank floors underfoot made him feel as if he were on a boat. Through the expansive windows, he could see the blue water of Rainshadow Bay.
Ellie tugged on his arm. “There he is.”
He followed her gaze to the pool table against the back wall. Dylan was cuing up with another Coastie, a young man about the same age with hair so blond it was almost white.
He glanced down at her and wished he hadn’t brought her. Something about the confrontation felt dangerous. Trafford was a hothead, and Grayson wouldn’t be surprised to see the guy swing a pool stick at one of them, especially if he’d been drinking.
He watched Trafford take a swig from a beer. “You could grab us a table while I talk to him.”
She shook her head. “He might talk to me. I think he really did care about Mac.”
She might be right, but he didn’t have to like it. He took her arm and steered her through the packed tables.
Trafford straightened as they approached, and his wary gaze flitted to Ellie, then back to Grayson. “Did you find Mac’s body?”
Ellie shook her head. “We still don’t know what happened to her. I was hoping you might help us.”
“She dumped me, remember?” He bent over the pool table and cued up, then took his shot. A blue ball thumped into the left corner pocket.
His partner eyed them. “Talk to you later, Dylan.” He put down his pool stick and fled.
Ellie took a step closer. “I saw the video, Dylan. We know she was involved in removing the cocaine from the Coast Guard hangar. Do you have any idea where she intended to take it? Were you in on it too?”
He jerked around with the pool stick in his hand. “That’s a lie! I had nothing to do with it, and I don’t believe Mac did either. That would mean . . .” He swallowed hard.
“Mean what?” Grayson prompted.
“That she only went out with me to locate the cocaine.”
Grayson hadn’t looked at how long they’d dated. “You only went out after the cocaine seizure?”
Trafford grabbed the neck of his beer bottle and took another swig. “She introduced herself in that booth right there.” He pointed to a booth near the jukebox. “I was sitting by myself, and she came up to congratulate me. Said she’d heard about the seizure and wanted to meet the man instrumental in it.”
“Were you? Instrumental, I mean?” Ellie asked.
“Not really, but she was all wide eyed and admiring so I couldn’t burst her bubble.” His shoulders slumped, and he laid the pool stick down on the table. “Looking back, I have to wonder, you know?”
Grayson examined the misery in Trafford’s face. Poor guy really did seem to care about Mackenzie, and Grayson was beginning to believe the young woman didn’t deserve Ellie’s loyalty. She had dark depths. He’d hoped he was wrong, but it wasn’t looking that way.
“Where might she have taken the cocaine?”
“I would think she’d sell it. I assume it hasn’t hit the street yet?”
“Not that we can tell. I suppose it could have gotten out of the country, but we’ve been watching smuggling routes pretty closely. I think she took it somewhere here.”
Ellie’s chin jutted out. “I think she was forced to do it.”
Trafford barked out a derisive laugh. “No one coerces your sister into anything.”
Color swept up Ellie’s neck and lodged in her cheeks. “You don’t know her as well as I do.”
Trafford lifted a brow. “I think maybe you don’t know Mackenzie as well as you think you do. That girl had dark layers. Lots of them.”
Ellie opened her mouth, then closed it again with a scowl. Grayson knew she wanted to argue but didn’t have any proof to offer. Was any of this getting through to her? It was one thing to be loyal and another thing to be stubbornly blind. She needed to realize her sister wasn’t who she thought she was.
Grayson would have to handle this now. “Any sign she might be part of a terror cell?”
Trafford rolled his eyes. “Get real. She was no terrorist.”
Grayson watched him shift from foot to foot and glance toward the door. “Thanks for your help. If you think of anything else, would you give me a call?” He passed his card to Trafford, then took Ellie’s arm and steered her to an empty booth.