The only sound that could be heard was the lapping water of Half Moon Bay. Gray watched as Griff silently undid the chain at the bottom of the staircase that lead from the water up to the main deck of the Golden Tulip. Then he started climbing the stairs.

God, could they make it any easier?

Gray, Griff and Dalton had all spotted the guard at the top of the stairs as they swam toward the starboard side of the yacht. He was peering into one of the windows of the boat, instead of watching over the rail or toward the stair.

Dalton was next up the stairs after Griff. He stayed low, so that only one member of Black Dawn could be seen above the main deck if the asshole guard actually turned around…which he didn’t. Griff took his knife out and silently killed the man, then Dalton rushed up to help Griff prop the body up against the side of the wall so it would look like the dead man was sleeping.

Aiden and Hunter were at the stern. Their job was to take out the two guards on the lower deck, then climb up to the main deck and take out those two as well. They still hadn’t reported in. When Gray had laid out his plan, Hunter and Aiden had both said, ‘piece of cake’, at the exact same time. They better not have jinxed themselves.

Gray climbed the stairs where Dalton and Griff were waiting for him.

“Lower deck clear,” Aiden’s voice came through clearly in Gray’s earpiece.

“Climbing up to the main deck,” Hunter whispered his report.

“One guard dispatched on port side of main deck,” Griff said into his mic. “I’m heading to port via the bow, I’ll monitor the interior through the windows and doors as I go. Don’t shoot me.”

“Roger that.” Gray heard Hunter’s grin through the receiver.

“Dalton and I will repeat the procedure clockwise.” Gray gave a hand signal for Dalton to follow while he took point toward the stern. Gray quickly peered through each window, but when he got to the door, he went down to his stomach and peeked around.

Damn, there was a guard who was actually alert. He was looking up high, though, so he missed Gray. He needed to take him out quietly. He did a sweep of the room, it was an open area with a circular staircase in the middle.

He turned his head and looked at Dalton, raising one finger.

“Get his attention, so the guard comes out to the deck. I’ll dispatch him as soon as he opens the door,” Gray whispered into his mic.

Dalton nodded. He padded over to the rail, close to the door, but still out of the guard’s line of sight. He took his fin and slapped it against the steel rail. The rapping of the rubber against the metal made a distinctive thwapping sound that had the guard turning to the door, his sub-machine gun at the ready. He spoke into a microphone attached to his shoulder, similar to what police officers wore, then he moved slowly toward the door.

“Dalton, enough,” Gray muttered into his mic. “Team, my bogey just called out to his team that he heard something. Your targets might be on the move to the main deck interior staircase.”

“Gray, we’re on the upper deck, immediately above you. All outside guards are dead, but you’re about to have company, two more guards are coming down the stairs. Hunter’s staying with the two Saudi girls, I’m going up to the owner’s deck,” Aiden said.

Gray looked over his shoulder and saw Dalton nod.

“Give me the fatality numbers,” Dex demanded from shore.

“Two,” Hunter said.

“Two,” Aiden said.

“Two,” Griff answered.

“Zero,” Gray and Dalton answered at the same time.

“But we’ll have three in just a second,” Gray whispered as the door slowly opened. Gray grabbed the Saudi’s ankle and yanked, and in a graceful coordination, Dalton ripped the submachine out of his hands before he could do anything with it. The man hit the deck with a thud. Gray immediately covered the man’s mouth, then shoved his knife into the back of the man’s neck and twisted. Dalton and Gray dragged him out of the line of sight of the door a millisecond before they heard booted footsteps descending the stairs.

Gray gave a chin tilt to Dalton, who put his back to the wall and started to turn with his MP7, when Gray heard a short blast of gunfire in his receiver and overhead at the same instant.

“Two more down, Dex,” Aiden said calmly.

Dalton finished turning and let loose with a hail of bullets. The two Saudi guards were laid out before they could even get a shot off.

“Three,” Dalton said into his mic.

“Which means there is one still on the loose,” Gray said to his men. “Time to spread out. I want those women found.” Gray looked at his watch. “You have fourteen minutes to get off this boat.”

“I have the two daughters with me.” Hunter said. “They’re in good shape,” he said before Gray could ask the question.

“I want them secured, and you to help search,” Gray commanded. “I’ll take the lower and tank decks. Dalton, you take the main deck. Hunter and Aiden, I want your asses up to the bridge, now. We’re going to have some nervous crew members up there. I want them secured, and or taken out. That’s going to be your call, you’ll know their status. That doesn’t just go for the crew on the bridge, you got that?”

Gray heard all of his men agree. They knew their jobs.

They’d already been on the lower deck, so Gray headed straight for the tank deck. He just had a feeling. He’d been around a lot of years, and he’d learned not to discount feelings. Gray yanked open the door and went inside, his rubber-soled boot ensured that he didn’t slip in the blood as he ran by one of the dead guards. He triple-timed it down the stairs, until he hit the lower deck, then he ran back toward the stern of the yacht. Gray shook his head in wonder. They’d fancified the door to the engine room in fine grain maple, but as soon as he opened the fancy-assed door he was looking into the same old guts of a boat. Bright lights, steel and the smell of grease and motor oil. It was hot and noisy, too. Kind of felt like home.

He slowed the door down so that it shut softly, and then he crouched down beside the left stair rail. He was out in the open, so he tried to make himself a small target in case there were more guards than anticipated, or if the engineer or one of the mechanics had guns. Then there was Faizon or his son. Gray was positive that this was where they were holding the women. He didn’t have anything to go by except for instinct. Damn, now he was sounding like Zed.

Oh for God’s sake, it’s away from the women and soundproof. This is logic, Tyler. Not whoo whoo psychic shit.

Gray crept down the stairs, then shot across the floor two meters so he could hide behind the ship’s main oil tank. Damn, how the hell could he smell body odor while he was butt up against three hundred gallons of grease? A man had to be close. Gray waited and listened, and took a deep breath in. Gray’s eyes watered.

Yep, real close.

A light footstep. Just the one. He heard the sound of metal touching metal. Gray recognized it, a wrench turning a bolt. He peered just enough around the corner so he could confirm that there was a man in a sweat-soaked dingy white tank t-shirt working on a hydrophore pump.

Gray didn’t see anyone else. He rushed him, hitting the mechanic on the back of the head with the butt of his gun. The man was out for the count. Gray still took a moment to search him for any weapons. There was nothing.

There had to be at least an engineer and another mechanic for a boat this size. He remained in a crouch. He was surrounded by tanks and pumps, he needed to get over to the boiler and piston rod. How often had he seen the chief engineer bitching about that equipment? By the sounds of things, he needed to move even farther to the back of the boat. Gray continued to use the large tanks as cover.

He hit pay dirt when he heard two men speaking in Arabic. They were not happy. As Gray got closer he could hear them talking about the woman who was being held in the engine store room. They were debating whether they should give her some water.

Gray stepped out from behind the water cooling tank, his submachine gun pointed at them. The fat man’s arms flew in to the air, the second guy stood stock still.

“Hands up,” Gray said in Arabic. When the second man still didn’t comply, Gray took three menacing steps forward and repeated his command in a lower voice. The man finally held up his hands.

“Turn around, hands on the wall, legs spread.” Once again the second man was slow to respond. As soon as he turned around, Gray slashed down with the butt of his weapon between the man’s neck and head. He fell to the floor like a bag of wet cement.

He patted down the other man and didn’t find any weapons.

“Take off your shirt and your friend’s shirt.”

The older man stared at him blankly. Gray said it again, slower. The man complied. He handed the grungy cloth to Gray. He really didn’t want to touch it. He threw one of the shirts on the floor, then ripped the other one into strips and swiftly gagged and hogtied the unconscious man.

“Where’s the women?”

Again with the blank stare.

“Where are the women?” he repeated his question slower. Gray knew he was speaking Arabic fluently.

“Only one woman.” The man pointed at a door. “She needs water. She’s hurt.”

“Take me to her,” Gray demanded.

The man stumbled forward, looking over his shoulder at Gray’s submachine gun.

“Hurry up.”

When he got to the door, he pulled at the key ring attached to his belt and unlocked the door. They were met by silence and darkness.

Please let her be alive.

He shoved the big man to the deck and felt for the light in the little room. He hit the switch, immediately scanning the floor. Which was when he saw her bare, dirty feet dangling in front of him.

Gray grabbed her around her hips, and she moaned.

Thank God that she had moaned, it told him she was alive. He looked up and saw her gaze down at him through swollen eyelids. He couldn’t tell the color of her eyes, all he could see was blood where the whites of her eyes should have been.

Gray couldn’t tell which woman it was. He looked at her hair. The strands were so dank, matted and sweat-soaked, that he couldn’t tell if it was Kelley’s brown hair or Chantelle’s blond hair.

“Miss, I’m with the United States Navy. I’m going to get you out of here.”

They had her tied to one of the pipes that ran across the ceiling. Her hands were swollen and dried blood coated her wrists. Gray pulled out his knife and cut her down. She collapsed over his shoulder, and he laid her gently onto the floor. He put his fingers to her neck. Her pulse was weak.

“Aiden. You got anything?” he growled into his mic.

“Nada,” his second-in-command answered immediately.

“Get your ass down to the tank deck. Got one of the women. She’s in really bad shape.”

“Roger.”

She whimpered, it was so low he almost thought he’d imagined it.

“We’re going to get you out of here.” He saw the incomprehension on her face.

Tenderly he cupped her cheek. “Safe. You’re safe now.”

“Give me a report,” Dex said quietly into his ear.

“I don’t know which woman it is. She’s bad, Dex.”

“Fuck,” he heard Griff whisper sadly in his ear.

He watched a tear track down her face.

Gray sprang up and found the man slumped outside the door. He hadn’t moved a muscle. When he saw the rage in Gray’s face he covered his head with his hands and begged for mercy. “Not me. It wasn’t me,” he wailed.

“But you knew, didn’t you? You heard?”

“Faizon. It was him. Him and his son.”

“But you heard,” Gray reiterated.

Gray kicked him. Hard. He grabbed the undershirt that was beside the man and ripped it up, quickly gagging and hogtieing him, like he had the other engine mechanic.

“Where is she?” Aiden asked as Gray finished tying the mechanic up.

The big blond man was by his side, and Gray led him inside the room. Aiden was on his knees next to the injured woman before Gray could even blink.

He heard a spurt of gunfire over his receiver. “Found the other guard,” Hunter said.

“She’s bad,” Aiden said. He pulled out a kit from his small waterproof pack. He rolled it out and inserted a needle into a vial, carefully measuring out some liquid.

“Can’t give her too much,” Aiden muttered to Gray. His friend’s eyes told him all he needed to know. She wasn’t going to make it if they didn’t get her to a hospital…fast.

Gray and Aiden’s heads shot up as they heard a woman’s screams. Both of them looked at the woman on the floor who was barely conscious, then realized it was coming over their receiver.

“Hunter, get to the upper deck. I’m at the bow. In the most forward cabin. Get here yesterday,” Griff ground out. “I’ve got the Ambassador’s daughter.”

At least Gray now knew that Aiden was caring for Chantelle.

“Anybody else?” Dex asked.

“Two pukes stupid enough to still be begging for help. They’re nothing but corpses, who’re taking too long to die.”

Griff had never sounded like that before. Never. Aiden glance snared Gray’s. This was not good.

“Hunter, you there yet?” Gray demanded.

“Griff, I’m almost with you,” Hunter said, by way of answer. “Keep it together.” Gray could hear Hunter Diaz’s heavy breathing as he swiftly ran toward Griff and whatever mess he had found.

“What’s the status of the girl?” Dex asked Griff.

Good for Dex, get Griff’s mind off the two men.

Another scream came over Gray’s receiver.

“Ahhh, God,” Hunter’s voice was anguished.

“Help me,” Griff said above the woman’s cries.

“Dammit, Hunter. Griff. I want a status now.” Gray appreciated how Dex was keeping command of the situation.

“She’ll make it,” Hunter said.

Who was he reassuring? Griff?

The screaming began to lose volume, but that somehow made it worse.

What the hell was going on?

Gray turned his head and crouched down beside Aiden. He couldn’t do anything about Emily Hoag, so he would concentrate on the woman he could help.

“Was the bridge clear?” he asked Aiden.

Aiden gave him a side eye look, then went back to working on Chantelle’s hands. He had bandaged her wrists, now he was rubbing circles on her palms, and twining his fingers between hers, trying to restore circulation. Even with the morphine running through her system, she was moaning in pain. But the sounds she was making were nothing compared to the high-pitched shrieks coming from Emily.

“Lieutenant, at your six,” Dalton called. Gray heard him in stereo. He stood up and opened the door to the engine store room. He saw his man bent over one of the men Gray had tied up. It looked like he was regaining consciousness. Dalton had picked up some rope in his travels and was attaching the man to one of the pumps.

“Get this guy, too,” Gray said, pointing to the guy slumped near the door. Dalton nodded.

“All decks are cleared. We’re good to go now that we have the women,” Dalton reported as he moved to tie up the next man.

“Dex?” Gray spoke into his mic.

“No can do,” Dex answered his question before he posed it. “The only safe way to bring the yacht close to shore is the marina at Dana Beach resort. If you tried going to shore any other way you’d rip out the bottom of the boat. But the resort is out, because it’s too crowded. There’s a wedding going on, you’ll be spotted. Your only option is our initial plan for you to meet up here.”

“Aiden, can you stabilize her for the swim back?”

“We don’t have to swim,” Dalton said as he came into the room. “Since we’ve overtaken the yacht, it doesn’t matter what we do. Normally I’d throw up at the sight of the world’s most overpriced lifeboats that I swear have leather seating, but I’m thanking God for them right now for these two ladies.”

Gray nodded. “Get them ready.”

Dalton nodded and disappeared.

“Did you hear that Griff? Will that work?” Gray asked.

“It’ll have to,” Hunter answered. “We’ll get her there. We’re over our time.”

“I can’t do a fireman’s carry,” Aiden told Gray. “She has at least two broken ribs.”

“You’re not carrying her. I am. You need to get up to Griff and Hunter and see what’s going on with Emily. I’ve got Chantelle.”

Aiden had his kit packed up before Gray finished talking.

“Guys,” Gray said. “Aiden is aiming for the two of you. How can he help?”

There was a pause. Then Hunter whispered. “She needs to be knocked out. She’s fighting us. She’s out of her mind with fright and I can’t blame her. There’s not one of us who could talk her down right now after what those animals did to her.”

“Are they dead?” Dex snarled.

“Griff took care of them. They’re still hanging on. They’re going to die bad.”

Aiden, Dalton and Dex all said “Good,” simultaneously.

Gray picked up Chantelle. “Did you grab the port or the starboard lifeboat?” he queried Dalton.

“Starboard.”

“Men, I’m taking Chantelle to starboard. Dalton’s with me. The rest of you go to the port lifeboat.”

“I’ll head there as soon as Aiden arrives,” Hunter said.

Chantelle stirred in his arms. “Emily?” she whispered. “Where’s Emily?”

“She’s alive,” Gray assured her as he weaved his way around the different pumps and tanks toward the stairs. He saw tears trailing down her face.

“Hurt,” she whimpered.

“I know it hurts, Miss. We’re going to get you to a hospital.”

Gray juggled with the door knob, and tried to shoulder the door open at the same time she lifted her hand in the air and waved it in front of his face. “Not me. Hurt Emily.”

“I’ve got the boat. It’s midship on the lower deck. We’ll load up and winch us onto the water.”, Hunter said.

“Got it,” Gray said. Even though he was walking fast, he did his best not to jostle Chantelle as he made his way up the stairs to the lower deck. He finally heard Aiden with Griff.

“Hold her still,” Aiden barked. It had to be a shit situation, but Griff needed to lay hands on the woman in order to help her. Her scream of terror was heartbreaking. “I’ll take her,” Aiden said after a long moment.

Yep, a shitty situation.

Gray’s boat was the first one to reach land. He didn’t know how he’d done it, but by the time he got Chantelle to the truck, he found that Dex had some of the softest pillows and blankets imaginable.

“Where’d you get these?”

“You don’t want to know.”

Fuck, no wonder he knew there’d been a wedding at the resort.

Chantelle was unconscious, and her breathing was labored, but no blood bubbles. Her fingers were pink, so that was a blessing. Gray left her in the truck with Dalton. He was the second best medic on the team.

Hunter and Aiden were pulling the boat to shore. Griff held Emily in his lap. There had only been one time Gray had seen Griff look this broken up, and that was when Miranda had been close to death. Gray waded beside the boat and held out his arms. He saw that she was wrapped up in a bed spread.

“Hand her to me, so you can get out of the boat. Okay?”

“She’s so young,” Griff said.

“You’ve done enough. It’s time for the rest of us to take care of her. Give her to me, I promise she’ll be safe,” Gray said.

Griff hesitated only a moment. “I know you will, man. It’s just that her eyes are the exact color as Livvie’s,” he said, referring to his daughter. The blanket slipped as he handed the girl over to Gray. Her soft, naked shoulder was exposed.

Gray’s worst fears were confirmed. He gently took the young woman out of Griff’s arms, and gave Griff a nod of approval.

Griff sighed. His glance cut over to the big, blond Irishman. “I’m sorry, Aiden.”

“Sorry’s aren’t allowed,” Aiden said as he clapped his hand on Griff’s shoulder. “I’ll take good care of her. Of both of them.”

“We need to get them over to Bahrain,” Griff said as he walked to shore beside the other men.

“Please tell me we don’t have to deal with Dickweed.” Hunter said.

“The Dickster had new papers worked up. It was an immediate reassignment to Libya. He’s in route right now,” Dex said from where he stood at the tailgate of the truck. “Baker is clearing the way for us on our return trip.”

“You arrange that?” Hunter asked Dex.

“Nope, it was our boy Wyatt.”

Gray felt his shoulders relax. He watched Aiden hand Emily up to Dalton, then he hopped into the back of the truck. Gray turned to look at Griffin Porter.

“Are you—”

Griff waved his hand. “I’ve got my shit together. Hunter made sure the father and son were dead before we left.”

“Good. That’s good.” No matter how satisfying a long drawn-out gut shot might have been, Gray wanted them dead.

“Everybody good?” Hunter called from the cab of the truck.

“Hold your fucking horses.” Dex shoved up the tailgate with one hand. His other was cuddling his laptop to his chest. Seriously, it was amazing that Kenna got pregnant considering Dex’s affinity to that thing.

“Livvie has a blanket that she carries around like that,” Griff grinned at Gray. “She calls it her dit-dit.”

“Dex, what’s your computer’s nickname?” Gray called out. He could feel even Dalton and Aiden were listening for Dex’s answer as he slammed the door to the passenger seat.

“I’ve heard him call it Honey,” Hunter said.

“Damn right I do.” Dex’s voice was filled with pride. “She’s a Honey Badger. This computer has lived through explosions, and has taken down terrorists. She’s tough as hell, and doesn’t give two shits what you have to say about her, she’ll just keep on, keeping on.”

Gray loved the sound of his team starting to laugh. He could have sworn that he heard Chantelle give a low snort of laughter.