His answer must have satisfied her because she dropped her hands to her sides, though she winced at his new cuts and bruises. “I feel your pain.” She knelt down, flipped the passed out guard onto his back, and shoved her hands into his pockets. “Yes!” She yanked a set of keys out of one.
“That’s your plan? We jack his car and just drive out of here?”
She jumped to her feet, cocked a hip, and stared him down. “You got a better idea?”
He considered the ten thick-necked muscle men on the other side of the door, the firepower each carried, and calculated the chances they’d actually make it out unharmed. Talk about a clusterfuck. He opened his mouth to say so when Ryder quirked an eyebrow at him, practically daring him to disregard her ability to get the job done. And he realized he didn’t. If she said this was the best option, it was.
He shook his head. “Fresh out.”
“Okay, then. Let’s go.” She reached for the door.
“Wait.” He grabbed her wrist, his thumb sliding across her gold bracelet, yanked her close, and crushed her mouth with his. It wasn’t their first kiss, and he hoped like hell it wasn’t their last, but he meant for it to be a damned memorable one. He put everything he had into it, all the wanting, all the needing, and all the ever after—if they were lucky enough to have one, and he sure as hell hoped they were.
She pulled away thirty seconds later with swollen lips and a dazed look in her dark brown eyes. “You’d better be following that up later.”
“It’s a date.” The caveman in him beat his chest. “Now, let’s get out of here.”
She yanked open the door and they ran out into a scene of utter chaos as the guards scattered and a group of women fled out the front door.
…
A whoomp, whoomp, whoomp sounded outside the warehouse’s open windows. Low-level dirt clouds whirled around Ryder’s ankles as she darted out from the storage room where they’d stuffed Devin. No one gave her a first look, let alone a second glance. The guards were too busy staring out the windows as an armada of helicopters swooped down from the sky.
Holy crap. Ryder shook her head in wry amazement as adrenaline ricocheted through her body. “Looks like Cam’s friends made it.”
Guys in ninja black zipped down rope lines from the hovering helicopters, hit the ground running, and headed straight for the warehouse. Highly trained and determined, the mercenaries looked every bit as dangerous as Cam had promised they’d be.
“Shall we let them in?” Devin grinned through his bruises, obviously enjoying the ensuing chaos and hullabaloo as much as she was.
“Why not?” She took off at a sprint to the garage bay door at the front of the warehouse and hit the open button. The dented metal door creaked upward.
Behind them, one of the guards yelled in Spanish.
A knife whizzed past Ryder’s head, embedding itself in the wood at eye level.
Spinning around, she raised her fists so they were just below eye level.
Long Hair and Freckles stood hip-to-hip, both looking a little worse for wear from their last encounter.
“Puta,” Freckles snarled.
Ryder grinned behind her fists. “Si.” Anticipation bubbled inside her, a hunger to make these punks pay for what they’d done to Devin, and to the rest of the island.
She didn’t wait for him to make a move, but claimed the aggressor’s route. Keeping her fists up, she landed her right leg with a solid thump right below Freckles’s chest. Air wheezed out of his mouth like a popped inner tube.
From the corner of her eye, she saw Long Hair, the bulkier of the two guards, rush Devin. He shoved his shoulder into Devin’s solar plexus in an attempt to knock him off balance. And failed. They jostled for control, punching and grappling. With a low growl, Devin swung out one leg and swept Long Hair off his feet.
Freckles made a half-ass punch attempt, and Ryder followed up with a fast punching combination and roundhouse kick, before grabbing his arm, spinning into position, and flipping him over in the air. A plume of dust rose when Freckles smacked down against the dirt floor.
“I’ll be glad to see the last of those two once we blow this island.” Devin leveled a solid kick to Long Hair’s ribs.
“Amen.” She headed toward the door as the mercenaries rushed in yelling for the Molina men inside to get on their knees, hands on heads. The bright late afternoon sun blazed hot overhead, temporarily blinding her, but not before she caught a glimpse of Sarah hustling around the warehouse’s corner. She slammed to a stop, her mind speeding.
Devin halted beside her. “Where to?”
“Truck.” She pointed to the half-rusted four-by-four parked at an angle and tossed him the keys from the jailer’s pocket. “I’ll be right there, I just have to grab something.”
She bolted after Sarah, determination pushing her forward with each stride. She almost caught up with the embezzler about a hundred yards from the warehouse, in the middle of the flat grassland leading to the volcano. Digging deep, she added an extra burst of speed—enough to reach out and grab the back of Sarah’s shirt, jerking her backward. The other woman flew off her feet.