Page 89 of Lock ’N’ Load

Her eyes went wide. “No!” She turned to run, but strong arms grabbed her and she was no match for their strength. One of the thugs shoved her into the chair, quickly strapping down her arms and legs. Fisting her hands, she strained at the straps to no avail. She tried kicking, but her legs were bound just as tightly to the legs of the chair. Again, she fought the urge to scream, knowing only these Russian bastards and the few rats she’d glimpsed scurrying away at their arrival would hear her.

Jerking her wrists from side to side, she strained at her bonds. Blood trickled down her arm onto the filthy white tile floor, and it was then that she realized the charm bracelet Matt had given her was gone. Her body began to tremble. She’d held back the tears until now, but the loss of that one little piece of jewelry undid her. A steady stream of tears trickled from both her eyes.

Now that she could see Lukashin clearly, she compared him to her memory of the photos she’d researched in the CIA data bank files, which were taken of a younger man. Lukashin was now sixty-five years old, with a thinning, receding hairline. That, and he had more lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes. But it was the black, soulless eyes that she would have recognized anywhere.

“For such a tiny woman, you have caused me a great deal of aggravation. Your technological and analytical talents are well known to us. Your skills far surpass those of our own people’s in those particular fields. What you failed to note was that while you’ve been tracking me, we’ve been keeping an eye on you.”

“Is that how you identified me?” It was a lingering question that still remained unanswered.

“Essentially, yes. You see, I’m a product of the Cold War, but I’ve made a point of keeping up with modern technology’s impact on the world.” Lukashin pursed his lips, giving her the impression he was pondering how much to tell her. “You’ve clearly invented a miraculous program enabling you to track my location on the black net. What you didn’t know is that my programmers can tag anyone found trespassing in my chat room. Still, I’d love to hear about how you found me online in the first place.”

“Is that why I’m here?” she cried in a trembling voice. “To divulge classified technological secrets to you? I assure you, that’s not going to happen.” She’d die before betraying her country. Heck, she was going to die anyway.

“What do you know about Senator Ashburn?”

“Nothing,” she lied. “Except that he’ll probably be our next president.” They couldn’t know for certain that she knew who the senator was and what he’d done. And they certainly wouldn’t know she’d stolen Thomas George’s external hard drive and cracked into his encrypted files.

“You listened in on my chat room conversation.” He pinned her with those cruel, dark eyes. “And you called the editor at the Arlington Sentinel, asking what story Thomas George was working on when he was killed. Why did you do that?”

Oh shit. She’d forgotten about that phone call. “I was curious.”

“Did you find out?”

“No,” she lied again, realizing he knew she was handing him a line of shit. She wouldn’t be in this mess if he didn’t suspect she knew Senator Ashburn’s backstory. “You murdered him, didn’t you? Over his story.”

He made a sucking sound as he shifted another peppermint from one side of his mouth to the other. “I did.”

She swallowed. Any possibility he’d consider letting her go just went out the window. The fact that he’d just confessed to murder was the final nail in her coffin.

I’ll never get out of here alive.

He leaned in until his face was inches from hers. “Who did you tell about my chat room conversation?”

“No one.”

“You work for the CIA. There is protocol. There must be a printout of what you overheard. Who has it?”

“I don’t know.” She did, and he knew it. Matt, Wayne, and Genevieve. But she’d never say their names. Never.

“You’re lying.”

“What’s the difference?” She snapped. “You’re going to kill me anyway. You’ve already tried and failed twice before.”

“Yes, that’s true. The difference now is that you have something I want.”

“What?”

“Information.”

“I’ll never tell you anything.”

He gave a soft chuckle, reminiscent of the way her grandfather used to laugh when he bounced her on his knee. But his grandfatherly demeanor was nothing but a grand facade. This man was a cold-blooded killer.

“We shall see, we shall see.” He plucked another peppermint from his pants pocket, unwrapped it, and popped it into his mouth. He nodded to one of the thugs, who handed him a syringe.

“No.” She began shaking her head back and forth. “Please don’t.” She twisted and pulled futilely at the restraints.

A hand clamped over her forehead, jerking her back against the headrest. The leather strap she’d seen earlier was tugged across her forehead and buckled tight.