Surrender A Section 8 Novel

Chapter Six





Hours earlier, Dare had brought Grace into his house, left her bound but ungagged in a chair in the living room facing the wall. He hadn’t said a word to her since they’d driven away from her place, and the tension had built to a nearly unbearable level.

Moving away from her had been a relief, although he could see her through the porch window from the old swing he lowered himself onto.

He’d brought one of Darius’s old guitars out with him because it had been sitting by the door as if waiting for someone.

Dare still didn’t know if he was that someone, but he set it next to him on the swing and listened to the rain slamming along the old roofing like it was trying its best to break it. His hands ached, as they tended to do in this weather, and no amount of flexing would help that, but he could still shoot and fight, and that was all that mattered.

Pain was always a part of his life—this injury made no difference.

Since he’d left the jungle, he’d exercised his hands constantly to keep them from seizing up, and they’d slowly begun to heal, one better than the other. He’d had to switch from being right-handed to left because the loss of sensation in his right hand made it difficult to handle a gun. Difficult, not impossible, but he was a better shot with his left than he’d ever been with his right. It was a different perspective. Some people said scars made things stronger because that tissue tended to be tougher. Dare wasn’t so sure of that, but he wanted to believe it.

The bayou reminded him of the jungle: hot and noisy and teeming with danger and beauty—just depended on your perspective. Nothing had changed—hurricanes might try to decimate this place, but it always came back.

Bayou living wasn’t for everyone. It tended to be rough, sometimes bordering on unpleasant and downright cruel, but some of his best memories were of this house, the surrounding swamps . . . he’d bet he’d find the same pirogues floating around the dock if he took a stroll that way.

So he was back here, but he wasn’t back yet, not fully. His mind was still in that jungle, his soul locked away and his heart, ice. Adele had chipped at it, Avery had broken through, but that was where it had ended.

“I always wanted a big brother,” she’d told him on one of their first of many days spent traveling cross-country in an attempt to throw anyone and everyone off their trail.

“Now you’ve got one. A little late—”

“Never. Never too late,” Avery told him. She’d ordered room service—cookies and hot chocolate for her and coffee for him, since he wanted to be boring, she’d said, and they’d sat and talked. Planned. Watched TV. Two months of that and he’d almost felt human again.

Damn, it had been nice. She was smart, like Darius. He trusted her more easily and completely than he’d ever trusted anyone, even his father. Maybe that was the way it was supposed to be when family was involved.

But now the plans were set in motion, and there was no more relaxing. They both had their jobs.

His phone buzzed in his pocket. Avery. Right on time. “You okay?”

“Like you don’t know?” she asked with that hint of laughter in her voice that hadn’t failed to make him smile yet.

Of course he’d watched her go into Gunner’s. He’d never let her take that on alone, no matter her insistence. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Thanks for trusting me to get to him on my own,” she said.

“I needed to see how you handle yourself when I’m not around,” he explained. “I didn’t mean to throw you to the wolves.”

“I took care of the wolves.”

“You damned well did. How’s Gunner?”

“Not happy.”

“He’s never happy—get used to it.”

“I had to promise him a tattoo.”

“That better be all he made you promise,” he muttered. But once she stepped inside his shop, Dare knew she was under Gunner’s protection, whether Avery knew it or not.

Gunner was so good, she wouldn’t.

Avery was safe with Gunner, although Dare had no idea how safe that really was. Gunner was out of the business, but there were a lot of people looking to recruit him against his will and an equal number who wanted him dead.

Gunner was in his early thirties, had come by his rep by the time he’d turned eighteen, solidified it in the Navy and got to legendary status during his first year in black ops.

He worked for no one but himself, which was always a risky proposition, but Gunner would never hook up with a group.

He’d been too much of a loner for the teams—no matter how many times they’d tried to recruit him. He’d known his limits, in love and fighting, but no woman ever believed him, which was why he’d married three times. Four, if Dare believed the rumors.

No matter—Avery wouldn’t be his next ex-wife. Dare would kill the guy first.

But that was business of an entirely different order, and Dare had more than his share to handle under this roof tonight.

“Is everything okay on your end?” she asked, changing the subject deftly.

“Darius left nothing on her beyond her address.”

“Is she okay?”

“I didn’t hurt her.”

“I know,” she told him. “You’re not like that.”

He wanted to tell her that she didn’t know him well enough if she could make a statement like that, but he didn’t want to ruin her perception of him. Not yet. And maybe it was because she was so open with him, because her life depended on him, literally, but being her protector didn’t feel like the burden he’d thought it would.

She believed in him in a way that made him want to believe in himself.

“Has she said anything yet?” Avery asked now.

“I haven’t started talking to her yet.”

“Do you want me there?”

That might be the best thing. Easier for him, for sure. “You’re better served where you are. Check in tomorrow.”

“It is tomorrow,” she chided gently before hanging up.

He put the phone back in his pocket, fingered the silver pick hanging around his neck and looked out at the dark bayou that lay beyond the house.

He remembered green grass, sticky air, the long, lazy summer days that rolled into easy summer nights when breezes were scarce and lightning bugs floated around like flickering magic.

Darius would play the guitar, the notes wafting along the thick air, and Dare would listen and pick up the guitar the next day, trying to play the notes from memory, sometimes succeeding.

But the days for being lazy were few and far between. Darius always had a mission for Dare, wanted his son to be mission ready, and Dare wouldn’t not be.

His mother . . . he had vague memories of her, singing in the tiny house in North Carolina that was just off base. She had a small vegetable garden too.

Later, all he remembered was the crying . . . and then she was gone.

Darius went off the rails after that.

Darius left the Army, although he’d never stopped working. It was then that the other six men and Adele began to circle his space. They were at various times friendly and angry and serious and silly. But no one ever took anything out on him.

Not idyllic, but he knew there were much worse ways to grow up.

He stared at the back of Grace’s head. She’d turned when he first started tuning the guitar, but she couldn’t see him, no matter how hard she tried.

Interrogation had its uses, but he’d have to soften her up first. She was strong and angry, and she would not go down easily. If she was left alone, her mind would take over. He wouldn’t have to do much more than that, let her get hungry and tired.

By the time he interrogated her, her own fear would’ve done more to her than he could’ve ever brought himself to do. She’d be working over her options in her mind, tiring herself out like a hamster on a wheel.

Will you be doing the same damned thing out here?

He answered himself with a snort and picked up the guitar, balanced it on his thigh.

The choices were pretty simple. If he turned Grace in, he could very well have his life back. More important, so could Avery.

Worst-case scenario: Richard Powell got Grace back and killed all of them. What could Dare do? He couldn’t kidnap and hold her as collateral for the rest of her natural-born life.

No, he needed something else on Powell to ensure this trade went smoothly. Grace had to know something he could use against Powell—and in turn, against her.

She’d spill if she thought it would save her from going back to her father, and that was just what he was counting on.

And then he’d have to decide if he could live with himself if he made that trade. A life for a life, Avery’s for Grace’s.

His palm curled around the smooth wood, his fingers playing along the strings. It would have to be tuned because no one had been here to play it in a long while.

He began to do that, hitting each note, tightening or loosening each string.

He’d never learned to play well with the pick, preferred strumming with his fingers since he could find the rhythm more easily that way. The vibrations under his rough fingertips spread through his hands, causing them to ache a little more. But hell, at least he felt something.


* * *

Grace heard the low notes of the guitar float through the screen door.

Dare was on the porch. She hadn’t heard him move for hours, but she’d heard him talking. And now this.

She didn’t turn around, hadn’t the entire time, no matter how difficult it was to stay put. Instead, she concentrated on keeping herself together, because he was counting on her falling apart.

What if she could share everything with him? Was he the one she was supposed to tell her secrets to? Didn’t everyone have one person in their lives they could trust, or did that only happen in movies?

The guitar continued now—he’d stopped the practice strumming and was playing a song.

Darius used to play on the old porch, but he wasn’t half as good as Dare was. Dare was a natural—he played from the heart. She listened to the chords as they built to a crescendo. She recognized the song—“Plush,” by the Stone Temple Pilots—and filled in the hauntingly beautiful lyrics in her head.

It was as if Dare was asking her about tomorrow, where she was going with her mask.

It was as if he knew her.

Set to the music, the question was mournful and hopeful, all at once. Maybe it was time for the mask to drop.

She closed her eyes and prayed he wouldn’t come in until the tears had stopped rolling down her cheeks.