Undercover Captor (Shadow Agents 5)

“Tina isn’t his daughter,” Sydney said at the same instant. “The kidnappers are mistaken about her identity. When they realize that mistake, Tina will become expendable to them.”

Rachel raised her dark brows. “They took the wrong bait,” she said sadly.

Yes, they had. The EOD’s careful plans had gone horribly wrong.

Before Dylan could reply to Rachel, the voice from the video was talking again. “We want an exchange,” the man continued. “Her life for yours.”

Dylan whistled. Mercer had suspected this would happen.

“For every day that you delay, we will hurt her.”

Tina stared out of that video, her eyes wide. But, wait, did her gaze just flicker to the left? It looked as if some of the tension had eased from her shoulders.

“We gave you proof of life,” the male voice said. “Now it’s time for proof of pain.”

Another man approached Tina. All Dylan could see was the guy’s back, his blond hair and the knife in his hand.

“Oh, dear God,” Rachel whispered.

“Slice off her finger,” the grating voice ordered.

The knife lowered toward Tina’s hand.

“Stop!” A familiar bellow. Drew’s bellow.

But the knife didn’t stop.

Tina looked away.

After that, all hell broke loose. Or, rather, Drew Lancaster broke loose. He leaped forward and attacked the blond. The video image twisted, flew sideways, and Drew pummeled the guy on the floor.

Then another image filled the screen. A man wearing a black ski mask stared straight ahead and said, “We have your daughter, Mercer, and we have one of your precious EOD agents. If you don’t come for them, if you don’t trade yourself, they’ll both die. I can promise you, their deaths will be long and very, very painful.”

The video ended.

Rachel slowly exhaled. “That would explain why Drew isn’t making contact.”

Because he’d had to blow his cover to protect Tina.

“There is no exchange,” Sydney told them. No emotion had entered her voice. For a moment she almost reminded him of Drew. “You have to extract Tina and Drew, immediately. Backup agents will be sent down to assist your team.”

“And the original mission?” He wasn’t just going to let a domestic terrorist group walk away unscathed. If those SOBs escaped, thousands could die.

Not on my watch.

“Contain Devast’s group. Local law enforcement has already been alerted, and they’ll move on your command.”

This was a mess. A terrible, dangerous mess. “What about the group’s boss? If we just get the underlings, we don’t stop Anton Devast.” That was why Drew had gone in. To take down the real threat. Not just the lackeys.

“We’ll work to make his men turn on him. If he isn’t there, if we can’t get Devast in this raid, then we’ll use any prisoners that are taken against him.”

But they might not turn on their boss. If they were afraid enough—or stupidly loyal enough—they wouldn’t.

He ended the call with Sydney. He understood exactly what had been said and what hadn’t.

The EOD wasn’t like other government agencies. They didn’t follow official protocols, and they didn’t always tie up their cases with nice, neat little bows.

More often, their cases ended in bloodshed and death.