The Wild Charge (Dartmoor Book 9)

Forty-Three

Plink. Plink. Plink.

Something was dripping. That was Reese's first awareness.

And he was alive. You had to be alive to be aware of things.

His eyes were closed, still; the prospect of lifting his lids was a daunting one. Concussion, then. He took a conscious breath, and pain lanced through him in a dozen places. The worse of it was the point where his shoulder joined his underarm.

GSW, he thought hazily, and then realized something more alarming. He was hanging, hands cuffed together above his head.

Scent of mildewed grass. Play of light through gapped boards. Rasped breaths of men waiting. His master's voice: again.

No, no. That was then. This was...

Plink. Plink. Plink.

He flexed his arms, and it hurt. His biceps were full of pins and needles, and his wrists ached, cuffs digging into the skin. It felt warm, there: he was bleeding. He'd been hanging for a while. If he concentrated, he could feel that he rotated, slightly, side to side, though there was no breeze. That meant–

A hot stripe of fire licked across his left thigh, and his eyes slammed open, full consciousness returning.

His vision swam and tilted a moment, and he had to swallow down his gorge, dry throat clicking. It hurt to breathe too deeply, so he took a few shallow, panted breaths through open lips.

Someone chuckled, low and dark. An unfamiliar voice.

Focus. Put it all away. Assess his surroundings.

He blinked the grit from his eyes and found a man standing in front of him. A man he'd glimpsed before, in snatches, while fighting him.

He was one of Hunter's. A little younger than Reese, of a similar build: slender and athletic. He had blue eyes, too, and his hair was blond, though he wore it short.

He smiled at Reese, a feral flash of teeth, and lifted a bloodied knife into Reese's field of vision. "You're awake."

Reese didn't smile.

The boy's smile slipped, the knife dipped out of sight, and a fresh line of pain carved across Reese's thigh below the first.

That was the plink, plink, plink, he realized. His blood dripping to the floor.

This was wrong. Hunter didn't go for torture. Didn't tease. Hunter was about killing targets and collecting his money. Quick and clean.

As if the thought had summoned him, Hunter's voice barked out, "Jax, what did we talk about?"

Reese still had no idea where they were, only that it was meat-locker cold, and the floor was dark. They were curtained in by plastic sheeting, a panel of which pushed back as Hunter joined them.

The pain and disorientation kept Reese from freezing up inside at sight of him, the way he had last time. His ears were ringing, his body was throbbing with pain, and all he could think, distantly, was that he looked exactly as he always had: graying hair, salt-and-pepper beard; still athletic and mean-faced. He hadn't always thought it mean – one face had been just like any other, save distinguishing features. Life with the Dogs, with Tenny, had altered his perception, had him attributing emotions to that old familiar face. Unpleasant ones.

The boy – Jax? – ducked his head with a murmur and stepped back, clearing the way for Hunter.

Reese continued to sway, easy, micro-rotations, as Hunter came to stand before him, arms folded in the old way, feet braced apart. A military man through and through. He executed a slow, visual sweep of Reese, from bound hands to dangling, bare toes. "The gunshot was clean. Went straight through. We patched it," he said, matter-of-fact.