The Missionary (17 page)

Only her hips moved, the rest of her was boneless on top of him, and now her muscles tensed, coiled, and then she felt something break inside her, burst open and detonate. She stifled a scream against his skin, and then he was there with her, moaning and pulling her down on him, driving into her relentlessly, and she felt herself filled by him as he released, coming inside her with a primal growl in her ear.
 

They moved together for long minutes more, milking their united climaxes, slick and sated and exhausted.

When they were both about to pass out, Stone shifted Wren so she was cradled in his embrace. “God, Wren. You’re fucking amazing.”

“Mmmm. So are you.” She could barely form words.
 

Even through her exhaustion, however, she felt the ache, the chemical need, the drowning desperation. She’d managed to push it away long enough to be with Stone, but now it was coming back with a vengeance. She shivered, cold now, and violently nauseous, but too exhausted to move.

Stone’s arms clutched her tighter as she shook, and then he reached down to pull the blanket over them. “You’re sick, babe.”

“It’s worse, all of a sudden.” She swallowed hard against the rising of her gorge. “It was bad, before, but now…oh God, I don’t want this. I hate this. Make it stop, Stone.”

Stone groaned. “I knew I shouldn’t have let us—”

“No.” Wren forced herself to move, to meet his gaze. “No. I wanted that. I
needed
that.”

“But now you’re even sicker. You needed that energy to fight the withdrawal.”

“I needed you emotionally, even more.” She wished she could express what making love to him had meant to her, but she was too tired to think anymore, too burned out and too sick to speak anymore. “Just…hold me.”

“That I can do.”

“Don’t let him get me again.” It was her last thought.

She heard him curse. “Never. Never.”

Blackness swarmed through her, sucked her under, and this time she welcomed it.

13

Stone held Wren in his arms, beyond exhausted but unable to fall asleep. She shook intermittently, her skin feverish. She moaned now and then, rolled away and then back, restless. Her fingers dug into her skin as she tried to scratch away things that weren’t there.
 

He’d known she was starting to feel withdrawal from the heroin Cervantes had forced on her, but he didn’t realize how bad it was until she’d collapsed in his arms after they’d made love. She was absolutely limp, yet unable to stop shaking, whimpering from the ache in her bones.
 

Part of him felt guilty, like he’d taken advantage of her somehow, but he knew that wasn’t the case. She’d wanted him, beyond the need for safety as her rescuer. She wanted him, as a man. And having wanted her back for so long, he couldn’t resist, and couldn’t keep inventing reasons to try.
 

And it had been better than he’d ever imagined. Even with both of them being hurt, tense with the knowledge that they weren’t out of danger, it had been the most intense and amazing experience of his life. And it had been making love, he realized. It was more than sex. He wasn’t ready to admit how deep his feelings ran for her, but what they’d shared had been far more than mere sex, and certainly more than anything so meaningless as fucking. It had been…necessary, somehow. They couldn’t have not gone there with each other.
 

Stone watched Wren as she tossed and turned and moaned, crying out in pain as her body tried to flush the poison from
 
her system. She was soaked in sweat, wracked with constant tremors. And even then, she was beautiful.
 

He wanted to stay awake, guard her, protect her. But he also knew he couldn’t do that properly if he didn’t get some sleep. Calling on years of practice, he forced himself to shut down, to push away all thoughts of worry and love—was it love?—and sleep.
 

*
 
*
 
*

Stone woke to the sound of Wren screaming. She was tangled in the sheets, spine arched to breaking, head shaking, “
nonononono!
” shrieking from her lips. He reached for her, and she pulled away, kicked out, rolling off the bed and scrambling into the farthest corner against the wall and the nightstand. She clutched her left forearm in her fist, knees drawn up. Her breathing was ragged, drawn out whimpers and moans escaping with each breath.

Stone slid slowly off the bed, heedless of being naked. He crouched down near the foot of the bed, a few feet from her. “It’s okay. You’re safe.” He extended his hand, palm up. “Wren, babe. It’s me. It’s Stone. You’re with me, in a hotel. You’re not there anymore. Look at me, baby.”

Wren shook her head, trying to shrink farther back into the corner. “It’s not real. You’re not real.”

Stone inched closer, until he was able to touch her foot. “Feel that? That’s my hand on your foot. I’m real. You’re safe.”

Wren stopped breathing, blinking furiously, as if debating the veracity of her own senses. Then she glanced at her arms, her breathing going panicked again, her palms scrubbing at her skin, nails gouging her forearms. “Get them off. They’re biting me. They’re crawling on me, Stone! They’re all over me. Get them off…please!”

“Look at me, Wren. Look at my eyes, okay?” He touched her knee with his palm. “It’s me, it’s just me. They’re not real, Wren. I know it feels like it. It may even look real. But I promise you, there aren’t any bugs. It’s the drugs, the fever.”

“No…You promise me you’re real? I’m not dreaming again?” She uncurled slightly, and Stone took her arms in his hands. “I dreamed of us. Together. But now I’m back there, in the dark. He’ll come and put the needle in me again, make me forget.”

Stone slid his palms up and down her arms. “Feel that? That’s real. That’s me, touching your arms. And that dream of us, together? That was real. We did that. It wasn’t a dream. You’re not there.”

She looked confused. “I was so hot. Now I’m cold. My skin hurts. I itch.” She looked down at her arms and whimpered. “They’re back. They’re eating me. Crawling on me. Get them off!” She batted at invisible insects on her arms, hitting and scratching until Stone caught her hands in his.

“Listen to me, Wren. It’s not real. I’m real. I’m here.” He pulled her toward him, stood up and scooped her into his arms, sank onto the bed with her curled against him. “Feel that? Feel me? I’m right here. You’re here. You’re safe. No bugs, no drugs. Just me and you.”
 

She touched his chest with her fingers, eyes shut tight, shivering and shaking. “You…you feel real. I’m so scared. I don’t want to go back there. Back into the dark. It was so dark, Stone. No light, not at all. I couldn’t see my own hand in front of me. I could hear things, voices, footsteps, birds. But I couldn’t see anything. And I was so confused. Like I was floating. Dreaming, lost in a cloud. Then I’d come down from the cloud and remember, and I’d try to hold on to the remembering, because even up in the clouds, I knew something was wrong, it was too dark and I was alone. All alone. And I was scared. Of
him
. He’s
evil
, Stone. The square door in the ceiling opens, and I see his—his green flip-flops. That’s all I’d see, until he was right in front of me, and he’d look at me. His eyes are dark, and they might almost look normal, like he looks almost normal. But then he looks into my eyes and I just know…he’s evil.
Evil
. He wants me to be afraid, but I can’t let him see. He wants me…he wants something from me. I don’t know what. I always thought he was going to rape me. But he didn’t. He hurt me. He’d hit me. Kick me. He brought men down to look at me. Like I was…a painting, or a sculpture. Something to be bought.”

She shook her head, opened her eyes and stared up at Stone, her gaze pleading with him to never let go, to not let her slide back down into that nightmare. And he wouldn’t. He’d never let go.
 

He rubbed her back with one hand and brushed the dark locks of hair from her eyes with the other. He felt the guilt like an acidic ball in his gut. “I knew something bad would happen. I knew it. I didn’t stop it, and I’m so sorry, Wren.”

She shifted, put her palm to his cheek. “No. Please no, Stone. It wasn’t your fault. You told everyone, whether they wanted to listen or not, that we shouldn’t do this, that it was a bad idea.” She seemed to draw strength, spine stiffening and tears drying, though her body was still wracked by tremors and slick with fever sweat. “It wasn’t your fault. You begged me not to go. You told me not to go anywhere without you.”

Stone rubbed circles on her back, held her against his chest. “Enough. Enough blame. It happened, and you’re out. I won’t let anything else happen to you. I’ll get you home.”

“What about—what about the other girls? The ones who…who didn’t have you to rescue them?”

 
Stone sighed. “I wish I could give you an answer you’d like. But…I can’t. It’s just not possible. There are too many, and only one of me. And even with a team of guys, a team of trained SEALs, I couldn’t rescue them all. It’s a trade that has gone on for…forever, I think. For as long as there’s been prostitution, there’s been a woman forced into it somehow. And this is just one corner of the world, one particular group of sex slavers.” He closed his eyes and breathed in the reality of Wren in his arms. “You know that story you always wanted to hear? You guessed it had something to do with Manila. What this stupid trip was all about. You were right. It was my last mission. A bunch of American girls had gone missing, including a senator’s daughter.
 
She was backpacking around Europe and Asia with her girlfriends, except she never made it out of Manila. Well this senator had some sources, and they said his daughter had been kidnapped by sex traffickers. Nasty fuckers. Kidnap the girls, drug them, sell them, run a train of johns on them until the girls were just…gone. Drug them again, use them until they were useless, and then leave them dead. Kill them, dump them in the river. It was happening to girls from all over the world. Russians, Germans, Italians, Chinese, Japanese, local Filipinas, Americans. It wouldn’t have involved us at all, my group of SEALs, I mean, until this senator decided to pull some strings. It was all to get his daughter back, of course, but it was wrapped up in a pretty little humanitarian package. Send a message, and all that.”

Stone took a deep breath. “So we went in, my fireteam and Foxtrot. My guys were point, the ones who went in. Foxtrot was backup, extraction zone coverage. On the surface, the traders, whatever you want to call ‘em, seem like just another group of thugs and smugglers, drug dealers, whatever. But they’re organized. Smart. Someone in charge is smart, rather. Individually, they really are just drug dealers and common criminals, but they’re run by someone sharp. We knew that going in. They had a network of informants, people on the street, people watching and reporting. Paid, or frightened into keeping an eye on anything that happened. Our intel even put out some false trails, misleading info. We went in dark. Swam from way out. You know those SEAL commercials, where the guys are coming out of the surf in full gear? That was us. We found the right place without trouble, which in Manila at night was quite a feat in itself, especially in somewhere like the Tondo district, just mile after mile of interconnected shanties with no direction or addresses or real streets or anything. We went in, and…they were ready for us. Six SEALs can do a shitload of damage, okay? We’re the best of the best. But when we’re up against twenty or thirty guys who are waiting for us with AKs and Uzis?”

He paused, rubbed his face with his palm and pushed on. Wren was silent and still, except for the shivers of the fever. “They were waiting for us. Dozens and Zane were covering our ingress point. Watching the door, I mean. Dozens got it first. I never saw it happen. Just heard the AKs open up, and then he was gone, Dozens, and then Zane. Gone, in less than thirty seconds. A blink of an eye, guys I’d known for five fucking years, just dead. I’d just gotten shitty with Dozens a couple days before. We’d gone to the bar together, put down like, four pitchers between us.
 

“Well, the only way for us to go was in. The ambush was behind us, so we went in. Room by room, by the book. We saw…some awful shit. Girls too drugged and apathetic to respond even to automatic arms fire. Rescued, but too fried to care. Some we rescued. We found the senator’s daughter, Lisa, and a few others. A bunch more. A dozen white girls, too many local girls to count. We got our target out. But we lost Dozens, Zane, Benny, Nancy. Blake almost didn’t make it. I almost didn’t make it. Took shrapnel to the knee, ended my career. Shredded my knee bad enough that I couldn’t keep up, even after I healed. But we got the girls out, and we took out their operation.
 

“Shitty thing is, even though we killed—god, fucking dozens of guys, it wasn’t enough. They came back. Started over, hired more, moved their ops to somewhere else. Cervantes, man. He’s the one.” Stone realized he was gripping Wren’s arm too hard and forced himself to relax his hand. “All that, for one girl. Four of the best SEALs in the entire Navy, dead. They knew going in, every mission, it might be the last one. We all knew it. Wasn’t the first time we’d lost guys. But…it was different. We all had sisters, girlfriends, wives, moms, friends, and when you see the pictures of the girls with ribs showing, beaten bloody, track marks on their arms, sold like fucking meat and killed, floating face down in the river…you’ll do whatever you have to. It wasn’t about Lisa Johnson. Not entirely. And then this stupid church and their goddamned idiotic mission trip. Save the prostitutes for Jesus. How goddamn stupid can you be? I tried to tell them. Build houses for Jesus. Feed the hungry, bring medicine, penicillin, water. Fuck, bring empty water bottles so they can have light. They fill these empty bottles with water and a little bleach, cut a hole in the ceiling and hang the bottle into the room, the sun shines through and it’s free light. Fucking genius, really. But no, those holy-ass elders wanted to do something bigger. Nick meant well, but he’s never left Virginia, he had no idea what he was planning, what he was getting you kids into. And it happened. And now I’ve got more blood on my hands. I’ve got Cervantes and his entire fucking operation on my ass, and all I’ve got is one pistol and my bare hands. This is the guy who managed to ambush US Navy SEALs, and I’ve got no back up. No extraction zone. No chopper waiting for me.”