Drew stormed from the room.
“Sydney?” Mercer had the phone to his ear. “Tell me you got them. They gave us proof of life, and we only have an hour left before the first woman dies.”
Tina’s heart was racing. She pulled in as many deep breaths as she could. Drew was back in the interrogation room.
Anton had his smug smile in place once more. “Talked to your sister, did you?”
“Where in Louisiana?” Mercer demanded. “I need specifics, and I need them now.”
One man knew specifics. One man knew everything.
The man smiling as he taunted Drew.
Tina rushed for the door. She wasn’t going to let this happen. Not to Drew. Not to his sisters.
The agents guarding the room tensed when they saw her. But they knew she’d just been in the observation room with Mercer, and she had treated these EOD agents before. They understood she wasn’t the enemy, so she just said, “Mercer wants me in there as backup.”
They weren’t used to her lying, so they let her in.
She hurried into the interrogation room just as Anton said, “If you want them alive, then you’ll give me what I want.”
Tina squared her shoulders. “Here I am.”
Drew whirled toward her. “Tina.”
She didn’t look at his face. Right then, she couldn’t. Tina focused completely on Anton. “You wanted me, and I’m here.”
His smiled faded as his gaze raked her face. “What I want is you dead.”
Drew stepped in front of Tina, blocking her from Anton’s sight. “You aren’t getting what you want.”
“Then you don’t get to see your sisters alive again.” His voice had gone low and rough and mean. “Because if you did want them back alive, you’d be bending down, taking that knife from the sheath you keep strapped to your ankle, and you’d shove it into her heart, right now.”
Tina locked her knees.
“I kill her,” Drew rasped the words. “Then how do I know you won’t still let my sisters die? I’m not a fool. I know how you operate. You turn on everyone that you can. Your only loyalty is to yourself.”
The door was shoved open again and it banged against the wall. Tina glanced over her shoulder. Mercer was there, chest heaving. His eyes blazed at her. “Out!”
Anton laughed. “Brave is she? Coming in here, getting away from you. Maybe she’s more like Marguerite than I first thought.”
Marguerite. Tina had heard that name before. Not from Mercer, but from her real father. He’d been talking to Tina’s mother once and he’d said, “Bruce won’t ever be the same. Losing Marguerite broke him.”
Mercer grabbed Tina’s wrist. “Come on. I told you—”
We don’t negotiate with terrorists. “I have a deal,” Tina said flatly. “A deal that I want to make.”
The room got real quiet. The tension was so thick she could feel it pushing at her.
Tina tugged free of Mercer. She stepped around Drew. And she faced the nightmare in that chair. How many lives had he destroyed?
You won’t destroy any more.
“You can’t be trusted,” Tina said simply as she stared at Anton.
“Neither can he,” Anton immediately replied as his head jerked toward Mercer. “You think he’s so good? That he’s on the side of the law?” His lips thinned. “You’re losing your life, dear girl, because of him. Because of what he took from me. Your father says that he works for justice—but how was killing my Jonathan justice?”
Mercer shoved past Drew and slammed his fists into the table, sending spider-web-like cracks across the top. “That attack was meant for you! How the hell was I supposed to know you’d brought your boy into that life? You were behind the attack on Marguerite. You killed her—”
“She wasn’t meant to die!” Anton tried to surge to his feet, but the handcuffs jerked him right back down. “I was taking her. Taking your daughter. It was leverage because you were too close to finding out—”
“That you were a traitorous bastard who’d sold out not one but two countries? Yes, Anton, I figured that out!”
They were fighting over lives long lost. What about the lives still hanging in the balance? “Neither of you can be trusted,” Tina said. Her breath rushed in and out. In and out. “And we’re running out of time.”
Anton and Mercer both swung their attention back to her. She focused just on the man who was pulling the puppet strings, even while in EOD custody. “We already know the women are in Louisiana.”
His eyes narrowed.
“We’ll run the rest of the trace down soon enough.” She tried to keep all emotion from her face and eyes, just as the others had done. Maybe she was learning how to be an agent. “Tell us where they are.”
Anton glanced toward Drew. “Still haven’t gone for the knife yet... I guess you don’t care that much for your sisters after all.”
“You planned better than this.” Tina shook her head as she tried to puzzle through the nightmare. “You wouldn’t just count on Drew killing me.”
“Drew?” Anton murmured. “How intimate. I thought for sure he’d just be Agent Lancaster.”
She’d slipped up.
“Drew and Tina,” Anton continued, as if tasting their names. “Perhaps I see now why the sisters don’t matter as much. They can’t matter as much as a lover.”
“Get out,” Drew snapped. His eyes pinned Tina and then Mercer. “Both of you.” His steps were slow and certain as he advanced around the table and got close to Anton. “Turn off any video feeds. Secure the room. Leave him to me. I won’t negotiate.” He spat out the word. “I’ll make him tell me.”
“Anton has been tortured before,” Mercer said, voice grim.
“You should know,” Anton told him with a sly glance Mercer’s way. “I won’t break.”
This had to stop. “Take me. Take Drew. Take us both to the place where you have his sisters. As soon as Drew gets them...y-you can kill me.” Or, a much, much better option—we’ll find another way out of this mess by then.
Mercer grabbed Tina’s wrist once more. “You’re done here.”
No, she wasn’t. She kept talking and focusing on Anton. “You have men close by, you have to. A guy like you wouldn’t leave anything to chance.” She ignored the burn in her chest and spoke even faster as she said, “You knew Agent Lancaster wouldn’t just kill me without making sure his sisters were safe. You wanted an exchange—so here’s one. Get your men to come in. Take us to the women. Then, I’ll—”