Page 48 of SEAL Ever After

She shifted and shivered slightly.

Were they at Juan’s house? Or had he stashed her somewhere else and left her here?

As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she realized that it had to be night. Juan had claimed she was worth a lot of money to him. He wouldn’t have gone through all the trouble to kidnap her just to leave her alone to die.

She moaned as she tried to sit up, her entire body aching. Her arms buckled beneath her, and she collapsed back onto the ground, the cool floor against her cheek. She had a sour taste in her mouth from vomiting earlier and would’ve given anything for a nice, cool glass of water and maybe a warm shower.

Had they even left her any food or water?

She wouldn’t survive if they starved her to death.

Taking a deep breath, she felt drowsiness began to overtake her again. Maybe if she rested a few more minutes, she’d feel better. Then she’d figure out a plan and what to do next.

She’d find a way to escape and get home.

She closed her eyes and surrendered to the darkness.

Chapter 22

Ryan groaned in his sleep and then awoke with a start, reality slamming back into him. He jumped up from the small cot in his office on base, nearly knocking the damn thing over. Fumbling for his cell phone on his desk, he saw there were no missed calls. His eyes landed on his office phone, but he would’ve heard that ringing. Besides, if anything urgent had come up, his men would’ve woken him.

“Damn it,” he muttered.

He scrubbed a hand over his jaw, knowing the few hours of sleep he’d gotten had done little good. He’d wasted precious time resting when Sarah was out there somewhere, alone.

Dialing the number for the bullpen, he was relieved to hear Hunter answer.

“There are no major updates,” Hunter confirmed. “The name Jesus Lopez was one he used nearly a decade ago. The police were able to pull new sets of prints from the third hotel room. They’ll be giving us an update within the hour.”

“Roger that.”

Ryan hung up, grabbed a clean uniform, and quickly showered in the locker room and changed before hurrying down to where everyone was gathered. Some of the men from both SEAL teams were there as they’d begun working in shifts.

Christopher and Lexi were already seated at laptops wearing fresh clothes, and he hoped they’d gotten a couple hours of sleep, too. Patrick was at the front of the room talking on the phone in a low voice, and some of the other officers and men from base were gathered around.

“Good morning, sir,” Hunter said, handing him a steaming cup of black coffee.

Ryan briefly did a double take but took the cup from him.

“Did we hear from the police yet about the prints?” Ryan asked.

“Negative. Ice is on the phone with the Virginia Beach PD detective though. Several witnesses saw Juan arriving at the hotel on your wedding day. They’re trying to get a better image of the license plates, but it turns out one of the security cameras in the parking garage wasn’t working.”

“Damn it all to hell,” Ryan muttered. He took a sip of the coffee, the black liquid burning down his throat. “What about other surveillance?”

“We’re on it,” Christopher said, looking up from his laptop. “It’s a hell of a lot easier now that we have a vehicle make and model to work with. We can hack into any security system down there and try to see which way they went. Even if the fingerprints give us nothing, this is a new lead we can chase.”

“Good,” Ryan said. “What about the bridges?” he asked, referring to the long stretch of bridges and tunnels that connected Virginia Beach to the rest of the state. “They have cameras there, too.”

“Already on it,” Lexi said. “I hacked into their system and am running through the security cams for the first twelve hours after Sarah went missing. We should be able to locate the car if he went that way.”

Ryan nodded, his chest tightening. They already knew Sarah had been moved to another location, but knowing someone had driven away with her inside their vehicle made his blood boil. They’d taken her away from him—possibly across state lines, possibly out of the country.

“What about flights?” he asked, frowning.

Patrick walked over, pocketing his cell phone. “I notified all the major airports yesterday. That doesn’t mean she couldn’t have been taken out of the area from a smaller airport though. Or they could’ve driven across state lines and flown from somewhere else.”

“She’d never let them do that,” Ryan said, shaking his head.

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