Wicked Lies: A Dark Mission Novella Read Free Page B

prisoner back into the chair. “Round two?” He grimaced. “Round three?”
    Try round fifteen.
    The interrogator—a different one, Jonas noted; broader but more squat than the last—wasn’t wearing a jacket. He also didn’t bother with the restraints. Cocky. And helpful.
    “Stay calm,” Jonas murmured.
    Danny didn’t verbally reply, but Jonas saw him close his eye. He stiffened, bracing for an impact that didn’t come.
    Jonas adjusted the rimless glasses on his nose. A habit born from waiting too long before tightening the frame’s grip on his temples.
    Why was the interrogator just staring at him? Like a statue, all wide shoulders and breathing heavily enough to pick up through the earpiece and the surveillance camera.
    After too long, Danny cracked open that crusted, blood-smeared eye. “Don’t make me wait for it,” he complained, even if it did shake.
    “Brave,” Jonas said into the line. “But don’t get cute with him. I need you on your feet.”
    “Been a while.” The interrogator’s voice was deeper than the previous one’s, lacking the refined polish of higher intelligence. A meat-man, then. Fists and facts. All Jonas saw of his head capped in hair buzzed so short he couldn’t tell if it was brown or blond. Thick rolls carved lines into the back of his neck, disappearing into his collar.
    “Can you hear everything?” Danny asked.
    “Oh, yeah, I’m all ears,” said the operative, but Jonas knew it wasn’t for him.
    “I hear it loud and clear,” he replied softly. “Go easy.”
    The man put his fists on his hips. A posture Jonas had seen other missionaries adopt, especially the men. Fist to hip, elbows wide out, legs braced. A stun baton hooked into his belt beside his right fist, a knife sheathed by his left. The man was a fighter. And he obviously didn’t count Danny as a threat. “You going to tell us anything?”
    Jonas found himself holding his breath, his hands frozen over the keyboard as Danny stared at the squat man in the white button-down shirt. The thick line that was his lashes, crusted into dark spikes, dropped.
    Then swept up again. “Blond.” Pure terror fought for control under a nonchalance Jonas sensed Danny struggled to maintain.
    The man bent, bracing one hairy-knuckled hand against the back of the metal chair. “What?” He frowned. “You out of your head already?”
    Jonas’s eyebrows rose.
    “Maybe not,” Danny murmured. “Too smooth for blond. Maybe a redhead. I like redheads.”
    Something twisted in Jonas’s chest. Something that felt a hell of a lot like laughter. And warning. Because Danny wasn’t talking to the interrogator.
    “I’m not blond,” Jonas confirmed quietly. There was no way that operative—Jonas couldn’t bring himself to call the unknown man a missionary—could hear the earpiece. Even still, he didn’t risk it.
    “Quit playing,” the interrogator demanded, shifting his hand to Danny’s short hair. He wrenched the kid’s head back, scowling down at the blood and bruises. “You going to tell me where your people are or not?”
    Danny’s grunt of pain echoed in the suddenly vise-like tension of Jonas’s chest. Come on, Gordon. Hurry your ass up.
    Through his teeth, Danny gritted out, “Red?”
    Jonas’s breath shuddered. “Nope,” he managed, somehow keeping his anxiety, his fear from his voice. Nice and easy. A touchstone. “Afraid not.”
    Danny’s bloody mouth curved up. Just a hint.
    Just enough to break the operative’s patience. As Jonas watched, horrified, he drew back a heavy hand and slapped Danny across the face. Right on the side already swollen nearly to twice its original shape. Already strained flesh tore. Danny cursed; pain and anger twisted together, strangely obscene coming from the kid’s lips.
    Come on!
    “Brown, then,” Danny gasped. Blood dribbled from the corner of his mouth.
    “Hang on” was all Jonas trusted himself to say. It was as good as a confession. “Help is coming. Just hang on