Free Hacking the SEAL (Saving the SEALs Series Book 2) by Leslie North Page B

man. Warmth spread outward from her chest to her extremities despite the situation. If they made it out of this… No. She shook her head. When they made it out of this, she wouldn’t mind getting to know him better. The way he always cracked jokes to make her smile, the warm, protective weight of his hand on her back as he walked with her, the way he’d stuck with her and their agreement to work together when he could’ve just as easily blown her off completely. Not to mention the guy cooked , for God’s sake.
    Then there was the earth-shattering sex…
    Yeah, I definitely need to get to know him better. Much, much better.
    But her first step was escape. Outside the window was a five to six-foot drop, then a flat, industrial-style rooftop stretched for a few hundred feet or so. Five to six feet she could handle. Now if she could just get the dumb thing to budge. Nope. Not an inch. Great. Breaking the glass would only have the goon squad downstairs descending on her in seconds. She pulled out her pocket knife again. Maybe she could use the blade for leverage. Or not. It was meant for cutting, not heavy lifting. So, back to the supply pile she went. After several more minutes of searching, Hayley located the top half of a rusted old screwdriver.
    She went back to the window and wedged the thing into the tiny crack between the bottom of the window and sill and pushed down hard. She’d just started to make a bit of progress when the voices returned outside her door.
    Fuck.
    She dove for the tarp and landed on her side, as more of her abductors returned.
    “What should we do with her?” one of the guys from before asked.
    “We’ll need to take her with us. She’s the bait.”
    Bait?
    Her heart battered against her chest. They were going to use her to lure Scotty and his team to the canal. Of course they were. The one time she’d had a decent night with a decent guy and now it would end in bloodshed.
    “And the diversion,” another guy said.
    Diversion? For what?
    “Rigs, you grab her and tote her down,” yet another new voice said, this one more commanding than the others. “The rest of us will load the equipment in the van.”
    “Yes, sir.”
    Hayley still had the screwdriver clutched tight in her fist. If she timed it right… She waited until the other footsteps disappeared down the stairs and the new guy’s breathing drew nearer to her side. She could take him. She would take him down. She had no choice.
    He tapped her with his boot again and she gathered her strength, then struck, driving the sharp end of the screwdriver deep into his lower leg. The guy screamed and dropped, clutching his shin. Hayley scrambled to the window.
    To hell with the noise. Hayley grabbed whatever she could find and smashed the window. With the way that dude was screaming, his buddies would be up here in seconds anyway. One leg out the window, she peered back and noticed the guy’s face looked weird, kind of shiny and pink, like the skin was new and plastic. Her eyes widened. Like a burn patient.
    Michael Becks.
    “What the fuck?” a man yelled from the doorway behind her, but Hayley was already out the window and running for her life.
    Get away. Get to Scotty. Get these bastards behind bars where they belong.
    The mantra chanted through her head in time to her pounding feet.
    She didn’t look back to see if anyone followed, just kept running. At the edge of the roof, she grabbed hold of a rickety old fire escape ladder and climbed down to the ground, then sprinted away as fast as her legs would take her.
    Brick buildings and people blurred past as she weaved through the crowd on the sidewalk. The smell of hot asphalt and bus exhaust stung her nose. She was somewhere downtown, perhaps the old manufacturing district based on the rusted-out, abandoned spaces around her. Weak sunlight filtered through the clouds above, so it had to be mid-afternoon maybe. She had no idea how long she’d been out, but it didn’t seem longer than