Several blocks away from Sam's disabled car the van pulled over.
"If you don't do exactly what I say; I'll go back and shoot that pretty little friend of yours in her weird looking eye."
Deeks looked startled and Damon patted the rifle, "Leupold Mark 4 scope on a M89SR, I spared no expense to get to you. Now hand me your gun, two fingers."
Deeks held the gun out, pinched between his finger and thumb, Damon tucked the gun under his shirt. "Throw your cell phone out the window."
"I just got this thing a week ago." Marty complained, taking the phone from the case.
"Then it's still under warranty. Toss it."
The phone sailed out the front passenger window landing on the grass of the curb.
"Good shot but that won't do you any good." He pulled the detective's gun out and shot the phone, shattering it. "No one is going to track you with it." He put the gun back in his waistband and pulled out a pair of handcuffs.
"Now sit down up here and cuff your left hand to the door."
Deeks got up and moved to the front, sat, snapped the cuff on his wrist and then to the door, "You really have a thing for tying me up, don't you?"
Damon's fist smashed into Deeks' mouth so fast the younger man didn't have time to blink.
"Shut up."
The detective settled back in the seat, trying to slow down his breathing, he was feeling light headed and his heart was pounding. He watched the traffic around them, hoping and yet fearing to spot a familiar vehicle.
After a while Sharpe began to smile, and then hum.
"You're in an awfully good mood."
"It's a beautiful day in sunny LA!" Sharpe laughed, "The DJ on WKTC always says that, no matter what the weather is like."
"I don't listen to that techno crap that you use to play in that club you use to own." Marty goaded him.
Sharpe punched him viciously in the side, "Keep it up; I'll just make sure you suffer that much more."
Deeks grunted, spat blood on the console between the seats.
"Too bad about your partner, she was a sexy little bitch and I would have loved to have gotten to know her better."
Sharpe laughed as Deeks thrashed in the seat, trying to reach him.
"I did some research; I found quite a bit about her but nothing on you. What a nice funeral they gave her. Was it because her daddy was the chief of police and her brother the commander at Pacific?"
"Gee, I didn't know you could read."
Sharpe raised his fist, and then put his hand back on the wheel. "You are not going to make me mad enough to kill you. I plan on letting you live long enough to regret every moment of your life. Where I'm taking you, no one knows about, we'll have plenty of time for me to remind you just how much I hate you."
Deeks couldn't help the convulsive shiver that rocked him, he could feel the sensation of the knife slowly flaying strips of skin from his back; hear echoes of Sharpe's laughter as he screamed.
"You remember that, don't you?" Damon asked his voice full of pride. "I didn't recognize you when you showed up with the cops. You look really different when you dress like a grown up. After those other people came and you started throwing up…" he laughed, "I must have made quite an impression on you."
Marty looked out the window and held his breath, he refused to give Sharpe the satisfaction of knowing how completely terrified he was right now. There had to be a way out of this.
And maybe, just maybe, this was it.
"Hey sweetheart," Marty whistled at the leggy blond in the convertible stopped at the light next to them, "call me sometime." he managed to tug his badge off his belt and tossed it out and it landed on the seat beside her.
"That was a stupid move." Damon growled, he hit Marty in the temple with the butt of the pistol and Deeks slumped in the seat. The light changed and Damon stomped on the gas, the van peeled away from the startled woman.
XxXxXx
"What's up Eric?" asked Sam.
"I've been scanning the police bands for any hits on that taxi. I just picked up a report from a woman who said that while she was stopped at the light at 39th and Imperial a blond man in a taxi van threw an LAPD badge into her car. She said the driver hit the passenger and the van took off north on 39th."
"The address Alvin Chang gave us is north of Imperial; I'd say that's a good sign that Sharpe is headed to the house. Where is Kensi?"
"She's a little closer than you are; ETA is probably half an hour."
G shook his head, "I doubt that."
"Why?" asked Eric.
"Kensi won't be adhering to the speed limit while one of our own is in danger."
"And we aren't either." said Sam, his mouth set in a grim line. He wouldn't admit it, but he thought of the newest addition to the team as something like a little brother, to be protected and encouraged. He admired the way the younger man was headstrong and wouldn't go down without a fight. He'd already been on the receiving end of that tenacity. Sharpe would have his hands full, Marty wouldn't go down easy. He just prayed that they would get there before Sharpe killed him.
As if he could read his partner's thoughts, Callen said, "We'll make it, Sam. And so will Deeks."
XxXxXx
Sharpe yanked open the passenger door, pulling Marty out. He reached over and opened the cuff attached to the door then snapped the cuff on Deeks' other wrist, cuffing his hands in front of him.
"Move it."
"Yeah, I'm not really in the mood to go inside just now," Deeks shuddered, "I think I'll stay out here and enjoy the fresh air if you don't mind"
"I do mind." He grabbed a handful of Deeks' hair and shoved him toward the house. "Let's go."
The house was three stories, white with a red tiled roof. Floor to ceiling windows made up most of the walls. The door Sharpe pushed him toward was painted red, the glass panes in the shape of a rising sun.
"I had this house built five years ago for my girlfriend Alyssa. I spared no expense, and yet she left it like it was nothing." Damon snarled. He kicked the door and it swung open, slamming against the interior wall and shattering glass onto the marble floor of the entry.
"Get in there!" he shoved Deeks inside and the detective stumbled through the shards of glass. The edges of the glass were sharp as razors; he barely felt them slash his bare feet.
"This was the first room they finished." Damon stood in the center of the living room, staring at the ceiling twenty feet above their heads; it was framed with cedar that gleamed in the light from the solid glass of the two walls.
"It smelled like paint and sawdust and glue. We pulled the plastic off the rugs and piled them in front of the fireplace and made love." He turned, grabbed the chain on Marty's handcuffs and dragged him toward the stairs.
Marty left bloody footprints on the white carpeted steps as they ascended to the second floor.
"This is the master bedroom; we spent a lot of time in here." Damon swept a hand across the top of a hand carved dresser imported from Italy, the figurines that had stood there crashed to the floor, shattering. "She left me for a dickless wannabe producer who swore he could get her into the movies if she'd leave all this and move to Paris with him."
"Yeah, yeah thanks for the tour and the history of your life," Marty grumbled, "can you just kill me now and get it over with 'cause I am seriously tired of listening to you whine."
Sharpe hit him with a right cross that spun Marty into the wall. He leaned there a moment, his head spinning. The chill of the stone wall felt good under his heated skin.
"Oh you are going to die Zack, just not yet. I've been waiting for this moment for a long time and I plan to enjoy every minute of it." He pulled a knife from a scabbard at his waist; sunlight glinted off the double edges of the curled blade. He laughed at the expression on the detective's face. "You just keep thinking about this; keep remembering what it felt like to be under my knife. This time there won't be any pretty partner to save you."
Again Sharpe grabbed the handcuffs and pulled his captive to another set of stairs, Marty skidding along behind him leaving streaks of crimson across the marble floor.
The stairs took them up to an open area and Marty realized with a start that they were standing on a small helipad.
"It's an incredible view isn't it?" Sharpe released him and paced around the circumference of the concrete pad. They could see for miles in every direction.
"You don't want to try going down that way." Sharpe said as Marty investigated the edges of the circle.
The only thing between them and drop of several hundred feet to a nest of boulders was a narrow skirt of chain link.
"Get over here." Sharpe commanded, pointing to the faded H painted in the center of the circle.
"Promise you won't hurt her. You won't go anywhere near her or the others." Deeks asked softly as the wind whistled around him. He stared at Sharpe, willing the other man to meet his eyes and not to lie.
"I don't have any reason to go after them; it was only you that I wanted."
"Swear it."
Sharpe stared right back at him, "I swear I won't do any harm to your new friends."
Marty stared up at the sky for several minutes, breathing deep, willing his heart to slow down, his muscles to take him to the center, to his death. He swallowed hard, blinked back the moisture in his eyes that threatened to become tears. The wind billowed his shirt and pants around him as he slowly stepped to the center; it blew his hair across his eyes as the tears fell. He dropped to his knees and Sharpe's fingers twisted in his hair, forcing him forward as the knife shredded away his shirt.