Midnight Captive Read Online Free

organization, but from what Sean could tell, the five Dagger members involved in the heist were on the up-and-up.
    “Then we find a way out of the jam,” Sean said coldly.
    “What the feck do you think I’ve been doing? Buggering myself? I’m
thinking
, you fecking fool!” The man’s Irish intonation grew deeper and less comprehensible the angrier he got. “But that fecking fasser shot a
garda
.”
    “Nobody said Lynch was smart,” Sean muttered. “We just need to improvise.”
    “Ya?” Gallagher said scornfully. “Got any bright ideas?”
    Sean shrugged. “We give ourselves up.”
    Gallagher gazed at him in disbelief. “Are you daft? You’re suggesting we walk out the bloody front door? We’ll get thrown in the Joy,” he snapped, referring to Mountjoy Prison, the medium-security facility where most of Rabbit’s men had been “guests” over the years.
    “Five of us will,” Sean agreed.
    Gallagher hissed out a breath. “What the hell does that mean?”
    “It means we got what we came for. Rabbit has his prize. And I’m no mathematician, but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t need six men to deliver it. One will do the trick.”
    “So five of us surrender?” Gallagher soundedskeptical. “And how exactly do you see the sixth man walking away from this?”
    “By pretending to be a hostage. The Garda doesn’t have an exact head count of how many people we’re holding here. For all they know, we could’ve stashed a hostage in the back for shits and giggles.” Sean shrugged again. “One of us takes the flash drive and joins the hostages, the other five surrender.”
    Gallagher went quiet as he considered it, just as Sean had known he would. The members of the Irish Dagger were good little soldiers, prepared to martyr themselves for their leader. Rabbit spoon-fed them his bullshit, and they ate it up like it was candy. They didn’t care that the world had labeled them a terrorist group. They believed in what they were doing and why they were doing it, and Rabbit made sure to remind them of it every second of the day.
    “It’s a sacrifice for the cause,” Sean said meaningfully, knowing the reminder would override Gallagher’s survival instincts.
    After a long beat, the other man nodded, resignation flickering in his eyes. “A sacrifice for the cause,” he echoed.
    Idealistic idiot. Sean would never sacrifice himself for a losing battle. The IRA and its dozens of splinter groups were living in the past. Their sacrifices meant nothing.
    People, on the other hand—Sean would give up his life for the people he cared about. Oliver. Bailey. Any of the men on Jim Morgan’s mercenary team. If Macgregor or Port or, hell, even that bastard D, were in trouble, he’d risk everything to save them.
    But Gallagher and his men didn’t matter to him. He had no intention of dying for them, even if it meant risking an arrest. If anything, he was banking on getting pinched. Once the Garda took him into custody, hewouldn’t stay there long. He had contacts in this city, allies with enough clout to ensure that he’d be back on the street in less than twenty-four hours.
    Except Gallagher surprised him with his next remark. “You’ll play the hostage.”
    Sean’s eyebrows rose. Well, fuck him sideways. He hadn’t thought he’d make the short list for hostage, let alone be tasked with the role.
    His reappearance in his former group had been met with hostility and suspicion, particularly from Gallagher and Kelly, Rabbit’s second-in-command. The crew didn’t trust him, he was well aware of that, and they didn’t like him anymore either, not since he and Oliver had abandoned Rabbit to deal in intelligence.
    “Why me?” he asked slowly.
    “Because you’re the least recognizable.” Gallagher lifted the bottom of his mask and rubbed the dark stubble on his chin. “We’ve all gotten pinched before. I don’t know if the Garda is using some sort of face-recognition bullshit, but if they see me or Lynch or