“Not hungry?” Grady said, breaking into her thoughts.
She poked the slab of meat with her fork, arching one brow in inquiry. It had a wild taste and took up more of the plate than she liked. The sad looking veggies were pushed to one small corner, with a huge potato hugging the meat’s other side. Also, no sight or smell of a dessert.
“Elk,” Grady said. “How do you like it?”
“If I were a bear, I’m sure I’d be in heaven.”
He chuckled. “It’s probably just as well if you don’t eat too much. I’m not sure how the scopolamine will affect you. Not an easy meal to hurl.”
Her brain produced the fact that scopolamine was a truth drug, but not much else, which was odd. Her brain had practically been puking facts since she woke up in Luke’s cabin. Now it decided to be sparing?
Donovan stiffened. He leaned forward, his face urgent. The guard behind him stepped closer, his Uzi ready.
“Don’t do this, Grady.” Donovan looked at Amelia. “You have no idea what effect the drug will have on her memory. It could just as easily wipe it out completely.”
“It’s a chance I’m willing to take,” Grady said.
Amelia wasn’t surprised to hear this, though her insides cringed at the thought of being out of control again. She couldn’t let it happen. Not again. Not now, when Grady’s eyes were no longer dispassionate when he looked at her. There was no question that the forces aligned against her were formidable. The cabin was isolated. The weather was hostile. There were armed men everywhere. All she had to pit against this was her resolve. It would have to be enough. If it wasn’t, well, they’d have to kill her, because they weren’t knocking her out again.
“I can’t afford to wait for her memory to return. And I have a feeling that even if she could remember, she wouldn’t give up SHEILD.” His gaze slid her way, admiring and vaguely frustrated. “There’s an unyielding quality about you, my dear. I used to train horses in my misspent youth. I learned to recognize which horses could be broke to a bridle and which couldn’t.”
She felt him try to reach her again, with his charm and that something more that he appeared to possess, something she didn’t recognize, but could feel even as her gaze worked to deflect him yet again. In some ways, it felt like this probing was the greater peril than a sexual attack. This probing sought to reach her mind, her soul. It was a relief when his gaze moved to Donovan, a look of malicious amusement turning Grady’s eyes dark.
“Hard to believe that sour old bastard, Knight is your father.”
At the word ‘father,’ Amelia’s world tilted, a quick, short stab of pain taking out her sight for a moment. When her vision cleared, she could feel the thin skim of sweat on her forehead and upper lip. The pain was slow to fade, leaving a dull ache behind her eyes to plague her. She was aware that Donovan had tensed next to her. And that this amused Grady. Thankfully neither man seemed aware of her distress.
She looked at the meat, felt her stomach roil and pushed her plate away. The water looked good, but she wasn’t sure she could lift her arms. They felt weak. Behind the pain, there’d been a flash of something that her mind had flinched away from. If her memory was returning, it had picked a hell of a time.
Grady laughed and lifted his wine glass, breaking the thread of the testosterone moment between he and Donovan.
“Relax, Donovan. We all know that Miss Knight never forgets anything. Well, almost anything.”
She looked down, her eyes felt owl wide and Sahara dry. Was it possible she had a photographic memory? That would explain the encyclopedia-like flood of trivia trickling out of her muddled brain. What she knew and didn’t know. A buzzing sense of relief took some of the edge off the ache. I’m not a bad person. Not a hit woman or thief.
Grady looked relaxed and triumphant. He thought he was in control—a touch of hubris that might be exploited? He thought he had his bases covered, but Donovan’s appearance had startled him. So he wasn’t as in control as he thought he was. Her lack of memory had to be a big setback, too.
She became aware that Grady was still talking.
“…sent Dr. Knight to the hospital…”
Pain exploded in her head again. Through tiny, explosions of light, she saw them still talking. Her head felt like it was going to fall off and they hadn’t noticed. Maybe all the action was inside. Little flashes of memory appeared and disappeared so fast she couldn’t take them in. Like tiny lights in real fog, they did more to highlight what she couldn’t see than what she could.
The flash of ambulance lights.
Feelings of panic.
A man in a hospital bed, his face twisted with pain and rage. His mouth moving with words she couldn’t—or was that wouldn’t—hear.
And with each flash of the past, the pain worsened. Not content with rampaging through her head, it spread downward toward her heart…
From a long way away, she heard Donovan say, “You don’t know what you’re messing with. I’m telling you, you could erase her memory permanently!”
Please do. Her lips moved, but no sound emerged.
“It’s a risk I’m willing to take.” Grady wiped his mouth with his napkin, then crumpled it and tossed it on his empty plate.
I don’t want to remember. I don’t want to know… With that thought, the lights and memory began to fade, taking the pain with them. She realized she was holding her breath, and let it out on a shaky sigh. The two men were still arguing, unaware her universe had been turned on its head. Luke had talked about shock and memory the night they met. They’d both assumed it was the shock of the kidnapping that had erased her hard drive, but now she wasn’t so sure. If she was Prudence Knight, then this Dr. Knight must be her father—
Pain exploding again, knocking her off this train of thought with pointed emphasis. Okay, don’t go there. I got that. She rubbed her temples until the pain eased again.
“But enough about that,” Grady was saying. “Let’s talk about you. You now know I do have Miss Knight and that I have no qualms about hurting her. The only question left is, what are you going to do so that I won’t?”
Donovan looked at her, then back at Grady. If looks could have killed, Grady would be lying on his back, barely twitching.
Amelia stared at him as the weight that had left with her memory, pressed down on her again. She remembered this feeling, even if she couldn’t remember why. She remembered it well—the weight of others’ expectations. And needs.
“Please…don’t do anything for me,” she said, her voice a desperate thread of sound. If he did this, she’d never be free of him. Her debt to him would be too great to walk away from. “Just…don’t.”
“Trust me. It’ll be all right.” He covered her hand with his, his touch igniting her panic instead of calming it. Looking in his eyes, she could feel Luke slipping away from her. He looked at Grady. “You bastard.”
“Hey, her old man is the one who stuffed his data in her head. Call him the bastard. Oh, you can’t, can you?” An edge altered his voice with something Amelia could only call…evil. “Too bad he’s dead. And not sitting right next to her.”
Dead? Her…old man? Her brain found this term less inflammatory than that other parental name, though the pain still came.
Donovan surged to his feet, his hands reached for Grady. His men jumped at him, pulling him back. One raised the butt of his Uzi with the intention of bringing it down on his head, but Grady stopped him with a sharp command.
“He’s not hurting me,” Amelia lied, looking at Donovan, trying to hold him with her gaze. “I don’t remember. I don’t remember…him.” That was a lie, too. She could see a face, a twisted, angry face. Her insides quivered, but she refused to allow Grady to see her squirm. She shrugged. Donovan stared a few beats longer, then his body relaxed. Finally he nodded.
“I’m very sorry about…it, Miss Knight,” he said.
“Thank you.” The pressure, the panic eased. Odd he didn’t call her Prudence, though she was glad of it, t
oo. “And please, call me Amelia.”
“Amelia?” He looked taken aback.
“It seems little Miss Perfect Daughter had a secret identity,” Grady said. He looked like he was enjoying himself. He got up and tossed Donovan the two drivers’ licenses.
Donovan studied them for a bit, then looked at her with a charming, crooked grin. “Clever girl. I wondered where you went—” he stopped, then said, “When this is over—”
He stopped again. Maybe because he knew they wouldn’t be alive when it was. His eyes promised her his best effort, but she didn’t want that. She didn’t want to owe him her life. She wasn’t a good person. She was an ungrateful person.
“I’m touched,” Grady said. “Really, but it’s time to get down to business.”
Donovan stiffened, then he looked at Grady. “So who is it you want me to kill this time?”
Amelia jerked in her chair. Damn, she hoped he wasn’t her lover, because it looked like he was the hit man.
* * * *
After a brief moment of elation at eluding Kirby and friend, Leslie spent the next few hours in fetal position on the cement floor of his dad’s old bomb shelter sobbing. He’d stumbled across it as a boy, using it as a private club house, then updating it as he got older. Now it served as his hideout. It was here he kept the equipment he used in the Green raids. It was here he’d planned to hide what’s-her-name. It was also a bunker in every sense of the word. It was well stocked with weapons, explosives and food. And it had a communications center, but there was no one for him to call. The only person he ever called from here was Grady. Always Grady—who had betrayed him.
Years, years they’d spent planning this, talking about it. Or had they talked? With his recently discovered hindsight, Leslie examined the years with Grady. He’d talked. And Grady had listened. And listened. And listened. Heady stuff to a kid with a father to whom not listening was an art form. He’d never heard Grady say he supported Green’s objectives. He had encouraged setting up the Irregulars, had laughed with him at the irony of it, while he set up the little, armed kingdom in the mountains. And given himself his handle, Forest for the Trees.
Damn. He’d laughed about it, thinking he knew what it meant and all the time, Grady was laughing at him. The bastard had played him with a few words of encouragement, and Leslie had given him his trust and piles and piles of money. No, it was worse than that. Leslie had given Grady his love. Not the twisted love between parent or child, or the sexual crap between a man and a woman. This had been the clean, pure love of friends. Or so he’d thought.
Was it just the money? Or was it something else Grady wanted? Why decide to kill the cash cow now? But he already knew the answer.
Shield.
Grady was hoping for a new cash cow, maybe one that didn’t talk so much or need so much. It was always about control. Who had it, who didn’t. That’s what his dad always said. Who had it. Who didn’t.
Leslie pulled himself into a sitting position and smiled through his tears. Grady was in for several surprises. He didn’t know everything about him. And he didn’t know everything about Shield.
It was time he found out.
SEVENTEEN
Dewey was annoyed with himself and Forest for the Trees by the time he reached the rendezvous point. He could be snug in bed with Bryn, his wife, right now, not sitting at some God forsaken intersection waiting for a very suspicious wacko. It was dang ironic that he’d started this to get closer to Bryn, and now he was further from her than ever.
He pulled his truck to the side of the road and turned off the headlights. The night descended, dark and forbidding. There was little moon to be seen in the sky. Just a thin crescent casting enough light to put an eerie glow on the surface of the snow and make the shadows around the trees deeper.
It looked like he was alone in the universe right now, but Dewey knew better. He was out there and he wasn’t alone. Dewey could feel eyes watching him. Knew he was being assessed. After being under Bryn’s microscope for a year, he wasn’t worried. He knew how to hide—even when the hiding was inside himself.
Dewey had decided on a modified geek disguise for the op. People expected it from hackers. Slicked down hair. Plaid shirt. Dockers. Penny loafer shoes. Polyester jacket. Some padding in the cheeks to alter his profile. And, of course, the all-important glasses with tape around the nose bridge. And in case they were suspicious enough to check, he’d even broken them before he taped them, then dirtied the tape.
It would be interesting to see just how paranoid Forest was. And if Dewey had been paranoid enough. This had all been a lot easier when he hadn’t cared if he lived or died. He wished he wasn’t so cut off. Be nice to have Bryn hissing sweet bitchings in his ear right now.
He’d been out at night, but not in the wilds. He was pretty sure that critters hibernated in the winter. Ninety percent sure. Well, sixty percent sure. Not sure enough to get out of the truck, even though pacing would have been a relief. Instead, he started beating a discordant rhythm on the steering wheel.
The motor was still running, but not loud enough. He reached for the radio knob, hoping for any kind of signal in the boondocks, when a bright light cut the night, freezing him in mid-reach. He shaded his eyes and tried to pierce the light. That’s when he heard the chopper approach. It swooped in, its search light sweeping the area before it settled down in a clearing a short distance away. The rotation of the blades kicked up the snow, adding a fog effect to the eerie scene. In the light from the chopper, he could see a jeep with a machine gun mounted in the rear. Three armed men manned the jeep, giving him the odd feeling he’d been transported back in time to the Battle of the Bulge.
“Show time.” He shut off the engine, pocketed the keys and slid out, his tennis shoe shod feet slipping on an icy patch under the snow. He regained his balance, then shut the door and walked to the front of the truck, still shielding his face from the bright lights and blowing snow.
One of the men hopped out of the jeep and approached him, tossing a bundle of clothes onto the hood of the truck.
“Take off everything and put these on,” the faux Rambo ordered.
Dewey had known it was coming, but being right wasn’t that satisfying with the prospect of freezing his family jewels off just when they’d been put into service. He opened his mouth to protest, but closed it again. What was the point? He was just wasting what body heat he had left.
He quickly stripped and donned the other clothes, aware his jewels weren’t displaying well in the bitter cold. His teeth were chattering when he pulled on a bulky coat. There were gloves and a hat in the pocket. He pulled them on, too. Next time Bryn had a problem, neither of his personalities were going to step up to volunteer
“Now what?” Dewey asked, stamping his feet and beating his arms against his sides to try to restore warmth.
The guy didn’t answer, but Dewey saw two men climb out of the chopper, their heads down, bodies bent until they cleared the rotating blades. Once clear, they joined him at the truck. One guy was tall and covered in winter camouflage. Spooky looking with furious eyes. The other one was Forest. Dewey knew it even before he spoke. He looked and acted like he was in control. It was in the way he moved and in his eyes. He was enjoying all the fanfare and playing at soldier. Odd attitude for an environmental wacko. It was a lovely bit of misdirection that Dewey could appreciate.
“Phagan?” Forest held out a gloved hand. Dewey took it, shook it. “Keys?”
“Huh?” Dewey pushed his glasses up on his nose, falling into the role he’d created for himself.
“To the truck. My friend here needs to borrow it. He’ll bring it back, won’t you, Donovan?”
Donovan gave a short, sharp nod.
Dewey stared at him in fascination. So this was Donovan. He said, “In my coat pocket.”
One of Forest’s men searched the coat, then tossed Donovan the keys.
A smaller, Irish looking, heavily bundled guy shifted nervously. “Shouldn’t someone go w
ith him, Grady?”
Grady flashed him a quick, annoyed look. “He won’t mess with me, will you, Donovan?”
Another short, sharp nod. He went to the truck and opened the door, stopping when Grady spoke again.
“Noon, Donovan.”
Donovan looked at Grady. Dewey was glad that look wasn’t directed at him. Talk about killing. Grady just smiled.
“Noon. Or else.”
Donovan got in and slammed the door. When he’d fired the engine, he gunned it, then spun out, the rear of the truck fish tailing before the wheels found the needed traction.
Dewey thought of several things he could have said, but they weren’t appropriate for his persona, so he kept them to himself. He sure missed working with Phoebe. She always knew what he was thinking, even the smart ass stuff, and would give him a look that was as good as a laugh. With a silent sigh for what had been, he turned his attention to Grady. The man stared at his glasses.
“You need those to see?” he asked.
“Only reason for wearing them,” Dewey said, pushing them up again.
“May I?” He reached for the glasses. Dewey nodded, letting him pluck them from his nose, then peered myopically at him as Grady held them up to the light. He moved them a little, feeling the break in the bridge. “Ever think of getting new ones?”
Dewey shrugged. “Maybe when I run out of tape.”
Grady laughed. “I had a feeling I’d like you, Phagan.” He slapped him on the back. “Let’s go somewhere warmer.”
* * * *
Grady had sent Amelia back to her room before the men discussed their business. It seemed he had missed the women’s movement. Donovan had jumped to his feet, taking her hand one more time and squeezing it so hard panic crawled up her throat again. She’d longed for time alone with him to find out more about herself, while at the same time feeling relieved to leave him behind.
As O’Rourke directed her toward the stairs, she’d spotted a paper clip on the desk, close to her two driver’s licenses. As she passed the desk, she picked them and the clip up with them. She’d held the licenses up.
The Lonesome Lawmen Trilogy Page 82