The blood probably belonged to Lockhart. From the information she’d received Lockhart had miraculously killed one of the cartel’s trained monkeys, but had been stabbed in the process. What Tracey needed to know was the identity of the mysterious white knight who’d ridden to the biologist’s rescue.
Despite the public cover up, someone was actively investigating Ted Burger’s death—probably someone in the US government. Tracey would be more concerned if it were The Gateway Project, but that shadowy vigilante organization had unexpectedly shut down in December, and the secretive cabal had disbanded without her or her boss learning their true identities. Burger had been pissed by the decision, but he’d also been afraid. She’d enjoyed the look in his eyes when she’d told him The Gateway Project had sent her to exact revenge, but she had no real desire to come to their attention.
Tracey was smart enough to tread lightly. Once she figured out who was involved, then she’d know where to start looking for Little Miss Lockhart.
A dead “assassin” suited everyone. Especially her. Tracey had wanted to kill Audrey before this, but her lover hadn’t let her. A mistake. Tracey didn’t like mistakes.
She eyed the cop up and down. If she couldn’t get what she needed out of this guy she’d have to risk going to the car rental company and try to bluff her way into seeing their records. She took photographs of the vehicle from all angles, and wrote notes on her iPad as he eyed the outline of her flat stomach and full breasts under her business attire.
She bit her lip and frowned. “I need the vehicle identification number to confirm this is the right car and then I can close the case from my end.” She gestured to her clothes, which were not suited for exploring a burnt out vehicle, and pouted. “I don’t really want to get too close.”
He raised his eyes, gaze shrewd and calculating.
Come on, pretty boy. Give me what I want and I might do the same for you. She smiled.
“I have the information inside,” he said.
“Thank you.”
“I’ll get it for you.”
He was young, fit, good-looking—unlike some of the people she’d screwed for information. Back inside the police station, the officer went through to the rear of the building and returned with a thick file.
She eyed it avidly and he saw her interest. She bit her lip and raised her brows. “I don’t suppose you have anything in there that might save me a trip to the rental office, do you?” She leaned over the counter, providing a nice view of her breasts enclosed in a lacy bra. “I have to be at the airport by three and can think of better things to do with my lunch hour.”
“Señorita, that is not possible I’m afraid,” he said loudly. Then she watched him photocopy the entire contents of the file before he returned it to the officers in the back.
He made a big show of putting the photocopies into a large envelope while she watched his every move. He thought he had all the power here, all the control, not realizing she was leading him around with a firm grip on his hefty young balls. He held out the envelope and she went to take it, but he didn’t let go. His dark eyes smiled and he tilted his head slightly, not threatening, but arrogant enough to know he held a few cards of his own. “Perhaps I could take you to lunch before you have to catch your flight?”
“That would be very sweet of you.” She fluttered her lashes. “But, considering my boss is an ass, it depends on what’s in the envelope.” She flicked long blonde hair over her shoulder. “He won’t be happy if I don’t get the information I need and I can’t afford to get fired.”
He let go of the envelope and she quickly peeked at the name and signature on the rental agreement. She recognized neither. The photograph on the driver’s license, however, made her whole body freeze. His identity shouldn’t have shocked her. But it did.
She should have known. A ball of hatred rose up inside her. The person responsible for her fall from grace. A man whose pretty blue eyes and irreverent grin were as famous at Langley as his unconventional way of doing things. The thought of ruining his legendary reputation, of making him look like an incompetent fool sent a thrill rushing through her blood.
She shivered with anticipation. After all these years she could finally make him and the CIA pay for ruining her life. But could she do it without getting caught? A challenge, she conceded, but not impossible. Not if he wasn’t expecting it. The idea of getting the better of a man like that was both tantalizing and seductive.
The cop walked around the counter to guide her out of the building to her car. Along the way he whispered in her ear, “I know a motel nearby. Perhaps you’d like a different kind of lunch today?” The chocolate eyes held a dark promise.
“Maybe I would.” The information he’d given her was worth celebrating. Giving her the opportunity to destroy the man who’d ruined her was worthy of a reward.
He walked to his own car with a male swagger in his step and she almost laughed. Men were so predictable—except for her boss, her lover, her partner in crime. She never knew what to expect from him, which was probably why she’d fallen for him quite so hard.
He might not let you take the revenge you want to take, a little voice inside niggled. And he might not know until the dust settled, she argued back. She’d take her chances. And as unpredictable and brilliant as he might be, right now, he needed her more than she needed him.
The cop rolled up beside her in his shiny gray muscle car as she started her rental’s engine. A huge rush of adrenaline surged through her. She was buzzing with pent up energy and the burning desire to show her true colors if only to a strange man in a paid by-the-hour motel room. Having a connection inside the police station could prove useful.
She waved her fingers at him and put her car in gear, following him out of the parking lot toward the outskirts of town. Romeo better make getting sweaty and naked worth the effort. She didn’t deal well with disappointment, as the spook and Audrey Lockhart were about to find out.
* * *
KILLION STARED THOUGHTFULLY as Audrey drifted off into another drug-induced coma. Why would she mention The Gateway Project in her report to the cops? Why the hell would she do that? No one involved in that organization would want it to be a matter of public record.
The facts didn’t make any sense. The situation didn’t make sense.
The night that he’d grabbed her and tied her up, she’d told him she didn’t speak Spanish, but he’d known she was lying. Right now if someone asked his professional opinion as to her veracity, even though he’d watched Hector Sanchez die at her hand, he’d say she was telling the truth. It raised the awful prospect that she might actually be innocent.
If she was innocent—huge if—but if she was, it was possible the police report she’d filed about his little warning visit two nights previous had spooked someone into sending Hector Sanchez to permanently take care of the problem. And, if Killion followed that line of reasoning, it meant that he was indirectly responsible for the attack on her yesterday and, therefore, the death of Gómez’s chief enforcer.
He could live with the latter. The former, however…
The thick bandage on Audrey’s waist, the smooth curve of her cheek and the idea she might be blameless made a wedge of remorse lodge in his throat. He really didn’t want to believe she might be innocent, but he’d seen that kind of denial before—in people who’d crossed so far over the line they couldn’t afford to admit they might have made a mistake. Or maybe his radar was off because of his attraction to her?
He didn’t know—and he wasn’t used to that either.
He watched the gentle rise and fall of her chest as she slept. There was an air of naivety about her that was hard to fake. But there was too much evidence and too many coincidences to believe this woman was uninvolved. She was either playing him like a maestro—because he was ready to wrap her up in cotton wool and personally take care of her in every way—or she’d been set up and he’d foolishly swallowed a line attached to a big fat juicy hook.
&
nbsp; Neither was palatable.
The first priority was keeping her alive. The second was interrogating Audrey Lockhart-of-the-trusting-violet-blue-eyes-and-tremulous-smile because, whether she knew it or not, she held the answers to his questions.
He couldn’t afford to let down his guard. There was still the very real possibility she was playing him until she got the chance to put something appropriately noxious in his coffee. She wouldn’t be the first woman to want him dead, but she would be the first frog biologist to ever go there.
“She out of it?” Noah came back into the room with a mug of hot tea. Killion hadn’t drunk the brew until he’d been stuck in the middle of the desert with a bunch of tea-swilling Brits. He’d figured out that the quickest way to defeat the British Army would be to put an embargo on Tetleys.
“Totally. What’d you put in her IV?”
“Morphine. She’s responding well to the IV antibiotics but she’s going to need to be on them for another forty-eight hours at least. Stitches will come out on their own. I’d recommend keeping her lightly sedated until the infection clears up, otherwise she’s going to be trying to get out of bed and generally be a handful.”
“She’s going to be a handful all right.” Killion dragged his hand through his hair. Damn. This wasn’t part of the plan.
He walked into the kitchen where Logan was dishing up lunch. The TV on the kitchen wall was switched to the local Spanish news channel.
Logan thrust a bowl in his direction and tossed him a bread roll. “We’ve got a job that’s just come up. Have to head out tonight. You can lay low here with your friend if you want.”
“’Preciate it.” Killion dug into his stew, knowing Logan was a good cook from their time together in Afghanistan. His encrypted phone rang and his one hand paused with his spoon halfway to his lips as he checked the screen. He hadn’t realized how hungry he was until he’d started eating.
It was Jed Brennan.
“You missing me already?” Killion said and then carried on chewing.
“Like a dose of the clap. Vivi says ‘Hi’ too, by the way.”
“Sure she did.” Jed’s new squeeze was slowly coming around to Killion’s special brand of friendship, but she wasn’t quite there yet. “You got anything for me?” He stole another mouthful of stew and chewed fast.
“I’m going to send you some coordinates,” Jed said.
He swallowed. “I thought these phone lines were secure?”
“Yeah, but when you get the coordinates you’ll understand. You’ve got free run of the place for two weeks before the owner returns.”
“Security?”
“Tight as a duck’s ass,” Jed said.
“It isn’t Wisconsin, is it?” Please, God, don’t let it be Wisconsin.
“What the hell is wrong with Wisconsin?”
Killion had known Jed would take the bait. “Nothing, if you’re a cheesehead—”
“Kiss my—”
“And then there’re the Packers…”
“Hey, buddy, don’t cross a line that can’t be uncrossed,” Jed warned. “Anyway, it isn’t the Badger State. We begged but they wouldn’t take you.”
Killion grinned and ate.
“So two weeks,” Jed continued, “is that long enough to, er…get the information you need out of the woman?” His words were measured.
Killion shook his head. It pissed him off that his friends believed he might be a party to torture, but he did perpetuate the myth, and he did get results. “Depends on when I drag out the thumbscrews.”
“You could seduce it out of her. Shouldn’t be a problem with your good looks and winning personality.”
Killion’s levity instantly evaporated. “Screw you.” He let out a tired sigh. “Something feels off. I’m not a hundred percent convinced she knows anything.”
There was a long pause. “You said it had to be her. You said you were certain.”
“She’s involved, I just don’t know how she’s involved.”
“What about the bank account? The poison?” He heard the resignation in Jed’s voice. Then the guy swore. “Why couldn’t the killer have just shot the bastard?” Jed sounded dog-tired all of a sudden. No doubt Brennan had come back to work too soon after nearly dying in the line of duty.
But right now Killion was grateful. He needed all the help he could get from people he trusted. “Do me a favor, see if there’s any way of getting hold of a police report Audrey Lockhart says she filed the night before last.”
“The night you warned her off?”
“Yep. She says she reported it. I want to know exactly what she said and what the detectives did with that information. How’s Frazer?” Killion changed the subject.
“Bitten by the love bug apparently.”
“Are you kidding me? This is worse than losing George Clooney. It’s like a contagious disease. All my bachelor icons are falling.”
“Pretty sure you’ll never have that problem.”
Hurt flashed quick as lightning along his nerves. He hid it under his usual banter. “Because I could never deprive the female population of their favorite stud?”
“Because you’re never in one place long enough to meet a woman.” There was another short pause. “And you never let them closer than your bed.”
He felt tightness in his throat. “That’s close enough for what I have in mind.”
“Don’t be an ass.”
“Seriously?”
“Sorry, I forgot who I was talking to.” Jed laughed but Killion heard something behind the humor. Frustration, because Killion didn’t talk about personal shit with anyone.
He wasn’t some teenage girl. He was an Intelligence Officer for the Central Intelligence Agency. “It’s safer not to go there in my profession. For their sake and mine,” he blurted. Where the hell had that come from?
“Sounds like a crappy profession.”
“Like the feebs have it any better.”
“I’ve got it pretty good.” He could hear the smugness in Jed’s tone.
“That’s because you have a good-looking redhead to climb into bed with every night.”
“Not every night.” Jed sounded pissed now. “She’s in Fargo packing up her and Michael’s things and putting her house on the market. I was going to help, but with Frazer out of commission we’re short-handed here. I even have a rookie to break in.”
“Frazer will be back before you know it.”
“I’m more worried about Vivi and Michael.”
“Worried she might leave you for someone better looking?”
“With nicer friends,” Jed agreed.
Killion felt a pang of envy at Jed’s life. The guy had been shot and almost died, but he had a fiercely loyal woman in his life and her very cute kid, and the lifelong gratitude of the President of the United States. He also had a job he loved with colleagues he didn’t mind seeing every day.
Most of Killion’s colleagues were grounded at Langley for a reason. Aside from Crista, his favorite people were the ones assigned overseas—like the Station Chief of the Pakistan field office who’d helped Killion through numerous inter-agency fuck-ups including one time when the State Department accidentally released all the names of CIA personnel operating in South East Asia to the Press Corp. And another time where a team of Navy SEALs were deployed to rescue three female hostages who’d already managed to escape with the aid of a CIA asset Killion had activated. Thankfully, the bad guys hadn’t discovered the SEALs or the hostages and everyone had come home alive.
The last couple of years he’d been attached to the Joint Terrorism Task Force, followed by this collaboration with the FBI. It was as close to freedom as he’d ever known with the Agency and he liked it. But he had a feeling the autonomy was about to end, just as soon as he figured out who was behind Ted Burger’s untimely demise.
“I’ve gotta go,” Jed said suddenly. “I’ve got an agent in New York State and he’s on the other line. Series of killings at an exclusive university. Pi
ssed off rich people and slaughtered co-eds don’t go down well. Shit hitting the fan from all directions.”
Maybe Jed’s job wasn’t all it was cracked up to be. “Don’t forget to look into that police report for me,” Killion reminded him.
“On it. I’m sending those coordinates right now. Two weeks. Parker cleared it with the owners.”
They hung up and Killion dug into his stew again, appetite renewed, until Logan grabbed the remote and boosted the volume on the TV. Audrey’s passport photo appeared on the screen, and that of some young guy, a student apparently who’d been found dead in his apartment early that morning. Killion stopped eating. Damn. The reporter was talking excitedly at the camera. Professor Lockhart had disappeared and it was unclear at this point whether she was a killer or another victim. No mention of Hector Sanchez or stolen airplanes. Gómez must have gotten rid of Hector’s body because he wouldn’t want to look weak to his competitors.
Killion stared at the screen, not really seeing it anymore. Gómez had gone after Audrey via her student—but if she was the assassin someone wanted Killion to believe she was, why bother? A professional would be long gone and her student wouldn’t know a damn thing about it. Anyone who’d hired her would know that. It was another “fact” that didn’t add up to the whole picture of this frog biologist being a cold-hearted killer.
His phone beeped with the coordinates of the safe house. Killion grinned and shook his head when he checked the GPS and saw the location was right in the middle of the ocean.
He turned the screen of his cell toward Logan whose brows rose. “We’ve got a destination, but I’m gonna need a ride.”
Chapter Six
THE SITUATION DIDN’T seem quite so amusing five hours later. As soon as the sun dropped from the sky, they packed up and drove to another airfield. Killion held Audrey’s unconscious form in his arms in the backseat of the SUV. She looked pale and there was a fresh sheen of sweat on her brow.
“I don’t like moving her,” Noah said for the tenth time as he twisted around in the front seat.
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