by Jesse Joren
"That was kind of unfair," I said.
"Do you think it was wrong?"
"No. Unfair, but the right thing. He doesn't look good."
It hurt me to say that.
"We need better light," Del said, handing me a small black flashlight. "Shine this on his shoulder so I can see what I'm doing."
He used a small, sharp knife to cut away the blood-soaked shirt, exposing the full wound. My hands shook, making the light waver and bounce.
"You sure you want to help?" Del asked. "I can manage alone."
I forced myself to hold the light steady. "I'm okay. It's not as bad as it looks, right?"
"It's good that he's resting," he said, sidestepping my question. "Look away. You don't need to see this part."
I closed my eyes and tried to ignore the sounds as he pulled the piece of wood from Hex's shoulder. It seemed to take a long time, but finally there was the sound of a zip-top bag being closed.
"Damn thing went all the way through him," he said. "I don't know how he stayed on the rope, or how he caught you. He's always been a tough son-of-a-bitch."
He tore open a handful of alcohol wipes, using them to clean away blood and grit. Hex groaned even in the depths of the sedative, a sound that stabbed me right to the heart.
Del dumped a small bottle of thick orange goo over the wound.
"Betadine," he said, packing wads of white gauze into the hole. "Great to prevent infection. If this bleeding stops in a little bit, we'll try some stitches."
I watched him work. "So you were in the Foreign Legion together?" I guessed.
He nodded, packing in more gauze. "Stephen saved my life more than once. When he asked me to watch over you in Atlanta, though, that was a first."
There was a little sparkle in his eyes as he glanced at me. Again I was struck by how good-looking he was, by that tiny spark that always tried to catch between us.
"He told me you were a client," Del went on, "and asked if I could make sure you were safe that Sunday. Easy enough until your target makes the news."
He grinned at me. That day in the coffee shop seemed like a hundred years ago.
"After you slapped around Peter the Not-So-Great," he went on, "and then when we talked, I felt something. Something I hadn't –"
He broke off whatever he was going to say, adjusting the gauze. A flush heated my cold cheeks. I had a pretty good idea of what he'd been about to say.
"I thought you might be more than a client, but I was willing to take a chance and find out. Lunch settled any doubt. Eva Bright was in love, but not with me. Check, please."
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't even have gone to lunch with you," I said. "I was in a weird place right then. It wasn't fair to you."
"I was in a weird place too." His tone was light. "The details aren't important. Let's just say that now when the right girl comes along, I'll be ready for her."
"She better treat you right. I still have my ass-kicking boots."
"Deal. And you have my number, if you ever need a favor."
I looked down at Hex, grimy and sleeping and gorgeous. So tender and protective, so intense and secretive and exasperating.
Del checked under the gauze again, looking satisfied. "It's time to close this up. Hold the light."
He pulled out a tiny spool of black thread and a needle that he doused with the orange goo. I averted my eyes when he brought the lips of the wound together and started to close it.
Far above us on the top of the hill, the faint sounds of sirens drifted down to the beach. By now the house would be mostly destroyed.
"How did you figure out where Killen was going?" I asked. "He was pretty unhappy that no one followed his little clue trail."
"I guess he was." He became very absorbed in the stitches.
"How did you know?"
"I think it's better if Stephen tells you that himself."
"Whatever it was, it worked."
"Yep."
"Come on," I coaxed. "Tell me. If he feels bad about it, you're doing him a favor to tell me, right?"
"You aren't getting around me with guilt," he said.
"I've been through a lot these last few days. I can handle it."
He glanced at me, and I gave him my most winning smile.
"He'll be awake soon. Ask him then."
"He may not feel like talking," I wheedled. "Be a good friend, and tell me."
Del paused. "Okay. I'm on the way out of the country, anyway. That should give him time to cool off."
I waited in silence, sensing that victory was near.
"We did it the old-fashioned way," he said. "We followed the tracking device."
"What's so bad about that? How did he get it on their car?"
"It wasn't on the car."
"Then where was it?
"The car wasn't bugged," he said. "You were."
"They took all my clothes. Even my jewelry."
Del looked like he wished he was someplace else.
"Eva," he said, "the chip is inside of you. He said something about seeing an opening and taking it. I have no idea what that means. I'm not sure I want to."
Both of us were quiet as he bent to his work. I closed my eyes and tried to think like Hex. He was always so damn ambiguous. An opening, that could mean anything—
Then it came to me. Underneath the crinkly silver sheet, I felt for my ankle and found the place where Hex had stitched me up, months ago.
The spot had healed with only a tiny lump deep below the skin. I thought that was part of healing, some scar tissue. No wonder he always knew where I was.
Scar tissue, my ass.
"I'm pretty sure I know that he means," I said.
"Are you going to kick him to curb now? I'd feel bad." He paused. "For about a week. Then I'd ask you to dinner this time."
Both of us laughed. He knew I wasn't leaving, and I knew he wouldn't screw over someone he considered a brother.
"I'm not mad," I said, 'but you can bet he's going to hear about this once he's better."
"He has some payback coming," he agreed. "You're good for him, Eva. Trust me on that one."
"He's been good for me too. He saved me."
Del raised his eyebrows. "Allow me to introduce myself. My name is chopped liver."
"I meant before now," I said hastily. "I owe you both my life after tonight. Before that, I was in a place where – oh, never mind. It's boring."
"If you say so," he grinned. "I'm just about done. We can make him more comfortable after that."
I watched Hex as he slept. My guy…grimy and sexy and protective and tender. My guy…secretive and tough and too damn smart for his own good.
Del was right. A little payback was long overdue.
"Were you serious about doing me a favor?" I asked.
"Sure." He threaded the needle for another stitch. "Name it."
So I did.
DECEMBER 5
Chapter Sixty-One
Marco eventually showed up later that night, and I slept most of the flight back to Atlanta. A sleek little Bentley convertible was waiting when we arrived at Hartsfield, silver and shining in the morning sun.
Del eyed Hex's shoulder. "You could at least pretend to rest, for my sake," he said.
"We're going somewhere that I can," Hex told him.
"Good. Stay in touch."
"Thanks, Del. For everything."
"Show me the money."
"Asshole. When are you back in the country?"
Del glanced at me. A slight smile crinkled around his warm green eyes.
"Not any time soon," he said easily, "but don't worry. You'll get my bill, even if I'm overseas."
He was laughing as he strode away, as if he didn't have a care in the world. You would never know that he'd spent half the night swinging from a rope and performing emergency surgery.
Hex watched him go, then turned to me. To my surprise, he tossed me the keys.
"Don't get used to the driver's seat," he said.
In
spite of his amazing stamina, he looked a little worn. I didn't know how he was even on his feet after last night. I was exhausted in spite of the long nap.
"So where's this quiet place where we're going?" I asked, sliding behind the wheel.
"Take I-75 south to I-16 west," he said, buckling up beside me. "That will get us three hours down the road, then I'll guide you."
"So we're going back to Walden?" I guessed.
"We're not going to backwoods Georgia," he smiled. "By the way, here's something you might want back."
He handed me my phone, the one Killen and Rosine had left behind along with my car and clothes. I had dozens of texts and missed calls from Natalie. She must have been frantic when I disappeared.
"The drive has to wait," I said, hitting her on speed dial.
She picked up on the second ring.
"Are you alright?" was the first thing she said.
"I am now. It's a hell of a story."
There was a brief pause as she digested that. "Is Stephen with you?"
"Yes."
"Put him on the phone," she ordered.
"I don't—"
"I have something to say to him."
I held out the phone to Hex. "Natalie wants to talk to you."
He clutched his heart in mock terror, but his voice was normal when he answered. Then he just listened, his eyebrows going higher and his grin getting larger.
Put it on speaker, I mouthed.
"—with connections," Natalie was saying in a cool attorney tone. "Not all of them are nice ones, so I'm telling you again that—"
"Natalie," he interrupted, "I'm just letting you know that you're on speaker now."
"What the fuck do I care? Let me recap. I like you, Stephen, and I'm grateful for what you've done for Eva. But you fuck with her, and I fuck with you."
"I understand," he said gravely. "I'm going to do my best to take care of her."
"Good. That will save me money in having someone beat the shit out of you. Eva?"
"I'm here."
"Call me when you get back, and let's go to lunch. Tell your boyfriend that he's buying our meal to make up for all the damn worry he's put me through."
"It's a date. I love you, Natalie."
"Ditto. He still owes me for those shoes." I heard the grin in her voice as she ended the call.
"She likes you," I told Hex. "Otherwise you'd already be at the bottom of a river."
"If you say so," he teased. "I hope Phillip knows what he's getting into."
"He's a good guy."
"Surprisingly, yes. You don't meet many people who really are what they pretend to be."
"You checked him out?"
"Of course. As soon as I knew where you worked, and especially when I thought he had his eye on you. Then when I went on his home computer—"
"You didn't."
"Absolutely," he said with no shame. "That's when I realized he was into your friend, not you."
"But that was a couple of years ago."
"He just had this one picture of them from some office party. Very tame, but the way he was looking at her, it was obvious."
He gave me a searching look, then laughed. "Speaking of obvious, we look like fugitives."
We did look strange. My blue cocktail dress was muddy and torn in several places, plus I was still smudged with blood and sand. I was wearing an extra pair of socks that Del had scrounged from his pack, but no shoes.
Hex's dark shirt was ripped away at the shoulder to reveal white bandages. His face was cut from his fight, with the occasional bruise and splash of dried blood thrown in for good measure.
"I'll try not to get us stopped," I promised.
A thrill went through me when the little car started with a muted roar. This kitten had some claws.
"Sorry about your dress," he said, reaching behind the seat. I glanced back and saw a small insulated bag stuffed with cold water and other drinks.
"How did I end up owing Natalie for shoes?" he asked, handing me a raspberry tea. "Do I have a secret shopping problem?"
"We played hooky and went shopping right before Rosine and Killen showed up," I said. "I wanted to buy something with my own money for her engagement party."
The look he gave me was very neutral. "And how did that go?"
"I know you tricked me about my size," I said, "but Natalie helped me put in perspective about why you did it. I'm not mad."
Very gently he took my hand from the steering wheel and brought it to his lips.
"You're beautiful, Eva," he said. "Do I have to kidnap you again to make you see things my way?"
"I'm not sure I'll ever see myself the way you do," I said. "But I can live with that."
"You always undersell yourself. Maybe that's not a bad thing, to keep the competition away."
His tone was teasing, but in my mind's eye I saw Del, walking away with a smile in his eyes. Wherever he was going, I made a silent wish that the right girl would cross his path.
"I also know about the chip," I said casually.
"I know," he said "Del confessed on the plane while you were asleep. He was guilty as hell. I was planning to tell you that night when I got back to Atlanta. Then Killen showed up, and I was glad it was there."
I was too. Without that chip and its element of surprise, the scene in the now-destroyed house might have ended with both of us dead.
"Rosine didn't have to die like that," I said, half to myself.
The memory of her strange smile as she drifted into the flames still made me queasy. Somehow she didn't seem to deserve that fate. Killen was a harder case to argue.
"No, but something was wrong with Rosine too," Hex said. "Killen attracted her for a reason."
I remembered her threat to find my "little sidekick" and use her razor. I still had a bruise on my cheek, and my throat was tender where she'd nicked me. I had a feeling that Hex's intuition about her was close to the truth.
"So you don't want to punch me out for invading your privacy?" he teased.
"If I punched you every time you invaded my privacy, you'd be a bloody pulp by now," I said.
"Fair enough. When we get where we're going, it's a quick job to take that chip out. I can give you a local, and then—"
"Don't worry about it," I said with a breezy little wave of my hand. "I asked Del to take care of it, since he was already working on you. Didn't he tell you?"
"No. He didn't."
Hex slid his hand down my right leg, pushing down my borrowed sock. I had a neat, flesh-colored Band-Aid on my ankle.
"So it's gone for good then," he said. "Del is paranoid about leaving evidence."
I nodded. "He made a fire and burned everything we left on the beach. Even those pieces of rope that fell from the terrace."
Hex pulled out his phone. "That chip is military-rated to just above a thousand degrees." He tapped the screen. "Let's see if he melted it."
A tiny beep sounded.
"I'm not surprised it's still working," Hex said. "It's built to survive. Probably some seagull will swallow it."
Something on the screen made him pause. Then he grinned.
"You tell a good lie," he said. "It's still reading you. You had me fooled with the Band-Aid."
"How accurate is that chip?" I asked.
"Very. Three feet or less."
"There's only one person within three feet of me," I said.
Chapter Sixty-Two
Silence made the smooth hum of the tires seem louder. Hex was still, then he touched the bandage on his shoulder. His eyes narrowed to dangerous silver slits.
"My buddy and I are going to have a serious conversation the next time I see him," he growled.
It seemed like a good time to be quiet. I navigated light traffic south of Atlanta near Jonesboro. The McDonough exit had just flashed by when he gave a low laugh in the seat next to me.
"That was a dirty trick, catching me asleep," he said.
"It wasn't dirty at all," I retorted. "Del sanitized i
t before he—"
"Smartass. You know what I mean."
"You think I took advantage of you?"
"Yep."
"Sort of like kidnapping someone and slipping a chip into their ankle while they're asleep?"
"That was different," he said. "I'm the dominant. I'm supposed to do things like that."
"Well, now you can go track yourself," I said in sugary tones.
"You sure are mouthy for a submissive," he said. "When I'm back to full strength, I'm going to find better uses for that mouth."
The thought of that got me thinking. The car next to us blew his horn, making me swerve back to our lane.
"Stop trying to distract me," I ordered. "This is how girls get reputations as bad drivers. With the chip gone, now maybe you'll have to trust me a little more."
"It was never about trust," he said. "The world is fucked up, Eva. Bad things happen, but they're not going to happen to my girl. This was about safety."
"And control."
"Yes," he admitted. "I tried to ease up when I left town and you were on your own. You see how well that turned out."
"Did you get your business done?"
"It was sort of your business," he said with a grin.
I was immediately suspicious. "What did you do?"
"I found Brody," he said. "He's living under an assumed name in Los Angeles. The police must not have looked very hard."
I swallowed. "Did you beat him up after all?"
"No," he said. "I arranged a very special meeting for him."
"So you paid someone else to beat him up."
"In a manner of speaking, yes." Now he didn't look tired at all. He was grinning.
"Hex, what did you do?"
"I introduced him to a friend of yours from Paris," he said. "Lady Cosima. She mentioned the night of the auction that her interests ran more to males who wanted, as she put it, a deeper experience."
"I don't think Brody swings that way," I mumbled in shock.
"Brody was swinging in a lot of ways he'd never experienced before," Hex said. 'What is it they say? Pictures or it didn't happen? Trust me. It happened."
He leaned back and closed his eyes, smiling.
"She made sure he saw the sun come up, at my request," he said. "And who knows where those pictures might end up? He hurt you, so he got off cheap. Next time –