“What?”
Marco blinked.
“Marco? Is that you?”
“Yeah, it’s me.” He cleared his throat.
“How’d it go this morning?”
“To shit. Fiona’s gone.”
“What?”
Marco gave Ghost the bare-bones update.
“She left with him? Just like that?” Ghost asked.
“What did you expect her to do? Say it was no big deal? I fucking betrayed her.”
“I told you it was going to end up this way,” Ghost said.
In that moment, Marco had never wanted to reach through the phone and punch a motherfucker so bad in his life.
“Well, at least when this Scott guy plugs her laptop into their network, we’ll get our hooks into it. One way or another, we’ll get the dirt on NueEnergy, it’s just going to take a bit longer than we planned for.”
“What?”
“I’ve been working on the code, fuckface.”
“Screw you.”
“I did a dude once. Not my thing. No, thanks.”
Marco sputtered. What the…?
Nope. No, he did not want to know or go there. Knowing what he knew about Ghost was already bad enough. He didn’t need more.
“I’m texting you an address. Come try to punch me if you want.”
“I will.”
“You can try. Hey.”
“What?”
“That friend of a friend thing you were asking about?”
“Yeah?”
“That girl disappeared in Delhi, right?”
“I think so.” Honestly that was the last thing on Marco’s mind right now.
“All right. See you in a few hours. Don’t get pulled over.”
Marco hung up and chunked the phone across the car. The back popped off and the battery fell out.
“Shit,” he muttered under his breath.
He shoved a hand through his hair and shifted in the seat. There was nothing comfortable about the little bucket seats or the way the car sat low to the ground.
Fiona was gone.
The blame was squarely on his shoulders, and yet…why had she gone with Scott? Of all people to trust, he was at the bottom of the list. They still didn’t know why he’d had the cameras installed, or what his game was. Marco could understand the spyware, hacking her laptop, but the cameras didn’t make sense, no matter what he’d said to Fiona. There was no solid reason for them to be there. Sure, yes, he could see Good Global wanting to see the living room and her office, but her bedroom? The bathroom? What good were those cameras to them? What else was Scott up to?
One thing was for certain. Scott wasn’t a Fed. He didn’t look like one, act like one or follow due process like one. So who—and what—was he?
Bad news.
Maybe this went deeper than the companies. Deeper than some corporate bullshit. So what then? Why Fiona?
And why couldn’t Fiona trust him? Why wouldn’t she listen to him?
Just because he’d lied to her…used her…didn’t mean…
Marco threw his head back against the head rest and punched the steering wheel.
Of course she wouldn’t trust him, much less listen to him. He was guilty as sin, and he’d known this day was coming. He’d just hoped to have had a little more time with her. And that she’d be safe by then.
Whatever else was going on, he was pretty damn sure Fiona wasn’t safe with Scott, and that was what really killed Marco. She was out there with a guy that didn’t have any qualms about lying to her face, and he’d…let her go.
It was the single biggest mistake of his life.
He should have…what? Tied her up and bundled her into the ATV? What would that do? Fiona would fight, she’d get away, and then what?
Marco needed to figure out who the hell Scott really was, and then find Fiona. As soon as she connected to the internet, Ghost would have a handle on her location, but until then…what did he do? How could he live like this?
His heart felt as though it’d been ripped out of his chest. He felt at his ribs from time to time just to make sure they weren’t cracked.
If he’d thought love was bad, this was worse. It wasn’t heartburn. It was the world’s worst case of acid reflux, burning him up from the inside out.
Marco thumped the steering wheel again, calling Scott every name he could think of, but none of it made him feel any better. Fiona was out there and in danger because of him. Because he’d brought all hell to her doorstep and left her vulnerable.
Scott peered at the monitor and Brat’s hunched shoulders. She’d gone into the bedroom to supposedly go to sleep an hour ago, but all she’d done was sit at the foot of the bed and plow through a box of tissues. What the fuck was she crying about? That musclebound idiot she’d shacked up with?
He rolled his eyes and reached for his phone.
The sooner he touched base with Lila, the sooner Brat could solve all their questions about NueEnergy and the sooner he could kill Brat.
He’d often thought about what kind of revenge he wanted. That was until he’d found her living a shell of a life, so scared of the outside world she’d retreated into something that barely resembled a human being. That’d been the best thing yet, learning that he didn’t have to extract his pound of flesh. He’d done it all along by just continuing to breathe air.
Brat was afraid of him. Of Nova. And she had no idea she’d let the wolf in through her front door.
Killing her would be the icing on top of the cake. Then he could stretch his wings, so to speak, and stop looking over his shoulder. The only thing the feds had on him was Brat. Once she was out of the picture, he could be a new man. Whoever he wanted. He wouldn’t need to answer to bitches like Lila. Granted, watching Lila squirm was awfully funny. She had no idea the shit-storm she’d stepped in, and it wasn’t like Scott had warned her. He’d taken the job, sat back, and watched the nightmare unfold.
Scott’s fingers curled around his phone. A few more days, and he’d get to finally squeeze the life out of Brat.
Fiona sat on the bed and stared at the wall. She hadn’t slept much despite how comfortable the bed was, and how good the sheets felt after a gloriously hot shower. Nothing could touch her heart.
It’d been a whole day now since she’d last seen Marco and yet…it felt as though he was there with her. Just outside her line of sight. She wanted him to be there…and she hated him and she…she didn’t know what she felt for him. It was too jumbled.
She’d been numb with fear before. This was…a different kind of numbness. She ached deep inside of her. As many times as she’d experienced heartbreak before, this was possibly worse. Worse than even Heath. With him…she’d been pissed. Angry. She’d wanted revenge. This thing with Marco ran deeper though.
Marco knew her truth. All of it. And she’d let him use her.
She should have known when things started going bad, when he had a friend nearby that could solve all her problems while she took a vacation, that it wasn’t right.
Who did that?
It was something out of a movie. A TV show. Not real life.
No, in real life people used you and threw you under the bus.
Just like Heath. Just like Marco.
And she’d let both men manipulate her.
Ultimately, it came back to her. She was broken in a very elemental way. On a cellular level. She was programmed to fall in love. It was her nature to give her heart away and love without reservation. She’d hidden behind that tendency, using it to fill her life with meaningless relationships. Well, no more. Marco had shown her the error of her ways, big time.
Whenever the Marshalls came to pick her up, because there was no doubt in her mind they’d relocate her after they chewed her out, she’d swear off men. From here on out, no more.
Fiona drew in a shuddering breath. Tears leaked out the corners of her eyes. She hadn’t stopped crying since the car ride. Every few hours another jag would surprise her and she’d go through a whole box of
tissues.
At least Scott and his team gave her space.
They’d set up in a vacation condo rental, not that far from downtown, doing…something. Every so often Scott would pop in, ask her a few questions, and leave. He gave her bad vibes still, but that was probably due to the way they’d met and the nature of his undercover assignment.
He’d been told to…to romance her. Sleep with her. Get close to her. It made her skin crawl. While she hadn’t been around many undercover agents, this also felt…wrong. And who in their right minds slept with someone on command? Scott wasn’t right. He didn’t…fit. Something about this whole set-up was…wrong.
There was that damn, nagging sensation again.
She glanced over her shoulder. Through that door was the living room. They’d set the space up as their command center, and it was her only point of exit. But she didn’t like going out there. The other agents left guns around, and those made her uncomfortable.
What was it Eric had told her once?
She’d mentioned that the firearms made her nervous.
The memory escaped her, but she couldn’t shake the idea that it was important. And maybe…maybe she’d made another mistake not insisting Scott take her to the Marshalls instead of staying on to assist in his investigation.
Wasn’t there some sort of cross-department protocol?
The bedroom door whisked open and Scott leaned in.
Fiona jumped, startled by the invasion.
Fucking Scott.
He smiled at her. The expression was…smarmy, and it made her skin crawl. How had she ever fallen for this guy?
“Sorry, Fi.”
“It’s okay, what’s up?” She turned so she sat facing the door instead of the wall.
“Hungry? Breakfast is ready, then we’re going to dig into the NueEnergy servers.”
“But…you can’t. They wiped the whole thing.”
“Maybe their physical servers, but we copied quite a lot of their data. I was hoping you’d help us narrow our search. Quicker we find the evidence we need, the quicker you can be done.”
“Oh. Okay.”
Helping Scott was the right thing to do.
She had to keep telling herself that.
Then why did she have a bad feeling about this?
Randy flipped through his list.
They’d had to eliminate four team members, including George, but that was how these things went sometimes. In the interest of protecting the greater good, sometimes they had to thin the herd a little.
The evidence was gone. The servers had been destroyed, in a rather elegant way that would put blame solely on George’s shoulders. Eli would take the fall for George’s death, and Eli’s passing could be ruled as a suicide with the right incentive.
There were still too many lose ends though.
Namely Fiona. And whoever the fuck she was working with.
There’d been another security breech, two days ago, on-site at the Moab location. The code was different from the original hack, which made Randy think that there was more than one entity out there trying to glean information from the servers.
Well, whatever they were looking for, it was gone.
Now all they had to do was figure out the who, and Randy was already working on that.
“Sir?”
“What?” Randy glanced up from his list.
“We found him.”
“Him—who? We’re looking for a few different hims. Be more specific.”
“That kid. Danny Benally.”
“Oh. That one.”
Randy grimaced.
This was not how he’d prefer to handle the situation. There’d be too many bodies and not enough answers. At least the kid was wrapped up in drugs. They could always overdose him and leave him if this didn’t work out. Addiction made such a convenient cover-up.
“Bring him here. I’ve got a few questions for him.” Randy scratched that off the list.
“It’ll be a few hours.”
“Let me know when he arrives.”
Randy adjusted his schedule. It was only Tuesday. Still, he’d like to have this whole thing wrapped up by tomorrow and his team out. Let the authorities make of the remaining mess what they would.
By Friday, NueEnergy would be gone, their employees fired and the banks swooping in to foreclose on massive amounts of debt. Everything else would land squarely on the shoulders of Eli and George. Who were conveniently dead.
Marco slammed the door shut to Ghost’s one-room rental. It wasn’t the same one as before. It was across town in another walk-up over a different store. At least this one didn’t smell of grease, and it had two single beds. As a bonus they had a hot plate and a tiny sink, in addition to a bathroom down the hall. So long as they paid in cash, no one asked questions.
“No luck?” Ghost didn’t turn from the mountain of monitors.
Marco was pretty sure Ghost added a new one every time he left.
“No. He’s not fucking there.” Marco dropped onto the single bed, exhaustion weighing him down. The texts from his family weren’t stopping. Everyone wanted to know what the hell was going on, and where was Danny? Since Marco couldn’t give them answers about current events, he’d gone in search of his cousin and come up empty handed.
“He’s probably jacked up somewhere, living the life.” Ghost’s tone was dismissive to the point it got Marco’s hackles up.
“What would you know?” It wasn’t like Ghost was very personable. A paper bag had more empathy than Ghost. The only reason Ghose was here was because he felt like he owed Marco some huge debt. If it weren’t for that, Marco was pretty sure the guy would have disappeared a long time ago.
Ghost’s fingers stopped moving and he turned his head toward Marco. There was something…prenatural about the movement. The hair on Marco’s arms rose and Ghost’s eyes seemed to swallow him up.
The only time Marco had seen that look on Ghosts’ face was the time the shit had hit the fan. They’d been holed up in a shack, their enemies closing in. Ghost had given him that same look, told him to stay out of range…and then death had rained down. They’d fought tooth and nail that night, and come out alive. Somehow.
Marco did not want that death stare aimed at him, but here it was.
“What do you think they did to me to make me this way?” Ghost’s stare bored into Marco.
“I never asked.” He swallowed. No, he’d turned off his conscience, handed Ghost his medication when it was time, sewed up the gashes, and dug bullets out of him.
“Always the good soldier.” Ghost turned back toward the monitors, the moment over.
Marco shivered.
Fucking Ghost. Sometimes he got off on being creepy.
“What would you have had me do?” Marco stared up at the ceiling, memories tugging at him. Things he didn’t want to remember.
“Nothing. You did your job. You kept me whole.”
“I made you a fucking pincushion.”
“I wasn’t…as strong back then.” Ghost’s fingers slowed and he stared up at the wall, at a point above the monitors.
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Do you know what Tank stood for? In the beginning?”
“Tactical and neutralizing something…”
“Tactical, assault, and neutralizing combat unit. TANC.” He shrugged. “I bet someone thought they were real cleaver calling it the Tank Project. The pills, the injections, they kept us together.”
“I knew…you weren’t normal.”
“That’s a word for it.” Ghost’s laugh was bitter. “You’re a badass motherfucker, but I bet you’d go down if someone shot you a dozen times, huh?”
Bile coated the back of Marco’s throat.
He tried to not think about that night.
“You thought I was going to die.” Ghost glanced at him, one side of his mouth pulled up.
“Fuck, man, I can still hear you laughing.”
Marco squeezed his eyes shut. He’d had to d
ig into Ghost’s chest, between the ribs, to get a bullet out. It’d punctured the body armor and wasn’t in that deep, but then Ghost had begun to laugh and getting the bullet out became half restraining Ghost and half cutting him open more.
“It was pretty funny.”
“The hell it was.”
“It didn’t hurt that bad.”
“Didn’t hurt? What the fuck is wrong with you?”
“A lot, but we don’t have time for the list. Besides, those little pink pills? Those deadened any pain for thirty-six hours.”
“What?” Marco blinked at Ghost.
“Yeah, take a couple of those before going on an op, and I didn’t feel a thing.” He shrugged.
Marco was torn between wanting to know more and self-preservation. The less he knew about Ghost, and how Ghost came to be…whatever he was, the better Marco would be.
“Danny probably doesn’t know what day it is. He’ll turn up. Besides, we have bigger problems.”
“Shit.” Marco scrubbed a hand over his face.
He needed sleep and solutions, preferably in that order.
“I’ve got news you’re not going to like.” Ghost stroked the keys, never once glancing Marco’s way. Did the guy even sleep?
“Hit me with it.”
“Scott DuPry.”
“Fiona’s ex?”
“This one wasn’t. Scott’s social security number goes back to a guy who was buried about nine months ago. Someone went to a lot of trouble to build a lot of background on this new version of Scott, but it doesn’t go that deep.”
“What?” Marco sat up and swung his legs off the bed.
“Scott’s a fake.”
“Who is he then?”
“That’s what I’m trying to find out. Or I was before you busted in here.”
“Fuck.” Marco leaned forward, elbows on his knees.
He’d known Scott was bad news, but this?
Scott could be anyone.
Anyone at all.
And Marco had simply let Fiona go with him.
Scott stared at the lock screen.
Their passwords weren’t working. He couldn’t log onto his laptop. Or the desktop they’d set up in the other room. Fiona couldn’t get into her laptop either.
“What the fuck did you do?” He turned toward Goon #1. “What the hell were you doing? Watch porn on your phone like any other normal human being.”
Dangerous Protector (Aegis Group Book 5) Page 20