by Lora Leigh
He was unassuming, almost handsome with his beard and goatee and shaven head. His smile was comfortable, his gray eyes amused, as he glanced down at Nik’s fallen form. Banyon had a quiet, confident look to his face that had always drawn her.
God, she’d been doing accounting for six months for a man who had just been awaiting the order to kill her?
Nik was tied securely and unconscious. At least he wasn’t dead. Yet. She looked from him to the man who squatted beside him.
He was dressed to perfection, as always. A gray pin-striped suit, well pressed. Wing-tipped shoes. And he had a limp. That was why he was late bringing his accounts to her.
She glanced at his foot, then back to his face.
“Yeah, the foot is still kind of stiff,” he chuckled. “I have to give your boyfriend credit, Risa. Even half-unconscious he was still a damned good shot. Then again, Mossad agents can almost shoot straight from the grave. Damned hard bastards to kill, you know.”
She shook her head. No, she didn’t know that.
“His mother was the one death I regret.” Orion straightened and stared down at Nik with a thoughtful expression before looking back up at her. “Her name was Ariela Abijah. She was married to a CIA agent and her son was one of the best Mossad agents I’ve ever known. For a while, I guess they were friends.” He shrugged his shoulders heavily as he sat down in the easy chair and watched her. He held Nik’s gun comfortably and acted as though they were simply visiting.
The man had to be insane.
“You killed your friends?” she whispered. She wouldn’t have a chance, then.
He nodded slowly. “Ariela was beautiful. I hated taking that job, but I had no choice. One of my employers knew a bit too much information about me.” He smiled, a wide, satisfied curve to his lips. “He doesn’t any longer, though, so that rather changes the state of my employment.” He leaned forward confidently. “I’ve wanted to retire for several years and he kept calling me back.”
“Heinrick,” she guessed. “He’s your employer.”
“One of them.” He shrugged. “He’s the scientist Ariela was searching for, and the man Jansen allowed to rape you.” He shook his head at that. “In all the years I’ve killed, I’ve never raped. Masturbated to death, maybe.” He grinned at her shudder. “But I never raped.”
He was crazy. Risa could feel the icy chill of his insanity reaching across the distance between them, threatening to freeze her with its cold.
“Heinrick’s dead.” He tilted his head to the side when she said nothing more. “Does that please you?”
She licked her lips nervously. “You killed him?”
He nodded like a little boy desperate for approval. “I found the evidence he had against me. I knew if I looked hard enough, I would. He was stupid. He kept it in his home safe.” He shook his head then. “I should have thought of that, but I assumed he was more intelligent than to keep it there.”
“Why are you here?” Her voice shook. She could feel the fear, and a burning fury churning inside her. “If you killed him, why didn’t you just leave? Just retire like you wanted to do?”
His smile was amused and much too friendly. That was how he tricked her. He was able to fake a warmth and sincerity in his eyes, in his whole expression, that most people couldn’t fake.
“Because you are a liability,” he sighed. “Not that I’m worried about you seeing my face. Cosmetic enhancements are so reliable nowadays, but your boyfriend isn’t going to let this go, is he?”
“You killed his mother. You were the reason his father died, and you tried to kill him. I somehow doubt he’s going to let it go.”
“But I left his cousin living,” he sighed. “I could have killed her as well. I should have, she was CIA, another liability, but I allowed her to live.”
“You believed he was dead,” she argued.
“Well, that’s true,” he admitted with a light laugh. “But still, I let her live to atone for the death of the family of Abijah. And now, he’s alive, and he still hunts me. What do you think it would take to make him stop?”
Risa shook her head. “He’ll never stop hunting you.”
He grimaced at that. “Ah well. I had hoped that by my allowing you to live, he would see the benefits in allowing me to finish my days as a retired assassin rather than prey. Oh well.” He shrugged. “If nothing will stop him, then I can complete my assignment here and retire with a clean record.” His eyes narrowed. “I’ve never failed to complete an assignment, you know.”
CHAPTER 25
MICAH DIDN’T bother with the elevator when they reached the apartment building. He slammed through the door to the stairs, took them two and three at a time as the others followed behind him.
He could feel his heart pounding in his throat, fear clawing at his mind. He’d left her. He’d walked away from her when she had begged him with her eyes not to leave her. And still, he had gone.
How had Orion gotten past Nik? How could Micah have allowed this to happen?
He could feel a curious sense of disbelief and unreality filling him. He remembered racing in a similar manner for the location where his mother’s body had been. Running around pedestrians and cars, his heart in his throat, adrenaline coursing through his body alongside his fear.
He had found her dead.
He had watched his father break. Kneeling in her blood, Garren Abijah had screamed out in horror, calling out his wife’s name. Begging her to come back. Not to leave him.
Micah could feel a prayer burning in his head.
Be safe. Be safe. Ah God, keep her safe.
He pushed through the door to her floor and raced up the hall. He didn’t pause. He threw himself into the door, crashing into the room and taking in the scene in one horrified glance.
Nik was conscious and bound with chains in one of the easy chairs, facing the kitchen. He was fighting the chains, throttled yells sounding behind the gag.
His horrified gaze was locked on the kitchen entrance.
Micah could feel the blood congealing in his veins as he moved to the doorway. Behind him, the others were pouring into the room.
Micah stepped into the kitchen and felt his knees weaken.
Risa was tied to her table. Her arms were tied by the wrists and held pointing to the floor by two large hooks that had been driven into the floor.
Her ankles were tied to a mop handle, the handle secured by a chain to another hook in the ceiling.
She was dressed. She was crying. Behind the gag, muffled sobs sounded as he moved to her, slowly, barely daring to believe what he saw. Tears easing from her eyes as she watched him, her chest rising and falling with her breaths. There wasn’t so much as a smear of blood on her body.
“Risa.” He touched her face, then eased the gag from her mouth. “Baby.”
“Oh God.” She strained toward him. “Oh God, Micah. I thought you were dead. I thought he’d killed you,” she sobbed. “He said there was only one way to stop you and he’d do it if he had to. I thought he’d gone after you.”
He shook his head, cupped her cheek, and laid his lips to hers. She was alive. She was struggling against the ropes; she was breathing. She was alive.
He pulled back and had to draw in a long, slow breath to fill his lungs with air. “Let me get you loose.”
Jerking a knife from the sheath at his side, he cut her legs loose first and gently lowered them before bending and freeing her right arm. He moved to the left and stilled.
There, wrapped around her wrist by the leather choker that had always held it, was the pendant his father had given his mother at their engagement party.
The silver star was tarnished with age, but the golden teardrops in each point of the star still gleamed back with rich luster.
He released the ropes holding Risa’s hand and lifted her wrist.
“He gave this to you?” he asked.
Her eyes, wide and still filled with fear, flickered to the pendant as he helped her sit up, only to pull he
r against him with one arm.
“He said it was a warning.” She stared at the pendant before lifting her gaze to his face.
He lifted the pendant and turned it over. Ad olam ani ehye lach. I’ll be yours forever. The Hebrew inscription had been engraved in the silver by his father.
It was a warning. A message that Orion knew who Micah was, knew who his parents were, Somehow Orion had managed to figure out Micah’s former identity, and he had left the pendant as a warning that he knew who he was and knew how to hurt him.
Micah tucked the necklace into his pocket, then picked Risa up into his arms and strode through the apartment until he reached her bedroom and the bed they had shared.
“Did he hurt you?” He laid her on the bed, his hands moving over her arms before he lifted her wrists and rubbed at the reddened marks the ropes had left.
She shook her head quickly, her gaze locked on his face.
“Don’t leave me,” she whispered.
Micah froze. He stared down at her and saw the plea in her eyes.
He inhaled sharply before swallowing past the thickness in his throat and shaking his head.
“We’ll talk about that later,” he promised her.
He had no intentions of discussing it. There was only one answer, only one conclusion to this.
“I know what you’ll do.” Her breath hitched as her tears filled her eyes again. “You’ll catch me asleep. Or in another room, and you’ll just walk away, won’t you?”
Micah could feel pieces of his soul breaking away, like a glacier cracking apart, piece by slow, agonizing piece.
He touched a tear that fell from her eye.
“I can’t say good-bye to you.” His hand cupped her cheek. “I can’t walk away while those beautiful eyes are begging me to stay. And I have no choice but to leave. We’ve always known, since that first night, that an end would come.”
She flinched at the softly spoken words and Micah felt the pain of them resounding through his entire being. If anything in his life had ever been worth fighting for, then it was Risa. But there was no way to fight the agreement he had made. He risked her life by risking his own if he attempted to defy it. And he risked everything that she loved about him if he tried to break the one bond that was his alone. His word.
She trembled beneath his hand, her lips quivering as she tried to control the cries he could feel welling inside her. Could he walk away if she cried? Could he deny her anything when faced with her tears?
But she didn’t cry. She drew in a ragged breath and nodded.
“Go,” she whispered.
“Risa.” He frowned, desperate to touch her one last time. To get the team out of her apartment, to hold her, to listen to her voice one last time as she cried out his name in passion before he was forced to walk away.
“Just go now,” she cried out roughly. “Leave me my pride, Micah. Get the hell out of my life now if you’re going to go. Don’t sit here and make me beg you to stay.”
He could hear the Durango team and the Elite Ops teams in the other room. Jordan’s voice bled into the room. Micah knew he was needed. They were going after Orion’s handler before dawn to learn his location.
Jordan was already pulling in information, tracking the assassin. Mac Knight was waiting in the other apartment, going over the pictures that had come through from the security camera on the elevator. They would have another identity on Orion soon.
And Risa needed to be debriefed. Micah couldn’t do that. Jordan and the federal attorney would handle that. Micah could be in the room, but he couldn’t touch her, couldn’t hold her to comfort her as she was forced to answer the questions that would come.
“I could stay till morning.” His jaw clenched as emotion swamped him and he saw the answer in her face.
“If you stay till morning you’ll destroy me,” she answered, her voice thick with the sobs she was fighting. “Please, Micah. If you’re leaving me in the morning, then leave now. Don’t wait until I’m asleep in your arms, or feeling the hope that you’ll stay. I couldn’t handle it.”
She’d already been forced to handle so much. And she had endured it. She had held her courage and her strength, and she had fought to survive.
He tucked the loose strand of her hair back behind her ear to reveal the gentle slope of her brow, her cheek. He feathered the backs of his fingers down the side of her face and once again marveled at the smooth, silken feel of her flesh.
“Please don’t…”
His head lowered. He couldn’t stay, though he knew his heart would always linger with her. His lips touched hers and desperation slammed into his head.
He’d meant to kiss her with gentleness. He’d meant to only brush her lips with his. But her lips parted and a muted sob tore at her chest. He’d already lost his heart and soul to her; he may as well lose his mind.
His lips parted over hers, his tongue slid inside, and the taste of sweet heated passion and a woman’s tears exploded against his taste buds.
A heavy groan tore from his throat. One hand gripped the back of her head, the other pressed into her back, pulling her against his chest as her head bent back beneath the force of his kiss.
He wanted to devour her. He wanted the taste of her seeped so deep inside him that he was never a moment without her.
The feel of her arms tightening around his neck, the sound of her sobbing moan of hunger, tore through him. Her lips opened to him like the petals of a flower to the sun as he slanted his lips over hers and tried to kiss her deeper, tried to draw her taste further into his senses.
He couldn’t let her go. He couldn’t walk away from her.
He couldn’t live his life without the feel of this, her hunger and her need flowing into his until he couldn’t breathe without the taste of her.
He stroked his hands beneath her shirt, felt the silky texture of her back. He couldn’t touch her enough. He couldn’t get enough of her.
Groaning, desperate for the feel of her, he bore her back on the bed, his lips taking hard, quick kisses before they settled against her again for another of the deep, drugging caresses that fueled his desire for her to a blazing level.
He pushed her thighs apart, settled his legs between them, and pressed the swollen length of his erection, covered by the black pants he wore, against the center of her thighs.
Grinding his cock against her, his hips shifting, rocking the thick flesh against her cotton-covered pussy, he groaned into her kiss.
Her knees lifted, bracketed his hips, moved with him as a strangled cry sounded in her chest.
He couldn’t get enough of her. This was the last touch he would have, the last taste. He wanted every second of it, every flavor of lust, desire and hunger, and love, that he could draw from the experience.
He could feel her beneath his flesh. He tried to press himself into her.
“No!” she cried out as he tore his lips from hers and let them travel down the arched column of her neck. “Don’t leave me, Micah. Don’t…”
She shook her head as he pressed his forehead into her shoulder. Micah could feel her body trembling, shuddering as she fought to hold back her pleas.
“Ani ohev otach.” I love you. “Me’achshav ve’ad hanetzach.” From now to eternity.
He tore himself away from her.
His breathing rough, heavy, he watched as she rolled to her side, her back to him, her face buried against a pillow as her shoulders tightened, tensing against her tears, he knew.
“Risa…”
“Go!” she cried out desperately. “Just go. Please God, Micah. Just go.”
He slid the pendant from the pocket of his pants and laid it on the bedside table after running his thumb over it. Regret slammed inside him with a brutality that nearly stole his breath.
“Dream big, love,” he whispered as he gazed down at her. “Dream enough for both of us.”
Turning, he moved to the door, jerking it open, and strode into the living room. A heavy silence filled the room as
too many eyes watched him. He stalked past the broken door and moved down the hall.
“Micah, we’re meeting here in five minutes,” Jordan’s voice carried to him as he neared the elevator.
Micah paused. He didn’t turn back.
“Find someplace else to meet,” he ordered his commander. “I’m out of here.”
He didn’t take the elevator. He pushed through the stairwell exit and took the stairs. Within seconds he was pushing through the back exit and entering the parking lot where the vans were parked. The vans and his replacement car.
He moved to the sedan, unlocked it, and settled into the seat as the overhead clouds opened up and rain poured around him.
He stared at the sheets of moisture washing over the windshield, unblinking. It reminded him of Risa’s tears.
It reminded him of dreams he hadn’t known he had, and ones he hadn’t imagined he would ever want.
He closed his eyes, and just for a second he let himself imagine. Imagine the house of her dreams, her laughter in the yard as he watched her, her body heavy with his child. She would glow like the brightest star. Her eyes would fill with love and laughter; her expression would be serene with the dreams that surrounded them. She would soothe him after a mission, be waiting for him, arms wide open.
He wouldn’t be a Maverick in her eyes; he would simply be Micah. Her husband. Her lover.
The image dissipated at the sound of a heavy knock on the passenger window. He opened his eyes, breathed out a heavy sigh, and disengaged the lock.
Tehya slid in.
She tossed the wet jacket that covered her head to the backseat and stared out the windshield as he had.
“We need a drink,” she stated.
“Why do we need a drink?”
She turned and stared at him.
“She locked her bedroom door and she’s refusing to speak to anyone until her grandmother arrives. Jordan is sending Noah and Clint after Abigail Clay.”
He nodded. She wouldn’t be alone. He didn’t want her to be alone. “That doesn’t explain why we need a drink.”