The Seduction of Lucy

by Kris Rafferty

  Lucy pointed to the air vents on the ceiling. “If Barrett wanted us dead, there are flash bangs on every floor and in every room. Nerve toxins. We’d be dead in seconds. More efficient than picking us off one at a time.”

  “Excuse me? When were you going to tell us that?” Phil’s cheeks were distended with cream puffs and it made her look like a rheumy squirrel.

  “It’s relatively humane,” Lucy said. “Quick death. Think about it. They could cold-turkey us off the gene therapy. We’d all linger.”

  Cat snorted, looking unconvinced. “Then they’d have to listen to us while we died. Quick is quieter.”

  Patrice laughed, throwing her head back, her auburn curls draping nearly to the floor.

  “You are twisted, Patrice.” Phil shook her head, washing down her pastries with coffee.

  “Oh, stop,” Patrice said. “You’re all wrong. It makes no sense. Unless they’re shutting the Agency down, there is no upside to killing off agents. It takes a lot of time and money to train us.”

  “They never lack new recruits,” Cat said. “They could wipe us all out and still have functioning teams under six months.”

  “Functioning isn’t the same as competent. Do you remember your skill level at six months? I remember mine, and it was sad. And anyway, I don’t see whoever runs this place—” Patrice lifted her hand, indicating the whole facility. “—I don’t see them putting their agenda on hold for six months.”

  Lucy agreed. “But someone is behind this, and if Barrett has a plan to stop it, she’s keeping it to herself.” She saw Troy staring at her from across the restaurant. He indicated she should come to him. “Oh, great.” He probably got information from the bug that would get them both killed.

  “What?” Cat craned her neck to see.

  Lucy ignored him and blindly looked at her plate. Troy in the light of day was a totally different animal than Troy between the sheets. She couldn’t stomach another brush with death so soon. Here she was worrying Patrice was losing her cool, when in fact Lucy was near paralyzed navigating the tightrope she’d been walking this week.

  When she looked up from her plate, he was standing next to her. She avoided his gaze, staring at her cup as she lifted it to her lips. The damn thing shook, nearly spilling.

  His arm dropped to the table and swept her place setting, food, everything to the floor. The vast restaurant, filled with trained killers and waitstaff, hushed. Her crew pushed their chairs back, putting critical distance between him and them, so if he made a move they’d have time to react. They watched, waiting.

  All Lucy heard was her heartbeat. He was obviously putting on a show, but she wasn’t sure whom it was for, her or their audience. “I was eating that,” she said.

  “I’m helping you prioritize. Breakfast is over. You’re late for a debrief.”

  Lucy wasn’t aware of any debrief.

  * * *

  Troy watched Lucy’s face show an array of different emotions as she stormed out of the restaurant. When she settled on angry, he thought, Good, because I’m pissed, too.

  The evidence Barrett had gathered made it impossible for him to keep Lucy alive inside the Agency. He had to get her out of here. He had to find a way to supply her with enough drugs to keep her alive, and he had to keep her alive during the debrief. When Lucy decided to screw up, he thought, she went big. And this time there was a very real chance she would take him down with her.

  Outside the restaurant’s door, she turned on him. “Is debrief code for sex, Troy? Because I’m not in the mood.”

  “Got your fill of me last night, huh?”

  “Forever,” she said. “I won’t be making that mistake again.”

  “Didn’t feel like a mistake.” He grabbed her wrist, pulling her against his chest, ignoring agents passing in the hall to get to the restaurant. Lucy wasn’t the kind of person you could split your focus on.

  She broke his wrist grab and turned it around on him, putting a wristlock on him, pushing, guiding his body toward the wall. Troy stepped forward, bent his elbow and used the momentum of her throw to pull them both against the wall. The force of impact made Lucy lose her breath. He took advantage of it by embracing her, kissing her, running his hands down her back to her ass, burying his fingers in its cleft until she startled and gasped.

  He whispered against her lips. “You want to play games? I wrote the playbook.” He forced his tongue into her mouth, anger rivaling his fear. She’d messed with the Agency, and now the Agency would make her pay. He never should have touched her in the elevator.

  When Lucy wrapped her arms around his neck and welcomed his kiss, clutching at him, he drank it up despite their audience of curious bystanders, because he was afraid for her. He didn’t know when or where they’d come for her, but it would be soon.

  Lucy’s leg wrapped around his, her heel dragging against his calf, sending exciting shivers through him. He grabbed her thigh, bunched her skirt in his fist and realized this had to continue somewhere else, somewhere he could talk some sense into her.

  Lucy’s leg locked his and took him down. He never saw it coming.

  He slapped out, and his great weight hitting the tile echoed in the hall. Agents rushed out of the way, but not too far, circling them. He rolled onto his feet, crouched, six feet from her, scanning the crowd.

  Troy saw their curiosity. He’d trained Lucy. Would the student outperform the teacher? She was drug enhanced; he wasn’t. Would that tip the balance despite his greater experience? They wanted a match between the Agency’s two best fighters before guards materialized and slapped Lucy down, possibly canceling her.

  Troy knew two things the crowd didn’t. He wouldn’t let Lucy die, and he was pissed enough to give them a show.

  Two long strides had him within critical distance of Lucy. He parried her first punch, checked her back knuckle and jumped over her leg sweep. He missed parrying the uppercut. It caught him unaware, bending him at the waist, taking his breath. Looking up, he saw she had an open shot for a hammering punch to his jaw, a lights-out shot. She knew it, let him see it, but she didn’t take it.

  Troy smiled. Lucy didn’t want to kill him. She just wanted to humiliate him. He could work with that.

  He watched her kick her heels into the crowd and walk the perimeter of the circle like a caged lioness. When she stepped close enough to him, he threw a roundhouse kick to her solar plexus as bait, expecting her to travel up his centerline to stymie the kick’s power. Strategy he had in spades.

  She surprised him, rushing forward instead, hook punching his inner thigh, then grabbing it while inward elbowing his hip. He dropped to the ground like a weight.

  With Lucy, strategy wasn’t enough, he thought. He’d need a crystal ball.

  The crowd moved back as Troy pulled himself off the ground. Lucy stepped away from him, glaring. It would be easier to kill her than get her to submit, impossible to win without damaging her. Yet he felt no urge to stop.

  She was making his life hell. It was time to teach her a lesson.

  Troy jumped back on his feet, walked the perimeter of the circle, watching as Lucy kept critical distance between them. Neither could reach the other without stepping forward. She looked as though she wanted to kill him. He totally knew how she felt.

  When he threw a punch, he saw her ax kick a second after he needed to. It slammed onto his arm, numbing him from the wrist down, but he didn’t stop his attack. He threw an uppercut with his other fist, but she wasn’t there to receive it. He push dragged to the left and felt the sting of her fist connecting with his eye.

  “You’re pulling your punches, Lucy.” He smiled.

  “You have such a pretty face,” she said. She stepped out of range, hands on her hips. “If I damage it, you’ll have nothing left.” She indicated the crowd, the circle, and lifted a brow. “We have an audience. Are you sure you want them to see your beatdown?”

  He rushed her, aiming for her hips, going for a throw to the ground.

  Lucy
sidestepped and punched his other eye as he flew into the outstretched hands of the crowd. They pushed him back in the circle, silent, keeping watch for the inevitable guards.

  “Now you’re just being insulting,” he said. She got in two punches that barely bruised. “I’m beginning to think you like me.”

  He caught her sneaking looks at the crowd and realized he’d hit the nail on the head.

  She couldn’t know he knew about her Cayman account, so this anger had to be self-directed. She was venting on him, angry she’d initiated sex last night. That filled him with such frustration and rage he could barely see. More so, even, than his anger over Lucy’s duplicity or this public beatdown. He was going through IOUs like tickets at a fair trying to save her ass, and she didn’t even have the courtesy to admit she wanted him. Nothing was ever easy with Lucy.

  He rushed her again, but this time anticipated her veer to the side. He pivoted and caught her around the waist. As he bent to throw her over his shoulder, he saw her chamber an elbow strike aimed at his neck. Too late, he realized he’d opened himself to a kill shot. There was no time to tap it off. The crowd gasped.

  Lucy shouted, “Shit,” at the top of her lungs and passed up the shot.

  Relief warred with elation. Pulling the shot meant on some level she had to care for him, right? Or maybe she’d calculated the repercussions of killing the number-two man at the Agency and didn’t like her odds. He bounced her belly on his shoulder and waved everyone gone. “Show’s over, folks.”

  Guards arrived with assault rifles at their shoulders, pushing past the crowd, dispersing them. Lucy kicked her feet and pushed off from his back, arching, making it near impossible for Troy to carry her. “Put me down!”

  He slapped her on the butt. Everyone laughed. “In due time. We’ve wasted enough of it. Barrett’s waiting.”

  The guards lowered their rifles and stepped out of Troy’s way. He hurried down the hall. Lucy wasn’t kicking anymore, but she was still pushing against his back, trying to see his face. “What are you talking about? Barrett? Why?”

  “She has questions.”

  “About? I haven’t been on an op since the last debrief.”

  “We’ll find out when we get there.” He slammed the elevator button and adjusted her on his shoulder as he waited for the carriage to arrive. He didn’t have time or the stomach to hear any more of her lies. “Hey, where are your shoes?”

  “Put me down.”

  “No. Oh, yeah. You kicked them off to beat the tar out of me. I remember now.” He slapped her on the butt again. She squealed.

  “Will you put me down?” The elevator arrived and the doors opened.

  “No.” Both of his eyes were stinging and watering, so when he walked inside, he jostled her on purpose. Her grunts were music to his ear. She deserved worse.

  As the elevator doors closed them in, Lucy kicked the security cameras clear off the wall and jackknifed her body, pushing off from Troy’s shoulder, wrapping her knee around his neck and bringing him to the ground. She settled her knee across his neck and glared at him.

  “I don’t like you,” she said.

  Troy palm heeled her knee off his neck, and Lucy fell flat on her belly, her face inches from his. He craned his neck up the three inches it took and kissed her. “I grow on people.”

  Lucy’s chin quivered and she looked as if she were about to cry, and then she was kissing him, crawling on top of him. Troy held her tightly, trying to soothe her the best he could. The ding of the elevator arriving at Barrett’s floor had him jumping to his feet, hiding Lucy behind him. By the time the door did open, they were flustered but presentable.

  Janice was frowning at them. “The debrief is in her conference room, not her office.” She pointed down the hall. Troy studied her face. Janice had served three administrators that Troy knew of, and he’d never seen her flustered. He feared Barrett had decided to act on her intel about the Cayman accounts.

  Or just as bad, maybe she’d discovered her office had been bugged.

  Troy’s instinct was to run with Lucy now, not risk the mercurial moves of his boss. It’s what he wanted to do. But to Lucy, it very well could be a death sentence, only slower, more painful. It had to be a last resort, and there was still a chance Barrett was waiting for Lucy to access the account, giving Troy more time to figure out who was pulling her strings. If he could get Barrett the body of the hydra instead of one head, it might appease her enough to allow Lucy to live. There were more benefits to her living than dying. He’d made sure of that five years ago.

  He had to take the chance that Lucy would walk out of the debrief alive, that he’d have time to finish his investigation. The alternative was far too risky unless he had no other options.

  He led them to the conference room and paused. Lucy’s whole body was trembling so hard it shook her arm. She pulled her hand from his as he opened the door. Three men in white coats greeted them.

  Medics.

  Lucy turned to Troy, a look of horror on her face. It was only then that he realized how it looked. She thought he had just led her to her cancellation. The final betrayal.

  Barrett was sitting at the back of the interrogation room, her expression letting him know he needed to get with the program or leave. He couldn’t allow this. He’d die before he let them hurt her, and he knew that was exactly what would be required of him once they stepped into that conference room. He was looking at his death, standing before Lucy’s accusing glare, incapable of explaining, of even showing an expression that might soothe her fears. Troy couldn’t save them now.

  She raised her fist to strike him, but two of the three men in white coats grabbed her arms, stopping her. Their touch triggered her training. No longer hampered by mercy and caution, she was the stone-cold killer the Agency had trained her to be. Troy scanned the room, saw the security cameras, knew guards were on the way.

  The medic on her right got her first strike to his elbow, breaking it clear in two. He screamed, startling his partner on the left. Troy stepped to the side, distracting the man as Lucy stomp kicked his knee. The medic went down to the ground. It all happened within the span of seconds, but was time enough for the third medic to prepare for the attack. When she turned, he swung; she ducked, he parried off her uppercut to the groin and kicked her knee. Troy stepped closer to Barrett, hoping to snap her neck before the guards walked in.

  Lucy stepped out of range and countered with a roundhouse kick to the medic’s groin, bending him over. She landed a hammering punch to his jaw, scattering his teeth on the tile. He fell to the floor, unconscious.

  When she turned to Troy, he was almost within reach of Barrett, but Lucy’s expression stopped him. There was murder in her eyes, and she was coming for him. Then Lucy collapsed to the floor at his feet. He caught her head before it bounced off the floor. Troy saw Barrett, mere feet away, holding a tranquilizer gun.

  “I have to do everything around here.” She put the gun on the table next to her coffee and hit a button on the intercom. “Janice. I need a cleanup crew and three more medics. We don’t have much time.” She released the intercom button and grimaced at Troy. “Lucy’s metabolism will shrug that dose off like a hangover.”

  Troy cradled Lucy in his arms, and relief hit him like a shot of cocaine. This was an interrogation, not a cancellation. “Are you going to tell me what this is about?”

  “Strap her in.” Barrett indicated a metal chair off to the corner that had straps strong enough to hold an agent twice Lucy’s size. The sight of needles and tiny clear bottles of drugs on a tray was answer enough.

  Lucy wasn’t dead yet, but if Barrett juiced her up, all their secrets would be laid out like a teenager’s diary, and when that happened, he and Lucy were both going to die in this room.

  Chapter Ten

  Lucy woke strapped to a chair, achy. Everything hurt. Straps. Why was she strapped?

  They were tight. She pulled against them, couldn’t move, and then jerked her arms hard, causing th
e chair to screech against the flooring. She flinched at the sound, at the pain that followed. Everything was too much. Too much sound, light—everything burned where it touched her. She was used to being oversensitized. It was part of the deal with being hooked on the drugs, but this was different. It was wrong. Her mind was foggy and she was afraid. Always afraid.

  Where was Troy? If he held her, it would chase this horrible feeling away.

  Lucy looked up, flinched at the overhead lights and broke into a sweat. She felt each rivulet of perspiration as it dripped down her neck, her chest, sopped up by her bra. Barrett’s shoe tap, tap, tapped and sent a spike of pain to her temples.

  “Can she understand me?” Barrett’s voice sounded distorted.

  “The medication is working. Her behavior is consistent with the other agents’ reactions.” Lucy didn’t recognize the man’s voice. She squinted against the light, trying to see his identity. He wore white, a medic, fussing with a tray of needles, gauze and alcohol. The items banged on the stainless-steel tray, scratching and jostling. Medics. Cancellation. She wished they’d get on with it. She hurt and wanted to beg him to finish her off, but her mouth wasn’t working right.

  “That’s not what I asked, and you know it.” Barrett turned from the medic and dragged her steel chair in front of Lucy, who cringed, trying to swallow. She couldn’t swallow.

  “What’s happening to me?” Lucy said. Where was Troy?

  Barrett smiled. “How are you involved in the agents’ deaths?”

  “Raven died.” Lucy’s mouth was so dry. Pins and needles ran down her limbs, distracting her.

  “Yes. Raven died, Lucy. Were you involved?” Barrett was leaning close to her. Lucy leaned away, repelled. Barrett bared her teeth in a facsimile of a smile. “What do you know about Raven’s death?”

  Lucy shook her head and it made her nauseous, so she stopped and tried to focus. Barrett wouldn’t believe her. Barrett didn’t want to believe her.

  Lucy saw him sitting against the wall. “Troy.” He hurt her but was the only one that could make her feel better. He looked like a statue sitting there. “Cold, unfeeling.” How could she want someone who betrayed her time and again, she thought. She still loved him.