by Lora Leigh
“Fuck him,” Jordan muttered as the elevator slid to a halt.
“This way.” Lilly, moved quickly along the thickly carpeted hall to the open double doors of the suite just above the elevator hallway entrance.
She closed the door as he stepped quickly inside the room and headed to the bedroom at the far end of the suite.
“A physician has been contacted,” Lilly informed him. “He’ll be here within the hour and slipped in as well.”
Jordan stepped into the bedroom and headed for the large bed across the room
Cloud soft, gleaming white, the comforter had been stripped back to reveal a protective covering that had been placed to keep the blood from the silk sheets below.
Laying Tehya on the bed carefully, Jordan drew the serviceable sheet at the side over her.
“She’s sedated,” he told Lilly as she stood at the end of the bed, her dark, moss-green gaze concerned as she watched Jordan lay Tehya down carefully. “It’s only a flesh wound, but…” He wiped his hand over his face. How the hell was he supposed to tell her that he just couldn’t bear to see the pain in Tehya’s eyes any longer?
He was a hardened soldier, but Tehya just did thing to his heart.
“But she breaks your heart when you have to look in her eyes and see the shattered dreams,” Lilly stated softy, her aristocratic face drawn into an expression of concern and sympathy. “I completely understand why you would sedate her Jordan. It’s likely the only way she would have slept.
“Is everyone aware of what she does to me?” he smiled with an edge of self mockery. “And here I thought I was hiding it.”
Lilly’s smile was gentle, soft. “Everyone but Tehya, I would guess,” she said. “And I believe she has a problem seeing beyond her perceived beliefs of why she isn’t good enough for you to see the truth of what you do feel. Besides, being Sorrel’s daughter is a tremendous burden to her. She’s terrified it will become a burden for you as well.”
Jordan shot her a sharp look.
“She knows being Sorrel’s daughter isn’t something I give a damn about.” He shook his head faintly. “There has to be another reason why she was so determined run.”
Lilly gave a bitter snort of laughter. “No, Jordan, trust me, once you accept that you came from pure evil, getting past it is never easy. If I hadn’t had Travis to keep me centered when I learned that lesson, I might not have survived.”
Lilly had been forced to face the fact that her own mother had considered her flawed, broken. And that she had carefully planned her own daughter’s murder.
“Contact Travis and John, make certain everything is going as planned,” he ordered her as he looked around the room, searching for anything that would indicate a problem. “And tell him I want the Intel Reece provided, ASAP.”
Lilly had begun to give a quick nod when Bailey stepped into the room.
“John and Travis are here,” she told Jordan. “The doctor’s ETA is twenty minutes. He’s being met by Nik, Micah, and Noah. They’ll escort him through the rear entrance and up here.”
Jordan glanced down at Tehya, hating like hell to leave her alone.
“Go, I’ll sit with her,” Lilly told him as she moved to the comfortable recliner next to the bed, and smiled back at him. “I promise, she’ll be fine with me.”
He knew she would be, and it wasn’t as though Tehya’s problem was life-threatening. Still, pulling away from her and stalking into the main portion of the suite was nearly impossible.
When she awoke, she would be groggy and pissed the hell off. And strangely enough, he wanted to ensure he was the one with her. The only one to watch out for her until she was feeling herself again.
As he stepped into the combined living and dining room, John and Travis turned from their discussion, their gazes flickering in concern to the open bedroom door.
“She’s still asleep,” he answered the unspoken question in their eyes. “Fuck, I knew it would happen, I just didn’t expect it so soon.” Travis raked his fingers through his dark blond hair in frustration. Jordan almost wished he could just tone down whatever he was feeling to that level as well.
“Always plan for the worst,” Jordan sighed. “Though to be honest, I didn’t expect it to happen this quickly myself.”
“The backup team we were lucky enough to have in place in Hagerstown did manage to get a few prints,” John injected. “As soon as we have a hit on those from our contact at the FBI, maybe we’ll have a better idea who or what we’re looking for.”
“Remnants of Sorrel’s organization,” Jordan informed them. “I’m almost certain of it. I just can’t figure out why, after all these years. What kind of threat does she represent that has someone going to the trouble, not to mention the expense, of launching such a search and attempted capture of her?”
As Jordan spoke, Travis shot John a hard look.
John grimaced at the obvious message in the other man’s gaze.
“I know you wanted Killian excluded from this,” he said as he reached to the table for the heavy file. “A courier dropped this off about half an hour before your arrival. Evidently there has been some movement over the past few years to reorganize and revive Sorrel’s operation.”
“By who? And why do they need Tehya to do this?” Son of a bitch.
Tehya was right. Somehow Sorrel was reaching out from the grave to haunt her.
“According to the information Killian has managed to pull together, whoever’s behind it believes Tehya is a key to the funding the operation.” John moved to the table and pulled out the chair in the front of the file.
Casting a quick glance to the bedroom door, Jordan followed.
“Here’s the will Tehya’s grandfather, Bernard Taite, left before his death.” A stack of legal papers was pulled from the file. “According to this, if Francis Taite, or one of her children, were ever found, then their inheritance would be incredible. The Taite main estate, which is currently occupied by his brother, Stephen Taite, and his family, would be immediately turned over to the heir. That includes two large estate homes, four guest cottages, various cars, limos, servants, jewels, you get the picture.” John waved his hand to the will.
“The Taites are one of the richest families in France,” Travis picked up. “They’re related to both the French and English crowns, with Stephen Taite holding the position of not just the third cousin to the king but also included on his board of advisors.”
“How much would Taite industries pay to have their heir back?” John asked. “Better yet, how much would any or all of them pay to see her disappear forever?”
“How much would she be worth if she could be brainwashed to obey the whims of her captors instead, if they had managed to capture her that night?”
The sun was rising beyond the narrow slit of the heavy curtains across from the table.
Travis sat back and stared at the will for long moments.
“As the legal heir to the Benard Taites fortune, the amount would be more than I want to sit and figure up for them.”
Neither did Jordan, but the amount would be enough to make any man risk the attempt.
“Any word in there concerning who contacted Arthur and Tenneyson concerning the true details of Tehya’s death?”
John picked up the papers in the file and rifled through them for a moment before pulling the printed report free.
Jordan accepted the page, his gaze moving to read the detailed report, as a frown pulled at his brow.
“Origination, Hagerstown, Maryland,” he murmured, then looked at each man. “Did you track the number?”
“The number went back to here.” Travis pulled the report free.
The number had originated from Room 714 of one of the better hotels in town.
“At the same time, Tehya was registered there while she was having interior work done on the house.”
“The caller didn’t reveal her location, though why he bothered to keep it quiet made no sense,” John grunted. “Because the
y revealed her name.”
“Be too helpful and you can sabotage yourself,” Jordan pointed out. “The caller gave just enough information to ensure the story was checked.” He tapped his finger against the file. “How did Killian acquire the information?”
“He sent a four-man team to Afghanistan after you discussed returning Tehya to base. He asked that you contact him concerning that, by the way,” Travis stated mockingly.
Jordan gave a quiet snarl of disgust.
“Yeah, that’s what we thought, too,” John approved. “But he had a team still working this. They’re currently in France attempting to put together a list of known associates for Ira Arthurs and Mark Tenneyson. Maybe we’ll get lucky.”
Jordan shook his head before leaning back in the chair and glaring at the curtains covering the windows across from him.
Some habits were impossible to break. He still kept the blinds pulled securely in his apartment in Texas. He had noticed, though, that Tehya kept the curtains over the kitchen sink open. She had been attempting to break the habit.
“You won’t find the person behind this on any list,” he finally told the other two men. “If Arthurs, Tenneyson, or anyone else sent after her knew who they were working for, then their name would have already shown up.”
John’s muttered curse just about summed it up.
“Travis, pull together our contacts in France,” Jordan ordered. “What I want to know is, who among the elite moneyed set had ties to Sorrel that weren’t found until after his death. Anyone related to him who would have the means to pull this off, or anyone among his social set who could reorganize the business or revive it. I’m betting we’d find the name on that list.”
As he moved to close the file, he caught a shadow of movement from the bedroom doorway.
Turning his head, he caught the sign from Bailey that Tehya was waking up.
“This is connected to the Taites, their money and influence,” he finished as he rose to his feet. “Arthurs and Tenneyson are watching the Taites, and it’s obvious they’re watching for Tehya. Let’s see what happens when we give them something.”
He didn’t wait for their opinion. Moving across the room, he headed for the bedroom and the woman too many damned men seemed way too interested in.
“She’s waking up.” Lilly nodded to Tehya with a soft smile, as Jordan entered the bedroom. “Doc will be here in a few. See if you can get her to cooperate. We all know how much she loves the medical profession.”
“Which means not at all,” he grunted, his gaze moving to the bed and the woman in it.
Lilly’s brows lifted, waggled, and a knowing grin crossed her face as Tehya’s lashes flickered open. The door closed softly as Lilly and Bailey returned to the front room.
Staring down at her, Jordan held back his grin as that first drowsy irritation crossed her face before her gaze adjusted, knowledge filtered through, and irritation turned to a spark of anger. As she caught sight of him.
“You drugged me,” she breathed out heavily. “Asshole.”
“We have a doc heading in to check the wound,” he told her. “You were in pain, Tehya.”
She gave a weak little snort. “This ain’t my first rodeo, cowboy.”
No, it wasn’t. She’d been wounded before.
She amazed him sometimes. One minute she was in tears over the invasion of her home, and in the next second so blasé about a fucking gunshot wound that the thought of the past she had lived had sweat popping out on his brow.
“It may not be your first rodeo, but you were too weak and you’d lost too much blood for my comfort level,” he informed her. “You needed to rest until we could safely stop, check the wound, then call a doctor in to look at it. You may need stitches.”
The weak little glare she shot him was almost amusing. It would have been, except for the anger he glimpsed in her eyes. That look assured him there might be hell to pay once she managed to regain her strength and lost the grogginess.
To a point, sometimes, he could maneuver her, but there was no controlling her. Especially when she was pissed. And Tehya was edging very damned close to pissed where he was concerned.
“And if we had been attacked while on the road? What then?” She struggled to sit up in the bed, her expression irate before she winced at the pain to her arm
“Let me help you.” He reached for her, only to have her slap his hand away with a glare. “Dammit, Tehya, you’re going to cause yourself to start bleeding again then you’ll really need stitches if you pull the adhesive I used loose.”
Tehya slowly pushed herself from the bed, the grogginess in her head making her teeth clench.
She really didn’t like being drugged. And she had no problem letting anyone know when there was something she didn’t like.
She’d learned quick enough that Jordan and his men did not care if she suffered her anger in silence.
She ignored him, pushing herself up with her good arm until she was sitting on the side of the bed and glaring at him. “Answer me,” she bit out, her voice strengthening marginally. “What would have happened if we had been attacked on the road and I was unconscious? I would have been dead weight, Jordan.”
“Good thing you don’t weigh much,” he quipped, then watched as she dropped her head, shaking it slowly. She wasn’t even considering the other side of the coin. She would have been vulnerable to enemies with an unknown agenda. All she was considering was whether or not she would have slowed him or the team down.
“I had everything covered, Tehya,” he promised when she said nothing more. “It was an hour-and-a-half trip and you were hurting like hell. You’ve lost sleep, and you’re riding on nerves. I wasn’t going to let you suffer like that when I knew the pain medication would help. Besides, there was an antibiotic with it. You have a head start on fighting back an infection.”
Tehya lifted her head and stared back at him, outraged. She couldn’t believe he had drugged her. How dare he have taken such a decision out of her hands?
“I fucking hate drugs,” she snapped, realizing her voice was still too weak to really hold any force. “And I was fine. It hurt. I was pissed off that my home was invaded, but if you had trusted me you wouldn’t have drugged me. What did you have to do, Jordan, that you didn’t want me to see or hear?”
Jordan always had plans. He was especially good at those contingency plans that no one was aware of but him. Had that had something to do with the reason he had drugged her? Was there a part of what was going on that he didn’t want her to know?
She watched as his gaze narrowed, his expression tightening with a hint of anger and disbelief that she had asked the question. “I’ve always trusted you, Tehya.”
“Whatever,” she snorted back at him as though it didn’t matter, and she didn’t believe him in the least.
But she wanted to believe him. God, she needed to believe him right now, because she felt as though her entire world were being jerked out from under her. “Where’s the shower? I stink of blood. God, I hate that smell.”
She needed to clear her head and clean the feeling of betrayal from her senses. Even more, she wanted to escape the memories that the scent of blood triggered.
Her mother’s blood, fresh, oozing from a knife wound that was too deep and refused to clot. “I’m okay.” The sickening iron stench invading her nostrils as she tried to help her mother apply a tourniquet. “It’s okay, sweetie. See, Momma is fine.” Her mother, so weak and still trying so hard to smile despite her pain.
It was too much. She didn’t want to remember, she didn’t want to feel what she had felt each time her mother had nearly been caught.
“Let me help you up.” Jordan didn’t take no for an answer. Before she could evade him, he moved to her and all but lifted her from the bed.
She pushed away from him as soon as she was standing steady on her feet, the irritation combining with the drugged, out of sorts feeling. If she had the strength, she’d kick his ass. She wished she just had the st
rength to kick him.
Well, she’d try to kick his ass. She might consider it anyway. Threaten him. She wouldn’t get far.
“Drug me again, Jordan, and I’m out of this little game. I’ll show you and my would-be captors exactly what I’ve learned during my time in hiding and disappear for good.”
She hoped he believed her. She prayed he did. Because if he ever did anything so asinine again, she might very well end up trying to kill him herself.
“Tehya.” His hold became firmer on her arm as the expression on his face hardened to pure make dominance. “Don’t threaten me. And don’t run. I promise, if you run on me I’ll make damned sure you understand the error of your ways within twenty-four hours flat. Are we understood here?”
She stared back at him furiously.
“I’ll tie you to a bed and fuck you until you can’t consider running ever again, sweetheart. I’ll make sure you’re so tired, the memory of pleasure so deep, the ache for more so ingrained inside you that even the thought of running will be erased from your mind.”
Her brow arched. “If I had known that, Jordan, I would have run years ago,” she told him, her voice lowering as she allowed her gaze to rake over him suggestively.
He wasn’t the only one that knew how to use the hunger burning between them
He was aroused. His cock was pressed hard and tight behind the zipper of his jeans. And she remembered clearly, very clearly, exactly what it was like to have him buried inside her. To have his cock stretching her until she was certain she could take no more, thrusting inside her, throbbing erotically against nerve endings that felt fully exposed.
As her gaze returned to his, she watched the blue darken, glitter with hunger and dominance. And just that fast her pussy was aching and wet, and all too ready for him. God, what was she going to do when he was gone. How would she survive losing him a second time when even the dream of a home wasn’t there to fall back on.
Slowly, he drew back, rather than following through with the threat. Disappointment clenched her chest and had her drawing in a ragged breath.