by Elise Faber
“Blind corner,” I agreed. “Olive is already getting another camera in place.”
“Good.”
“Yeah.”
He didn’t move and neither did I. Dan, for his part, seemed riveted to the screen, but I was frozen in place by temptation.
If I moved, I might touch.
If I touched . . .
He straightened, and not a moment too soon. My fingers had clenched on my lap, resisting the urge to stroke that warm skin, but remaining there only by pure dint. Because that kiss. Because his smell. Because his body and the way he’d stroked my hair and how he’d held me so carefully.
And whiskey on his breath and on my tongue, mixing with peaches and rum.
Summer heat and sea breeze.
Gentle eyes in a gym.
Muddy hair and light bone.
Tempting. The man was far too tempting for a woman who didn’t have any hope in hell of giving him what he deserved.
I turned my head and found my lips a mere inch from his, blazing blue eyes staring into mine, pinning me in place.
Just one inch, and I could taste him again.
Just one inch, and—
“I’ll be right back,” he said, stepping back.
“Dan—”
He stopped, straightening, that glorious chest on display. “Yeah?” he asked, a husky question that sent fire through my veins.
I opened my mouth but found the words were stoppered up in my throat.
“I—um . . .”
I wanted him. Just as I wanted so badly to pretend my past didn’t exist, to have a moment with him, to maybe have more than just moments.
But that couldn’t be.
We couldn’t be.
“I moved your bag,” I whispered, heart heavy even as I shored up the walls. Hoping and wanting didn’t make one bit of difference. The only thing that mattered was reality. “It’s by your bed.”
He held my gaze for a heartbeat, lips parting, but then I looked away, pretending to turn back to the cameras, but in reality, watching him in the mirror as he scooped up his duffle bag and headed back into the bathroom.
“I’ll be out in a minute.”
I nodded but couldn’t form words.
Not when every nerve in my body was telling me to trail after him into the bathroom, to dislodge that towel, perched so precariously around his hips. My words were bottlenecked by the need coursing through me, nearly propelling me to my feet and into that steam-filled room.
It would be so easy.
It would be so good.
That kiss had been the ultimate tease, bringing me back to two years ago. How good it had felt to give in to the fiery attraction, the sparking desire, the connection between us. I’d forgotten about my uncle, the elevator, the public place, and been right back in the humid summer days, eating peaches until my stomach hurt.
For a moment, I’d even forgotten about covering my back, about covering Dan’s. I’d forgotten everything.
Because it felt so fucking good.
But . . . my feelings didn’t matter.
The door clicked closed, and I stood, walking over to the windows. The curtains were drawn, but I knew if I shifted just slightly to the side, I could see a sliver of the sea, a glimmer of the beach below, and the sun sitting just below the horizon in the distance.
Maybe I should have felt trapped, the dim light of the room suffocating me, only the narrow slice of the outside world in front of me.
But I didn’t feel contained.
This life I lived might, in many ways, be smaller than what most people hoped for, but it was more than I had ever dreamed up when locked in that cell.
I was strong and could protect myself. I’d spent the last years helping other people, undoing some of the bad in the world. I knew I could never hope to make up for what my family had done and what it currently still did, knew I couldn’t begin to right every wrong.
But I had made some small difference.
Right now that was enough.
As was the truth I knew in the very marrow of my bones—I would never be back in that cell again.
Feeling slightly more centered, I turned away from the window.
Or started to, anyway.
Because just as I began to step back from the glass, I saw movement.
Coming in from the water.
And in the distance?
Boats.
A whole line of boats.
Eleven
Southern Italy
20:12hrs local time
Dan
The knock on the bathroom door sent my blood pumping, and for one instant, I thought that Ava had acted on the heat I’d seen in her eyes.
The same heat I was feeling.
Desire drawn tight after the kiss.
Since that day in the gym, I’d promised myself I wouldn’t push her again, that I’d be patient until she made the next move. I’d soak up every nugget of information, file away every detail.
But I’d be patient and wait.
I just . . . hadn’t known it would be so difficult.
She was so fucking strong and locked down, and yet I could feel her pain beneath those walls. And God, I just wanted to make it go away.
That was just wasn’t reality.
I couldn’t wish away pain and bad memories. I couldn’t give her a decent family and an easy childhood. I—
The knock came again, sharper this time.
“Boots on,” Ava said. “Two minutes ago.”
Yanking myself out of my head, I didn’t waste time by asking questions. I just yanked on my shirt, old habits making it so that I’d already put on my jeans, socks, and boots. I’d take a bare chest over bare feet any day of the week.
Turning the handle, I yanked open the door and stepped out into the hall. Ava thrust a bulletproof vest and jacket at my chest. “The beach.”
I nodded, got busy strapping everything on, then reached for my gun. “Tell me.”
Ava was checking Luna in rapid, efficient movements before breaking her down and putting her into a large beach tote. Inconvenient, yeah, but it wasn’t like we could start running through the hotel with weapons.
“Boats about a hundred meters out. Olive and Ryker have already moved into position. They spotted Sergio and Romeo moving toward the dock behind the hotel.” She lifted the bag onto her shoulder, busied herself strapping a blade to her thigh over her jeans, shoved her feet into her boots. “Laila is watching their backs at the bar while organizing the other teams.”
I quickly checked my weapons, slid them into the various holsters. Guns on my chest, knives in my boots. “Where does she want us?”
“Rendezvous point six.”
So, on the far side of the beach, behind the dock. “Got it.” I shrugged into my jacket, headed for the door, and checked the peephole.
Clear.
I flicked open the bolt, tugged open the heavy wooden panel, holding it wide and glancing back at Ava. “So, you and Luna ready for a midnight stroll?”
I’d checked the peephole.
But the peephole didn’t show everything.
And by the time I processed that there was panic on Ava’s eyes, by the time I’d recognized her reaching for her weapon, it was too late.
I spun, deflected one blow, dodged another.
Click.
“Put the gun down, Evelina.”
I glanced over at Ava, saw the indecision on her face.
“Take the shot,” I mouthed.
I knew she wouldn’t miss. It was a fact of life, just as I knew the Earth revolved around the sun, that gravity pulled objects down, that I would give her my heart, if she only asked.
The barrel of a gun pressed against my temple. Hard.
“I can’t,” she mouthed, still holding her gun, but her eyes were flicking back and forth.
Fuck.
I knew then it wasn’t that she didn’t want to take the shot, but rather it was that she didn’t have the shot.
I dro
pped my weight, got out of the first hold using one of the tricks I’d learned from her, spinning and kicking out, thrusting up with my elbow to knock the man who held me unconscious. Then I lurched back, intending to make it to the door, wanting it between me and Ava and the bad guys. We’d be trapped, but we would have more weapons and time to call in backup.
But there wasn’t space to be had, wasn’t space to move and maneuver.
Not when the hallway was crowded with fuckers speaking Italian and our backup wasn’t in the room next door. Not when we were alone, and I couldn’t make my way to Ava.
I saw movement out of the corner of my eye and ducked.
Not fast enough.
Something hard collided with my temple, exploded into red-hot pain.
And the last thing I heard before blackness swarmed up and pulled me under was Ava crying out my name.
Unknown hrs local time
I didn’t know how many hours had passed by the time I woke up.
But I emerged from unconsciousness, carefully slitting my eyes open and finding myself in pitch-black darkness with a foggy brain and a throbbing skull.
Carefully, I flexed my fingers, slowly getting the feeling back, then worked on my toes.
“You okay?” Ava whispered.
I froze, mid-toe flex. “I’m fine. You?”
“Dan,” she warned, her voice shaking slightly. “Where are you injured?”
The shake did me in, made my heart squeeze tight, made me immediately want to repeat I was fine. But empty sentiments wouldn’t reassure her, so I forced himself to focus, to take a breath, to cautiously move my arms and legs then sit up. “Nowhere,” I said. “Besides a splitting headache, I’m good.”
“Don’t shit me.”
“Where are you?” I asked.
“About five feet to your left,” she said. “Careful, the ceiling is low.”
Reaching overhead, I felt the roof of wherever the fuck we were, and found it was indeed low, and covered with or hewn out of rough stone. I made my way over to her slowly, feeling for any openings or weak points.
There were none.
And before I knew it, I’d gotten to Ava.
I found her by bumping into her, and her hiss of pain sliced through me. “Ava, I’m not the one injured. Where are you hurt?”
“Knife wound in my abdomen. Didn’t hit anything major, just I’ve lost a bit of blood.” Her voice was quiet. Serious. “Patched it with the kit,” she said, referring to the emergency supplies we all had stored in the tongue of our boots. “And the bleeding is under control. I took a bullet to my arm, only a glancing shot, so nothing to worry about there.”
“But?” I asked, hearing the unspoken word.
“But,” she said, “my ankle is broken.”
Fuck. “How?”
“I went down wrong, caught my boot on the carpet.”
I found her fingers in the dark. “How bad is the break?”
“Not good.”
Shit.
“We’ll figure it out.” A squeeze. “Any idea where we are?”
“My uncle’s special cell.”
My heart seized. Her tone was dry and falsely calm because I could sense the note of terror beneath the surface. “Ava.”
“Fate’s laughing at me,” she muttered. “I promised myself less than twenty-four hours ago that I would never be back here.” She groaned. “And I’m only telling you this because if I freeze up, I might need you to kick my ass.”
My lungs seized, but my tone was deliberately even. “Why would you freeze up?”
“Because this was where they would put me when I refused to do what they wanted, where I would sit in the dark and try my best to count the hours and sometimes the days before I heard another person’s voice.” She sighed. “I shouldn’t be telling you any of this,” she said. “It’s the past, shouldn’t have any bearing on the now.”
“Except it does.” She sucked in a breath. “So, what did they want you to do?”
Silence.
A long, quiet silence. “I can’t talk about it. Not now. Maybe not ever.”
“It’s okay,” I said, touching the back of her hand. “You don’t have to talk about anything you don’t want to.”
She shifted slightly, and I wished I could see her face, but it was dark, too dark to make out anything more than the barest outline of her body.
“I wasn’t like them,” she whispered.
“I know.”
“How?” she asked. “How could you possibly know?”
“Because I’ve spent these last years on this team with you, Ava. I know how well you shoot and that your rifle’s name is Luna. I know you prefer the aisle seat on a plane. I know you don’t have a sweet tooth, but you’ll never turn down a bag of Fritos.” I squeezed her fingers. “I’ve seen how you are with the kids we come across. They always turn to you. Because you’re good inside.”
She laughed, and it was a broken sound. “I’m not good inside. I’m broken and ruined and I’ve done things . . .” She cut herself off. “I’ve hurt people and killed. I’m not good.”
“We’ve all killed,” I said. “We’ve all done bad things.”
“Dan.” She sighed. “I’ve done more than bad things. I—”
“You fought them.” I sucked in a breath and risked touching her cheek. “You wouldn’t have ended up in this cell if you hadn’t fought them.”
A beat. “That doesn’t make the rest of it okay.”
“No,” I said, filing that information away to process later, knowing that I wouldn’t change her mind in this moment, and understanding that sometimes it didn’t matter what anyone said.
The guilt never went away.
“How did you recognize where we are?”
“I was awake when they brought us down.”
“Any idea of an exit route?”
“I have it mapped in my head.”
“Good.” I shifted so that I was lying next to her, wanting to keep her calm. Her voice was frosty, but it wasn’t her usual chill. Rather it was an alpine river, just frozen over for the winter, its tumultuous current still flowing rapidly, right beneath the surface. Steady on top, panic below. “And this cell?”
A beat and I actually felt the tension leave her body when I gave her the out to stop focusing on the past and to think about the mission—or at least, to pool our resources on sorting out how to get the fuck out of this cell.
“At the dead end of a corridor. Heavy metal door. Hinges on the outside. No other exit.”
“Well,” I said on a sigh. “I’ve certainly had better accommodations.”
She snorted.
“Where exactly is this special cell located?”
“Two clicks south of the hotel. Just above sea level at my father’s mansion.” She sighed. “But I’m not sure if the trackers”—all active agents had recently been implanted with GPS locating chips that could be activated by headquarters if shit got real—“will work beneath all this stone.”
“So, we can either sit tight and see if they do work. Or—”
“Or we can do our best to get the fuck out of this shithole.”
“I vote for option two,” I said.
“Me, too.” She pushed her elbows beneath her, and I helped her to gingerly sit up. “Okay.” A short, pained sigh. “Here’s what I know. The door is a metal plate, three feet in front of me. The exterior wall is made of stacked stone. There’s a loose piece back behind where you were lying. If you tug it out, we’ll be able to get a line of sight, and we might be able to put one of the trackers outside to ensure a signal.”
That seemed like a reasonable place to start.
“Have you bound your ankle?”
“It’s still in the boot.” A beat. “I think it’s better if it stays in for the time being.”
I didn’t like the sound of that, didn’t like what that meant for her mobility, nor for how bad the actual injury was. “Where’s the rock?”
“Lower left side of the far
wall, about six inches from the floor. There’s a piece that sticks out a bit. You should be able to get your fingers behind it.”
I nodded. “Got it.”
“Watch your head.”
“Brit always says it’s extra hard,” I said, trying for light. “I’d be more likely to damage the rocks than my skull.”
Ava snorted. “You do put the stub in stubborn.”
I groaned. “That was a Ryker level joke.”
She got quiet then said softly. “They’re okay.”
Except it was more question than statement and . . . it was something I hoped as well. Because if the Toscalos had found our room, they most likely had eyes on KTS and knew where all the agents were. And seriously, what a goddamned mindfuck—thinking we were the ones who had all the eyes, going in overconfident and thinking we were in control.
Then in the end, we’d been the ones ambushed.
Fuck.
“They had backup from the other KTS teams,” I said, as much to convince myself as her. “I think they’ll be in a better position than we are.”
“You’re right.”
“Always.”
She laughed lightly. “Nice try. Okay. Get your ass to that wall.”
“Try not to stare at me as I move,” I said, feeling in front of me as I crawled my way to the wall. “I know my ass is my best asset.”
“That is the worst joke I’ve ever heard.”
“Even worse than Ryker’s?”
“Fuck yes.”
But my bad jokes and the lighthearted banter were distracting her, were subduing that buried panic in her tone, perking up her voice so she didn’t seem so distraught and unlike herself.
The dry, calm Ava was back.
“How about you get your ass in gear?” she told me.
“Laila would be gagging about that one,” I said, finding the little divot and trying to get my fat ass fingers behind it.
“She likes his bad jokes,” Ava said. “Otherwise he wouldn’t have married her.”
“I suppose,” I said.
“Did you find it?”
“Yeah,” I said, tugging at the rock. “It’s tight.”
A beat.
Then, “That’s what she said.”
Freezing, not processing the statement at first, I nearly cracked my head on the low ceiling. Then I began to laugh. “Really?” I asked.
