“I’m not your insurance for anything and I think we’ve already established what I think of following your rules.” He clasped his hands behind his head and stared at her.
Evelyn stood at the end of the bed, scowling at him. There were dark shadows under her eyes, and in the lighting from the lamps already on when they entered the room it was obvious she was much older than she wanted the world to know.
It wasn’t her physical appearance that mattered to him, though. Evelyn did nothing for him. Her physical beauty was superficial at best and faded quickly when the coldhearted bitch inside her came forward. What grabbed his attention was the way she looked at him. Marc knew when a woman wanted him, and there was absolutely no interest in Evelyn’s eyes at all. Instead, the way she focused on him, forcing her gaze to travel down his body slowly before returning to his face, revealed even more about her. Evelyn would try seducing him if she believed it would be to her advantage. Not that this revelation surprised him. It was the flash of fear in her eyes when she returned her gaze to his that he focused on. Evelyn was afraid of him, terrified in fact.
“Whether you like it or not,” she said, cocking one eyebrow. They were one-on-one now and it was obvious Evelyn planned on ensuring her title as captor and his as the prisoner. “You’re not free to do as you wish. I would prefer you honor my wishes of your own free will, but if you force my hand I’ll make sure you do what I tell you to do regardless of the means necessary.”
“Whether you like it or not, you’ve broken quite a few laws. Take your shower, order food, or go to sleep. Your next move won’t change the fact that I’m going to see you arrested and behind bars.”
Evelyn shook her head, walking away from him and into the bathroom. Marc didn’t move. He suspected she didn’t want to leave him alone and believed he would try doing something, either escaping or calling someone the first chance he had. The shower didn’t turn on. No other sounds came from the bathroom. Marc didn’t move, either. Instead he worked to sharpen his thoughts while replaying everything in his mind he could remember prior to leaving the underground facility.
There had been shots, although he was pretty sure what he heard was Evelyn shooting the men in the other cells. He could only speculate as to why she’d shot them but hauled him along with her. He was not an insurance policy. She’d been frantic to clean out her lab, packing files and deleting files from her hard drive to flash drive. When she’d thought she’d run out of time she’d blown up her computer, which annoyed her to do. Obviously, she would rather destroy whatever work was on her computer than allow anyone else to find it.
She’d repeatedly mentioned that she wouldn’t take the blame for any of this, which seemed to be her motivation for running. Marc had to conclude someone had found the facility. Evelyn told him they’d been compromised. If London somehow figured out where he was, she must have pulled off some kind of impressive show to send Evelyn scooting out the back door. But did that mean she was at the facility when he left with Evelyn? Had she searched and found her parents and Marc’s family?
He prayed that was the case. It would mean that she got past the men who had taken him and Jake out of the hotel room. It would also mean Marc’s sexy dark-haired seductress had some hidden talents he hadn’t initially seen in her. Maybe growing up as the only child of two habitual criminals made her despise anything to do with guns or law enforcement or criminal investigation. Did London know of her skills and simply not want to put them to use? Was she forced to use them, then put on one hell of a show that he’d missed? A show so spectacular it sent Evelyn running?
Evelyn popped out of the bathroom, almost jumping around the corner but then frowning when he was lying in the same position she’d left him. “You can try all you want to make me think you’re not going to try to escape, I won’t believe you.”
He turned his head to look at her. “That would make you a smart woman.”
She seemed surprised he so openly admitted he would try to escape. “Which I am,” she said. “Therefore, you’re not staying out here alone. I want to take a shower. You’re coming in here with me.”
“Do you have luck with many men seducing them like that?” He rolled off the side of the bed, taking his time standing and moving around the bed until he stood in front of her. “Or is that why you’re so obsessed with controlling men?”
“You’re not going to say anything I haven’t heard before.” She stepped to the side and pointed to the bathroom.
Marc walked into the large fancy bathroom, turning when he stood in front of a large sunken bathtub complete with jets to turn it into a Jacuzzi. Evelyn paused in the doorway but entered as well, closing the door behind her.
“I know what you think.” She moved to the counter, staring at him through the mirror as she pulled the ponytail holder out of her hair. “You think I’m crazy, some kind of mad scientist.”
“I’ve never thought of you as a scientist.”
Evelyn was one of those people blessed with a very nondescript appearance. She wasn’t ugly, far from it. In fact, she was thin, with large breasts, clear skin and long blonde hair. That generic description would imply she was hot, sexy, stunning, and she was none of those. His insult hit a nerve, and eyes he wouldn’t have been able to describe once he was away from her suddenly glowed with raw rage.
She turned on him slowly. “Displaying your ignorance only makes you even more of a Neanderthal,” she hissed.
He watched her teeth, remembering her accusation that clenching them would erupt the capsules under his skin. “Actually, I find it interesting that you claim to know what I think when, since I’ve met you, it seems to be your intention to make me not think.”
“If I didn’t want you to think, you would have been running laps until you collapsed,” she pointed out, and ran her fingers through her hair once it was loose, fluffing it out until it hung past her shoulders, looking wild and untamed. Again, it transformed her appearance, and she actually looked better than she had when it was pulled back tightly against her head in a ponytail. “You were an experiment of one, an attempt for me to show in my work that soldiers can perform and meet exceptional standards without being drained of all cognitive thought.”
“And apparently I was an experiment that no one but you wanted done,” he added, putting it together as he spoke to her. “Claude didn’t want you working with any of the men abducted unless they were drugged. Why is that, I wonder?”
“Claude is an idiot.”
“If he’s an idiot, then why did he choose such a successful scientist as yourself?”
She straightened, accepting Marc’s praise with a nod. Her anger drained out of her as quickly as it had spiked. Evelyn walked around him and turned on the tub, bending over to adjust the water while the silence between them grew. The last thing he wanted to do was sit there and watch her bathe. Closing the lid, he sat on the toilet and waited for her answer. Once she was soaking in her bath he would make his move.
“Claude wouldn’t have chosen anyone else to work with him when he decided to enter the game,” she said, satisfied with the water and pulling off her shirt. She faced him in her jeans and bra, putting her hands on her hips and showing off round breasts that filled her lace cups perfectly. “I’m his wife and in most cases that means I can’t testify against him. But it’s not just that. I know how to work with him. Claude doesn’t get along well with many people.”
Marc didn’t find that as surprising as he did the fact that the two of them were married. It explained their banter that he had overheard while in the facility. The way she taunted Claude, suggesting she enjoyed her prisoners possibly more than she actually did. He was jealous of her working with the men and Evelyn fed off that jealousy, believing he cared for her because he insisted she not be too impressed with any of the men in her care.
“Why did you leave him there if he’s your husband?” Marc’s gaze fell to her hands when she unzipped her jeans. Evelyn was possibly twenty years older than London. She
looked forty years older.
“He knows where I am.” She waved her hand in the air, dismissing Marc’s question. “He’ll come crawling to me when he realizes I was right. I told him from the beginning he wouldn’t be able to set up his players by himself. When he insisted on choosing all the wrong kinds of people for his pawns, I knew I would have to step in and help. And it was the perfect opportunity to show how well my new drug worked.”
There were so many questions. He needed to stay on topic, though, going with the flow of their conversation, to keep her talking. Since Marc and his family were the pawns chosen to play his game, Marc was curious if Claude had wanted them on board, or Evelyn. “Why didn’t you like the idea that Claude chose my family?”
“Because Neanderthals don’t train well.” She slipped out of her bra and her jeans. “I lined you up with the dummies we’d chosen, intending to prove to him that you wouldn’t conform simply because you were told the men around you were conforming.”
“Who were those men you killed?”
Evelyn pushed her underwear down her legs and stepped out of it while laughing. “I didn’t kill them. They are all still alive. I injected them with a neutralizing drug so if anyone found them they wouldn’t be able to detect my drug in them. I’m not ready to announce it to the world yet. But I will be soon, very soon.”
Marc would have to find out more about this drug she was so proud of, but there were other questions he needed answered first. He ignored her as she pranced around him naked, moving to the counter and gathering her shampoo and conditioner. Marc rested his head on his hand and stared at the water filling the tub.
“What do you mean by ‘dummies’? You knew before I showed up I wouldn’t follow orders just because the men already there were? They were high on your drug, though, and I wasn’t.”
“‘High’ hardly describes what this drug does to you. ‘High’ implies you’re enjoying the sensations stimulated around you. My drug renders you blank, steals your free will. Claude wanted to take some of the most stubborn, bullheaded men who were known for upholding our laws by breaking them and turn them into his pawns. I do love my husband, whether you believe it or not.” Her words might have been more convincing if she weren’t standing in front of Marc naked. “But he’s not man enough to control pawns of that magnitude. I needed to show him if he wanted in on the game he would need pawns he could control, and not ones who would inevitably destroy him.”
“You set him up to fail so he would choose pawns that were more submissive from the beginning?” Marc searched her face and knew he was right. Now that he understood her motivation, he needed to learn more about this game and, most important, who the other players in the game were. Others would be abducted to play this war game. Marc needed names and locations. But, at the least, names.
“Claude believed the other men were also bounty hunters. I brought them in. All I had to do was find large, muscular men who were full of themselves and he believed me. Claude lured you and your family in. It was my idea to send the little slut in Colorado pictures of her parents once I knew you were sniffing around her. My theory was correct that you would insist on protecting her. She was the perfect distraction, for both you and her parents, which made it easier to capture both of you.”
“Her parents were sent pictures, too?” Snapping at Evelyn for calling London a slut would distract her from the conversation. He was pretty sure she’d insulted London to test him anyway, and he was done being Evelyn’s personal guinea pig for whatever hypothesis she wanted to explore at that moment.
“Jonnie Brooke knows his line of work well. When I sent the Brookes pictures of their daughter with a famous bounty hunter sniffing around her, they immediately grew suspicious. They panicked, thinking you were going through her to find them.” Evelyn smiled. “Which I might have suggested you were doing.”
“What about the private investigator who came to the lodge questioning London about her parents?”
Evelyn frowned. “I don’t know anything about a private investigator.” She snorted. “More than likely he was legitimate. The Brookes are crooks, scam artists, and I’m sure on quite a few hit lists.”
Marc wasn’t a strong advocate of coincidence. He made a mental note to learn more about the PI who’d been sniffing around London. “So why abduct bounty hunters and thieves? What kind of game is this?”
“Enough questions for now, Neanderthal. We’ll continue with your education after my bath.” She placed her shampoo and conditioner on the edge of the tub. “Get undressed.”
Marc raised one eyebrow. “Why would I get undressed?”
She gestured at the bathwater. “I thought you could scrub my back. After all, I’m the one who drove all night, not you.”
Marc looked at the items she’d scattered across the counter. Picking up one of those round, rough balls he remembered seeing in London’s shower, he tossed it and caught it in his hand. “I tell you what. I’m not getting in the water with you and I think you know you can’t force me. I’ll kneel next to the tub and scrub your back.” He looked at the other items on the counter, focusing on tweezers and spotting fingernail clippers. Far from surgical equipment, but his options were limited. He returned his attention to Evelyn, pulling off his shirt. “Climb in,” he encouraged.
“Now you know I’m not going to relax in a hot bath so you can leave.” She seemed to forgot she was naked. Wagging her finger in the air, she made a tsking sound. “Don’t ever treat me as if I were stupid.”
“I’m not getting in the tub. Better start grinding your teeth. Don’t lose a filling over it,” he mumbled, turning his back to her and picking up the fingernail clippers.
Marc moved fast, not only because he knew it would hurt like hell but also because he might not hit his mark if she jumped on him.
“What are you doing?” she shrieked when he raised his arm over his head, faced the mirror, and brought the clippers to the soft flesh under his arm.
Marc ignored her, pressing the clippers into the foreign objects just under his skin and grabbing them between the metal. He clenched his own teeth when he squeezed, feeling the pain ransack his body as he closed his eyes and focused on yanking the small cylindrical objects out of his body.
“God! Stop it!” She did jump at him, grabbing his arm that held the clippers and hanging on when she couldn’t make him lower his arm.
He braced himself, using her attack to distract the pain and instead focused on remaining still when she lunged at him.
“You’re nuts. God, you idiot. You’re bleeding everywhere.”
“You’re not helping matters.” Marc threw her off him. It was more instinct when he was unable to prevent his body from reacting to the pain consuming his body.
He didn’t pay attention when Evelyn fell backward. There was blood everywhere, making it damn hard to make sure he had the small objects out of his arm. Holding his arm high, he forced himself to keep the small silver fingernail clippers in his arm until he thought he had both small, cylindrical bloody tubes. Marc dropped the clippers, which were drenched with blood, into a small glass cup next to the sink and grabbed one of the towels folded on a rack on the wall. It wasn’t until then that he noticed he’d hurled Evelyn into the tub.
The way she was splashing around, fighting to get out and cussing him out at the same time, was enough proof she wasn’t hurt.
“I’m not going to be your insurance policy,” he growled, wrapping the towel around his arm and enduring the pain as he struggled to put his shirt back on. “In fact, it would help me if you stayed in there. Enjoy your bath, Blondie.”
She probably had more clothes somewhere, but it bought him a couple minutes when he grabbed her clothes with his uninjured arm and threw them in the tub with her.
“Marc, you don’t understand,” she wailed. “You can’t leave me. This isn’t about you, or me. You don’t understand.”
She was destroying the bathroom, splashing water everywhere. She began cussing him out wors
e than before when he tossed the towels in with her as well. It would probably be the last time she ever asked for a room with a sunken tub. Marc grabbed her arm, feeling the pain streak through him and ransack his body. He swore getting shot didn’t hurt this bad.
“I don’t think you understand,” he said, trying to stay patient when he wanted to knock her out and insure her silence. “I’m c not c staying c with c you,” he said, stressing each word slowly as he forced her down into the water.
“You’re not leaving, damn it!” She dug her nails into his arm, inflicting even more pain.
Marc was raised not to hurt a lady, no matter how evil or demented she might be. His upbringing on treating women with respect didn’t leave him even now. But he did manage to shake her free of him, which caused her to lose her balance and fall into the water again. Her rear end hit the bottom of the tub and her arms flew up in the air while her pretty-much-soaked hair slapped against her face. Water flew out of the tub as if someone had tossed a small bomb into the tub.
He ignored her and grabbed the small drinking glass with the fingernail clippers and the capsules in it, soaking in a small pool of his blood. Taking the plastic that had been wrapped over the top of the glass, he secured the contents, left the bathroom, then pulled the hotel room door closed behind him. Marc was grateful the nice hotel had thick walls. The moment he took off down the hallway he no longer heard Blondie yelling. Marc took the stairs instead of the elevator, pausing in the stairwell and yanking the drenched hand towel out from under his shirt. It was completely soaked with blood. He would be ruining someone’s night when they found the towel, but he wasn’t about to take it with him.
It was time to endure the pain and pray he wouldn’t bleed up a storm before he reached the lobby. He smiled at the lady who’d just checked him and Evelyn into their room when he reached the front desk.
Get Lucky Page 30
