Take the Key and Lock Her Up

by LENA DIAZ,

  He pushed her back down.

  No! She fought to get away, but his hold was impossible to break. She collapsed back into the suitcase, exhausted from her struggles, her breaths wheezing against the gag.

  His jaw tightened. “I know you must hate me. I’d hate me if I were in your position.” He leaned down, as if to make sure he had her absolute attention. “I am everything you believed me to be when you interviewed me at the station and worse. Which means if I wanted you dead, you’d already be dead. I wouldn’t have risked my neck fighting those two men at your house if I wanted to hurt you. Do you understand what I’m saying? The man who got away, the one who tried to shoot you, is scouring the city right now, using every resource he has to find you. He’ll be looking for your car. For you. I’m going to switch cars again at the airport, where I’ve got another car sitting in long-term parking. I need you to be quiet, and calm, and lie in the suitcase so if anyone sees me, they’ll see only a lone man getting into his vehicle. They won’t remember a man and a woman. Nod if you understand.”

  He was everything she’d believed him to be and worse. Assassin. Killer. Murderer. Her blood rushed in her ears. She couldn’t catch her breath, couldn’t draw enough oxygen through her nose. She moaned against the gag. Her airway was blocked. Help me, help me! Her chest ached. Her vision blurred. Oh God, she was going to die.

  “Emily? Emily?”

  The words sounded tinny, like they were coming from far away. Her world went dim. Suddenly she was home again, lying in bed. A strange peace fell over her.

  Strong, gentle hands slid beneath her and lifted her up. She was surrounded by warmth. A brief sting of pain tugged against her mouth. Warm air suddenly rushed into her starving lungs. She drew in deep, gulping breaths, her eyes squeezed tightly shut. Where was she? The peace she’d felt before began to fade.

  “It’s okay,” someone whispered against her hair. “It’s okay.” A gentle hand stroked her back, up and down, up and down, cradling her against a hard chest, like a lover, rocking her slowly back and forth. She snuggled more deeply into his embrace, breathed in his comforting scent. He’d saved her. This man, whoever he was, had saved her.

  “No one’s going to hurt you, Em,” he whispered. “I promise.”

  That voice. That familiar scent, subtle, spicy, like expensive aftershave. Calling her Em as if she were special to him. The voice reminded her of something, someone, holding her close, his lips capturing hers in a searing kiss that warmed her all the way to her toes. A forbidden kiss, because the one who’d been kissing her was all wrong for her, on the wrong side of everything she believed in.

  Devlin!

  Her eyes flew open. She was in Devlin’s arms. No, no, no. This was all wrong. He was going to kill her. He was going to put her in a suitcase and throw her away. She shoved against his chest and screamed. A cloth clamped down over her nose and mouth, its sickeningly sweet scent setting off alarm bells in her mind.

  He was drugging her, killing her. No! A curious weakness flowed through her veins. Her hands fluttered against his chest like a bird against the bars of its cage. She twisted her head to the side and gulped a deep breath of clean air.

  The cloth clamped down over her nose and mouth again.

  She struggled, but it was no use against his superior strength. Her vision blurred. She held her breath as long as she could. Her lungs screamed. One breath; she had to have just one breath. She sucked in a deep gulp of air through the cloth, recoiling against the thick, sweet mixture.

  Everything went black.

  EMILY WENT LIMP in Devlin’s arms. He threw the cloth off her face and pressed his fingers against the side of her neck, checking her pulse. Strong. Her breathing was shallow but steady. He let out a shaky breath and cradled her unconscious body against his chest, stroking her back through her soft cotton T-shirt. He needed a minute. Hell, he needed a dozen.

  The panic and accusation in her eyes had shaken him to the core.

  His marks—the people he was assigned to eliminate—were pure evil. They thought nothing of strapping bombs on innocent children and sending them onto buses full of more innocent people to blow them into so many pieces their family had nothing left to bury. They raped, tortured, brutalized others, relishing their pain. Yet, more often than not, when they were finally standing face-to-face with their executioner, their eyes were filled with arrogance, scorn, hatred. No remorse. No guilt. And on the rare occasion when one of them looked at Devlin with fear or panic, it didn’t bother him. At all. Not once. Until now.

  The terror in Emily’s eyes, even though all he’d wanted to do was protect her, had nearly killed him.

  Trying to soothe someone, reassure her, was a skill he’d forgotten long ago. Which probably explained why he’d screwed up so thoroughly. Killing Cougar with the garrote had made sense at the time. It had freed his hands so he could grab what Emily needed and get her to safety. It had also freed him to react if Cougar’s handler showed up, which he had. But when he’d made those decisions, he hadn’t taken into account the impact they would have on Emily—and he damn well should have.

  She wasn’t an evil criminal or a terrorist. She was innocent, good, and deserved better treatment. Her strength and courage amazed him. Not many people, law enforcement or not, would have gone into that basement without backup. But Emily had, because she hadn’t wanted a victim to suffer even another minute waiting for help to arrive. She’d also stood up to him, countless times. And after nearly being killed, she’d had the gumption to order him to sit on the couch while she took charge of the crime scene. She was a strong woman, until he broke her.

  He fervently hoped he hadn’t broken her permanently, that she’d recover from what he’d put her through and would be the same sassy, funny, brave woman she’d been before he’d battered his way into her life a few days ago.

  Unfortunately, her ordeal was far from over. Until he could convince her that he meant her no harm, that he was her best chance at survival and that she needed to work with him instead of against him, she would have to remain his prisoner. Which meant when she woke up tomorrow morning from her drug-induced sleep and realized what he’d done and where she was, her terror was going to start all over again.

  He reluctantly carried her back to the suitcase and gently lowered her inside. Where moments ago he hadn’t thought twice about putting her in a suitcase, now, seeing her lying there, remembering the fear in her eyes, he was feeling something he hadn’t felt in a long time.

  Shame.

  He reminded himself that he had no choice, but he was starting to wonder if he’d handled this entire situation wrong from the beginning. He stared down at her, thinking about his options going forward. As much as being in the suitcase had scared her, wouldn’t being tied up and blindfolded in the back of a van scare her even more? He certainly couldn’t let her sit in the passenger seat beside him. She was a cop, and after tonight, she knew without a doubt that they weren’t operating on the same side of the law.

  It didn’t matter that EXIT was sanctioned by the government—even though it was a private company—its existence was a dirty secret not acknowledged in polite circles. When the official alphabet agencies failed—CIA, FBI, NSA—EXIT cleaned up their messes, did the lowly jobs they were too good to do. Or too inept to do.

  EXIT did an enormous amount of good in the world. But none of that would matter to someone like Emily, not when the good was achieved by doing some bad, sometimes a whole lot of bad. Could she ever go back to the life she’d once had? After what had happened at her house, the odds seemed low. Cougar and Ace wouldn’t have gone after her if Cyprian had rescinded the EXIT order. But if the order was solely based on what she’d said in the alley, there was still a chance Cyprian would dig a little more and decide Emily really wasn’t a threat. Maybe he hadn’t had time to do that or to call Cougar and Ace off before they’d attacked. Until he knew for sure, one way or the other, all he could do was keep her safe while he tried to find Kelly. Maybe after De
vlin proved to his boss that he wasn’t the one who’d killed Shannon and abducted Kelly, Cyprian would be willing to listen to what he had to say about Emily. And he’d cancel his orders. Maybe.

  It was the only way she could ever go back to her former life.

  He steeled himself against his sympathy for her. He’d continue with his original plan. He’d keep her drugged until they reached his destination. After that . . . well, he’d have to take it one minute, one hour, one day at a time and see what happened.

  Chapter Fifteen

  * * *

  NIGHTMARE COULDN’T BEGIN to describe the dream Emily had just had. She groaned and snuggled into her pillow. She’d have to make Tuck swear never to let her work almost two days straight again with next to no sleep. Her mind had gone into full-fledged hallucination mode. She’d imagined being tied up, gagged, shot at—the list went on and on.

  Those crazy pictures in her head must have played havoc with her body too. Nausea coiled in her stomach. The pressure of an oncoming headache told her if she didn’t take something soon, she’d have a full-blown migraine in a few hours. She rubbed her temple and something brushed against her nose. She swatted at it, and her fingers tangled in what felt like a smooth plastic string.

  She forced her sleepy eyes open and blinked to focus. Not a string, a cord. She held it up and followed it to where it disappeared an inch below the collar of her shirt. It was attached to a plastic circle taped above her heart. An electrode? Was she in a hospital? No, wait, what was going on? The images, last night, they had been a nightmare, hadn’t they?

  The ceiling above her shined white in the dim light. But instead of the smooth plaster in her bedroom, there was a metal grid of acoustic tiles. She bolted upright in the bed.

  “Don’t panic, Emily. You’re safe.”

  She whipped her head toward the deep, all-too-familiar voice. Devlin. He was sitting about ten feet away on a folding chair, watching her.

  Through a floor-to-ceiling wall of bars.

  She wasn’t hallucinating. The nightmare was real.

  She pressed her hand to her chest, a wave of dizziness surging through her as her heart sped up, thudding in her ears. What was this place? The room behind Devlin was large but windowless, with crude stairs hugging the far wall, ending at a trapdoor in the ceiling. She drew several shaky breaths, willing away the dizziness.

  Calm down. Use your training. Catalog your surroundings and look for an exit, a way to escape.

  The room—the cell—she was in was about ten by ten, furnished with the bed she was sitting on and nothing else but what appeared to be a heart monitor attached to the wall. Green digital numbers flashed and zigzag lines darted up and down across the screen. The far wall had an open door that led into a bathroom—a luxury she was sorely in need of at the moment.

  She looked at Devlin again. Her initial panic faded beneath a red-hot rush of anger. It poured through her like molten lava, burning through her veins, cauterizing her fear, settling in her gut like a dormant volcano ready to incinerate anything in its path.

  “Where am I?” she demanded.

  His expression turned wary at her tone. He stood and pushed his chair out of the way. “We’re underground, outside of Savannah. In a bunker, more or less.”

  “Is this where you bring your prisoners to interrogate them?” she accused, pressing her hand to her stomach as a wave of nausea churned through her.

  “When necessary. Yes.”

  His deadpan response to her half-serious accusation left her shaken. The urge to throw up was becoming more urgent.

  “I don’t feel so great. What did you do to me?” She pulled at the plastic circle on her chest.

  “I’d rather you didn’t—”

  She tossed the circle and cord to the floor.

  “—take that off.” He sighed deeply. “But since you’re conscious and talking, I suppose I don’t need to monitor your heart rate anymore. You said you don’t feel well. Are you in pain, nauseated?”

  “I imagine I feel the way anyone would who’s been knocked out with chloroform. Yes, I’m nauseated. Yes, my head is throbbing. And my mouth feels like cotton.”

  “It wasn’t chloroform; far too dangerous. People don’t always wake up after a dose of that. I used a derivative of sevoflurane and—”

  “I’m not interested in the list of chemical compounds you used. You shouldn’t have drugged me in the first place. What did you do, knock me out and . . .” She narrowed her eyes, curling her fingers against the sheets. “You stuffed me in that suitcase, didn’t you? Then kept me drugged until you could put me in here. What kind of person does that?”

  He shrugged, seemingly unconcerned with her opinion of him. “I did what I had to do to keep you safe. You’re alive. That’s what matters.”

  “You’re one of those ends-justifies-the-means kind of people.” She shook her head. “How could I have ever . . .”

  “Ever . . . what?” he asked, his voice soft.

  “Doesn’t matter.” She shook her head, grimacing when that made her growing headache throb even worse. She pressed her hand to her temple again.

  “You should take something for that or you’ll end up with a migraine,” he said. “One of the side effects of the drugs, I’m afraid. There’s bottled water and medicine in the bathroom, along with your clothes and toiletries, so you can shower or soak in the tub if you prefer.”

  Her clothes? She looked down and realized she was still wearing a thin T-shirt and panties and nothing else. The indignity of her situation had the smoldering anger inside her flaring again. But her near-to-bursting bladder meant that confronting him about what he’d done, and finding out what he planned to do, would have to wait. She braced her hands on the mattress and swung her legs over the side.

  “Don’t try to stand,” he warned.

  “If you expect me to docilely follow your commands, you’re going to be severely disappointed,” she bit out. She stretched her toes toward the floor.

  He swore. Keys jangled. Metal creaked.

  Emily slowly slid off the bed. But when her feet touched the floor, her wobbly legs wouldn’t hold her up. She kept sliding, right into Devlin’s arms.

  He scooped her up and cradled her against his chest, his dark brows an angry V. “Are you always this stubborn?”

  “According to every single person who has ever met me, yes.”

  He laughed, his irritation gone as quickly as it had appeared. She hated that the deep sound of that laugh and the beauty of his smile still had the power to send a warm thrill zinging straight to her belly. She should punch that smile off his face and make him let her go. But she wasn’t sure she had the strength to stand.

  “Bed or bathroom?” he asked.

  Unable to look at him as she answered, she said, “Bathroom.”

  He took her through the doorway, kicked the toilet lid down, and gently set her on top of it. His brow furrowed with apparent concern as he squatted down in front of her.

  “Don’t underestimate the effects of the drugs that are still working their way through your system. You’re going to be weak and wobbly for a few more hours. Take it easy.”

  “I can pee by myself. Get out.”

  His lips twitched. “Good to know. But I’ll still be a shout away if you need help with, ah, anything.”

  When he closed the door behind him, she slumped weakly against the back of the toilet. Her bleary eyes settled on the bottle of pain pills on the counter and—thank God—a giant pink bottle of Pepto-Bismol. Next to that was a neatly folded stack of clothes he’d obviously grabbed from her house. Probably when he’d grabbed that horrible suitcase. She shuddered and downed the pills, using the Pepto as a chaser, before following that with a deep drink of water.

  Twenty minutes later, after a hot shower and brushing her teeth, she felt almost human again. A warm bath had sounded ridiculously appealing, but she’d worried that she wouldn’t have the strength to get out of the tub on her own. At one time, having De
vlin help her and see her naked would have been a fantasy come true. But now that he was her enemy, it would be beyond humiliating.

  Without a blow-dryer in sight, she blotted her hair on a towel and left it hanging free to her shoulders to dry on its own. Her tennis shoes squeaked against the wooden floor as she stepped into the cell. Devlin was sitting in the folding chair again, reading something on his phone. But this time the cell door was standing wide open. She stood beside the bed, debating whether to try to run past him. When he stepped to the open door and braced his hands on the bars, blocking the exit, she had her answer.

  She noted with interest that he still had his gun in a holster on his belt and the knife sheathed on the other side. She down on the bed and prepared to ask him all the questions swirling through her mind. Once she had the information she needed, she’d pressure him to let her out of the cell. Or distract him somehow while she grabbed his gun and left him locked up in here instead of her.

  “Feeling better?” he asked.

  “Let’s skip the small talk and not pretend we’re anything other than enemies.”

  He slowly shook his head. “I’m not your enemy, Emily.”

  “Right, because friends drug each other, tie them up, and stuff them into suitcases.”

  “They do if that’s what it takes to keep their friends alive.”

  “Yeah, about that. That’s the part where you lose me. Because I don’t understand any of this. What’s going on? Why did Cougar and that other guy—”

  “Ace.”

  “Whatever. Why did they come after me?”

  He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Emily, but the less you know the better.”

  “Better for whom? You? If you were in my place, wouldn’t you want to know why this was happening?”

  His look turned guarded. “I can’t answer your questions without putting you more at risk. You’ll just have to trust me about that. The only way you may be able to return to your life the way it was is if I can convince the people who are after you that you aren’t a threat.”