“I have a feeling you’ll be using every moment of that week for other matters.”
Clay perked up. “Another heist?”
“Sit, please.” Ralph extended his hand toward Clay’s chair.
Clay looked at me and I shrugged, not having any idea what Ralph was up to. “Clay, the last time you arrived on my doorstop, you brought with you a great deal of blood.”
“Sorry about that.” Clay ducked his head.
“Yes, well, I’d prefer you always come here after being shot.” Ralph took another sip of tea. “We didn’t have a chance to talk about that with the flurry of Christmas and my research into the sword. The two of you need to address that before Greece.”
I couldn’t agree more, but I kept my mouth shut. Clay would listen to Ralph and he’d already shown that my opinion on this matter didn’t hold any weight with him. Not enough to take it seriously anyway.
He fidgeted under Ralph’s attention. “We addressed it on the way over. It’s handled.”
Ralph crossed his arms over his chest, mimicking Clay’s posture. He waited, not saying anything.
The men faced off, neither willing to give into the silent battle. Finally, Clay grunted and ran a hand through his hair. Still Ralph waited. It was the longest six seconds of my life before Clay finally straightened and clenched his jaw. “You don’t think it’s handled either, do you?” he asked Ralph.
“I don’t, Clay, I really don’t.” Ralph relaxed and clasped his hands over his stomach. “These enemies aren’t typical men, though they may look and act like it to fool you, to infiltrate everyday life, to make you think you have a mince of a chance against them. They’ve worked hard to know you, to know your weaknesses…” He glanced quickly at me and I wasn’t sure if that was because he thought I was one of Clay’s weaknesses or because he thought I was in danger of having my own exploited. Both were true, if I wanted to be honest with myself. “Men like these will not stop until they complete whatever mission Azazel’s sent them on.”
“Now, wait—” Clay stood quickly, making the chair rock backward. “I’ve known this buyer for years. Way before her.” He pointed at me, anger and confusion marring his features.
I understood. It was exactly how I’d felt when Metatron had first come to me, first showed me the level of involvement of Azazel in my own life, starting with my mother and her untimely death. The sooner Clay could accept that we’d both been played, the sooner we could work together to beat these guys and finish the job. Ignorance only kept us at risk. I needed him to hear Ralph out, to see what was staring him right in the face.
My stomach hurt when I thought about how we’d been played at Felt’s, then again at the Renwick, the party… We’d been nothing more than pawns, and damn if I was going to let anyone manipulate me, be it man or divinity.
But Clay had to get to those conclusions on his own. Or it would continue to be a giant brick wall between us, and I couldn’t have anything working against us. We had plenty of obstacles without any irritations between he and I. And not only would it place friction between us, but it would give us a massive blind spot. If he continued to ignore this, he was a massive liability for me. One I might have to reconsider.
I’d rather ditch him on this one until he came to terms with people wanting him dead, than having him dead.
“Clay, your involvement in this is not coincidental,” Ralph said, sitting up and leaning toward Clay, his face intense and serious. “The farther you travel on this journey, the more intertwined your life will become with Lina’s, but do not for one moment think that they haven’t known that you were destined for her.”
Chapter Six
I choked. Destined? Ralph’s brain had better have just taken a sharp left turn. I sat as still as possible, hoping like hell I didn’t look as terrified as that comment had made me feel. I didn’t want us to be some Team of Destiny. I had a soul mate.
My heart constricted. I didn’t want to replace Griffin with Clay just because one was dead and the other was alive. If—and that was a big if—if we were destined, then it was as partners, as valors, victors, the final winning team. Nothing more.
Clay’s gaze swept over me, softening only a bit. I returned the stare until he finally turned his attention to Ralph. “Go on….”
“You must accept that the men who shot you, as well as the one who ordered that moment, are still after you. Right now they are aware of your every move, and possibly even the next one. Do not underestimate the power of their reach, nor the extents to which they will go.”
“I’m worried about you and Anna,” I said. The more Ralph talked the more worried I became that these men would use them against us. If they knew everything about Clay, then they certainly knew that Ralph was every bit as much a weakness for him as I was, if not more. Clay cared deeply for Ralph and respected him a great deal. I knew just enough about Clay to know that he’d do just about anything to keep Ralph and Anna safe. If it were up to me, and Clay was my own hit, I’d exploit that weakness like nobody’s business.
I had to assume that our opponent would absolutely do the same.
But Ralph didn’t. He waved off my concern. “Good heavens, no. What would they want with two old biddies?”
On the far side of the room, Anna tsked, her arms full of freshly laundered clothes.
Ralph smiled and turned toward her. “That’s not what I believe, dear Anna. Why, I’ve always thought you didn’t look a day over sixty and you’re fresh as a daisy.”
She shook her head and went back to folding laundry. Ralph winked at me, then turned serious and patted my hand. “Thank you for the concern. Metatron will ensure that we remain safe. I’ve talked to him about it, as I held the same concerns at one point.”
I wasn’t sure how much I trusted Metatron with those I loved, but I didn’t have a lot of choice. We couldn’t really stash Ralph and Anna anywhere, but I would be speaking to Metatron about their safety when I saw him next. I’d put a guard on them if I thought it would help, but if Azazel’s men wanted to hurt them, there was nothing of this world that could stop them. And that went for Clay too. Much as he might be a liability, the only way I could truly keep him safe was keeping him right next to me.
But that didn’t mean we couldn’t take out a few in the process. If there were fewer of them to attack us, then they wouldn’t have extra to send after Ralph. We had to get Clay’s buyer and all the people associated with that hit taken care of immediately.
Clay let out a big breath and held out a hand to me, palm up. “Will you help me get these guys?”
I lifted my hand and settled it in his, giving him a squeeze. “Of course.”
He tugged, pulling me up to stand beside him. “I’m sorry that I didn’t believe you. That I didn’t take the threat seriously. I should have trusted your instinct.”
I shrugged. “I’ve dismissed my instinct enough since we’ve started this wild ride, so we both need to get better.”
“Tell me what we need to do.”
I patted his shoulder. “We’ll figure it out.” I turned to Ralph. “We’ll get this handled. I can take out bad guys in my sleep, so I’m confident we’ll have plenty of time to do it before we need to be in Greece. What else do we need to know?”
“Like everything you’ve been drawn to thus far, I believe you’ll know the sword when you see it. You’ll find the dig on the west end of the airport, near Spata. They located relics as they were tying into the sewer line for a new metro rail.”
We stayed for breakfast and Ralph entertained Clay with a half-dozen stories and I helped Anna clean the kitchen. We declined their offer to stay for the day, knowing that there wasn’t enough room for us with all the boxes and papers in the house. I preferred us to have some good sleep before we started this trek. The plane was detained in Cairo, anyway, and wouldn’t be at the airport until tonight.
The tension between Clay and me was still there as we left. Ralph stopped us at the door and shook Clay’s hand. “You mu
st be there in five days, so do not tarry where your attacker is concerned.”
Clay’s mouth drew tight and he nodded. “I think I’m in pretty good hands.”
I tipped my head and studied him. That was the closest he’d ever come to complimenting me. Other than after he’d been shot and he told me that I made a terrible wife but was the only partner he’d ever want. I’d filled him full of morphine at that point, so I hadn’t given it a second thought.
I kissed Ralph’s cheek. “I’ll keep him alive.”
Clay took my hand and tucked it in the crook of his arm as we walked to the car. I started to pull away, thinking he was going to walk around, but he escorted me all the way to my door and opened it for me. It was strange, but I figured he was doing it for Ralph’s benefit and I didn’t mind being tucked against his warm strong body. I pulled free and climbed in, then reached for the door. But he blocked it, stepping into the open space, hand on the frame above my head. “I’ll be better.”
I frowned. “About what?”
“Trusting you.”
“It’s okay, Clay. We’ll figure this out.”
“I could have put you in danger—did put you in danger.”
“I can handle myself.” I felt bad that he was still struggling with this and I didn’t know what else to say to ease his worries.
He looked over the roof of the car and stared across Ralph’s weathered neighborhood. “You’re going to have to help me.”
I knew that, but I didn’t think his ego wanted to hear it. “We’ll be fine. Let’s go to the hotel and we’ll make a plan.”
He nodded, shut my door, and climbed in behind the wheel, remaining stoic and thoughtful until we got to the hotel. I checked us in and we carried our sparse bags, along with my weapons bag from beneath the front seat that the CIA had left for me. It was nice to have friends in low places and they made sure I always had whatever I needed. And better, they never asked any questions. This mission was proving to be in need of every one of those connections, and we hadn’t even started yet.
I paused at the threshold, glancing up and down the walkway, checking for pursuers and creepy crawlies. The morning was a comfortable calm and I hitched my gear bag higher as I walked in the room, only to find Clay sprawled across the only bed in the room, a large king. “Oh, hell no.”
He grinned and tucked his hands behind his head. “This makes twice. Pretty sure it’s a message from Metatron.” He bounced his hips against the mattress. I rolled my eyes.
“Nice try.” I set my weapons on the small desk, tossed my bag beneath, and dialed the front desk, only to be told that there’d been a mixup and they didn’t have any double rooms left. We were stuck with a king room on the main floor. Not ideal. “Thanks.” I hung up and ignored Clay’s chuckle.
With my back still to him, I pulled the black bag close, reveling in the weight of it as it slid across the motel table. Nothing better in the world for soothing my nerves than the feel of trusted weaponry. I unhooked the double clasp and unrolled the girthy fabric, revealing two handguns and a dozen knives: six small concealable ones, and the remaining half-dozen a sweet collection of large ones that I could carry well enough in my other holsters.
I loved knifes, loved their deadly silence. Guns were handy, but they made it difficult to stay concealed with their loud reports and obvious muzzle flashes. I wouldn’t ever be comfortable using one as a main weapon. I much preferred my knives and the anonymity they afforded me. I’d taken my share of jobs that had required sniper rifles, and while they did give me the ability to stay far away, the distance troubled me, made the kill too impersonal, too machine-like. I wasn’t a killer, I was an assassin, and I realized there wasn’t more than a hair between the two definitions, but it was the hair that I’d made my own personal line of demarcation. One was a mercenary, heartless and cold. The other acted within a code, a creed, following a mission. I would never be a killer.
I’d been called to be an assassin.
And now I would challenge the code that I’d clung to since firing my very first shot. I hadn’t been hired to kill Clay’s buyer, but he was certainly a bad guy. And that’s where my gray area lived. There were a lot of bad guys out there, ninety-eight percent of whom I’d never killed and would not kill. I couldn’t eradicate evil from the planet, but I could do my part in eliminating the people that agencies had tracked, researched, and believed were the worst of them, or those who could spread evil like a contagion.
Now I was the one doing the tracking and researching. And Clay, Ralph and I did believe that the men who’d tried to kill Clay were ones worth taking out. There was an element of self-defense, and had certainly been the case when I’d killed the shooter trying to take Clay out, but again … complete gray area. I could apply the self-defense angle to every associate of every person I’d killed. But I didn’t, because my carefully constructed rules and creed were what kept me sane, kept me believing that at the end of the day I was better than the men and women I destroyed.
That was the rub, though, wasn’t it? I slipped one of the knives from the case and turned it over, back and forth. The righteous always believe that they’re on the right side of the “law.” Over the course of mankind, religious zealots had killed millions because their targets fell outside their own carefully constructed creeds. Azazel, too. He wanted to eliminate all of us who stood in the way of his goal, those with the power to keep him from succeeding.
Was I that much different?
I laid the knife on the desk and took another, smaller one out, turned it over and ran my finger lightly along the crisp blade. I didn’t have a choice and though I knew it, killing someone who I hadn’t been hired to kill or who wasn’t currently attacking me made my stomach sour. But without taking them out, we’d never be able to let our guard down. Savvy as I was at having alert senses and eyes in the back of my head, I still had to sleep, still had to eat a meal without inhaling it so I wouldn’t be caught off guard. My nerves needed the ability to relax, even if only for a day or two. With a killer on the loose, I’d lose that opportunity.
I grimaced. You’d think that with a damn archangel on our side, that Metatron would be willing to help us out and give us some protection.
“What are you thinking about over there?”
I glanced over my shoulder. Clay sat on the edge of the bed, hands pressed into the mattress, shoulders hunched high. Like the stress of our situation was getting to him too. I took one of the mid-sized knives and carried it over to him. “That we’re not as prepared as I’d like.”
“You mean I’m not.”
“You need to be ready to kill.” I flipped the knife and held the blade, pushing the hilt toward him.
He reached an unsteady hand toward it and curled his fingers tentatively around the metal. I released it. “How much hand-to-hand did you do in the military?”
He shook his head and stood. “I wasn’t in the military.”
I frowned. “Yes, you were. Two years.” I’d looked it up in the database. I knew all about the time he’d spent in the Army.
He shook his head and moved the knife to his left hand, let the weight settle into his palm, then switched it back. His head lifted and he pierced me with those blue eyes and a cheeky grin. “Nope. Didn’t even graduate high school.” He shrugged. “But I made a couple friends good with computers.”
“I knew it.” Again, I’d dismissed my first impression about his background when I’d found it. I knew little about him when I’d pulled up all the data that I had access to, but it had seemed manufactured, too perfect. I shook my head and he winked. “Well, that just means you have more work to do. You’ve proven that you’re fairly decent, but you have to be better. If I can beat you, then they’re going to annihilate you.”
“You haven’t beaten me—”
“First.” I was not about to get into a discussion about how many times we’d traded the upper hand when we’d fought. I’d held him off and he’d never been able to best me, and he had
me by six inches and fifty pounds. I needed him to be able to take me every time if I was going to feel safe about him protecting himself … and watching my back.
His mouth snapped closed and the skin around the edges of his eyes creased like he was finally taking this serious.
“First,” I started again. “You need to be able to throw and then we’ll work on getting away clean. I don’t want you wrestling with these guys. I want you staying as far away from them as possible. Throw, slice, run.”
“I don’t run.”
“Yeah, I know.” I poked him hard in the shoulder right in his still-healing wound.
“Ow, dammit!” He jerked away and rubbed his arm. “What the hell?”
“You got lucky and you know it. That should have killed you. If you wouldn’t have been toppling out the window, he would have gotten a clean kill.” I would have.
“I’m always lucky. I don’t have to worry about this stuff like you do. I’m not in life-or-death situations. Ever.” He handed the knife back. “I thought you were going to handle all of this. Killing is what you do. I’ll do the thief stuff, you take care of that.” He waved his hand toward the stack of weapons.
I shoved the knife toward him again. “Clay, I’m serious about this. They’re going to try and kill you again.”
“And what’s a knife going to do? Block the bullet? You think they aren’t going to come at me with everything they have so they don’t miss this time?” His voice rose. “Because I think I don’t stand a fucking chance. They’re probably going to blow up my car, or shoot me through that window while I’m sleeping with you tonight!”
He knocked my hand away and paced the room. I holstered the knife and crossed my arms. I wanted him mad enough that he’d see reason, but I didn’t want him giving up all hope. “They’re not going to kill you like that.”
The God Game: Evangeline Heart Book 2 (Evangeline Heart Adventures) Page 3
