He’d learned that lesson the hard way. He wouldn’t make the same mistake again. And if he felt pain at losing Melinda, he deserved it for allowing his barriers to come down. When she kept her back to him, he recognized that she was hurting too, and he ached to take her into his arms—but he no longer had that right.
He picked up his cell phone. “I need to call the D.O. again or he’ll be suspicious.”
Melinda didn’t answer him. She stared out the window, rocking back and forth, her arms wrapped across her stomach, her hands resting at her waist.
He dialed the necessary number, waited for the phone to trigger two satellite systems, which made the call untraceable, before again ringing Tower’s phone.
“Yes?”
“We’re on the move.”
“Estimated time of arrival?”
“Five hours.”
“What? You should have made it to the extraction point by now.”
“It’s the best I can do.”
Clay clicked off the line, hoping he’d bought them some time. Next he phoned Barry, who must have been speeding the entire way up the interstate. He kept the call short and gave the reporter directions to the hunting lodge and their room number.
The next few hours passed in a tense silence. He paced. She flicked through television channels, gave up and spent most of her time staring out the window. “This is the hardest part of any operation—the waiting.”
“It seems like each minute takes an hour to pass.”
“It’ll be over soon.”
When he looked up fifteen minutes later, Melinda still hadn’t moved from her position at the window. “You hungry?”
She shook her head.
“I could find you a place to hide until the story hits the newspaper,” he suggested gently. “I can meet Barry on my own and arrange for—”
“I’m seeing it through.”
“Fine. Whatever you want.”
She spun around and planted her fists on her hips. “Whatever I want? You mean whatever I want as long as it’s not you.”
“I never promised…”
“No, you never promised me anything, so your conscience should be clear.”
“What do you want from me?”
“Obviously something you aren’t able to give.” Her breath hitched and suddenly her mouth parted. Behind her, the window shattered.
“Get down.” His order came too late.
Her lips let out a little “oof,” and she toppled to the floor.
Oh God! She’d been hit. Shot. Every cell in his body froze as if the air just left his lungs. He couldn’t breathe, could barely think.
Heart kicking into high gear, he dived to the floor, rolled and doused the light in one smooth motion. In another instant, he drew his weapon and crawled over to Melinda. He didn’t waste time to see if she was alive, he shoved her under the bed, protecting her as best he could, knowing it was too little too late.
Oh God. She was hurt. Lying there bleeding, and he felt as if a part of him had died.
Damn. He’d expected the D.O. to wait. Somehow Tower must have traced the signal back to the lodge. His agents had moved fast and Clay wondered how many foes were out there. Even if there were only a few, more would be coming.
Clay had to go on the offensive fast. As much as he hated to leave Melinda, her best chance of survival was for him to take out her shooter. Easing open the door, he used his elbows to crawl out on his belly, his worry about Melinda so frantic that he barely felt the glass digging into his chest and torso and thighs.
Leaving her behind was the most difficult decision he’d ever made. It was his job to protect her and he was leaving her injured and unarmed. Unconscious. Maybe dead.
He prayed not.
That she’d been shot clawed at him and he had to fight down a howl, had to use every bit of his gigantic intellect to focus on what was ahead of him—not what he’d left back in that room. Sweating, pulse pounding, he crawled ahead by inches into the hallway.
When he reached a corner, he stood and listened for the sound of choppers, sirens, running feet or the unmistakable sound of a weapon being cocked. He heard nothing and realized the gun that had fired at Melinda through the window had had a silencer attached.
A silencer most likely indicated that the attacking force was small and didn’t want to draw attention to itself. At the realization, Clay’s hopes rose a notch. He ducked into a bisecting hallway, sprinted through a hall, ran outside to the pool area and used the bushes for cover.
He forced his pace to slow, made his way to the parking area and the direction from which the shooter must have positioned himself. The woods were close by. An owl hooted and mosquitoes buzzed.
Slowly his eyes adjusted to the darkness. One road led into the acreage that surrounded the lodge, then it divided, heading toward the stable and the skeet-shooting range.
Clay stared at the woods, waiting for a shadow to move, a piece of metal to glint. Something. Anything that didn’t belong, which could give him a hint as to the enemy’s location.
Finally, a black silhouette rattled a tree branch. It wasn’t much to go on. But Clay didn’t need much. Walking lightly, he circumnavigated the parking lot, keeping to the edge of the woods, hoping to take the enemy from behind.
He stepped with care, placing his toe down first, then following up with his heel. He didn’t want to warn them by snapping a twig or sending a bird into flight.
Minutes passed and sweat beaded on his face, drizzled into his eyes. There had to be at least two of them. Agents always worked in teams.
He weighed the danger of moving fast against the fear of Melinda’s lifeblood spilling out unchecked. He reminded himself that he couldn’t help her unless he won this battle.
He stopped, listened above the pounding of his heart. A soft rustle, just the faintest of noises, caused him to adjust his direction slightly. The humid air left his clothing sticking to him, the moonless night made his mission seemingly impossible, so he tried to use his other senses besides sight.
He sniffed, knowing his opponent would know better than to use cologne, but Clay might luck out with a hint of body odor or deodorant. Nothing.
Suddenly, he heard the slap of flesh against flesh, like his foe swatting a mosquito. Clay narrowed his eyes, squinting to see through the darkness, and the outline of a man slowly formed. First the head, then the torso and finally the long legs. The man rested, his back against a tree, his face focused on the room where Melinda waited for Clay to return.
Clay inched behind the man, his need for stealth great. He needed to take out the man without a sound, strike so swiftly that his foe had no time to call out a warning.
Three more steps and he’d be in striking distance.
Two steps.
One.
Clay lunged, using his gun like a baton, swinging it down on the man’s skull, taking no satisfaction as metal collided with bone. His enemy dropped silently. Clay moved in to break the fall, lowered the man to the ground.
He straightened, ready to hunt the fallen man’s partner with no clue to where he might be.
That’s when he heard Melinda scream.
Chapter Fourteen
Her scream froze him straight to the bone. Clay had miscalculated. He’d assumed the shooter’s partner was somewhere outside, but Melinda’s cry for help told him differently.
Fear pounding up his throat with every lunging footstep, Clay dashed out of the woods, across the parking lot, straight back to their room. Fear for her life dogged his every move. He shouldn’t have left her alone, and if she died because of his mistake he would never forgive himself.
There was no time to pick the door lock. No time to run through the hallway and retrace his steps. Without hesitating, Clay took the shortest route to Melinda and barreled straight through the open window. He took the brunt of the landing with his hands and shoulders, made a diving roll onto the mattress and tumbled into struggling bodies, losing his gun in the process.
A powerful elbow rammed his side and knocked the air from his lungs. A meaty fist clipped his jaw, slamming his head back so hard his teeth snapped together. With a roar of pain and anger and fear for Melinda’s safety, Clay ignored the sharp daggers of agony that sliced down his neck.
He couldn’t extract his spare weapon in the close quarters, couldn’t reach for his gun, needing his hands to ward off a series of blows to his head and shoulders. Besides, shooting in the dark could be dangerous to Melinda. He had no idea where she’d fallen.
He focused on taking down his opponent, using kicks and punches before closing in and setting his hands around the man’s neck, choking the air from his lungs.
His opponent kicked out, barely missing his groin. Clay squeezed harder and ducked his head as the struggling man tried to gouge out his eyes. Clay rammed a knee into his foe’s stomach and the fight went out of him.
“Clay, is that you?” Melinda asked. He saw her silhouette looming over him about to crash a lamp on his head.
“Yeah, it’s me. You can put that lamp down. He won’t bother you anymore.”
Melinda flicked on the light. The lamp slid from her fingers. Blood ran down her arm and side. “Is he dead?”
“Just unconscious.” Clay released his stranglehold on the man’s neck and turned to her. Relieved she was alive, worried about her injury, he blamed himself for leaving her alone. “You were shot. You’ve lost blood. Sit down and let me—”
The door slammed open. A tall, thin stranger with silver hair pointed a gun at Clay. “Don’t move.”
Again Clay had miscalculated. He’d thought there were only two agents outside. This man stood too far away for Clay to lunge at him before he could pull the trigger and too close for him to miss. Now they’d pay for his mistake with their lives. That his life should end didn’t bother him as much as the painful thought of Melinda dying due to his mistake. She would never meet her brother and sister, never open her business, never make love to him again.
God, he wanted her. Wanted to hold her and love her and tell her he’d been a fool not to accept her offer to come to Virginia. Now it was too late. He braced for the bullet, sorrow overwhelming him that he’d never told her how he felt. Never told her he loved her more than life itself.
If he could have lunged and taken down the third opponent, he would willingly have given his life for hers. But the man stood too far away. Clay could attack quickly, but not that quickly.
“Lady, are you all right?” the gunman asked. “Maybe you should sit down and let me call an ambulance.”
Melinda looked at the stranger holding a gun on Clay with one hand, his laptop computer in the other, and started to laugh. It must be the shock. The loss of blood was making her woozy. Still chuckling, she slid down onto the carpet, her back propped against the wall. “You’ve got to be the only reporter in the world that thinks the gun is mightier than a story.”
Clay’s mind had been so full of worry over Melinda, he’d failed to consider all the alternatives. The man was carrying a laptop. He’d invited this man here. He kept his hands raised but smiled grimly. “Barry Lee?”
The reporter nodded. “I heard a woman scream and…old instincts die hard.” Sheepishly, Barry put away his gun and held out his hand. “Viper, I presume?”
“Call me Clay.” Clay gestured to the documents sitting neatly in a stack on the nightstand while the rest of the room looked as if it had been struck by a tornado. “What you need is over there.”
While the reporter perused the documents, Clay sat next to Melinda, pulled her gently onto his lap, and searched her body for an injury.
“Here.” She lifted her arm and showed him where the bullet had left a bloody trail along the fleshy part of her skin. The wound looked raw and painful but not life threatening.
“You’ll be fine.”
She cuddled against him. “It hurts.”
“I was so afraid I’d lost you. When the bullet hit, you just collapsed. I thought…”
“Would you have missed me?”
“You have to ask?”
Barry rustled some papers. “I hate to break up this touching scene, but we’re not in the clear here. I need complete, concise and factual explanations. And maybe we should do it from someplace safer?”
Clay stood and rubbed his forehead. He wasn’t thinking clearly. He tore a spare shirt and made a bandage for Melinda’s arm while he tried to concentrate on their next move.
When Melinda spied his back, she gasped. “You’re hurt, too.”
“It’s just slivers of glass.” He turned to the reporter. “What’s your deadline?”
“Midnight.” Barry checked his watch. “My editor went out on a limb to save me page one. Most of the story is written, but I have to confirm the facts before we can put it to bed.”
“You probably have a lot of questions. You can ask them as we drive out of here.”
Clay didn’t bother gathering anything but Melinda, letting the reporter keep the papers. Slowly the trio made their way to the car. “When Tower’s men fail to check in, all hell’s going to break loose.”
Barry nodded. “I’ve been waiting to write this story for over thirty years. A few CIA agents aren’t going to stop me.”
Clay helped Melinda into the passenger seat and strapped on her seat belt. “Can you type while I drive?” he asked the reporter.
“Sure. Explain how you broke the code.”
Ten minutes later, Barry had the last details of his story ready to transmit to his waiting editor. There was only one problem, a red and blue blinking light and a siren from a Georgia sheriff who had spotted their car and wanted them to pull over.
Melinda looked nervously over her shoulder. “You can’t stop.”
“Tower will kill the story if we’re stopped now,” Barry agreed. “You’re going to have to outrun them.”
MELINDA THOUGHT THEY had a chance of outrunning the cop until she heard a chopper hovering overhead. The helicopter flew in low and shined a spotlight on their racing car.
Clay kept speeding down the highway and spoke calmly to Barry. “How much more time do you need?”
“The story’s done. I need an Internet connection to transmit. And for that we’ll have to stop.” He peered worriedly out the window. “We’re not going to make it, are we?”
Clay handed his specialized cell phone to Barry. “You can plug in to my cell phone. We have satellite uplink to the Net. How long will the transfer take?”
“Thirty seconds. Then I need you to buy me another minute or two while I wipe my hard drive clean.”
Clay passed a semi-truck, steering smoothly, seemingly unfazed by the growing number of police cars behind them. “You’ve got three minutes, maybe four.”
Barry connected his laptop to Clay’s phone and transmitted the story. He typed quickly and erased the data.
Melinda didn’t understand why he was bothering to hide the data when the entire world would soon hear about the front-page story, but didn’t ask until he finished his work.
“Why erase the hard drive?”
“It’ll make it more difficult for the bad guys to figure out what we did,” Barry explained.
Clay clarified. “We have to keep our actions a secret until the newspaper hits the streets.”
“That’s another two to three hours.” Melinda looked over her shoulder. No way could Clay evade the cops for that long. She turned back in her seat and, through the windshield, she saw a blockade up ahead. Fear clutched her stomach in a fierce grip. They were about to be caught.
Clay applied the breaks. “Okay. They’ll likely split us up and demand that we talk. Stall. Ask for your attorney. Give them nothing until after 3:00 a.m.”
Melinda tried to fight through her growing fear. She’d never been arrested. Her biggest legal trouble had been a speeding ticket. Now she had multi-government agencies after her and no idea how many laws they’d broken. “What about my mother’s papers? If they confiscate them, we won
’t have proof to back up Barry’s story.”
Barry chuckled. “Yes, we will.”
She couldn’t believe the reporter could laugh or that Clay could appear so calm when she felt nausea churning up her throat.
Barry patted his laptop case. “I photographed the documents and transmitted the pictures with the story. And Herbert still has his copy.”
“It’s going to be okay,” Clay assured her, then turned to Barry. “I don’t suppose you brought any fake identification? It would help if the authorities couldn’t figure out your identity right away.”
“Wouldn’t matter anyway. My fingerprints are on file with the agency.”
“Then I think misleading the authorities will be best. Tell them you met us to find out why the CIA is harassing a citizen. Tell them you just started to speak to us. If you can convince them you’re working on another story, they might just believe it.”
“Don’t worry, I’m a writer, I’m good at making up stuff.”
While the men spoke about deceiving and stalling, Melinda’s pulse raced. Of the three of them, she was the least experienced in this game. She was the weak link.
“I’m afraid I’m going to screw up,” she admitted as Clay slowly braked.
He reached for her hand, and she welcomed his heat as he rubbed the cold from her skin. “They can’t force you to talk. The only thing you need to do is to ask for your attorney. Remember, you’ve done nothing wrong.”
“Okay.”
“And remember this, too.”
“What?”
“I love you.”
Before she could even react to his astonishing statement, he stopped the car. At least two dozen police cars surrounded them. The chopper kept them in a blinding spotlight, making it difficult for them to see outside the perimeter of vehicles surrounding them.
Over a loudspeaker, they heard a man’s voice with a Georgia accent. “Open the doors, come out with your hands up.”
Melinda started to comply.
“Wait,” Clay told her. “Remember, we’re stalling for time. “Move slowly. Make them say everything twice.”
Lovers in Hiding Page 18
