Extreme Measures

by Elisabeth Naughton

  “We’re about to have company,” he said to Eve. “Come on. All the way up out onto the arm.”

  Eve let him help her up onto the arm, then waited as he pulled himself up next to her. Once on top, she leaned forward to suck back air and gripped the railing to her right. “Smooth move, smart guy. We’re sitting ducks up here.”

  Yeah, no shit. The arm didn’t even come close to the construction site, as if the operator had swung it away from the building at quitting time so no one could mess with the thing. Options rushed through Zane’s mind, but the only plausible one solidified when he heard voices on the roof of the warehouse behind him. He grabbed Eve’s hand and pulled her with him. “Come on! Toward the water!”

  “What the fuck? Archer!”

  Automatic gunfire ignited in the air. Eve gripped his hand and ran. A whirring sound echoed, followed by a jolt as the arm of the crane began to swivel.

  Holy God, they’d turned the damn crane on. Zane grasped the railing with his bloody hand and pulled harder on Eve’s arm with the other. “Fucking run!”

  She was right. This was easily the dumbest thing he’d done to date. When was he going to start using his fucking brain like Ryder had told him to do?

  Eve pulled back on his hand as they neared the end of the jib, her face awash with horror. The entire arm slowly rotated away from the water. They had seconds before they’d be out over dry land instead of the Sound. Zane gripped Eve’s wrist tightly. “Jump!”

  “Goddammit, Archer. I really hate you!”

  Her last word echoed up as they pushed off, the sparkling water of Puget Sound hovering below. The jib bounced under their feet. As cool air rushed over Zane’s skin and bullets pinged off metal at their backs, he said one quick prayer that the water was deep enough off these docks so they didn’t kill themselves when they hit.

  But before he heard the splash, a burn like the heat of a thousand suns lit up his left arm. Then he was sucked down in a black, wet, ice-cold abyss. Where he heard nothing at all.

  Eve came up gasping.

  The frigid water cut like a knife, and she was sure her heart had taken up permanent residence in her throat. The scents of fish and algae filled her nostrils, nearly making her gag. She treaded water and breathed deep as she turned a slow circle to catch her bearings. As she tried to clear the cobwebs from her head still lingering from the drugs Archer had given her.

  Holy shit, she’d made it. No way she should have survived that drop. Voices echoing from above reminded her she needed to get out of sight. She swam toward the dock, grasped the slimy wood of a post, and looked back for Archer.

  The low light of dusk made it hard to see off the water. She should leave his ass. After what he’d done to her, she didn’t owe him a damn thing except a swift kick in the balls. And yet, something held her back. Where the hell was he? He should be up by now. Why wasn’t he breaking the surface, yelling at her to move her ass?

  Panic closed in. She looked up at the crane’s arm, stopped now, no longer rotating away from the water. The men who’d chased them up onto the roof hadn’t ventured out on the steel themselves, and they obviously hadn’t seen her yet. They were pointing down at the water, waving their guns, yelling things she couldn’t quite make out. She looked back to the water again and flinched when something brushed her leg.

  Come on, Archer . . .

  He broke the surface a good ten yards out and gasped, a pained expression across his face.

  “Dammit, Archer.” Relief rushed through her chest even though he didn’t deserve it. He looked like he was having trouble, so she swam out to him, grasped his arm, and helped pull him back toward the safety of the dock. “I thought you were fish food. That was the dumbest fucking idea you’ve ever come up with.”

  “Worked, didn’t it?”

  He hooked one arm around the pillar of the dock and paused to catch his breath. And that’s when she saw the blood running down his biceps. That panic formed all over again. “You’re hit?”

  He glanced at his arm and then wrestled his way out of his shirt. More shaken than she wanted to admit, Eve helped free him from the wet garment, then tied the T-shirt around his arm to slow the blood loss. But her stomach rolled as red seeped into the cotton.

  She swallowed hard and glanced up. The thugs had left the roof and were likely on their way down to the docks. Her brain switched to action mode. “We have to get out of this water.”

  He nodded, his tanned chest rising and falling as he sucked back air and pointed toward what looked like a ladder. “There.”

  She swam that direction and told herself she was a fool for being relieved he followed. He’d tied her up, drugged her, and then nearly gotten her killed with his Superman stunt. But instead of being pissed, all she could think about was the fact he’d saved her life. He could have left her tied to that chair in the warehouse when those men came in, but he hadn’t. Instead of offering her up to save his own ass, he’d put himself between her and danger. And he’d taken a bullet as a result.

  Water sluiced off her body as she climbed onto the dock and ducked into the shadows of another warehouse, wishing for her gun. Don’t be stupid, Eve. Archer hadn’t saved her because he cared about her. He’d done it because he still wanted answers. Answers she couldn’t give him. Not if she wanted him to live.

  They inched around the building, making their way toward the road that led to the Seattle waterfront. If they could get to the tourist area, they could blend in and find safety in numbers. These guys wouldn’t gun them down in broad daylight. At least she hoped they wouldn’t.

  An engine roared somewhere behind them.

  Archer grabbed her arm and jerked her back against his body into the shadows of the building. She gasped. Then his wet chest pressed against hers, and there was nothing but her dripping bra separating their skin.

  His whispered “shh” mixed with the warmth of his breath drifting over her chilled flesh to heat her in ways she didn’t expect. She looked up into those familiar hazel eyes and couldn’t help but remember the hundreds of times she’d looked into his eyes when they’d been in Beirut together. Heat arced between their bodies. A heat she couldn’t help wonder if he felt as strongly as she did.

  The vehicle sped through the parking lot, the sound of tires crunching over loose gravel echoing in the air. Long seconds passed before he wiped a hand down his face and nodded north. “We need to get into the city. They’re going to be looking for us. And then you have a hell of a lot of explaining to do.”

  Explaining. Right. Not if she could help it.

  She looked past the shipping yard toward the Seattle waterfront beyond, just now coming alive with light, and tried to think clearly. But her head was too full of memories and missed opportunities and lies that had finally caught up with her. “If we can make it onto a ferry without being noticed, they won’t know where to follow.”

  “The key word in that phrase is if. You’re not exactly dressed for Seattle foot traffic.”

  She glanced down at her open shirt, soaked bra, and torn skirt. She’d dressed the part for her meeting earlier today, hoping to coax out as much information from her contact as she could. While sleeping with an informant was out of the question, she’d never been against using her God-given assets to get what she needed. Today, however, the push-up bra and formfitting skirt hadn’t done a thing to help her cause. In fact, now they deterred them.

  And damn, there was something from that meeting she was forgetting. Something important she needed to remember . . .

  Her gaze strayed to Zane, bare-chested and gorgeous, even with that blood-soaked T-shirt wrapped around his arm. Neither of them was dressed for Seattle foot traffic, but she wasn’t going to let that hinder her. And she was determined to get them on that ferry, no matter what it took.

  She gripped the tails of her ruined shirt and tied them at her midriff. It left her belly way too bare for her liking, but at least her breasts were now covered. “Lack of appropriate attire has never stop
ped me from getting the job done.”

  Heat flared in his eyes. A wicked, knowing heat that told her he was remembering the night in Beirut when they’d been locked in that van together, running surveillance on a safe house where they suspected an arms dealer linked to the Taliban was holed up. And without warning, a tingle ran down her spine and shot between her thighs. She’d been draped in cloth that night—as was customary for women in the culture—and they’d been so bored, sitting there hour after hour after miserable hour with no movement, that he’d challenged her to a dare: to see who could break the other’s concentration first.

  She’d won, of course. She hadn’t even needed to remove the first scarf. He hadn’t seen her coming. But he’d definitely felt her, especially when she’d leaned over his lap and slid the zipper of his jeans down.

  Stupid move. Stupid risk to take in a country that didn’t value women. They’d been lucky they hadn’t been seen. Or that nothing had gone down at that safe house while they’d been distracted.

  If she were honest, she’d admit that night was part of the reason she’d walked away from Archer without an explanation. It hadn’t just been about her career. It was about the fact that when she was with him, she forgot what she was supposed to do and gave in to what she wanted to do. And for a woman in her position, in some of the places around the globe she traveled, that wasn’t just idiotic, it was deadly.

  Her cheeks heated at the memory, and a pain she didn’t want to acknowledge took up space in her chest.

  “Just keep up, Archer.” She headed for the parking lot as dusk turned to darkness, careful to keep her expression neutral and pick her way over rocks and leftover construction materials so nothing tore up her bare feet. “And try not to bleed everywhere. That, more than my shirt, is bound to get us noticed first.”

  “Beautiful,” Archer said at her back, his voice low and warm and so damn gruff she felt it all the way in her core, “it’s not your ripped skirt or my bleeding arm that’ll make us stand out. It’s those world-class breasts of yours. Damn things should have a warning label on them. We won’t get far with you dressed like that.”

  An idiotic warmth unfurled in her stomach. That he’d looked. That he’d noticed her breasts at all. A warmth she wasn’t going to give in to this time. They’d become unlikely allies for the time being, but that didn’t mean they were on the same side. Zane Archer had very clear right and wrong boundaries. He’d never understand or condone the things she’d done, but she justified them by knowing she was making a difference. A difference she couldn’t see today but someone else would feel tomorrow.

  Or so she hoped.

  The smartest move for her right now was to play along, not be confrontational, and then ditch his ass the first chance she got.

  Which, for her, was harder said than done. Because regardless of what he’d done, this was Zane Archer. The only man she’d never truly gotten over.

  “These breasts might just save your life. Watch and learn, Archer.”

  Zane’s arm was on fire, and his leg hurt like a son of a bitch. Somewhere between the top of that warehouse and the bottom of Puget Sound, he’d lost his pain pills, and he was cursing his shitty luck because in another hour he was going to be seriously hating life. More than he already was.

  He followed Eve away from the port and toward the pier, the two of them careful to stay in the shadows and dart into crowds whenever they could. They got looks—especially Eve in that Daisy Duke top and obscenely ripped skirt—but Seattle was an eclectic city known for bringing out all kinds. Though every car that sped by on the busy street sent Zane’s already-soaring adrenaline into the ozone. No way those goons had given up looking for them.

  Who the hell was she working for? She’d disappeared from the CIA a year and a half ago, after he’d caught her playing double agent in Beirut and told her to get lost. Since she’d screwed his mission in Guatemala, he’d been trying to find her, waiting for the moment to strike, but the woman knew how to disappear. She’d only just recently popped up on his radar.

  Shit, he should have turned her in back in Beirut. He knew that now—knew it then—but something had held him back. Something inside him that had wanted to believe she wasn’t the traitor she appeared to be. Guatemala had changed his thinking for good, though. And now . . . Holy hell, people had likely died today in Seattle—on American soil—all because of her. All because he hadn’t been able to do what needed to be done.

  This time was different. This time he wasn’t letting her get away. This time she’d answer for everything she’d done.

  She drew up short on the sidewalk in front of him, shoved a hand against his chest, and pushed him into the wall of a building. “Stay here. Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

  Before he could grab her, she disappeared into a tourist shop. His head was foggy, the pain messing with his reflexes. Just as he was about to go after her, she reappeared and handed him a navy-blue T-shirt that read I RODE THE SLUT (SOUTH LAKE UNION TROLLEY).

  “Here. Put this on.”

  He was still trying to process the fact she hadn’t taken off when she helped him drag the shirt on so it covered his wound. “Where the hell did you find money in that getup to pay for these?”

  She dropped flip-flops on the ground, slid her feet into them, and then tugged him back into the crowd. “I didn’t. Move fast.”

  Great. Now he could add theft to her list of crimes.

  He followed as she quickened her pace, gritting his teeth with every step that sent pain spiraling up his bad leg. Rounding the corner, he spotted Pier 52 and the ferries that linked Seattle with Bremerton and Bainbridge Island.

  She was right. A ferry out of here would get them far enough from the city where those goons couldn’t find them, but getting on one wasn’t going to be as easy as it sounded. Security guards roamed the area, peering into cars, stopping pedestrians. Of course security would be on heightened status after that bombing downtown. He scanned the area, then realized that could work to their advantage.

  He reached back for his wallet, but Eve’s hand on his arm stopped him. “No, don’t. Drenched dollar bills are going to get us stopped, and if those guys figured out who you are, I guarantee they’re now tracking your credit cards.”

  “We have to get tickets.”

  “No, we don’t. Because we’re going through there.”

  She nodded toward the passenger reentry gate on the Bainbridge side of the lot. Two security guards manned the entrance. One was talking to passengers as they passed in and out of the gate, and the other was searching a woman’s bag. Beyond the gate, cars were lined up, those of passengers who’d already bought tickets and were waiting to board the ferry that hadn’t yet arrived.

  “How the hell do you plan to get through there?”

  “With a lot of BS and my world-class boobs.”

  When he shot her a look, she added, “The kiosks don’t work, and they don’t give out tickets anymore. Security has definitely waned the past few years. Passengers park in line and then wander out because the wait can be up to forty-five minutes. Normally, there isn’t even anyone in the booth, but today they’re obviously being more cautious.”

  She’d clearly been in Seattle awhile. That thought didn’t settle his nerves. “So how—”

  The warmth of her palm against his chest rather than the way she tugged on his shirt cut off his words. “Just play along.”

  They waited in line until it was their turn, then stepped up next to the guard with the thin moustache manning the gate. Thankfully, their clothing had dried enough so they didn’t look like they’d just crawled out of the Sound. Eve turned a charming smile the Moustache’s way and waited as he focused on her breasts, squeezing her biceps at her sides, Zane noticed, to push them out even more.

  No way the guard would fall for that.

  Moustache stared a moment too long and, realizing his mistake, looked up at Eve’s face with a scowl. “Stamp?”

  “Oh, we didn’t get one.
” Eve’s brow furrowed, and she looked toward Zane, then back at the guard. “Were we supposed to?”

  “Only stamped passengers allowed back through the gate.”

  “In all the chaos, someone must have forgotten to stamp our hands.” She nodded toward the parked automobiles without looking. “That’s our baby-blue Volkswagen.”

  She rattled off the Oregon license plate number, then stepped close and gripped Zane’s bad arm, right above the makeshift bandage, rubbing that delectable breast against his skin in the process. Pain shot through his arm, followed by a heat that felt way too damn good.

  “We drove up from Eugene yesterday. We’re on our honeymoon. Davey here already got us in a little fender bender and dented the back wheel well when we parked over at Lake Washington to go jet-skiing, and it’s going to cost a fortune to fix. We’d hate to get stuck here in Seattle when we have a beach rental waiting for us. We just went to get a drink while we waited for the ferry. Can’t you make an exception just this once?”

  Moustache frowned, and when Eve let go of Zane and pushed her breasts out again, his gaze dropped to her cleavage once more.

  Dumbass. A major bombing only miles away and this guy had boobs on the brain instead of his fucking job.

  Eventually, Moustache looked from her to the other guard, then nodded for him to go check the vehicle.

  The ancient VW bug was parked six cars in, hard to see among the other vehicles. The second guard jogged over to look, then came back and nodded at Moustache. “Looks like they hit a pole. License matches.”

  Moustache eyed her again, from her flip-flops to her bare midriff and tied shirt, hovering a little too long on her breasts once more. After several seconds’ hesitation, he reached for a stamp from the window counter behind him. “Hold out your hands. And the next time you come through, make sure you get stamped before you leave, or you won’t be allowed back in.”