Thankfully, his run-in with Mrs. Chan had deflated his erection. He didn’t have time to deal with annoying bodily needs right now.
In one of the other drawers, he found T-shirts and one pair of cargo pants, also folded. Jesus, Reece was anal-retentive. But at least some of his clothes had survived.
Once dressed, he checked the boxes. He hadn’t had a whole lot in the way of possessions to begin with, but anything personal had been destroyed. All that was left were the most innocuous knick-knacks of daily life. His coffeemaker sans pot, because of course he might have drank straight from the pot and left his DNA. A few more small kitchen appliances, but no other dishes or flatware. Some books he’d been meaning to read and had never gotten around to, but none of his movies because DVDs held fingerprints. Anything that could have been used to potentially identify him was gone. The paranoid bastards he worked for had done a complete erase.
He found an old duffle bag and packed his few remaining clothes. Unfortunately, it looked as if all of his shoes had also fallen victim to the apartment cleansing, so he had to face Natalie again. His boots were still in her apartment.
No set of spare keys. Damn.
Not that he’d be locking his apartment—there wasn’t anything left to steal—but it’d be great to have the keys to his Jeep and Harley. It’d also be great to know where both vehicles were. He usually stored his bike for the winter, but the people who did this to his apartment would have gone to his storage unit, too. The bike had probably been chopped up and sold for parts.
And he didn’t want to think about that because it pissed him off. That bike had been his only luxury.
As for his Jeep, he must have driven it home after he’d been attacked, but he couldn’t remember for certain. It was possible he’d dropped the keys somewhere between the parking lot and the spot he’d collapsed. If that was the case, he probably wasn’t going to find them. It’d be faster to just buy a new car. He’d been meaning to anyway, since the Jeep was on its last legs.
He finished searching the boxes and, finding nothing else useful, he grabbed the duffle. Took one more look around.
This. Was. Bullshit.
He stormed across the hall and started to enter Natalie’s apartment, but thought better of it and rapped on the door.
She opened it a minute later and tossed his boots at his feet. “Are you done moping now?”
Moping? He didn’t fucking mope.
He ground his teeth together and stuffed his feet into the boots without lacing them up. “I need your car.”
“Yeah?” She propped a hand on her hip. “That’s unfortunate because I’m not giving it to you. I told you I’d drive you wherever you needed to go.”
“No.”
She started to shut the door in his face. “Then I guess you’re not going anywhere.”
“Natalie—” He stopped the door with his foot and tamped down his impatience. What was it about this woman that got his back up? “Please.”
She whistled. “Ooh, that hurt didn’t it?”
That’s it, he decided. The sarcasm was what did it. And the fact that he was used to having his orders followed—even his brothers listened to him, usually after much bitching and moaning, but they always did as they were told. Not Natalie. She. Didn’t. Follow. Orders. And it drove him crazy.
“Jesus. I’ll take the bus.” If he caught the very next bus, he could make it to the airport before rush hour and rent a car. Either way, he was getting to Virginia today.
Natalie said nothing until he was halfway to the stairs.
“Dammit. Greer. Wait.” She chased after him. “Jesse said he doesn’t want you driving for a few days until your concussion heals.”
The mention of the word concussion made his head pound in beat with his heart. He swallowed back a sudden surge of nausea. “I’m fine.”
“No, you’re not. You just turned green.” She sighed. “I’ll take you where you need to go.”
“You can’t.”
“Why not?” she shot back. “It’s not like you’re going to some top-secret military base.”
Wow, she’d nailed that one on the head. He clamped down on the surprise and thought he’d done a good job of hiding it from his expression, but her mouth dropped open in shock.
“Holy cow. You are?”
“I can’t talk about it.” He sidestepped her. “And you’re not taking me.”
She ducked past him and blocked the stairway with her arms and legs outstretched. “Then you’re not going. Jesse said no driving.”
“I don’t give a flying fuck what Jesse said. Now either move or I’ll move you.”
“You will not—” Before she could finish the sentence he picked her up like a recalcitrant child and set her aside. She gasped in outrage. Feeling rather smug, he ignored the pain from his wounds and reached for the push-bar.
“Fine. Leave,” Natalie said behind him. “But I’m calling Reece and telling him you’re not missing anymore and that you’re purposely avoiding him because you plan to murder someone. How do you think that will go over?”
He swung around. She already had her cell phone in hand, and he snatched it away. “There’s a difference between murder and getting a bit of long-overdue justice.” He took the battery from her phone and pocketed it. “And I’m protecting my brothers by staying away. I’m trying to protect you, too, but you’re making it fucking impossible.”
Her lips parted in a soft, “Oh.” She stepped into his space, stood on her toes, and cupped his cheeks in her hands. “Jesse said you do that. Protect people. But, Greer, who’s protecting you?”
The gesture was so unexpected he didn’t know how to react. For a solid five seconds, he just stood there, staring down at her, trying to convince himself he didn’t want to kiss those lips and failing. He leaned down, caught himself.
Cursing, he stepped back, away from her reach. “I don’t need protecting.”
“Says the man I found unconscious in front of my door a few days ago.” Features set in stubborn lines, she crossed her arms over her chest and glared.
For the first time in his life, he realized this wasn’t a battle he’d win. If he left her behind, she’d do something stupid, like call Reece or follow him. Might as well keep her close until he found a way to shake her off his tail.
“All right.” He held up a finger when she gave a bright, triumphant smile. “But you’re only driving me as far as I tell you to, and then you’ll turn your pretty little ass around and go someplace safe. Do you understand?”
Some of the brightness faded. “What kind of trouble are you in?”
Greer shouldered his duffle and shoved into the stairway. “I don’t know yet.”
Chapter Six
He made Natalie drop him a mile away from the base. She hadn’t liked it. Had liked it even less when he waited and watched to make sure she’d pointed her ridiculously tiny Fiat back toward DC, before finally hiking it the rest of the way to base.
Stubborn woman. She just didn’t get it. She absolutely did not want to land on these people’s radar. They fucked up lives. They certainly had his.
The guards at the gate knew him by sight and surprisingly didn’t act shocked to see him. Then again, they wouldn’t have the kind of clearances to know he’d most likely been decommissioned. They let him pass without so much as a blink of suspicion, and he stalked to the administration building, where the man he’d come to see kept an office.
Sergeant Major Jeremiah Revly dropped a stack of folders when Greer entered the room. “Holy shit. You’re alive.”
He ignored the man and shoved into Lieutenant Colonel Bruce Chambers’s office.
“Greer?” Eyes wide, Bruce half-rose from behind his desk. The same place he sat when he made dumbass decisions that more often than not nearly got his operatives killed. Decisions that had nearly killed Greer not all that long ago.
As a matter of fact, Bruce kind of looked like a ghost had just walked into his office. “Good lord,” he wh
ispered. “You’re alive.”
“You sent cleaners to my apartment.”
Bruce and Revly exchanged a glance.
“Well, yes,” Bruce said. He waved Revly away, sank back into his seat, and scrubbed his hands over his face. “It’s SOP when an operative dies, and you fell off the radar after Syria. What else was I supposed to think?”
“You expected me to die there,” Greer said.
“No, I expected you to do the job and come back like you always have. When you didn’t…” He dropped his hands and stared at Greer for a long moment. “I mourned for you, son. I mourned for your brothers, too. I thought about going to them, telling them what I could, giving them a little bit of closure, but…”
Greer’s heart bungeed in his chest. “We had a deal, Bruce. You get me, and you don’t go anywhere near my brothers.”
Bruce held up his hands. “A deal I upheld. I’ve never talked to them, even after I thought you were dead. They still think you’re missing.”
“Good.” And he wanted to keep it that way, since he very likely wouldn’t survive much longer, one way or another. It was just easier if they never knew what had happened to him. Or what he’d done to make sure they’d survive.
“What happened to you in Syria?” Bruce asked. “You completed your mission and then just…vanished.”
Greer shook his head. It wasn’t something he was ready to talk about. Now or ever. He held out his arms. “As you can see, I’m not dead.”
“What about Williamson? Is he with you?”
A wrench tightened around Greer’s chest, and he dropped his arms. “Sergeant Dustin Williamson didn’t make it out.”
“Shit,” Bruce said softly. “Did you make sure his remains couldn’t be identified?”
“He took a mortar straight to the chest. There was nothing left of him to identify. Sir,” he added belatedly, bitterness coating his tongue. He suddenly hated this man, who sat behind this desk with an entire ocean between him and the horrors of war, and so blithely talked about desecrating a human body—a friend’s body.
Bruce rested his elbows on his desk and templed his hands in front of his tight lips. “Greer, we have a problem here. Technically, you’re a deserter.”
Yeah, right. “You gonna court-martial me and explain to the world just what the hell I was doing in Syria?”
Bruce said nothing more for a solid minute. And then another. Greer waited. If the guy thought silence would intimidate, he really didn’t have a fucking clue about the monster he’d created.
There would be no desertion charges, and they both damn well knew it. Most of the regular Army wouldn’t approve of the things they’d done—the general population definitely wouldn’t approve—and Bruce wouldn’t take the risk of it all becoming public knowledge.
“I should,” Bruce said finally. “This isn’t the first time. That whole mess last year when you sent mercenaries to rescue Zak Hendricks in Afghanistan? I’m still taking heat for that.”
Greer’s fists rolled into balls at his sides. “I wasn’t leaving him there. He’s alive today only because I went against orders.”
“He’s alive because your mercenary friends got lucky. And in the process, they all but handed a nuclear device to our enemies. It could’ve ended much, much worse.”
“They handled it.” And Bruce was trying to distract him. “Look, we both know you’re not going to court-martial me, so let’s cut the shit. I need leave time before you put me back in the field.”
Bruce’s eyes narrowed. “For what exactly?”
Revenge. “Shits and giggles. What do you think? I haven’t seen my brothers in months.”
“Good,” Bruce said, which startled him. He’d been expecting a fight, but the guy was nodding with approval. “I was going to suggest a leave. You have it coming and, honestly, you look like you could use it.” He indicated Greer’s battered face. “Do you need medical attention?”
“I’ve already been tended to by the best in the business. Prognosis is I’ll live.” For a little while longer, anyway. He changed topics. “I need a new set of wheels. Thanks to your cleaners, my bike was sold for parts and I don’t have keys to my Jeep.”
“Your bike’s fine.” Bruce cracked a smile. “I put it in my garage.”
The news left him dizzy, almost happy, though he didn’t let the emotion show on his face. Why he cared so much about the damn Harley when he hadn’t cared about much of anything for months, he didn’t know. Maybe it was just the concussion screwing with his brain. Or maybe because the bike was the one indulgence he’d allowed himself in his entire life. Whatever the reason, knowing it hadn’t been chopped up was a huge relief. “I want it back.”
“Of course. I’ll make the arrangements.”
“Thanks.” With that, Greer turned to leave the office.
“We really thought you were dead,” Bruce said behind him. “You could have walked away from all this, disappeared, and we’d never have known. Why didn’t you?”
For one thing, he had a killer to catch. For another…
He faced the man who was equal parts mentor and devil in his mind. “You would have known. Eventually. And I’d have spent the rest of my life looking over my shoulder, waiting for you to show up and drag me back.”
Bruce closed his eyes as if the words pained him. “Listen, son—”
“I’m not your son.”
“No, you are your father’s son.” He winced. “You’re a great soldier, Greer—but, I’m sad to say—David was the better man.”
The words were like a knife straight to the gut. “I’m exactly what I needed to be. Exactly what you made me.”
“Yes, I know.” Bruce heaved a breath, opened his eyes, and nailed Greer with a look that was full of regret. “I didn’t mean that the way it sounded. But your father never let his loved ones go without knowing he was safe. You need to talk to your brothers, Greer. They’re worried about you. Don’t leave them hanging.”
Greer didn’t bother with a response. He was almost to the door when the intercom on Bruce’s desk buzzed.
“Yeah?” Bruce answered.
“Sir, patrol spotted an unauthorized vehicle loitering near our perimeter,” Revly said.
“All right. Have the guards detain the occupants. I’ll be there in a minute.”
Greer swung around. “Is it a woman?” There was only one person stubborn enough—or possibly stupid enough—to hang out near a top secret base without prior authorization.
Bruce relayed the question and got a response in the affirmative.
Greer punched his thigh for lack of a better thing to punch. “Goddamn it.”
“Do you know her?” Bruce asked.
“She’s my neighbor.”
“Greer, Jesus. Are you out of your mind bringing her here?” His chair scraped back as he jumped to his feet. “Get her the hell out of here.”
“I didn’t bring her. She dropped me off and was supposed to go back to DC.”
“Obviously she didn’t.”
“It’s on me. I should’ve known she wouldn’t listen.”
They both reached the door at the same time, and Bruce held it open. “Yeah, it is, son. Get her out of here and make damn sure she knows she needs to forget anything she’s seen.”
“Yes, sir.”
…
Natalie glared at the two guards currently holding her captive in a room that looked like something out of Zero Dark Thirty. Did they torture people in here?
No, never mind. She really, really didn’t want to know.
It had been stupid to circle back to the spot she’d dropped Greer off. She knew it, accepted it, but Greer still had her phone’s battery in his pocket, and her phone was her only link to Andy at the moment. What if Andy decided to reach out, ask for her help? She needed her phone intact in case he did. She’d turned back hoping to catch Greer, and the next thing she knew, her car had been surrounded by guards.
How did she get herself into these things? She hadn’
t even been meddling this time. She’d only wanted her phone back in one piece. That was it.
The door flung open, banged against the concrete wall. A huge shadow filled the frame, and her guards snapped into salutes.
“Sir,” they said in unison.
“I’ll take it from here.” At Greer’s voice, she relaxed in the hard metal chair they’d cuffed her to.
“Yes, sir.” They filed out.
“Thank you,” she said earnestly when they were gone.
Greer didn’t make a move to uncuff her. “Are you suicidal or just stupid?”
She jerked upright. “Excuse me?”
“I told you to go back to DC. Go somewhere safe.” He finally stalked across the room and dipped a hand into his pocket, pulled out a key. Her cuffs released and clattered to the floor. “So what did you do? You turned around and followed me. Jesus.”
Rubbing her wrists, she whirled to face him. “I didn’t follow you. I tried to catch you because you still have my phone battery.”
“So buy a new one.”
“Do you think I have a magical money tree in my apartment? I’m working two jobs and can barely afford my rent. I don’t have $100 to fix the phone that you broke.”
He dipped a hand into his pocket and shoved the battery at her. “Now get the hell outta here.”
“Gladly.” Except she hesitated, her conscience not allowing her to wash her hands of this mess. Greer was going to murder someone. Whether or not that person killed his parents—well it didn’t matter because she firmly believed the whole “eye for an eye makes the whole world blind” thing.
Too Wilde to Tame (Wilde Security) Page 5
