*
On the drive to Aiden’s, Jem had thought long and hard about the next steps, the “where do we go from here?” part of things. Besides having to practically promise Aiden his left fucking nut for possibly bringing danger to his door in the form of the OA—and possibly the FBI as well—Jem knew S8 would be less than thrilled if he brought Drea back into the fold, right at this moment, during what would become the most dangerous part of their current mission.
Aiden could handle two women living with him for the next couple of weeks, couldn’t he? And then Jem would finish the job and come back for her.
And yet, even as he thought that, his heart told him that was the absolute worst idea ever. Carolina seconded that now.
“I kidnapped her. Then got her kidnapped again,” Jem reminded her quietly, even though she didn’t need any reminding. “And now this.”
“It’s definitely been exciting, Jeremiah, but that’s no reason to keep reliving it.”
“I’m not … forget it,” he grumbled.
Carolina looked around to make sure Drea and Aiden were still nowhere near the small bedroom. “No matter how many times I lay out the facts to Drea—and trust me, I haven’t exactly put a spin on what’s happened to her—the heart is always going to rule over the head.”
“Fine, that’s great. But what if her heart’s not into this? What if she gets her memory back and remembers that I was just a convenient way out from under her near-constant OA supervision? What if I’m reading this wrong and all I’ve ever been to her is an escape.”
“Jem …”
“You and I both know that desperate times call for desperate measures.”
“And you and I also know there’s nothing convenient about you.” Carolina was serious. “You really want to know what I think?”
“No,” Jem said. “But that’s not going to stop you.”
“Definitely not, Jeremiah. You have to court her.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Court her?”
“Yes, court her. Be romantic. Take her on dates. Get her to like you. Because I’m pretty certain she does love you, but obviously you can love someone but not like her.”
“She’s being chased by feds and an MC. We’re on the run.”
Carolina waved her hands. “Details.”
Details. Christ. “Maybe she’s better off with the feds. If they see she’s got no memory, they won’t charge her.”
“Really?”
He threw his hands up in the air. “No, that would never happen—they’re playing both sides against the middle. I know that. But I fucked her up enough already.”
“She was a bit fucked up to begin with. Now you, you fucked yourself up.”
“That was my father’s side of the family,” Jem protested. “My momma’s side were just drunks.”
“Court. Her.” She stared at him. “That’s your only hope. And Jem? That’s not the same as fucking.”
Jem buried his face in his hands and groaned.
*
Go with Jem, Carolina was telling her.
Go where with Jem? Drea wondered.
Carolina trusted him, and she expected that would be enough for Drea. And partially, it was.
It was what you wanted the other night—time alone with him.
Yeah, when he’d made her put her shirt back on.
Wherever Jem would take her, she wondered if it would be more populated than this. They were truly in the middle of nowhere. The house, which was more like a well-made cabin, looked like a survivalist’s dream. It was well stocked, and she had no doubt that Aiden was paranoid as hell.
Which, in this case, she supposed was a good thing. Still, compared to where Drea had been staying, this place was a runner-up to the claustrophobia category, right behind the panic room.
Carolina’s house was so pretty, filled with beautiful things that made Drea walk on eggshells at first, scared to touch anything or walk too hard in case she broke something. Now she knew that Carolina’s pretty house was filled with beautiful things that were also deadly things. Most of the antiques could easily be turned into grenades at a moment’s notice. There were alarm buttons all over the place. Secret cameras tucked into many pretty bowls and trinkets. Guns stored in vases, knives stashed behind curtains. And Drea loved knowing that all she had to do was move a hand right or left and she’d find a weapon.
“I want a house like this when I grow up,” she’d told Carolina one morning over coffee.
Carolina had laughed as if that was the best thing she’d ever heard. “At least you know you’re not grown up yet. Tell you the truth, most days I feel like I’m not either. But the house and the weapons? That’s easy enough to pull together.”
“I’ll have time on my hands to do that—it’s not like I’m going to be able to work in a hospital any time soon.” Or ever, she thought morosely to herself. It wasn’t a pity party—simply the truth. It was going to take her a while to get used to that. “What made you decide to hide all these weapons?”
“I could say that I’m just extra paranoid, or that a woman living alone needs extra protection—and that’s all true. But most of all, I love knowing that deadly things can come in beautiful packages. We fool people, Drea. That’s why women make such good spies. What makes us terrible ones is when we fall in love.” Carolina had sipped her coffee with a faraway look in her eyes.
And now Drea suspected that the man helping Carolina was the same one Carolina thought of when she got that faraway look in her eyes. Was Aiden another spy? A military man? A civilian doctor? Drea guessed it really didn’t matter. But why were they living so far apart? Why hadn’t it worked out?
Because love wasn’t always enough. Those were her grandmother’s words—practical advice from a practical woman. If Drea had to apply it today, she would have to admit that she probably never truly loved Danny but rather used him for an escape. He was good-looking. Fun to hang out with. And good in bed. Outside of that, he didn’t make her heart flutter, at least not the way it did when she saw Jem or even thought about him.
“Drea, honey, can you come here?” Carolina called. Her voice sounded weak, but when Drea got to the small room she was staying in, she noted with relief that Carolina’s color looked better than it had even twenty minutes before.
“Do you need something?”
“You.” Carolina held out her hand for Drea to come closer.
Drea did and sat on the edge of the bed so she and Carolina could talk quietly and privately. “Are you going to be okay here?”
“Honey, I’ll be fine wherever I am. I want to see where your head is at.”
“I’ll let you know when I do,” Drea told her.
“That bad?” Carolina sighed. “I told Jem I’d slice him up if he hurt you.”
“Nothing like a little threat to make a man like you.”
“He definitely did not need my incentive to like you.” Carolina frowned. “What’s wrong, honey? I’m fine—you said so yourself.”
“I said you’ll be fine if you rest,” Drea corrected. “It’s just … I’m going to miss you like hell.”
Carolina froze and for a second, Drea wondered if she’d said the wrong thing, made Carolina uncomfortable. But then there was evidence of tears in Carolina’s eyes and Carolina took Drea’s hand in hers. “Drea, you’ve been a gift. I didn’t want to say that before, because of the circumstances, as I’m certain you didn’t see your memory loss as a good thing. But having you with me—it’s been wonderful. And I wouldn’t mind you staying with me, anytime.”
“I might take you up on that.”
Carolina nodded. “First, you have to take this journey with Jeremiah and see where it leads you. If it’s not right, my house is open. But if it is right … I expect visits.”
“I can do that.”
“And lots of phone calls, no matter what,” Carolina said. “Especially the nights our shows are on.”
“Definitely,” Drea agreed. Because she was pretty sure no one wo
uld believe that a former CIA spy was addicted to Real Housewives shows. Then again, Drea had gotten pretty into them herself.
“Good.” Carolina closed her eyes sleepily. “I consider you my daughter.”
“Did you ever think … ,” Drea began, and Carolina’s eyes shot open.
“About having children?”
“Yes.”
Carolina sighed deeply. “I did, Drea.” And then, just when Drea was trying to decide how to take that statement, Carolina continued. “She was beautiful. And she was taken from me far too soon. After something like that, it’s easy to take on danger. I was completely numb.”
“Oh, Carolina, I’m sorry. I didn’t know …” Drea thought back to the house. Were there pictures? Maybe they were in Carolina’s room, a place Drea never really went. It was on the third floor, and Carolina always came to Drea. Carolina never seemed to spend any time in her own room.
“It was a very long time ago.” Carolina looked up and her eyes went soft. Drea looked to where her gaze had gone … to the man whose house she was staying in.
Drea couldn’t ask any more questions, but obviously, there was far more history between these two than she’d realized.
“Andrea, it’s time to go,” Jem bellowed.
“Andrea my ass,” she muttered, and Carolina chuckled.
“You go with him and try to keep him in line.”
“Good luck to me, right?”
“If I could, you can,” Carolina assured her. “Because he was never in love with me.”
Drea’s mouth snapped closed before she said something pathetic like Do you really think Jem’s hung up on me? Instead she leaned in and hugged Carolina. “I’ll check in for the Tuesday night showing.”
“Good girl.”
Chapter Eight
Jem was waiting for her by the front door. Her bags were by his feet—Carolina taught her that you never left anything you might need behind, even if it seemed like it might be safe.
Life, according to Carolina, was all about the game of survival. If you played it well, you’d be just fine. And living with Carolina had taught Drea more than she’d ever wanted to know … taught her more than anyone else had ever given her.
Drea was never going to forget that.
Jem’s hair was rumpled—he’d been running his hands through it—and as she walked toward him, he pulled out a green bandanna and wrapped it around his head, catching all his hair inside it. It made him look dangerous.
It also gave her the briefest, oddest flash of something.
“Hey, Andrea—what’s going on?”
Jem was watching her, and she realized she’d simply stopped and stared at him. Well, that was embarrassing. “Sorry. Just …” She waved a hand in what she hoped was a casual manner, because she felt anything but. “It’s been a long day.” A long month. A long year.
“Are you all right coming with me?”
“I didn’t think I had a choice,” she blurted out.
“Do you want one?” he asked with a slow drawl in his voice she’d heard come through when he was talking sweet to her.
“I don’t know,” she whispered after a long moment of debate. “I’ve made bad choices in the past, Jem. You have to understand.”
“Yeah, I do. More than you know. I told you, the first time we met, but sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference between the good guys and the bad guys.”
“Was this when you kidnapped me?”
“Yeah, right about that time,” he said wryly.
“You know I believe you, about it being hard to tell. I also know which one you are.”
“I’m not sure I want to know what you come up with.” Jem smiled, shrugged a little, but there was tension in his shoulders.
She figured he was so used to playing the role of the bad guy he wasn’t sure how to wear the role of the good one. She was also sure he was a good one. “You know Danny and I were together for a long time, right?” When he nodded she continued. “I thought he was a good guy because he helped me escape from my parents, who were definitely bad. But predators usually find us when we’re at our weakest. They camouflage themselves well. I try to think back, tell myself that there had to be a turning point, that Danny must’ve been a good guy. That I didn’t have such bad judgment. But at that point I definitely did.”
“And now?” Jem asked.
“Now I know good from bad. I wouldn’t have asked to see you at all if I didn’t.” Jem nodded but didn’t look entirely convinced. “And I’m worried about Carolina.”
“She seems fine to me.”
“She is fine. It’s not that. It’s just … I got her shot. I’m, like, the worst bad luck ever. First to myself and now it’s, like, spreading or something.”
Instead of laughing at her or telling her she was crazy, Jem just waved his hand in the air. “She loves that shit. You gave her a new lease on life. Trust me—she doesn’t hold you responsible for anything. If anything she feels bad that she couldn’t protect you more thoroughly.”
“She saved my life.”
“Yeah, and she plans on keeping it that way. She won’t be satisfied until she takes down that entire biker club, single-handedly.”
Drea didn’t doubt that, given the right ammunition, Carolina could. She took comfort in the fact that she’d been able to provide Carolina with medical attention. Her body had taken over, her hands moving across the bullet wound by rote. It had been a relief for her to know that those skills were not gone or forgotten. Being a doctor had gotten her through some of the roughest points—Danny hadn’t wanted her to go to medical school, had done everything in his power to keep her in line, in town and in his bed. She’d known the only way to ever escape her mother’s fate—a teenage mom addicted to drugs and fucking whatever guy would give her money to get those drugs—the only way to escape her grandmother and then Danny was to educate herself. She really hadn’t thought through that Danny might not ever let her leave, that he was so invested in her that he would chase her down to the ends of the earth. He was a noose around her neck, a constant reminder of how stupid she had been.
Now she had a chance to fully escape. She wouldn’t let Danny or the FBI drag her back. “I need to go with you,” she said firmly.
Jem sighed. “Well, that’s a start.”
*
Jem was letting her drive the first leg of their trip. Drea was surprised by that, and more than a little happy. It wasn’t a motorcycle, but it was a powerful truck and she couldn’t wait to get in and put some speed to it.
She’d lost pretty much everything she’d owned, mostly clothes, which Carolina had replaced easily. But Drea’s bike, her prized Harley, was in storage in a secret facility that Carolina had promised her was secure. Drea missed riding badly enough that she almost asked Jem if they could buy a used bike when they got where they were headed. But she didn’t know where they’d be or what they’d be doing, so she contented herself with the fact that Jem let her drive his big bulletproof truck.
She had the radio on pretty loud too, although it didn’t seem to bother Jem, who slept right through it. Actually, he’d been asleep before she got down Aiden’s long driveway. How he did that, she had no idea.
And he’d already programmed the GPS and told her to just follow it and if she happened to notice a tail, give him a shove.
Yeah, she wanted to give him a shove all right, but with the wind blowing in her hair from the open window and a newfound sense of freedom, she was feeling remarkably mellow. Considering the circumstances, she couldn’t remember the last time she’d been this calm.
Finally, about three hours into the trip, Jem woke, turned to her sleepily and asked, “Did you stop and get me food?”
“You’re really kind of a princess, aren’t you?”
Jem roared with laughter. Slapped his knee.
“Why didn’t you sleep with me?” she asked, and sure enough, that got him to stop laughing. He shifted in his seat as though he didn’t want to answer.
After several moments, he said, “You have no idea how badly I wanted to.”
“And now?”
“You have no idea how badly I want to.”
She hid a smile as she stared out the window at the open road in front of her. For now, that was more than enough. “Where are we going?”
“To the rest of the Section 8 crew.”
“Oh.” Her fingers tightened on the wheel and the calm she’d felt dissipated.
“They’ll help to keep you safe,” he assured her. “And normally, I wouldn’t be bringing you on a mission—not like this, anyway—but we’re in the middle of something. A job that’s important.”
Wow. It must be really important if he was actually bringing her along. Or maybe he just felt guilty. She glanced over at him. “Are you doing this because I don’t remember what happened on the last mission?”
“Partially yes. I mean, I know you know what happened to you, but knowing it and remembering it are two different things.”
“You think if I remembered it, I wouldn’t go on this?”
“Maybe not.”
She couldn’t deny that. After a brief stop, they were back on the road, with Jem driving. A few moments later, she asked, “So, what kind of mission were you guys on?”
“Kidnapped daughter of an ambassador.” Jem was tapping the steering wheel with his thumbs a few times as they rolled through traffic. “The girl we’re rescuing now is seventeen, and she was taken right before her parents fled the country. So now that her parents are safely home, the United States won’t negotiate with the kidnappers, so they didn’t have another choice.”
“And Section 8 negotiates with terrorists?”
“If by negotiate you mean burn the motherfuckers down and rescue the girl, sure, we negotiate.”
“I wish I could tell the parents that their daughter’s in the best hands possible.” And she meant it, truly. When she glanced at Jem, he kept his eyes straight ahead on the road, but his hands were wrapped tightly around the steering wheel. So much guilt. “So, are you sure it’s okay with the others that I’m coming with you?”
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