Mirror Me

by Stephanie Tyler

  He’d avoided the movie version because he’d lived it. Wasn’t sure how to feel about having his name touted as one of the greatest Special Forces Operators. He took his job seriously. Had saved a lot of people, but he sure in hell hadn’t done it for the small burst of glory the publicity had afforded him.

  His town had gathered around him, protected him from press. But his locale, his face, everything was still shrouded in secrecy, so no reporters ever came to him. For that, he was grateful.

  “You’re thinking loudly.”

  She was staring up at him, an arm tucked under her head, the sheet barely covering her.

  “Sorry.”

  She glanced over to the night table. “I guess I shouldn’t have read that.”

  “No rule saying you can’t.”

  “It upsets you.”

  “Sometimes,” he agreed, and decided not to ask her about the abuse. Not tonight. Maybe not ever.

  Maybe she’ll bring it up to me when she’s comfortable. Although she looks decidedly so.

  “Were you kicked out of the Army?”

  “No, I took retirement early on the strong rec of the shrink. I think it had something to do with me saying I wanted to kill every motherfucker out there.”

  “You did that on purpose.”

  He shrugged. “I needed out. Better that I was on my own. I could do less damage that way.”

  “I do know what you mean.” In the moonlight, Kayla’s eyes glowed, a little wet, but she didn’t seem exactly sad. “This is the first time I’ve been in the dark in forever.”

  He took pride in that. “Dark’s not so bad.”

  “It’s not, now that my eyes have finally adjusted.”

  “You can gain a big advantage in the dark,” Teige told her.

  “You already took that advantage.”

  “Yeah, that’s not what I’m talking about.”

  “I didn’t say I minded.”

  It was what he’d been hoping to hear. She didn’t appear to have any regrets, but he’d know more next time he came to town.

  “Why did you stay with Diane for so long?” she asked now.

  “I don’t know. She’s not a bad person. We’re bad for each other.”

  “She’s bad. You’re punishing yourself by being with her,” she said.

  Could it really be that simple, he wondered. Maybe Diane was punishing herself too. He didn’t know much about her past, because she refused to talk about it. She never wanted gentle and he never thought himself capable of it, but maybe he was. Kayla seemed to bring it out in him, even as she sought his dominance.

  She would push him to his limits, even as she explored hers. That excited him, more than he’d been in years.

  “How, Teige?” she asked quietly. “How did you know what I’d want?”

  “I knew what you needed. It might not always be what you want. Sometimes, it’s in direct opposition.” He stroked a finger under her chin and she shivered at his touch. “Giving up control doesn’t make you weak. It’s the opposite, really, but most don’t ever understand that. You do.”

  *

  Kayla lay next to him, rubbed her wrists, not wanting to admit she liked the way the red marks looked on them and realizing she just had. She blushed when she thought about the way he’d tied her. The way she’d screamed for him.

  The way she’d had such a completely out-of-body experience after coming three times in the space of an hour. “I wish you didn’t have to leave again.”

  She wanted to ask where he was going, how long he’d be gone. Wanted to know if maybe, this time, he could stay in touch.

  God damn, she was needy. Instead of saying anything, she curled her hand around his forearm, feeling the rope of muscles strong under her touch. He was watching her, waiting for her to say something and when she didn’t, he said, “You don’t mind watching Hanny again?”

  “Never.”

  That got a soft smile from him. “She likes you. A lot.”

  “Can you stay for a while?”

  “I leave at o-dark hundred. Which means I need to get going. Can you go back to sleep?”

  “I’d need you here for that.”

  He started at that but he didn’t pull away from her. She wondered if she’d ever be able to control her words around him and decided no, that she was decidedly out of control in his presence.

  *

  She heard Teige’s truck start, and so did Hanny, who jumped up and watched out the window. Kayla waited until Hanny came back to her and curled around her legs protectively.

  They’d had more sex—much more—after a quick and frank discussion when they were both panting with need, about how often he was tested…and how long it had been since she’d been with anyone. About how she was on the pill anyway, for many different reasons unrelated to sex, like the migraines. And they’d done away with the condoms.

  She waited an hour before finally calling Abby, unable to avoid it any longer.

  When Abby answered, Kayla simply asked, “Who was she?”

  A pause, and then, “A juror. From the original trial.”

  “How would Mara find that out?” she demanded.

  “She shouldn’t be able to,” Abby admitted.

  But that had never stopped her before. Nothing stopped Mara. And there was no way this was a coincidence. “There’s something else you’re not telling me.”

  “There’s a second female juror missing.”

  She rubbed her arms. Couldn’t tell if the original feeling about Mara was centered on both women or not. She wasn’t sure what terrified her more—the fact that she was possibly losing her bond with Mara…or that she wouldn’t ever lose it. “You weren’t supposed to give me that information.”

  “You’re right.”

  “So why did you?”

  “I think you have a right to know,” Abby said simply.

  ‘Thank you’ seemed the wrong response so Kayla nodded, like Abby could see her.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Abby caught some sleep on the cot in the back room, woke around four in the morning, showered and put on fresh clothes she always kept in her locker. Hair still wet on her shoulders, she grabbed some coffee from a fresh pot the night staff made, sugared it enough to keep her flying for hours and checked her phone and email for the millionth time.

  Nothing from Ethan.

  Nothing from Kayla.

  She couldn’t help but wonder if nothing was better than a something she didn’t want to hear. She’d learned that no news was good news, but that didn’t necessarily apply in Ethan’s case. And maybe not in Kayla’s either.

  She threaded through the office, noting that the skeleton crew was winding down. Finishing up paperwork. Music played softly from one corner of the room and most used desk lamps, opting to turn off the harsh fluorescents above.

  Nighttime here had a whole different rhythm to it.

  These days, no one asked Abby if she ever went home—she appreciated that the teasing had stopped. They seemed to respect that she was this devoted to her job. At least that’s what she told herself. In reality they probably felt sorry for her and she couldn’t face that.

  But she also couldn’t change it. There was no time off for Abby. Hadn’t been as long as she’d made this job her life.

  She rifled through her desk, finding the familiar paper enclosed in the evidence baggie. It was supposed to be in the folder, but she wouldn’t place it there until the case had been closed.

  The note she held now had come in an hour before the phone call, too late for her to make any connection.

  Hoss. I like the name. He seemed nice. Claire liked him. And he ended up liking me…really liking me.

  Killing him was easy. He didn’t see it coming. Didn’t recognize me. Crazy, right? How could he not recognize me?

  I don’t want to kill. I have to. Claire knows it too. She can feel it when it’s too much for me. Ask her…I know she felt this one.

  She had.

  Abby put the baggi
e back into the drawer—it had already been vetted for fingerprints. Mara hadn’t bothered to hide them.

  She sipped her coffee as she stared at a map of the city where the juror’s body had been found. Did that until the sound of the security beep made her look up.

  Someone was coming through the door. She saw the flash of a badge and figured it had to be her new partner.

  At first she thought he was early, and then realized that hours had passed and it was nearly eight. She’d lost track of time, allowed morning to sneak up on her.

  He was dressed in all black—jeans, T-shirt under a leather jacket that looked worn enough to tell her he was the real deal in it, not just a poser. The black, heavy motorcycle boots confirmed the sounds of a loud motorcycle that’d pulled up outside moments before he’d walked in. No helmet, unless he’d left it outside.

  Instead, he carried a small, zippered case that looked like it held no more than a laptop and some files.

  Lena, the secretary, was flirting with him. Abby could tell by the tilt of the woman’s head, but Jacoby Razwell was already staring over Lena’s shoulder directly at Abby.

  “Maybe because you’re staring him down,” she muttered, brushing through her air-dried hair with her fingers self-consciously. She took a sip of her coffee, refusing now to stop looking just because she’d been caught.

  He had messy, dark hair, dark eyes. Brooding. Like a goddamned rock star instead of a US Marshal and maybe she should’ve done some kind of background check on him. She’d wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt, she told herself.

  In truth, she figured since he’d only been with the marshals for a year, he was too new for him to be anything but the fucking new guy.

  Lena turned and pointed toward Abby. Jacoby nodded at Lena and walked in a missile-straight line toward Abby, who remained with her ass perched half on the corner of her desk as she finished her third cup of coffee of the morning.

  He extended a hand and she took it and gave a firm shake. “Abby Daniels.”

  He opened his mouth to introduce himself but “Hey, Raz,” came from behind him and Clive was patting him on the back. “Didn’t think we’d see you in this office—you were headed for the big time.”

  “Big time’s not all it’s cut out to be,” was Raz’s answer, his voice low and gravelly, a smoker’s voice, although he smelled like fresh air instead, and Abby tucked that information about the big time away carefully.

  Who the hell had they paired her with—someone who’d been kicked out of the main offices?

  He didn’t seem all that concerned she’d heard the exchange. His expression remained placid as he looked between her and Clive, and Clive talked a little about how the office ran and Abby’s experience.

  “I’ve heard nothing but good things about Marshal Daniels,” Jacoby said and she gave a curt nod. She wasn’t going to give him an inch—not yet.

  Everyone had something to prove. She needed to see just how much—and how far—Jacoby Razwell was willing to go.

  “I’ve read up on our witness,” he said, pulling out a folder and a small laptop from the bag. “Any leads on Mara?”

  “The last killing took place in Arizona. She could be anywhere. Never kills in the same county, never mind state.”

  “How’s she supporting herself?” Jacoby’s question seemed more like he was talking to himself than to her, but it was something she’d often asked herself.

  “We’re suspecting she’s using stolen social security numbers to collect disability or get jobs.”

  He considered that for a moment. “Maybe she’s running scams on men.”

  “She’s pretty enough—but also notorious.”

  “Maybe it’s part of the thrill.”

  She considered that, then reminded him, “It’s our job to keep the witness safe, not profile Mara.”

  “And that’s why you’re looking at a map of the county Mara was last spotted in.”

  “Touché,” she muttered. “It’s been a long time since I had a partner.”

  “And you didn’t want a new one. I figured that. Have you looked me up already or are you going to hear it from me first?”

  She pointed to her computer. “Want to check my search history?”

  But Jacoby was suddenly more interested in his phone. “You might want to make your check-ins on your witness a little more thorough. She punched a local,” he informed her.

  “Wait, what?” Abby demanded. “And why’s she only my witness?”

  “When she does shit wrong, she’s mine?” Jacoby asked and Abby nodded. He sighed. “She hit a local—some chick named Diane.”

  Abby groaned. She’d heard Teige alternately bitch and moan about Diane more times than she cared to remember. She guessed that Diane tried to make a police report…and that it got kicked right through to the marshals’ office.

  “Think we need to pay her a visit?” Jacoby continued.

  “Which one?”

  “Your witness.”

  Abby rolled her eyes. “She checked in. An ‘okay’ test an hour ago.”

  “And the police report was filed about a minute later. I called the station and made sure there was no meet and greet, but Diane wants a restraining order.”

  Shit. What the hell had Kayla been thinking?

  “Has Kayla seen a therapist?”

  “Yes, when she was first in protection. A little more with Hoss, but not lately. It’s not unlike Kayla to fight, though. She wasn’t exactly a model teen.”

  “Right.” Jacoby frowned. “On paper, she looked way more like the candidate most likely to commit a violent act.”

  “Can’t judge a book,” she said hollowly, her fingers brushing across her iPad to find no check-in from Ethan. The disappointment must’ve shown clearly on her face, because Jacoby asked, “Waiting for news?”

  “It’s all I do.”

  “Sounds like you resent it.”

  She glanced up at him. “You won’t get an argument from me.”

  Jacoby motioned to the iPad. “Come on—you haven’t eaten yet. Let’s grab some breakfast.”

  “I—”

  “We’re partners. Getting to know each other is imperative.”

  He left no room for further argument.

  *

  The newest job wasn’t driving supplies through IED-ridden land, which was a combination of Russian roulette meets Frogger. No, this one concerned getting a businessman out of the hands of Mexican kidnappers. It was pretty much the national business, second only to drug dealing.

  And even though Teige had already extracted the businessman—Dale Harrison—and killed the guards quietly enough, getting Dale out of Mexico would prove to be more difficult. It would require at least a week, if not more, of hiding in safe houses, letting things die down before smuggling him back out of the country. The guy was a billionaire and the kidnappers wanted their money—and if they couldn’t have their money, they’d use the guy’s dead body as a warning to other businessmen that they weren’t fooling around. To top it off, they had contacts at the border, which meant an illegal exit was also in the cards.

  Nothing in this place was safe—everyone could be bought for the right price, although Teige supposed he could say that about anywhere.

  That hit home harder when he’d stumbled back to the waiting truck with Dale and discovered that Kirby—former Army Ranger and his lookout—had been shot and killed. Most likely a robbery and nothing to do with the kidnapping. But it necessitated wrapping Kirby up and putting his body in the back—Teige would find a place to bury him, because hell, he couldn’t take a dead body across the border. His boss would have to send someone in to retrieve it.

  He said a short prayer before he loaded Kirby into the back of the truck. It shouldn’t have mattered, but it always would. He didn’t want to cop to the fact that it was just possible that his whole career was based on a lie—the fact that he could turn his emotions off, that he believed war wasn’t personal.

  Tonight, for t
he first time, he admitted that he knew better.

  He leaned into the passenger’s side window to check on Dale. The guy’d pissed his pants, and Teige pretended not to notice. But once they parked, he clapped a hand on Dale’s shoulder to move him forward, spilling a bottle of water across both their laps so no one would know. Both of them smelled to high heaven anyway. Dale’d been captured for four days, held in a stifling cell, and Teige spent the better part of two days lying in the same position, waiting for his break.

  This was his last black ops job. Maybe he wouldn’t stick to that internal proclamation, but at this moment he truly fucking believed it.

  He was done. He’d find something mindless to do, like train future Deltas or bodyguard. Anything but this merc-for-hire shit. It was killing him. Maybe it always had and he hadn’t realized it.

  Maybe he was just like his goddamned father.

  He’d grown up with an odd sense of violence—it was all around him, the periphery of his life—but it hadn’t touched him. Yet. The statistics were there. He watched his father investigate horrific things and knew it was only a matter of time before the claws of something dark and deep reached out to harm his family, no matter how much Mom tried to cocoon them.

  But after she died, the violence consumed their father and overwhelmed Teige to the point where he knew he had no choice but to jump in and swim. For years he did, immersed himself in his father’s work, let the violence batter him from the inside out until he was bleeding. Raw and vulnerable.

  He knew that if he didn’t drag himself away, he’d drown. His father was sinking into the abyss and had refused Teige’s hand to help him climb out.

  That obsession had killed him as sure as another man’s hands. By then, Teige was already ensconced in the Army, through Ranger school and in the process of being considered for Delta Force training, although he hadn’t known that at the time. Thankfully, he’d had that to sink into with a single-minded drive that got him through the grief and rage, lasering his focus sharp and narrow.

  Delta saved him—and he’d needed saving.

  But his mother’s words still rang in his ears. You have to use the gifts you’ve been given.