It was only a matter of seconds before they came back into the station.
Lucky was too far away to read their lips, but their expressions and gestures as they spoke to their friends were obvious. They didn’t like the way the 4:48 smelled.
Back to the desk, back to the clerk. Pointing toward the bus, talking, talking.
The ticket clerk shook his head, shrugged, pointed to the bus driver, a handsome young Mexican-American man who smiled at the women. And just like that, the mood changed from indignant to a little less uptight. Everyone flirted a little bit. The women explained about the smell—complete with the gestures, but with smiles, too, this time—and the driver nodded, flexed his pecs, straightened his shoulders and disappeared around the side of the bus.
The women hovered, fixing their big hair, adjusting their bras beneath their shirts, moistening their lips, waiting for their hero’s return.
One minute turned into two into three…and then he was back, holding what looked to be a torn suit jacket between one thumb and forefinger, and…
A black plastic trash bag…?
“Oh, damn,” Lucky said, scrambling out of the van. He ran into the bus station, ran past the women and the driver, out the side door and around the waiting bus.
The door was open, and he launched himself up and into it and…
The bus was empty. It was absolutely empty.
He searched it, rushing all the way to the back, but the foul-smelling woman in the big blue dress wasn’t on the damn thing.
He swore again, taking the stairs off the bus in a single jump, heading back into the station.
The driver had set the plastic garbage bag next to the overflowing trash can, and Lucky grabbed it, opened it and…
A giant blue dress. Little lacy ankle socks. A baseball cap. Old magazines, and a fine collection of rags.
And—all the way at the bottom—the key to locker number 101.
Wes had come inside, and he watched as Lucky grimly took the key and opened the locker.
Empty.
Mitch’s so-called “bag of tricks” was gone.
“Son of a bitch!” Lucky swore. “Son of a bitch!”
The foul-smelling woman had been Mitch Shaw.
There was no point looking for him. A man who’d been trained in covert ops like Mitch would be long gone. Or hidden so completely even Lucky and Wes wouldn’t find him.
Wes followed Lucky back to the van, climbed in silently.
“He looked right at me,” Lucky fumed, as he started the engine. “He had to have recognized me. I mean, he knows me, we’ve sat in meetings together. What the hell is going on?”
“We have to call the captain,” Wes said quietly. “I don’t know, Lieutenant, but maybe we’ve got to stop thinking about Mitch as one of us, and start thinking of him as the enemy. If he has sold out…”
Lucky nodded. This wasn’t going to be easy. Damn, telling Joe Cat that he’d let Shaw get past him wasn’t going to be easy, either. “I never thought I’d say this, but I’m going to recommend to the captain that it might be time to get FInCOM involved.”
Becca drove north along state roads as the sun sat low in the sky.
Mish sat in silence next to her, the leather bag he’d found in the bus station locker at his feet.
He hadn’t said more than twenty words to her since she’d dropped her little bomb back in the motel room. And two of those words had been an apology. Becca shook her head. She’d told him that she loved him, and his response had been I’m sorry. Still, she supposed that was a good thing. She didn’t know what she would have done if he’d told her he loved her, too. It was too terrifying to consider.
The truth was, she didn’t want him to love her, too. Even if he’d been just a normal ranch hand, just a regular guy, even if he hadn’t come to her with amnesia and a bullet wound—yes, even a priest’s collar—she wouldn’t want him to love her, too.
Love was too risky. It was too uncertain. When she planned for her future, she didn’t want to leave that great big unknown black hole of uncertainty gaping out in front of her, the one with the caption under it that read: What If He Stopped Loving Her?
Mish was sorry that she loved him, and she was sorry, too. But at least she knew what her future held in store for her. She knew that sooner or later—and probably sooner, from the way things were going—Mish would leave. And she would miss him. She already missed him. From the moment she’d seen that collar, their relationship had changed drastically, and she missed feeling free to touch him, to take his hand, to look into his eyes and dream about the night to come.
But there was no way she would do that now, not without knowing for sure who he was, what he was.
Their journey together had come to an end, and soon—possibly in hours—they would part. And she would feel like hell for a few weeks or months, until the day when she woke up and found she could think about him without aching. Then she would find she could wonder fleetingly where he was, and smile at the way he’d briefly touched her heart and her life.
But before that could happen, before she let him walk away, Becca wanted to know the truth. She wanted to know who he really was. She wanted to know what was inside of that bag.
Back in the motel room, Mish had beat a quick retreat after his apology, telling her that he was heading to the bus station. He intended to find out if the key they’d found in his jacket actually opened a locker there. How he was going to do that without the men in the van noticing him, he didn’t say. He’d simply told her to meet him in two hours in the parking lot of the closest thing to an upscale bar Wyatt City had, over on the north side of town.
And then he’d left, taking his shirt, his jacket and that unmistakable, unforgettable collar along with him.
Becca glanced at him, glanced down at the bag at his feet. Supple, tanned leather covered a harder surface. It wasn’t a gym bag as she’d first thought. It was some kind of hard case. And it looked as if he’d had it and used it for a long time. “Is there a reason you haven’t opened that?”
He turned to look at her. “I’m afraid of what I’ll find inside,” he told her quietly.
Becca nodded, forcing her eyes back onto the road. “I am, too.” There was a pull-off up ahead—an old abandoned gas station, the garage boarded up. She slowed and pulled into the dusty, potholed driveway, the truck bouncing until she stopped and put the engine into park.
She didn’t turn off the engine. They both needed the air conditioner running.
She took a deep breath. “Mish, what happened between you and me…We’re the only ones who know about it. No one else ever has to…”
She could tell from his eyes that Mish knew what she was doing. She was giving him permission to turn his back on her, to deny that their relationship had grown beyond the physical—or at least that it had for her.
“If we both agree it never happened,” she continued, “then—”
“But it did happen,” he interrupted her. “Bec, I know you think otherwise, but I’m not a priest. The collar was just a disguise. I’m…good at disguises. I know how to change the way I look so completely and…I wish I were a priest. Because then at least I’d have more options right now. I’d have the hope of someday having you in my life. I could make a career change.” He tried to smile. “Take you up on your offer to teach me how to care for horses.”
Was he saying…? “You’d want that?”
“I want you,” he said simply.
Becca’s heart nearly stopped. She’d said those exact words to him, and she’d meant…
“But it won’t be easy to walk away from who and what I think I am,” he told her. “It might be flat-out impossible. And I won’t put you in danger. I don’t really know who the hell I am, but there are people looking for me, Bec. Dangerous people. And I want to be far away from you when they finally catch up with me.”
She didn’t know what to say, didn’t know what to do. He’d spoken of “someday,” implied they could have a futu
re.
Becca turned away, suddenly wanting that future so desperately, her stomach hurt. Oh, that was bad. That was very bad. She couldn’t have this man. And even if she could, she’d never wanted her happiness to depend on any one person. And yet here he was, saying that he would give up everything, if only he could, just to be with her.
“I know what’s inside this case,” Mish told her quietly.
“I haven’t opened it, but I still somehow know. I knew when I first saw it. It’s got a combination lock, but that’s not a problem because I know the combination, too.”
He swung it up between them on the bench seat.
“There’s a change of clothes inside,” he continued.
“Jeans and a T-shirt. Two clean pairs of socks. A pair of boots and extra laces.” He spun and set the combination, and the lock popped open. “My H&K MP-5 assault weapon.”
Mish opened the lid. Sure enough, the leather covered some kind of metal. This was no lightweight suitcase. This was heavy-duty. As Becca watched, he reached inside and took out something that was wrapped in dark fabric.
“And an overcoat so I can carry it concealed.”
The dark fabric was, indeed, some kind of lightweight raincoat. And inside it was…
An extremely deadly-looking submachine gun.
“Oh, my God,” Becca breathed.
“I’m not a priest,” he said. “I wore that collar as part of a disguise. Are we clear about that?”
She nodded.
“Good.” He smiled tightly. “No way am I going to have you spend the rest of your life thinking what we shared was any less than perfect.”
Mish set the weapon down on the floor at his feet. He pulled a tightly rolled pair of jeans out of the case, along with another, smaller gun in a leather shoulder holster. Clips of ammunition—enough to outfit a small army. Boots, as he’d said. Rolled-up socks. A vest of some sort. A medical kit. A passport.
No, not one passport—seven. Mish had seven passports. As Becca silently watched, he flipped through them. His picture was on them all, but each of the seven names was decidedly different.
Becca had to ask. “Do any of those names—”
“No. They don’t sound familiar. Not even the one with the Albuquerque address.” Mish loaded everything back into the case. “I knew,” he said quietly, “but I was hoping I was wrong.”
Becca shook her head. “The guns don’t prove anything. I mean, maybe you’re a…a…”
“A thief instead of a killer?” he suggested.
“A gun collector.”
Mish laughed, examining the machine gun before wrapping it in the raincoat again. “This weapon’s sanitized—all serial numbers and other identifying marks have been filed clean. Same goes for the handgun. And I bet if we look at the .22 I left back at the ranch, we’ll find the same thing.” He closed the case, spun the combination lock. “Apparently I collect illegal weapons, which is, of course, illegal in itself.” He set the case back down on the floor. “I want you to drop me at the next town and go back to the ranch.”
Woodenly, Becca put the truck into gear. First he was a ranch hand who didn’t know a damn thing about horses, then he was a hero who saved a young boy’s life. Then he was a man without a past, without the faintest clue who he’d been and where he’d come from. Then he’d been a priest. She’d been so positive he was a priest. But no. He was, in truth, some kind of master of disguises, someone who needed seven passports and seven names and three deadly guns.
And two extra pairs of clean socks.
The socks gave him away.
Mish wanted her to believe he was some kind of a monster, and maybe he had, in fact, done some terrible things in his past, but he was, first and foremost, a man. A man she had only ever seen act gently and kindly.
She held tightly to the steering wheel. “You’re going to Albuquerque to check out the address on that passport.” She knew him well enough by now to know he couldn’t let that go, even though it was probably just another false lead.
“Yeah. And no, I don’t want you to drive me there.” He knew her pretty well by now, too. “You can drop me at Clines Corners, but that’s as far as I’ll let you take me.”
Clines Corners was on Route 40, right where 285 cut up toward Santa Fe. He’d be able to get a ride to Albuquerque from there, no problem.
Becca glanced at the clock on the dash. They were at least three hours from Clines Corners. She had a solid three hours to convince herself that the best thing she could do for both of them would be to say goodbye and let him go.
She knew it was the right thing to do.
So why did it feel so wrong?
Chapter 14
The door opened, and the American leapt.
The assault weapon skittered across the floor, and Mish didn’t think. He just picked it up and fired.
A spray of bullets, a spray of blood.
So much blood.
“Good job,” the American told him through the blood that bubbled on his own lips.
Mish stared at the bodies, stared at what he’d done.
And on the floor, his father’s hands started to twitch. Mish backed away, but he couldn’t get far enough. He would never get far enough away. Thou shalt not kill.
The American’s voice was tight with pain. “Way to send them straight to hell, Mitch.”
Mitch.
He awoke with a start, drenched with sweat despite the truck’s powerful air conditioner.
The sun had set, their headlights the only light for what had to be miles around. Becca’s face looked ghostly in the dim glow from the dash. “You okay?”
He was still breathing hard, his hands shaking as he took his can of soda from the cup holder and took a sip. “Mitch,” he managed to get out. “My name. I had a dream…”
“Oh, my God! Mitch,” she tried saying it aloud. Laughed. “Mitch. Of course. No wonder Mish sounded so familiar to you.” She turned toward him eagerly.
“What else do you remember?”
Did he remember more than that one awful day? He tried to think back to the alleyway, to the man with the beard. But there was nothing there. No connection. He couldn’t even grab hold of his last name. It was out there, but just beyond his grasp.
He shook his head. “I dreamed about…About my…father. He was shot. Killed.”
“Oh, God,” Becca breathed. “Are you sure it wasn’t just a dream? Sometimes—”
“I don’t know, Bec, it seems so real. I’ve dreamed about it a lot, although I didn’t realize until now that he was my father. And it always happens the same way, as if it’s a memory. I mean, yeah, some of it gets weird, like I know my father’s dead, but then he stands up and it’s pretty grisly…” He took another sip of his soda, trying to banish that image from his head. “I think it’s more than a dream. I think some of it happened.”
Becca glanced at him again. “Were you…Did you actually see him—his body—after he died?”
“I think I was there when he was killed.”
“God, Mitch.”
“I was fifteen.” Mitch watched the lines on the road, brightly illuminated by the headlights but quickly fading into nothing as the truck moved forward into the night. How old was he now? Thirty-five was the number that came to him first. It seemed to fit. Twenty years since he’d first picked up a weapon and pulled the trigger and…
“Can you…tell me about it?” Becca’s voice was so soft, so uncertain.
And ended a human life.
Mitch looked at her sitting there behind the steering wheel. She tried so hard to be tough and strong, when in truth the past few weeks had been devastatingly difficult for her. But her resilience shone through. She looked tired, yes, but gloriously undefeated, and Mitch knew without a doubt that she wasn’t going to take Route 285 to Santa Fe and to the Lazy Eight when they hit Clines Corners.
No, she was going to stick with him. She was going to take him all the way, wherever he needed to go, and maybe even then some.
But it was only a matter of time before the gang in the surveillance van outside the Wyatt City bus station discovered that locker 101 had been emptied out beneath their noses. And it was only a matter of time before the search for him intensified.
And while Mitch still didn’t know what he’d done to spark a manhunt, he did know one thing without a doubt.
He was not going to put Becca into any danger.
Even if that meant disappearing into thin air the next time they stopped for gasoline. Even if it meant leaving her without an explanation, without even saying goodbye.
He didn’t want to do that. He didn’t want to leave her wondering. He’d given her so little as it was.
Can you tell me about it, she’d asked. And he knew that this was really all he had to give her. This small piece of his past that he remembered, this awfulness, this terrible thing that—he suspected—had helped shape him into the person he was today.
“Yeah,” he said. “I’d like to tell you. But it’s pretty intense, so if you want me to stop…”
“I’ll let you know,” she told him, and he knew that was the last he’d ever hear of that.
“I was fifteen,” he said again. “I don’t remember exactly where we were, but we were overseas, I think somewhere in the Middle East. My father was a minister and he’d recently won this position as part of a multidenominational peacekeeping group. It was a really big deal—he was so proud.”
It was strange. Telling her about it was helping him to remember. He could recall the open airport where he and his parents had first arrived. He could remember the scent of exotic foods cooking, the swirl of colors and people. He remembered his disappointment when the hotel they were brought to was a tall, modern building rather than something ancient and mysterious.
“We’d been there for about two weeks, when my father took me to lunch at the downtown McDonald’s. We were both dying for a Big Mac. I remember we’d ordered burgers from the hotel room service, but they were strange. My dad thought maybe they were cut with horse meat. And I remember my mother rolling her eyes, taking a bite and telling us it was just the local spices. But my father had the afternoon off, so the two of us took a bus from the hotel down to the market. He was…very charismatic. I remember he had everyone on the bus singing the McDonald’s theme song. And most of the busload of people followed us into the restaurant, too. Some American businessmen. A group of tourists—mothers and teenaged girls from France, I think.”
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