The Maze (ATCOM)

by Jennifer Lowery

  “What now?” Attie asked as they waited to see what was going to happen next.

  They didn’t wait long. After a few minutes, water began feeding back into the pool. At first he couldn’t tell what was being fed with it, but when Attie stepped closer and drew in a sharp, startled breath his gut clenched.

  The water swirled and churned with a handful of fish. What kind he couldn’t tell. Attie had gone very still and pale. He didn’t like the disadvantage of not knowing Santiago well enough to know what to expect.

  He knew Santiago as a terrorist, not the man as Attie did. Santiago was using these tactics to torment her. Not just physically. Emotionally. Each one meant something to her, took her back to the past. And Noah couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Hell, Attie wouldn’t confide in him about what really happened during her mission. His hands were tied. He sure as hell didn’t plan to find out by Santiago’s sick, twisted games.

  Staring into the pool, Attie asked in a low, tormented voice, “Have you ever seen piranhas feed?”

  “Only on the Discovery Channel.”

  “That isn’t the same as watching a pack feed on human flesh.”

  Noah stiffened.

  She spoke with venom. “They attack in packs, drawn to the smell of blood. It starts with a couple bubbles, like fish feeding near the surface of the water. At first you don’t know what’s happening and then you feel it. Little nips that sting and surprise you more than hurt. And then it starts to hurt as sharp, little teeth start to tear into your flesh, ripping it to shreds. The water churns and bubbles as the fish bite at you with their razor sharp teeth. It’s a feeding frenzy.”

  Noah’s stomach clenched. She’d said Santiago kept piranhas as pets. Sick bastard had filled the pool with them to torment her.

  “He made you watch?” he asked.

  She nodded, her eyes full of memories and loathing.

  “Bastard.”

  “Watching wasn’t as bad as having it done to you.”

  Noah kept his expression neutral. Attie was watching him, gauging his reaction. He knew the rest of the story was coming and he braced himself for it. He didn’t like the thought of that bastard hurting her.

  “Imagine yourself being a substitute for someone else’s crimes. Imagine you were Carlos and you just found out one of your employees was skimming off the top, but he wasn’t there to punish. You sent your thugs to pick him up, but it would take a couple days. Someone had to pay and a couple days was too long to wait. He wanted blood now.”

  “Yours,” Noah guessed.

  Attie stared at her hands, no longer speaking directly to him. She had gone back in time and taken him with her.

  “Yes, mine was a suitable substitution. He’d caught me wandering down the hall where his office was located earlier that day so he was already upset with me.”

  Gathering evidence. He hadn’t realized what price she paid for her assignment, but he was beginning to. The realization settled like a brick on his chest.

  “It wasn’t just that. Carlos lost control of his employee and he needed to regain ground. Control was very important to him. So he brought me into his private zoo and while others watched, made a small cut on my palm and held my hand in an aquarium filled with piranha.”

  Noah let out a low curse and raked a hand through his hair. Anger simmered inside him and made him want to wrap his hands around Santiago’s neck and squeeze until no life remained.

  “Let me see your hands,” he said, his voice rough with emotion he normally kept under tight rein.

  She hid them behind her back. “The wounds are healed, Kincaid. There’s nothing to see. There are hardly any scars. Carlos didn’t let them tear my skin, just nibble.”

  “Jesus, Attie.”

  One long stride brought him to her side where he grabbed her hands and pulled them out from behind her back. He turned them over, palms up, and traced the tiny, faded scars. He didn’t realize he was holding her so tight until she winced and tugged at her hands. He let go and took a step back.

  “Why the hell didn’t you put this in your reports?” he demanded.

  Attie reared back as if he’d struck her. “Excuse me?”

  “If I had known what Santiago was doing to you I would have sent Seth in sooner.”

  “That’s exactly the reason I didn’t tell you.”

  “Damn it. You should have told me.”

  “I handled it. There was no reason to tell ATCOM.”

  “What else did he do to you?” Noah asked his voice low and deceptively calm.

  “Drop it,” she warned.

  Instead of heeding her warning, he advanced a step. “I’m not going to let it go. I’m eventually going to learn every detail of what should have been in your reports and you’re going to give them to me.”

  He knew he was backing her into a corner, but he was too angry to stop. He wanted everything she had to give and, dammit, he would get it.

  * * * *

  Attie tilted her chin up a notch. “You don’t know when to quit, do you?”

  “I never quit.”

  Those softly spoken words were more of a promise than a threat, but they threatened everything she had worked so hard to forget. Noah was like a dog with a bone when it came to getting something he wanted. She didn’t want to remember that he was a man of honor and integrity who she had once respected and looked up to. She couldn’t see him as a leader who she would follow at any given moment. All of those things were in the past, along with her nightmares.

  Whatever bonds they’d had in the past were severed. There would be no starting over or going back. What he’d done to her, to Seth, was unforgivable. The second she forgot that was the second Noah would slip past her defenses and topple the walls she had so carefully built. She wasn’t willing to let that happen. Not by him or anyone else. She had survived Carlos’s onslaught and she would survive Noah’s.

  “What do you think you’ll accomplish? Do you think you can fix me?” she challenged. “Maybe we should call you St. Gabriel instead of MacKenzie. Isn’t he the one who usually fixes things?”

  Gabe had a special talent to fix things and people that were broken. He could smooth over rough waters and get things back on track with the ease and grace of the angel he was named after. Gabriel, the keeper of the gates, the protector. Though he humbly denied his title he continuously kept others in line and on the right track.

  “Don’t change the subject,” Noah said.

  She had to. This conversation hit too close to home. It made her feel vulnerable and she didn’t like that at all. She had been invincible before her undercover assignment, confident and sure of herself and where her life was going. Uncle Jed had been proud of her and she had been proud of herself. Now, as she watched the pool fill with piranha she realized how naive she’d been.

  She’d been ready to conquer the world and in the end it had conquered her. It forced her to retreat behind walls of pain that not even Brendan had been able to tear down. He had been there to give her what she needed, but he hadn’t gotten through and now she risked losing him forever.

  “I won’t do this now. Not with you,” she said, pushing the ache in her heart away. Brendan was alright. She had to believe Carlos hadn’t done anything to harm him yet. He knew she wouldn’t play his game if she thought otherwise. She held on to that belief and refused to let go.

  “When, Attie? When is a good time? It isn’t like we’re going anywhere.”

  “How about never?”

  “Wrong answer,” he growled and stormed through her walls by invading her personal space. He crowded her, his chest bumping hers.

  Fine, he wanted to hear it? Then she’d tell him. The parts that weren’t personal. “The piranhas were babies, they didn’t leave scars.”

  “Babies?” he repeated with a slight frown.

  “Too young to do much damage, but big enough to get his point across. He was training them at the same time he was training me.”

  Part of her wanted to t
ell him the rest, but her throat constricted. She couldn’t talk about it without reliving it. Why would he want her to relive the past? To torture her. She’d had enough of that to last a lifetime all over again.

  * * * *

  Noah clenched his jaw and remained silent. He understood what lesson she had learned that day without her having to say it. Santiago’s pride had suffered that day, but Attie bore the scars. A hell of a difference.

  A picture of Attie in one of her designer gowns standing in front of the aquarium, fear in her eyes as Santiago held her hand in the water and let his pets feed on her pounded through his head. He imagined her maintaining control, yet barely holding on as she endured. Not even a pack of baby piranhas had caused her to blow her cover.

  Realization hit him. Nothing Santiago did made her quit. Until now, he hadn’t realized what lengths she would go to in order reach her goal and why she was so angry with him for aborting her mission. By the time he had figured out something was going on, Attie had already endured too much to stop.

  Damn. By acting on instinct he had thrown away everything she’d worked for, and all for nothing. Looking down into Attie’s green cat-eyes he realized what he’d cost her. It dealt him a crushing blow. He’d thought he’d been protecting her.

  “Heard enough, Kincaid?” Attie taunted.

  Noah met the challenge in her eyes and slowly shook his head. He didn’t scare that easily. It was going to take a lot more than that to make him let it go. Camron would vouch for that, since he’d never been able to get Noah off his case when he wanted to know something.

  “Not a chance, Devayne,” he said, letting her know he wasn’t walking away.

  She wasn’t happy with his answer. “Why? Why are you doing this?” she demanded.

  “Because I care.”

  * * * *

  Attie took a stunned step back. Of all the things Noah could have said, this was the furthest from what she expected. How could he care about her? She had blatantly blamed him for Seth and her retirement, throwing her mistrust in his face. Done everything in her power to push him away because of her attraction for him. Part of her was missing. She’d spent the past six months trying to get it back without success.

  What did she have to offer a man like Noah? He knew her as an agent, not as a woman. What would he do if he discovered she had nightmares every night and heard Seth whispering to her when she slept?

  He already knew her past. There would be no explaining what she used to do for a living or what had happened in South American. What he didn’t know was what Carlos had done to her over the course of the months she was undercover. No one knew. Not Uncle Jed and not Brendan. She had endured, so why hurt them with the truth?

  They had seen enough when she had been rescued and taken to the hospital. She would never forget the anguish in Uncle Jed’s eyes when he looked at her in that hospital bed. She never wanted to see that pain in his eyes again. If she had to live with her nightmares, then so be it, but she wasn’t going to destroy the man who had raised her.

  Brendan had masked his pain in the hospital behind a wry grin and a joke or two, but she had seen past it to the despair he tried to hide from her. It had hurt him to see her like that and she saw the regret in his eyes. He blamed himself for encouraging her to become an agent in the first place and for not protecting her.

  She had never needed protecting, but Brendan and Uncle Jed had always tried. She loved them for it but always thought it misplaced. She had always been able to hold her own and take care of herself. If she told them what really happened during those months, they would lock her up forever and throw away the key. Then she would have to live with the pain she caused them. She wasn’t going to do that. She could handle this. Eventually, it would go away and she would be able to move on. Time healed all wounds, wasn’t that the way it went?

  Suddenly very tired, Attie dropped to the ground and rested her head on her drawn-up knees. She wasn’t prepared for this. She couldn’t handle Carlos and Noah at the same time. Noah’s thigh brushed hers as he sat beside her. The electric shocks she felt every time they touched were too much right now. What she really wanted was to be alone. Preferably back home in the barn.

  Noah’s shoulder bumped hers. God, he just didn’t know when to stop.

  “Hey,” he said.

  “Leave me alone. Please.”

  Silence. “I’m sorry.”

  Attie’s head snapped up. That was the last thing she’d expected him to say. The last thing she wanted him to say. It made her vulnerable. Made him seem more human than machine. It knocked her off balance. Not a good thing. She already teetered on the edge.

  “Sorry for what?”

  His eyes met hers and offered solace. No. Not falling into his trap. She tamped down the urge to lose herself in his steady gaze, and dropped her eyes.

  “For everything.”

  Her stomach clenched. She definitely couldn’t do this right now. It was easier to be angry at him. When he offered shelter from the storm raging inside her, she was lost.

  “You don’t even know what ‘everything’ is, so save it.”

  “Then tell me.”

  His eyes urged her to tell all and for a moment she almost did, but then she came to her senses and shot to her feet.

  “I can’t,” she whispered and walked away.

  He didn’t try to stop her this time.

  * * * *

  Noah watched Attie stroll over to the camera in the corner and look up at it, hands on hips.

  “Your pet is dead, Carlos. As you can see, we are not,” she called out. “What are you waiting for? Let’s get this over with. I’ve played this game before. Do you think it scares me?”

  Noah groaned. Nothing like antagonizing the enemy. His gaze slid over her. Her wet clothes clung to her slender curves like a second skin. Hard to believe she had spent months recovering in the hospital not long ago. He still remembered the shape she had been in when he walked inside that dark cell that day. It haunted his dreams.

  Absently he rubbed his shoulder where he’d taken a bullet that day. His reminder of what happened and of his mistakes. He should have done something long before. Then maybe Seth would be alive and Attie wouldn’t be retired and suffering. Hell, she wouldn’t have been tortured at all if he’d done things differently. He should have insisted she put more details in her reports. Dammit, he should have known.

  Attie wasn’t the only one who had nightmares about South America. He had woken up in a sweat more than once throughout the past year calling out her name. In his dreams he didn’t get there soon enough and she and Seth both ended up dead. He saw Attie broken and bloody, reaching for him, but he could never reach her and eventually she slipped away.

  He knew she would hate it that he dreamt of her as a woman who needed him and not a soldier. He hadn’t been there when she needed him, and for that he couldn’t let her down again. It was part of the reason he insisted on being the one to go after Brendan. He wasn’t going to fail her again. She may be angry with him, but he didn’t regret the decision. God knew what would have happened to her if he hadn’t.

  “…you’re going to have to try harder than that to get to me,” Attie was saying.

  “Atalanta, I’m not trying to get to you. That’s not what this is about. I’m simply entertaining a fantasy. So far I am very impressed with your performance.” Santiago’s voice echoed through the room.

  “And punishing me, can’t forget that part,” Attie said.

  “That too. Now tell me, what fun would all of this be if you were to fail this early in the game?”

  “If you’re not trying to kill us, then where’s our food and water? We can’t keep going without it.”

  “I work on a reward system, remember? You can’t have forgotten how fair I was to my employees. When the mice succeed I reward them. Keeps them motivated.”

  “And if the mice fail?”

  “Then they are punished.”

  “But we’re already bei
ng punished.”

  “Ah, but that is different. Imagine the possibilities.”

  Noah could imagine and he didn’t like anything he came up with. By the stiffening of Attie’s spine, neither did she. That didn’t stop her from taking a step forward.

  “Then I guess we won’t fail.” She had no intention of backing down or losing this game. And neither did he.

  “That’s the spirit. Now, your meal is being brought in. Don’t bother trying to attack my guards or I will be forced to express my displeasure on your brother.”

  Attie went ramrod straight. Noah rose to his feet and took a step toward her. She wasn’t in any immediate danger. He couldn’t stop Santiago from using Brendan to keep Attie in line.

  “Leave Brendan out of this, Carlos. I’m the one that betrayed you. Any punishment you have, you give to me.”

  Noah moved to her side, standing a mere step behind her.

  “Ah, Noah, showing your support, I see. The silent partner that always seems to be there when Atalanta needs you. Tell me, do you think she needs you now?”

  Noah felt Attie’s eyes on him, but he focused on the camera. “No, I don’t. She’s seems pretty capable of handling things on her own.”

  There was a moment of silence before Santiago spoke again.

  “Have you ever heard the expression ‘the eyes are the windows into the soul,’ Noah?”

  Noah didn’t bother to answer.

  “I see what your eyes are telling me, but what I want to know is, does Atalanta know?”

  Noah felt Attie tensed beside him and turn a questioning frown to him, but he didn’t look at her. He stared directly into the camera. Santiago was trying to get a hold on him but he wasn’t playing along. Let the bastard wonder.

  Attie turned to Noah. “What is he talking about?”

  “Nothing.”

  Her eyes narrowed. Some secrets were better left unsaid. Noah knew he was good at hiding his feelings, but Santiago’s comment made him wonder. Could the man see the attraction he felt for Attie? The thought didn’t settle well. The last thing he wanted to do was underestimate Santiago. Or give him ammunition.