Firethorn (Discarded Heroes)

by Kendig, Ronie

  “No.” Griffin leaned closer. “If he killed your family—what can he hold over you now?”

  “Everything.” She furrowed her brow. “Don’t you get it? He’s cutting anything and everything that’s important to me. At the club, he made that very clear. It’s why I escaped.” Watery eyes met his. “I have to bury myself. Every job I did was connected to him—so he’ll have eyes around the globe searching for me. I am not safe anywhere. My career is over. If he’s angry enough, I’ll be dead soon.” She slumped again. “Just as well. I have nothing left and nothing to go home to. They’re all gone. I have no one.”

  “You got me, Baby Girl.”

  Her eyes flicked to his.

  “Hold up,” he said. “I didn’t mean it like that.” He most certainly did mean it like that. But he was a fool to think anything could work between them. She was a spy—she’d go her way when things were over. “Don’t jump ship on me just because one slick Willy tries to play his cards. Just stick with me, see this through, okay?”

  Confusion tightened her smile lines. “Don’t you get it—?”

  “Yes. But do you?”

  Kacie drew back. “Do you have family, Griffin? People who matter to you, outside of this team you’re trying to salvage?”

  Dante rushed to the front of his mind. Then his mom…Venus…Like a mighty, angry river, the images tumbled over him. No, no, he couldn’t go there. He had to realign her with the mission. “All I’m saying,” he said, trying to navigate around the intrusion of memories, “is what we’ve got here is your freedom. You’re not—“

  “My freedom?” Her intensity caught him off guard. “Griffin, he killed my family, and you’re going to talk about freedom?”

  “But you’re free now; it’s not holding you back—“

  “How dare you! That’s my brother, sisters, mother you’re talking about. Gone!”

  Griffin settled back. Let her talk.

  “Up in smoke because that man decided I had outlived my usefulness, after all I’d done for him, all those years sacrificed. Doing things I abhor and things that could get me killed. Burning one person to save another…all because he had a noose around their necks. He bought my soul through them.”

  But as if they had been dammed up, the waters of the past stopped.

  Indignation colored her flushed cheeks. “I don’t know how you just did that.” She looked down, toying with a thread on her jeans. “What do you know about losing family, loved ones?”

  “Family is our core,” Griffin said, his thoughts jumbled by her vulnerability and the thinly veiled accusation. “People we love, people we’re willing to put things on the line for—they keep our honor intact because we know how we behave affects them. Every now and then we have to stop and take record of what they mean to us or they lose their value. We lose the will to fight for them.”

  “But they’re dead.”

  “Maybe.”

  She frowned.

  “He showed you pictures—of bodies?”

  Kacie’s face slowly shifted from distraught to disbelief.

  “Okay”—he held up a finger, not wanting her to get her hopes dashed again—“just hold that thought. And think. What if he just wanted you to think they were dead?”

  She shook her head. “Why?”

  “God knows, but…” In the dark, cluttered recesses of his past, a connection formed with Kacie Whitcomb that suddenly felt irrevocable. But she didn’t know about his past. Didn’t know about…so much. ‘Sides, this was about her and her family, her fight. “What would you do differently if they were still alive?”

  “I…I don’t know. Eventually, I planned to go back there, live out the rest of my life in peace.” She wrinkled her nose. “But that’s not realistic.”

  “Maybe, maybe not. What would you do then?”

  She shrugged. “Keep working.”

  Griffin grinned. “That’s it—he wants you to quit.” He wagged a finger at her. “There’s something he doesn’t want you to figure out.”

  Kacie dropped her chin. “What?”

  “Or maybe he knows I have enough data to put him away for the rest of his life.” She smiled weakly. “I took this job with your team so I could fund myself into retirement. I have plenty to incriminate Carrick. I just had to find a way out of his hold.”

  Dread drizzled through his brain. “Kacie…whatever it is you think you have, don’t do anything with it.”

  Again, she frowned.

  “He knows.” A bad taste rolled across his tongue. “That’s what he wants—for you to go public with it. To think you have nothing to lose, so you risk it.” He placed his hands on either side of her and pressed into her personal space. “He’s not through with you.”

  If she knew Carrick Burgess, he’d never be through with her. Not till she was a rotting, bug-infested corpse. Even then, he’d probably find a way to draw out the last drop of blood from her body.

  But Griffin…his intensity, his strength, his adamancy drew her like an arrow to the heart. Tripping and falling into the man’s gaze was stupid. Sitting here, in a high-speed train’s bathroom, practically nose to nose with the man and trying to form a coherent thought that was clever enough to buy her time and space, was impossible.

  Those brown eyes…rich, deep mahogany with flecks of caramel…

  “Stick with me, Kacie.”

  Fire had nothing on the heat that flashed through her knee when he set his hand on it.

  “Help me get my boys back and bury whoever did this.” He ducked, trying to capture her eyes again, but she avoided him. “I meant what I said. You got me. I’m not leaving you out in the dark. We finish this mission, and I’ll do whatever it takes to help you get this ape off your back.”

  She braved those eyes once more. He believed the words he spoke, which meant he was sincere. But deep down, she knew he was sincerely wrong. Nobody could get Carrick off her back in a permanent way. Yet…mentally, she traced the strong angles of Griffin’s cheekbone and wanted with everything in her to believe that someone really had that kind of power. That ability to sever the talons of Carrick’s hold on her life. If anyone did have that, it’d be the man standing before her.

  “What do you say, Baby Girl?”

  “Kazimiera.”

  His face softened.

  “My name is Kazimiera Faronski.”

  He smiled. “Nice to meet you.” His gaze dropped to her mouth, and though she felt the tidal pull of attraction, all she could remember was the moment when she’d tried to work him to get her way. He’d been repulsed. Was it because he wasn’t interested in her that way? Would he think that’s what she was doing this time? It felt like someone had a bungee attached to her chest, drawing her to him.

  His smile slipped as his head tilted to the right, his eyes tracing her lips. Was he seriously looking at her lips? His breath dashed against her cheek.

  A knock on the door severed the electrical current between them.

  Griffin hung his head, then pressed himself to the wall, misery contorting his face as he pried open the door. Taking the cue, Kazi slipped out—and sucked in a breath as Neeley stood there, glowering. She ducked her head and headed toward their seats.

  Despite having four hours in virtual silence sitting across from the matched set of musclemen as they made their way back to Greece, Kazi felt neither composed nor collected by the time they reached the safe house. Though Neeley hadn’t spoken or asked why they’d been in that loo together, she’d be a fool to think he didn’t know something happened between her and Griffin. In fact, she felt as if she were wearing a neon sign declaring their guilt.

  What guilt? You didn’t do anything.

  But she wanted to, and that thought alone made her cheeks flame.

  At the same time, Griffin seemed unaffected, talking to Neeley calmly. Even as they had grabbed a cab and headed to the airstrip, the men chatted as if nothing had happened. Griffin neither seemed inclined to touch her nor avoid her. Griffin remained stoic as alway
s, as if they hadn’t almost kissed. As if she hadn’t given him the most intimate thing she owned—her identity.

  Was it just me?

  Had she been so worn down and emotional that it’d been her imagination, that she’d naively believed he had an interest in her beyond this mission? Yes, she had been emotional. No, she didn’t believe she imagined it. Physical attraction to a man wasn’t something she battled, because snakes came in every size and package and she no longer weighed appeal with interest.

  True, Griffin Riddell had a lot going for him—handsome, big, muscular—but…it didn’t matter.

  Okay, perhaps not the complete truth. External appearances did matter, but not—

  “Kazi?”

  As if she’d been zapped into the middle of a conversation and location without warning, Kazi looked up. Griffin stood with Neeley and the general, waiting. “Excuse me?”

  The general placed a hand on her shoulder. “I will work to find the truth about your family.”

  She snapped straight. Her family? How did he know about them?

  “The others should be here any moment. We’re going to have a full house.” He pointed toward his wife, who was bustling about the kitchen. “She’s been baking since word came.”

  Behind them, a door opened. A sea of bodies pressed into the home. Involuntarily, Kazi moved up onto the first step leading upstairs. Then another as more people streamed into the home. How could so many people fit? Griffin rushed forward, pulled a young man into a strong-armed greeting. A woman’s yelp dragged her attention to where Neeley clutched a tall, beautiful woman to his chest, muscles straining as he held her tight. Her arms wrapped around him tightly as a small girl hugged his legs.

  “Daddy, we missed you!” the girl said in a squeaky high voice.

  “I missed you too, darlin’.” Neeley lifted the girl, then kissed her and the bald baby the woman held. Then he angled in and pulled the woman tight, buried his face in her neck. An intimate exchange that pushed Kazi’s gaze away.

  Suddenly, Kazi felt pushed to the edge of reason, of belonging. When was the last time she’d hugged someone like that? When was the last time someone wanted her, loved her so wholly?

  A woman with brown hair and matching eyes locked on to Kazi as she bounced a baby with a mop of black hair in her arms. Another woman with near-black hair and a newborn swaddled to her eased toward Lambert and hugged him. An awkward tension sifted between them along with quiet words. Neeley and his wife moved to Golding, then to the assassin Kazi had rescued. Tears spilled down the woman’s face as she hugged the man.

  “I am well, Lil—Piper.” Aladdin tucked his head in a quiet nod. “As is your husband, cousin. Be at peace.”

  She nodded, smearing her tears aside as the baby gawked at his mom, then reached for Neeley, who lifted the boy. Family. Love. Thick and deep. She’d know what that felt like if things in her life hadn’t been turned upside, ripped out, and churned.

  Something tugged at Kazi’s pant leg. She looked down.

  A little boy with black eyes and hair climbed up onto the step next to her. “Who are you?”

  Nobody.

  The woman with the black-haired baby caught his hand and drew him away. “I’m sorry. He’s not afraid of anything.” She smiled. “I’m Sydney, by the way.”

  “Kazi,” she said, realizing her mistake too late.

  In the twenty minutes of chaos as greetings were exchanged, visits to the bathroom were made, and beds claimed, Kazi wished harder than ever that she could vanish.

  The young man Griffin had first greeted came toward her with an extended hand. “Marshall Vaughn.”

  She shook his hand but said nothing.

  “And you are?” he asked, smiling.

  “Nobody.”

  Griffin loomed over her. “This is my angel.”

  Taken aback, Kazi looked at him.

  “She pulled me from prison, saved Aladdin, and extricated Neeley.”

  Vaughn grinned, a boyish charm that no doubt had the girl behind him clinging worse than plastic wrap. “Then that makes her Nightshade’s angel, not yours, right?”

  Griffin smacked the boy’s gut. “Ignore the Kid. He’s got a mouth but no brain.”

  Nerves pushed the words from her mouth. “Then he fits in, doesn’t he?” Kazi wanted to bite her tongue for teasing Griffin in front of the others.

  The Kid slapped Griffin back. “Legend, you caught a live one! I vote she stays.”

  Amid the laughter and banter that ensued, Kazi locked on to the woman with brown hair and two sons, who had sidled over to the general. “Have you heard from him?”

  “What about my brother?” a young woman with Vaughn asked.

  “I’m sorry, Sydney and Rel.” The general nodded to the two long tables littered with computers and Mossad agents. “They’ve been working nonstop to locate Max, Midas, and Dighton—that’s our priority, of course. But we’re also working to figure out who did this and how to stop them from doing more or permanent damage.”

  Marshall said, “I can answer that.”

  CHAPTER 28

  Golding Residence, Cyprus

  Hands on his belt, Griffin stole a look at Kazi while they waited for the Kid to rifle through his rucksack. Still the smell of her—not fancy perfume but something light and clean—wormed through his brain, infected since he’d lost his fool mind in the train and nearly made good on that kiss last week.

  Week. Got it? You don’t know this girl. You can’t feel this way. Get stupid equals get killed.

  Marshall cut off his line of sight as he stood and returned to the table. He tossed a handful of pictures on the table. “Found those in my father’s safe at home.”

  “Your father?” Griffin growled, lifting the pictures. His gut writhed as he took in the images. “It’s…us.”

  “Sydney,” the Kid called across the din of activity. He waved her over. “These the pictures you told us about outside Mindanao?”

  With Dillon propped on her hip, she looked over the images. Her face went pale. “Yes.” She looked at Cowboy. “That’s them. Where did they come from?”

  “My dad, I guess.” Marshall scratched his head. “But something bugged me about them.”

  Griffin thumbed through them. “A lot bugs me about them.”

  “Nah, I mean…” With a finger, the Kid spread them over the grainy white surface. “Look at them. Notice anything?”

  Cowboy’s shoulder pressed against Griffin’s as he leaned in. “What’s your point?” He handed his baby boy back to Piper.

  The Kid bent over the table, palms spread wide as he peered up at them through a knotted brow. “Who’s not in the pictures?”

  Flashes of memory, heat, humidity, and smells vaulted out of the images. Things he knew. But nothing unusual. Griffin reached through the tangle of bodies and lifted one. Then another. “You.” He snatched up another. Sorted through the others quickly. “You’re not in them.”

  “Bingo! Give the man a sucker.” Torment darkened the Kid’s face. “I remember this village—I would’ve been standing right here”—he motioned holding the picture out and placed a hand in front of it—“which means somehow…the images came from me. I don’t know how, but my dad must’ve planted a camera on me.”

  The assassin braced himself against the table, his skin clammy and bruised, but his eyes alert, intelligent. “All images are taken from about chest high.”

  “Button camera,” a soft voice said.

  Griffin looked over his shoulder, surprised to find Kazi there.

  “I’ve had diamond stud earrings that were cameras,” she said. “You’d never notice it.”

  “Cameras can be the size of lint,” Aladdin said. “This has been going on for a while.” He held up two pictures. “Before I joined the team.” He tossed them down. “I can’t believe we didn’t catch on sooner.”

  “I’m the reason the team’s been disassembled,” the Kid said. “It’s my fault.”

  “Bull.” Cowboy s
hook a finger at the Kid. “Don’t go there. None of us are to blame for this. Somehow, Nightshade stepped into your dad’s line of fire.”

  Griffin shifted his attention back to the team. “We just have to figure when and where.”

  “And why he’s trying to kill us,” the Kid said.

  “He tried to kill you?” Griffin scowled.

  “I think he was behind the attack at the Shack, and then he kept me drugged at my own house, lying and saying it was a hospital.”

  “Sick.” Griffin patted his shoulder. “As much as we’d all love to blame you”—laughter trickled through the room—“what we need to figure out is why.” Griffin shook his head. “Okay, folks, let’s put our heads together and figure out this nightmare.”

  They went to work plotting the pictures around the missions, talking through possible connections and implications. But the more they searched, the more confusion leaked into the data. Griffin slumped back in the chair he’d taken earlier and ran a hand over his face and mouth. “There’s no connection, know what I’m saying?”

  The Kid agreed. “It’s so…random.”

  “But it’s not,” the general said. “There’s something here, something we’re missing.” A tweetle jerked him to his phone. He answered it and visibly swayed, then swung around and looked toward the women—no, at one woman.

  In the kitchen, Sydney’s face went chalky. Then she looked over her shoulder to Danielle, who slowly came to her feet.

  “Thank You, God!” The general bobbed his head. “Yes…good…” He placed a hand on the shoulder of a Mossad agent. “I’ll give you to someone who can do that.” As he handed off the phone, he let out a long, hard breath. “Midas is alive and safe.”

  Danielle collapsed into the chair, holding her baby tightly. The women embraced her, crying and laughing. And on the fringe, Griffin saw Kazi watching it all. She seemed disconnected. Or overwhelmed. What was going on in that head of hers? It was like, put her in a room with vipers and murderers, and she came out kicking and screaming. Put her into a domestic situation, and she fell apart.

  “He killed my family.”