Mason Pierce’s last thought.
Kader
Present day
I followed Laurel toward the office, my gaze going to the roundness of her ass in her blue jeans while my thoughts went to this morning and the way that same ass fit perfectly in my grasp, the way her body responded, and the soft noises she made. No woman has affected me the way she does, and I don’t understand it. I know it has to do with the way she looks right at me, her blue eyes on me as she comes apart.
It’s new and electrifying.
I can’t get enough of it.
This must be the way it feels to be addicted. I’m fucking addicted to Laurel Carlson. I should be satisfied with what we did this morning. I had been...until I wanted more. It was as if the more I got of her, the more I wanted.
After opening the door, Laurel stilled at the entry to the office. As she did, she turned to me, her blue eyes clouded and lips downturned.
“What is it?”
“Every time I’m in here, I learn something I don’t want to know.”
Probably not a good time to suggest sex.
“Do you think it’s better not to know?”
Her head shook. “I’m at least glad to not learn these things alone.”
My goal wasn’t to compound her sadness about Cartwright and Moore. It was to shed light on what had been happening around her. With a sigh, she settled in the chair beside mine.
“Why does that screen...” She tilted her head upward. “...always have the hallway outside the office door? You live alone. You said no one comes here.”
“I set the cameras to motion. There aren’t any located in this room. The last motion they detected was in the hallway.”
Laurel nodded. “So you’re saying, they were displaying the dining room.”
“They were.”
“Are you worried I’m going to make a break for it? Because after your little speech yesterday, I don’t think that needs to be a concern. Besides, where would I go even if I could?”
“I’m not worried. I like seeing you, knowing you’re safe. If you would leave, my first guess would be that you’d go to your parents’ or your sister’s.”
Laurel sat taller. “Did Ally go to Indianapolis?”
“No. She’s called your mom many times and your mom has called her. Your parents checked out of the hotel today and have a...” I looked down at the time in the corner of the screen. “...correction. Assuming their flight is on time, they recently left the Indianapolis airport for Des Moines.”
“I feel better about them being home. I don’t know who to trust at the university.”
I sat taller, my exposed lower arms momentarily sidetracking my focus. I’d pulled the sleeves down after Laurel left the kitchen. On my way to get her, I remembered to raise them. To my surprise, since retrieving her, she hadn’t mentioned them or even taken a closer look.
It seemed impossible that she was already accustomed to them, and yet that was how it appeared. Granted, her mind was probably a million places besides my tattoos.
It was time that we got down to the business at hand.
Clicking the mouse, I pulled up an Indianapolis map. “As you probably know, there are numerous hotels and restaurants not far from the university. First, I accessed Cartwright’s finances. Did you know that eight months ago he was issued a Centurion card?”
Laurel’s nose scrunched. “Isn’t that one of those invitation-only American Express cards?”
“It is. While there’s no published requirement, it’s understood that the holder of such a card is expected to spend between $100,000 to $450,000 a year.”
“No. You’re mistaken. Russ didn’t make that much money.” Her neck straightened. “Did he?” Her sentences came quicker. “Are you going to tell me that on top of everything else, the university was paying him more—?”
I laid my hand over her knee. “No, Dr. Carlson, I checked. You and Dr. Cartwright were both tenured professors appointed the same year. Your salaries were identical.”
“Were,” she said with a sigh. “Well, then there was no way—”
“Since securing the Centurion card, Cartwright has accumulated purchases of nearly $200,000.”
“What? In eight months?”
“His balance is zero.”
“Who is paying his bill and what was he buying?”
“The payments,” I began, “didn’t flow through his bank accounts. The card was paid in full each month from a corporation located in Delaware. The corporation is a shell company. That’s as far as I’ve currently dug.”
“What is the name of the shell company?”
“It really doesn’t matter. That’s all it does. Shell companies aren’t illegal, but they require certain information. I’m still digging.”
Laurel leaned forward, her eyes narrowing as she looked at the screen. “Can you show me what he purchased?”
I clicked again, bringing up the activity for the last billing cycle. “The biggest expense was a recurring reservation, a corner suite at the JW Marriott. Over five hundred dollars a night plus taxes adds up. He had it reserved for every day.”
“The JW isn’t far from...”
“Three keys were issued,” I said. “The room and card were canceled the day after Cartwright was killed.”
Laurel sat back in the chair. Her sensuous neck strained and her jaw was set. “But no one knows he was killed. They think he’s missing.”
“Laurel, someone killed him. That person knows he’s dead.”
“So whoever is behind the shell corp...?”
“I’m not sure,” I admitted.
She let out a sigh. “Are there cameras?”
“Yes, within the corridors. I sped through the video rather quickly. Besides hotel staff, the room was frequented by Cartwright, Ms. Moore, and another woman.”
“Two women?” she asked. “Do you know who?”
“Yes, I found her listed as staff at the university. Her name is Pamela Browncoski.”
“She’s Dr. Oaks’s assistant.” Laurel looked my way, her blue eyes wide as slowly they narrowed and her nose wrinkled. “Together? All three?”
“Only once were they all together, the afternoon before the gathering. Lunch was delivered. My gut tells me it wasn’t a ménage à trois. Other than that, it would usually be two people, in any combination.”
“Russ met alone with Pam? She’s close to retirement. I mean, at least Stephanie is younger.”
My head shook. “Again, I don’t think this was completely a sexual adventure. That doesn’t mean that Cartwright and Moore—I doubt he went to her place for a late-night meeting. And the availability of the suite would have made that arrangement easier for sneaking out of the lab and getting a midday fuck.”
“I don’t want to think about it.”
“There was one other visitor who I found on the hotel’s security.”
“Who?”
“It was Saturday afternoon, after you met with Cartwright and Olsen at the coffee shop...”
Laurel leaned forward, moving to the edge of the chair.
I clicked on the still picture I’d saved from the feed.
“Damien Sinclair.” She turned to me. “Who was there with him?”
“The ready-to-retire assistant, Ms. Browncoski.”
Laurel stood and walked around the chair. With each step, her gaze grew glassier and farther away. If I were to guess, she wasn’t seeing the office or even the reds and purples in the sky beyond the windows. With each turn, as her expression came into view, she had her lower lip trapped beneath her upper front teeth. By the flexing of the muscles in her cheeks, she wasn’t just biting, but nibbling.
“Talk to me, Laurel.” Before you chew a hole in your lip. I kept the last part to myself.
“And say what?” Laurel stopped pacing. “That the three of them were working together to sabotage our work? I don’t want to say that.” She slapped the sides of her thighs. “The night those fake police arrived. You said you heard my discussio
n with Russ.”
“I did.”
“On tape or in person?”
“I was there.”
Her shoulders went slack. “How did I not know?”
“Laurel,” I said, lifting my hand, “come here.”
Moisture filled her eyes. “How have I been so stupid and blind?”
“Over here,” I said again.
Step by small step, she advanced until she was standing in front of me. I reached for her hand. “You are not now nor have you ever been stupid.”
Laurel swallowed. Pulling her hand away, she gestured to the screen still containing the purchase activity from the Centurion card. “Then call it something else.” Her voice was growing louder with each sentence. “Naïve. Totally oblivious.”
Standing, I reached for her shoulders. “I have the correct word and you haven’t used it.”
“What then?” she asked, her blue eyes staring up at me.
“I knew it the moment I started working this case. It was part of what drew me to it—to you. I do what I do. I’ve been doing it for a while. Like I told you, it’s not always people who I kill. I kill ideas, plans, and deals. I’m no Robin Hood. I don’t do what I do because it will make the world a better place. I do it because I have the skills and it pays fucking great. When I received the request, I couldn’t help but wonder why a contract would be taken out on you.”
Her shoulders shrugged under my grasp.
“The more I studied and watched, the less I trusted Cartwright. I told you that before. Moore slipped under my radar. I screwed up by being too focused on you.”
“You still haven’t said that I’m stupid and naïve.”
“Because you’re not,” I replied. “Laurel, why are you here, with me, in no-fucking-place Montana?”
She scanned the office. Beyond the windows the sun was growing closer to the horizon, casting colorful hues on the sparse clouds above. “I’m here because my life as a renowned researcher is over, and I saw the opportunity to change my career to sex toy and figured what the hell. So I took it.”
I scoffed as a small smile came to my lips. “You’re fucking amazing.”
“I’m glad you think so. When you have a minute, could you write a recommendation for my future employment?”
“Not in a hundred years.”
“Kader?”
“You’re here,” I said, “because you trusted me.”
She peered upward, her blue eyes searching me. “No, I didn’t, not past tense. I did and despite your attempts to deter me, I still do.”
“And that’s fucking insane. You willingly left your home, city, and state with a self-proclaimed assassin for hire.”
Stepping away, she walked to the windows, leaving me with a view of her back.
Who turns their back on the person hired to kill them?
Drawn to her, I followed Laurel to the window and while standing behind her, I wrapped my arms around her waist. With a sigh, she leaned back against me, her head resting on my chest.
“Doc, you aren’t and have never been stupid. Your downfall has been trust. You give it too easily.”
We stood for a few minutes as the colors began to fade and nighttime replaced the crimson with darkness.
Finally, she spoke, “That night, when you were in my house, fake police were there, and Russ was there. Before you made your presence known, Russ said something about changing his mind. He mentioned Dr. Oaks being greedy. He said something about Eric and that Sinclair had threatened Eric.” Laurel spun in my arms. “Is that conversation on there?” she asked, tipping her head toward the screens.
“I can find it.”
“Maybe Russ was given a deal and just maybe...” She swallowed as she reached for my arms, laying her hands over my ink.
It took all my self-control to not flinch. The only thing that stopped me was that she wasn’t looking down at the mutilated skin beneath her palms.
Her neck straightened as she stared upward at me. “...maybe Russ regretted it. As he said, he changed his mind. He said he came to save me or help me. I can’t remember.”
Damn, I hated her eternal optimism in that man.
“Laurel, there’s a reason that investigators and law enforcement say to follow the money.”
“Right, I know. Russ saw dollar signs. He agreed and that deal got him that card. Then he got cold feet. That’s why he wanted us to make the backup, the external hard drive.” She nodded. “Yes, he was trying to get out of it—whatever deal he was in. He...”
This information was supposed to put the final nail in his coffin—not that he’d ever need one. It wasn’t supposed to renew her faith in the cheating bastard.
“I’ll pull it up,” I said, hoping that seeing him the way he was that night and the memory of him leaving her alone would forever quell her support.
“Okay.”
Sergeant First Class Pierce
Nearly seven years ago in an undisclosed location
* * *
There were no words to describe the excruciating pain. I’d survived wars, wars I’d had the will to survive. This war was different. Internally, I prayed for it to end, to lose this battle. It didn’t surprise me that those prayers went unanswered or that eternal damnation was mine. It was the course I’d charted. Reaching the destination shouldn’t have come as a surprise.
Parts of my life came back, bits and pieces taunting me with a life that was gone. Small fragments of time littered in the wasteland of my mind, appearing in my sleep, not enough to find joy, only enough to mock my existence.
Not all sleep came naturally.
Weeks and months were lost to drug-induced comas.
The voices told me it was better, a way for me to heal.
“Sergeant First Class Pierce.”
That was the name they used.
Scenes from childhood came and went, scrounging for food, searching in dumpsters behind restaurants and grocery stores—anything to feed my sisters. Maybe those memories came to me because I hadn’t eaten in months. I’d been fed through a tube as reconstructive surgery repaired broken bones and charred flesh.
At first I had no recollection of how I’d become a mummy unable to move.
And then all at once, I remembered the explosion.
Some of the voices shared information. The Kevlar vest I’d worn had saved me.
I wanted to tell the voices I wasn’t saved.
While in contact with the accelerant and fire source, the vest had burned. That wasn’t what saved me. It was the vest’s ability to protect my organs from the shock wave associated with the blast as well as the shrapnel from the explosion.
Time moved on in cycles filled with bouts of extreme pain—dead skin must be removed—followed by weeks of unconsciousness, allowing the body to heal. When the pain would come, in my mind’s eye, I’d see the flames, hear the girls screaming, and recall Sparrow’s panic.
And yet not once did he visit or anyone contact me.
In broken thoughts, I wondered about Lorna, about Reid and Patrick.
What did they know?
The voices around me faded in and out like the wind in the open desert.
The air was hot.
The bandages itched.
At one point, the voices secured my wrists to the side of the bed. The mission was to stop me from ripping off the bandages and reopening the wounds while I slept. The result was that I was a prisoner to their treatment.
“Sergeant First Class Pierce. The decision was made that too much had been invested in your skills to allow you to die in that explosion.”
“I did my time. I’m fighting a new war.”
Had I said the words aloud?
I must have, in a rare bout of consciousness, because the voices answered.
“It’s the old war that now owns you. Your body was too badly damaged. Officially, you did not survive. A body was provided and Mason Pierce has been laid to rest.”
Through the small slits between the bandages, I coul
d only see parts of the officer speaking.
“I have family. My sister needs to know the truth.”
“Sergeant First Class, we are speaking the truth. The army never issued you a family. Your presence will be unidentifiable. Your mission will be to do as your country requests. We’re helping you. You’ll help us.”
I didn’t want this help.
The side rails rattled as I strained against the straps to get free.
Sleep returned.
My screams echoed within the small concrete room when the fire returned. Tethered to the bed, I was helpless to the flames. The voices tried to soothe me. I rebuked their assistance. This wasn’t a life I wanted. For the first time, I was ready to surrender.
If this was hell, I would never make it out. It was better to stop fighting.
There had been a time when I had hope for a future. Intermittently, I recalled a girl from my youth, one much better than me. I’d kept track of her through the years. The last time I’d checked she was in graduate school. I always knew she was smart. She deserved more than a man like me. Nevertheless, that boyhood crush refused to die.
And then there was Lorna.
What happened to her?
Sometimes, I would recall images from the night I died. There were ones of her and Reid. I wasn’t certain if it had happened or if I was hoping. I reasoned that a man in hell—where I was—had no right to make requests, yet if I could, I wanted her safe. If that was with him, so be it.
I’d said no man was good enough for my sister. That was still true.
Reid Murray came damn close.
While the voices continued, I stopped listening. Endless hours of debriefing, telling me what I knew, what I was, what I believed. I turned away, allowing the voices to be consumed by the fire.
“It could help. The medication is still being tested, but his recurring nightmares won’t allow him to be of any use to us. We can’t put a trained soldier into an explosive situation who is afraid of fire.”
“It could also imperil his skills. We don’t have the side effects fully researched.”
The debate occurred around me—over me. My input wasn’t necessary. The decisions weren’t mine.
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