Backing out of the parking space, I spot a couple of men at the edge of the highway, both waiting a lot more patiently than I did for traffic, and I take the opportunity to leave via the farthest exit from the parking lot, out of their sight. “I don’t have my purse,” Gia says. “Or my credit cards—not that I think I can use them, but I have nothing, is my point. I have to go to the bank, maybe in another city so I don’t draw attention. I’ll grab cash and then we’ll be gone before he can get to us.”
“There is no ‘we,’ sweetheart, and I have a plan that includes untraceable resources.” I turn into traffic and take the ramp to I-35. “Why don’t you?”
“I told you before. I acted spontaneously. They were about to give you truth serum. You would have talked.”
I give a bark of humorless laughter. “Sheridan should know that I’m ready for that. It wouldn’t have worked.”
“It’s a drug. It’s not torture and mind over matter.”
“I have a plan for everything,” I assure her, which is a lie, considering truth serum had never crossed my mind.
“If you’re pointing out my lack of a plan,” she replies, climbing off the floor and onto the seat as we change lanes onto and take the exit for Ben White Boulevard, “you’re right. And I’m going to pay the price. I know you know that you don’t betray Sheridan and get away with it.”
My fingers flex on the steering wheel at her statement, which hits close to home, and the loss of my parents. “Who are you to him?”
“I’m the secretary to the head of the chemistry department,” she declares, and despite the quickness of the reply, it rolls off her lips awkwardly, the way most lies do.
“A secretary,” I repeat flatly.
“Yes. A secretary, and my boss is very close to Sheridan, so I do work for them both. The bottom line here is that I was in a position of trust. That means my betrayal will be unforgivable.”
Yanking the wheel sharply, I pull in at the storage facility I’d rented when I was here doing surveillance on Sheridan, putting the vehicle in Park and turning to face Gia. “I hate lies.” My voice is low, rough, vibrating with the six-year-old anger she’s managed to stir. “I hate the people who tell them even more.” I don’t wait for her reply, opening the door and storming toward the security system panel to punch in my code.
The gates start to open and I head back to the truck, my mind running in circles as I try to decide exactly what to do with Gia. Obviously she’s been close to Sheridan, deep inside his operation, which makes her a resource, but also dangerous as hell. With what I know is nuclear-level agitation, I yank open the door and climb inside without even looking at Gia. When I look at her, she stirs the protector in me, and makes me want to believe every damn lie she tells me.
I drive inside the facility, and Gia twists around to watch the gates shut. I have no doubt she’s on edge, afraid I might turn on her. I’m no murderer, but if I find out she had anything to do with Sheridan killing my family, I’m not responsible for my actions. No one works closely with Sheridan Scott and remains innocent for long. We halt in front of one of the many storage units in a row, a streetlight illuminating the cab of the truck. She reaches for the door. I grab her arm, cursing the rush of male awareness she stirs in me. “Stay here,” I order. “I’ll only be a moment.”
It’s her who avoids eye contact this time, giving me a choppy nod. Yep. She’s nervous all right—unsure if I’m here to do her harm. Good. Bad.
Fuck.
If she’s innocent, I don’t want her to feel fear. I shove open the door again and exit the truck, scrubbing my itching jaw, and retracing in my mind how Meg fooled me. I’ve been too busy taking my beatings to even think about it.
I use my code again to unlock the steel door of the unit and open it, walking inside toward a pile of newspapers, a kid’s mini swimming pool, and six bean bag chairs, all meant to make anyone who looks inside think this unit is full of nothing but crap. I walk to the extra-large red bean bag chair and turn it over, ripping open the hole I’d sewn shut after I removed the stuffing, and pull out three duffel bags, one at a time. Despite the fact that everything that matters to me is in these bags, I lock the door again as I leave, fully intending to keep the unit for future use if needed.
Returning to the truck, I find Gia still there. Of course she is. Either she’s setting me up or she really doesn’t have anywhere to go. Throwing the bags on the seat between me and her, I climb into the cab, still without a damn clue what I’m going to do with her. I flip on the overhead light and unzip a bag that I know has a weapon inside.
“I guess you know Austin,” she observes.
“Am I supposed to believe you don’t know I grew up an hour from here?”
“How would I know? I told you. I’m just a secretary who clearly got in over her head—but with good intentions, I swear.”
She’s no secretary, I think, but I let her enjoy the false comfort of her lies. Propping my foot on the dash, I raise the leg of my jeans to wrap a gun holster around my ankle before I level her with a hard look. “Know your enemies and their territory better than they know you and yours.” I reach back inside the bag and remove a handgun. “Isn’t that why you’re here?” I challenge. “Because Sheridan thinks a pretty woman in trouble is my weakness?”
She turns and leans her back against the door, a defensive posture that tells me I’ve succeeded in making her uncomfortable, and I’m pretty sure her hand behind her back goes to the door. “I’m not a setup. I swear.”
I pop an ammunition clip into place. “Then give me a solid reason why you’re involved.”
“Will you believe me?”
“Just answer the question.”
“If you have what I think you have, it can’t end up in the wrong hands. And Sheridan is the wrong hands.”
“What is it that you think I have?”
“A cylinder that generates enough clean, safe energy to replace all other sources and make the nuclear, oil, and coal industries obsolete. And since Sheridan is an oil man, it would make him obsolete.”
It would make a lot of very wealthy and incredibly vicious people across the world obsolete, I think, but I don’t say that, or confirm or deny her words. “And you know this how? Wait. No. You know what? Don’t tell me. I’m not going to believe you, anyway.”
“Last night, I was working late and I overheard Sheridan and Sergio, the head of the chemistry department, talking about the cylinder. It’s a miracle I couldn’t believe, but the more they talked, the more certain I was they didn’t intend to let the world know—at least, not until it served their agenda. I didn’t know what to do. Fast forward twenty-four hours: I intentionally left my wallet in my desk, and came back to the office to get it and nose around. That’s when I heard Sheridan going off on Sergio, demanding he make the ‘treasure hunter’ talk. Sergio said he could make a truth serum, and Sheridan wanted it tonight. Sergio is gifted. He could do it; I know he could. I didn’t have time to weigh my actions. You were going to talk, and maybe end up dead.” She takes a deep breath. “So there you have it. That’s my story.”
“So you want me to believe you overheard this and just charged over to the warehouse to free me.”
“Yes. I told the staff that Sergio sent me to see if a woman could make you talk. They didn’t believe me, and to make a long story short, it didn’t go well. I just winged it, and here we are.”
“Why Sergio and not Sheridan?”
“To buy time. They’d call Sergio first, and he’d be confused and investigate.”
I study her long and hard, and to her credit, she doesn’t blink or look away. That gets points with me. Liars look away. I hold up the gun, the barrel facing the ceiling. “Do you know how to handle one of these?”
“I know how to shoot a gun,” she replies, her voice taking on a hint of desperation as she changes the subject. “Do you have the cylinder?”
“You know how to handle a gun,” I say, ignoring her plea for information I don’t
plan to give her. “Why does that not surprise me?”
“I’m a single woman in a big city. I’ve made it a point to be able to protect myself. Chad, please—”
“You’re just a single girl who needs to protect herself. I believe that about as much as I do the one about you being Sheridan’s secretary trying to save the world from his greed.” I shove my gun into the ankle holster. “Secretaries don’t know how to set bombs.” She opens her mouth to give me some perfectly formed explanation, and I cut her off. “Don’t. A lie is just going to piss me off all over again.”
“If you believe nothing I say, then why am I here?” she demands, actually sounding indignant and angry. “Why haven’t you just dumped me or killed me?”
I face her, making sure she gets the full force of my one open blue eye that’s probably more red right now as I reply. “Because I haven’t decided if you’re useful or not.” And it’s true. Until her boss, murder wasn’t on my list of skills, but he’s changed that. Oh yeah, he has, I think, adding aloud, “I’m leaning toward no, you’re not.”
Her bravado, which I’d seen in the bedroom earlier, flares into a full-blown glower now as she taunts me. “They say you’ll do anything for money.”
The words send a slicing blade of hard, brutal guilt right through my heart. “Who exactly is ‘they’?”
“Does it matter who? Is it true?”
“I find what no one else can, for a cash price, yes.” I move without thinking, grabbing her and pulling her to me, driven to escape the truth in her claim, to find the reality behind her lies. My fingers tunnel into her hair, tugging none too gently, bringing her mouth to mine, where I linger long enough to murmur my own accusation. “But money isn’t what you’re offering, now is it? And like I told you: If you offer, I won’t decline.”
She presses weakly against my chest, her hand flat over my heart, which has been bleeding for six years straight. “I offered you nothing,” she hisses. “I’m not his whore, or yours.”
“Prove it.” My mouth comes down on hers, punishing, hard and full of demand, my tongue stroking against hers, and she tastes like bittersweet temptation, like she is Eve and I am Adam, desperate for the poison apple. I don’t trust her. I still want her. I taste her again and again and she doesn’t respond, but I expect her to hesitate, to make this look good. And then it comes. Her moan and a soft swipe of her tongue against mine. It ignites passion in me, but it infuriates me just as much. I tear my mouth from hers and set her aside, having the answer I sought: She’s Sheridan’s bitch. And I tell myself knowledge is power. Taking by choice, not seduction, is power.
“That meant nothing,” she whispers, hugging herself, her breath coming in fast, hard pants.
If only that were true, I think bitterly. “We both know that’s the biggest lie of the night.” I reach inside one of the duffel bags and she cringes, as if she expects another gun, when actually I’m removing the cell phone inside instead, along with a battery I slide into place.
“It proves nothing,” she whispers again. “It means nothing.”
She sounds like she’s trying to convince herself, but we both know that she’s trying, and failing, to convince me. I shift the truck into Drive and pull a fast U-turn. She reaches for the door. I hit the brakes and grab her arm. “Don’t make me tie you up.”
“Do you have the cylinder?” she demands. “Tell me I’m going through this for a reason.”
“If I did, I’d make sure it wasn’t found by anyone I didn’t want to find it, and no one could fuck me good enough, or hard enough, to get it. Ask Meg, Sheridan’s last bitch. She tried and failed. That’s how I ended up there with you tonight. As for Sheridan, that bastard can go fuck himself—he’ll never get that cylinder.” I pause, my teeth grinding together. “If I had it.”
“I don’t know Meg. I’m not trying to seduce you. And I know you don’t fully believe I am, either, or I’d already be tied up.”
My jaw clenches and unclenches, several beats passing as I stare at her, wishing like hell she wasn’t right. But she is. I have doubts about her guilt that I can’t afford to entertain. Releasing her, I put the truck in motion and accelerate again, feeling more of that nuclear-quality energy radiating off me—and apparently she does, too, because she zips her lips. She starts to move toward the door, and I grab her arm again, shoving the bags to the ground and then dragging her to me.
My hand clamps down on her inner thigh and her left hand that seems to still be wrapped around a tissue. “Just let me go,” she pleads. “I’m resourceful. I’ll figure it out without you.”
“That’s not what you said an hour ago.”
“We were in East Austin and I’m in heels and a skirt with no phone and no resources. Of course I needed help. I’ll figure it out from here.”
“You’re right. You will.”
“What does that mean?”
“You’ll find out.” I accelerate again, a plan in my mind. It’s then that I realize her knee is bleeding, along with her hand. I don’t comment, and I tell myself I don’t give a damn. I don’t give a damn. There is only one thing on my mind right now, and that’s my sister’s safety. I’m not losing my sister.
THREE
FAR TOO AWARE of my hand still on Gia’s leg, I navigate the truck onto I-35, and it takes all of my willpower to resist the urge to call Jared, one of the few people I’ve trusted in the last six years, to check on my sister. Instead I slide the cell phone into the pocket of the door, not about to give Gia ammunition to use against me or risk putting Amy on the radar any more than I did by trusting Meg in the first place.
“Ouch,” Gia hisses, punching my hand with her fist. “You’re cutting off the circulation in my leg.”
I blink as I realize that I’m squeezing her leg hard, and now I’m back to thinking about the blood on my palm. “Go back to your side of the truck,” I order, releasing her. “But don’t even think about going for the door.”
“The last thing I want is to greet the pavement with my face,” she assures me, scooting to the side. “I thought you wanted to get rid of me.”
I don’t reply. I have no intention of explaining myself and giving her time to adjust to my plan. I’m done talking. It opens the door to mistakes I can’t afford to make. Not with Sheridan and every oil tycoon across the world after what I have in my possession. Probably a few from the coal industry, too. And then there’s the CIA, the worst fuckers of them all outside of Sheridan.
Exiting the highway, I cross over to a service road, cutting behind the adjacent strip mall and turning down a side street to enter the parking lot of the bus station, where I pull into a space. I reach to the floorboard and set the bags between us again. I stuff money in a small, as of yet unused bag and hand it to her.
“That’s for you. Fifty thousand dollars.” I grab a pen from inside the duffel and scribble a name on a piece of paper before stuffing it in her bag. “Go to New Mexico and see the guy on that card. He’ll get you a new identity, but that alone won’t protect you. Don’t do anything Sheridan would expect you to do—not the same work, not the same lifestyle. Don’t touch your bank account or call anyone you know, or he will find you.”
Her lips part in shock, and I really hate that I remember kissing them as vividly as I do.
“That’s it?” she says, disbelief wrenched into her voice. “Just ‘get out’? You’re done with me?”
“That about sizes it up.”
I can almost see the arguments running around in her head, but to my surprise, she clamps her lips shut and puts on her shoes, slipping the bag over one shoulder. She reaches for the door, and for some godforsaken reason, I grab her arm and she turns to me, her brown hair waving around her heart-shaped face. Her blue eyes, illuminated in the overhead light, hold a hope I’m not going to give her as I say, “You’re a risk I can’t take. Too many lives are on the line.”
A hint of anger replaces the hope in her gaze. “And here I thought you cared about money, not lives.”
r /> “If that were the case, sweetheart, I would have taken the five hundred million dollars your boss offered me for his prize. This isn’t about money anymore. It hasn’t been for a long time. Sheridan made sure of that.”
“Or it’s about you not having what he wants at all. Maybe that’s why you were so confident you wouldn’t talk.”
“If you’re baiting me, it won’t work.”
Her far-too-kissable lips tighten; her voice with them. “I was just trying to figure out if I lost everything to save a man who didn’t even have the secret I was protecting.”
“This conversation is over.”
“I can’t just leave town.”
“Stay, then, and die. My conscience will be clear knowing it was your foolish mistake, not me, that got you killed.”
She inhales, telling me that she feels the cold bite I know is in my words, looking like she just dug herself six feet under. “Right. You’re welcome. Happy to save your life by screwing mine up,” she says.
“He wasn’t going to kill me.”
“I stand corrected,” she snips, bravely managing to bristle despite clearly feeling the intended heat of my actions. “You were just going to be injected with truth serum and who knows what else, until they got the information they wanted from you. Then they would have killed you.”
“I told you. I plan for everything. What they would have gotten from me would not have led to my death.”
She looks conflicted and then blurts out suddenly, “Let me help you protect the cylinder. Please. Let me feel this was all for something.”
“If I had it,” I bite out, irritated that I’m presently thinking that she’s convincing and beautiful, which only makes Sheridan more of a bastard for choosing her, “I wouldn’t need any help protecting it, and you’re a fool if you don’t get as far away from this as you can. Get on the bus. Go to New Mexico and get a new identity. If you’re telling me the truth, and you were smart enough to pull off what you did tonight, then be smart enough to do what I’m telling you now.”