“And what are you going to do?” Mercer demanded. “What do you really think you can do? Like you said, you’re just a civilian.”
What are you going to do? The familiar question echoed through her mind.
“That’s the same question you asked me when I told you I was going after the Executioner,” Cassidy reminded him.
The silence in the room was heavy and thick.
Voice growing stronger, she said, “I managed to do something with him, didn’t I?”
From the corner of her eye, she saw that Cale was watching her. He looked…proud?
But then Cale was moving, in front of her, shielding her.
She didn’t need to be shielded from Mercer. It was past time for her to stand on her own with him. She immediately stepped to Cale’s side.
“I’ll stay with Cassidy,” Cale said to her father, his voice hard and flat. “I’ll make sure she’s protected.”
“And if you screw up?” Mercer wanted to know. “Because I can see what’s in your eyes, Lane.” Mercer’s tone deepened. “You’re making a mistake. Both of you are, and I’m not going to stand by and let Cassidy pay for that mistake with her life.”
For an instant, Cassidy could have sworn that she saw grief flickering across Mercer’s face. But that was impossible, wasn’t it? Mercer didn’t feel like other people. The fleeting glimpses that she kept thinking were there…they were just her imagination. Wishful thinking from a desperate daughter.
He’d shut himself off from real emotions years ago.
He’d laughed when she’d been a child. Smiled. She was sure of it. Those memories were there, tucked away so deeply in her mind.
She was sure that he had…once.
“You’re off the case, Lane.” A jut of Mercer’s chin dismissed Cale.
“The hell I am,” Cale snarled right back at him.
Mercer straightened up, but he still stood an inch or two below Cale. “I just gave you an order, soldier, and you damn well better follow it.”
“I’m not leaving Cassidy!” She didn’t imagine the emotion in Cale’s voice. The anger and determination were plain to see. He’s so different from Mercer.
“She’s not alone.” Mercer jerked his thumb over his shoulder, indicating a watchful Gunner. “She’ll have EOD agents watching her 24/7. Those agents just won’t be you.”
But Cale shook his head. “I’m not leaving her.”
Cassidy’s heart beat even faster. She’d never seen anyone stand off against Mercer with such intensity. Would Mercer give in? Because she knew Cale wasn’t going to give up.
Then Mercer smiled. “Cassidy doesn’t know about your file, does she? About the violent tendencies that you have…the control issues. The danger that you both covet and create.”
She didn’t like Mercer’s smile. Too cocky. Too knowing.
Too Mercer.
Cale quickly glanced at Cassidy. He turned his stormy blue stare back on Mercer. “If I weren’t a little violent, I wouldn’t get the job done for you, now would I?”
“But the shrink said you could be dangerous, obsessive.” Mercer studied him. “Why is it that you’re so determined to stay close to Cassidy? Is she becoming an obsession for you?”
What was even happening? “Mercer, stop!”
Frowning, he looked over at her.
She just felt tired as she stared back at him. “Stop. This isn’t—”
Her phone rang, vibrating in her front pocket. Genevieve? Hope flooded through her as she yanked out the phone. Yes, yes! That was Genevieve’s picture flashing on her screen. She answered immediately. “Gen—”
A scream cut through Cassidy’s voice.
Genevieve’s scream.
Cassidy stumbled back.
Cale whirled toward her. His hands curled around her arms, steadying her.
“Help me…” Genevieve begged; her sobs filled Cassidy’s ears.
“I will,” Cassidy whispered. I promise. “Where are you, Genevieve? What’s happening?”
“They…want you.”
Her gaze met Cale’s.
Turn on the speaker. He mouthed the words.
Fingers trembling, she pressed to connect the speaker.
Then they could all hear Genevieve’s cries.
“He says…h-he says that if you don’t come, I’m mort.”
Mort. Dead.
“Je ne veux pas mourir!”
Tears stung Cassidy’s eyes at those pitiful words. I don’t want to die.
“You won’t,” Cassidy promised. “You won’t! Just tell me where you are. I can bring help to you.”
A train’s whistle sounded in the background. The sound was long, mournful.
“Je ne sais pas.”
Cassidy swallowed the lump in her throat. I don’t know.
“Track her phone,” Mercer whispered to Gunner. “Get Sydney to triangulate that call’s location.”
“He says that you have to come for me.” Genevieve had switched back to English. She did that when she was upset, a tumble of her mother’s English and her father’s French. “He…he wants you to meet him. H-he said…said to meet him at midnight, at a park just behind—”
Genevieve broke off, screaming, a pain-filled cry. As if she’d been struck or—
No, don’t imagine it, don’t. Cassidy’s breath sawed from her lungs.
“Behind Dunlay Street and M-Manchester,” Genevieve finished, tears nearly choking her.
Cassidy heard Gunner softly repeating the instructions to the person on the other end of his phone.
“P-please…be there, Cassidy…”
“I will,” Cassidy vowed.
But Genevieve wasn’t there to hear her.
The line had gone dead.
* * *
THE CLOCK ON Mercer’s desk was ticking far too loudly.
Cale paced back and forth in the small confines of that office, tension and adrenaline pulsing through his veins. Cassidy waited down on the level below him, guarded by Gunner and Lancaster, but—
I need to see her.
Instead, he was being called in for a sit-down with Mercer. Like he needed to deal with office politics right then.
The door opened behind him. Ah, so Mercer had finally joined him. Let the battle begin.
Cale’s shoulders stiffened. “I’m not letting her go to that exchange without me.”
Mercer’s sigh carried easily to him. The sigh and the soft click of the door shutting behind the director.
Cale glanced over his shoulder at Mercer. The lines on the man’s face were even deeper than they’d been before.
Mercer lifted a hand and pointed at Cale. “You’re making a mistake.”
It wouldn’t be the first time.
Or the last.
“You should cover your emotions better.” There sure wasn’t any emotion in Mercer’s voice as he slowly headed around the desk and eased into his chair. The last time they’d been in this office, yes, Cale had been able to read Mercer pretty well. The emotions had cracked beneath his surface. This time…the man was far too controlled.
He was dealing with Mercer, the EOD director, and definitely not the father who’d been frantic.
Cale realized that he’d done that same compartmentalizing with Cassidy. The agent and the lover.
He damn well wouldn’t do it again.
Mercer eased behind his desk. The leather chair groaned as he leaned forward. His watchful stare had never left Cale’s face. “Others will read those emotions of yours. If you’re not careful, your enemies will use them against you.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Cale grumbled, not about to discuss what was going on personally between him and Cassidy. “But—”
/>
“I’m talking about Cassidy. About the way you look at my daughter.” Mercer flattened his hands on the desk’s surface. “About what others will see unless you start watching yourself a whole lot better.”
Cale’s back teeth clenched. “What happens between me and your daughter—”
“Cassidy looks a lot like her mother.” Mercer’s gaze seemed far away. He looked right through Cale, and at his own past. “Same hair, eyes…even that stubborn chin. Marguerite was so beautiful. The first time I saw her…” He swallowed. “I knew I couldn’t walk away from her.”
Isn’t that the way I feel about Cassidy?
Because he knew that he should step down. Another case waited—plenty of other cases—but he couldn’t leave Cassidy.
Wouldn’t leave her.
“I was undercover, even then. Pretending to be someone I wasn’t.” Mercer stared down at his hands. “Always pretending. But Marguerite seemed to see through that.”
This was a Mercer that Cale didn’t know. So he just stood, watching, waiting to see what Mercer would reveal next.
“I loved her, but I loved my job, too. People counted on me. So many lives. So many…” His lips kicked up into a mocking smile. “But I was young. Foolish. I thought I could have it all. The girl. The job. The danger. All of it. Everything I wanted.” The smile faded. “We married in secret.”
Married…and had Cassidy.
“But I’d made so many enemies. They found my Marguerite. And took her from me.” His hands slapped against the desk. “In an instant, they took everything from me. I wasn’t even there to tell her goodbye.”
Cale felt his muscles turn to stone. This story…the ending…it hit far too close to home for him.
When he’d been a teen, his parents had been taken from him. Not by an enemy, but by a drunk driver. Gone in an instant.
He’d never been able to tell them goodbye. He’d never been able to save them.
So he tried to save others.
Cale’s breath whispered from his lungs. “You didn’t lose everything that day. You still had Cassidy.”
Beautiful, bright Cassidy.
Mercer’s eyes closed for a moment. “Because of who I am…what I am…Marguerite died. Cassidy had to see that terrible moment. Just a child, and she had to watch her mother die.”
And the memory still haunted her. He knew it probably always would.
“What do you think you can give to Cassidy?” Mercer asked him after he opened his eyes.
Cale stared back at him, no ready answer on his lips.
“You’re on the same path that I took. Danger. Enemies.” Mercer shook his head. “One of your enemies framed you for murder just months ago. You don’t have a safe or easy life.”
No, he didn’t.
“What will you give to her? More danger? Maybe even the same death that I gave to my Marguerite?”
Mercer looked very tired and weaker than Cale had ever seen him before. “I want Cassidy to be safe. To have a normal life. But she won’t have that life with you, Agent Lane.”
Because he was EOD. Because he’d learned long ago how to deal quick death to the threats in this world.
“Step back from this case,” Mercer told him. “Step back from Cassidy before you do more damage to her than even I ever could.”
“The last thing I want is to hurt her,” Cale conceded. The words were true, but he hadn’t thought ahead. Hadn’t thought past the moment of being with Cassidy.
He’d just wanted her.
After so long of being in the shadows of life, she’d been a temptation he couldn’t resist. He’d reached out to her.
Taken what he needed so badly.
And hadn’t considered the future.
“There is no future for you two,” Mercer said, seeming to read his thoughts. “Cassidy needs to move away from the EOD, away from the guilt of her past.”
Because of her friend’s death.
“She needs to find someone safe and settle down.”
Another man. Anger had his hands fisting.
“You see that, don’t you?” Mercer pressed. “You see that you aren’t the right one for my daughter.”
He wanted to be. He wanted to be her everything.
“Too violent, too dark and with too much death hanging on you.” Mercer’s shoulders slumped. “Don’t you think I know? You’re just like me.”
No. He didn’t want to be like Mercer.
“We weren’t made to love,” Mercer continued. “We were made to break and destroy.”
Cassidy couldn’t be destroyed. “That’s not happening,” Cale growled.
“You will let her go,” Mercer said. “Because you don’t want her to break.”
Their eyes locked.
“I can pull you from this case—we both know I can.” Ah, there was the Mercer he knew—the cold confidence. The hard threat.
But Mercer was right. He was the EOD. If the guy wanted Cale tossed from the building, he would be. Armed guards would flood upstairs in an instant at his command. They’d toss him into the street.
Then I’d just have to bust my way back inside.
“But I want you working this one,” Mercer continued, surprising him. “Cassidy trusts you. And with her friend’s life at stake, I don’t want Cassidy any more afraid than she has to be.”
Cassidy was already plenty afraid.
“So you can keep working with the team.”
Cale’s eyes were slits. Thanks—I was going to do that anyway.
“But when Genevieve is back, when we have this SOB in custody, then it will be time for you to do the right thing and walk away from Cassidy.”
The right thing.
For her.
For him?
“Are we clear, Agent?” There was no weakness in Mercer’s voice then. It made Cale wonder if there ever had been. Had it just been an act?
Cassidy must have gotten her acting talent somewhere. But unlike Cassidy, Mercer didn’t give away any tells when he lied. The man was an expert at deception.
“Oh, I think you’re being pretty damn clear,” Cale told him. And now it was his turn to be clear. Cale stalked toward the big mahogany desk.
One of Mercer’s brows rose.
Cale wrapped his hands around the edge of the desk and leaned toward Mercer. “I’m not you.”
Mercer blinked.
“So don’t tell me that I am. Don’t tell me what will happen to me or to Cassidy.” He kept his voice level with an effort. “You’re my boss—I get that. But I’m starting to think that coming on board with the EOD was a mistake.”
“Are you, now?”
“Being a free agent worked a whole lot better for me. There was a lot less B.S. to deal with.” Like a father who should have been there for his daughter. He stared at Mercer—glared at him—then said once more, “I’m not you.” Then he turned and walked away.
Because, really, what else was there to say?
* * *
MERCER DIDN’T MOVE as Cale Lane stalked from the room. The agent did have a lot of rage inside him, but Cale was pretty good at containing that rage.
If he hadn’t been so good at that containment, Mercer figured the guy would have taken a swing or two at his jaw.
The door closed behind Cale.
Mercer opened his desk drawer, carefully moved the papers and pulled out the old black-and-white photo that he kept hidden there.
A photo of Marguerite, holding Cassidy when his daughter had been barely a year old.
I deserved those hits.
The past was gone, and no matter how much he wished that he could change things, there was no going back for him.
Things would be different for Cassidy. He’d make sure of it
. No matter how many strings he had to pull.
And no matter who he had to hurt.
He put the photograph back in place. The edges were rough. From all the years he’d held that precious memory.
Back then, Cassidy’s eyes had lit with love when she looked at him.
When had she stopped looking at him that way?
At her mother’s grave…
At the grave site, Cassidy’s beautiful gaze had held an accusation. She’d known her mother’s death was his fault.
They’d both known it.
Because he hadn’t been able to give up the job, he’d lost his family.
He shut the drawer and then pressed a button on his phone to contact his assistant. “Get Lancaster up here,” he ordered. Lancaster was one agent who never let emotions slow him down.
Mostly because the guy didn’t seem to have any emotions.
Not like Cale. His eyes burned when he looked at Cassidy.
A few minutes later, a light rap sounded at Mercer’s door. When Drew Lancaster entered, Mercer waved him forward.
“I have a job for you,” he said to the agent.
Drew Lancaster nodded.
I can’t trust Cale, but I can count on Drew.
In the end, Drew would do whatever was necessary. He always did.
CHAPTER NINE
“How long have you had the tracking device?” The quiet question came from Dr. Tina Jamison as the EOD doctor approached Cassidy. “I’m sorry but—I, uh, wasn’t given full access to your file.” No, of course Mercer hadn’t given her that access. Cassidy rolled her shoulders.
“The current device was implanted about six months ago.” Not that she’d wanted it implanted. But she hadn’t exactly been given a choice.
Dr. Jamison, a petite woman with dark hair, peered up at her from behind the frames of her small glasses. “Sydney checked the signal, and it seems to be operating fine.”
Ah, Sydney. That would be the delicate-looking blonde over in the corner. The one huddled over a computer screen.
The one with the too-assessing gaze that kept sweeping back to Cassidy.
“It is operating perfectly,” Sydney said as she rose. And when she stepped away from the computer, Cassidy finally got a good look at the woman—and her very pregnant body.