Aside from the dead body in the trunk of Zoey’s car, things had gone better than he had expected—and he hadn’t been forced to tell her anything about what he knew about the situation with Chad. But as he stared at the wall across from her bedroom door, he couldn’t help but feel like he had made a mistake in not coming clean.
She needed to know about the contract out on Chad’s head.
There was the creaking sound of the floor as she paced around her bedroom. Either she was trying to calm down after the attack or she was working away. Knowing her, it was probably a little bit of both.
It was a relief he had gotten to her in time. A couple of minutes later and who the hell knew what kind of condition she would have been in. She had seemed to think the man only wanted information about her brother, but if that was true, why had he used a voice-cloaking device and attacked her in the dark?
Eli couldn’t make sense of why the man had gone about the attack as he had. If Eli had taken the contract on Chad’s head, he wouldn’t have dinked around going after his sister in the night; he would have waited, watched and calculated before making any sort of move. The man had been reckless.
By coming here and following Zoey, the man must have been desperate. Perhaps the clock was ticking.
He hadn’t gotten the specs on the hit, just that there was a job up for grabs. However, some employers loved to give little bonuses for quick and “accidental” deaths. But it didn’t seem like the kind of thing a group like the Gray Wolves would do when ordering such a hit.
But there were a million different conditions and factors he didn’t know. Maybe it would have been better if he had taken the contract. At least that way he would know more about the job and what he and Zoey’s family could expect. If nothing else, when he decided to tell Zoey the truth, he wouldn’t be going to her empty-handed and clueless about what the future was going to bring—other than madness.
He clicked on his phone and contacted his boss, James, at Watch Dog.
ON RECON. SEND ENCRYPTED FILE ON CASE #19807—M8.
In a matter of just a few seconds his boss emailed him the posting. It was the basic details. Chad Martin, date of birth, last known location and a picture. The photo was grainy and looked like the kind that had been pulled off a surveillance camera. There was a black star at the corner of the picture.
He texted James back:
BLACK STAR =?
This time he waited for James’s response, almost as if James had to look it up. After ten minutes he got a text back:
Foreign GOVT assigned
If that were the case, it couldn’t have been the Gray Wolves that had put out the contract. Or could it have been? There were several known persons within foreign governments who were also members of militant groups, or funded by them. Perhaps Bayural had paid someone within the Turkish government to put out a hit on Chad. Or, for all he knew, Bayural held a seat in the government.
WHICH ONE? he texted back.
UNKNOWN. MORE INFO ON HIRE.
If he took this job, his employers would expect him to get the kill. They weren’t in this business for the familial honor, not like the Martins were. The only thing that mattered to the Watch Dogs was their bottom line. Which meant there was no room for failure if he accepted this contract—if he failed or let his feelings get in the way of finding and killing Chad, they may well put a bead on him. His bosses loved to reiterate that they were only as strong as their weakest link, and they would stop at nothing to be the strongest chain of contractors in the world.
He couldn’t rush this decision. But there were no other options to get the information he desperately needed to figure out who had taken out the hit.
He did a quick search on the Gray Wolves and their leader. The public information on the group was sparse: just a few mentions in Turkish papers, Al Jazeera and the BBC. No information on Bayural, or any ties he held in the government or to the prime minister.
Eli didn’t know how he would come out of this without hurting himself or someone he loved, but his options were limited. He had to do what he felt was right.
I’LL TAKE THE JOB.
DONE. STANDARD RATES.
He had no problem giving the Watch Dogs their cut so long as he could do what he was really trying to do by taking this job.
Before he clicked off the screen, an email from James landed in his encrypted in-box.
Glancing back at the closed door beside him, he could make out the sounds of Zoey’s pacing. She had to be upset—she was just dealing with it in a different way than he was.
He clicked on the email and took a look at the details spread out before him. Whoever was picking up the tab was serious. As he had assumed, there was a bonus of one million dollars if someone could get the job done within seven days of the posting. According to the date, that was three days ago.
Based on the craziness of the man in her trunk, there was no way they were done dealing with mercenaries who were hungry for a profit.
In addition to the bonus, it looked as though there was a four million flat on taking him down. Five million dollars was a lot of money—his normal jobs paid only low five figures—and then cut the company’s commission. Even in his own life that kind of money would make a huge difference. He would never have to raise a gun again. He could retire anywhere. No wonder even the poorly skilled sewer rats had come out to take on the job.
He could see snow still coming down through the window at the end of the hall. Winter was crashing in upon them.
If he did kill Chad, he would probably walk away with more than enough money to buy a place just like this ranch. It was just too bad he knew and liked the man he had just agreed to take out—only time would tell if he would have to pull the trigger or not. The only person he truly wanted to take aim at was the person responsible for putting his friend in the sights.
Though he was paid to think about the “what ifs” in any situation, this time he focused on putting those kinds of thoughts to the back of his mind. For so many years, working with STEALTH, they had always had a focus on the family sticking together. At one point, before things had blown up in his face, he had definitely been part of that family.
Nostalgia beckoned him, but the door to the room beside him opened, and Zoey stuck her head out. “You can’t sleep, either?” Her hair was ruffled, as though she had tried to sleep and had wrestled with her pillow. He savored the opportunity to see Zoey in her natural, beautiful state. It reminded him of waking up with her at his side every morning.
“Have a job to do.” He slipped his phone into his pocket as his words echoed in the night.
It is just a question of which job, and where my loyalties will stand or fall.
He could feel her gaze upon him, as though she was trying to read between the lines.
“I can leave you alone then,” she said, moving to close the bedroom door.
“No,” he said with an adamant shake of his head. The last thing he wanted to do was sit out here any longer by himself—especially if she was offering some kind of olive branch. “I was just filling my time while I waited for your bogeyman.”
“So, you’ve come to believe that the man was here for me, not Chad?”
He stood up, his knee popping as he moved.
“Ha,” she said, glancing down to his offending appendage and not waiting for him to answer. “Getting older, are we?”
He chuckled. Zoey always had a way of finding his vulnerable spots—and aging, especially in this business, was one of them. Killing for a living was a young man’s business, and not for someone in their midthirties with a repaired rotator cuff and pins in his ankles that required him to announce their presence anytime he wanted to catch a flight.
“Hey now, I’m not old. I’m just getting more refined,” he said, giving her the grin that used to beckon her into his arms.
This time, it didn’t work. Instead, she stepped inside the bedroom door. But then she waved for him to follow.
There wasn’t much in the way of furniture in her room, just a bed, a dresser and a love seat tucked in the corner. She nodded toward the couch as she walked over to the bed and sat down on the edge on top of a sleeping bag she had unzipped and smoothed into a bedspread—as much as a blue-and-red flannel mummy bag could.
Nervous energy. She’d never been one for caring about the state of her dwelling. They were never in one place long enough to unpack—at least, usually. He remained standing.
“How long have you been here?” he asked.
She cringed as she ran her finger over the zipper of the bag. “Uh, a month or two.”
“Going stir-crazy yet?” he asked.
“You have no idea.” She pursed her lips, nodding. “Jarrod tried to convince me to stay home, to stay away from the show in Billings, but I couldn’t stand staring at these four walls for another second.”
“I thought you were working with Mindy on H&K’s new line?” he asked.
“Remotely, I’m still working tech with STEALTH. But ever since...well, you know...we’ve been keeping a low profile.” She sucked in a breath. “Which for some, has been easy. Chad has really liked catching up on old basketball highlights.” She cocked her eyebrows in feigned annoyance, but he could see the glimmer of love for her brother and his quirks in her eyes.
“He’s here, then?” he asked, motioning toward the bedrooms down the hall.
“No,” she said. “I’m not sure where he is now, but he was supposed to be coming home from Sweden this week. He had been checking on our manufacturing plant, the one Mindy’s father had built near Stockholm.” She glanced over at her phone and its broken screen. “I tried to call him when I was driving back from Billings, but it went straight to voice mail. I pulled the info on his phone, but the last data usage was from Sweden two days ago.”
Damn, he forgot how good Zoey was to have around when it came to tech. His new team didn’t have anyone that could even compare. She could pinpoint just about anyone on a map at any time, using anything with a digital footprint.
Which reminded him of his phone. All of a sudden it—and the secrets it held—weighed even heavier in his back pocket.
If, even for a moment, she considered him anything less than one hundred percent trustworthy she could probably hack into every device he owned within a matter of hours.
The thought provided him with a new and deeper sense of foreboding.
But if he opened up to her now and told her what he had done, she would probably be forced to turn him out. How could she possibly trust him when five million dollars sat on the table? Zoey would undoubtedly think he was just using her to get close—and he couldn’t risk having her flee. If she disappeared, the only time he would likely ever see her again was when her face flashed across the news as a missing person—or worse.
She could glean far more information from the actual post than he could. With all of her skills, she could probably pull everything from the post’s initial location and time stamp all the way down to the author’s eye color and their DNA sequence.
He had to tell her. The chances were okay that he would be able to make her understand why he had taken the job if he told her now, but if he waited...well, those minimal chances decreased by each passing nanosecond.
He was torn between his promises to his employers and the girl who had broken his heart.
Damn his heart.
“Zoe...” he said with a sigh.
She stopped pacing and looked at him. As though she could read that there was something up on his face, she moved closer. Her scent wafted toward him carrying the floral notes of Marc Jacobs Daisy...her signature scent.
He could feel his pupils dilate as he took her perfume deep into his lungs.
“What’s wrong, Eli?” she said, touching his shoulder.
Her fingers were barely touching him, but he could feel them burn into him like they were sparking against his skin. She was the only woman who had ever had that effect on him, but no matter how much he cared for her, he couldn’t be sure if those sparks were the kind brought on by lust, love or the magnetism of the forbidden. Knowing his luck, it was probably a combination of them all—but none more than the latter.
“Nothing,” he said, drawing himself back as he looked at the hard pink lines of her lips. Damn, what he would give to kiss those lips and to have them both make promises of a future, a future without the pain that no amount of “I’m sorry” could make them forget.
“I know you better than that. Don’t lie to me.” She stepped even closer, like she was feeling the same pull he was. “If there is anyone in the world that you can be honest with, you know it’s me.”
Nothing could be further from the truth—but it wasn’t because he didn’t want to tell her everything. It was just...well, time had proven that trusting Zoey Martin with his heart wasn’t wise.
He reached up and cupped her cheek in his hand. She drew in a long breath, as though his touch had surprised her. The sound made him drop his fingers from her face and, as they lowered, he grazed his fingertips down the front of her T-shirt, slipping over the hardened surface of her nipple that pressed against the cotton. His body quivered to life as his mind drifted to all the times he had touched that exact place in the past—times he had taken for granted.
“I thought you were here to protect me,” she said, her tone as much a question as it was a warning.
They were too close to the past, the future and a place where both of their hearts were threatened. And as she was so kind to remind him, he was there to alleviate the threats to Zoey, not to create more.
He took a step back.
They both needed to sleep. With fresh minds, they could make better decisions. Nighttime was fodder for wicked thoughts and even darker deeds.
“I am.” He moved toward the bed, looking back over his shoulder. “You need to get some rest.” He pulled back the sheets, fluffed her pillow and motioned for her to get into bed.
“You aren’t trying to tell me what to do, are you?” She sounded annoyed, but at the same time there was a lightness to her tone like she found his actions charming.
“Never. I’m smarter than that.” He gave her a wicked grin as she walked toward the bed and took off her slippers.
He turned away before she moved between the sheets.
“I’ll be just outside your door.” He motioned to the hall.
As smart as he thought he was, he would never be gifted enough to see the future—or to know the right answers. For now, the only thing he knew with any certainty was that he was playing with fire.