Black Jack (6 page)

Stepping to it, she opened it carefully, her breath catching at the sight of the weapon packed

carefully in black foam.

A sniper rifle. It was broken down, well oiled, and shining in the dim light. Reaching out to

touch it with trembling fingers, Lilly fought back the realization that she had used it, more

than once.

Moving to the smaller cases, she found handguns, and knew somehow that they were

modified and highly illegal. There were empty clips and cases of ammunition.

There were clothes, maps, files that Lilly scanned as fear stole her breath.

What in the hell had she been involved in?

Shaking, she pulled a leather bag from a small cabinet and packed clothes, a Glock,

ammunition, and several knives inside.

Storing the bag in the back compartment of the motorcycle, Lilly turned to the remainder of

the clothes.

She dressed quickly in leather pants, t-shirt, and jacket. Flat leather boots pulled above the

knee, and she found the key to the cycle hanging in the ignition.

Fear was ever present, but so was excitement. It pounded inside her, raced through her

bloodstream, and sent adrenaline flying through her system.

She didn’t remember who she had been.

She didn’t remember what she had been.

But maybe those memories were now growing stronger, moving closer, and were almost

within reach.

Friendly’s Sports Bar sat in the perfect location for assignations such as the one Travis had set

up with his favorite former Elite Ops counterpart.

It sat on a corner. Across the street were an assortment of closely built inner-city brick

houses that served as apartments, homes, and offices.

Franklin Street was a busy area, especially on a Friday night, which allowed for greater

anonymity, as well as plenty of traffic, both by vehicle and by foot, which could be used as a

distraction as the other agents positioned themselves to watch every corner of the tavern.

They wanted to know who was following Lilly, how she was being followed, and who they

could be traced back to.

Sitting at the bar, Travis nursed a beer, his gaze trained on the side entrance of the building

from the short end of the L-shaped bar. At the other corner, Nik sat sideways on a bar stool as

the red-haired Tehya, one of the team’s communications experts, sat beside him and flirted

outrageously.

Farther down the bar Clint McIntyre, a former Navy SEAL and now part of the Elite Ops

independent backup team, sat with his wife and tried playing the drunken male on the make

while his wife, Morganna, her long dark hair pulled back in a braid, pretended not to be

amused.

The rest of the team, backup as well as the agents, were positioned outside along with

Jordan and Santos Bahre, one of Lilly’s commanders.

“She’s not showing.” Santos’s voice came through the tiny earset that linked

communications between the agents and the commanders. “I warned you she wasn’t this

predictable.”

Travis glanced around the bar.

“She’s here.” She’d been here for a while, he suspected. He could feel her watching, those

green eyes narrowed on him as she waited to see what he’d do.

“Doubtful.” Reno Chavez, commander of the backup team that had been with the Ops for

years, now spoke into the link. “Macey and I both have the entrances covered. There’s no way

she slipped in there without us knowing it.”

There was a way. Lilly always found a way.

Travis pushed back the warm beer he had been nursing and made to rise when he felt the

small hand that pressed between his shoulder blades, indicating he should remain in place.

Settling back on the stool, he turned his head, restrained his smile, and watched as Lilly slid

onto the bar stool that had been vacated beside him.

“I didn’t think you were going to show.” He motioned for the bartender to take her order.

Waving the man away, Lilly turned back to him, her gaze suspicious as she watched him

closely.

She was wearing her riding leathers. Leather pants, boots, a short jacket, and a black silk

shirt that bared her midriff if she moved just the right way.

“Neither did I.” Her green eyes were dark in the shadows. “Tell me who you are and what

do you have to do with me?”

There was something about him, something familiar, something she couldn’t put her finger

on. She should know him, but she couldn’t remember him. She couldn’t remember meeting

him.

But her body seemed to know him. Each time she had seen him, this morning as well as

tonight, her body had responded with heated warmth and that familiar sense of remembrance.

This man had touched her, he had kissed her. Her body remembered it and she ached for

more. That ache had followed her through the day, the remembered feel of his body behind

her, at the store, impossible to recover from.

“I’ve had many things to do with you.” His smile was rakish, his brown eyes filled with

sexual knowledge. A sexual knowledge of her.

Lilly looked up at the bartender as he set a cold beer in front of her.

“Good to see you back, Lilly.” The grizzled bartender gave a wide smile and a wink. “I see

your friend found you.”

“That he did.” She lifted the beer to her lips and took a long, cold drink.

The bartender moved away, leaving her with the man watching her now. She didn’t even

know his name.

“Travis Caine,” he whispered at her ear as though reading her thoughts. “In case you were

wondering.”

She was doing more than wondering. It had been driving her crazy not knowing even that

scrap of information. “I know your name then,” she said quietly. “Who are you to me?”

“We met six years ago,” he told her. “We’ve run together at odd times since.”

Lilly pushed the fingers of one hand through her hair.

“We traveled together then?” Her heart was racing, her lungs starved for oxygen as she

fought not to breathe too hard.

He nodded and Lilly tipped the beer to her lips, and finished it quickly before setting it

rather hard on the bar and flicking her fingers at the bartender to the empty bottle.

He’d obviously been watching for her. Within seconds there was another bottle in front of

her. She wondered what tip she usually left him for such excellent service.

She finished half the beer, set the bottle on the bar, then glanced back at Travis.

“I fight?” she whispered back at him.

“Rather well.” He gave her a strange half smile. Strange, because she felt she should know

what that smile meant.

“What did I do when I fought?” she asked him. “Did I kill?”

She knew she had. She rubbed her finger and thumb together, knowing her fingerprints

weren’t there any longer and they weren’t there for a reason.

“You don’t remember anything about the past six years then?” he asked as he turned more

fully to her, the backs of his fingers stroking down her lower arm.

Did she remember anything?

She remembered her nightmares. They were filled with pain, rage, and fear. She

remembered a sense of drowning, of icy water closing over her head as she fought to breathe.

She remembered a kiss, a touch and an underlying anger that made no sense.

She remembered the sharp retort of a gun, and then nothing.

“I don’t remember anything.” At least nothing that she was willing to discuss at the

moment. Especially considering the fact she was presently being watched.

A long, slow turn of the stool seat gave her a clear view of the bar and within seconds she

knew all she needed to know. A second later she was facing him once again.

“You have friends with you.” She kept her voice low enough that it wouldn’t carry to any

listening device, unless he was wearing one himself.

She felt herself paling at the thought and dropped her head to stare at the beer. Where had

that suspicion come from? How could she look around once and see so much, pinpoint those

who were there for fun and those she knew were there to watch her?

When her gaze met his again, she saw a warning in his eyes. A warning that she not see any

more, or say any more?

“There’s no one with me,” he finally replied. “But you.”

Yeah, right, no one was there with him. He was lying to her and they both knew it. But he

was also warning her. To protect her? What the hell was going on here and what did this man

want from her?

“Why am I here?” she asked him. “Are we going to talk or play games all night?”

“I rather enjoy playing with you.” He grinned then.

“And I’m getting rather impatient.” She got to her feet. “You want to talk, Mr. Caine, then

you can come to me.”

Lilly stood to pull her jacket on, only to have his fingers curl around her wrist to halt her.

“The same willful Lilly I’ve missed like hell,” he murmured. “Tell me, how does your

family handle your stubbornness? I’ve heard your mother rarely has the patience for it from

anyone else.”

Not anyone else, not from her, Lilly could have informed him. But he didn’t need to know

that.

“I’m her daughter.” She arched her brow. “Of course I can get away with more.”

“Of course you can,” he agreed. “So tell me, Lilly, why did you sneak out of the house

tonight rather than informing her that you were leaving?”

“The same reason I’m walking out of here now without answering your question,” she

retorted blithely. “Need to know.”

At that, she turned and walked out.

He was following. She could feel him. Moving close behind her, the arousal that was so

much a part of him spreading around her. Her thighs were tight, her pussy heated.

Her pussy.

She paused at the door, allowing the cold air to wrap around her and possibly cool her

libido. He chose that moment to move closer, to step up to her until they were touching, the

hard proof of his erection well defined beneath his leather pants as it pressed against her lower

back.

Lilly gripped the door frame and held on tight. She wanted to rub against him, wanted to

thrust back and feel the heady hunger rising harder and faster between them.

Right there, surrounded by dozens of bar customers and “friends” or perhaps “nonfriends”

of Travis Caine’s.

“Tell me where to meet you,” he demanded. “Just the two of us.”

“It was supposed to be just the two of us this time,” she whispered breathlessly.

Taking a deep breath, Lilly stepped to the sidewalk, tried to brush away the need racing

through her system, and headed for the parking lot. He was still behind her, walking silently,

but she could feel the warmth of his body still surrounding her.

Moving to the motorcycle, she threw her leg over the raised seat effortlessly then unlocked

her helmet, all the while too aware of him standing next to her, as though waiting for

something, expecting something.

“What?” She turned to him, frowning, her heart racing.

His lips quirked. “You remembered the bike after all.”

Lilly jerked her head down, her gaze focusing on the helmet straps she was playing with.

She had remembered which storage unit it was parked in, she had remembered where she had

hidden the keys.

She knew things that didn’t make sense. Things that had no memories to back them, and

that terrified her.

Such as the knowledge that this man could make her burn with hunger.

He had also taught her how to survive at one point. She was certain of it.

Why was she certain of it?

That question would drive her insane. Why? Why did she know? How? How did she know?

“Who am I?” Lifting her head, she tried to fight back the sense of loneliness and confusion

racing through her. She felt lost.

Staring back at him, she watched as his hands lifted, his fingers stroking back the hair that

had fallen across her face. As he tucked it behind her ear a small smile tipped one corner of

his lips.

“You’re wild and brave,” he told her softly. “Over the past years I’ve sworn you’d get both

of us killed.”

And that only confused her more.

Travis watched the heaviness of her expression, the way her lips turned down, the sadness

and loss in her gaze. He could read how lost she was, and for Lilly, that wasn’t something he

was familiar with. She didn’t often show her emotions, no matter what they were. Unless it

was passion. Damn if she hadn’t burned the night down around them.

“Come with me, Lilly,” he urged gently. “We’ll talk, uncensored. I can tell you who you

are.”

He could tell her partial truths and half-lies. He could give her the explanations the agency

had come up with. He couldn’t let her know who she was entirely, only the cover the agency

had given her. It was a piss-poor offering, but it would fill in some of the blanks at least.

Maybe wipe that lost look from her face, at least for a little while.

“If you wanted to talk uncensored, then you shouldn’t have brought your friends along for

this meeting.”

She moved to pull away from him, to put the helmet on her head and to ride away into the

darkness. But he wasn’t ready for her to leave quite yet.

Sliding his fingers under her hair, he gripped the back of her neck, catching her by surprise

as he tipped her head back and lowered his own.

Travis caught the small gasp from her parted lips and took full advantage of the slight