Defender (22 page)

Chuck tried again to relay his thoughts through his expression.
It’s okay, man. You’re here now.

“You did the right thing, hanging on. Don’t give up now.”

I didn’t talk
, he tried again to say, but just the effort of being awake sapped him. He closed his eyes and surrendered to the painkiller dousing his system. Or was it a death euphoria? Either way, after the hellish two weeks of holding strong, he didn’t have any fight left inside him.

He didn’t expect to live, but at least he wouldn’t die staring up at Marta’s evil face.

TWENTY-TWO

Nunez may have been winding his way around rows of military cop cars like all was well in his world, but he couldn’t get rid of the tic in the corner of his eye, a tic that had started the second a security police sergeant informed him that Anya Surac refused to leave the air base.

This should have been a time for victory dancing. He’d retrieved Chuck Tanaka alive. Spiros Kutros was spilling information faster than the man used to puff dragon trails of smoke from Cuban cigars.

Sure, the backup dancer, Steven Fisher, had lawyered up, stating only that no way in hell was he ending up in a foreign jail. He wanted to go to the embassy, then home. Frustrating, but at least they had him in custody.

Could they accept Fisher’s story at face value, that he’d just called a pal for a ride and emotional support? Or had he set Livia up to be kidnapped? Hopefully, Kutros would answer those questions as well with time.

Nunez bit back a curse. He needed to be downtown at the hospital overseeing Kutros’s interrogation. Instead, he was back in Incirlik’s security police station to spend more face time with a woman who—innocent or not—he should leave the hell alone. How could he stay objective about her aunt with Anya up in his grill?

Sweat stung his eyes. He swiped his arm over his brow. Was it already daytime again? Tough to keep track when you didn’t sleep.

Nunez tugged the front door open and strode inside the station lobby. A poof from the tepid air conditioner met him along with the low drone of a television. A trio of uniformed cops from different NATO countries strode out, discussing where to eat, clearing his line of sight to the far corner. Anya sat in a corner chair beside her assigned military escort.

Nunez held up the ID clipped to his shirt. “Good afternoon, Sergeant. Agent Nunez. I’ve got this.”

“Yes, sir. Uh, good luck.”

She’d been that stubborn? Great.

Anya looked as weary as he felt. His anger ratcheted down a notch. She still wore her red silky dress from work, minus the apron, but with plenty of wrinkles along her willowy curves. Blond locks straggled from her tired ponytail.

He stuffed his hands in his pockets to keep from dropping to sit beside her, maybe stretch his arm along the back of her seat to pull her against his side. He couldn’t escape the fact that she attracted him. Her toughness. Her apparent struggle to free herself from Marta. “You can leave anytime. We don’t have evidence to hold you.”

He didn’t mention how much he hoped it would stay that way.

“I want to help.” She clutched the front edge of her chair in a white-knuckled grip, her dusky eyes darting from him to the oblivious traffic of people going about their workday. “The police here said I could stay until I check with you. Maybe I will think of something else that will help you find my aunt.”

Was she faking the nerves, angling for a deal by playing the sympathy card? “That would be good.”

“Do you believe I am staying here for another reason?”

“Are you?”

Her chest rose and fell with erratic breaths, and she began to rock almost imperceptibly. “I am staying here because she scares me like death.”

His brain translated her meaning well enough. He’d seen how Chuck Tanaka fared after two weeks with Marta Surac. Anya was right in believing that woman was enough to scare anyone to death.

He dropped to a crouch in front of her, eye level. “Has she ever hurt you?”

“Not physically, but I’ve seen what she does to others.” She paused, visibly gathering her nerves until her dark-shadowed eyes met his again. “I want to stay here until you find her, and I’m willing to earn my keep. Ask me questions, anything you want to know about her.” She swept an expansive gesture, opening herself up to his interrogation.

Okay, she was winning him over. Maybe he should wrangle some deal for her with people who could stay objective. “I can talk to the Turkish police about—”

“No.” Her breathing hitched again in that near panic attack pattern he’d seen while questioning past suspects. “Aunt Marta pays the police. When we lived in Hungary, I tried to report her, and they simply told her what I had done.”

Hungary. Nowhere had he found anything to send him searching there. He started to ask her what city, when she gasped.

Anya reached, her trembling fingers hesitating just short of his arm. “You’re hurt.”

He glanced at the bandage peeking beneath the edge of his rolled-up shirtsleeve. There hadn’t been time for him to think when the gunman had turned the weapon on him. Thank God for training and reflexes, or the bullet would have hit his heart. “It’s just a flesh wound.”

“Did my aunt do that?”

“No.” He stood again.

“But one of her people did.” She held up a hand. “You don’t need to answer that. I can see the answer in your eyes. Yes, Mr. Secret Agent, you do show things in your expression on occasion.”

Now, that surprised the crap out of him after an eleven-year career when he should have been past surprising. “Nobody else thinks so.”

“I guess that makes me different.” Some of her old starch crackled back to life.

“You’ve been different from the start.”

A tentative smile eased tension lines around her eyes. “I take that to mean I am no longer on your suspicious persons list.”

He couldn’t go that far, but he kept most everybody on his suspect list until a case closed. He nodded toward the door. “Let’s get some fresh air.”

For once, he startled
her
quiet. Hell, he startled himself quiet at the request he hadn’t planned. But Anya Surac had gotten under his skin, and he would be lying to himself if he thought otherwise. He held the front glass door wide, waiting for her to exit into the parking lot. She strode alongside him, her heels clicking on the way to his car. Again, he opened the passenger door for her.

“Where are we going?” she asked as he settled behind the wheel of the nondescript blue sedan.

“Somewhere we can talk.” Where he could learn more about her and figure out who she was underneath all the layers he’d seen in the past week.

A few winding turns deeper into the base later, he pulled up outside the recreation center baseball field. As he stepped from the car, familiar sounds of home rode the wind. Two teams of airmen played an intramural game: shouted calls, good natured heckling, the crack of a ball against the bat, families cheering from the metal bleachers. Over the years he’d embraced classic American moments to help bring him out of the grip of his undercover persona.

He took Anya’s elbow and pointed to an empty corner on the first row. “Over here.”

She followed alongside, picking her way through the patchy grass to their seat, regally ignoring the curious glances from women in jeans checking out her red dress and heels.

The bleachers felt hot even through his suit pants. “Is this okay with you?”

“Of course,” she answered without hesitation but with plenty of confusion. She adjusted the drape of silk over her knees.

“Good.” He shifted his attention front.

A big dude stepped up to bat with an accent Nunez pegged as Czech. Not exactly a country known for its Little League teams. The guy swung and rocketed the ball into foul territory, all torque, no aim, but having a blast.

The sun baked away two days of rain and tension. Elbows on his knees, he watched the game, ever aware of Anya beside him, yet still not sure what he felt for her. Ditching his Miguel Carvalho guise should have ended his attraction to her.

It hadn’t.

She tugged the band from her hair and shook it free down her back. “Do you play the baseball?”

He could listen to that accent all day, a realization that reminded him he wasn’t tamping down the attraction by not looking at her. Even her voice tempted him.

“No, I just like to watch.” He took the opportunity to think about the question and not the woman. He’d wanted to play baseball once upon a time. His parents had signed him up for a team twice as a kid, but they had to move halfway through the season.

No more avoiding. He needed to get back to business. “You’ve been helpful in rounding up people who work for your aunt when you could have just as easily gotten away with playing dumb.”

“My aunt’s workers? You still haven’t found
her
?”

“We posted an alert bulletin out for her and her bodyguard.” He could safely tell her that much, obvious information anyway.

“What about Baris and Erol?”

“Excuse me?” The bearded man who’d participated in Chloe’s kidnapping had been named Baris.

“She has two bodyguards, Baris and Erol. I am sorry, but I do not know their last names.”

“Will you work with a sketch artist?”

“Of course.” She spun the hair tie around her fingers. “You still did not say whether or not you have crossed me off the suspect list.”

“I am as sure of you as I can be of anyone.”

“Trust is a difficult thing. I imagine trusting would be all the more difficult because you spend much time doing your beneath covers work.”

He choked on a cough, and an image of just how hot sharing a bed with Anya could be. “Pardon? Beneath covers?”

“Your pretend persona. Miguel.”

He unbuttoned his suddenly too-tight collar and pulled free his tie. “Uh, that’s called undercover work.”

“Ah, right. I will remember that.” She stared at the ball field as a lady on the blue team whacked a home run and emptied the bases. Once the roar of the crowd dwindled, she said, “No wonder you do not have a quirk.”

“Excuse me?”

“Quirk. A character trait. I believe I have the right word this time.” The exotic melody of her accent thickened the air between them.

“What is your quirk?”

“I do not have one either. Mostly, I tried not to bring attention to myself. It is safer that way.”

“Sounds like we have more in common than I thought.” He slid his arm along the bleacher behind her, allowing his thumb to graze her arm in comfort.

“My aunt is sentimental.”

“You’re going to have to explain that one, because I’m having a hard time understanding how anyone who tortures other people could be sentimental.”

Anya blinked fast, her mouth sealing thin.

Shit. “I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings.”

“You’re only speaking the truth about her actions.” She fought back the tears.

“Explain to me what you meant about her being sentimental.” He would be a fool not to tap into her insights. And yeah, he wanted to get to know Anya as much as he needed to understand Marta.

“You have a show in your country about the Mafia. I believe it is called
The Sopranos
.”

“Right, but the series is over now.” He tucked his feet under the stand to make room for a mother passing by with a double stroller.

“Still, you know what show I am referring to. It centers around one Mafioso in particular, the leader.”

“Tony Soprano is probably one of the most recognized TV characters ever.”

“I believe that is because he had a human side with a quirk as well as his evil side. Even bad people are not . . . uh . . .” She wiggled her fingers beside her head as if searching for a word. “Flat?”

“Correct. Flat. One-dimensional.”

“Yes, my aunt has many dimensions. One of them, she collects things that remind her of the past. That is why I say she is sentimental.”

“Vulnerabilities. The downfall of anyone, good or evil. You would have made a damn fine agent, Anya.” He would be wise to stay alert around her.

She twisted the hair tie around and around her fingers tighter until the tip of her index finger turned blue. “I am not as innocent as I would like to be.”

Ah shit. Here it came. Her confession would blindside him after he’d convinced himself she really had tried to escape her aunt. He could see how it would unfold and hated what he would have to do, but he was completely helpless to stop the end result. “I’m listening.”

“I ran packages for my parents as a child without knowing. After they died, I continued, but understood my actions. I transported drugs for my aunt, and I smiled at men to get them to tell me things.” Her tumbling confession began to stutter. “S-s-sometimes I did more.”

He numbed himself, almost. For some reason his normal defenses weren’t working at optimum levels. Her revelation explained the sadness and regret, and yeah, even shame he saw in her, her sense that she could never be just an ordinary girl on a date to a ball game.

“I am not proud of what I did, and I will not make excuses.” She studied the shortstop as he fielded a routine ground ball. “I knew what I did was wrong. Plenty of people are scared and still choose to do what is right. I did not stop until she asked me to kill someone. That is a line I could not cross. That is the day I went to the police.”

“The time you discovered the cops were on the take.”

“On the take?” Then her face cleared. “Right. That is also when I began saving to leave, to become clean. How silly of me to think I could escape her reach.”

Relief funneled through him. How damn strange that hearing her confession made him trust her more. Maybe because he was beginning to really grasp what she already knew about quirks and layers to people.

“What sort of things has your aunt kept?”

Anya blinked fast, confusion skirting across her eyes. “She has a ring from her mother, and she carries a cigar clipper with her always. She told me once it belonged to her uncle, Radko.”

Radko. He made a mental note to look up more on the guy.

“She told me one day that ring would be mine. I do not want anything from her, but still, it seems strange knowing that I will never have that ruby.” Her dark eyes softened with sentimentality. “Just as it makes me sad I will not kiss you again.”

Her surprise admission cleaned his clock like a ball upside a batter’s helmet—for all of one shouted call from the ump. Nunez tucked a knuckle under her chin and tipped her face to his. He skimmed his mouth over hers once, again, lingering.

“Get a room, dude,” called a teenage batboy staring up at them from the first base line.

Anya’s smile stroked his kiss for a final second before they eased apart. “I know your last name is Nunez. What is your first name?”