Endgame (37 page)

“What kind of party.” She was sane enough to understand why John would expect them to show up at a party. Tons of collateral damage. His turf, her death on his terms. It was perfect for him.

“The kind John likes. We have an invitation. He’ll send an address right before we leave.”

Shit.
John liked BDSM dungeon parties, ones that would find her submissive on the end of Chase’s very dominant collar and chain combination. “I’m not going to a party with you. Period.”

“You will. Period.” His tone reminded her of when Jake was in control, during anger management times, and she squelched the need to give in, to submit to him. That’s what they wanted, for her to submit and be their killing machine. “You’ll do whatever I say, to save Jake. That’s an order.”

Jake
. If Chase knew… She had to know how deep Jake was in this, though every cell in her body fought it. Someone besides Aaron had to be on her side. Chase had screwed Jake over, too.

She stopped in her tracks, the TSA agent stepping on the heel of her shoe. “Did Jake know what you know? All of it?”

Chase stopped and hesitated just long enough for her to realize Jake knew enough. Pain sliced through the numbness, grabbed her stomach, and squeezed. She would have thrown up right then if she had anything in it. She doubled over, breathing around misery. Fool. Stupid, stupid fool. “Oh, God.”

Aaron, her new favorite, grabbed her shoulders with one hand, rubbed her back with the other. “Baby, you okay?”

“No, I’m a stupid, gullible, blind fool, falling in love with two men who said they had my back, who made me believe I was their world and invincible and strong.” She struggled upright. Chase had seen enough of her weakness. She forced herself to stand toe to toe with Chase and wished she had a free hand to shove in his brick-hard chest. “Fuck you. You are motherfucker number three, Jake is four. Go yourself. I’m done.”

“Ma’am!” the TSA agent said. “You need to calm down.”

She took a step back, against Aaron, but he stiffened. “You have to go.” His hands tightened on her shoulders, and she shrugged him away. “You have to do this for me.”

“You want John,” Chase reminded. He grabbed her elbow and turned her roughly. “Walk. You’re drawing attention.”

She walked, fuming, yanking her elbow from Chase’s hand.

“We’ll get through this, baby.” Aaron’s hand settled on the small of her back. “I’ll have your back. You and I, we can do this. But we need them. Don’t let Jake die because Chase is an asshole.”

“Fuck off, Aaron,” Chase rumbled from her other side. “Jake’s just as much of an asshole, but she owes him, so she better suck it up and do her job.”

She did owe Jake for saving her, for giving her a week of Aaron before she died tonight. She focused on Aaron’s hand, caressing her back because if she didn’t focus there, she’d succumb to the driving pain in her gut. It hurt so much.

They reached the black SUV, the air outside crisp, the snowflakes gone, snow piled up against the curbs. Their luggage waited for them as well.

“Aaron, open the back door, then start loading your bags into the rear.” Chase wasn’t making a request. Aaron did as he was told.

Chase reached into the truck for something and then returned to hold her as the TSA agent unlocked the handcuffs. He shot her a glare of warning before he left, the other agents falling into step.

She started to make a comment when Chase slipped a hand around her waist, deftly yanked down the waistband of her pants at her side beneath her long coat.
No
. She struggled, and he held her still, his arm like a vise on her belly, right above that fucking piercing, the pain almost blinding. Chase, who had always held her so gently, twisted her arm behind her back. His breath was hot on her cheek, his scent cloying. “Don’t fight me.”

“No,” she whispered, tensing as he reached into his pocket. She had expected force, but it didn’t make the vortex of fear swirling inside her any less painful to bear.

“Be still.” He stabbed, the needle piercing that inch of skin he’d exposed at her waistband, the fluid burning as he injected.

“No.”

Chase gave a low laugh and smoothed her shirt over her pants again. “You know better, Char. Act like a child and you get punished. I own you. You have a job to do, and in a few hours, you’ll thank me for reminding you. You’ll wake up clear headed and remember what the game is all about. That’s anger management at its best.”

There was no point in going ballistic. This was what Jake liked to call spy juice. A little something the lab whipped up for the good guys. It took you down fast and then laced the recipient with something that numbed all emotions when they woke. She had probably had five minutes or so. Long enough to get some answers.

But the world titled, spun, and her legs started to turn to jelly. Way, way too fast. Aaron paused in picking up the last bag, his brows furrowing with questions.

She grabbed his shirt to stay up, and his confused face appeared in front of her. Shimmering, swirling Aaron.

“Baby? You okay?”

“No.” That fucker had never jacked her up with enough to take her down this quickly when they used it in training. She was going down fast, now. Really fast.

A swirling bastard Chase kissed her cheek and smiled at her. Smug bastard. “Sweet dreams, sweetheart.”

“Kill you.” The words were beginning to slur. She fought harder. Jabbed a finger into bastard’s hard chest. “Motherfucker. Three.” Three came out really slurred.

“I know.” He sounded sorry. Fuck him, sounding sorry. He propped her against the car to keep her upright.

“Jesus, did you have to do this?” Aaron. She couldn’t see him, because he swirled faster.

“Get her in the back,” bastard ordered, like he ruled the free world.

Aaron wrapped his arms around her as her legs turned to spaghetti, and she just swam around the bowl in her mind, in the tomato sauce. Aaron, her punk. Her only reason to live.

“Love you,” she whispered. And went under.

****

“Aaron, get her in before she draws attention,” Chase ordered as Aaron fought to balance Charlotte’s unconscious form against the side of the SUV.

“What the hell?”

“Put her in the fucking truck, now,” Chase growled under his breath.

An older couple was staring from the sidewalk, whispering.

“My wife,” Aaron lied. “She’s pregnant and passes out instead of barfing. She just needs to rest.” He kissed her check, panicking as he shoved Charlotte into the rear of the vehicle. He slid in and slammed the door, heart racing faster than the speed of light. Chase jumped in the driver’s side and pulled out into traffic.

Aaron wanted to toss his cookies. Shit, he’d just been an accessory to kidnapping his girlfriend. He’d already been an accessory to her learning tons of shit she had no right to learn. Now this.

Aaron leaned forward. “What the hell. Frenemy, dude. That’s what you are.”

“She’ll thank me later. She needs to reset.”

“Reset? You don’t drug people to reset them.”

“You do with Charlotte.” Chase studied her in the mirror. “I need her to be quiet in the car.”

“You carry drugs and not handcuffs? A gag?”

“You take what you can get.” Chase adjusted the rearview mirror so he could glare at Aaron better. “I need her out and I need to talk to you.”

“Then you say, ‘Aaron, could I have a private word with you?’ And I say, ‘Sure, Chase.’ And we go to another room while Charlotte powders her nose. You don’t knock her out.” This couldn’t be happening, could it? But it was, because here she was, on his lap, unconscious.

Chase shrugged.

Aaron lost it. “This is a bad, fucking B movie. My brother is a hostage disguised as me, my Danger Girl is unconscious at the hands of her devil incarnate boss, and no one is calling cut to the scene.”

Chase laughed. “Danger Girl? I wouldn’t say that in front of her when she’s conscious.”

Aaron adjusted Charlotte’s head so she lay on his lap in a better position. Her blonde hair fell onto her cheek, and he brushed it aside, taking comfort in the softness of her skin under his fingers. It was weird, brushing away blonde hair.

“I know you think I’m a monster for this, but I have no choice,” Chase said. “I can’t have her trying to kill me while we’re rescuing your brother. I know you don’t get it, but she won’t be angry when she wakes up. I need her to be clear. Cold, hard, and mean, like she’s been trained.”

Jake.
Aaron pictured him tied in a chair with not even a bead of sweat on is brow. Jake was ultra cool. He had been a bad-assed superhero even before he was a spy, but now he seemed larger than life, twice as bad-assed, despite being in on betraying Charlotte. Hell,
he
had betrayed Charlotte. “You said Jake was fine. What proof did they give you?”

“I video conferenced with him. He was pretending to be you, all sissy and whiny because that’s who John thinks he has—you.” Chase glanced at him in the rearview mirror. “Baby cowboy has borrowed a pair of Danger Girl’s balls, it seems.”

Thank God, Jake was okay. At least one thing was going right.

Aaron noticed the car wasn’t heading away from the airport. Chase was looping around. “So what’s the plan?”

“The plan is for you to board a plane back to L.A. A ticket is waiting for you, and here,” he tossed a paper over the seat, “is your flight info.”

“I’m not going anywhere.” Aaron sailed it right back.

“You
will
go. You are nothing but a distraction, do you understand? Nothing. She needs you to go home so she can finish this.”

Charlotte must have transferred her freight train anger to him before she went under, because Aaron felt the sucker firing up in his gut. Smug asshole thought he owned her. She was no longer Chase and Jake’s pet. She was his.

“Nothing? Really? Let’s discuss that. I remember her saying you’re motherfucker number three. And I recall she said she loves me. Seems you’re closer to nothing than I am.”

Chase laughed. “The shit I gave her would make an elephant drunk text a lion and a crocodile for a ménage before it went under. She doesn’t love you.”

Aaron wasn’t buying that she didn’t love him. He knew Charlotte. “You know how I spent last night? I cleaned up your mess because you blew her world sky high. She doesn’t trust you anymore. So I’m not going anywhere, not when she needs me to help her stay sane to rescue my brother.”

“Do you know what an endgame means, Aaron?”

Fuck these people and their endgame. “Yeah. I do. And in case you haven’t noticed, her endgame has changed. You failed to inform her of the change in players. So she has cleared the board and set up brand, spanking new pieces.”

Chase sucked in a breath. “Is she thinking of running? Because that’s not an option. Not if you want a big brother.”

“Do you know Charlotte? Really know her? Running was never an option. She still wants to kill John. She’s scared shitless. She has no clue how she’ll face him. But she’ll do it, because it’s her ultimate checkmate.

“But you—you are motherfucker three. You are a lousy friend and spy and couldn’t lie to her about Jake. Now he’s motherfucker four. She will go down in a blaze of glory and kill all of you, no questions asked. That is her endgame.”

Chase didn’t look fazed. “I’ll get her back in the game. She’ll be fine.”

“Really? Because you were the man who held her when she cried five years ago? It’s not enough. She hates you enough to kill you. She just tried, for Christ’s sake. You need me. I’m the man who held her last night, before and after her nightmare. I’m the man who had to tell her maybe you had a hell of a good reason to betray her, to make her what she is now, able to face John.”

That got Chase’s attention. He held Aaron’s gaze for a long moment in the rearview mirror. But fuck if Aaron could read what the man was thinking.

“You want to know what she’s most afraid of? Not the dying part. She’s good with the dying. She is afraid that you, motherfucker number three, won’t be pleased with her. So I took care of that, too. She knows I’m proud of her no matter what happens. She doesn’t need you. Not anymore.”

“She’s worried about what I think. That I won’t be pleased with her?” Chase actually looked…upset.

“Asshole, yes. She was. Probably still is, but I’m trying like hell to hold her together. Do you understand how badly she hurts?”

“Yes.” At least he had the decency to look sorry. “I knew going in this would happen. I did what I had to do.”

“Then don’t be an asshole. I’m staying.”

Chase sucked in a long breath. One filled with unease and probably a zillion emotions that—God forbid—he reveal. Chase blew his breath out, weighing things in his mind, no doubt. Jake vs. Charlotte vs. Endgame. Which would win?

“You can stay. But you have to sell what I have planned.”

Aaron shouldn’t feel relieved. No way was he leaving anyway. But Chase’s permission eased a bit of tension. “What’s that?”

Chase’s eyes glittered with renewed purpose in the rearview mirror. “The plan is for me to escort Danger Girl to the party and get Jake back. Take down John. You’re staying home to keep Tia from killing someone, because that’s her goal. Then you go back to California. Alone.”

“I’ll sell the party, but Charlotte’s not going without me.” Aaron leaned back against the leather seat. “I’m not going anywhere without her. I don’t like your endgame or hers. I foresee she will do what she has to do and she will live. For me.”

Chase pulled over into a desolate parking lot of an abandoned car sales place. He put the SUV in park and turned, his arm over the seat, to glare at Aaron. “Okay, so this is when I step in with ‘the chat.’ You ready for ‘the chat,’ Aaron?”

How he had the balls to stare this guy dead in the eye, he had no clue. But he did. Charlotte would be so freaking proud. “I don’t need your advice.”

“I think you do. Because we have a huge problem here. Huge.”

“You’re just pissed because she doesn’t need you.”

Chase gave a low, sardonic laugh. “You think you can love her? Let’s say she does make it out of this. How long before she gets made by some other thug and is killed on your arm?”

“She can’t have that many people after her.” Stupid, stupid words. He knew that.