Midnight Action (28 page)

This wasn’t her mother lying there. It was a slab of meat her grandfather insisted on keeping fresh.

Cate gagged again, unable to control the revulsion gripping her stomach.

“You don’t deserve this,” she whispered to her mother.

The earsplitting drumming of her heart drowned out her thoughts. She walked to the side of the bed. Stood there. Stared at the tubes taped to her mother’s mouth and nose.

She felt like she was having an out-of-body experience. She was watching herself do the unthinkable. Seeing her own hand gently peel the tape off her mother’s face. Seeing her shaky fingers struggle to unhook the plastic pieces.

She felt sick again. Faint.

Breathing hard, she popped the tube out, and recoiled when a loud wheeze echoed in the air, like a balloon that had just been deflated.

Ariana didn’t move. Her chocolate brown eyes stayed blank.

Cate could barely see through the sheen of tears. Very slowly, she leaned down and kissed her mother’s forehead.

“You can rest now, Mama. I love you.”

Then she looked at the heart monitor.

And waited.

* * *

“Still no sign of her.” Ash’s green eyes were focused on the house, his fingers drumming the steering wheel of the SUV.

They’d been waiting for almost five minutes, parked in the narrow driveway at the side of the house, which Cate had explained was used primarily by the staff. The driveway had its own gate separate from the one at the main entrance; Cate had given them the code for it and said she’d be outside at exactly ten o’clock.

But it was 10:05, and she was nowhere in sight.

Morgan couldn’t control his growing worry. He suspected they were at Ariana’s house, but he hadn’t caught a single glimpse of the woman he’d seduced all those years ago. The only car in the main driveway was the one Cate told them she’d be arriving in, but he supposed Ariana could have a vehicle or two stashed in the three-car garage.

Christ, he hated feeling so powerless. He wanted to run into the house and get Cate, but he forced himself to heed Noelle’s advice.

You have to trust her,
she’d said firmly.

At the moment, Noelle was out front with Sean Reilly. They’d reported seeing an armored sedan drive through the gates. Cate had gotten out of the backseat and entered the house sandwiched by two beefy bodyguards, the same ones who’d been at the Eiffel Tower with her.

It concerned him that neither Dietrich nor Bauer had accompanied her today. Dietrich was attending a board meeting in the city, which had been confirmed by Bailey, who was staking out the headquarters of Durand Enterprises.

Sully and Liam had remained at the Durand property, and they’d checked in to report that Bauer had walked Cate out to the car but hadn’t joined her. Liam had managed to snap a photo and send it to Morgan, who’d grimly confirmed the identity of one Nikolaus Bauer.

Fuck, he had no idea what was going on. Why was Cate so desperate to escape? What had happened in that maze?

And where the hell
was
she?

“There,” Ash said suddenly, his hand moving to start the engine. “She’s coming out.”

Morgan instantly hopped out of the passenger seat and saw her walking toward the car.

Her dirty blond hair was arranged in a long braid, and she wore jeans, a white tank top, and a blue gingham shirt tied around her waist. It didn’t escape him how similarly they were dressed—he had jeans and a white T-shirt on, and a flannel shirt he’d tossed in the backseat because it was too damn hot today.

But he didn’t have time to dwell on their clothing, because he took one look at Cate’s face and knew that something was wrong. Her expression was eerily vacant, and she was moving like a zombie, her arms hanging limply at her sides.

“Are you okay?” he demanded when she reached him.

She offered a weak nod. “We have to go. Now.”

He wasn’t about to argue. He opened the back door for her and she quickly slid inside. Rather than return to the passenger seat, Morgan got in next to Cate, then slammed the door and rapped the back of Ash’s seat.

“Go,” he ordered.

Ash was already reversing toward the gate.

Morgan clicked his earpiece and addressed Noelle. “We’ve got her. Meet us at the rendezvous.”

“Yes, sir.” A mocking note in her voice.

He cut off the feed and immediately refocused his attention on Cate. “Tell me what’s going on.”

When she turned to face him, he was stunned to find unshed tears clinging to her eyelashes.

Alarm flared in his chest. “Cate. What happened?”

“I...” She made an anguished sound. “I killed her.”

As shock slammed into him, Morgan met Ash’s eyes in the rearview mirror. For a second he thought he’d misheard, but the severe look on Ash’s face confirmed that he’d heard her loud and clear.

“You killed who?” he said softly.

She repeated herself, her face devoid of emotion. “I killed her.”

“Your...mother?” he hedged.

“But she was already dead,” Cate whispered. “I didn’t really kill her because she was already dead, right?”

Morgan couldn’t make sense of it. He reached out for her, but she backed away from him, until her side was pressed against the car door. The rejection hurt, but he ignored his own pain because Cate’s suffering was clearly a million times worse. She was going through something, something he still didn’t understand.

“I can’t answer that, sweetheart,” he said gruffly. “Not until you make me understand.”

“Brain-dead,” she choked out. “
Maman
has been brain-dead for seventeen years.”

Morgan froze. “How is that possible?”

“She was shot in the head during an assassination attempt on my grandfather. One of his rivals tried to kill him.”

The revelation brought a frown to his lips. He knew that was what Cate must have been told, but it sounded like a load of bull to him. Businessmen didn’t customarily go around solving problems with bullets.

And she’d said seventeen years. There’d been only one attempt on Dietrich’s life seventeen years ago. The ambush in Berlin.

Son of a bitch.

Ariana had been shot during the ambush.

Morgan drew in a breath. “Was she pregnant with you when she got shot?”

Cate nodded numbly. “There was no brain activity, but her body could still function with the help of machines. The doctors monitored her carefully throughout the pregnancy and delivered me through a C-section. And then afterward, they kept her alive. But she wasn’t really alive. She wasn’t.”

Despair swam in her eyes. “She lived with us at the beginning, back in Greece. But it was too hard to see her like that, day in and day out. My tutors convinced Grandpa that she belonged in a private clinic, but he didn’t want her to be in a hospital. So he bought a house, just for her and the nurses, and then when we moved to France he bought her another one. This place. He made me visit her every week.”

Morgan’s heart ached for the girl beside him. Christ, being forced to see her mother like that...It must have been torture for her.

A loud honk suddenly captured his attention. He glanced out the window in time to see a red BMW cutting off the car in front of them. Nobody was tailing them, thank God.

He watched the scenery flash by, relieved to realize that the airport wasn’t much farther. It was the one he always used when he was in Paris, conveniently located closer to Dietrich’s countryside estate than the city itself.

He turned back to Cate, whose expression was lined with despair. “I dreaded the visits,” she mumbled. “Does that make me a bad person? Because I didn’t want to see my own mother?”

“You’re not a bad person, sweetheart.” His throat was so tight it hurt to speak.

Her face collapsed. “I pulled out her breathing tube. I was going to take out the feeding tube but it would have taken too long for...for the heart monitor to stop. You can survive for days without a feeding tube. Did you know that?”

He gulped.

“They all rushed in...the nurses...Bruno and Christian... They didn’t notice when I slipped away. But her heart had already stopped. They won’t be able to resuscitate her. They shouldn’t even try.” Anger hung from her voice now. “She didn’t deserve to live like that.”

This time when he pulled her close, she didn’t protest. She buried her face against his shoulder and sank into his embrace, whispering against his chest.

“You can’t kill someone who’s already dead...”

His heart officially cracked in two. He wanted to reassure her, to tell her everything would be all right, but he didn’t know how. He’d never been good at sharing his feelings, or comforting other people when they were hurting.

God, how was he ever going to be a father to this girl?

He tried to quell his rising panic. He’d figure out the whole fatherhood thing later. Maybe he’d be shitty at it. Maybe he’d be great.

Right now, the only thing that mattered was bringing his daughter home.

•   •   •

Cate was groggy as hell when she opened her eyes. For a moment, she had no idea where she was, and it took several seconds to orient herself. She heard quiet voices from somewhere behind her, the soft hum of an engine. She blinked, and noticed the plush white armrests of her seat, the off-white and dark wood interior of a spacious cabin.

The jet. They were on the small jet they’d boarded back in France.

It all came rushing back to her. Arriving at the private airport, her father’s strong arm around her as they crossed a cavernous hangar toward a sleek white plane. He’d held her hand as they’d climbed a set of metal stairs, and then he’d settled her in a comfortable chair before going to talk to a beautiful woman with golden hair. Two men had joined the hushed discussion, one with scruffy blond hair and stubble on his face, and a dark-haired one with a southern accent.

Cate had been too numb to pay much attention, but she remembered the queasy feeling in her stomach when the plane had taken off, and her father asking her if she wanted something to help her sleep. She’d nodded, eager to shut out the world, and then she remembered swallowing two pills—and that was all.

She sat up and rubbed her eyes. The cabin consisted of two aisles with four seats on either side, each pair facing the other. Nobody was beside her, but the brown-haired guy who’d been talking to her father sat in the seat opposite hers, his green eyes focused on her face.

“How’d you sleep?” he asked.

“Terribly,” she admitted, before looking around in search of her father.

He was across the aisle, his eyes swimming with concern as their gazes locked. “Hey,” he said gruffly.

“Hey.” She shifted in her seat, then stood up on shaky legs. “I need to use the washroom.”

Morgan was instantly at her side. “C’mon, I’ll take you.”

She didn’t protest as he took her hand and led her to the back of the plane. He opened a door for her and she walked through it, finding herself in a bathroom that was as elegant and spacious as the rest of the jet. After she’d done her business, she splashed cold water on her face, then examined her reflection in the mirror and saw nothing but an impassive face looking back at her.

Her heart clenched as she remembered what she’d done.

She’d pulled the plug on her own mother.

God, it sounded like a plot straight out of a cheesy television movie—only it wasn’t. It was real. She’d actually done it.

She wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to forgive herself, but at the same time, she refused to let herself regret her decision. She’d had no choice; she needed to create a distraction in order to slip away from Bruno and Christian. But more than that, she’d wanted to set her mother free, once and for all.

She’d wanted Ariana to finally be at peace.

Cate tore her gaze off her reflection and stepped out of the lavatory.

Morgan waited outside the door. “Want something to drink?”

“Some water would be great.”

“Sure thing. I’ll be right back.”

As he disappeared behind a blue curtain to their left, Cate wandered back to her seat. The dark-haired guy was still there, and now that she was more alert, she realized he was actually really good-looking. And young. He was at least five years older than her, but far younger than everyone else on board.

“We weren’t properly introduced,” he said with a smile. “I’m Ash.”

“Cate,” she murmured back, then felt like an idiot because obviously he already knew her name.

He gestured to the other side of the plane. “That’s Sean Reilly. And the woman next to him is Noelle.”

“You doing all right, luv?” Reilly had an accent too, an Irish one, and he sounded genuinely concerned as he looked over at her.

“Yeah, I guess,” she said before focusing on the woman who’d been introduced as Noelle.

The blonde gazed back with shuttered blue eyes, offering a brisk nod.

That was it. No
hello
, no
how are ya?
Noelle just sipped her coffee, continuing to watch Cate over the rim of her cup.

“Are we the only ones here?” she asked Ash.

“Yep. Just us. Oh, and Giovanni. Our pilot,” he clarified after seeing her puzzled look. “There’s no crew on board. Morgan doesn’t like to travel with attendants.”

She opened her mouth to ask why, but Morgan chose that exact moment to appear with a bottle of water in his hands.

“Here,” he said, handing it to her.

“Thanks.” Cate untwisted the cap and took a quick sip. “How long was I sleeping?”

He didn’t sit down, just hovered over her, and it suddenly registered how big he was. Definitely taller than six feet, with a broad, muscular body you saw only in action movies, not real life. But then she glanced at Ash and Reilly, and realized they were just as ripped.

“Eleven hours,” Morgan told her.

Her eyebrows shot up. “Seriously? Wow. Those are some powerful sedatives you gave me.”

He shrugged. “You needed them.”

Cate shifted her gaze out the window, which revealed nothing but a thick carpet of fluffy white clouds. “I never even asked where we were going.”

The realization was a tad unnerving. How was it possible that her trust in this man ran so deep that she’d willingly gone to a strange airport with him and boarded a plane without knowing where it was headed?

“Costa Rica,” he answered. “Our compound is near San José.”

“Hey, boss,” Sean Reilly called. “Sully’s on the sat phone.”

“I’ll be right back,” Morgan muttered.

After he’d stalked off to take the white satellite phone Sean was holding out, Cate turned to Ash in confusion. “Do you guys all live together?”

“Most of the team does. A few guys live off-site.”

“The team,” she echoed. A pang of embarrassment tugged at her. “I just realized I don’t even know what you guys do. Security or something?”

“Or something,” he said with a grin. “Ever heard the term ‘soldier of fortune’?”

“You mean, like mercenaries? You kill people for money?”

“Nah, that’s contract killers.”

He grinned again, and this time a set of dimples appeared, bringing a stab of pain to Cate’s heart. Gabriel had had dimples too.

Gabriel was dead.

She reached up to rub her temples, forcing herself not to dwell on that right now. It still wasn’t time to grieve.

“We focus mainly on extractions,” Ash explained. “Rescuing people.”

“Like who?”

“Whoever needs rescuing. You’d be surprised by how many dumb-asses get themselves captured nowadays.”

She found herself smiling for the first time all day. She wanted to ask him a million more questions, but they were interrupted by a male voice.

“We’re starting our descent,” their pilot called through the open cockpit door. “Buckle your seat belts. We’ll be landing in San José in the next twenty minutes or so.”

Cate snapped her seat belt into place. When she lifted her head, she found Ash’s sympathetic green eyes on her.

“I’m sorry about your mother,” he said quietly.

She swallowed. “Thanks.”

“It’s rough...what you had to do...” He shrugged awkwardly. “I know it must hurt pretty bad right now, but for what it’s worth, I think you did the right thing.”

She looked up in surprise. “You do?”

Ash nodded. “Nobody should have to live like that. It’s not fair to them, or the people they left behind.”

His words succeeded in easing some of the pressure in her chest. She nodded in gratitude, then glanced across the aisle again. Her father was still on the phone. Sean Reilly was next to him, flipping through a magazine, and Noelle was still drinking her coffee, her blue eyes fixed on Morgan.

Cate had never seen a more beautiful woman. Or a more aloof one.

Lowering her voice, she turned back to Ash. “Is that Morgan’s girlfriend?”

“I honestly don’t know.”

“She’s not part of your team, though.”

“No. She’s...Well, it’s complicated.”

Cate opened her mouth to ask another question, but all of a sudden a loud
bang
boomed from behind them and the plane lurched so hard that if she hadn’t been wearing a seat belt, she would have been thrown out of her seat.

“What was that?” she blurted out.

Ash frowned. “I don’t—” He stopped midsentence.

Because all hell had broken loose.

A deafening blast rocked the plane, and the lights flickered wildly before shutting off completely. A rush of air blew through the cabin, and for a second Cate thought the door had been blown off, but when she frantically twisted her head to look, she saw that the door was still intact.

Her heart raced as a cacophony of noise blared all around them. The shriek of the wind that had somehow penetrated the cabin, the shrill ringing noises from the cockpit, a metallic grinding, and a rattle that vibrated beneath her feet. And then there was a popping sound and the oxygen mask over her head released from its compartment and dangled in front of her face.

As terror shuddered through her, she clutched her armrests in a death grip, scared she was going to be sucked out of the plane, but clearly she was the only one worrying about that because everyone else was on their feet, rushing past her as they shouted things she couldn’t make out over the uproar.

She experienced a wave of dizziness and hastily reached out for the oxygen mask. She brought it to her face and inhaled deep gulps, trying not to let the panic take control of her.

“Cate, get up!” someone shouted.

It was Ash. He appeared in front of her, bending over to unbuckle her seat belt for her. She wanted to bat his hands away, to stop him from taking away the one thing guaranteed to protect her, but he tugged her onto her feet and pulled her from the safety of her seat.

Her eyes widened when another grinding noise screeched in the air. She desperately searched the dark cabin for her father, finally spotting him in front of the cockpit door, his shoulders tense as he spoke to their pilot. She couldn’t make out their words, but the high-pitched alarms coming from the cockpit didn’t sound good. At all.