Omega Force 01- Storm Force (10 page)

Kell reached over and twisted the
water control farther into the cold range. He needed the hot spray pounding his
lower back, but the rest of his body could feel Mori watching him through the
clear plastic shower curtain, and apparently, on some caveman level, he thought
it was a real turn-on. How fucked up was that?

“Need
help?” Mori sounded like she was laughing again, and he deserved it. He turned
to face her, heat running through him as her gaze dropped slowly from his face
downward. She even leaned over to get a better view, her face inches from the
sheet of clear vinyl. “Looks like you have a problem there, Ranger.”

Shit.
He turned his back on her, and
sure enough, she was laughing — loud. Served him right.
He’d gone all macho on her, and she ended up with the last laugh. He hated when
that happened.

Why
had he dragged her in here and gotten naked? He could have at least cuffed her
to the nightstand, or put off his damned shower and popped more ibuprofen.

Except, he couldn’t leave her out there alone, for a couple of
reasons.

She
would run, even if it took chopping off her hand or, more likely, breaking
whatever piece of furniture he cuffed her to. She’d find a way. He’d seen it in
her eyes and recognized the desperation. He’d seen that same look in the eyes
of men he’d led in the sandbox. Men who’d seen so much war and horror, without
an end in sight, that they just wanted to run. Didn’t even matter where, as long as they were moving.

Whatever
shit she was messed up in, whatever he’d stumbled into, it was bad. And hearing
the truth from him tonight had pushed her closer to the brink of desperation.

She
wanted to trust him; he could see that in her eyes, too. But the fear
outweighed it, and he didn’t have the time to earn back the trust he’d lost
tonight.

The
other reason he couldn’t leave her locked in the room was he wanted to be there
when Nik and Robin met her. If they got here earlier
than expected and found her alone, Nik would be curt
but civil, but Razorblade Robin was a wild card. She was volatile; she was
strong. And she had a wide predatory streak. Mori would bolt for sure, and
someone might get hurt.

Kell was turning into a prune, so he had to face the
inevitable. At least the thought of Robin had cooled his hard-on. He reached
over, turned off the water, and stuck his arm outside the curtain. “Hand me a
towel?”

Through
the plastic, he saw a fuzzy Mori cross her arms and cock her head. “Sorry,
can’t reach it.”

Fine,
let her look. He jerked the curtain back and exchanged glares as he stepped
past her and ripped a towel off the rack over the toilet, knocking another off
on her head. “Oops. Sorry.”

The
cuff jingled as she slapped the towel to the floor, turning to watch him knot
the thin white terrycloth around his hips. “I need to pee. And take a shower.
Alone.”

Kell walked into the bedroom and retrieved the handcuff
keys. Unlocking them, he pulled the cuff from Mori’s wrist and rubbed where it
had left a red mark. Man, he hated what he was about to say. “I’m sorry.”

“Sorry
is when you do it once. Doesn’t work the second time.”
She stood up. With her in shoes and him in bare feet, they were almost the same
height, and he was suddenly aware of how close their bodies were. Two inches to
full body contact, and his towel wasn’t much camouflage for what that thought
was doing to him. Again.

The
same awareness flickered across her face, and Kell’s
gaze dropped to her mouth. Her lips parted on an exhale, and his heart took off
at a gallop.

“We
can’t do this.”

“I
know.” Her voice was almost as rough as his.

Kell took a step back. “I’ll give you some privacy.”
Someone should give him a medal for restraint. “I have an extra T-shirt you can
put on after you shower.”

Mori nodded, and Kell walked out of the bathroom, not turning as the door
shut softly behind him and the lock clicked.

He
tossed the handcuffs on the dresser, hung the clean T-shirt on the bathroom
door handle, and dressed quickly in his camo shorts
and black tee. He couldn’t find any clean socks in the duffel, so he sniffed
out the ones he’d taken off and decided they could live a while longer.

He
heard the water turn on and relaxed on the bed nearest the bathroom. How was he
going to get Mori to open up and tell him the truth? He knew how to conduct an
interrogation, but he cared too much to push her until she was too exhausted or
frightened to remain silent. He was way too involved.

He
pulled the pillow from beneath his head and doubled it beneath his knees to
help relax his back muscles. The shower had been anything but relaxing, but the
ibuprofen had finally kicked in, so the spasms had calmed to a twitch. Of
course, he might as well not worry about getting called back into active duty.
The colonel was going to have his balls for dinner. The man would probably have
him castrated and shipped off to Morocco just on principle.

Maybe
the whole case wasn’t in the crapper yet, though. Kell
would try to talk to Mori first, if he had a chance before the others arrived.
If she wouldn’t talk to him, he’d have to turn her over to Nik
and keep his mouth shut if it got uncomfortable for her. Maybe he’d wait
outside or pick up something to eat from one of the dozen fast-food chains near
the motel. They had to find out the truth now, before this went any further.

Besides,
Nik was really good at interrogation, with more
patience than Kell and better people skills than
Robin. He also could often touch the person being questioned and get mental
images that would help him ask such perceptive questions the freaked-out
suspect usually answered without thinking.

Labor
Day would be here in a week, and they still weren’t sure if New Orleans was
even a credible threat. He’d talked to Gadget this morning, and he’d been developing
threat assessments and floor plans of the convention center and nearby hotels.
He’d also found three visiting groups related to energy or industrial
expansion. Adam and Archer had been swapping shifts, watching Tex-La’s downtown
New Orleans headquarters and the company’s wharf area along the riverfront. Not
much more the NOLA team could do until something broke in Houston.

Kell flicked on the TV and half dozed/half watched the
evening news. Tropical Storm Geneva still churned in the middle of the Gulf of
Mexico, almost stationary as she gained strength and waited to see which of two
slow-moving weather systems would arrive first to steer her toward land. Still
could go anywhere.

The
water shut off in the bathroom, and he heard Mori open the door, retrieve the T-shirt,
and shut it again. Kell sat up, took a deep breath,
and prayed for patience. Getting her to open up would test his composure and
tact. Neither were among his strengths.

A
couple of minutes later, she came out, skin moist and pink from the shower, her
shoulder-length hair damp and slightly curled from the humidity. His Ranger
shirt looked a hell of a lot better on her than it ever had on him, especially
tucked into those jeans that hugged every curve.

He
was so fucked.

She
threw her old T-shirt on the dresser and turned to face him. “What now?”

Keep it cool, man.
“We need to talk. About you, about the bombing, about the governor, about Michael
Benedict.”

She’d
remained stone-faced until Benedict’s name was spoken; then she blinked and
looked at the door, the other bed, the floor. Everywhere but
at Kell.

“I
wouldn’t know where to start. Plus, it’s nothing you can fix. Knowing will only
get you—”

He’d
expected her to pull out the it’s-for-your-own-good
card. “Stop trying to protect me. I know how to take care of myself. Did you
ever happen to think maybe I could help you? Because from where I’m sitting,
you are
way
over your head in this
thing, whatever it is.”

Mori
opened her mouth to speak. Closed it. Kell could practically hear her teeth grinding against each
other. She wanted to talk, but someone — Benedict — had her too scared.

He’d
try easing her into it.

“How
long have you known Michael Benedict?” He leaned back against the flimsy
headboard. Relaxed, that was his middle name. Just making
conversation.

He
could almost hear the thought process going on behind her frown as she decided
whether it was safe to answer the question. Finally, she shrugged. “My whole life. He owns the land next to my grandfather’s
ranch, so I don’t remember a time when he wasn’t around.”

It
rang of truth. “He’s a lot older than you, though, right? I mean, I’ve never
seen the guy, but you’re mid-twenties and I figure he can’t be that young if
he’s head of a shipping empire, unless he’s some kind of genius.” According to
Gadget, Benedict was fifty; would be fifty-one next month. He’d sent photos.
The man was big, burly, probably considered handsome enough by the ladies. Definitely a power broker.

Mori
laughed, and with it, some of the tension drained from her face. Her shoulders
relaxed, and she shook her head as she walked over to sit on the other bed.
“He’s twice my age and used an oil inheritance to start Tex-La, not his own business
savvy. That’s not to say he’s not an evil genius.”

Interesting choice of words. Kell
kept his tone light. “Like, set-up-the-woman evil or bomb-the-building evil?”

Too far. Mori stood up and paced back to her spot leaning on
the dresser, her posture again stiffened. “Just…ruthless, I guess. When he
wants something, he goes after it.”

Kell sat up. “What is it he wants, Mori? You?
Is he the one who hit you?” The bruise on her jaw still shadowed a little. He
was surprised it wasn’t worse; in fact, it seemed to have healed even since
they’d gone into the restaurant at lunchtime, and the marks on her neck had
disappeared.

Mori
crossed her arms tightly over her chest and traced a line of pattern in the
carpet with the toe of her running shoe.
Shit
.
He’d gone too fast.

“We
just had an argument,” she finally said. “No big deal.” But she wouldn’t look
at him.

It
was a big fucking deal. He didn’t care how much money or power Michael Benedict
had — he had no right to hit a woman. And while Mori wasn’t expressly defending
him, she was making excuses. The beaten, stunned look on her face when he’d
come to her apartment and found her hurt had burned itself into his psyche, and
he wanted to kill the man who’d done it.

But
he stuffed down the feelings. That was a sidetrack to revisit later. “Was
Michael the one who implicated you in the bombing?”

Mori
scrubbed her palms across her cheeks and let out a whoosh of breath. “Kell, it’s more complicated than that. You have to promise to
stay away from Michael. I mean it. Away. Completely. You have to let me handle him.”

Yeah, because she’d handled him so well when he put a fist to her
jaw. “I can’t do that, Mori. At the very least, he tampered with a
federal investigation, diverting resources spent
watching you instead of looking for someone else.” Someone
like Benedict himself. “I’ve got to ask again. Was he involved in the
bombing?”

Mori
pushed herself off the dresser and walked to him, reaching down to stroke her
fingers across his jawline. “Kell,
I wish things could have been different. I really do. You’re a good guy, and
I’d almost forgotten there were good guys left in the world.”

She
leaned over and kissed him, smelling of motel shampoo and sunshine. He slid a
hand behind her head and angled to take the kiss deeper, ignoring his raging
conscience and focusing on where her left hand was headed as it slid up the
inside of his thigh.

She
trailed kisses across his check until her mouth was poised above his ear. “I’m
sorry, Kell.”

Focused
on the moral dilemma growing inside his shorts, he didn’t notice what her right
hand had been doing until the click of the cuff around his left wrist.

“What
the fuck?” He jerked his left arm away, but she pulled harder, snapping the
other cuff around the leg of the nightstand and backing away from him.

“Mori,
don’t do this.” The nightstand proved surprisingly sturdy — he pulled against it
until he thought his arm would separate from his shoulder. He only succeeded in
cutting his own wrist.

He
quit struggling and stared at her. For several long seconds, they simply looked
at each other with regret and sadness and, Kell
thought, a sense of inevitability.

“Good-bye,
Kell. Don’t try to find me. Sit tight, and this will
all be over in a day or two.”

Mori
didn’t look back as she opened the door, strode out, and closed it behind her.

Across the Super 8 parking lot,
through the line of big rigs parked in the lot of the truck stop, over the low
hedge separating the brightly lit cafe from the shadowy lot of the self-storage
business next door, Mori walked with purpose.

She
circled behind the far row of storage units and leaned against the concrete
wall, her heart pounding so hard Kell’s T-shirt
vibrated. She’d bought some time, but probably not much. She was a bad liar, and
Kell knew he was on the right track with his
questions. Damn it, why hadn’t she run in the parking lot of the Mexican restaurant
instead of getting in his car after they’d heard the governor’s accusations? Why
hadn’t she run when they got to the motel?

She’d
been careless with Kell’s life, hoping he could save
her, when, deep down, she knew better. There was only one possible way to fix this,
and she prayed it wasn’t too late.

Her
fingers shook as she retrieved her cell phone and turned it on. She scrolled to
his name on her contact list and punched the number marked HOME.

He
answered on the second ring. “Mori, I keep underestimating you.”

“You
win.” She hated that her voice shook, but even taking a deep breath didn’t stop
it. His cool, smug laugh calmed her, reminding her that as much as she hated
him, she still held some power. “I’m coming to you now. I’m ready for this to
be over.”

“Come
to my house in town. We’ll discuss your conditions over dinner.” He paused. “If
you’re half as smart as you think you are, you’ll come alone.”

Well,
he’d made sure she was totally alone in this world, hadn’t he? “Give me an
hour. I’m way out on the east side of town.”

“I’ll
send a car. Tell me where you are. It isn’t safe, and we wouldn’t want any harm
to come to you.”

God
forbid anyone hurt her besides him. “I’ll be there in an hour.”

She
disconnected the call and turned off her cell phone. No point
in letting the police try to track her and somehow end up finding Kell. His friends were on the way and would uncuff him. With any luck, they’d talk him into leaving
town and forgetting she existed as soon as Michael somehow deflected blame for
the bombing and kidnapping on someone else. The thought made her sad, but she
had to be realistic. Even if she were able to get away from Michael and her
obligations, she and Kell didn’t really know each
other. Theirs was simply a physical attraction between two strangers who’d told
each other too many lies. It felt more real than that, but it wasn’t.

Mori
dug in her purse and found her debit card. She slipped around the storage units
and waited a few minutes outside the truck stop, watching people come and go,
looking for any sign of Kell or his friends. She
didn’t know who they were, but two military-looking guys would stand out in the
Lucky Trucker.

No
sign of anyone who didn’t look like he’d spent too many hours on long, empty
roads with cigarettes and caffeine for company. Mori walked in the store and
found an ATM near the cash register of the convenience mart. She knew the
police would be monitoring her bank account; she only hoped it hadn’t been
frozen.

Crap
. ACCOUNT ACCESS DENIED flashed across the screen, and the damned machine probably
went right through to the police.

She
looked at the middle-aged woman behind the checkout counter, who was engrossed
in a tabloid. “Could you call a taxi for me?”

Mori’s
heart sped up as the woman gave her a longer look than was comfortable. Did she
recognize her from the photos on TV?

“Sure thing, honey.”

Only
when the United Cab pulled up in front of the truck stop fifteen minutes later,
only after she had her butt planted firmly on the ripped vinyl seat and had
given the driver Michael’s address in River Oaks, only then did she relax.

Maybe
Kell would be safe now. As long as she stayed away
from him and kept Michael happy, maybe he’d be safe.

She’d
expected to have enough time on the cab ride to pull herself
together and prepare for whatever humiliation Michael served up to punish her,
but just her luck, she’d get the one driver in Houston who knew all the back roads
from Baytown into the city. Too soon, the well-manicured lawns of one of
America’s wealthiest neighborhoods surrounded her, everything neat and tidy, with
working streetlights, a young couple strolling in the rapidly falling dusk.
They’d probably wandered over from one of the adjacent neighborhoods to gawk at
the $10 million houses.

That
was how much Michael had paid for the Italianate estate whose curved driveway
the cab pulled into, rolling to a stop in front of the arched, carved double
front doors. He’d bragged about it enough.

Soft
light shone through the tall windows nestled behind the five stone archways
that stretched across the front of the house. Michael walked out and paid the
cab driver without a word, and Mori watched the taxi drive away as if it
contained her last hope.

“Good,
you’re here before my guest.” Michael looked like a millionaire shipping
magnate relaxing at home after work — dark slacks, tailored white shirt with the
collar open, even a flashy gold chain around his neck. A handsome,
self-assured, and 100 percent arrogant asswipe.
Just looking at him made Mori feel like a shabby interloper
from the wrong side of town.

“What
guest would that be?” She stepped past him onto the polished oak floors of the
octagonal foyer, a curved stairway flanked by an ornate wrought iron banister spiraling
up one side. Her running shoes squeaked until she walked onto the round
medallion-print rug that filled the center of the floor.

“A business associate, here to sign the final agreement on a new
shipping contract out of New Orleans.” After closing the door, Michael
walked to the foot of the stairs, leaned on the rail, and gave Mori a
head-to-toe, disapproving look. “It will be your first appearance as my fiancée,
although you’ll have to hurry to make yourself at least halfway presentable.”

“Are
you serious? We need to talk about this” — she waved her hands in the
air — “arrangement.”

Michael
took her elbow and pulled her toward the stairway. “And we will. But I need to
take this short meeting, and it’ll be good experience for you in your new role
as my mate.”

Mate, my ass.
She
might have to play the role of wife. She might have to bear his children. But
“mate” implied an intimacy that wasn’t going to happen.

Mori
grabbed the wrought iron banister to avoid Michael pushing her onto the bottom step.
“How are you going to straighten out this legal mess you’ve created? It’ll be
hard for me to be your fiancée from federal prison.”

Michael
grinned. “Don’t worry. Once we’ve
consummated
our arrangement, the governor will recant his statement. In fact, the governor is
taking all his direction from me now.” He motioned up the stairway. “Top of the stairs, first door on the right. I had some
things delivered for you a while back. Wear the navy.” His tone turned
sarcastic. “There might be dust on it, as stubborn as you’ve been. Our guest arrives
at eight.”

“Fine.” That statement about the governor sent chills
through her, and Mori climbed the stairs without looking back. Obviously,
Michael wasn’t going to talk until his business appointment was over. He hadn’t
made any more threats. In fact, her arrival had made him downright jovial. One big, jolly asshole. 

She
might as well play along for now and put the word
consummate
out of her mind.

Off
the landing at the top of the stairs, long hallways stretched left and right, and a boat-sized window at the back of the landing
looked out on manicured formal gardens circling a fountain. Gas torches lent a
soft glow to the whole vista.

Mori
paused to look at the gardens, with their rows of neatly trimmed hedges and
sections of riotous flowers left unclipped to give the illusion of wild growth.
Reflections of the torches seemed to make fire dance in the fountain’s blue
water.

If
she’d given in to Michael six months ago, would all those lives lost in the Zemurray bombing have been saved? How many women would
trade places with her, thinking a loveless union was a small price to pay in
order to live in such luxury and help her people at the same time? Had she been
completely blind and selfish?

And
now that Michael had literally gotten away with murder and, if his claims were
true, gained control of the governor, would he stop at Texas? Why not
Louisiana? Mori could only hope he’d be satisfied with what he had, with her
thrown into the bargain.

She
took a deep breath and turned the knob of the first door to the right of the
landing. The bedroom suite was a confection of cream-and-gold fabrics and dark
polished wood. Ceiling medallions, as in the formal room downstairs, were
etched with gold leaf. Two windows overlooked the front lawn, and a bathroom
full of marble led off to one side. It looked like a professional decorator had
been told to “make it look wealthy,” without adding a single ounce of
personality. The tops of the dresser and chest were bare, the only wall
adornment an antique tapestry.

Mori
thought of the collection of stuffed animals that filled her little bedroom in
Montrose and felt a pang of sadness. If Michael let her bring them here, no
telling what she’d have to give up in return.

She
looked around for the closet door and opened it to find several items of
clothing, all with price tags still attached. Awesome.
Only one item was navy blue, and Mori’s heart sank as she pulled it out. A
silky curve-hugging dress with a deep V in the front that would guarantee she
couldn’t wear a bra, a sparkly beaded collar that held the whole thing up, and a
backless silhouette that dipped almost to the waist. At least it wasn’t short.
It looked exactly like something that Michael would love and that Mori would
normally never wear.

Except tonight. She would force herself to make nice until
things were settled.

She
only had a half hour before Michael’s deadline of 8:00 p.m., so she rifled
through the dresser and was horrified, but not surprised, to find a supply of
silky panties — bikinis and thongs, of course — and, in another drawer, teddies and
negligees.

Maybe
Mori’s sudden wave of nausea was due to hunger, but she thought not. The idea
of Michael touching her the way Kell had touched her…

She
shook her head and pulled out the least offensive panties — black, with more than
an inch of fabric. Her legs were tan enough to forego hose.

You can do this.
She pulled on the dress
and stared at herself in the bathroom’s full-length mirror. Thank God she’d
thought to bring her backpack when she left the hotel. She dug out a small
first aid kit and breathed a sigh of relief when she found two Band-Aids. She
flattened them out over her nipples and inspected herself in the mirror again.
She wouldn’t have Michael mistaking air-conditioning chill for arousal, even if
she did have telltale bandage outlines if she pulled her shoulders back far
enough.

How
could he have thought to buy her a might-as-well-be-naked
negligee but not a hairbrush? Huffing, Mori dug hers out of her pack and
brushed out the kinks from the hotel shower and the night air. She grinned at
herself in the mirror. One thing about tonight she
could control. She went to the bed where she’d thrown her jeans and reached in
the pocket for a lime-green elastic band, which she used to secure her hair in
a ponytail.

She
had a feeling small acts of rebellion were all she’d be allowed for a while.

Mori
looked at her running shoes, a five-year-old pair of Nikes that had a lot of
dust and miles on them. While they’d definitely make a statement, she didn’t
want to humiliate Michael and risk his anger. The ponytail would annoy him, but
the shoes would embarrass him. She’d noticed a few shoeboxes on the floor of
the closet, so she opened them and found a pair of silver sandals with low
heels she could live with. All the shoes were her size, of course — information
probably supplied by her traitorous mother.

At
five before eight, she left her sanctuary to return downstairs, practicing the
art of keeping a pleasant expression on her face despite the fact that her feet
hurt, the house was chilled to the temperature of a freezer, and she was
petrified of what Michael might do.

As
it turned out, the worst thing he did during the hour-long meeting with George
Benoit of New Orleans was tug the elastic band out of her hair as he pulled her
alongside him to open the door. She played the dutiful, attentive, smiling
fiancée, and Michael the cordial and generous everyman who’d lucked into “this
whole shipping thing.”

By
the time Benoit left, Mori had begun to feel at ease for the first time since
walking into the house, and she wished he’d stay longer. An outsider kept both
Michael and her on their best behavior. Maybe they needed a full-time, in-house
referee.

They
watched from the doorway as Benoit’s taxi pulled out of the drive. Michael’s
hand strayed from her waist to her butt, squeezing as if testing a ripe tomato
for firmness. Mori gritted her teeth and let him squeeze a few seconds before
stepping aside and walking back into the big living room, as ornate and
passionless as the rest of the house except for the huge fireplace that took up
most of the south wall, flanked on either side by floor-to-ceiling windows.

“That
went well, don’t you think?” Michael followed her into the room, and Mori
gasped as he slipped an arm around her waist and deftly twisted her to face
him.

“He
was nice and seemed to be excited about your business deal.”

Mori
held her breath to block out Michael’s scent of whiskey and aftershave as he
pulled her closer and leaned in to kiss her neck. “That dress looks as
beautiful on you as I thought it would.” He touched his lips to hers, and when
she tried to slip away, he pulled her more tightly against him with his left
arm.