Shiver of Fear (35 page)

A car door slammed, then another. At least two of them, then. He backed up again, slowly lifting his gun, perfectly still
and silent.

But his head was screaming.
Sharon Greenberg sent someone after me
. She had to have—that was the only explanation.

Which meant Devyn wasn’t safe at all with her.

Clenching his teeth, he listened to the footsteps, heard a murmur of words. One set of footsteps broke into a run, coming
toward him. Marc backed up, ready to shoot the instant his target passed.

He was ten feet away, five, two. He fired the second a shadow passed his hiding place, and the man fell with a thud. Marc
jumped out and spun to fire on the next guy, who’d already pivoted and was running back to his car.

Marc vaulted toward him and aimed low, wanting to bring him down, but still get information out of him. He hit his leg, and
the man buckled and fell. As Marc neared him, a shot whizzed by his head, fired from his first victim.

Pouncing on the runner, he looked over his shoulder and got off another shot into the shadows, eliciting a grunt of pain from
his target.

“What the fuck do you want?” Marc demanded, flipping the guy onto his back and holding him down with a knee and the gun. And
a prayer that the one behind him was dead.

Marc ducked as another bullet buzzed by his head. He lifted his hand and slammed his gun against the guy’s temple, turning
just enough to gauge the position of number one.

He was flat on the ground, pistol in hand, using his last breaths to try and kill Marc. Closing one eye, Marc aimed for a
kill and pulled the trigger, the shot echoing through the alley, no doubt about to bring the Irish police.

And Christ only knew who paid
them
.

He turned back to the man pinned under him. “Who sent you?”

The guy narrowed deep blue eyes, sweat glistening on his forehead. “Fuck you. You’re in the wrong place,” the man said. “We
kill fucking Republicans over here for sport.”

“I’m not even Irish.”

He got a tight smile. “But you’ll die like one and those are my… orders.” On the last word, he got in a sucker punch to Marc’s
face, the blow just hard enough to give the other man a momentary upper hand. They rolled again, Marc flipping onto his back.

As he did, he got off a shot, which grazed the man’s stomach, but the bullet bounced off the bricks of the supermarket. It
weakened him, though, and he lost enough power for Marc to crack the pistol over his face again, needing information more
than he needed the guy dead.

“Whose orders?” he demanded.

But the guy just groaned as blood oozed out of his wound at the waist, soaking Marc’s knees. “Who?” Marc aimed directly at
his heart. “Tell me who the hell sent you and how I can find him.”

He didn’t move, clenching his jaw, fighting pain and the will to live. “At the shipyard. Malik’s getting there early.”

“And Sharon Greenberg?”

He frowned. “They need a hostage to hold off American fire. She’s doing it… for Malik.”

For a second, that made absolutely no sense—unless the Pakistanis knew there’d be a raid. Dr. Greenberg wasn’t working for
Baird. She wasn’t working for the SIS. She was a fucking double agent for the Pakistanis.

And no doubt part of her deal with the Pakis was to either
act as
or
be
a female hostage so they could escape after picking up Liam Baird’s delivery of botulism spores.

Unless she could get a stand-in as a hostage.

He glanced at the cemetery behind the fence. No use going back there now. Either Devyn got away or her birth mother was handing
her over to a terrorist right now.

Marc pushed himself off the other man and aimed his gun at his face. “Give me your keys.”

The man turned his head, writhing in pain. “He has them.”

Marc shot his leg and the man jumped and howled, then reached into his pocket and threw a set of keys at Marc.

Hanging on to a hell of a lot of hope, Marc ran to the other car and jumped in, leaving one man near dead and the other unable
to go anywhere.

He had to get to the shipyard, before Devyn became a human shield.

Devyn didn’t dare stumble, or stall, or even talk.

Her captor, despite her injury, used the gun Marc had left to jab Devyn’s back and silently keep her almost at a run. They
tore through another unfamiliar section of the cemetery, down a set of stone stairs, around another monument, and through
a fence to a side street.

There, they ran to a car, which Sharon made Devyn drive.

Somehow, hands trembling, heart breaking, questions reverberating, she did. When they cruised past the hospital, Devyn started
looking hard for a possible escape route.

She slid a glance at the woman, at… her mother. Anything that might have felt like a connection turned to stone.

“Don’t even think about it,” Sharon said, wincing again and gingerly moving her arm. “I can drive with you dead.”

“I’ve made a mistake, haven’t I?” Devyn asked.

“If you mean by trusting me, yes. But you aren’t the first.” Sharon’s pale gray eyes were locked on her, the gun unwavering
in its aim toward Devyn’s head.

“You can’t really be my birth mother.”

She snorted softly. “You can pick your friends, but… You know the rest.”

Her stomach turned. This was
worse
than her worst nightmare. “You sent that picture of me.”

“You? No, sorry, that wasn’t you. That was just some baby picture the housekeeper where I was staying had in her wallet.”

No. She wanted to scream but kept her voice steady.
“I found a picture of me at your house.” That wasn’t the housekeeper’s picture. That was her.

She let out a put-upon sigh. “Finn MacCauley had pictures of you, not me. I never even knew who adopted you, and I didn’t
care.”

Devyn closed her eyes like she’d been hit. “But Finn did?”

“Evidently. For a man in hiding, he certainly managed to sneak into every public event where you’d be present. Recitals, graduation—good
heavens, he even got shots of your wedding.”

“He was there?” The words trapped in her throat. Was that possible?

“That’s what he says.”

She cruised through an intersection, looking for anyone who could help. But Belfast was quiet at this hour. Maybe she could
find a CCTV camera and stop in front of one. At least someone, somewhere, would know where she was.

Marc. Another stab to her chest.

“Why did Finn send you pictures if you don’t care about me?”

Sharon exhaled again, rubbing the dried blood on her lab coat. “He thought I did. I guess because he did. And he wanted something
from me.” She smiled, a dry, heartless smile. “I knew he would eventually. It just took a damn long time. Turn at the next
street, head toward the cranes, past the airport. We’re going to the shipyards.”

“What did he want from you?”

“Oh, his second chance.” She choked softly. “Finn wants redemption, don’t you know?” There was an ugly note of hatred in her
voice. “He wants his freedom. So, he came to me to help him buy it.”

Devyn frowned. “How?”

“He thought he was so smart arranging this.” She waved the gun like all of Belfast encompassed “this.” “He worked with the
FBI and the CIA and the SIS and God knows who to frame that idiot Liam Baird. He thought if he brought me and my expertise
in on it, they really could get Baird. And, of course, through Baird, they could get Malik.” She chuckled. “Nobody gets Malik.”

Devyn made the turn she indicated, using the excuse to look at Sharon again, the headlights shining just enough to emphasize
the wrinkles in her sallow skin, the shadows under her eyes. The wound may be superficial, but the blood loss was taking its
toll. She could escape… eventually.

If she stayed alive.

“So you don’t work for Liam Baird or the SIS?”

“No, I don’t. They both just think I work for them.”

“Who do you work for?”

Sharon laughed. “What makes you think this is work? Screwing Finn MacCauley is my lifelong dream, kid. Ever since the day
he used me and left me high and dry, I’ve been waiting for this.”

High and dry? “He left you with me.”

Sharon sighed, shaking her head. “I didn’t want you.”

Oh. Devyn swallowed the lump that strangled her throat, cutting off air, her arms and legs tingling with the heat of adrenaline
and agony.

“Sorry,” Sharon said with a shrug. “I’m not going to lie. I could have had an abortion, you know. I didn’t.”

“I know.”

“So, don’t take it personally. You’re not my daughter. You’re not part of me. You’re a mistake in judgment I made on a particularly
bad day when I made several.”

Devyn waited for the punch, for some kind of take-your-breath-away blow to her heart as the words settled over her.

But nothing happened.

Except release. The pressure released a little on her chest. The painful truth wasn’t so painful at all. It was a relief.
This may be the woman who gave birth to her, but she was no more her mother than… than a stranger on the street.

They had no
connection
. So why was Devyn looking for one? Suddenly, she felt free. Light. Liberated from a need that had weighed her down her whole
life. There
was
no connection.

But there was the little matter of staying alive. And information was power. “So you’re here because Finn asked you to, but
you’re really here to, what, screw him out of the chance to buy a pardon?”

“Well, there is the money. I’m getting a lot of money.”

Devyn shook her head. “Sorry, I’ve been to your house. Money’s not important to you.”

“Money is a nice side benefit,” she shot back. “Believe me, this was not the first time a terrorist organization approached
me. I have a unique and valuable talent, but I always took the high moral ground and said no. But when Finn asked me…” She
actually smiled. “Revenge trumps morals, every time.”

“Enough that you would let innocent people die?”

“If I can make Finn look bad? Lose his dream of a pardon and a”—she slid a look to the side—“his chance with you.”

Devyn gripped the wheel. “That’s what he wants?”

The other woman let out a scoffing choke. “He’d say anything to get what he wants, honey. That’s what Finn
MacCauley does. And now I’m going to make him look so bad.”

“But what about you? You’ll look bad, too.”

“I’ll have the money to not care, but don’t worry—I’ll finesse this so I look like a good undercover SIS spy. That’s where
you come in. You know, I’ll try to save you. Or make it look like I did. But Finn will be screwed and he will not get his
pardon. And I’ll be free.”

“That’s what you want? Freedom from…”

“From hating him. Freedom is a good thing.”

Yes, it was. And Devyn had never felt so free in her life.

She had no connection to this woman—none at all.

And that was the “connection” she had never been able to make. She was her own woman, not a product of any man or any woman.
They were nothing but bodies who brought her alive.

And right now, she felt more alive than ever.

Except for the gun pointed at her. “Take that right, go around the dock, and pull into that gate. It should be open.”

So Finn had tried to convince Sharon to do something good for the government and buy a pardon, and she double-crossed him.

“I’m sorry if this disappoints you,” Sharon said, not sounding sorry at all. “I hope you weren’t expecting a happy family
reunion with me.”

“Not at all. You’re not my family.”
Freedom
.

“Then why are you here, hunting me down?”

Devyn glanced at her, fighting a smile. “I needed to find out what I was made of.”

Sharon lifted a dubious brow. “Did you?”

“Yes, I did.”

“What are you made of?”

She was about to find out. “Better stuff than you.”

“Well, I can say you don’t look like Finn or me.”

“Because I don’t have any part of you in me.” No part that mattered anyway. Not her head. Not her heart. Not her soul.

“Through the gate,” Sharon ordered.

She drove toward the expanse of the shipyard, which was acres of concrete jutting into wide docks and black water.

“Stop here.”

The clang of metal against metal punctuated the order, drawing Devyn’s gaze upward to the massive shipbuilding crane standing
hundreds of feet in the air. The moonlight and pale yellow lamps along the docks allowed her to make out the giant black H
and W on the side of the famous landmark.

She managed a slow, steady breath, and another look at Sharon, who still hadn’t lowered the gun. With her injured arm, she
somehow pulled out her phone and pressed it to her ear.

“I’m here. How much time do we have until Baird arrives?”

How could this be happening? And
Marc
. What happened to Marc? The question echoed in her head and heart. Had she lost him?

Had she thrown away
that
chance for
this
one?

She should have listened to him when he told her that she wasn’t made of the same stuff as her parents, that strings of DNA
are meaningless. He was right. Because regardless of the genetic imprint, this beast next to her was nothing to her. Nothing.

In fact, Devyn would kill this woman in a heartbeat. All she had to do was figure out how.

“Okay, I see you now,” Sharon said. “Move fast. I’ll be on the dock.”

Devyn followed Sharon’s gaze out to the water, seeing… nothing. Then something moved, sinister and fast, skimming over the
water like a blacked-out shark fin. A dark boat with no lights, no markings, cutting through the waves toward the shipyard
docks.

“Get out of the car and don’t you dare try to run. You’ll be dead before you take your next breath.”

Devyn had to buy time. As she climbed out, she eyed the entire space, gauging every option.

There were none.

The entrances were gated off. The docks led to ice-cold water. A long, gray warehouse lined one side of the shipyard, closed
tight for the night. The only other place was… She lifted her gaze two hundred feet in the air.