Smoke and Mirrors (16 page)

His.

He booted the door open and raced out, firing at the plane. A handful of soldiers, panting from a long run, arrived at the same moment, shouting that a passing jeep had blown up the guard shack. I picked two off before Juan started shooting. Brad whipped his leg around and cleared the semi-automatic from Juan’s hand. A nanosecond later, the foot rerouted itself and took out Juan’s teeth. Blood splattered Brad’s shirt as Juan dropped to his knees, hands arcing toward his mouth. But Brad was faster. Yanking him by the hair, he leaned in to say something. An instant later, he jammed his gun against Juan’s head and blew out the back of his skull.

The brutal exchange had lasted about six seconds, but I’d seen a look of utter horror in Juan’s eyes that delayed my trigger finger.

Brad had done that because of me. Because of my mouth.

I remembered to cover him not a moment too soon.

Raul, now in full retreat mode, reached the plane and was charging up the stairs under the cover fire of the pilot’s AK-47. One of my shots hit the pilot’s foot, but he kept firing, causing Brad to hit the sandy strip rolling. Somehow he managed to nail four soldiers. Now only the pilot stood between him and Raul. I sucked a breath of gasoline-laden air and put a hole through the pilot’s chest, clearing the way for Brad to get to his feet and race for the plane.

I guessed Raul must be behind the controls, because the steps of the plane were retracting and its wheels turning when Brad finally reached it.

Leaving the cover of the building, Alberto beside me, I scanned the area to make certain no one was left to impede Brad’s movements. A burst of rounds sounded, bouncing off the airplane’s metal exterior, and I fired in the direction it had come. There were two more soldiers hidden behind an overturned pallet, and I got one before a bullet from the second hit me in my right shoulder. Spinning with the force of the shot, I lost my balance and landed on my side. A cry must have escaped my lips, because I saw Brad turn just as I thudded into the turf. His face went white with terror, and his feet turned in my direction.

Acting sturdier than I felt, I yelled, “I’m fine! Go!” I hauled myself to my knees and aimed at the jackass who’d hit me. His gun flashed a split-second after mine, and back he flew, leaving me a clear sightline of Brad grabbing the lowest plane stair as it arced upwards. The plane’s engines revved, and I wondered how the hell he planned on hanging on once it started down the runway.

The scent of expensive cologne distracted me, and I realized Alberto was crouched beside me. “You okay?” His eyes darted madly about as he tried to unjam his gun. Sand and gravel had been shoved into a thousand places in my palms, and I could barely hold the gun between the blood oozing forth and the pain each abrasion caused.

“Fine. Fine. You?”

He looked down at me. “Take a breath, Alex. A deep one.” He must have decided I looked like I was about to topple, because his eyes widened and he grabbed at my arm. “Breathe,” he yelled.

I hadn’t realized how rattled I was until I did as he said and found I was better able to steady the world around me. Reluctantly letting go of me, his gun finally unjammed, he touched my cheek where Brad had only moments before. “I’m so sorry.”

For some reason, his gesture prompted my tears. “I –”

But the bushes behind him parted, and a trio of men emerged, eyes wild, guns pointing.

“Behind you!” I croaked, leaning to his side and squeezing off an awkward round. I felled the first as Alberto’s gun silenced the other two.

Unfortunately, it was not before the man I’d wounded let loose a volley of indiscriminant shots that filled Sanchez’s chest and flung him back into me. We hit the dirt with a sickening crunch, our limbs tangled like bloodied pasta.

Spitting blood and curses, Alberto did his best to slide off of me. My eyes were everywhere around us, fear and vulnerability making me ignore his dire situation.

The winged man lurched to his knees. His gun wavered, and I fumbled with mine. “Fuck, I’m out!” I was going to die in the Andes Mountains without telling Brad I didn’t care if our being together got me killed.

Which is when a single red hole bloomed between the soldier’s eyes.

I hadn’t heard a sound and guessed it was probably a long distance rifle with a silencer. Whoever was behind me, he or she meant me no harm. I listened to make certain, but no other sounds save for those of the jungle met my ears.

I scrabbled forward and cradled Alberto’s head in my lap. He was a man with perforated lungs and an irrevocably damaged heart. Air whistled from the cavity of his chest, and I pressed against one of the many streams to stem at least a little blood.

Tears dripped off my chin and mottled his dusty countenance. His coughing grew steadily weaker, but he seemed determined to speak. I swept my loose hair from his face. “You’re not really Alexandra.”

There seemed no point in hiding it now. “Brad…Giovanni…we work for British Intelligence.”

“And that bastard accused
me
of double crossing
him
?”

Reminded of Brad’s desperate plight, I lifted my head to the sky, terrified to see that he and the plane were out of sight. “Double fuck.”

A bubble of blood had expanded between my fingers and it popped when Alberto snorted. “Brad?”

“Bradley Milton.” Tears trickled into the corners of my mouth, salty like the blood staining my hands. “I’m Parker.”

The sounds in his chest became a low rumble of lost air. “I’ll be damned.” He was pure white, and I doubted that he would live two more minutes. “Francesca?” His eyes searched the space behind me.

“Francesca’s fine, Alberto, and I’ll make certain she gets back to Isabella. She loves you, you know.”

My words brought a change to his gaze. It grew fond, almost angelic. “She’s the best thing that ever happened to me.” He stopped moving, and I thought he’d died until he said, “I wasn’t the only one with secrets. Raul has a partner. Find that man, and you’ll find out more than I ever knew.” Then the chest under my hand dropped.

I pressed my hand more firmly, a sob stuck beside the question I knew I had to ask. “Where do I look?”

“Russia.” Alberto’s last words were like the final hissing of a popped balloon.

I sat there, dizzy from loss of blood and Alberto’s horrible death. Then a sob, like the sob that should have come after my parents died, began way down in my churning stomach. It broke the surface like a bloody geyser, and I turned myself over to it.

Sometime later, a chopper landed in the blood-soaked grass beside us. Feet approached me, and I looked up, blinded by the sun which all but obliterated Alasdair’s face. I must have been a sight, covered in Alberto’s and my blood, face streaked with tears, body shaking with the horror of what had just happened.

He leaned down and closed Alberto’s unseeing eyes with a calloused thumb. “You look like shit, Parker.”

I fought to see him through tear blurred eyes, wincing when the bullet wound in my arm protested against my meager movements. “Brad got her out…got them out. He’s –” I felt another hiccup rise as I tried to fight back a second wave of hysterics.

Alasdair put a consoling arm around my shoulder and handed me a bottle of water. It was cold and clean, and I swished it into the cavernous hole my recent extraction had left behind. Then I drank until I could bear to ask, “Where’s Brad?”

Alasdair brushed the tears from my face with his thumb. “Let’s let the doctor sort you out.”

“I
am
a doctor; tell me! What happened to him? Alasdair, the last time I saw him he was hanging from Alberto’s plane.”

A footstep dragged behind me and I whirled to see Brad. His face was bashed about, visible even through the camo, his eyes were heavy with exhaustion and his hands torn and greened by crushed plants. He was limping too, not four steps from me when he paused, a crooked grin cracking his face. “Got your message.”

“You came,” I choked, my throat burning with the effort it took not to bawl.

Brad’s smile weakened as he glanced first at Alasdair and then at the body of my once-boss. “Oh fuck.” He dropped down beside me, his arms around me in an instant, his mouth murmuring soft words.

•   •   •

It shocked the hell out of him seeing her so rattled. But bullets had a way of scaring people. Made them second-guess themselves.

His grip on her was tight. “Alex, shhh. Francesca’s safe.” He examined her shoulder. It was bloody and torn, but the blood wasn’t pouring.

A moment later, their team physician dropped beside them.

“The doctor wants to see it, luv.” Brad turned her around and settled her between his legs. He stroked her hair from her face so she could watch if she wanted.

Alasdair returned with a slice of gray canvas. Brad reached up to take the other side of the makeshift blanket, and together they draped the cloth over Alberto.

“How’s she doing?” Alasdair mouthed.

Parker’s sobs had subsided, and she was lying loose in his arms. Brad shrugged, so Alasdair drifted away.

“Alex, can you turn a bit more?” Brad hoped his voice sounded stronger than it felt.

Her laugh was brittle. “It’s Parker.”

“Yeah, sorry,” he murmured into her ear, relieved her humor was resurfacing.

She shifted, flinching when the doctor probed deeper. Brad tilted her head and kissed her neck. It was warm – tasted of gasoline. He didn’t give a fuck and buried his head in the silky heat of her hair. She was safe. Safe.
Thank you, God.

“You said never again,” she whispered.

“Makes me two kinds of fool,” he decided. Keeping his current thoughts – ones involving locking her inside a luxe safe house – to himself.

Just because she’d done a damn fine job didn’t mean he approved.

“Okay then.” The doctor finished his work and stood, arching his back to relieve a cramp. “You next.”

“In a minute.” Brad waited until he was out of earshot. “Ms. Brothers?” The longer he waited the worse she’d feel. Not that the words he would speak were a permanent balm.

“I haven’t gone anywhere.”

“It does hurt less in time.”
Or not at all
, he considered, his mind drifting back to Juan’s death.

He felt her stiffen. “What kind of monster swears the Hippocratic Oath, then goes and murders someone?”

She was crying again, and he tucked her head into the crook of his neck. She had more freckles than before. “What you did,” he said, “isn’t murder. Francesca’s safe because of you. It’s sadistic bastards like Juan who kill women with grenades who are the monsters.”

He figured she was staring at Alberto’s blanketed figure when she murmured, “No matter what you said, Alberto was nothing like the bastard who raped me.”

Fucking hell.
Had he really been so stupid?

But she didn’t say anything else. Just drew a shaky breath and turned into his shell-shocked form looking for protection he had never expected her to want.

Protection he didn’t deserve to give, considering he was a callous fucking sod.

“W
here is Milton now?” C asked.

“Being prepped for the operating theater.” Alasdair’s voice was muffled by the sound of passing cars. “I’ve sent you their lab results.”

C slid the uploaded file across the computerized table toward Kingston, who pulled forth two sets of x-rays and spun their reflections into neat stacks.

Dr. Branden, the team’s thirty-year-old, hotshot surgeon, touched the glassy-surface and enlarged one of the images. “Looks like Agent Milton has a displaced fracture of the tibia.” He paused and tapped his way through the layered images of an MRI. A moment later, he added, “It doesn’t appear his fall caused much ligament or cartilage damage, but there’s a fair amount of fluid retention.”

Alasdair’s voice echoed once more. “He had to walk a few klicks before a medic could set it for transport.”

“That explains his mood,” C said, his brief and unpleasant conversation with the agent having been heard by all present
.

Dr. Branden typed a quick set of notes into his mobile. “Alasdair, I’m sending orders to the surgeon from whom these came. Make certain he uses the materials I’ve listed.”

“Will do.” A car horn blared. “ –anything for hers?”

C watched as Branden turned his laser-like attention to the bones in Parker’s upper arm. “A standard proximal humerus fracture. There could be rotator cuff damage, but aside from stitches, I can’t imagine they’ll have her control it with anything other than a sling.”

“Ta,” Alasdair signed off, leaving a momentary vacuum of silence in the conference room.

“Right, anyone else you’ve sent into harm’s way?” Branden stood as Jack flipped the images back into their folders.

C, deaf to adolescent comedy, dismissed Branden and turned his attention toward Monroe, who had begun adding his two-cents.

“Milton’s ‘mood’, as you put it, is more apt to do with Agent Forsythe’s death than his injuries.”

“Go on.”

Monroe eyed his well-groomed nails. “From Alasdair’s debriefings, it’s obvious Milton’s been against her being reassigned from the start.” The gray eyes shifted. “You are aware the two were seeing one another?”

“From what I could see, it hadn’t progressed into a sexual relationship.”

Monroe’s left eyebrow shot over the top of his glasses.

“I didn’t say, it wouldn’t have gone in that direction,” C clarified, “Only that, as of when she left for Italy, it hadn’t.”

“So you planned for their chemistry to work in favor of your op, but didn’t allow for emotional attachment which might hinder it.”

“Put that way, I sound a fool.” Looking back, it was obvious his focus had been the mission, rather than the man.

Monroe seemed to gather as much. “I’m guessing you still need them working together on this op?”

“I had hoped so. Though it’s not likely given Milton’s just accused me of sending a civilian into a red sector.”

Monroe scoffed at the idea. “Dr. Brothers has been trained as thoroughly as any of the agents working with him. If she doesn’t have the depth of field experience, she certainly has its equivalent with her work in casualties.”