The Mercenary (5 page)

“You’re very literal, aren’t you?” He absently wiped a drop of amber liquid off her bottom lip with his

thumb. She stared up at him, unblinking, as he rose and set the empty glass back on the table.

Victoria Jones was a dangerous woman.

“Actually,” she said in a small voice, frowning as she rubbed her fingers across her forehead, “I’m pretty

much a coward.”

“You could have fooled me.” Marc’s tone was dry.

“Really?” She looked ridiculously pleased as she swung her legs to the floor, feeling around for her

shoes, which she must have lost when she’d keeled into his arms. When she couldn’t find them she

settled one foot on top of the other. “Well, I might be a chicken but I don’t usually faint like that. Sorry.”

She tried to wrangle a yard of silken hair back into a tight little bun. Wasn’t working.

Not one-handed,

and he sure as hell wasn’t going to offer to help. Her hair had a life of its own as it unfurled like ribbons of

black satin around her shoulders.Her touching it turned him on.

“Leave it.”

Her hand dropped to her lap.

Refilling his glass—hell, what was one more drink at this point?—he quietly watched her. The silence

built and built and he could tell by the stiffness of her shoulders that she was ready to break, which was

fine with him. He would give her directions to the motel in the next town and be ecstatic to see the back

of her.

Her chin wobbled.

Marc ground his teeth. Tell her you’re going to have a team sent…. No. A few more hours of worry

wouldn’t kill her.

A tear welled and ran down the side of her nose; another followed. Marc scowled. The fact that she

didn’t utter a sound made the tears more poignant. He jammed his fingers into the back pockets of his

jeans and glared into the leaping flames. In his mind’s eye he saw her shoulders heaving, but when he

turned to look, she was as still as a statue. Her lips were moving in a silent litany, which Marc realized

was counting. He’d noticed her doing the same thing earlier. It must help her calm down.

It sure as hell wasn’t helping him, and he was up to two thousand eighty-six.

He was either going to kiss her or kill her and since neither was an option, it looked as though he was

going to have a hell of a hangover tomorrow. He drew in a deep breath. Two thousand eighty-seven, two

thousand…

CHAPTER THREE

“HE’S—” THERE WAS A CATCHin her voice as she turned to face him. Her soft, pale mouth

trembled as she whispered helplessly, “He’s all I have. Please. Please, help me.” Marc felt the ice around his heart melt a little. He looked down at her glossy hair. When he didn’t

answer she wiped the tears off her face and turned her head to look out the window, obviously trying to

compose herself. Her back was ramrod straight.

Damn it, didn’t she realize that her blouse was undone? His eyes were drawn to the slender wedge of

pale skin he could see reflected in the window—skin that looked so soft and smooth and…defenseless.

Marc squeezed the bridge of his nose.

“Put that blanket around you or do up your blouse,” he said, more gruffly than he’d have liked as he

forced himself to concentrate on her face. He hated the life he’d left behind. Hated the thought of Alex’s

fate. Mostly, he hated himself for caving in. “Tell me everything.” Flushing, Tory buttoned her blouse and pulled the blanket around her shoulders, as well.

She sank back with a wince and blew a breath upward to clear a tendril of hair from her eyes. Covered

to her knees by the mohair blanket, she looked like an orphan rescued from a storm.

With every

movement she made, more and more hair slithered loose from the coil at the back of her head.

“Where do you want me to start?”

Marc came and sat on the coffee table, facing her, their knees almost touching. “Start at the beginning

and don’t stop until I tell you.”

“I have—had,” she corrected, “a condo in San Diego. I always kept a room for Alex.

He’d come once

in a while and stay for a few days in between…assignments. Not as often as I liked, but he did stay a few

times a year.” She shrugged out of the blanket and he saw the pink mark where it had scratched her

throat. The blanket settled around her hips as she fiddled with her hair. She used the waist-length strands

like worry beads and Marc absently filed that information away. Better than wondering what those glossy

strands would feel like trailing across his body.

“He used to send me a letter—mailed to a post office box in Mission Valley before each assignment. I

was to keep it until he came and got it. I’d pick up the letter, take it home and wait for him. He’d come

back and burn the letter. I never read any of them—not until the last one.”

“What made this time different?” He leaned over and tugged at the blanket until it covered her knees to

his satisfaction. Surprised, she looked at him, then continued softly: “He always gave me a time frame.

Ninety days. I was supposed to wait for ninety days after he was due back, before I opened it. A week

after he was due back I had this awful feeling—I just knew that something had gone drastically

wrong….”

“What made you think he wouldn’t be back?” Marc asked. “He came back late from assignments

before. We all do. Can’t be helped. It isn’t like these things ever run on a fixed timetable.”

“We have a…connection.” She looked him straight in the eye. “A telepathic connection, if you will.”

Marc couldn’t negate what she’d said. T-FLAC had a special psi branch in fact, and he’d witnessed

some amazing things while he’d been in the field. But he’d known Alexander Stone for six or seven

years—and never seen any sign of him having any psychic ability. “So you packed your bags and went

off on a little vacation to look for him? Is that what he told you to do in the letter?

“He told me where his last assignment was and told me to contact you if he wasn’t back by the end of

the month. And I didn’t go on a ‘little vacation.’ I called you. You were gone.

Indefinitely, they said. I

couldn’t wait. Alex was being hurt, and he was calling me. I went.”

“Calling you? So the bad guys could trace the call and findyou? I don’t think so.”

“Telepathically. I don’t expect you to understand.” Looking grim, she said urgently, “I knew he was in

trouble. I had absolutely no idea when or if you would be back. For all I knew, you were with him.”

Marc winced. Direct hit. He should have been with Lynx, then maybe things wouldn’t have gone so

wrong.

“I sold my condo and cashed in some other investments. I had no way of knowing how long it would

take to get him out. I wanted all my resources liquid. Then I flew to Rome and from there I rented a boat

and went to Marezzo.”

Marc got up and started pacing again. “And you waltzed in and asked someone where your brother

was?”

“Nobody asked me anything. I looked like a tourist. The pickpockets treated me like a tourist. I carried

a camera and I did some sightseeing. And I did find my brother. Which,” she said hotly,

“is more than I

can say for you.”

Marc’s temper flared. She was annoying as hell. But she was right. His people had shipped Alex

Stone’s body home. He’d done a cursory inspection and believed Lynx was in that body bag. He

grabbed the phone, punched a series of numbers and waited. After rapping out a string of numbers, he

held the line again. Tory sat stiffly, her face devoid of expression as she listened to his short commands.

“We have a code five on Marezzo,” he said into the phone. “Who’ve we got? Yeah, lousy timing. I’ll be

coming myself. I’ll take care at this end. I’ll leave the transportation and ordnance to you.” He looked at

her assessingly and frowned. “I’m bringing someone with me. A woman. Expect us tomorrow at 0900.”

“Surely you didn’t mean…” Tory went white. “Oh, no! I can’t go with you.”

“I don’t have a choice.” Marc slammed down the phone and resumed his pacing.

“You’re the one who

can communicate with him. If you’re not with me, I might not be able to find him.” If Lynx was

alive—and that was a big fuckingif— they might have moved him from his last known location.If what she

said was true, andif she had some sort of psychic connection then he’d use it to expedite the search.

There were a shitload ofifs .

“Of course you will.” She sounded panicked. “You’re a spy. You do this kind of thing all the time. It’s

your job. You don’t need me to slow you down.” She held up her arm. “I have a broken arm. I can’t go

running around chasing the bad guys.”

“Lady, that’s your brother over there. If I say I need you, I need you. If I say go, you go.

If I say jump,

you ask how high. Got that?”

Her pupils dilated and she swallowed convulsively. “I don’t do well under pressure. I’m a bookkeeper.

Not Mata Hari. I work for an auto-parts store because I don’t even like the pressure of tax time.”

“You know what Will Rogers said. ‘We can’t all be heroes—someone has to sit on the curb and clap as

we go by.’”

“I can clap for you from here.”

“You’re going.”

“I could wait for you in Rome,” she begged desperately.

“You’re coming with me to Marezzo.”

“I’ll fall apart.” Tory caught his wrist and stared up at him with pleading eyes. “Oh, please. Believe me.

Taking me with you will be the worst mistake. I’ll draw you a map of where they’re holding Alex. You’ll

have no problem finding it. Really. Give me a pen and I’ll show you—”

“Listen to me,” Marc said slowly. “The last thing I want to do is haul your butt over there. But I don’t

seem to have a choice. Without your telepathic ability, I’m not sure I’ll be able to find your brother.”Not

in time, anyway. “For all we know, they’ve moved him. You’re going to Marezzo.” He didn’t say that she was his insurance. If she was anything like Krista, he would give her no

opportunity to set him up. Ninety percent of him believed her story. But he was listening to the

all-important ten percent that told him to watch his back. Keep your enemies close.

Victoria Jones was

going to be right by his side whether she wanted to be or not. He gave her a cold look.

“Unless you were

bullshitting me about this telepathy bit?”

“No, that’s the truth.” Her shoulders slumped. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you, though, when I cower

instead of attack.”

“Nobody will be attacking anybody. We go in, find Alex and get the hell out.” He’d get the job done. In,

out. Clean and simple.

“Don’t say I didn’t try to warn you,” she said weakly. “I just know you’ll be sorry.” MARC WAS SORRY.Sorry he’d forced her to come, and sorrier still that they were on this stinking

fishing boat from hell.

He was especially sorry she’d spent the first three hours puking her guts out over the side of the boat,

mostly because he wanted to join her. The waves crashed into the side of the forty-foot hunk of wood

until he was sure they’d have to swim the next hundred miles. She retched again, and his gut knotted in

sympathy. Salt spray shot twenty feet in the air, soaking everything in sight, including her. He’d tried to

keep her down in the relative warmth of the cabin, but the smell of fish had been so overpowering, even

he hadn’t been able to stomach it.

Tory dry-heaved over the side. Her stomach hurt, her arm throbbed, and she hated Marc Savin more

with each passing moment. The man was relentless. He couldn’t say she hadn’t warned him.

“This really gives you a thrill, doesn’t it, you bastard?” At the rough sound of Marc’s voice, Tory raised

her head weakly from the railing to glare at him. In case he hadn’t noticed, she wasnot having a thrill a

minute. But he wasn’t talking to her. He was smiling that hateful smile and talking to the fisherman who

was steering this death trap out to the open sea. Her head flopped back as her stomach heaved again

and she groaned.

She was never stepping foot on anything smaller than a cruise ship ever again, she thought just before her

stomach muscles cramped.

“Certo!”Angelo exclaimed with gusto, the muscles in his massive arms bulging with the strain of

controlling the wheel. “Look at those waves, my friend. It makes us remember who is boss, no?”

Tory glanced up at the dark sky instead of at the mountainous waves beating the hull of the boat. A

bright moon shone down, illuminating the glistening deck. To the east a thick bank of clouds moved

swiftly toward them.

“It makes me think you’ve used this damn cover too long,” Marc told the other man.

For all he knew

she’d fallen overboard hours ago, she thought crossly. “Time you got back in the field, my friend. You’re

having just too damned much fun—I’d hate to see a trained T-FLAC operative lost to the sea. How

soon till we get there?”

Angelo looked down at the waterproof watch on his massive wrist. “Give or take, 0500.

The storm will

cover you, but you’re going to have to swim the last couple of hundred feet to the beach.

You sure she’ll

make it?”

Shewasn’t sure she’d make it, Tory thought, holding tightly to the railing as Marc walked toward her, his

body and long legs adjusting to the rocking of the deck.

“She’ll make it if I make it,” he said grimly, checking the plastic bag he’d wrapped around her cast to be

sure it was still watertight. He handed her the canteen and told her to rinse her mouth out.

Gulping the water, Victoria shot him a furious look when he took it away and handed her a stick of gum.