Vengeance (SSU Trilogy Book 1) (46 page)

Or did she?

She frowned. Kai had been hurt. In a coma. She’d been trying to reach him when…

“Kai! Rafe!” She tried to sit up, but Niko gently held her down. “They’re alive. Wounded, but conscious and raising hell. You’re the one we’ve all been worried about.” He brushed a kiss over her lips. “You flatlined in the helicopter.” He closed his eyes, but not before Jenna saw the shadows there. “You scared me to death. I…wasn’t sure if you wanted to come back.”

“I—” Something teased the edge of her memory. She closed her eyes, trying to capture it. She thought…maybe…it was an echo of light and warmth haloing her parents and the twins. Saying good-bye to her. Setting her free.

She looked at Niko. “Yes. I want to live. Now that Alvarez is dead…” She swallowed, trying to clear the lump in her throat. “I think my family is finally at peace now. And I have someone to live for. Kai.”

She licked her lips. “And…you?”

Niko’s smile erased her fear like dawn chasing nightmare. “Oh yeah. I love you, Jenna. You want me, I’m all yours.”

While her heart soared, part of her froze in disbelief. Without her vengeance, she didn’t know who she was any more. How could Niko like her, let alone love her? “Even though I planned to kill Kai? And then Alvarez? That’s a lot of hatred. I’m…not a good person. And I haven’t held much value for my own life.” She glanced away.

“Jenna, what’s important is that you didn’t kill. I saw you line up your shot,” Niko said. “You could have killed Alvarez. But you didn’t. That took strength,
querida
.” He reached for her hand and placed a kiss on her knuckles. “I’m damn proud of you.”

“Really? It…didn’t feel like strength. It felt like failure. But…I realized you were right. Killing Alvarez would have destroyed me. I…would have felt like a monster. Like one of his assassins. So I did the next best thing. Disabled him.”

Niko stroked her hair. “See? There’s more of that sunny, compassionate girl in you than you think. But I love all of you, Jenna. The dark and the light. Because God knows, I understand the dark. Just don’t leave me again.”

Her eyes sought his and found truth. And acceptance. She felt the first warmth of hope.

“You really love me?” she whispered.

He raised her fingers to his lips. “Hell, yeah.”

This strong, tender, honorable man loved her. She grinned.

“Andros,” a dry voice said from the doorway. “I won’t go all big brother and beat your ass for touching my sister, since you put that grin on her face. But hurt her and all bets are off.”

“Kai!” Jenna swiveled her head. Kai sat in a wheelchair just outside the open door. Between his bandages, casts, and bruised skin, he looked like the Mummy’s beat-up cousin. Rafe stood behind him, his teasing grin a dim imitation of its normal wattage. His face was drawn with pain and she was pretty sure the only thing holding Rafe up was his grip on the handles of Kai’s wheelchair.

“What are you two doing out of bed?” she demanded.

“We were bored,” Rafe answered as he pushed Kai’s wheelchair through the door. “What else?”

“Did someone call a meeting and forget to send my invitation?” Ryker asked as he stepped into the room.

Jenna gaped. Wearing jeans and a leather jacket, with his hair slightly rumpled and a day’s growth of beard on his chin, Ryker looked like he’d stepped off an action adventure movie set. It was the first time she’d seen him in anything but a suit and tie.

Yet his aura of authority had everyone in the room straightening to attention as much as their physical conditions allowed.

“At ease,” Ryker said. “This isn’t a military review.”

Jenna relaxed back against her pillow, but then sat back up, shooting an anxious look at Kai. Her brother’s expression was guarded as he watched their boss. She knew he wasn’t entirely certain of Ryker’s honesty.

Ryker glanced around the room, touching each of them with a warm smile. “It’s good to see everyone alive.”

“You’ll each be formally debriefed once you’ve been cleared by the medical staff, but how about you give me the highlights. What happened with the chip?”

“No,” Kai said. “Not until you clear up a few questions.”

Ryker met Kai’s eyes and nodded, as if he’d expected this reaction.

“Did you send assassins to kill me after I called you about the fire?” Kai demanded.

“No. I never even knew you’d called.”

Kai studied the director’s face, and Jenna could feel him weighing the truth of Ryker’s words. Finally, he nodded. “Who knew about my mission?”

Ryker gave a short list of names. “I’ve had all of them investigated and watched since the attack on your family, and there’s been no suspicious activity. I believe there’s a mole at the agency, but it’s not one of them.”

Again Kai digested the information, and again he nodded. “What about the attack on our family?”

“Someone deleted the message from my voicemail, but didn’t realize my deleted messages don’t get erased immediately. I found the message the night of the attack and I called your father to warn him. He was supposed to evacuate the family and meet me at the airport. When no one showed, I headed to the house.”

“Okay,” Kai finally said. “I believe you.”

“Good. Now, what happened with the chip?” Ryker asked.

“According to Percone, Dr. Nevsky has a daughter, first name Susana, last name unknown,” Niko said. “Percone said Nevsky arranged to have the chip implanted in her during a routine operation. We were interrupted before he could say more. Then he was dead.”

“Alvarez’s men?” Ryker asked.

Niko shook his head. “Tonelli. He tried to shoot me—”

Jenna gasped and Niko squeezed her hand again. “But he was in a hurry and his aim was off. Tonelli heard Percone’s confession about the daughter.”

“Right. Nevsky’s records make no mention of a daughter. So now we’re in a race with the CIA to figure out the daughter’s identity.” Ryker said. “Kai, as soon as you’re healed and we have her location, you’re going after her and the chip.”

“Right.”

“Niko. Rafe. I’m sorry about your aunt,” Ryker said.

Jenna ran her fingers in soothing circles over Niko’s hand, wishing she could absorb some of his pain.

Ryker nodded to Niko. “We have at least a dozen witnesses that say you killed Alvarez in self-defense, Niko. Good job.”

Niko nodded back.

Ryker’s expression sobered as he looked at Rafe. “Now for the bad news.” He paused, waiting until all eyes were on him. “We’ve been asked to look into a string of disappearances of military and federal law enforcement personnel. All involved were reported dead or missing in action. At least two of the dead later turned up alive, pumped up on some new steroid and homicidally insane, in remote towns along the east coast.”

Kai swore. “Sounds like someone’s continuing Nevsky’s work. Was there ever any proof that his second in command, Kaufmann, died in the lab fire?”

“No,” Ryker answered.

No one said a word, but the collective tension in the room rose to a high vibration.

“So we’ve got a potential offshoot program running in an unknown location,” Kai stated.

“Right.” Ryker turned to Rafe. “When you’ve been cleared, Rafe, I’m putting you in charge of this investigation.”

Rafe dipped his head in acknowledgement.

Jenna bit her lip. Kai and Rafe hadn’t even left yet, and she was already worried about them.

Ryker turned his attention to her. “So…ah…Jenna…”

“Jenna and Niko are in lo-ove,” Kai said in a sing-song voice.

Jenna rolled her eyes.

“I’d like to request some personal time off, sir,” Niko said.

“Already done. Come back to us when you’re ready.” Ryker shot Jenna a look of mixed frustration and admiration. “Jenna, we’ll talk later.”

She felt like she was being asked to report to the principal’s office. “Okay.”

“Right, then. That’s all. Good job, people.”

#

Monday, Afternoon

Washington, D.C.

CIA Director of Special Operations Wayne Jamieson hung up the phone. Tonelli’s report had been far from the success he’d expected.

He tapped his fingers impatiently on his chair’s thick leather armrests. Dr. Kaufmann’s subjects, while useful additions to Kerberos, were only temporary solutions. None of the men survived past four months.

Jamieson needed men that would last years. Kerberos’s success depended on it.

He opened up his secure e-mail program and sent Kerberos’s researchers hunting for Susana, daughter of Dr. Mikhail Nevsky. He was confident they’d locate the woman before the SSU.

If for some reason the SSU found her first, Jamieson still had a hidden asset within the upstart organization. The man would sabotage any plans to get the chip.

In the meantime, Jamieson had ordered Tonelli to use an alias and take a vacation. He needed the SSU to lose track of Tonelli. Because Jamieson needed Tonelli to retrieve the daughter and the chip, and he couldn’t do that if the SSU was following him around.

Chapter 37

Six Weeks Later

Delaware

Jenna knelt in front of the simple white tombstones that marked the graves of her parents and the twins. “It’s done,” she whispered, reaching out to trace Isabel’s name with her finger. “All the men who hurt you are dead.”

Kai’s hand squeezed her shoulder. “I killed them, Dad,” he admitted in a hoarse whisper. “Well, most of them. Not Alvarez. Niko Andros did that. And Alvarez had already killed one of the assassins before I could get to him. But the rest knew the same pain before they died. I’m sorry…” His voice broke. “I’m sorry I didn’t make it home in time to stop them.”

Jenna took Kai’s hand and let him pull her to her feet. Then she wrapped her arms around him in a fierce hug. “It’s not your fault,” she said, knowing only time would convince him of that. Her heart still ached from missing her family, but her guilt over surviving had finally faded.

“They’re at peace now,” she said through her tears. “We got vengeance. It’s time to move on.”

Kai tightened his embrace. “Not yet. Not for me. The chip is still out there. It’s the reason they were killed. I won’t be able to move on until we’ve found it.”

Jenna stepped back. “Be careful. I don’t want to lose you, too.”

Kai blinked back his tears and gave her a cocky grin. “Don’t worry, I’ve just found you again. I plan on having many more years playing the protective big brother.”

“Not too protective, I hope,” Niko said, coming forward from where he’d been waiting by the cemetery path. He put his arm around Jenna’s shoulders and placed a proprietary kiss on her lips.

“He scared off my high school boyfriends,” Jenna warned with a laugh.”Well, at least those that he knew about.”

“Wimps. All of them.” Kai raised a brow and gave Niko the once over. “I suspect Andros won’t run so easily.”

“Damn straight.”

Then Kai turned and leveled a glare at Jenna. “And what the hell do you mean, those that I knew about?”

Jenna just grinned and snuggled against Niko. A deep warmth spread out from her heart. A few months ago she never could have imagined feeling this content ever again. But not only was Alvarez dead, she had her brother back. More surprising, she had Niko and his generous, loud, crazy family.

“Happy?” Niko said, gazing down into her eyes.

“More than I thought possible.”

“Good. Let’s go home.”

As Niko led Jenna out of the cemetery, she looked back. Kai was staring down at the graves with such a lost expression that for a second Jenna couldn’t breathe. Then Kai shook his head, gave a nod to the tombstones, and caught up with Jenna and Niko. His slight limp was barely noticeable and would fade completely once he’d finished healing.

Jenna linked her free arm through Kai’s. Until he was cleared by the doctors to head after Dr. Nevsky’s daughter in his search for the chip, Jenna planned to keep Kai close. Niko had pulled her back from the darkest edge. She could do no less for Kai.

She took one more peek back toward the graves. A shaft of light illuminated the markers. Jenna smiled, feeling that at last she’d been forgiven, and stepped forward into her future.

#

Keep reading for a sneak preview of Kai’s book,
Betrayal
, Book 2 in the SSU Trilogy by Vanessa Kier. Coming soon!

Chapter 1

Friday, Afternoon

Amazon River

Upriver from Caracaraí, Brazil

Kai Paterson stood at the bow of the souped-up fishing boat, staring at the jungle flanking the river. Humidity pressed against his skin like a lover. Underneath the boat’s odor of fish and diesel fumes he caught the jungle’s signature stench of rotten vegetation and sweet flowers. But his mind wasn’t on the present.

“Why do you get to go after the girl,” Rafe Andros had groused over a month ago, “while I’m left trekking in the woods with a bunch of smelly, foul-mouthed men?” A characteristic smile had teased the corners of his mouth.

Kai had laughed and lightly punched his brother-in-law and fellow Surgical Strike Unit agent on the shoulder. “Because you’re the ex-Ranger, my friend. You’re the one trained in covert rescue and assault. I’m just a scientist turned spy.”

Kai shook his head. Just a scientist turned spy. Right. Try scientist turned spy turned grieving son and brother turned ruthless killer turned…what? Hell. He didn’t even know who he was anymore.

He could only say one thing for certain. He wasn’t a quitter.

Two years ago he’d gone undercover in Dr. Nevsky’s lab, investigating allegations that in his quest to create superhuman spies and soldiers the scientist tortured and killed his subjects. Today Dr. Nevsky was dead, but his assistant Dr. Kaufmann carried on Nevsky’s program, continuing to elude the SSU while wreaking havoc with its agents’ lives.

Out on the river, a fish broke the surface then quickly disappeared into the murky water. Yeah, wasn’t that a metaphor for his life these days? Barely able to take a clean breath before he waded back into the muck.

Rafe had gone missing in action last month during a mission to shut down Kaufmann’s lab. Despite wanting to join the search for his missing friend, Kai knew it was his job to put an end to Nevsky’s legacy of horror. To do that, he had to find Nevsky’s daughter, former supermodel turned archaeologist Susana Dias.