True Shot (11 page)

These weren’t her clothes. Where were
her
clothes?

She scanned the room for luggage or duffels. Saw nothing except two white plastic grocery bags on the table in the corner.

Another horrible thought struck her: Maybe these
were
her clothes, and they no longer fit because she’d been a prisoner for so long that she’d lost a significant amount of weight. But, no, that didn’t make sense. The clothing was so clean that the scent of fabric softener clung to it.

When she trusted her legs, she checked out the grocery bags and found bandages, hydrogen peroxide and a bottle of Advil in one. No prescriptions. That didn’t seem right. Shouldn’t there be antibiotics for her shoulder?

The decimated packaging for a prepaid cell phone filled the other bag, the phone gone. Not that she would have known who to call, except maybe 911.

Next stop: the bathroom.

Her wobbly legs got her there upright. When she turned on the light, she squinted against the brightness, raising a hand against the stabbing glare. Her head ached, a steady, throbbing bass line of pain behind her eyes.

Hangover? Not from alcohol, she thought. Well, possibly. But more likely from drugs, which fit with what Mac had told her. But she still didn’t believe him. Something was off here . . . more off than just her memory loss.

At the vanity, she braced her hands on the sink and studied her reflection, hoping for a spark of recognition.

Long, curling black hair. Eyes that were more slate than blue, underscored by the dark circles of fatigue . . . or sickness. Straight, narrow nose. A subtle cleft in her chin. Pale skin. She didn’t look healthy. Too thin, too drawn, exhaustion etched into the lines in her forehead.

Worse: She didn’t know those lines.

Or the rest of her face.

Her legs started to shake, threatening to buckle, but she stayed in front of the mirror, determined to gain control over her body. She didn’t have much time before Mac returned.

Getting the shirt unbuttoned required dexterity her fingers were reluctant to deliver, but she kept at it until she could ease the fabric over and off her bandaged shoulder. Then, shivering in the chill bathroom, she went to work on the haphazard surgical tape. Her breath whistled through her teeth as she pulled the gauze away to reveal massive bruising around a puckered, viciously red hole in her flesh.

She realized then that the back of her shoulder sported a similar bandage.

Her vision abruptly tunneled, and she backed away from the vanity until she bumped into the wall. She sank to the floor and dropped her spinning head into her hands.

She’d been shot.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

S
houldn’t I wait for backup, sir?”

If Flinn and Marco had been in the same place, Flinn might have knocked the stupid shit upside the head. Instead, Marco was outside a motel in Front Royal, Virginia, while Flinn tried to speed west on Interstate 66, only to be slowed to a maddening crawl by road construction.

He never would have consented to let Marco go in alone to secure Samantha, but the dumb Italian had reported that Hunter had exited the motel room. That left Samantha alone and vulnerable—and much easier to secure without the unpredictable civilian around to fuck it up.

Flinn slammed on the brakes, stopping inches from rear-ending the dipshit in the BMW in front of him. How he hated Virginia drivers.

“With all due respect, sir, I think it would be safer to—”

“You’re not being paid to think,” Flinn ground out between his teeth. “If you’re afraid to do your job, you don’t belong with N3. I’d be happy to start the paperwork for your transfer.”

“That won’t be necessary, sir.” No frustration or animosity crept into Marco’s tone or expression. The perfect soldier.

Flinn still planned to get the lunkhead kicked out of N3 as soon as the drama with Samantha was resolved. He didn’t understand what Andrea Leigh saw in the man. But he’d tolerated Marco from the beginning because he had to carefully pick his battles with the assistant director. No sense in burning capital over a useless subordinate.

“Samantha might react on instinct. Do
not
underestimate her.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Do exactly as I say. Understand?”

“Yes.”

“Let’s do this before Hunter returns.”

 

 

The door in the other room opened, and Sam raised her head, blinking against the bright bathroom light. Her head felt muzzy and unclear. She must have fallen asleep or passed out for a few minutes.

She assumed Mac was returning with food. For a moment, she wondered whether he was the one who’d shot her. He’d obviously lied about the hiking accident. But if he
had
shot her, why would he take care of her afterward?

Unless he wanted something from her and hadn’t gotten it.

Pain flared in her shoulder as she pushed to her feet. Somehow, she had to get away from him. Somehow, she had to find someone who knew her, who could help her remember. How she would do that, she had no idea.

She had the flannel shirt back on and two buttons fastened, her hands shaking less now that she had somewhat of a plan, when the bathroom door opened. She whirled, expecting Mac Hunter, and prepared to deck him for walking in on her without at least knocking.

Instead, a thickly muscled man with a black crewcut and a gun pointed at her stepped slowly across the threshold.

She backed away until the backs of her knees bumped against the edge of the bathtub. She barely managed to maintain her balance.

The man had dark, cold eyes and an expressionless face. “Come with me, and no one will get hurt, Samantha.”

Her name on his lips startled her more than the gun in his hand. “You know me.”

He didn’t respond, a coiled tension in his muscles. He was a snake preparing to strike. Where Mac had made her feel safe, even as he’d lied to her, this man oozed danger.

She would have backed away even farther, but she was trapped. She braced, ready to fight if necessary. But, first, she wanted answers. “Who are you?”

Mac ran the three blocks to the Jeep, his breath sending clouds of steam into the chilly fall air. When he’d returned to the motel room seconds ago, letting himself in quietly so as not to disturb Sam, he’d been shocked to discover she wasn’t alone. A man who had to be another of Flinn Ford’s henchmen had her cornered in the bathroom. Mac had dropped the bags of fast food and started running the three blocks to the SUV.

There, he fumbled the keys out of his pocket and unlocked the passenger-side door. His clumsy fingers mismanaged the latch on the glove box, but he finally got it open and shoved a hand inside to retrieve Sam’s gun. He wished now he’d stashed it somewhere in the motel room after he’d liberated it from her lax fingers in the car earlier. He could have had it aimed at that thick-necked dickwad right now.

Racing back to the motel, Mac didn’t think about anything but getting to Sam, helping Sam, hoping to God he wasn’t too late. At Room 109, he eased the door open and stepped inside. Outside the bathroom doorway, he swung the gun up to point at the head of a man who looked big enough and bad enough to break Mac in two with a flick of one thick wrist. Dr. Evil must get his goons from Muscles ’R Us.

“Time for you to go,” Mac said.

Mr. Muscle glanced over his shoulder, startled.

At the same moment, Sam shifted, lightning fast, and before Mac could blink, she had the henchman bent forward over the vanity, his right arm twisted up and behind his back. She kept viciously twisting that arm until his fingers relinquished their grip on his weapon. The gun hit the tile floor, and she used her foot to expertly sweep it out the door and onto the carpet in the other room, well out of Marco’s reach.

Mac let his breath out in a relieved—and impressed—huff. Hot damn, the woman could
move
.

Mr. Muscle jerked against her grip, but she held fast, pissed and surprisingly strong. “Who are you?”

“Marco Ricci. Flinn sent me to pick you up.”

“Who is that?”

“Flinn Ford. He’s our boss.”

Mac watched her face in the mirror. Uncertainty creased her forehead, maybe because not only didn’t she recognize the name—she couldn’t—but she also must have noticed that Marco hadn’t appeared the least bit confused or surprised by her questions. He
knew
she had no memory.

Marco must have glimpsed the uncertainty, too, must have taken it as a sign of weakness, because he jerked back, hard, sending Sam careening back against the wall opposite the vanity. A pained grunt exploded from her, and her knees buckled. He turned and grabbed her and pushed her into Mac.

Mac caught her with one arm, the momentum knocking him back a step. He fought to keep his balance without letting her fall, knowing even as he did it that he’d taken his eyes off the biggest threat. He had only the impression of that threat lunging at them.

“Shoot him!” Sam shouted.

Mac pulled the trigger.

Marco reeled back. The edge of the bathtub smacked into the backs of his knees, and he toppled backward, landing on his ass in the tub.

Mac might have laughed at how ridiculous the bulky man looked with his huge legs draped over the edge of the tub. But he was too busy thinking, holy shit, he’d just
shot
the man. And that man was
pissed
as he clamped a hand over the blood oozing from his upper left arm and growled several “fucks” in a row, each one growing in intensity.

“Mac.”

Mac hesitated to look behind him at Sam. He didn’t even know how she’d gotten there. He’d lost track of her in the chaos—the chaos he’d caused when he’d made the mistake of looking away from Marco. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.

“Mac,” she said again, her calm voice a sharp contrast to Marco’s violent stream of expletives. “I’ve got him.”

He finally glanced at her. She stood a few feet behind him, about where Marco’s gun had stopped its glide onto the carpet. She held that gun in one steady hand, sighted on the man bleeding in the tub. She might have sounded calm, but her face—dead pale and sheened with a film of perspiration—looked murderous. Her left arm hung limp at her side.

“Are you okay?” Mac asked. Stupid question. Of course she wasn’t. Her injured shoulder had just been slammed against the wall. It was a miracle she was still standing.

And then he noticed her finger flexing on the trigger. “Don’t.”

She froze but didn’t shift her eyes from Marco.

Much as Mac wanted to kick the living shit out of the man for hurting her, he wasn’t going to let her add a third to today’s body count. “We need to get out of here,” he said. “The cops’ll be here any minute.”

She didn’t waver, and neither did the gun in her hand, gripped so tightly her knuckles turned white.

“Do not trust this man, Samantha,” Marco said. “He doesn’t know who you are.”

She flicked a questioning glance at Mac.

“He’s trying to manipulate you,” Mac said.

“He doesn’t know
what
you are, Samantha,” Marco said.

Her indecision appeared to grow, worry lines creasing her forehead.

Mac knew he needed to gain her trust. If he proved he wasn’t a threat to her, maybe she’d believe he really wasn’t. Relaxing his stance, he tucked her gun at his lower back.

Alarm widened her eyes. “You didn’t put the safety on.”

“Shit.” He fumbled the gun back out and peered at it. He had no flipping idea where the safety was.

“Behind the trigger,” she said.

He spotted the tiny button and pushed it. “Got it. Thanks.”

He gave a sheepish shrug as he restashed the gun at his lower back. “Guess it’s kind of obvious that I’m not much of a bad guy if I don’t even know how to work the safety.”

When the tension in her shoulders relaxed some, he knew he’d said the exact right thing. “So . . . we should probably tie him up, right? So he can’t follow us. We can use the cord from the window blinds.” Been there, done that.

She nodded. “Get it.”

While Mac attacked the blinds, Marco worked on Sam. “You’re making a mistake, Samantha.”

“Shut up.” Her voice was low and lethal.

You tell him, Sam.

“There was an accident,” Marco said, softer now, apparently shifting gears. “You were injured. That’s why you don’t remember.”

She said nothing.

“Your name is Samantha West,” Marco said. “You’re a covert operative for the FBI.”

She let out a choked, disbelieving laugh. “Right.”

“Flinn Ford recruited you as a teenager. You’ve been working with him, with us, for several years. He’s concerned about you.”

“Is that why he sent a goon with a gun after me?”

“The weapon was to protect you.”

Mac walked up with the cord dangling from his fingers. “So that’s what you were doing when you pointed it at her. You were
protecting
her.”