Locked and Loaded

She didn’t bother lecturing him on chivalry or issuing orders. She didn’t look behind her, either. A narrow green searchlight twice cut through the dark cabin while they stood there. She knew the men outside were getting close, had probably surrounded the house and cut off the obvious exits. Good thing she had a surprise one.

She threw open the door and with practiced efficiency removed the ironing board and fake panel behind it. The flashlight came next. She ripped it from the wall and tested it. “You ready?”

“I see you are.”

“Always.” She dropped to her knees and started crawling.

The dank air smacked her in the face as soon as she crossed the threshold. The heavy staleness stole her breath as fear raced through her mind. She couldn’t think about what lived in her makeshift safety route or what would happen if they were caught before they could get out.

Her first handler, Rod Lehman, had insisted on her having an emergency exit no matter where she lived. The workmen who thought they were laying reinforcement pipe for the sewer helped, but she did all the work in the final connection to the cabin. Building and reinforcing the tube in the dead silence of night had been quite an undertaking.

Once completed, she had set up an escape strategy and practiced shortening her time to the shed. One oversight was in conducting the drill in jeans. Now in her pajama shorts, the hard flooring hurt her knees and the coolness of the metal sent a chill through the rest of her.

And then there was the issue of creeping around with an unwanted partner. One who held her ankle and crowded against her the entire time.

“Could you move back and give me some room to move?” She shook her leg, trying to break his hold, but he didn’t let go.

“Keep moving.”

She did as he ordered. She sped up, trying to increase the space between their bodies and her chances of getting away. “Why should I trust you?”

“Because you don’t have a choice.”

Wrong. She’d let that be the excuse for the dead end her life had become. Well, no more.

She was done paying for her poor choices. Getting shipped from Chicago to Sweet Home, losing touch with everything and everyone she’d ever known, constituted a pretty big punishment in her mind. Her bad-boy, thrill-ride addiction was over. Likely so was her time in West Virginia.

She reached the end of the tube and grabbed for the handle of the door to pull her body up to a kneeling position. Spinning the dials, she put in the combinations and undid the series of locks. Silence filled the small area, but the tension pulsed hard enough to knock her over.

“Got it?” He reached around her and helped shove away the panel.

The tight space turned claustrophobic. His chest pressed against her back. His arms wrapped around her from each side, trapping her tight to his body. From his breath against her hair, to his knees wedging her feet against the outside walls of the space, she was surrounded. Imprisoned and unable to launch her desperate plan.

Fingers fumbling, she helped Adam unseal the last of the opening. The black night and cool reviving air greeted them. A ceiling of stars peeked through the thick walls of trees. She heard chirping and the rustle of branches in the wind.

“Looks clear.” The words were almost soundless by her ear. “Climb out nice and slow until we’re sure.”

Her brain started a countdown. It ended when Adam grabbed a fistful of her shirt and held her in place.

“Don’t even think about running.” He guided her out and jumped to his feet before she could gain her balance. “I’m your best shot at staying alive.”

If he was trying to make her feel better, he missed the mark by a good two miles. “They have the guns.”

“They’re not alone.” He slipped one hand under her elbow and kept the other on the weapon that appeared in his hand as if by some demented magic trick.

“I thought you were one of the good guys.”

“Why do you think I’m not?”

“The gun.”

“You want a rescuer with a weapon. Trust me.”

She didn’t want a rescuer at all. “I’d prefer to get out of here.”

“That’s next.” Adam pressed her back against the shed and slid his body against hers.

Pinned to a wall with his hard chest at her front, she couldn’t move. His stance wasn’t sexual or even over-bearing. It was more protective than anything.

For the first time since he walked into the diner, he struck her as a man accustomed to giving orders and having them followed. The type of guy who rushed in to help when others ran away to safety. The exact opposite of a shy computer nerd.

The gun passed in front of her face for a second then was gone. He had one of her hands in his and her other was trapped against his broad chest. He wasn’t looking at her, but she couldn’t help looking at him. She wondered how she’d ever viewed him as harmless. Seeing him in action now, gun up and attitude firmly in place, she could smell the power on him. It mixed with the cool mint scent of his breath.

She swallowed, trying to block out everything but the slamming of her heart and the plan forming in her head. “Well?”

He shook his head. “I don’t see them.”

“What does that mean?”

“They could have breached the inside.” He stepped back and brought her with him. They walked around the side of the shed until her cabin sat to their left and his stood at a fifty-yard dead run in front of them. “We’re not going to wait to find out. We have to circle around my cabin and get to my car.”

“Why not use mine?”

“They’d probably recognize it. Might have tampered with it.”

His points made sense. Very logical, just a bit too informed for the man he was supposed to be.

But standing there was the wrong call, in her view. “Let’s run while we can.”

She had shifted only enough to get an unobstructed view of her house, when the snapping of a twig registered in her brain. A green light sliced across her yard to land on her stomach. Shock stopped her steps.

“Get down!”

Adam’s voice barely registered. She saw his eyes widen and his mouth open on a shout. Everything else moved in slow motion. A figured appeared in front of her, clad all in black and aiming a weapon right at her head. She tried to see his face, but a helmet and mask covered him.

Her brain clicked to life just as a huge weight knocked into her from behind. Her knees buckled and the ground inched closer. Arms wrapped around her chest, banding and confining her, half cushioning her fall and half pushing her deeper into the dirt.

The thud and bounce against the hard earth pushed a grunt up her throat as her bones rattled. Every muscle screamed in agony from the force of the fall.

Her legs wrapped around something and kept her locked in a deadman’s position. The shove could have taken five seconds or five days. She couldn’t tell. Time slowed until the whoosh of the air around her became a moaning call.

That fast the weight lifted. One minute she saw the attacker stalking toward her, the next her face pressed into Adam’s back. Flat on her stomach with leaves scratching her cheek, she found her body shielded by Adam as soft pings echoed around her. His body kicked back against her as he fired his weapon.

She lifted her head in time to see the commando at her back door drop to his knees then fall face-first down the short steps. He hit the bush she’d always hated and meant to remove. Another man lay off to her right, facedown. She hadn’t even seen that one coming.

Then the world stopped tilting. She dared to hope they were safe. “Is it over?”

“Not for you.” The stranger’s voice came from behind her.

Before she could turn around, a beefy hand grabbed her arm and yanked her hard to her feet. Her muscles seemed to tear as if she were made of paper. Blinding pain shot up to her shoulder and pounded there.

The pressure of the attacker’s hand on her elbow made her vision blur. Nausea rolled over her, but she bit it back. She wanted to reach up and slap the man’s gun away. It hovered right in front of her face, pointed at the dead center of Adam’s chest.

Adam stood now, facing down the remaining gunman with his own weapon drawn. It was a standoff and suddenly it hurt just to stay on her feet.

“Let her go.” Adam’s voice dipped to a gravelly octave she’d never heard before.

A dark covering hid the gunman’s face, but she could see the white teeth in his feral smile. “You messed up. You only counted two.”

Adam’s gaze never wavered. He stared the attacker down, looking every bit as terrifying as the man in battle gear. “I’m guessing there were three of you.”

“Lower your weapon or I’ll kill her.”

“No.”

The pain took her breath away as the dizziness assaulted her brain. “Adam—”

The attacker chuckled in a deep grumble that promised an unending nightmare of anguish. “Listen to her panic. Now imagine what I’ll do to her before she dies.”

“You need her alive.”

“We’re not negotiating.”

She tried to focus on Adam, to send him a silent message that she was about to drop. But every time she blinked he shifted. It was subtle and the move so slight, but he now stood off to the left instead of directly in front of her.

And he kept talking. “That’s the plan, right? You need to take her back to your boss.”

“You don’t have to worry about it since you’ll be dead.”

Adam shook his head, then shot the attacker a patronizing grin. “No.”

She felt the gunman jerk. “What?”

Adam’s smile grew wider. “Your turn.”

“What are you—” With the gun blast the question turned to a gurgle. Blood spurted out of the man’s neck as his hands dropped and his body fell right after.

Shock and disgust knocked her speechless. Not that this was her first body or even her first bloodbath. No, she’d earned her ticket into witness protection the hard way, through the deaths of others. Still, she stood there held together by nothing more than a bit of adrenaline and watched the red puddle inch closer to her once white sneakers.

Adam reached out but didn’t touch her. “Maddie?”

“You could have killed me by accident.”

“I’ve got good aim.” Adam glanced around. “I think we’re clear here.”

Anger flooded through her and exploded, spewing with enough strength to break her. She clenched her jaw to keep from screaming him deaf. “You are supposed to be a computer guy.”

“Sometimes I am.”

His shrug just made her more furious. “What are you the rest of the time?”

“An agent with the Recovery Project.”

“What the heck is that?”

“I work for Rod Lehman.”

Just like that her anger evaporated. Melted right out of her. “Rod?”

“There are three things you need to know right now. Ready?” He didn’t wait for a reply. “Rod’s missing. You’re in trouble. We have to go.”

The pieces floated around in her mind, but she couldn’t put them together. “I don’t—”

“But first I have to fix your shoulder.” Adam tucked his gun in his waistband. “This is going to hurt.”

“What is?”

Before she could pull back or process what he planned to do, he bent her elbow at a ninety-degree angle then rotated her arm to the left then right. Each movement shot red-hot pain through her body. She cried out for him to stop as tears filled her eyes. When she couldn’t take one more turn, something popped in her shoulder and the ruthless agony stopped.

She tried to catch her breath, but she could only pant and glare as she rubbed the spreading soreness. “What was that?”

“I fixed your dislocated shoulder.”

She thought about strangling him with her good arm. “You killed two men—”

“Three.”

She shifted to her right and glanced around him. The third body lay just feet away from the spot where Adam had curled up around her on the ground.

She stared at him again. “Were you shot?”

He looked offended by the question. “Of course not.”

Massaging her injured shoulder made it throb even harder, so she stopped. “Right. How silly of me.”

“And it’s Wright.”

She looked him over for signs of blood, wondering how a guy could take out three obviously trained killers and not suffer anything more than a wrinkled shirt. “Do you have a head injury or something?”

“The name is Adam Wright, not Wallace.”

That little tidbit ticked her off. “And I’m just supposed to believe you?”

“Yes.”

Her fury was ridiculous. She knew that. She lived under an assumed name with a life she never wanted and certainly didn’t earn. She had no right to judge him. But now she understood she couldn’t trust him and that ticked her off. He’d taken out a trio of guys with guns, but she still didn’t know who was on what side.

And she could not depend on him to be honest. The only thing that saved him from a knee to the groin was the way he threw out Rod’s name.

“Is anything about you real?” she asked.

“I could ask you the same thing.”

Chapter Three

Luke Hathaway stepped up to the conference room table of the newly rebuilt Recovery Project headquarters. From the outside, the place looked like nothing more than an abandoned beige warehouse near the southwest Washington, D.C., waterfront. Inside was a different story.

Monitors and enough flashy electronic machinery to make even the most hardened technogeek smile lined one wall. Adam had set up the surveillance part of the office, using the unwanted inheritance of Luke’s wife, Claire, to fund the construction.

Stairs ran up from the middle of the large open room to the crash-pad bedroom above. The space under the stairs served as both a storage space and an informal seating area with couches and chairs.

The building stayed in lockdown and required palm prints and a secret code for access. Luke insisted on the extra security measures after a group of commandos had stormed his suburban home and left in body bags.

Three months ago they’d operated as a quasi-governmental but still legitimate venture. They found missing people, both those who wanted rescue and those who were desperate to stay hidden. One of those missions had centered on Claire. Saving her had meant blowing their agency cover and losing their funding, all at the direction of a corrupt politician who had died in a shoot-out with Recovery agents.

Now they were a private organization, which meant no government oversight…and no one to stand up for them if they messed up. Since they rarely did, that was not much of a concern.

Luke took the seat at the head of the table and reached for the coffeepot in front of him. He poured what was his fourth cup before six in the morning. Much more and his eyes would float.

“What’s the word from Adam?” he asked the others in the room.

Without any planning or fanfare, the team had designated Luke their interim leader now that Rod Lehman, the previous boss, had gone missing. Making the head chair the one available to Luke was their way of reaching a silent agreement on the matter. Their loyalty humbled him.

“Adam checked in. Said there was gunfire during the extraction.” Caleb Mattern managed to fold his arms behind his head and shrug at the same time. “He took out three and is on the way back here with the Timmons woman.”

Avery, Caleb’s wife of one week, reached for a mug and settled into the chair across from her husband. They held matching science degrees and both excelled in forensics. The sly smile on her face said she was using her investigative skills now to eye up her spouse.

“It is amazing to me how you guys can say stuff like that and think it’s normal,” she said.

Caleb’s mouth dropped open in mock surprise. “It’s not?”

Luke enjoyed the banter, actually hated to break it up since the headquarters served as Caleb and Avery’s temporary home. They deserved a place to step away from work, but they didn’t have it right now.

Getting Avery to safety during their recent search for Rod had left Caleb’s condo open to compromise. Their new place was being retrofitted with the appropriate security measures. Until Adam was satisfied the condo near the National Zoo had every precaution and a host of silent alarms, Caleb and Avery made their home above the stairs.

“Any chance Adam took care of the bodies before he got in the truck?” Luke asked once the couple went from bickering to staring at each other. Luke didn’t want to get in the middle of that, either.

“I’ll check.” Caleb spun his chair around to face the bank of monitors and started typing on one of the keyboards. “But you know Adam.”

“I’ll assume that means no.” Luke reached for the phone in the middle of the table.

Avery morphed from newlywed to concerned team member. She’d worked in a government lab, analyzing exhibits and evidence for criminal cases until she’d helped Recovery on an off-the-books job and got placed on administrative leave. That left all her attention for Recovery and Caleb.

“Do you think we need to send in reinforcements just in case Adam missed someone?” she asked.

Luke shook his head. “Never get there in time. Besides, Adam was doing a grab and run. He should be long gone. It’s pretty standard stuff.”

Avery snorted. “Only if the grabee cooperates.”

“How could any woman say no to Adam?” Caleb laughed at his own joke then grew serious. “The bigger question is, who sent the men? Taking out the crooked WitSec handler a month ago clearly didn’t stop the bloodshed. That means, as we feared, this is not done.”

“We could have more victims, more participants in the program whose locations are being given up for cash,” Avery said.

“Exactly.” That familiar anxiety churned in Luke’s gut. “I want Adam back here so we can question the Timmons woman and figure out how to keep her hidden until we find the person at the head of this killing scheme.”

Caleb yawned into his mug. “Now.”

“What?”

“You mean, who’s in charge now. So far we’ve already uncovered a conspiracy involving Bram Walters, a now very dead congressman, and a supervisor in the Marshals Service who handled WitSec participants.”

Avery raised her hand. “Don’t forget Trevor Walters.”

Caleb swore under his breath. “Can’t even though I want to.”

“He’s in on this. I can feel it. Being Bram’s brother just increases the taint on Trevor as far as I can tell,” she said.

Luke wished it were as easy as thinking it was true. “We have to prove it. Until we do, Trevor is just a very rich, very connected and very untouchable businessman.”

“We’ll get him.”

Luke wanted to agree with Avery, but being sure about Trevor’s involvement hadn’t stopped the disaster so far. They needed facts and a way to take him out. “Try Adam again.”

Caleb nodded. “Will do.”

“How is Claire?” Avery’s voice softened as she asked the question.

Just the mention of his wife’s name and Luke felt the tension ease from his shoulders. “Pregnant and pissed because I insist she have security all the time.”

Avery smiled. “This will all be over soon.”

“Let’s hope.” Luke turned to Caleb. “What does Adam say?”

Caleb spun back around to face the table. His lips were thinned in a grim line. “Nothing. I suddenly can’t reach him.”

ADAM GOT MADDIE into his truck and watched her strap the seat belt across her chest. She stayed quiet and agreed with everything he said, followed every direction without fighting back. Didn’t try to kick him or steal his weapon.

He didn’t buy the act for one second. He’d bet his life she was waiting for the right time to run.

He wanted to think his sound arguments had convinced her to calm down, but he knew that wasn’t true. This woman was trained by Rod, the same man who’d trained Adam. She wouldn’t believe a stranger who showed up to pull her out of bed and race through the woods. She wouldn’t admit to being in WitSec.

And she wouldn’t sit quietly in his truck while he drove her to some unknown destination.

She was not stupid. She possessed street smarts and a stunning will to live. Turning evidence on a boyfriend who ran the biggest meth operation in Chicago proved that. Maddie was smart enough to get out and cut a deal with the Justice Department, one that landed her in WitSec and eventually in his lap.

Adam just hoped she’d put her drug past behind her. He didn’t want to deal with her going through withdrawal or looking for a hit. Recovery had a no-drug policy. They were all clean and no one questioned it. Adam believed in getting his thrills in other ways. Always had.

“Russell Ambrose is dead.” Adam meant to deliver the news of her handler with a little less anger in his voice and a whole lot more tact, but it didn’t work out that way.

Her head whipped around. Her unblinking stare out the window ended that fast. “What?”

He slipped the keys into the ignition but didn’t start the car. “He was giving away the identities of WitSec participants. He collected cash and got them killed.”

When she just stared at him, Adam rushed to fill the uncomfortable silence. “That’s why I’m here.”

“To kill me.”

“No.” He shook his head for emphasis since words alone didn’t appear to be working.

“Sure feels like it.”

“Maddie, listen to me. I’m trying to help you.”

“Right. Because the bad guys always admit they’re trying to kill you.” Sarcasm dripped from her voice.

“Good point.” He turned the key. “I know about Rod.”

“I don’t know who that is.”

Looked as if they were back to denial. Adam wasn’t surprised, but he was getting frustrated. “I can tell you anything from your file.”

She folded and refolded her hands on her lap. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He hit the door locks just in case she ended the innocent act and headed for the handle to escape. “I know you’re trained to pretend. I get that.”

“Call the police.”

She could have told him she was a toaster oven and he would have been less surprised. He admired the move. It shoved him right into a corner. “I don’t think so.”

“If what you’re saying is true, call the police.” She glanced around the truck. “I don’t have a phone but I’m betting you do and I know you’re smart enough to dial 911.”

He did have a phone, but the real power came from his watch. It was how he communicated with the other agents, and that was the least impressive of its functions. “Taking you in will send a message to someone in WitSec. A handler will come to pick you up and hush up everything with the police.”

“Exactly.”

“I can’t risk it.”

“Neither can I.” She launched her body in his direction as she unlatched her seat belt.

If he hadn’t been expecting the attack she would have slammed his head against the window. Even waiting for it, she got in a few good shots.

She grabbed for the keys with one hand and punched him in the jaw with the other. The hit sent his head back. The smack against the headrest hurt his neck more than the blow, but she didn’t let up. Her fists pummeled his legs and chest.

When she switched to scratching, dragging her fingers across his forearm until she drew blood, he went from defense to an offensive strike. He grabbed her hand and leaned hard against her, pinning her on her back against the seat.

Her knee caught him in the stomach as she squirmed and flailed. She grunted and panted, forcing him to use more strength than he intended. He’d hoped to talk her down. That was before she aimed for his groin.

“Maddie, stop.”

“You’re hurting me.”

That admission ripped through him. He hated the idea of giving her so much as a bruise. “Stop trying to run and I’ll get up.”

He doubled his intent, stretching her arms above her head and straddling her upper thighs. He braced one foot on the floor and leaned over her, his face just inches from hers. He tried to get her to look at him, but she rolled her head from side to side, her neck muscles straining as she tried to knock him to the floor.