Double Impact: Never Say Die\No Way Back (35 page)

He crossed the room and visually examined her, as if looking for other signs of mishandling. “Worse was what you were headed for.” He glared at her then. “If you'd been caught by any of the locals, do you have any idea what they would have done to you? You weren't properly attired and—”

“I don't want to hear it,” she cut him off. “They didn't catch me, you did. I want to know why you've been following me and haven't tried to contact me.” Pain seared through her again. What she really wanted to know was why he hadn't gotten her out of here.

“Following you is my job,” he said tightly. “And keeping you alive,
if
I can.”

Yeah, right. Her own temper rushed toward the boiling
point. “For how long? Until I accomplish whatever task it is the CIA needs me to do?” He wasn't going to rescue her…not until she'd done whatever the hell it was he wanted.

He didn't have to respond. She saw the answer in his eyes. “That's it, isn't it? I'm expendable. Once I've done your bidding, it doesn't matter whether I survive or not.”

“That's not true,” he countered savagely. “I will keep my word. I'll get you back to your son. I won't go back on that promise.”

As if she could trust him. She didn't even know the man.

“Forgive me if I don't put a lot of stock in that guarantee,” she tossed back at him. The whole world had gone mad as far as she could see. The only thing she wanted to do was to go home. But no one would let her.

“Why didn't you just let me go?” she asked, the anger pulsing out of her like the blood from a severed artery. There was no need to ask him how her son was, he'd never gone back. He'd been tailing her…her and Michal.

He looked away then. “I can't do that. Not until this is finished.”

She threw up her hands in surrender. “To hell with it. I give up. I'm never going to see my child again and we both know it.” She rounded on him then. “Why not just admit that and be done with it? I'm dead, right?”

Ten long seconds ticked by before he answered. “As far as anyone else is concerned, your survival is not essential to the mission,” he admitted wearily.

She started to shake her head, but then remembered the hot ball of pain pulsing at the base of her skull. She laughed instead, a dry, brittle sound. “I knew it.”

“But that's not the way I see it,” he pressed. “I'll keep my word, Ami. You have to trust me.”

She glared up at him from beneath her lashes. “Like hell. I can't trust anyone.”

“I have everything set,” he said more quietly as if fearing someone would overhear him. “I have a backup plan that no one else knows about. Your son is safe. I'll see that you're reunited with him. But you've got to do exactly what I tell you. I can't help you if you get me killed or one of my operatives spotted by Arad or his people. I can't help you if I'm out of the picture,” he reiterated.

She took the final step that stood between them. “Swear to me that you won't let anything happen to my child and that if I survive this you'll get me to him.”

“I swear.” He started to say more but didn't or couldn't. Slowly, without taking his eyes from hers, he lifted his hand and stroked her cheek. “I won't let you down.”

For that brief moment a memory surfaced—him holding her…kissing her. She blinked the image away. She remembered something he'd said that first day they'd met…something about their relationship before.

“Did we…?” Her gaze locked with his and she pleaded for the whole truth. She didn't want any more lies. She was so sick and tired of deception.

“Yes.” He lowered his hand and backed off emotionally. She felt his withdrawal. “But that was before. Our…personal relationship ended when you went undercover.”

That meant only one thing. “He's Nicholas's father.” The words were scarcely a whisper, a mere breath, but the realization was so profound she staggered beneath the weight of it. On some level she'd known.

“Yes,” Tanner admitted. “He's the father. Do you understand what that means?”

She looked up at him once more.

“If he finds out about the child, he'll do whatever nec
essary to get his hands on him. Is this the kind of life you want for your child?”

She shook her head slowly from side to side, the pain now relegated to some rarely used area of gray matter. As the rest of her hurts, it no longer mattered. “I don't want that.”

“Then this mission is your only hope. As long as Arad is alive, you and your son won't be safe from his reach. He's too powerful…too ruthless.”

They were going to kill him, Ami realized. The thought seemed to come from some faraway place. She felt somehow outside her body as she watched her mind absorb the implication of his statement. She'd suspected that, as well.

“You want me to help you kill him.”

Again his eyes answered before he did. “Yes.”

How could she do that? He was her son's father…he was her…lover. Emotion twisted inside her. She wasn't a murderer. No matter what anyone said, she would not believe that.

“Look at it this way,” Tanner said, calling her attention to him once more, “one more sick terrorist will be dead and you and your son will be free of him once and for all.”

She backed up a step, putting her hands up in a stop fashion. “If he's so bad, why hasn't the CIA done this already? Why wait for me to come along? Surely I can't be that important to the success of the mission.”

Tanner plowed his fingers through his hair, apparently annoyed that she didn't just go along with his plan. But none of this made sense.

“It's complicated,” he hedged.

Her fury kindled again. “Don't let my simple mind stop you from giving an explanation your best shot.”

He held up a hand in protest. “I didn't mean it that way. There's just some things that I can't tell you.”

She gritted her teeth to the count of five in hopes of slowing her anger's ascent. It didn't work. “Well, tell me what you can.”

“Arad has served a purpose in the past.”

Disbelief shook her. “So the CIA deals in terrorists? Let them live as long as they serve a purpose. Please, no wonder you guys got your hands slapped after—”

“I told you,” he interrupted pointedly, “that there were certain parts I had to leave out. A perfectly logical explanation regarding his status is one of those things you don't have clearance for.”

She rolled her eyes. “Whatever.”

“He's gotten too powerful, too arrogant. We need him out of the picture.”

“So you people can't do this?” Ami deadpanned. “You need me—a civilian—to do it for you?” She looked heavenward in exasperation.

“Again,” he said, his patience clearly thinning, “it's not that simple. And you're not merely a civilian.”

Apprehension welled inside her. She didn't want to talk about this anymore. Things between her and Michal were—as Tanner so eloquently put it—complicated.

“When this goes down, no one can know we're responsible. The setup with you is perfect.” Tanner splayed his hands as if the answer were clear. “Think about it. Everyone knows you betrayed him two years ago, now you're back. It won't come as any surprise if he comes up dead with you hanging around again.”

Ami felt certain he had no idea how his words affected her. Her whole body rejected the idea…but some brain cell connected to long-term memory that had lain dormant for
two long years suddenly went active and she knew Tanner was right. “So it's true, I did betray him?”

Tanner's guard came up. “We've been over this before. You went undercover to set up Yael Peres. You used Arad to accomplish that and left him to face the Israelis' wrath. That he escaped was pure luck.”

She searched his eyes, looking for any indication that he was lying to her. “Why did I do that? Set up Peres, I mean?”

Tanner shifted, his impatience palpable now, his gaze averted. “We've been over that part, too,” he said crisply.

“No.” Ami waited until he looked at her again. “Not that part. I need to know why the CIA wanted Peres out of the way.”

His anger resurfacing, Tanner's jaw hardened. “Because he was secretly using his influence in the Israeli government to undermine Israeli-U.S. relations.” He had to pause a moment to contain his emotions. She saw the muscle jerking rhythmically in his jaw, saw the vein throb on his forehead. He took a deep breath and continued, “If you watch the news you know how vital that relationship is. We can't let anything jeopardize it.”

She nodded. Even she could see the necessity in that. But Michal… An ache banded around her chest at even the thought of having anything to do with hurting him. She knew she shouldn't feel that way. He was a terrorist. A kidnapper. A murderer.

Her son's father…her lover… But if she didn't do this she would never see her son again. Michal had chosen his own path. As helpless as she was at the moment, she had, as well. But her son was the true innocent in all this.

She closed her eyes and forced all emotion aside. “What do you want me to do?”

Jack swallowed back the regret that stuck in his craw.
He hated this shit. He should just take her right now and get her the hell out of here. He set his jaw hard and forced himself to do what had to be done.

“Arad will take on another job in a few days. I'll need specifics in order to catch him off guard. Times, rendezvous points, anything you can get. Then I'll take care of the rest. It's going to look as if someone trying to get at you took him down.”

A frown furrowed its way across her brow. “But how can I do that now? Raoul has probably already sent word to him that I—”

“You have to go back,” Jack interjected. “It's the only way.”

She retreated a step as if preparing to flee. “How can I do that? Raoul—”

“Is dead,” he cut in again.

Jack allowed the impact of those two words to sink in before he continued. “As soon as my team recognized what you were up to, we sent someone in and terminated him. We've since pretty much wrecked the room so that it'll look like someone broke in, killed Raoul and nabbed you.”

Her complexion turned ashen. “Because I tried to escape, you had him killed?”

Jack considered whether he should tell her the truth or not, but opted to keep things on the level. “We had no choice. We need your cover intact.”

She blinked, looking far too close to fainting for his liking, but he couldn't let her see anything less than complete detachment on his part.

“What do we do now?” Her voice sounded small, like a lost child's.

He brutally squashed the urge to tell her everything…to take her and run as far and fast as he could. “Most likely
someone in the hotel, an associate of Arad's, has already informed him of the incident and he's probably on his way back here right now or may even be here as we speak. We'll release you on the street and you'll say that you escaped.” He gestured to the room at large. “Tell him you were kept here. We've planted evidence to indicate a local group of extremists were responsible for the incident.”

“What am I supposed to tell him they did to me?”

She trembled and he had to restrain the need to reach out to her. Every instinct told him this wasn't right. But, like her, he had no choice.

“You tell him that they tried to beat information about his whereabouts out of you, but that you didn't know anything. Tell him that you managed to escape when one of the men tried to…to rape you.”

She blinked but didn't clear the confusion totally from her gaze. “What if he doesn't believe me?”

This part was almost more than Jack could live with and yet it was the most crucial element…her survival depended upon it. “We have to make him believe it.”

“How?”

Jack stepped to the door and gestured to the man waiting outside. When he entered the room, Ami gasped, obviously recognizing him from the claw marks on his forearms and cheeks as well as the swollen nose. She'd worked the guy over pretty good in her efforts to escape.

When her frightened gaze swung to his, regret pierced Jack like a dagger straight through the heart. “I wish there was another way.”

He turned away from the shock and confusion in her eyes before the first blow landed, unable to watch the brutality necessary to make her cover story real.

The story that would ultimately save her life.

A
MI LAY PRONE
in the dusty street, her face turned to one side, her eyes unblinking. She stared, seeing nothing. Her mind as well as her body was numb.

She felt nothing.

People gathered around her. She sensed more than heard or saw them.

She wondered briefly if she was dead.

Something ached through the numbness.

Her son. She would never see her baby again.

Arms lifted her and she did not resist.

They turned her over with a great deal of care.

She didn't recognize the voices or the faces around her.

She no longer cared where she was.

Darkness tugged at her.

A bolt of pain erupted, screamed through her, awakening the other senses her mind had shut down hours ago. She groaned, unable to do more. Her tongue slid forward, to dampen her dry, cracked lips and fire rushed through her once more.

Finally she did the only thing she could, she closed her eyes and surrendered to the blessed oblivion.

 

M
ICHAL PACED
the outer room of the tiny clinic, rage churning inside him. Someone would pay for this. His jaw hardened. Someone would pay dearly.

Anguish squeezed his heart each time he thought of how
badly she'd been beaten…of what could have happened had she not escaped the imbeciles who had taken her hostage. To get at him, he knew for a certainty. He'd grown complacent when it came to this city. Felt untouchable. He was respected and feared here. Obviously not feared enough.

That would change.

Carlos and four of his men were scouring Tripoli at that very moment to determine how this had happened. A physician Michal trusted was doing all he could to make Amira comfortable as he tended her injuries. He'd insisted Michal leave the room since his presence appeared to upset the patient. The few patients in the clinic when he and his men arrived had chosen to come back later.

Michal kicked the closest object. The chair skidded across the floor and crashed into the wall. The Spaniard and Thomas moved yet again to avoid his path as he began to pace once more. He kept seeing her lying on that shop floor, crumpled and broken-looking. The owner and his wife had seen her stagger into the street and fall facedown. They had thought her dead the way she'd lain so still and with her eyes wide open, unblinking. Michal could not banish the images their words evoked. The shop owner had called the authorities who had reported her whereabouts directly to Michal.

She was bruised badly, her arms, upper torso, and even her legs. Her left cheek was swollen and discolored, as well. One cracked rib.

His mind went black for several seconds before he could again regain control of the consuming rage.

Thank God she had not been raped.

This
was bad enough.

She had told him that she'd barely escaped the man.
There had been three, but only one had been with her when she'd managed to break free.

Michal's fingers curled into fists. This man would die. As would the others.

This wasn't supposed to happen. She should have been safe, here of all places.

Word had come swiftly to him. The mission had been accomplished, but this necessity had required that he leave earlier than planned. And still it had taken what felt like a lifetime to reach her.

Michal's gaze moved back to the door that stood between them. He would see that this never happened again. He closed his eyes and fought the urge to roar like a lion with the emotions twisting inside him.

He should have protected her. He had failed.

The fear she must have suffered at the hands of those brutes haunted him. Made him sick with disgust.

This was no life for her. He inhaled sharply, his chest heavy with too many regrets. She was different now. Before she had seemed to enjoy the thrill of living on the edge, the dangerous lure of how he lived. He remembered well when she'd first sought him out. Michal had been certain he had never met a woman more like himself—utterly fearless.

In no time she had worked her way into his heart, and then she had demanded to know his price for killing her father. Shocked at first, Michal had played off her suggestion. But Amira had been insistent. Then the word had come down that Peres was to be added to his list. Michal had not questioned the coincidence at the time, his only concern had been keeping Amira pleased with him. He wanted to make her father suffer for the hurt and neglect she had suffered because of him.

He frowned and stared at the door as if he could see
through it, see what the physician was doing now, by sheer force of will. Her continued assertion since her return that she was not Amira Peres nagged at him. Could she have fooled him, as well as Yael Peres? Michal could only assume that her amnesia was so complete that even the most remote aspect of her past was now gone forever. The only other conclusion would be that she was not Amira Peres. He shook his head in protest of that reasoning. That was not possible.

Still, she was quite different now. Whatever bitterness that lurked in her soul two years ago had disappeared along with her memory. She was not the same. But on every other level she felt the same.

This Amira—Ami—was more vulnerable, softer, with no idea how to function in his world. And he had failed to protect her. Leaving her helpless to defend herself and a perfect target for those who would seek to bring him down.

The door opened and the physician waved him inside. His feet moving him forward, Michal's heart shuddered to a near stop as his gaze fell upon her once more.

She sat on the examination table, her ribs wrapped tightly beneath her torn blouse. Another blast of fury thundered through him. The blood had been cleansed from her skin and her hair had been combed. His gaze flitted to the nurse standing next to her. The nurse's doing, he imagined. The entire staff of the small clinic had been terrified by his volatile emotions. He was certain they wanted to appease him in any way possible in hopes of surviving this encounter.

“She will be fine,” the physician told him in stilted English. “She must take care for a time until the rib is healed properly. There is no concussion despite the lump on her head. There is nothing more I can do.”

Michal nodded. “Good.” He knew he should at least glance at the doctor and thank him, but he couldn't take his eyes off Ami. She sat so very still, her eyes glazed and empty.

“We can go now?” he asked, finally sparing the physician a glance.

“Yes.”

Michal stepped closer to her, but she made no move to reach out to him or to even stand. She simply sat there, staring at nothing. The nurse scurried to the other side of the room as far away from Michal as possible.

He reached an arm around Ami's shoulders and she flinched. A blade of hurt skewered him as if he'd been run through with a sword. “We can go now,” he murmured as reassuringly as the emotion clogging his throat would allow. She made no response. Worry thudded in his temples. “You are sure she will be fine?” he asked, suddenly certain the physician had missed some aspect of her injury.

“The shock,” he offered. “It will take time to recover from the shock.”

Satisfied with that diagnosis, Michal gently urged Ami toward the edge of the table until she scooted off the rest of the way on her own. Once on her feet, she wobbled for a moment, but he steadied her against him. He didn't bother saying anything else as he led Ami from the room. His man, Thomas, would generously reward the physician and his nurse. No other discussion was necessary.

Outside, he helped Ami into the back of the car and slid in next to her. She leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes as if too weary to do otherwise. Thomas and the Spaniard climbed into the front, Thomas behind the wheel.

“I'm taking you home,” Michal told her softly, again hoping she would respond to his words. “You'll be safe there.”

A cellular telephone buzzed and Thomas quickly silenced it by answering the call. He pulled out onto the street as he listened. Michal only half listened until Thomas demanded to know the address, then his instincts soared to a higher state of alert. Carlos had found something. He was sure of it.

Thomas ended the call and glanced at him in the rearview mirror. “Carlos found him. He's holding him at the house where they took her. The other two men have not been found.”

“Take me there,” Michal ordered, his fury burning bloodred, clouding his vision.

Ami tensed in his arms. “Don't worry,” he soothed, his voice still gruff despite his best efforts. “You will be safe. I swear it.”

The ride took only five minutes. Ami prayed every second of those few minutes that she could keep up the pretense. Tears burned behind her eyes, but it was the fear that pounded in her chest that made her weak…made her want to run. If Michal found out what really happened.

She would be dead.
If you betray me again I will kill you.
His words as he'd made love to her that first time echoed inside her skull.

The car bumped over a rut in the road and she had to close her eyes against the pain that seared through her sides. Her whole body ached, her lower lip felt raw from the split there.

She tried to block the memory of that jerk coming at her, slapping her repeatedly with the back of his hand, shoving her against the wall and then to the floor where he'd kicked her. Had Tanner not interceded, things could have gotten a lot worse. The jerk had been extremely pissed at her. She'd sobbed harder with each blow, hadn't wanted to, but the pain had been overwhelming. She'd
been certain that the extent of the beating wasn't necessary—that the guy had been out for revenge rather than simply following orders. She tried to think now if Tanner could have stopped him sooner. Maybe not. Maybe he'd done the right thing.

She was definitely thankful for the indisputable evidence of her innocence the brutal beating provided. If Tanner wasn't going to get her out of this, and he likely wasn't, she definitely didn't want Michal suspicious of her.

She pushed away the thought of what Tanner expected her to do. She couldn't think about that right now. She only wanted out of this godforsaken country. Her thoughts were too fragmented, too scattered to analyze the situation.

She would do what she had to.

A single tear rolled down her cheek at the reality of exactly what that entailed. She pushed it away again, determined not to let it into her thoughts until she could think more clearly.

Her heart lurched when the car stopped in front of the crumbling building where Tanner's people had held her last night. Where she'd been beaten to within an inch of her life or what felt like it. What if they'd forgotten something? Something that could link her to the CIA?

“I don't want to go in there,” she said, pulling away from Michal's hold. Wanting desperately to crawl out the passenger-side door and run like hell. She wasn't cut out for this cloak-and-dagger stuff. “Please.” Her gaze shot to Michal's. “I can't.”

His eyes turned even darker with some raw, savage emotion that went way beyond rage. He took her by the arm, less gently than before. “You must. It is necessary.”

Terror clawing at her, she slid across the seat and allowed him to help her from the car. Every move she made sent pain radiating across her nerve endings. Outside the
contusion and the fractured rib, most of her injuries were superficial. Why did she have to come back here? Why was vengeance necessary? Why did it matter who did it? She just wanted to leave.

She shivered as she recalled Tanner saying that he would plant evidence. She didn't know what kind or about whom; she didn't want to know. She didn't want to be here. She stalled at the entryway, but Michal prodded her into forward motion. He wasn't going to leave it alone. She might as well face facts. She doubted he would even consider leaving the country until he'd exhausted all his resources.

Inside the gloomy structure that smelled of urine and disuse, it was evident the place had been ransacked. She remembered distinctly that the front room, the one she now stood in, had been vacant. The room where she'd awakened had been furnished with only a cot, a chair and a rickety old armoire.

She surveyed the room once more as they moved through it. The overturned furniture and shattered crockery had definitely been added since she left. Papers were scattered over the floor. She didn't remember those, either, from before. Part of the evidence, she presumed.

As they approached the room where she'd awakened, she balked, couldn't make her feet take the final steps. “Please, can't we just leave,” she pleaded once more.

Ignoring her plea, Michal turned to Thomas. “Stay with her,” he ordered.

She watched, her heart racing, as Michal shoved the door inward and entered the room. Thomas stood a few feet away as if fearing, like Raoul, she might cost him his life, as well, if he got too close.

The seconds turned into minutes and still she gleaned nothing from the hushed conversation in the room. Ami
prayed with every ounce of strength she possessed that they hadn't found something in the room that would contradict her story. Surely Tanner would not be so careless.

Carlos hated her. He would like nothing better than to nail her. She could imagine him on his hands and knees going over every square inch of the place looking for clues against her. She trembled. God, how much more of this could she stand? She closed her eyes and tried to slow the drunken 'round and 'round sensation in her head. She summoned the image of her son and focused on him, pushing away all other thought. He was all that mattered.

“Ami.”

Her eyes opened to Michal standing in the doorway, looking directly at her. Before she could dredge up a proper response, he had taken the few steps that yawned between them.

“I want you to come into the room and look closely at this man. Tell me if he is the one who hurt you.”

Panic broadsided her. Man? What man? Her gaze flew to the open doorway. Carlos and three other men were crowded around someone seated in a chair. The image of the man tied to a chair in the cellar flashed through her mind. That scene had resulted in death. Not again. Who…