MARCUS (Dragon Security Book 4) (10 page)

Megan

Dante was gone before I woke the next morning. I’d arranged for the family’s private jet to fly him into New Mexico, a rental waiting for him at the private airport in Roswell. It was a fairly short drive from there to Ruidoso. But I was still waiting mid-morning for his report.

“We have a bit of a cluster fuck up here,” he said when he did call.”

“What are you talking about?”

“It looks like someone used an AK-47 to take out the front of this cabin. There are bullet holes and glass everywhere.”

“You’re joking.”

“No. The local cops are on their way up. Do you want me to stick around?”

“Any sign of our asset or his target?”

“No. Their things are still here, the Dragon-registered SUV is out front, but no sign of them.”

I got up and waved to Sam, gesturing for her to come into my office.

“Stick around. There will be questions about the SUV. Answer them honestly, but don’t offer information, understand?”

“I do.”

“Good. Keep me informed.”

Sam came to the door, concern on her face.

“Marcus has gotten himself into trouble. Have we had any calls from an unauthorized phone?”

“Not that I’m aware of.”

“Keep an eye out. He’ll be calling in eventually.”

Sam started to go, but I caught her shoulder. “Where’s Hayden?”

“Out on assignment.”

I bit back a groan. “Important? Or can we call him back in?”

“I can call him back in. Why?”

“We’re going to need him to go after Marcus. It sounds like he’s got someone bad after him.”

“Okay. Anything else?”

“Vincent’s back, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Have him be ready to go, too. I want as many men on this as possible.”

“Will do.”

I watched Sam leave my office, wondering what I would do without her.

Call in, Marcus. We can’t help you until you do.

Dante called back an hour later.

“The local cops think the shooter was in the woods. They found some casings, but not much else. There’re no vehicles in the area, no other houses. There are no witnesses.”

“So, nothing.”

“Nothing. Except the cops did have a report of a stolen car in town. A 1966 Ford Bronco.”

“Marcus must have taken it to get out of town.”

“Probably. The SUV is still three feet under snow. The door’s open on the driver’s side and there are bullet holes on the passenger side, suggesting he was trying to get it started, but abandoned the idea.”

“The stolen Bronco suggests they’re still alive. That’s what’s important.”

“Are you going to call the client?”

“Don’t know. Come back. We might need the plane to go after them.”

“On my way.”

I set the phone in the cradle, thinking about Blake Zimmerman. He was paying for our services, so I owed him at least a phone call. But he could also be behind this attack on my asset. Or at least know something about it. That required a face-to-face meeting.

“Hayden? You’re with me.”

We drove across town in silence. Sam had briefed Hayden on what was happening, so I didn’t have to explain it to him. And my thoughts were a million miles away anyway.

We pulled up to the main gate of the house, suddenly the center of attention of the half dozen paparazzi sitting along the street. Hayden whistled under his breath when the gate opened and allowed us access to the long driveway. The house appeared at the top of a small swell of the land, a stone and brick monstrosity that could probably house all the paparazzi outside the gate along with their families.

Hayden was impressed. I…well, I grew up two blocks from this place, so I was less impressed.

Blake was standing at the front door when we came to a stop in the circle drive. He was barefoot, looking much too casual for the kind of man who could afford a house like this. I don’t think I ever saw my father barefoot. And he only wore jeans when my mother forced him to. Daddy was a suit and tie sort of guy.

“Ms. Bradford,” Blake said, approaching me with his hands outstretched. He was wearing a white oxford shirt that made his skin a deeper shade of ebony, but it, too, was made overly casual by the lack of buttons done up the front. He looked as though he’d just thrown clothes on when we rang at the gate.

“I apologize for bothering you at home, Mr. Zimmerman.”

“Blake, please.”

“Only if you’ll call me Megan.”

“Of course.” He gestured toward the house. “Come inside.”

Hayden stayed close to me as we went inside, his hand on the small of my back. It was comforting to know he was there, but it wasn’t necessary for him to act as some sort of bodyguard. I could handle myself. I picked up the speed of my steps, moving away from his touch.

“Can I get you a drink?” Blake asked as he led the way into a large sitting room to the right of the front doors. “We have water, wine, liquor. Just about anything you could want.”

“No, thank you. We’re only here for a few minutes.”

Blake nodded, coming to stand in front of us. “I’m guessing you didn’t come all the way out here with good news.”

“I’m sorry, but you’re correct.”

He crossed his massive arms over his chest and studied my face for a moment. “What happened? Is Cadence okay?”

“We don’t know. It appears that someone fired a high-powered weapon at your cabin. You wouldn’t happen to know who would want to do such a thing, would you?”

Blake shook his head. “Of course not.”

“My asset was there with her. We believe that they somehow found a way back to Ruidoso and got a vehicle there. But we haven’t heard from them.”

“I haven’t heard from Cadence in days. I thought she was snowed in.”

“She was, we think. But another of my assets managed to get up to the house today and found them gone.”

“And the cabin shot to hell.”

“Yes.”

He shook his head, turning away from us. He walked over to the bar and grabbed a bottle of water, downing half of it in one gulp.

“Cadence was shot at before she left for the cabin. Have the police come up with any suspects?”

“No. Whoever did it was careful to wipe his prints from the stolen car. They have nothing else, not even footage from the security cameras outside the restaurant. The guy apparently knew where they were and he was able to avoid them.”

I glanced at Hayden. That sounded like someone with a little experience at this sort of thing. Like someone who’d served time in the military.

“When you hear from Cadence, you’ll have her contact me?”

“Of course.”

Blake ran his hand over his shaved head. “If you hear anything…”

“What’s going on?” a woman’s voice asked from behind us.

I turned and found myself looking at a familiar face. Annie Kincaid Zimmerman. She’d been a model before she married Blake at the height of his career. She’s pretty much just become a trophy wife since then, always on his arm at important events, but never in front of the cameras any other time. I’d heard a rumor she’d been ill, but she looked quite healthy as she stood in front of us.

“Cadence is missing,” Blake said, crossing to her. “And someone shot up our cabin.”

“What?”

Annie seemed to grow a little faint, falling into her husband’s arms. He lifted her up and carried her to the couch, laying her with a carefulness that was heartwarming. He glanced at me.

“She’s got a heart condition.”

“Is there anything we can do?”

He shook his head. “If you could show yourselves out…”

Hayden laid his hand on my arm, guiding me out the door.

We drove back to the office in the same silence we drove there in, though my thoughts were on Annie Zimmerman now. The poor woman. First she couldn’t have a child of her own because of her health issues, and now her surrogate was missing. It must be incredibly stressful.

“Do we know if they’d completed the surrogate stuff?” I asked aloud, aware that Hayden wouldn’t know.

He glanced at me. “I think our main concern should be her safety right now.”

“I know. I’m just wondering if we’re protecting a woman, or a woman and a child. These are the kinds of things that Sam asks the clients, but I didn’t think to ask.”

“It doesn’t really matter.”

He fell silent again until we reached the office, clearly not in the mood to talk. I knew Hayden well enough to know that meant he had something on his mind. That’s why I wasn’t surprised when he grabbed my wrist as I started to get out of the car in the parking lot.

“What’s going on between you and Dante?”

I stared at his hand on my wrist until he let go.

“That’s none of your business.”

“You’re my friend, Megan, more than you were ever my boss. I don’t want to see you hurt.”

“I’m a big girl. I can handle my own stuff.”

“You’re wrapped up in Peter’s case and Cole’s getting married, I know those things are bringing up a lot of ghosts for you. Don’t let Dante take advantage of that.”

“I’m not.”

“We don’t know anything about him.”

“I know that, too.” I studied him for a second. “What’s going on with you and Sam? All the whispering that’s been happening lately?”

He looked away. “Sam’s worried about you, too.”

“So the two of you are talking about me behind my back? That’s healthy.”

I started to get out of the car, but he put his hand on my shoulder.

“Just promise me you’ll be careful.”

I glanced back at him. “I’m going to be fine. You…don’t break my best friend’s heart.”

He just nodded, his expression thoughtful.

Marcus

I caught her just as she passed out. Blood was seeping from a wound on her shoulder. I lifted her, carried her into the bedroom and wrapped her in the bedspread on the bed. She was shivering even though the water had been warm and her skin was hot. Fever. I set her on the bed and rushed back to the bathroom, grabbing a couple of towels to press against her shoulder.

It looked like a through and through. Not a lot of damage, but she’d lost some blood. And the fever. That worried me. She should have told me sooner.

I didn’t have any bandages. Didn’t have any medical supplies at all. I had a bottle of cheap wine that I bought on a lark. Nothing else. I put pressure on the wound until the bleeding began to slow. Then I grabbed the wine and poured the whole bottle over the wound. She moaned, but she didn’t wake.

I hated to leave her, but I had to get some bandages on her wound. I lifted her higher up on the bed and wrapped her a little better in the bedspread. I was careful to lock the door behind me and drove back to the Walmart, making my purchases quickly. Tylenol. Bandages. Antiseptic. Cold packs. Thread and needles. A couple more bottles of wine.

She was in the same place when I got back. I pulled the towels away from the wound and it was seeping blood again. It went right through, but it was a significant hole in her shoulder. I had to sew it closed or she’d just continue to bleed. I expected her to wake when I pierced her skin with the needle, but she only groaned. It was a quick procedure, one I’d done before. But it hurt more doing it to a woman I cared for than a man I barely knew.

When it was sewn up, I bathed it in antiseptic and covered it with a thick, heavy bandage. Then I laid the cold packs over it, hoping it wouldn’t swell too much.

She was burning up. I needed to do something to bring down the fever. But I didn’t know what to do beyond putting her back in the shower and that would require getting the wound wet, something I really didn’t want to do right now.

I crushed the Tylenol and put it in a cup of water. It wasn’t the best solution, but at least she drank a little of it.

All I could do now was wait. If anything happened to her…

I grabbed the burner phone and stepped out onto the little concrete porch outside our room. It only took a second to put it together. I punched in the appropriate numbers and listened to the phone ring some nine hundred miles away.

“Grosbeak.”

A second later, Megan’s voice filled my ear.

“Where the hell are you?”

“We were ambushed. We had to get out of Ruidoso in a hurry.”

“I know. I sent Dante out there when we hadn’t heard from you in three days.”

“We were snowed in.”

“Know that, too. Where are you?”

“Lubbock.”

“Good. I’ll send Hayden and Vincent to pick you up.”

“Cadence is sick. She was hit in the shoulder and didn’t tell me right away. She’s got a fever.”

There was silence on the other end. “Okay. I’ll let Hayden know and he can make the appropriate arrangements once he arrives.”

“Does anyone know who’s behind this?”

“No. Use caution. Don’t leave her unattended for long. And the Bronco?” There was a touch of appreciation in her voice. “I’d ditch it somewhere.”

“Will do.”

“I’ll call you back when I have details on Hayden’s arrival.”

I hung up and slid the phone into my back pocket. The Bronco was sitting in the parking lot of a Red Lobster down the street. I debated over taking it somewhere further away, but I didn’t want to leave Cadence alone that long. I was careful not to be seen by any video cameras or to allow the guy in the motel office to see which car I got into. It shouldn’t be traced back to us.

But there could always be something I overlooked.

In the end, though, I decided to leave it where it was. I ducked back into the room with Cadence, pulled the curtains tight and pushed the deadbolt into place. I checked on Cadence. Her forehead seemed cooler, but it was so hard to tell. I left her long enough to shower and change into the clean clothes I’d picked up at the Walmart on my first trip. I rinsed her clothes out in the sink, not sure why, but finishing what she’d started. I hung them up to dry, then went into the bedroom and climbed onto the bed beside her. And waited.

It was going to be a long night.

I must have drifted off sometime after dark because I woke with a start when Cadence moved against me, groans of pain slipping from her lips.

“Hey, babe,” I mumbled, touching her face in the dark. “It’s okay.”

“My shoulder hurts.”

“I know. You were shot and I had to sew it up.”

She moaned, not really awake, but not really asleep anymore, either. I flipped on the lamp beside the bed and touched her face again. She was still burning up, her cheeks red with the fever. It was time to do something more drastic than just crushing up Tylenol.

I went into the bathroom and filled the tub with lukewarm water. Then I untangled her from the bedspread and carried her into the bathroom, laying her carefully in the water. She hissed as the cool water touched her burning skin. But then she focused on me and I could see that she understood what I was trying to do.

“You should have told me.” I carefully cupped the water and poured it over her skin. “I could have helped you sooner.”

“You were driving. In a hurry.”

“I know, baby, but you’re more important. I could have done something.”

She shook her head. “Didn’t hurt. I didn’t know until later.”

I nodded. I understood that. Sometimes the men I served with in Afghanistan, they would suffer the most incredible wounds, but they wouldn’t feel them until the fight was over, until the adrenaline pumping through their bodies was spent. It was an odd phenomenon that kept some of them alive until they could get to a hospital where proper care waited.

She seemed cooler after a few minutes in the water. I got a bottle of wine and brought it to her, helping her sip the warm liquid in hopes that the alcohol would aid with the pain. She closed her eyes after every sip and sighed.

“Not the best. But it’ll have to do.”

She peeked at me. “Does this constitute our first date?”

I laughed. “Maybe. Wine. Romantic lighting. It just might be.”

She smiled, but then her entire body suddenly stiffened and her eyes rolled back into her head. She began to shake, the water splashing everywhere as her head slammed back against the porcelain again and again. I grabbed her shoulder, mindless of the bandage, and held her still, hoping to keep her from doing any more harm. When it was over, she was unconscious again, her breathing a little shallow.

I couldn’t just sit there and wait for Hayden to come find me. I had to get her some help.

I carried her back to the bed and dressed her carefully, constantly afraid she would begin to convulse again. I had no choice but to go get the Bronco. I knew from Megan’s warning that it was hot now—that the police were looking for it—but it was the only set of wheels in this area that I could hot wire. I drove it back to the motel, aware of the outdoor security cameras, and I quickly loaded Cadence into the front seat. I cleaned up the room as best as I could, getting rid of all evidence that we were there. Then I drove to the nearest emergency room.

And I lied.

“What happened to your wife, Mr. Rudolph?”

“She had a bad rotator cuff. The doctor’s said that it would need just a few little adjustments here and there, but I told her…the doctors in Mexico, well, that may not be the right place to do this. ‘But they’ll do it cheaper,’ she said. ‘They know what they’re doing.’ They clearly didn’t.”

They didn’t question it. How many times did they hear lies in the emergency room? It was an American pastime to tell lies. I was just hoping they wouldn’t recognize the wound as a bullet entrance and exit.

They took her into a trauma room and set up an IV. After the doctor came and examined her—more lies—they cleaned up the wound, sutured it properly, and injected antibiotics into her hip. She woke suddenly just as the nurse was wrapping a bandage around her shoulder.

“Where am I?”

“I’m here, babe,” I said, leaning over her. “You’re in the hospital, but you’re going to be okay.”

She stared at me for a minute, but then she lay back down, her eyes slowly sliding closed.

“The doctor wants to admit her for a few days,” the nurse said as she cleaned up her mess.

“Why?”

“To make sure the fever breaks. These things can get pretty serious pretty quickly.”

“Don’t I know it. But we don’t live in the area, we were just passing through.”

“I’m sure we can work it out with your insurance.”

“No insurance. I’m paying cash.”

“Well, either way, she needs to be observed.”

The nurse left. Cadence was still asleep. I slipped out of the room and went down the hall to the drug cart they’d left unattended. It was protected by an elaborate computer system that only allowed certain drawers to be opened at a time according to the needed medication. But the last user had forgotten to log out and hacking computer systems had been a hobby of mine since high school. I quickly manipulated the system, convincing it that there was an emergency that overrode its protocols. All the drawers popped open and I had my choice of what I wanted to take. I filled my pockets with antibiotics and opiates, and a few additional analgesics for good measure.

Cadence was sitting up when I walked back into the room, struggling to pull the blouse I’d bought for her at Walmart over her injured shoulder.

“Let me help.”

“I thought you’d want to get out of here when the nurse left.”

“You read my mind.”

I lifted her up and carried her, setting her in a wheelchair as we turned a corner in the corridor and heard voices come close. No one seemed to notice us or wonder what we were doing. Cadence jumped out of the chair the moment we were out of sight of the triage. We walked around the corner of the building, searching for a car that would suitable to become our next source of transportation.

“There,” Cadence said, pointing out a 1980s era pickup truck.

“Perfect.”

I hotwired the truck, loaded our things from the Bronco and we were on the highway in a matter of minutes.

“Now what?”

“We just keep moving.”

“Okay.”