Mercy (11 page)

She was so primed, so ready for his entrance, that it didn’t take much for her body to tighten. When he stopped to grind his lower body against hers, the world exploded. The orgasm rocked through her. Her body bucked and her mind went blank as her body kept lifting off the bed to get closer to his. She tried to breathe as every part of her tingled.

His pace picked up and his breathing grew heavy and she knew his orgasm was about to hit him. When it finally did, all she could do was drop her hands next to her head on the pillow and watch his shoulders stiffen.

Then a thought floated through her mind: he was right, she was his.

•   •   •

Becca gave up on sleep somewhere around five and headed for the shower. Jarrett had already slipped off around four. Later than usual, but he cut out just as he had night after night. Screw-and-run seemed to be his MO these days. They had sex, he picked a fight, they had sex again, but this time with an intensity that knocked her near unconscious, then he walked away to sleep alone. This time he’d stopped to turn off the light on his way out.

Early this morning she snuck out to see what he did once he left the bed. The answer wasn’t all that original or difficult to figure out. He beelined for his bedroom where the door remained closed for the rest of the night.

She’d debated busting in on him. Even walked across the great room several times with that very intention in mind. But she refused to beg. Forcing him to kiss her, going to him on his terms while obeying his no-clothing rule, all cost her enough. So, she’d stayed in bed. Pulled the covers over her and settled in their softness. She expected to drift off to sleep, but it never came. The water revived her but not by much.

When she came out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel, because she would be damned if she’d walk around naked for him at all from now on, she spied the stacks on the bed. Flicking the bedroom light on, she froze. For a second she didn’t know what she was seeing but then she did.

The pile on the left consisted of her sneakers, along with underwear, running shorts and a bra. The one on the right was nothing more than two of his dress shirts, her preferred outfit these days.

She didn’t know what it meant, but it meant something.

With a shaky hand, she picked up the blue shirt on top and brought it to her nose. Inhaling deeply, she searched for the scent of his soap. The combination she couldn’t identify by ingredient but associated only with him. It lingered in the morning long after he was gone. It wrapped around her when she slipped on the shirts he’d worn and abandoned.

These were clean and fresh. His but not intimately him.

She still wasn’t sure what he wanted from her, but she now knew she needed more than his help. And this move on his part was a start.

TWELV
E

Jarrett sat in the second-floor conference room and stared at the information spread out in front of him and highlighted on the three large monitors lining the wall. This room once served as a place for him to conduct business meetings, leaving his downstairs office private. But then Elijah moved in and it became a command center.

Jarrett looked at all the photos and notes and still didn’t know what the point of it was. Elijah had showed up two months ago, begging to be heard. Crawled right up to the same door Becca used. For his trouble, Elijah got a bullet in the shoulder. Jarrett would have done more damage if Wade hadn’t stepped in with worries about new criminal charges.

When Becca pretended to get caught, even though she all but knocked on the door, Jarrett ushered her inside. The reason for the different treatment wasn’t a mystery. He used all sorts of excuses, trying to trick his brain into believing inviting her in was about revenge and cold fucking. But he knew the truth.

Despite the lies, despite handing him over to the feds and tearing his life apart. Despite everything and regardless of the passage of time and the festering anger, he loved her. Right down to the dark lonely place in his soul. And it fucking sucked.

He leaned back and stared up at the ceiling, trying to call up what little common sense he had left. What he felt for her made him vulnerable and stupid. He could lose everything and he doubted he’d fully recover a second time.

He’d just closed his eyes when the alarm dinged and the door opened. He sat up in time to see Elijah walk in looking six-feet-two-inches of furious. But that wasn’t new. He’d been sporting a frown for days and Jarrett knew Becca was the reason.

“What are you doing?” Elijah nodded at the table top as he asked.

The snapping, the questioning—Jarrett was damn sick of all of it. “Sitting in a chair I paid for, in a building I own.”

“It was a simple question.”

Jarrett didn’t get lured in by that one. Nothing had ever been easy or straightforward with this man. He’d worked as an assassin on the government payroll. Trained and paid for by the CIA and used for its purposes. He retrieved data, did whatever he had to do to collect information and killed on demand. The only reason he lived at the club now was because he turned over information that helped Bast negotiate Jarrett’s safety.

After all, the public would not take kindly to a tape of a CIA operative talking about how he got an order from above to frame an American citizen in order to bribe him for information. The CIA could deny it and claim Elijah’s tape was a fake, but the people in charge wouldn’t want even a whiff of the allegations out there. Combined with the certain defense weapon intel from a former member now relocated to Spain, it helped buy Jarrett’s freedom and hold back a second round of blackmail. So far.

That meant, as much as Jarrett hated to admit it, he owed Elijah something. Jarrett had repaid that debt in the form of room and board and a level of security while Elijah investigated who lied to him about the real reason behind the arrest at the club months ago. The way Elijah saw it he’d been used and double-crossed. That seemed to piss him off more than the attempts to kill him and wipe his existence from every database. In reality, Elijah looked for many of the same pieces Becca did. Jarrett decided just that morning to give them to her. Maybe if Elijah knew Becca worked on the same puzzle, he’d have more incentive to get the job done and get them all out from under this weight.

Jarrett jumped right in, expecting blowback. “We need to reconfigure the system to add a user but limit internal access to protect your identity and work.”

“Who?”

“Just do it.”

Elijah crossed his arms over his chest. “Going to tell me why?”

The man hadn’t led his team, but he was born to the task. That made dealing with him a total pain in the ass for Jarrett. “I’m not sure why you think you’re in charge here or entitled to explanations.”

“Are you telling me I don’t have a legitimate reason to know?” Elijah pulled out the chair across from Jarrett.

Jarrett couldn’t argue with that. “To give Becca access.”

Elijah froze in the act of sitting. “What the fuck are you thinking?”

Here we go
. “That this is my building, my computer, my resources, and you’re living here on my good graces.”

“I handed you the information you needed to get out from under the criminal charges.” Elijah dropped down. “Have you forgotten that already?”

“You gave me leverage. In return, I’ve given you cover, helped you fake your death and have not once unleashed the unholy hell you deserve for dragging me into your bullshit.”

With his elbows on the table, Elijah leaned in. His voice didn’t rise above a hoarse whisper. “I don’t trust her.”

“I don’t trust either of you.” And that was the truth. Becca and Elijah—hell, the whole CIA crowd—lied for a living. They got paid to engage in subterfuge. Becca only crossed his path because she showed up claiming to work for a satellite company, and he ignored her words and any potential alarm signals in favor of luring her into bed.

Looked like that joke was on him.

“After everything you still think I’m the problem?” Elijah asked with a voice filled with shock.

“Possibly.”

“Well, I’m not.”

“You’ll understand why I’m skeptical of most everything you say.” Which was why Wade was supposed to be watching Elijah and why Jarrett double-checked every move Elijah made.

The locks and security codes that kept intruders out also let Jarrett track everyone’s movements. He didn’t care what Wade did with his private life, except to worry he’d made a bad choice throwing in with Elijah, but Elijah was on Jarrett’s personal watch list.

Elijah flattened his hands against the tabletop. “I’m not the one you need to worry about here, and you know it.”

“Find a new topic.”

“You’re the one upstairs fucking her.” Elijah threw out his hand. “Letting her work her way into your head.”

Jarrett slowly rose to his feet. His legs hit the chair with enough force to send it spinning behind him. “This is your last warning. One more word about Becca, and you’re on the street. You can explain to Natalie and her crowd why you’re still alive and take your chances on staying that way.”

“You care about Becca that much?”

“Just follow the advice.”

Elijah slumped back in his seat. “You are playing games with my life.”

The words mirrored the ones Becca had said. The same tremor of worry carried in Elijah’s voice as had in hers. With anyone else, Jarrett would write the comments off as overly dramatic. But Becca and Elijah knew nasty people. Both enemies and friends could be after them.

Which brought Jarrett back to the point. “The two of you are looking for the same thing. Underneath it all, you both want to know who set up Spectrum for termination and why, and find a way off the hit list.”

“Unless she is the one at the bottom of it all. She could be the one who wrote the hit list.”

Jarrett wanted to believe that possibility because then he could hold on to his anger, but the theory fell apart every time he mentally walked through it. While this whole “I need to be in the club” thing could be one more assignment for Becca, he doubted that was the case. There was no reason for her to delay or win him over this time around. The longer she lingered, the harder it would be for her to get the jump on him, if that was the plan.

She’d had ample opportunity to remove him and search for his files. If she was on an information hunt or looking for Elijah, she could have gone on a rampage or at least be working on a way to get around his security system. As an expert, she could find a way or turn a weapon on him. He knew that much. More important to him, every time he climbed on top of her, she could have plunged a knife in his back. She didn’t, which was why he decided to open the information to her now.

As far as he could tell, except for a case of restlessness and balking at his nudity requirement, she wasn’t fighting being confined. Part of him wondered how long that would last and, trust or not, dreaded the day she’d walk out of his life again.

The constant battle between being so angry and wanting her so much robbed him of sleep and good sense. Maybe Bast and Wade were right. Maybe he should let her be someone else’s problem, if for no other reason than to spare him from the inevitable gut shot to come.

At the very least, he could step out of the battle. “I should put you two in a room, let you hash out whatever pissing match you have and then put you both to work finding a solution.”

Elijah dropped his head in his hands. His fingers massaged his skull as he sat there. A minute passed before he looked up again. “Tell me why her.”

Jarrett wished he fucking knew. There had been other women and plenty of great sex over the years. None of that compared to being with her. “We’re not discussing my private life.”

“The last time . . .” Elijah shook his head as his arms dropped against the table.

No way was Jarrett letting that just sit there. “What?”

“She disagreed with how I was handling the operation back when she lived here.”

Jarrett bit the inside of his mouth to keep from yelling that he was not an operation. “Why?”

“Ask her.”

“I’m asking the man who trespassed on my property and lived to talk about it. Which, I would remind you, was by my choice.”

“My shoulder still aches.” Elijah rubbed it as if talking about it reminded him of the pain.

“I don’t care.”

Elijah hit Jarrett head-on with a full push of eye contact. Elijah didn’t even blink. “Here’s the part you’re not going to like.”

“I haven’t enjoyed much of this conversation so far.”

Elijah rubbed his hand up and down his thighs. “Before I could tell Todd my concerns about her cover, he moved up the timetable.”

“Meaning?”

“He fast-forwarded having you dragged off to jail.”

A stark silence followed Elijah’s statement. Jarrett knew the other man was telling him something important, something that incriminated Becca. Rather than jump in and pepper Elijah with questions, Jarrett sat there. Elijah wanted to spill this story and only needed the room to do so.

He waited a full minute before launching into another comment. This time he seethed with anger. It poured out of him and showed in every inch of his tense body. “When you and Becca get together things get fucked up, and that time you messed up my timing.”

“How?”

“I thought you knew everything.”

Jarrett made a hard grasp for his temper. Calling up his control, he kept his expression blank and his voice even. “Elijah, spill.”

“We were off plan and I didn’t know why, or how far up the chain the orders were, but I knew the entire operation could end up with me being sacrificed.”

The plan all fell together in Jarrett’s head. Elijah played hard at not caring and insisting his life was about killing on command, but he’d known something was off back then and tried to derail the operation before it went to hell.

Jarrett felt a punch of admiration. It almost overcame his usual urge to shove Elijah out the window. Almost. “You were planning to take Todd out yourself and end the operation.”

“If necessary, yes.”

“Instead, it blew up on you. My arrest. Your team members dying. Hell, Todd getting attacked. It all meant whatever had you worried should have had your worried.”

“Exactly.”

Jarrett had never gotten this far, never broken through Elijah’s reserves and the layer of silence covering the intricacies of the operation, so Jarrett treaded very carefully. “For some reason you blame Becca for the destruction?”

“For everything. We fought about what was happening with the operation back then, and she snuck out, broke protocol and went to Todd. Next thing I knew, the order came down to take you in.”

Jarrett’s insides shook from the force he exerted to keep his anger from bubbling up and over. “You’re saying she made sure I got arrested.”

“I’m saying I don’t trust her.” Elijah slapped a hand against the table. “And a little advice? You shouldn’t either.”

•   •   •

Wade walked out of his condo bathroom and slipped a T-shirt over his head. His hair was still damp from a shower as he searched out his coffee mug in the kitchen. When the alarm chirped, he did a quick check over his shoulder.

Elijah came in and slammed the door behind him. He wandered around wearing a furious scowl. He seemed too busy swearing under his breath to notice what was happening around him.

Never a good sign.

“Where have you been?” Wade asked.

Elijah barely spared him a glance as he looked around the family room area with his focus not stopping on any one thing. “Conference room.”

“You okay?”

His head snapped up. “Do I look okay?”

Sounded like they were back to pissing and moaning. Wade grabbed the mug and walked over to stand behind the couch and wait for the storm to hit. “More like half-possessed.”

“That’s about right.”

“I’m guessing that means you found something.” Wade didn’t know whether to be happy or not. Finalizing the investigation meant moving on. Elijah wasn’t one to stay in place.

Wade recognized the type because he’d once been the same way. Then Jarrett yanked him off the street and out of his loan enforcer job. Jarrett went legit and insisted Wade do the same. Being raised in a family of petty thieves, finally finding stability suited him. Wade never looked back and never regretted.

But he would regret Eli.

“Jarrett’s lost his goddamn mind.” Elijah rested his hands on the back of the chair. His fingernails dug into the dark leather.

Wade didn’t need an explanation. Only one thing set Elijah’s anger firing at this level these days. “So, we’re dealing with a Becca issue. Again.”

He pushed off and stood up straight again. Pacing started right after. “What is it about her?”

“Hard truth is that Jarrett wants her. He probably even loves her.”
Had from the beginning and always would.
Wade was convinced of that now. Really, there was no other explanation for his usually steady boss’s loss of control.