Protecting the Enemy (13 page)

“We couldn’t. I had a plan. We would change our names and go far away where ETE 7 would never find us.”

She pressed her finger tips to her temples. “But what if they did? You said yourself that we couldn’t run, that we would always be looking over our shoulders.”

“I know that now. I was selfish. I wanted the family neither of us ever had. Having children with you was something that probably never would have really happened.”

“I cannot have this conversation right now.”

“Fair enough. I’ll go get you the test, but keep your gun on that door until I return.”

She nodded and took the gun from the table. “Did you—” She paused to find the words. “Did you do this on purpose, to get me pregnant?”

“No, Jewels. I didn’t. But would it be such a bad thing?”

Her eyes widened. “Yes! Until Boss is erased, we’re still in serious danger. And my head is all messed up. I’m not even sure who I was six months ago!”

Reid opened his mouth, then shut it. He turned the handle. “Gun on the door, until I return.”

***

Son of a bitch. Reid stood in front of the feminine aisle, baffled. How many freaking tests did a woman need to tell if she was pregnant? He counted ten different tests. Some with a plus or minus sign, some turned pink or blue, some even had the amount of days typed out. He didn’t have time for this. With a sigh, he grabbed the five most expensive boxes and tossed them in the plastic basket. He didn’t try to get Julianna pregnant on purpose. That would be stupid. But what if his subconscious did? He grabbed a box of condoms, angry at himself.

He picked out some donuts and filled two cups of coffee.

The checkout lady rang up his purchase. She raised an eyebrow. “That’s some combination you have going on there, pal.”

Reid tossed her the money and glared at her. The last thing he needed was to be judged by some drugstore cashier. He shoved the box of condoms into his pocket.

Paper sack in one hand, and cardboard drink carrier in the other, he made his way down the street. He kept his eyes peeled to make sure he wasn’t being followed. Could Jewels be pregnant? Part of him wanted her to be, the other part didn’t. He wanted her to be madly in love with him the way she once was, before they created a child—a family. Something neither of them had ever really had. His plan would have worked. Maybe it still could.

“Julianna, it’s Reid.” He called before he sat down the bag to open the door.

“Good, I have to pee.”

He walked inside. “I got chocolate glazed donuts.”

“I can’t eat yet.” She grabbed the sack from him and looked inside. She raised an eyebrow. “Five? How many babies do you think we made?”

Reid shrugged. “Yeah, I didn’t know which one to get so I narrowed it down. There were a lot more than that.”

She disappeared into the tiny bathroom with the sack.

Reid ran his fingers through his hair. He sat down and took a huge bite of donut. “Anything suspicious while I was gone?”

“You were only gone ten minutes, but no,” she called through the door.

Like that mattered. Last time she’d been abducted was in less than three minutes. Anxious for her to come out of the bathroom, he finished his donuts while he paced. “Your coffee’s getting cold.”

“Kind of busy here!”

***

Julianna zipped up her jeans and stared at the plastic fortune tellers lined up along the sink. She’d peed on all five just to be safe. She washed her hands and glanced at the round wall clock. In three minutes her whole world could change once again. Tick Tock. Tick Tock. She was tempted to shoot the darn thing off the wall.

She tapped her foot up and down. She bit down on her thumbnail. Oh God! One was getting a blue line! She looked over at the mess of boxes in the floor. What did a blue line mean? She looked back over and another was turning pink. She took a deep breath and read the instructions over. Thank goodness. The blue line was a minus sign. The pink line was a test line… the pregnancy window was blank which meant not pregnant. Why then did she feel a twinge of disappointment when she scooped the negative tests into the trashcan, like she’d failed something?

She opened the bathroom door. Reid turned to her, a look of mystification covering his face. “All five were negative.” She forced a grin. “We’re good.”

He smiled and hugged her. “That’s a relief. The more I thought about it, a baby would have been a mistake right now.”

She took a drink of her lukewarm coffee. “I guess we dodged that bullet.” She bit down on the donut to keep from crying. What the heck was wrong with her?

Reid kissed her cheek. “Finish breakfast, we need to get that laptop to Weasel.”

“Reid, I’ve been thinking, we need to get that kid out of town for a while. I don’t want his death on my hands. I have enough already.”

He grinned. “And you said you weren’t the motherly type.”

Julianna tossed a pillow at his head.

“Sorry.” He grabbed the soft missile from the floor that had just missed his face. “Okay, I have an idea.”

Chapter 12

“Y
ou’re one awesome dude.” Reid slapped Weasel’s back with approval. Not only did the genius hacker find the connection to Boss, he’d found a secret agent that reported directly to Senator Grant. The agent was hired by the senator to keep tabs on Boss and most likely all of ETE 7. With a phone number, Weasel was able to trace the agent to an address in Washington D.C. If they couldn’t find Boss, maybe they could find agent Fuller.

“Good job, Weasel.” Julianna smiled and lit up the otherwise mundane apartment.

“Thanks guys. You know, I think I may need to get a gun. This hacking you’re having me do seems pretty dangerous.”

Reid looked at Julianna and she nodded.

“Hey, we were thinking, it’d be a great time for you to take your mom on a cruise.” Reid took the tickets out of his pocket that they’d purchased for him. “Think of it as a perk.”

Weasel groaned. “A cruise… with my mom?”

The kid didn’t know how lucky he was. Reid would give anything to take Julianna on a cruise to get away from everything. “It’s for the best. The ship’s so big you won’t even know she’s there.”

Julianna nodded and placed her hand on Weasel’s shoulder. “Just for a couple of weeks.”

Weasel sighed and looked at Reid. “Is this payback? For me begging you not to kill my dad? Are you sending me to my death, too?” He paused and whispered, “You know, he died from a car accident a few weeks later.”

Julianna drew her brows together. She opened her mouth and Reid stood up. “No, I didn’t know. Sorry. Kid, if we were going to kill you, we wouldn’t be sending you off on a vacation. I’d remove my Glock and shoot you in the head. No need to be sneaky.”

Weasel glanced at Julianna with wide eyes.

“Time to go, Jewels. Weasel has a boat to catch.” He hadn’t exactly told her about how he had met Weasel.

Julianna shrugged apologetically. “Have fun.” She followed Reid outside. “You scared him.”

Reid sighed. “That wasn’t my intention. I was just being honest. I guess you want to know what that was all about.”

She eyed Reid as they walked down an alley. “I think I got the jest of it. Weasel’s dad was a hit that you chose not to go through with, but why? And how did you not follow instructions and live to tell about it? Or did you? Car accident?”

Reid kept his eyes peeled for Boss or anyone suspicious. “About three years ago, Boss gave me a name, told me the man was a traitor—” He rubbed his face. “When I got to his office parking garage, I was ready to pull the trigger. Until a kid, came out of no where and called to his dad. He’d seen me pull the gun. The guy and the kid both begged me to let him go. The kid told me he’d do anything if I let his dad live, that he wasn’t a bad man, he’d just made a mistake.

“According to protocol, I should have walked and just taken the guy out when his son wasn’t around, but instead I told the guy that he should leave and never come back. And no I didn’t kill him later. Not saying Boss didn’t find out and have someone else complete the task. But doubtful, since I didn’t get reprimanded. Anyway, Weasel owed me, I collected.”

Julianna kept walking without saying anything.

Reid paused. “Do you think I was wrong to let him go?”

She stared straight ahead.

“Or you think I was wrong to collect my favor from his son?”

She wasn’t anyone to judge. “I don’t know what is right or wrong anymore.”

He stopped walking. “Julianna, I never signed up to take a boy’s dad away, no matter what the guy may have done. And we needed Weasel to survive otherwise he would have never seen me again.”

That was the problem with killing… one never knew just how much they were really taking away from the world. Most times she forced herself not to think about the bigger picture. She turned to him. “How do you know that your other marks didn’t have a child, a wife? Someone that mourned their death?”

“I don’t. And neither do you. We did as we were told, for the greater good.”

He was right. How many times had they been told the greater good was all that mattered? She frowned and started walking again. He followed her. They got to the end of the street and turned the corner.

Julianna paused. “I don’t want to do this anymore. When I believed what I was doing was saving lives, it made it okay. Justifiable. That belief is crumbling, Reid.”

He took her hand. “I know, Jewels, I know.”

***

Reid peered through the rain-streaked glass of the hotel window. Ever since they’d gotten to Washington D.C. Jewels reverted into assassin mode. The change in her almost scared him. Maybe it was her way of coping. “If Agent Fuller is still in
Washington D.C. we’ll make him tell us where Boss is.”

Julianna pulled her hair into a tight bun. “We are the best. Isn’t that what Boss always told us?”

He watched her slip into the provocative red dress. The fabric clung to her thighs and around her toned butt. Her favorite color complimented her well. They’d made a stop on the way to the hotel for the outfit. Julianna would get Fuller’s attention all right and Reid didn’t like it one bit. “I don’t really see the need for you to seduce the man.”

She applied red to her lips. “Because seducing is what I do or at least did. We go in there guns blazing, we’ll scare him off. We can’t kill him. We need him to talk.”

“Okay, but if he so much as lays a finger on you, I’m shooting him.”

Julianna grinned and kissed his cheek. “It’s kind of nice having a partner. Someone that has your back. I could get used to that.” In general, being an assassin was a job they’d done solo.

“I’m happy to hear you say that, because from now on, Jewels, I’ll always have your back.”

She pressed her lips together and put her soft hand on his cheek, then turned to walk to the door. He shoved his gun into the waistband of his jeans and followed her. Fuller wouldn’t know what hit him. Then again, none of their targets ever did.

***

The exterior of the one-story brick building was aged. Trimmed boxwood shrubs flanked the entry. Reid held the wide door open for Julianna.  She walked up to the secretary who was wearing a conservative blouse. The woman had a nose as sharp as a hawk and the look on her face was no nonsense. Maybe Reid would’ve been better for the job after all.

The secretary narrowed her eyes at Julianna. “Can I help you?”

Julianna pretended not to be intimidated by the woman. “I’m here to see Mr. Fuller.”

She flipped through an appointment book on her glass desk. “Did you have an appointment?”

“No, but Mr. Fuller is going to want to see me.” Julianna leaned in and whispered, “You wouldn’t want to disappoint your boss.”

The woman wasn’t buying what Julianna was trying to sell. “I’m sorry Mr. Fuller is booked. You’ll have to call and make an appointment.”

She stood firm. She’d been through a lot worse than this uptight secretary. “Tell Mr. Fuller I have very important information about Senator Grant.”

“Senator Grant?” The woman pressed her lips together and darted her eyes toward the office door. She picked up the phone. “Sir, there is a rather persistent woman here to see you without an appointment. She says she has information about a senator.” She nodded and hung up the phone. “He’ll see you.”

“Thank you.” Julianna went over to the black door and knocked. She took a deep breath. It had been a while. Reid had made her soft.

“It’s open,” he called through the door.

She turned the black handle and walked inside. A man in his fifties sat behind a glass desk. A little on the plump side and not very attractive. He had dirty blond hair parted to the left and a thick moustache. This would be a piece of cake.

“You have information do you?” He motioned for her to sit down in the black leather chair in front of the desk.

She sat down and crossed her legs, giving him a show as she did. “I do.”

He kept his eyes on her legs. “Well, let’s hear it. I have an appointment in thirty minutes.”