Love & Deception (Agents in Love - Book 1) (38 page)

“What’s her name?” Ted asked as they wheeled
her toward the hospital door.

Her name? He hadn’t thought that far ahead.
He couldn’t give their real names, but also didn’t want to use
their new identities until they were safely out of the country. He
could claim they lost their IDs in the fire, and extra money would
ease away any concerns the hospital staff might have. The only
question was, what name would she answer to? “Stephanie,” he said
after a slight hesitation. “Stephanie Plume.”

Ted looked down at her as they rolled her
inside. “Stephanie, I know you hurt. We’ll get you medicine real
soon.”

Carlie’s shrieks lapsed into small moans and
she twisted against the sheet in obvious discomfort.

Nick hoped they knocked her out before
cleaning the wounds. A shudder raced through his body. Could too
much pain literally kill her?

The men ran for the double doors into the
hospital proper, but the receptionist called out to Nick. “You
can’t go back there. Not yet, sir.”

Hating to separate from her, Nick stopped
obediently. Causing a bigger scene than he already had would get
them noticed. They didn’t need that. He watched them roll Carlie
down the long hallway until the doors closed and blocked his
view.

“I need your help checking your wife in,”
the receptionist said. “First, and most important, they need to
know right now if she has any allergies.”

The breath stole from Nick’s lungs and he
shook his head. “I don’t know. None that she’s mentioned.” Perhaps
he should have been more thorough when Carlie said she wanted them
to get to know each other. What if they gave her a medicine that
she had a bad reaction to? Then he remembered the narcotics. “Wait.
I remember now. She doesn’t know of any.”

The receptionist didn’t successfully cover
her raised eyebrows, though she tried to. “Newlyweds?”

“Very recent,” he agreed. And how long would
they stay ‘married?’ How the hell did Paul know they were leaving
today? Or was it just dumb luck? “She’s going to be okay,
right?”

“The doctor will meet with you later. First,
I need you to fill out this paperwork.” The receptionist stood,
handing him a clipboard over the countertop.

Nick reached to take it, but the woman
snatched it back.

“You’re bleeding.”

He turned his palm upward and shook his
head. With the urgency to take care of Carlie, he forgot about
cutting his hand on the window. It wasn’t horrible, but red leaked
steadily from the wound. Wiping it against his leg, the dried blood
covering his pants suggested he’d done that several times without
thinking about it.

“I was so worried about my wife, I didn’t
really feel this.”

“Let’s get you taken care of. We’ll worry
about paperwork later.”

Nick nodded. The delay would give him time
to gather enough money that no one would worry about their lack of
identifications or insurance cards. If Paul could make things
disappear from police files, certainly Nick could bribe the right
person to delete their medical records.

***

“Stephanie? Stephanie? Can you wake up?”

The insistent voice wouldn’t leave. Carlie
finally didn’t feel as though every nerve in her body was inflamed,
but she didn’t know how long the feeling would last. All she wanted
was sleep.

“Stephanie, wake up. Your husband’s anxious
to talk to you.”

Ryan? What?

“My husband’s dead,” she whispered.

“No. He’s okay. Just a small cut on his hand
and had a second-degree burn. You’re the one lucky to be
alive.”

Sense slowly returned. The fire, the shop,
Nick driving her to the hospital. He must have told them her name
was Stephanie and that he was her husband.

She opened eyelids almost too heavy to lift.
“I feel weird.”

A brunette in blue scrubs nodded. “We had to
sedate you for the bath. That’s going to wear off soon. Can I bring
your husband in so I can speak with you both? You might not
remember this conversation, and I’d like him present.”

“Yes, bring him in.” She was anxious to see
Nick. There were a lot of questions she needed answered, the least
of which was how badly she’d been injured or what that meant. Where
were they? Could the assassins find them?

Was it wise to give them her real name?

Nick walked in and brushed hair away from
his forehead, relief lighting his dark eyes. “I’ve been going out
of my mind.”

She smiled. “I slept the whole time. You
didn’t need to worry.”

The nurse raised her eyebrows and turned to
Nick. “The sedative causes lapses in memory.” She took in a deep
breath and shuddered. “Anyway, everything went as well as can be
expected, and the doctor will be in to talk to you in a few hours.
I need to explain the PCA pump to you so we can manage her
pain.”

“PC...what?” Nick asked.

She waved him over to the bed and pulled an
oblong wand off a machine with a bag of fluid attached beneath it.
The gray stick had a blue button in the center. “Stephanie, this is
hooked into your IV. Whenever you feel pain, push this button and
it will give you morphine to help ease that.”

Nick shook his head. “Isn’t that dangerous,
letting her have medicine whenever? I heard you can stop breathing
or something.”

“We’re monitoring her. If she pushes it
before it’s safe for another dose, it won’t release any medicine,
but that can help us gauge how bad her pain is.”

“I feel great right now.” Even as she said
it, Carlie realized that wasn’t entirely true. Prickling of pain
crawled along her knees and arms. The palms of her hands seemed
most insistent.

The nurse pursed her lips together. “That
won’t last.”

A tendril of fear wound down Carlie’s spine.
The least the woman could do was lie.

“If the pain gets too bad and the morphine
isn’t controlling it, call the nurses’ station right away.” She
headed for the doorway. “I’ll let your husband fill you in on what
happened, Stephanie, while you wait for the doctor.”

As soon as she left, Carlie looked down at
herself. White gauze swathed every inch of her not covered by the
hospital gown. All except for the fingertips of her right hand.

“I look like a mummy.” She smiled, but
looking at Nick’s unhappy face wiped it away.

“What happened in that shop, Carlie?” His
voice was dangerously low and his anger a physical, tangible force.
“How did you get stuck inside?”

“I honestly don’t know. I didn’t even know
anything was wrong until I was getting ready to leave.” She felt
foolish for not knowing sooner. “The smell of smoke had been there
for a while, but I didn’t realize what it was. Once I did, it was
too late. I never heard anything.” She shook her head. “When I’m
alone in the shop and it’s dark, it creeps me out. I always shut
the office door. It must have muffled any noises.”

“It’s not your fault. I should have reminded
you to stay alert, but I thought we would get away without…the
assassins finding out about it.” Nick dropped into the chair next
to her bed and leaned forward. “Speaking of that, I think Stephen
did this.”

“Yeah, me too. The assassins probably hired
him to finish the job he started earlier. Shelves from the kitchen
were wedged into the hallway, keeping my door closed. The phone
line wasn’t working before the power went out, so I think he cut
it.”

“And I had your damn cell.” He ran a hand
over his face, and Carlie saw the bandage on his other hand.

“Are you okay?” Worried about him, she tried
to sit up for a better look. Falling back and biting her lip, she
struggled against letting Nick know she had a problem. It seemed
the nurse was right—the intensity of her pain built with each
passing moment.

Unaware of her trouble, Nick held his hand
up, showing her the bandage. “This is the only thing wrong with me.
I’m fine.”

“That’s good.” The nerve-endings in her
hands zapped in long spasms, and she couldn’t bite back a moan.
“Think you could push that little blue button?”

He hurried to do so, staring at her with
drawn eyebrows. “Damn. I’m so sorry. I should have realized
something like this would happen and left Sayle earlier.”

“You couldn’t know. We thought you were the
one in danger. I never considered that the assassins would attack
me as soon as I was alone.” She shook her head, hoping the floating
feeling returned soon. “Shelley wanted to go to karate class, so
she left early. They must have been watching.”

He reached out as if to touch her, but
pulled back. “I’ve done everything I can to keep us hidden, but we
couldn’t go very far from Sayle.”

“So, we’re not in Canada?”

“No. We’re only about fifteen miles north of
town. Hopefully they’ll think we went further away and won’t
realize you’re hurt.” He sighed. “And even that drive was too long.
I’m sorry you had to suffer more.”

“Please don’t worry. You’re trying to keep
us hidden. You didn’t have a choice.”

“I just hope I’ve done enough. Before they
brought you out of recovery the doctor spoke with me. He said
you’ll need to stay here three weeks, at the least. We have a new
car, I ditched both our old phones back with the Porsche, and I
lied about who we are. It’s the best I could do.”

“Won’t the hospital want insurance cards and
stuff? Even if I had that, I can’t tell them who I am.”

Nick shook his head. “I worked that out with
admitting. Don’t worry. I’m paying cash and they aren't asking
questions or reporting anything. Paul—uh, the FBI guy won’t find
me. We’ll be safe. Our identities are secret.”

She closed her eyes as the morphine kicked
in and relief flooded through her. “I figured out we were someone
else when the nurse called me Stephanie and said my husband wanted
to see me. If I’m Stephanie, who are you?”

“Frank Plume.” He finally smiled for the
first time. “We’re newlyweds.”

Crossing the Canadian border and getting
Carlie safely tucked into his house on the lake was easier than
Nick feared. After a month in the hospital, Carlie’s pain had
receded to the point she didn’t require much medication to stay
functional.

The first thing Nick did was hire a private
doctor and a physical therapist to visit her at the house. Though
most of the burns had only been second degree except for deeper
ones on her knees and left hand, it was all bad. Her recovery had
been extremely painful. Regaining function in the fingers of her
left hand to the point she could cook again was the biggest
priority now.

Nick brooded as he stared out across the
water. Even though he’d thought reaching the lake house would solve
their problems, he felt restless and edgy. He wanted revenge
against Paul and S.A.T.O. for the pain they’d put Carlie through.
Especially since she was innocent.

He wondered if S.A.T.O. searched for them.
It was a constant worry. Each day that passed with no surprise
attacks from other agents calmed his fear marginally. It seemed
they were safe, but Nick knew Paul wouldn’t give up easily. They
had to be vigilant about hiding their former identities.

At the sound of the door creaking, he looked
up at the house. Carlie padded out wrapped in a blanket. Even
though she was upset when they chopped her burnt hair off, he liked
the short, sexy cut.

“Hey, beautiful. How was your nap?”

She sat down next to him on the whicker
couch and pulled her legs across his lap, snuggling into his
shoulder. “Good. Lonely. I thought you were napping, too.”

“I couldn’t sleep.” It would be better to
focus on happy things, rather than tell her his worries. Besides,
how could he explain S.A.T.O.? He had to keep quiet. “The physical
therapist seemed pleased with your progress today.”

“I’m pleased too.” She kissed his cheek.

The soothing sound of water lapping against
the shoreline and holding Carlie in his arms relaxed him, cooling
his anger. A slushy drizzle of rain mixed with snow drifted onto
the rocks below the deck, but they were dry and warm beneath the
awning. As much as he wanted to kill both Paul and Stephen, this
was what was important.

“I love you, Carlie, so very much.”

She laid her hand against his cheek. The
scared and damaged flesh of her palm felt odd against his face, but
gratitude filled him when he thought about how easily she could
have been taken from him.

“I love you, too.” She kissed his lips
softly. “I never imagined I’d get a chance at real happiness.”

“Neither did I.”

She grinned. “I’ve got some great news for
you.”

“Yeah?” He ran his fingers through the spiky
hair at the side of her head. The short style was slowly growing
out, but he wondered if she’d keep it short for him. “What’s
that?”

“The doctor gave me the okay today for...”
Her eyes met his and she bit her lip as red crept up her neck and
cheeks.

Nick jiggled his eyebrows. “Did he?”

“I’ve been thinking, I never gave you a
Christmas present.”

He shrugged. They spent Christmas in an
agonizingly long line at the border, waiting to get into Canada.
The oral medication only marginally controlled Carlie’s pain, so
neither one of them felt like celebrating. “I don’t know what that
has to do with anything, but don’t worry about it.”

Smoothing down his eyebrow with her thumb,
Carlie licked her lips, continuing to stare at him. “I hoped maybe
I could give you a present now.”

“Okay...what is it?”

“It’s really one for both of us.” A
beautiful smile lit her face up. “I’m giving you me. Now. I need
you, Nick.”

***

Carlie lay with Nick in the king-sized bed.
Crisp winter air came through the open window, bringing scents of
the wilderness beyond and sounds of the lake water lapping below
the house. The cold made her delightfully shivery, and it felt good
to snuggle against Nick’s warm chest, him holding her tight.