Surrender in Silk (6 page)

“This isn’t about me, Sanders,” he said. “It’s about you. You’re going to have to be faster, stronger and better. After a while, there isn’t anything left. I’m talking about an empty life. No family, no home—nothing normal.”

His words washed over her. She ignored them, ignored everything but the pain. She jerked free.

“You’re saying this because I’m a woman, right?” She shook her head. “You’re a hypocrite, Zach. I don’t see you having this conversation with Rick or anyone else.”

“Maybe they don’t have as much to lose.”

“Forget it. You’re asking me to give up everything I’ve ever worked for. Leave me alone,” she said. “I’m out of here.” She went into the bedroom and slammed the door. Ten minutes later, she was packed and heading out the door.

There was only one Jeep, but she didn’t care. She would leave it in town and pay someone to drive it back to him.

He made no move to stop her. She spared him one last glance as she started the engine. He stood in the doorway, wearing nothing but jeans. He was the most beautiful man she’d ever seen, and the most dangerous. As usual, she didn’t know what he was thinking and she told herself she didn’t care.

She put the Jeep into gear and started down the mountain. The beauty that had enticed her the first few days no longer impressed her. She wouldn’t be able to look at a mountain without thinking about Zach.

As the sun crept over the eastern horizon, she told herself at least she hadn’t cried. She would put this incident behind her and pretend it never happened. Then the lie got caught in her throat, and she had to fight back a sob. Who was she trying to kid? Zach had been right—she took things too personally. She wanted to tell herself that in a few days she wouldn’t even remember him, but she had a bad feeling she was never going to forget.

J
amie raised the binoculars to her eyes and stared at the compound. The spring desert sun beat down on her. She’d never seen Zach Jones again. She’d heard about him, had even followed his career, without letting anyone know her interest.

Despite her accusations, she’d found out that he didn’t take women to his cabin. In fact, no one else knew the small wooden house even existed. Except maybe Winston Danville. Their boss knew everything.

“I owe you this for making me the best, Zach,” she said. “Then we’re even and I’m out of this business.”

She checked her watch. Three minutes.

In three minutes they would find out if their plan was going to work. She pushed away the tiniest flicker of fear. She’d always figured she was going to die on a mission. Why not this one?

“Party time,” she said.

She pressed her head into the crook of her arm and began to count. When she reached a hundred and eighty seconds, the ground started to shake.

The explosion was deafening. Even though Jamie was over a hundred yards from the compound and the ammunition depot was on the far side of that, she experienced a few seconds of not being able to hear anything. Dust and bits of debris pelted her like hail. The air was smoky, the smell acrid. Even as her mind registered all these impressions, her thoughts were overwhelmed by one piece of good news. At least there hadn’t been any surprises. Just a good, old-fashioned explosion.

She reached for her binoculars and quickly scanned the area. Dozens of men ran toward the inferno. No one headed her way. She shrugged into her backpack, then rose to a crouch and moved toward the compound.

The clock in her head told her about five seconds had passed since the ground had started shaking. Time was not her friend. In less than ten or fifteen minutes, the terrorists would stop chasing each other around and organize. Her window to find Zach and get out was seven minutes, tops. She would waste two of those just getting to the building where he was being held. She shook her head to clear any last cobwebs from the explosion. Her ears stopped ringing, and she could hear the sound of her own breathing.

Then her mind kicked into high gear. She needed all her mental energy to stay alert. Bits of metal and wood continued to fall from the sky. In the distance, a cloud of black smoke reached toward the heavens. Burning fuel. She inhaled, then coughed. The chemical smell grew as she got closer to the main compound.

The south and a bit of the east wall had been destroyed three weeks ago when Zach had been captured. The depot explosion had taken out most of the west wall. A large fire truck rolled out of a garage and headed toward the smoking
fire. Jamie paused at the last shallow indentation before the compound itself and looked around.

Only a handful of men remained. Their uniforms weren’t much different from her own. In the confusion, she might just pass for another soldier. She tucked her long braid down the back of her shirt and pulled her cap low. After scanning the area one more time, she pulled out her nine-millimeter Smith & Wesson automatic and ran.

When she reached what was left of the east wall, she flattened against it. A minute forty-five seconds had elapsed. Her eyes burned from the drifting smoke. Sharp bits of wood dug into her back. She ignored it all and pictured the compound diagram. Prisoners were kept in the third building over. If it was still standing. If he was still there.

Adrenaline coursed through her, and her heart pounded, but her head was clear. Zach had made her the best. This situation wasn’t unfamiliar. She’d performed this particular exercise many times before. The only difference was, now it was personal. Pray that one change in circumstance didn’t get them both killed.

She pushed off the fence and ran into the compound. A few soldiers milled around. One she passed looked dazed. When he glanced up, his eyes widened. The edge of her left hand connected with the back of his neck, and he went down.

A jeep raced past her. The officer in the front passenger seat screamed orders. She ignored him and jogged toward the only low, one-story building. The structure next to it had collapsed in on itself, but this one was fine. She pulled open the wooden doors.

Empty interrogation rooms lined both walls. Beyond them were small offices, also empty. The floor was concrete, stained with blood and cracked. The air smelled of fear and suffering, and of the dead. Jamie held her pistol ready and jogged toward the back, where the prisoners would be kept.

The compound was an outpost, its purpose to guard the
depot and distribute munitions. There should only be a half-dozen prisoners. The first two cells were empty. The barred opening in the third door showed three starved men huddled together in the far corner. She ignored them and kept moving.

Three minutes twenty-five seconds.

The last door on the right was the one. She felt it in her gut as she approached. She glanced through the barred opening. One man lay on the dirty straw. He was turned away from her, but she would have known him anywhere.

“Zach,” she said softly. He didn’t stir.

She glanced at the thick, ancient lock, then the sturdy wooden door. Despite how easy they made it look in the movies, in real life it was time consuming to shoot open a door. But she didn’t have a key and there wasn’t time to find one. She kicked the door once in frustration, then prepared to fire on the lock.

She didn’t have to. As her foot connected with the wood, the door swung open. She immediately crouched down and moved away from the opening, prepared to shoot whoever was hiding inside.

No one appeared. She held her gun in front of her as she entered the cell. When she cleared the door, she jumped back and aimed her gun. But there was no enemy.

Zach stirred slightly. She heard the unmistakable clink of metal on metal. The unlocked door suddenly made sense. They didn’t need to lock him inside. He wasn’t going anywhere; they had him chained.

She was at his side in less than a heartbeat. His clothing hung in tatters, and there were bruises everywhere. She didn’t want to think about that. She had to concentrate on getting him out of there. She touched his shoulder, and he moaned.

“It’s all right,” she murmured. “You’ll be fine.”

She lowered her backpack onto the dirty straw and flipped open the flap. Her supplies were packed in the order she
would need them. Her clippers were on top. As she reached for them, Zach rolled onto his back. Her body stiffened.

She knew about torture. She’d been beaten herself, threatened with death, shot, stabbed. She’d seen prisoners with broken legs and missing limbs. In her head, she’d known what he would look like when she found him. She’d promised herself she would ignore his condition long enough to make their escape. Seeing him now, that emotional distance wasn’t possible. Every fiber of her being rebelled against the truth.

Blood matted his dark hair and stained his face. His mouth was swollen, his lips cracked. He wore a black T-shirt over army-issue trousers. His arms were purple and red with welts and bruises. His skin had been split in dozens of places, and most of those were infected. His trousers were rags. She could see more bruises and open wounds on his legs. Some looked as if they’d been made that morning. He was painfully thin and dehydrated. She touched his forehead. Fever, too.

Next to him was a small bowl of grayish gruel and a cup of water. Neither had been touched.

Four minutes thirty-five seconds.

Time was running out. But instead of moving him, she brushed her fingers against his cheek. “Oh, Zach, I’m so sorry.”

The feelings returned. They sucked her under like a riptide, threatening to drag her out to open sea. She remembered what it had been like to see him that first day of training. Tall, strong and powerful. He’d held the keys to what she most wanted in the world—a job with the agency. How she’d tried so hard to impress him and how discouraged she’d been when he never seemed to notice. She’d fought against her crush and the odds to be a success. In the end, she’d made it because he’d pushed her so hard.

She remembered their week together, the joy she’d found in his arms, then the pain of realizing he didn’t want her. She
remembered how long it had taken to forget him and the endless nights when she wondered if she ever really would.

It had been seven years. Why hadn’t she been able to let him go?

Five minutes.

She shook her head to clear it and ignored the lingering memories. No time for them now. She pulled a penlight out of a slender pocket on her thigh and checked his eyes. His pupils responded to light. Thank God. From another pocket, she removed a syringe filled with morphine.

“This is going to be a long, painful trip,” she said as she gave him the shot. He didn’t stir. Next she used the clippers to cut the chains. She didn’t worry about the collar around his neck. They could get that off on the plane.

She grabbed both of his arms and pulled him into a sitting position. He was limp, which would make it harder. She took a drink from her canteen, then slipped on her backpack.

“Let’s go.” She bent forward and drew him up, tugging until she could settle her shoulder against his midsection.

“Please don’t have any internal injuries,” she murmured, then grunted as she took his weight and started to stand.

She cursed several times as she got her balance. Zach had probably lost thirty pounds, which meant he still outweighed her by twenty. She wrapped her left arm around the back of his thighs, holding him securely. She pulled the nine-millimeter pistol out of her waistband and clutched it in her right hand.

“Show time,” she said, and headed for the door.

They made it to the main entrance before she saw someone. A middle-aged man, probably a captain, stepped into the building. When he saw her with Zach, he shouted something. She kept walking toward him. He reached for the gun at his side. She pulled the trigger of hers first.

He slumped to the concrete floor. Jamie was out of the building before the sound of the shot stopped echoing.

Six minutes thirty seconds.

Zach’s deadweight drained her energy. She dismissed the pain ripping through her shoulder and down her back. Her thighs felt as if they were moving through quicksand. She glanced around the open compound, but no one was there. The captain might have been the only one left behind.

She hurried back the way she’d come, clearing the fence without incident. Then there was nothing between her and the jeep but two miles of desert. Two miles with Zach’s dead weight to drag her down.

“Damn you,” she said, more to distract herself than because he was listening. Between his condition and the painkiller she’d given him, he would probably be out until they landed in the States. “All those times you told me I wouldn’t be enough. All those days you tormented me about my lack of strength. Well, look at me now. I’m strong enough to save your sorry hide.”

Sweat poured down her face, chest and back. Her heart pounded. His arms hung loose, his hands gently bumping against her rear. She settled into a medium-paced walk. Her instinct was to run from the compound, but she couldn’t, not with his extra weight. As it was, she wasn’t sure she was going to make it back to the jeep. Of course, she didn’t have a choice. She would find the strength from somewhere. Once she nearly lost her footing in the loose earth, but she staggered a couple of steps, then kept going.

She used the sun to gauge her position. When she figured she’d gone about a half mile, she pulled out her compass and double-checked her direction. Right on target.

Memories from the past returned. She didn’t bother fighting them. What was the point? She remembered everything about their time together, then she cursed him for what he’d done to her. Harsh laughter cut through the silence of the open desert.

“What did you do to me, Zach? Nothing I didn’t want.
You made me the best. If you hadn’t done such a fine job, I wouldn’t be here rescuing you today.” Her left arm and shoulder were on fire with pain, but she kept walking.

“You told me I would have to work harder and smarter. I did. I beat them at their own game. I’m stronger and better, and you’re not even awake to see it.”

She sucked in a breath. She felt as if she’d come off a ten-mile run. The temperature had been pleasant on the walk to the compound. Now the air was hot. She paused long enough to drink again from her canteen, then started walking again.

“Even the fact that you dumped me made me a better agent,” she said, her breath coming in pants. “After that I decided I would never need anyone’s approval again. Do you know how many times you’ve saved my life? Not just when we were on assignment together. But since then. A dozen, maybe two. I could hear your voice in my head telling me what to do. All that training. And if that didn’t help, I would ask myself, ‘What would Zach do?’ Then I did it. So I guess I’m grateful. But I still hate you.”

There were other emotions, but she refused to deal with them now, just as she refused to think about why, after seven years, she still hadn’t been able to forget.

“Look at me,” she said. “I’m a perfectly trained agent. A killing machine. The dead don’t keep me up anymore. What does that say about me? I want out, Zach. But I don’t know what I’ll do when I leave the agency. Isn’t that funny? I have everything I thought I wanted, and I hate what it’s done to me. But I can’t say you didn’t warn me.”

Her thighs trembled with each step. She had less than a half mile to go, but she was starting to worry that she wasn’t going to make it. Zach was a hundred and fifty-five pounds of deadweight. She stumbled and went down to her knees. Every breath was agony. She waited until the pain in her chest and legs subsided, then forced herself back on her feet and kept walking.

“I don’t know how to be a normal person anymore. I don’t know what it means to be a woman.”

Zach groaned. She wiped the sweat from her eyes and kept going. Ten minutes later, she heard the sound of a boot against gravel. She pulled out her pistol and spun in that direction.

Rick jogged toward her. He was covered with dust and soot, but he was grinning. “You made faster time than I thought,” he said when he was in earshot.