Suspicious Activities (12 page)

“Backup,” she heard the man say.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she said.

The black van hit its brakes a few yards in front of her at the same time the back and passenger doors flung open.

Two men jumped out, guns raised.

Nikki nearly cried.

Chapter Seventeen

Oliver Quinn and Mark Tranton aimed their guns at the two men behind her with equal looks of anger and promise.

“If you so much as move, we’ll shoot!” Mark yelled. His voice was a boom that echoed through the world around them. The men behind her silenced.

Nikki stared, surprise quieting her, too.

The driver’s-side door opened and Jonathan Carmichael jumped out, gun also in hand. He didn’t raise it, though. Instead he moved quickly to where Nikki was rooted to the spot.

“Nik,” he said, voice filled with concern. “You’re okay now.” He put his hands on her shoulders and lowered his eyes to meet her stare. “Nikki?”

“How are you here?” was all she could say.

“It wasn’t easy,” he said. “But I’ll explain later. Right now let’s get you away from them.” He threw a look of pure hatred at her attackers.

That shook her completely out of her surprised haze.

“Jackson,” she hurried. “He’s been shot. He needs help.” She pointed over their shoulders.

“We had Calvin on speakerphone when we pulled up,” he said. “He said he was sending the closest cruiser and EMT our way.”

Nikki gave a small nod; relief started to seep in. Despite the hard veneer she always tried to keep in front of everyone, her eyes began to water. She sniffed and watched as Jonathan’s expression softened.

“He’s hidden,” she said, clearing her throat.

“You two go,” Mark said. “We can watch them.”

Jonathan looked over her shoulder. He seemed to be okay with the odds. He let go of her shoulders.

“Take me to him,” Jonathan said.

Nikki’s cheeks heated slightly.

“It’ll be faster if you carry me,” she said, knowing that if they wanted to get to Jackson in a timely manner, then her leading the way on her own two feet would seriously hamper the speedy rescue attempt. Jonathan didn’t question the out-of-character request. He scooped her up easily enough. She pointed to the construction site and they were off.

“You were right about Jackson,” Nikki said after they made it onto the lot and into the concrete-and-steel jungle. “I wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for him.”

“I’m sure he’s okay,” Jonathan assured her, no doubt picking up on the waver in her admission. Seeing her bodyguards arrive in the nick of time had made her more emotional than she cared to admit. Finally, Jackson and she had some good luck.

She just hoped it would continue.

Sirens sounded in the distance as they made it to Charles’s body. Like Nikki before, Jonathan didn’t stop. He moved through the beams holding his boss and one of his closest friends without comment.

“Up here on the left,” Nikki said as they got close to their hiding place. “At the end—Jackson!”

The bodyguard walked around the corner so quickly that Jonathan tensed, ready to fight. Jackson, too, had his fighting stance ready, both hands fisted.

“Whoa there,” Jonathan said. He tilted Nikki down so she could stand. Jackson looked between them but didn’t smile.

“What are you doing walking around?” Nikki chided. Jackson openly looked her up and down.

“I heard you screaming,” he said, seemingly satisfied she wasn’t further hurt. It was such a simple, honest answer that Nikki smiled.

“Andrew did send more help,” she admitted. “But luckily we had our own show up. Everything’s okay now.”

“Talk to me again when Andrew Miller is behind bars and I’ll feel better,” Jackson said.

Jonathan nodded to that. “Amen.”

* * *

B
Y
THE
TIME
Jonathan and Nikki got Jackson to the road, it was filling up with people. It looked and sounded odd compared to the wasteland they’d been trapped in for what felt like hours and hours. Bright Eyes and the short man were being stuffed into two separate cop cars, freeing up Oliver and Mark to run over as soon as they saw them.

“So this is the new guy, huh?” Oliver asked, grinning at Jackson. “I don’t think you’re supposed to break them in so hard, Nik.”

Mark laughed, continuing the tired humor.

“Hey, you shouldn’t complain,” Mark said to Oliver. “Now you aren’t the only Orion who’s been shot on the job.”

Oliver made a face of pure delight. He’d used the “you don’t know what it’s like” card on the guys many a time in the past few years. Now someone
would
know what it was like.

“You’ve been shot?” Jackson asked, unable to hide his curiosity. Oliver lifted his shirt in answer. An angry scar on his stomach. Jackson snorted.

“So this
is
a normal day on the job,” he said.

The Orion agents laughed. Nikki smiled, happy to see the unity between them and Jackson, despite the situation. She wondered how she would break it to them that Jackson might just be more than a bodyguard to her. Then she wondered again what that
more
was and if it had staying power past the crazy week they’d found themselves in.

“There’s a body in there,” Jonathan said when the attempt to lighten the mood subsided. He looked back at the construction site. “I need to go get Calvin and show him. He’ll want to see it.”

Mark patted Nikki’s shoulder and changed places with Jonathan beneath Jackson’s right arm. He didn’t need the support, she guessed, he was still standing on his own two feet, but she’d bet it felt better just in case.

“Two,” Jackson corrected, but their attention collectively cut away to the ambulance turning onto the road. Oliver waved his arms and pointed to Jackson. Between the two of them, his injuries were worse than Nikki’s. While she felt bad and would also seek medical attention, she wanted to focus on Jackson first. The driver went past the wreckage and the other vehicle with the two men in the other vehicle, killed by a madman, without slowing. He pulled up until the back of the ambulance was a few feet from them. A female EMT with dark hair and a kind smile jumped out and opened the back doors.

“Oliver and I will follow you to the hospital,” Mark said. He moved with Jackson to the back of the vehicle, Nikki close behind. All of them already knowing she fully intended to ride in the back with Jackson. If the guys had known she had been drugged they would have more than insisted she get the same attention but she knew Jackson needed it more. Mark helped get him into the vehicle while Oliver ran back to the van. The EMT was quick and polite as she started to set Jackson up on the stretcher.

“Be careful,” Nikki said to Mark as he helped her up into the back, too.

He winked.

“That’s what you pay me for, boss.”

“Okay, time to go,” the EMT said after Mark cleared the doors. She shut them tight and soon they were speeding off, sirens blaring.

Nikki sat on the opposite side of the woman as she bustled around, doing what she could. Jackson explained what he was feeling and answered questions with surprising strength. Maybe he had needed to rest a little to get some of his strength back. Even as the woman started to examine and prod at the wound near his shoulder, he answered clearly and confidently. The pressure made him wince, sure, but he kept on talking without complaint. Without thinking, Nikki reached out and took his hand in hers. He gave her a reassuring squeeze but didn’t look at her.

The pressure of his skin against hers again somehow made everything feel okay. Jackson was going to be all right. Andrew was going to be caught. The world was going to go back to normal.

Nikki looked down at the hand in hers.

I don’t want
everything
to go back to normal
, she thought. It was a truth that surprised her again. Here she’d been worried that her career-focused life had cost her a romantic one. When actually it had, in fact, thrown her right into the path of Jackson. If he did feel the same, what would happen next?

Images of the intimate moments they’d shared in the last two days blotted her vision. Would they have more when this was all said and done? She couldn’t deny she wouldn’t mind it.

Nikki replayed seeing him round the corner, bloody and beaten but still smiling when he saw her. Was that happiness she’d seen created by a series of intense moments? When the danger died down, would his feelings, too? She would have spent the rest of the ride deep in this particular pool of thought had something Jackson said earlier not caught in her head.

“You said there were two bodies,” Nikki said, cutting Jackson off from his conversation with the EMT. He turned to her and nodded.

“Michael shot Charles when I was talking to him and then Michael and I shot each other.” He gave a little laugh at the last part, like it had been no big deal to be shot. She wondered, fleetingly, if he was doing it for her benefit.

“But—” The ambulance’s sirens cut off. Still, Nikki finished her thought. “There was only one body.”

“What?” Jackson’s eyes widened.

Nikki turned her attention to the EMT. She’d stopped what she was doing and cut her eyes toward the doors. Nikki followed her gaze, her mind moving slowly. Her hindsight kicked in, as always, too late. The ambulance driver hadn’t gotten out to help when they loaded Jackson inside.

“Oh, no,” she breathed as the ambulance slowed. Her stomach dropped. They finally came to a stop.

Was their luck really
that
bad?

* * *

N
IKKI
’
S
HAND
SLIPPED
out of his just as the EMT opened the double doors. Jackson swore loudly, frustration exploding.

Instead of seeing the hospital, Jackson was looking at the Orion office across the street. And instead of seeing waiting hospital staff, or even Oliver and Mark, Jackson was staring at the man he’d thought he’d killed.

“Next time check for a pulse,” Michael said. He had a bandage held to his side. It didn’t keep him from standing tall. “Not that there will be a next time.”

Jackson started to get up—he needed to do
something
—when the EMT stepped back into view. She held up a gun at Nikki, who sucked in a breath. He stilled.

“If you try anything, Heather here will shoot her but not kill her. Then she’ll shoot her again and again because she knows the best spots to hit without killing her,” Michael pointed out. “Got it?”

Jackson felt his nostrils flare. He gave a small nod. They were at a serious disadvantage in the back of the ambulance. If Michael wanted to kill him, he could do it with ease. The man must have picked up on his thoughts. He turned his attention to Nikki.

“And you,” he started. “If you don’t come with me
right now
I will get Heather to riddle your boyfriend here with that entire clip and then just take you inside anyway. Capiche?”

“Nikki, no,” Jackson said as the woman instantly got up. She turned back with a pained expression.

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Michael said, reaching out and grabbing her wrist. Jackson jumped when the man yanked her out of the ambulance. She yelped but didn’t resist. Heather shook her gun at Jackson, once again making him freeze.

Michael fixed Jackson with an even stare, but when he spoke, it was to the woman at his side.

“Don’t shoot him unless he tries to bolt or fight,” he said. “We’re trying to keep the noise down, but after I finish my end of the contract, I fully intend to do that myself.”

Heather nodded as Michael turned and began his walk across the street. He pulled Nikki along with him, not slowing at her limp. Nikki managed to turn and give Jackson one last look.

She was terrified.

“How much is Andrew paying you people?” Jackson asked once Nikki and Michael had gone inside. He was furious. At every turn there seemed to be more and more people under Andrew’s employ. Even when they thought they had won a round, or at least made it to the next one, Andrew had shown them that he could still get to Nikki. That he was still in the game and, seemingly, winning.

And this time? This time he’d had Nikki delivered.

Heather snorted.

“Andrew isn’t paying me,” she said. “I don’t even know who that is. I owe Michael.” She shrugged and motioned with her free hand to the ambulance. The gun in her other hand didn’t waver. “After this we’re even.”

“You’re going to regret that when my friends get here,” Jackson ground out. He looked over her shoulder, hoping his words alone would summon the Orion agents.

They didn’t.

“Oh, hon, I’m pretty positive Michael made sure to lose them before he stopped,” Heather said, her Texas twang shining through. She smiled sweetly at him. “Right now there’s only me and you. Then, when Michael gets back, there will only be me and him.”

“Andrew will kill her,” Jackson said, ignoring the not-so-veiled promise of his impending demise. “He’ll kill an innocent woman if you don’t let me go. Don’t you care about that?”

“That’s not my problem,” Heather replied, still just as sweetly. “And, once again, it won’t be yours for much longer, either. So, if I were you, I would take the next few minutes to say your last prayers. Because, hon, you’re going to need them.”

Chapter Eighteen

Christmas.

That was what it felt like for Andrew when he saw Nikki walk through Orion toward him. A present he so sorely deserved. One he had worked tirelessly for. One that, after all this time, was only his.

Such a strong feeling of glee swept over him.

Finally, he could see his endgame.

“Nikki, how nice of you to join us,” Andrew greeted. Over Michael’s shoulder, the redhead gave him a look he’d bet could chill most men’s bones. Good thing he wasn’t most men.

“Here she is,” Michael said, all business. “Now give me the rest of my payment.”

Andrew readjusted his focus on the brute in front of him. He’d been shot and, seemingly, beaten. Way worse for wear than Andrew might have imagined a trained man like Michael to be. Especially going up against Nikki and her brand-new bodyguard.

Andrew tilted his head to the side, nearly questioning the validity of the mercenary’s résumé out loud. But what was the point? Nikki was now within his physical grasp. He didn’t need the man anymore. Andrew turned to Cam, his last line of defense, a man who had been with him since he’d started this plan, who was standing within the doorway between the lobby and hallway. Cam left his post and came to stop at Michael and Andrew’s side. Michael eyed him with obvious wariness.

“Restrain Miss Waters, Cam,” Andrew ordered, pointing to an office chair positioned in the middle of the lounge. Cam nodded and pushed Nikki toward it. With another thrill of happiness, Andrew noted her limp. Turning to Michael, Andrew said, “Follow me and we’ll get everything squared away.”

Michael did as he was told, but not without a grunt of displeasure. He didn’t like Andrew and Andrew couldn’t say that he liked the killer, either. He’d be happy when they parted ways for good.

“I can’t help noticing that Charles isn’t with you,” Andrew noted when they were inside Nikki’s office. “Should I be expecting him, or...”

“You can forward me what you owed him,” Michael answered.

That was an interesting response.

“And why would I pay you another man’s wage?” Andrew asked. “Even if he’s no longer with us, you and I already agreed on a price. One you assured me would get you to do your job and do it without any mess.” Andrew motioned to the glass through which he could see Nikki being tied to the chair in the other room. “If everything that’s happened is your idea of mess-free, then I doubly assure you that I won’t be paying you a cent over what we originally agreed upon.”

Michael’s jaw muscle visibly tensed. His fist balled.

“For a man who had to pay nearly ten men to kill one woman, you sure have a lot of guts to talk to me like that,” he said, voice vibrating low like a rattlesnake shaking its rattler. If Andrew didn’t defuse the situation soon, Michael would strike. And considering he’d had to call in a dirty EMT contact to get Nikki there, Andrew doubted time was on their side. Soon her Orion grunts and the cops would come for them. With Charles out of the picture, Michael wanting to leave, Dabney dead and the two thugs now in police custody, that left only one man, Cam, to keep those who came at bay if he ran out of time.

Andrew didn’t like those odds.

“Fine,” he said, moving around the desk and sitting in the chair. “I’ll transfer the money right now.” He powered on Nikki’s computer for show. Michael unwound enough to let his gaze go out of the office’s window to the Orion boss.

“She must have really messed you up to go through all this trouble,” Michael observed. “I hope it’s all worth it.”

Andrew opened the top desk drawer and pulled out his gun. He shot the man in the head, the silencer registering a
pop
right before the life went right out of the mercenary. His body crumpled to the floor, blood spraying the wall behind him. Andrew rolled his eyes and stood, holding the gun down at his side.

“I promise,” he said with a smile. “It will be.”

* * *

N
IKKI
’
S
MOUTH
FELL
OPEN
.

The man restraining her feet didn’t even blink.

“He just killed him,” she said, more to herself than the man in front of her.

“Not my problem,” he said. He pulled the ropes tight, finishing off the knot.

“Not your problem?” she asked, bewildered. “He just killed a man who was working for him. What should keep him from doing the same to you?”

“To be fair, I was ready to pay Michael and let him be.”

Nikki whipped her head to the side and watched as Andrew walked over to them with a shrug. “But then he wanted more than we’d originally agreed on. Seeing as I wouldn’t give on that and knowing he wouldn’t have, either, I decided to terminate our agreement. Seems fair to me. What do you think?” He aimed the question at his other hired helper, who stood and nodded.

“I don’t see anything wrong with that.”

Andrew clapped.

“And that is why I keep
you
close and not those outside hires,” Andrew said, letting out an exhale. “You
get
me.”

Nikki looked between the two men and wondered what hell she’d managed to find herself in. Two clearly demented men were talking about killing a man like they were objective observers and didn’t currently have a woman tied up, ready to be killed herself.

Andrew turned to the man and dropped all pretenses of humor. The quick switch only put Nikki’s nerves further on edge.

“Michael came with a woman, a paramedic,” he said. “If she’s still outside I’d like you to take care of her. She won’t be happy I’ve killed him.” The man nodded, more than happy, Nikki guessed, to ask “how high” when Andrew asked him to jump. “And let me know at the first sign of the cops or her merry band of agents.”

The man nodded again and was gone.

“Finally, it’s just the two of us,” Andrew said with the cheer of an old friend reconnecting. He grabbed an office chair from the nearest analyst’s desk and pulled it up to face her. While he moved, Nikki tested the strength of the rope. Her ankles were tied to the stationary wooden chair legs while her wrists were connected to the arms. She couldn’t move either, not even a wiggle. If there was a way to escape, she wasn’t seeing it. Pain shot up through her left side as she made one last attempt to find a way out of her restraints.

“The injection he tried to give me,” Nikki said, nodding toward her office. “What was it?”

Andrew smiled, like he was genuinely happy she’d asked.

“A paralytic cocktail of fun.” He raised his eyebrow. “One that
should
have kept you from being any trouble at all.”

“He didn’t get to inject all of it,” she said, answering his unasked question. Not that she needed to. Andrew Miller didn’t deserve anything from her.

“Ah, that would explain things.” He waved at her dismissively. “But still, now I have you here and it’s all all right.”

Nikki shook her head, frustration breaking through the wall of nerves that had gone up as soon as she saw they were at Orion.

“I still can’t believe you went through all this—all this trouble—to get me here,” she admitted, voice rising to match her mounting anger. “You’re basically giving up your life—your future—to what? Kill me? What you’ve done this week can never be taken back, you have to realize that.”

Andrew laughed, a terse sound.

“I can’t give up a life I’ve already lost, Nikki,” he said. His humor had gone again. Standing before her now was a man who had been wanting to tell her exactly what was on his mind for a long time. “A life that
you
took from me.”

“You lost your job,” she bit back. “Whatever happened after that was all on you and your twisted ideals of revenge.”

“Whatever happened?”
he yelled, his collected composure cracking. The movement was so violent that some of his hair knocked loose from its gelled hold. “After you created your monster story about me, I lost
everything
.”

“I didn’t create anything,” Nikki interjected. “I told the truth!”

“
Your
truth,” he said, thrusting his finger into her chest so hard that the chair tipped back a fraction. She was barely able to keep from yelling out in surprise. “You told them a Nikki Waters—the woman who can do no wrong—truth. You painted me as some kind of soulless man for
doing my job
. You misplaced your guilt on me. It wasn’t my fault you felt responsible.”

“We
were
responsible!” Nikki felt her face heat, anger pulsing through every fiber of her being. “You told us to turn her away and we did without question, and then, then you admitted you wouldn’t have helped even if you could have. That unless she had money, she was worthless.
Your
words, not
mine
. You had already painted a picture of the monster that you are. I just showed it to the public.”

Andrew slapped her so hard across the face that her head flung to the side. The sound echoed through the lounge as the pain that was partnered with it burst across her cheek.

“Years of dedication to that job ruined by a mouthy secretary,” he continued, voice still carrying through the open room. “After that my name, my good name, was tarnished. No one wanted me. No one would take me. I couldn’t even get an interview anywhere. One moment I was dining with some of the biggest stars and the most beautiful women, and the next everyone was too embarrassed to be seen with me!”

Nikki turned her head back slowly, bracing for another hit. She’d never really seen the man in front of her before. He looked like a rabid animal. Eyes slit, teeth barred, spit flying when he spoke each word. True anger. Nikki once again thought about Jackson in the ambulance. She hoped he’d be able to escape.

Because right now she realized she had resigned herself to the likelihood that maybe she wouldn’t.

“When I heard about your new agency, your new success, I knew I had to teach you a lesson,” he continued. The color in his face was starting to fade. He rolled his shoulders back and straightened his slacks at the knees.

Nikki was almost afraid to ask but knew she couldn’t help it. “And what lesson is that?”

“That you can’t take what isn’t yours without consequences,” he answered.

“What isn’t mine?” she asked. Yet again unable to keep from encouraging him by asking another question.

He waved to the room around him. “You ended my career, tarnished my name, and ruined any chance I had to get everything I’d ever wanted in life,” he said. “Then you used my downfall to jump-start
your
career, get good press for
your
name, and created a future of possibility for
yourself
.”

He stood so suddenly that Nikki flinched away, afraid he was going to slap her again. “This,” he said, moving back and waving his arms around. “All of this should be
mine
.” A brilliant smile lit his face as he looked around the office, as if he was seeing his life in place of hers. For one startling moment, he seemed normal. A man who was happy. A man who had found peace. A man Nikki wished she’d known.

Whatever he was envisioning didn’t last long. Andrew faced her, still standing. His happiness, no matter how disillusioned it had been, was gone. He smoothed down his hair with his hand and cleared his throat.

“But, as you’ve pointed out, everything I’ve done has ensured that I can’t have what is yours.” He held up his index finger to stop her response, though she had none to give. He’d hired men to kill her and they had, in turn, killed others while he’d also murdered a man no sooner than five minutes beforehand. He’d have to live in hiding the rest of his life unless he wanted to pay for his deeds. And something told Nikki that he didn’t want to do that.

“The next best thing is to make sure you can’t have that, either.”

Nikki inadvertently cringed while a shiver ran up the length of her spine. Andrew Miller was a confident man and he sure seemed confident about that.

“So, what? You’re going to kill me now?” she asked when he’d seemed to exhaust his urge for long speeches. Her gaze went to the gun in his hand. He didn’t miss the shift in her focus.

“You mean, am I going to shoot you?” He shook his head. “No. Not when I have one more point to make.” When he seemed to realize she had no idea what he was talking about, Andrew sighed. “Don’t tell me you’ve missed my nods to your golden boys’ most well-known jobs. I admit I didn’t go in chronological order, but still I hoped you’d pick up on the similarities.”

“I’d hoped no sane person would go that extra mile,” she admitted, anger growing again. It wasn’t enough that he was going to kill her. No, he had to rub Oliver’s, Mark’s and Jonathan’s noses in it, too. Using horrors that had somehow played a part in each of their most dangerous contracts. The question now, though, was which past case held her fate?

“The bathtub was for Oliver’s contract in Maine?” she asked, already knowing she was right. Andrew nodded as another piece connected. “And the injection was for Jonathan’s case in New York.” Andrew nodded again, explaining the chronological comment, since Jonathan’s contract hadn’t happened until after Mark’s biggest case.

Which brought her to the question of what part of that particular case would be used to kill her.

“Oh, my God,” Nikki breathed. She didn’t need to think about that too long. There was one terrifying detail about the case that had brought Mark and Kelli together.

Andrew smiled wide.

“I take it you’ve guessed correctly,” he said. Instead of asking for her conclusion, he held up his finger again and then went back to her office.

As soon as his back was turned, Nikki tried to break free. She threw herself around almost as violently as Andrew’s earlier outburst, but the ropes still didn’t give.

Nikki thrashed around, miles past panicked.

Andrew returned in the middle of her trying to tip her chair over. Anything that could possibly get her free.

“Calm down, Nikki,” he chided playfully. She zeroed in on what he had in his hand. How she wished it was the gun.

“I’m assuming you know what not-so-subtle reference I’m making with this?”