Take the Key and Lock Her Up (25 page)

The cloth clamped down over her nose and mouth again.

She struggled, but it was no use against his superior strength. Her vision blurred.
She held her breath as long as she could. Her lungs screamed. One breath; she had
to have just one breath. She sucked in a deep gulp of air through the cloth, recoiling
against the thick, sweet mixture.

Everything went black.

E
MILY WENT LIMP
in Devlin’s arms. He threw the cloth off her face and pressed his fingers against
the side of her neck, checking her pulse. Strong. Her breathing was shallow but steady.
He let out a shaky breath and cradled her unconscious body against his chest, stroking
her back through her soft cotton T-shirt. He needed a minute. Hell, he needed a dozen.

The panic and accusation in her eyes had shaken him to the core.

His marks—the people he was assigned to eliminate—were pure evil. They thought nothing
of strapping bombs on innocent children and sending them onto buses full of more innocent
people to blow them into so many pieces their family had nothing left to bury. They
raped, tortured, brutalized others, relishing their pain. Yet, more often than not,
when they were finally standing face-to-face with their executioner, their eyes were
filled with arrogance, scorn, hatred. No remorse. No guilt. And on the rare occasion
when one of them looked at Devlin with fear or panic, it didn’t bother him. At all.
Not once. Until now.

The terror in Emily’s eyes, even though all he’d wanted to do was protect her, had
nearly killed
him
.

Trying to soothe someone, reassure her, was a skill he’d forgotten long ago. Which
probably explained why he’d screwed up so thoroughly. Killing Cougar with the garrote
had made sense at the time. It had freed his hands so he could grab what Emily needed
and get her to safety. It had also freed him to react if Cougar’s handler showed up,
which he had. But when he’d made those decisions, he hadn’t taken into account the
impact they would have on Emily—and he damn well should have.

She wasn’t an evil criminal or a terrorist. She was innocent, good, and deserved better
treatment. Her strength and courage amazed him. Not many people, law enforcement or
not, would have gone into that basement without backup. But Emily had, because she
hadn’t wanted a victim to suffer even another minute waiting for help to arrive. She’d
also stood up to
him
, countless times. And after nearly being killed, she’d had the gumption to order
him to sit on the couch while she took charge of the crime scene. She was a strong
woman, until he broke her.

He fervently hoped he hadn’t broken her permanently, that she’d recover from what
he’d put her through and would be the same sassy, funny, brave woman she’d been before
he’d battered his way into her life a few days ago.

Unfortunately, her ordeal was far from over. Until he could convince her that he meant
her no harm, that he was her best chance at survival and that she needed to work
with
him instead of
against
him, she would have to remain his prisoner. Which meant when she woke up tomorrow
morning from her drug-induced sleep and realized what he’d done and where she was,
her terror was going to start all over again.

He reluctantly carried her back to the suitcase and gently lowered her inside. Where
moments ago he hadn’t thought twice about putting her in a suitcase, now, seeing her
lying there, remembering the fear in her eyes, he was feeling something he hadn’t
felt in a long time.

Shame.

He reminded himself that he had no choice, but he was starting to wonder if he’d handled
this entire situation wrong from the beginning. He stared down at her, thinking about
his options going forward. As much as being in the suitcase had scared her, wouldn’t
being tied up and blindfolded in the back of a van scare her even more? He certainly
couldn’t let her sit in the passenger seat beside him. She was a cop, and after tonight,
she knew without a doubt that they weren’t operating on the same side of the law.

It didn’t matter that EXIT was sanctioned by the government—even though it was a private
company—its existence was a dirty secret not acknowledged in polite circles. When
the official alphabet agencies failed—CIA, FBI, NSA—EXIT cleaned up their messes,
did the lowly jobs they were too good to do. Or too inept to do.

EXIT did an enormous amount of good in the world. But none of that would matter to
someone like Emily, not when the good was achieved by doing some bad, sometimes a
whole lot of bad. Could she ever go back to the life she’d once had? After what had
happened at her house, the odds seemed low. Cougar and Ace wouldn’t have gone after
her if Cyprian had rescinded the EXIT order. But if the order was solely based on
what she’d said in the alley, there was still a chance Cyprian would dig a little
more and decide Emily really wasn’t a threat. Maybe he hadn’t had time to do that
or to call Cougar and Ace off before they’d attacked. Until he knew for sure, one
way or the other, all he could do was keep her safe while he tried to find Kelly.
Maybe after Devlin proved to his boss that he wasn’t the one who’d killed Shannon
and abducted Kelly, Cyprian would be willing to listen to what he had to say about
Emily. And he’d cancel his orders. Maybe.

It was the only way she could ever go back to her former life.

He steeled himself against his sympathy for her. He’d continue with his original plan.
He’d keep her drugged until they reached his destination. After that . . . well, he’d
have to take it one minute, one hour, one day at a time and see what happened.

Chapter Fifteen

N
IGHTMARE
COULDN’T BEGIN
to describe the dream Emily had just had. She groaned and snuggled into her pillow.
She’d have to make Tuck swear never to let her work almost two days straight again
with next to no sleep. Her mind had gone into full-fledged hallucination mode. She’d
imagined being tied up, gagged, shot at—the list went on and on.

Those crazy pictures in her head must have played havoc with her body too. Nausea
coiled in her stomach. The pressure of an oncoming headache told her if she didn’t
take something soon, she’d have a full-blown migraine in a few hours. She rubbed her
temple and something brushed against her nose. She swatted at it, and her fingers
tangled in what felt like a smooth plastic string.

She forced her sleepy eyes open and blinked to focus. Not a string, a cord. She held
it up and followed it to where it disappeared an inch below the collar of her shirt.
It was attached to a plastic circle taped above her heart. An electrode? Was she in
a hospital? No, wait, what was going on? The images, last night, they
had
been a nightmare, hadn’t they?

The ceiling above her shined white in the dim light. But instead of the smooth plaster
in her bedroom, there was a metal grid of acoustic tiles. She bolted upright in the
bed.

“Don’t panic, Emily. You’re safe.”

She whipped her head toward the deep, all-too-familiar voice.
Devlin
. He was sitting about ten feet away on a folding chair, watching her.

Through a floor-to-ceiling wall of bars.

She wasn’t hallucinating. The nightmare was real.

She pressed her hand to her chest, a wave of dizziness surging through her as her
heart sped up, thudding in her ears. What
was
this place? The room behind Devlin was large but windowless, with crude stairs hugging
the far wall, ending at a trapdoor in the ceiling. She drew several shaky breaths,
willing away the dizziness.

Calm down. Use your training. Catalog your surroundings and look for an exit, a way
to escape.

The room—the
cell
—she was in was about ten by ten, furnished with the bed she was sitting on and nothing
else but what appeared to be a heart monitor attached to the wall. Green digital numbers
flashed and zigzag lines darted up and down across the screen. The far wall had an
open door that led into a bathroom—a luxury she was sorely in need of at the moment.

She looked at Devlin again. Her initial panic faded beneath a red-hot rush of anger.
It poured through her like molten lava, burning through her veins, cauterizing her
fear, settling in her gut like a dormant volcano ready to incinerate anything in its
path.

“Where am I?” she demanded.

His expression turned wary at her tone. He stood and pushed his chair out of the way.
“We’re underground, outside of Savannah. In a bunker, more or less.”

“Is this where you bring your prisoners to interrogate them?” she accused, pressing
her hand to her stomach as a wave of nausea churned through her.

“When necessary. Yes.”

His deadpan response to her half-serious accusation left her shaken. The urge to throw
up was becoming more urgent.

“I don’t feel so great. What did you do to me?” She pulled at the plastic circle on
her chest.

“I’d rather you didn’t—”

She tossed the circle and cord to the floor.

“—take that off.” He sighed deeply. “But since you’re conscious and talking, I suppose
I don’t need to monitor your heart rate anymore. You said you don’t feel well. Are
you in pain, nauseated?”

“I imagine I feel the way anyone would who’s been knocked out with chloroform. Yes,
I’m nauseated. Yes, my head is throbbing. And my mouth feels like cotton.”

“It wasn’t chloroform; far too dangerous. People don’t always wake up after a dose
of that. I used a derivative of sevoflurane and—”

“I’m not interested in the list of chemical compounds you used. You shouldn’t have
drugged me in the first place. What did you do, knock me out and . . .” She narrowed
her eyes, curling her fingers against the sheets. “You stuffed me in that suitcase,
didn’t you? Then kept me drugged until you could put me in here. What kind of person
does that?”

He shrugged, seemingly unconcerned with her opinion of him. “I did what I had to do
to keep you safe. You’re alive. That’s what matters.”

“You’re one of those ends-justifies-the-means kind of people.” She shook her head.
“How could I have ever . . .”

“Ever . . . what?” he asked, his voice soft.

“Doesn’t matter.” She shook her head, grimacing when that made her growing headache
throb even worse. She pressed her hand to her temple again.

“You should take something for that or you’ll end up with a migraine,” he said. “One
of the side effects of the drugs, I’m afraid. There’s bottled water and medicine in
the bathroom, along with your clothes and toiletries, so you can shower or soak in
the tub if you prefer.”

Her clothes? She looked down and realized she was still wearing a thin T-shirt and
panties and nothing else. The indignity of her situation had the smoldering anger
inside her flaring again. But her near-to-bursting bladder meant that confronting
him about what he’d done, and finding out what he
planned
to do, would have to wait. She braced her hands on the mattress and swung her legs
over the side.

“Don’t try to stand,” he warned.

“If you expect me to docilely follow your commands, you’re going to be severely disappointed,”
she bit out. She stretched her toes toward the floor.

He swore. Keys jangled. Metal creaked.

Emily slowly slid off the bed. But when her feet touched the floor, her wobbly legs
wouldn’t hold her up. She kept sliding, right into Devlin’s arms.

He scooped her up and cradled her against his chest, his dark brows an angry V. “Are
you always this stubborn?”

“According to every single person who has ever met me, yes.”

He laughed, his irritation gone as quickly as it had appeared. She hated that the
deep sound of that laugh and the beauty of his smile still had the power to send a
warm thrill zinging straight to her belly. She should punch that smile off his face
and make him let her go. But she wasn’t sure she had the strength to stand.

“Bed or bathroom?” he asked.

Unable to look at him as she answered, she said, “Bathroom.”

He took her through the doorway, kicked the toilet lid down, and gently set her on
top of it. His brow furrowed with apparent concern as he squatted down in front of
her.

“Don’t underestimate the effects of the drugs that are still working their way through
your system. You’re going to be weak and wobbly for a few more hours. Take it easy.”

“I can pee by myself. Get out.”

His lips twitched. “Good to know. But I’ll still be a shout away if you need help
with, ah, anything.”

When he closed the door behind him, she slumped weakly against the back of the toilet.
Her bleary eyes settled on the bottle of pain pills on the counter and—thank God—a
giant pink bottle of Pepto-Bismol. Next to that was a neatly folded stack of clothes
he’d obviously grabbed from her house. Probably when he’d grabbed that horrible suitcase.
She shuddered and downed the pills, using the Pepto as a chaser, before following
that with a deep drink of water.

Twenty minutes later, after a hot shower and brushing her teeth, she felt almost human
again. A warm bath had sounded ridiculously appealing, but she’d worried that she
wouldn’t have the strength to get out of the tub on her own. At one time, having Devlin
help her and see her naked would have been a fantasy come true. But now that he was
her enemy, it would be beyond humiliating.

Without a blow-dryer in sight, she blotted her hair on a towel and left it hanging
free to her shoulders to dry on its own. Her tennis shoes squeaked against the wooden
floor as she stepped into the cell. Devlin was sitting in the folding chair again,
reading something on his phone. But this time the cell door was standing wide open.
She stood beside the bed, debating whether to try to run past him. When he stepped
to the open door and braced his hands on the bars, blocking the exit, she had her
answer.