Taming the Fire (25 page)

Gabe touched her arm, such a sweet gesture that she almost pulled back, not able to bear it. But there wasn't pity in his eyes, as she'd expected. No, there was pain and a great deal of understanding, as if he'd spent his entire life being the only screwed-up one. “I'm sorry.”

“Don't be, it's not your problem.” She took her hand away and kept her eyes on Gabe. Other men at the bar had begun their ritual circle, trying to gain her attention so they could buy her a drink, dance with her, attempt to take her home for the evening. There was only one bed she'd go to tonight, and that would be her own. “Come with me.”

Gabe followed, actually put his arm around her as they left, as though he instinctively knew she wanted a shield between her and the men. They got into her car and she drove down the back-roads and onto ACRO's guarded compound.

“You're taking me home?” he asked.

“I'm taking you where you need to be,” she answered. It wasn't the first time she'd deliberately disobeyed her boss's orders, so she did something that Devlin would not want her to do but was still the best thing for him. She turned up the radio as she left Gabriel standing outside of Devlin's front door and drove away.

D
EV HADN'T MANAGED
to sleep more than an hour before he was back up, actually showered and ready to go into the office at motherfucking five in the morning. He'd resisted the urge to call Marlena and make sure things were okay with her, that Gabriel hadn't put up too much of a fight, but resisting had taken its toll on his patience.

So when the pounding on his door began in earnest, accompanied by yelling, he flew down the stairs and nearly took the door off its hinges when he slammed it open.

“What the fuck is going on?” Gabriel was demanding loudly before Devlin could even get a word out.

Dev yanked him inside, hard and by his shirtfront, prepared to have a talk with him that involved protocol, most possibly while using his fists in conjunction with his mouth, when Gabriel said, “Oswald Jameson Hughes drives a '76 Olds with a white convertible top.”

Dev let him go and took a few steps back. “What did you just say?”

Gabe repeated his statement.

“How the hell did you know that?”

“Because he drove me here two nights in a row. Tonight, Marlena dropped me off—after she left, I saw that he's parked across the road from the house.”

“Where?” Dev strode to the window first and then the front door, slamming it back open and staring into the night. He scanned the area. Nothing.

“It's gone,” Gabriel said quietly from behind him. “Why does your dead lover keep bringing me here?”

A valid question, one Dev didn't plan on answering. “Who do you think you are, coming here and asking me these questions?”

“The man you almost fucked last night, that's who,” Gabriel spat—and yes, the boy was angry.

“Yeah, that went really well. What, I wasn't gentle enough for you? Were you looking for flowers and candles? You don't like to sweat? Are you really a romantic under the tough-guy swagger?”

Gabriel straightened. “No, but Oz says that you are.”

That made Dev stop in his tracks. “What else did Oz say?”

“That you're an asshole, and not to let it bother me too much. That eventually you'll come around.” Gabriel headed to the door, but turned one final time before he left. “And for the record, I don't mind getting sweaty. What I do mind is you calling me by another guy's name.”

With a final, definitive slam of the door, he was gone. And Dev knew with certainty he would not be back, that it was his turn to chase the boy. Because that was most definitely something Oz would do to him.

“You're not getting your way!” he called down to the floor, just to piss Oz off. He waited for thunder, lightning—an apparition. Anything.

None came. And so he sat on the floor and pulled his knees up to his chest and whispered, “Damn you, Oz,” even though the only thing he could see in his mind's eye was Gabriel walking down the lonely path, alone.

Ryan didn't think the flight from England could have been more tense. Trance hadn't sat still, kept glancing at the crate where Ulrika lay in a state of half sleep, half snarl. And every time Trance looked, the beast snarled louder, and Annika, who wasn't pleasant on the best of days, pounced all over Trance's not-so-covert attention to the crate.

Trance, who had always been intense but calm and in control, had been on the verge of exploding out of his skin.

Annika had antagonized the situation with her teasing.

Then there was Meg, who had continued to shoot death glares at both Trance and Annika. Ryan hadn't helped her mood by being a total asshole when he should have tried to reassure her that everything would be okay. She'd been incredibly brave in the face of being bound and shoved on a plane headed for a location she didn't know, with people she didn't know. She was a tough little thing, and he admired the hell out of her.

He'd admired her even more when, after Trance sat down across from her and hypnotized her into telling him who she was and what she did for a living, she kicked him in the nuts.

Annika had laughed her ass off. Trance had limped back to his seat, cursing, but he'd left both Meg and Ryan alone for the rest of the flight.

Yep, the tension in the cabin had been so bad, the pilot probably felt it through the closed cockpit door, and Ryan heaved a huge sigh of relief as he and Meg stepped off the jet and onto the familiar ACRO tarmac.

Yes, familiar. He remembered it.

He also remembered how armed security guards would always be standing at the base of the stairs if an enemy or potential operative was being brought in. Sure enough, they were waiting, a couple of them eyeing him and Meg, but the rest watching as Ulrika's crate was unloaded.

“What now?” Meg crowded close to him, her eyes wide as she took in the huge old military base.

“I have no idea,” he said, and didn't that just chap his hide. He hated feeling so out of place in his own home. Hated feeling like the enemy.

Trance came up behind them and unlocked their cuffs. “Security is taking you to Dev,” he said, as a black Hummer pulled up. “And hey, welcome home. It's good to have you back.”

“Thanks.” Ryan shook Trance's hand and then took Meg's. “Time to meet the boss.”

She shot Trance one last glare, and then hopped into the back of the vehicle, where a security guy sat. Ryan climbed into the front passenger seat for the short ride to headquarters, where he and Meg were escorted into Dev's outer office.

“Hey, Marlena.” Ryan smiled, because damn, it felt good to recognize someone.

Dev's secretary came out from behind her desk and gave him a hug. “I'm so happy you're safe.” She pulled back, gave Meg a smile and gestured to the leather couch. “Have a seat. Ryan, Dev is ready for you.”

“Thanks.” He squeezed Meg's hand, sort of an apology for being such a dick on the plane. “I'll be right inside the door, okay?”

She nodded and sat, and he headed into Dev's office, where his boss was doing something with a PDA. Annika and Trance had caught him up on ACRO stuff, but the biggest shock had been the fact that Dev had regained his eyesight, and now Dev looked up, his brown eyes flashing with what Ryan swore was relief.

“You have no idea how glad I am that you're safe, Malmstrom,” Dev said with a grin. “You had us worried.”

“
I
had me worried.” He still was, truthfully, but he'd keep that information to himself for the time being.

Dev put down his PDA, and his expression turned serious. “How are you? Doing okay?”

“Yeah,” Ryan said, as he sank into a chair across from Dev. “My brain is still a little scrambled, but it'll work itself out.”

He hoped. His memories were there inside his skull, like a box containing all of the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle, but they hadn't been put together to form a finished product yet. He blew out a long breath, feeling a release of tension that had been coiled inside him since the day he'd awakened in the Itor med lab with no memories except the false ones Itor had given him. He might not be whole, but he was home, and he was safe.

“What happened, Dev?” he asked quietly. “How did my cover get blown?”

Dev was always in control, never showed weakness on the job, but for a split second, his eyes skipped away, coming back to meet Ryan's so fast Ryan wouldn't have seen it if he'd blinked.

“Dev?”

“It was my fault,” he said bluntly. “I gave you up.”

Ryan's breath rushed from his lungs. “It was… how?”

“My mind was breached.” Dev looked down at his hands, seemed to realize he'd clenched them, and splayed them flat on the desk before looking back up. “There's not enough time in the world to tell you how sorry I am.”

“Sorry.”
Ryan's body and brain went numb, and he sagged back in his chair. “They tortured me,” he murmured. “They came for me one night, tortured the fuck out of me for days and then scrubbed my memory. And you're sorry.”

Dev said nothing, though Ryan knew he was being unfair. His blown cover might technically be Dev's fault, but how could he have prevented it? Dev had taken extreme precautions to keep Ryan's mission a secret by making sure he was the only person at ACRO who knew about Ryan's insertion into Itor, so it wasn't as if his boss had been negligent. But Ryan also wasn't ready to apologize for being unfair. Not when he'd had needles jabbed into his joints.

“How?” Ryan demanded. “How could that have happened? Don't you have one of the strongest minds in this agency?”

“Let's just say it was an inside job.” Dev shoved his fingers through his hair. “I know you're angry—”

“Fuck you.” Cursing at his boss wasn't the brightest thing he'd ever done, but he was tired, confused and his nerves were shot. “Sorry. It's just… I knew the risks when I signed on, but…” He trailed off, afraid he'd say something that he couldn't take back. He didn't trust himself to be logical right now, so he bit out, “What now?”

There was a long silence, and Ryan had a feeling he'd gone too far, and Dev was trying to decide just how hard he wanted to come down. Finally, he said mildly, “The usual. You need to check in with your supervisor for a debriefing, and then check into Medical.”

Fun. He'd be subjected to medical tests, psych evaluations and then finally, he'd have to get run through the Paranormal Division so the psychics could sweep him for psychic tags, mental programming and a variety of other crap. The entire process would take months.

“What about Meg?”

“She'll be handled.”

Which meant she'd be interrogated—nicely, but still, she'd be subjected to a battery of questions by trained interrogators and psychics. Then, depending on a huge variety of things, including her skills and background, she'd either be asked to stay on at ACRO, or she'd be released back into the wild—with or without some memory modifications.

“I'm not ready to let her go.” The words popped out as if someone else had said them. Ryan cursed. “Ah, what I meant was, well… could you take it easy on her? She's here because I sort of kidnapped her…”

One corner of Dev's mouth tipped up. “I know.”

Of course he did. Trance would have called from the jet after he got the info from her. “Are we done? I could use a shower. And a beer. Bad.”

Dev nodded. “Get some rest, but make sure you're checked into Medical by ten
A.M
. And send Meg in.”

“Yes, sir.” Ryan left the office, which had started to close in on him after his stupid I'm-not-ready-to-let-her-go crap. He was an idiot.

Meg was chatting with Marlena in the outer office, and she stood when she saw him. “Are we done?”

She looked so hopeful, like they could leave the office and he'd put her on the plane for home right now. “Dev wants to see you.”

She frowned. “Oh. Then what?”

His stomach turned over. “I don't know.”

“Okay. You're going to wait for me, right?”

Shit. “I can't. They're going to take you somewhere after this.”

The color drained from her face. “Where? Why?”

“They have some questions for you.”

“Will… will I see you again?”

“Why would you want to?” Christ, after everything he'd done to her, he couldn't imagine her wanting to be anywhere near him. She should be grateful for the opportunity to get away from him. But deep down, he knew. He was the only familiar face in a strange, scary place.