Heatseeker (Atrati) (6 page)

“When isn’t it?” And Roman might think orders were going to sway Rachel, but Kadin knew better. They weren’t leaving Africa until Rachel was convinced Jamila Massri was safe.

Roman just chuckled and rang off without saying good-bye.

Rachel woke to the sound of low voices outside her tent. She recognized those of Kadin and the doctor, Eva, but she could also hear a smooth, melodic male voice that was unknown to her.

She couldn’t make out all the words; they were being too quiet, but she thought she heard “Cowboy” and “picture.” She noted the empty glucose bag hanging from a tent pole above her and decided it was time to take out her I.V.

She’d done it before, but it never made the doctors happy. The nurses, either, for that matter. She couldn’t help the fact that an I.V. line always made her feel tethered. Once the feeling of being trapped set in, she got a little irrational.

It had always been that way. Ever since the accident that killed her parents. And the accident’s aftermath.

Better to get rid of the I.V. before the inevitable panic set in.

She carefully withdrew the needle, wincing at the pain but managing to stifle her gasp. Blood ran in a thin rivulet from the place the needle had been. She looked around for something to blot it away and spied a pack of wipes. She opened it and yanked one out, vaguely remembering the medic using them to clean her up the night before.

She pressed the wipe against the tiny wound until the blood stopped, and then she looked around for something to wear. Her soiled clothes had been removed at some point, though she couldn’t remember exactly when.

Things had been pretty hazy right after her rescue, Rachel’s discordant sense of reality in no way helped by the presence of the one man she had resigned herself to never see again.

She still didn’t understand how Kadin Marks could be her rescuer; the mere idea was worthy of a drug-induced hallucination. She’d had those once, after a mission that ended badly, with her recovering in a hospital on narcotic painkillers. She hated hospitals.

The zipper on the tent opened as Rachel sat up despite her muscles’ screaming protests. She yanked the cover over her, glad she had when her visitor turned out to be Kadin, not the female medic.

He noticed her missing I.V. immediately, his eyes narrowing, his gaze focused on her hand. “What did you do?”

Right.
Ask a stupid question,
she snarked in her head.

“Took it out,
Capitan
Obvious. What does it look like?” Okay, maybe she should tone down the sarcasm, if for no other reason than because her throat, though better, was still strained.

Kadin didn’t appear fazed by her detour to Snarkville. “If Doc wanted the shunt removed, she would have done it.”

Rachel shrugged, unconcerned by the possibility. She had enough to worry about already. The medic’s reaction to Rachel’s necessary action didn’t even make it onto the bottom of her A-list.

“Maybe she’ll want to administer meds through the I.V. line,” Kadin said in clear censure.

Well, that was hardly impetus to have left the shunt in. “No meds.”

“Your body took a lot of abuse.”

And her muscles wouldn’t be forgiving her for a while, but that wasn’t the most important factor to consider. “I don’t need to be loopy.”

“You can afford to get some relief. I’m watching out for you.”
Now
he looked offended.

“I stopped trusting someone else to take care of me a long time ago.” She was careful to keep her voice modulated, but the words refused to stay inside.

That he’d been the one to teach her that lesson remained unsaid, however.

He frowned as if he’d heard the unspoken caveat and really didn’t like it. “You can go back to being the Lone Ranger when we hit Stateside. For now, I’ve got your back.”

No long-term promise, but then, she hadn’t expected one. Kadin had stopped making forever promises to her about the time she stopped believing in them. It wasn’t a coincidence.

Cause and effect, more like, and it was about to bite them both in the backside. She could feel it.

Maybe because she knew that “for now” was going to be shorter than
she
wanted and
he
expected. It wasn’t going to last past her refusal to leave Africa without Jamila.

Rachel was under no illusions that the Old Man—Andrew Whitney, head of TGP—would approve bringing the young Egyptian woman in. Rachel had already requested it once and gotten turned down for well-articulated reasons, but that wouldn’t stop her from trying again.

She had to. Jamila deserved to be safe. Rachel hadn’t been able to protect Linny, but she wasn’t going to let down another vulnerable girl who should be able to count on her.

“No drugs,” she repeated firmly, letting Kadin know she was taking his assurances as seriously as he’d taught her to.

Which was not at all after he broke the most important promise he’d made to her: to love her forever.

Tension filled him, but he did a darn good job of hiding it. Too bad for him that she knew his tells and had been trained to notice. The slight tightening around his sherry brown eyes and the way his breathing hitched belied the casual stance he tried to portray.

“Have the bigwigs arrived?” She still wasn’t convinced Chuma and his cohorts would show at all once they realized she was gone.

“Cowboy and Spazz both worked to get pictures.”

“They did?” Her breath caught in excitement, and she winced at the immediate pain tensing her muscles caused. “Face shots?”

“You’re hurting.”

She waved that off with one hand, demanding with a look that he answer her.

“Yes. There were four men in the jeep. Between Cowboy and Spazz, they got all four in full frontal face shots.”

“Impossible.”

He frowned, as if something bothered him, but only said, “My team does what they have to in order to get the job done.”

Someone had to have gotten dangerously close to get those pictures, though. “Thank you.”

She shifted, unable to hide another wince, and his scowl darkened.

She sighed. “The human body is not meant to withstand the convulsions accompanied by electrocution.”

“Your muscles seize just as much during orgasm, but the endorphins and adrenaline protect you from residual pain.”

“I can guarantee you, being hooked up to a car battery is nothing like sex.” Rachel found that if she kept an even and low tone, it didn’t hurt too much to talk.

It was Kadin’s turn to wince. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I know.” He just had a habit of spouting useless facts when he was nervous.

“What are you worried about?” she asked warily.

What wasn’t he telling her?

“Spazz wired them for sound.”

“So?” That was a good thing, right?

“Jamila Massri’s name came up, but without enough info to know if she’s in any trouble.”

Her entire body tensed, and she didn’t waste energy on hiding the pain that caused her. “What, exactly, was said?”

“One of the men asked, ‘What about Jamila?’ Your target replied that she was nothing to worry about.”

Cold chills went down Rachel’s spine. Abasi Chuma was not a man to dismiss a potential threat to himself. He had to have a plan for Jamila that would eliminate any threat she might pose. The least disturbing of which, but by no means without danger to Jamila, was moving the wedding date forward.

The fact that the young woman’s name had come up at all in this context could imply that she was now under suspicion, whether because of Rachel or because of something else did not matter.

“Stop,” Kadin ordered. “I know what you’re thinking, and that’s why I didn’t want to tell you about this. You don’t know what Chuma was talking about. He’s engaged to the woman. It would be strange if her name
didn’t
come up.”

“But—”

Kadin pressed one callused fingertip against her lips. “
But
nothing. Stop assuming worst-case scenarios.”

That was easy for Kadin to say, but she’d bet he never took his own advice in that regard. Assuming “worst case” was something they both had to do in their jobs.

No matter what, Rachel would not allow Jamila Massri to become collateral damage.

Surging to her knees, Rachel ignored the pain spiking through her muscles at the movement, though she could do nothing about the way her body swayed. “I need to get to her.”

“Calm down. You’re not going anywhere right this second.”

She glared.
That’s what you think.

Instead of looking worried, he chuckled, the sound warm and too familiar for comfort.

“What’s so funny?” she asked with enough censure to put some strain on her vocal cords.

“Well, you’re not exactly dressed for a hike down the mountain.” His gaze had warmed considerably, and there was a message there she did not want to see.

But his words registered. “I need clothes.”

“You
need
to check in with your boss.”

Kadin probably expected her to insist on getting dressed before calling Andrew Whitney, but she wasn’t the naïve girl he’d grown tired of all those years ago.

She put her hand out. “Give me your satellite phone.”

His eyes flared with surprise as she’d expected, but it didn’t show in his tone. “No can do. It will be safer to make the call once we’re in Marrakech.”

“I need Whit’s approval to bring Jamila in.” She kept her voice even with effort; she had to settle for letting her urgency show in her expression.

“Do you think he’ll give it to you?”

“He’ll have to.”

“Maybe. Maybe not.” His unconcerned words were belied by the intensity of his gaze.

“She’s just like Linny, Kadin. So innocent, ready to wed a sadist, and clueless.”

He frowned, his expression showing he had questions about Linny, but all he asked was, “Isn’t it an arranged marriage?”

“It is, but she seems to want it.” Clearly the dutiful Jamila had no idea about the real nature of the man her father had told her to marry.

“Maybe she’s into it.”

“She’s not!” Jamila was young. Innocent. And totally ignorant of her fiancé’s sadistic bent. “Her father must know, though. He has to. He and Chuma are friends as well as partners in business.”

Rachel had long suspected Dr. Massri of being one of the key players in Abasi Chuma’s organization, but she hadn’t been able to turn up anything conclusive linking him to Chuma’s illegal dealings. She told Kadin her suspicions.

“You insisted on staying here just to confirm something you already knew?” Kadin didn’t sound remotely happy about such a possibility.

“No.” Her throat, which had been doing better since waking, grew tight. “Not if I’m lucky.”

“You were hoping the other honcho would show so you would have all the names,” Kadin guessed, proving he still knew the way her mind worked . . . or that he would make a darn good spy himself. Maybe both.

But she liked the idea of his being a good spy better than his still knowing her that well. It would mean that too much of the innocent girl she’d once been still existed inside her.

She nodded her agreement to his supposition, regardless of how he’d come to make it.

Kadin didn’t lecture her on the foolhardy nature of her plan. He just shook his head with a wealth of meaning. “Cowboy will catch up to us on the hike to our transport. You can look at his pictures there. See if you recognize any or all of the men.”

Again she nodded, figuring she’d pushed her vocal cords far enough.

Kadin handed her another one of those foul energy drinks. “Your breakfast.”

“I like your French toast better,” she said with a grimace as she took the drink.

Kadin chuckled. “I do, too. Now stop talking. You need to drink some water after that.” He indicated the drink. “Especially after taking out the I.V.”

She ignored the pointed remark and forced herself to down the energy drink.

It tasted just as awful as the one the night before, but it didn’t upset her stomach.

Considering the amount of stress-induced acid roiling in there, that was saying something.

She didn’t argue when he traded her now-empty cup for a water bottle, but she imbibed in sips, not gulps. Both beverages had soothed her throat.

A slight relaxing in the tension around Kadin’s eyes indicated he approved. She didn’t like the pleased feeling that accompanied that realization.

Her brows furrowing, she asked the question that had been bothering her since she’d come to accept that the Kadin Marks who had arrived in her temporary prison was not an apparition created by her fever-ridden mind.

“How?”

“The Atrati get called in by The Goddard Project almost as often as the CIA,” he answered, doing her the courtesy of not pretending he didn’t understand the question.

“Not the Marines?” she asked, surprised he’d left behind his military career.

It was the dream he’d decided to keep when he’d dumped her and their dreams of a family and a future together.

“The Atrati recruited me. They . . .
we
do things for Uncle Sam when a sanctioned military force would cause problems. I’m still a weapon, but in the Atrati, I’m more than the finger that pulls the trigger.”

There was something in there, something beyond what he had said, but her thoughts were still too disjointed for her to get it. Maybe later.

“I get the Atrati, but why
you
?”

“I requested the assignment for my team when I heard who the extraction was.” He started packing up things from around the small tent. “I didn’t know you’d transferred to TGP.”

“You knew I was DEA?” He’d known more about her than she’d known about him and the changes in his life.

But then, since Linny’s death, Rachel had made a concentrated effort to forget Kadin Marks even existed. And, mostly, it had worked.

“I kept track of you.”

Why? He’d made it clear she didn’t matter to him anymore.

“Never called.” Or wrote. Or even e-mailed. Except for one sympathy card. She’d believed absolutely that he’d walked away that devastating summer day and never looked back.