Operation Swift Mercy (4 page)

“But I’m not
your
responsibility,” Mercy said exasperation heavy in her tone.

“If I hadn’t been out there fishing today—you’d be dead. End of story. I’m responsible for you.”

“I’m not a child! I’m a grown woman and I can take care of myself!”

Maloney gave a slight lift of his eyebrow at her outburst as he stood, arms folded across his big chest, looking down at her. “Not from where I’m standing you can’t.”

“Then stand somewhere else! I don’t need you acting like my warden.”

“You need to rest and give your body time to recover. You’re safe here and I’m not going anywhere until you’re back on your feet again.
” Why the hell did he have to find the one damsel in distress who liked to argue? Why couldn’t the stubborn damn woman see he was trying to
help
her? “Get some sleep.”

“Would you stop telling me what to do!”

Biting back a frustrated growl, Maloney stalked across the room and hit the light switch off. “I’m going outside to make a phone call then I’ll be right back.”

He walked outside, letting out a long sigh as he gently pulled the door shut behind him. He needed to organise a few things. First thing was to get someone he trusted over here to stand guard while he sorted some clothes out for her. He could hardly take her where she wanted to go tomorrow dres
sed in a hospital gown and the things
she was found in had been beyond repair.

“Hey man, where’d you disappear to last night?” The voice on the other end of the line greeted him.

“I left the party early—I wasn’t in the mood to socialize, plus I wanted to get up early to go fishing this morning.”

“You shoulda
’
stuck around man, there were some mighty fine pickings to be had in the lady department let me tell ya
’
.”

“You’re such a man-whore Tupper,” Maloney said with a quiet chuckle. He’d known Tupper for
a long time
and while in their younger days their entire unit had played and partied hard, over the last few years it had lost its thrill. Maloney went out less often now and he knew Tupper missed the old camaraderie, but his heart just wasn’t in it any more.

“So did ya
’
at least catch anything today?” Tupper interrupted, snapping him back to the present.

“Well funny you should ask…I need a favour.”

****

Mercy gave a
small gasp and opened her eyes
feeling disorientated and for a moment panic
fell upon
her like a thick, suffocating blanket. Slowly the room came into focus and she remembered where she was
.
As her heart beat settled back into a normal rhythm she lifted her head and found the large, strangely comforting presence of Chase over on the sofa across the room
.
She felt a twinge of guilt that his long frame was squashed on the small lounge chair, but brushed it aside. She hadn’t asked the man to stay. In fact, his whole he
-
man attitude was a little annoying.

Yes, she knew she wasn’t in a position to be throwing away offers of help—she still had to work out a plan to get down town and get her hands on some money without drawin
g too much attention to herself
and there was the small matter of no clothing
.
She fr
o
wned
at that. What
was
she going to do about finding something to wear?

Her ribs hurt when she moved, but it was a bearable pain. Her head didn’t ache as badly as it had when she’d first awoken in hospital
—
all things considered
, she had been incredibly lucky she hadn’t sustained a lot more injuries.
A shiver raced through her as she
recalled
the lead up to that terrible moment she thought she was about to die.

A sickening feeling settled inside her stomach as the events of the last
week
flashed through her mind. She’d thought up until now she’d done remarkably well keeping herself together even though her entire world had just fallen apart.
If only she hadn’t overheard that meeting…if only she could no longer disregard her instincts, the little alarm bells that had been ringing in her head for the last few months…if only she hadn’t been so gullible and weak to have fallen for a man like Nikkos
Petros in the first place.

Mercy’s upbringing had not been ideal. She’d watched her mother bounce from one relationship to another her entire life. She wasn’t sure who her real father was, but she prayed every night that one day he would come bursting through the door and take her away to his beautiful house where he’d
lavish his attention and money up on her, because
let’s
face it, if you were creating a fantasy, it may as well be a good one.

Her mother worked whatever jobs she could find and money was a scarce commodity. Mercy’s mother swung from bouts of terrible depression to euphoric highs when she found a new man that she was certain would be the one. And through it all Mercy was there to pick up the pieces and comfort her mother when it all
inevitably
ended badly.

She’d never been quite sure what her mother had been searching for, but she
hadn’t
found it with any of them men she brought home
.
As she grew older, Mercy’s dream of meeting her father dimmed, but never quite extinguished, which was the only crack in her defences a man like Nikkos had needed
.

She dreamed of the day she could leave home and escape her
mother’s
destructive cycle of dysfunctional relationships, but the guilt that followed swiftly always dampened her rebellion. There was no way her mother could function on her own. She couldn’t be left to her own devices when she hit a low…she’d come to accept the fact that she would have to be her
mother’s
keeper. Which was why she had lacked the social skills most other young women had developed by the time she was twenty three.

Working as a secretary in a legal firm,
she avoided making any close friends, and turned down
dates, knowing there was no way she could expect someone she cared about to fit in with her
mother’s
unrealistic demands
. S
he simply did her job and went home
.
Then one day
her
mother just
seemed
to give
up. The cycle
of highs
following a depression
never arrived and Mercy came home
one evening after work
to find her mother in bed with an empty bottle of pills on the floor beside her. Even though Mercy had been taking care of herself for a long time, the realisation that she were now truly
alone had
been a terrifying discovery.

Then one day shortly after her mother
’
s funeral, in
to her
office walked
the most beautiful man she’d ever laid eyes on.

Nikkos Petros was a man who demanded attention.
He was in his
early
forties, but his body could have been that of a man half his age.
In the society elite, he was considered a saint. He actively supported refugees and underprivileged kids. Raised money and donated his own wealth to help homeless kids get off the street. There was
an aura of power and sexuality that people reacted to—there was simply no way to avoid it.

M
ercy
had been relieving for Mr S
peckman
’s usual secretary
,
when
she was asked to bring in some files. Entering the office nervously, M
ercy
swallowed
and kept her gaze on the floor as she made her way across the room toward her boss. As she placed the files on the man’s desk, a large hand gently clasped her wrist, making her gasp and lift her gaze in alarm.

She found two dark,
intensely
dark
,
eyes fixed upon her own and f
o
r the first time experienced what the romance novels she secretly read at night described as ‘fell into his gaze’. Where he touched her arm, burned, but not in a painful way, almost like a branding…to this day she couldn’t quite describe what happened in that one brief moment in time, but that had been the beginning of the end. She’d fallen head over heel
s in love with Nikkos Petros.

The courtship which followed was every bit as breathtaking as the cheesiest chick flick romance she’d ever watched
.
Nikkos swept her off her feet and
fulfilled
her every single
dream
she’d
had
as a little girl. The fact that i
n her dreams it
was her
father,
who rescued her,
was of little consequence. Here was someone who wanted to cherish and protect her. Wanted to give her the world…everything she’d alw
ays wished for and she fell hard.
Mercy bit back a groan as she shifted in her bed.

Looking back, she’d been such a fool. Why hadn’t she seen the man for what he was?
Because you were blinded by the illusion of what you wanted to see
, a little voice whispered in her head. Maybe she had been messed up—okay, there was no doubt about it, she
knew
she was a little messed up, but looking at it objectively, she  should
probably
have been a lot
more
messed up
than she was,
living with her mother all those years
.
B
ut something had always grounded her.

She knew from a very young age her mother was sick, that it wasn’t normal behaviour for the child
to be taking care of the
parent
. T
hankfully some small part of her had withstood the majority of the damage she could have suffered
.

P
erhaps it was wrong to blame her ignorance on the fact she’d grown too used to the fantasy life Nikkos had given her
. The bitter truth of the matter was she
was determined not to let
reality
intrude upon
her pretty
new life.

But overhearing that meeting two days ago had been like a bucket of ice cold water being thrown on her.

She was awake and the fantasy was
dead
.

There was no way she
could
continue to ignore what deep inside she’d already suspected. The man she loved was a criminal
, a
nd not just any criminal…the worst kind of cold hearted criminal imaginable
.
 

In shock she’d listened outside that room as
Nikkos
boasted about his lucrative business
trading in human trafficking. It was as though she’d been frozen in place, her heart was telling her to run, to block her ears and just forget she’d heard it, but her brain screamed out in outrage.

This was too big to ignore. These
men
were making money from human suffering.
Making money from the
very
people
Nikkos
was known around the city for being a champion of.

It was sick and twisted and cruel.

Mercy gave a start when a hand touched her wrist, opening her eyes to find Chase
standing over her,
watching her
closely. “I’ve got some pain killers if you need them.”

“No. Thanks,” she added softly.

“Any
headaches
?”

“No. I’m fine. Really. You can stop fussing over me.”

“There was a reason they wanted to keep you overnight for observation you know.
It’s important to do checks on you throughout the
night
.”

“What are you? An off duty Doctor or something?”

“I’m a medic with the Navy.”

Well that explained his overbearing attitude and why he took her health so seriously
.

“You’ve been tossing and turning for a while now. You sure you don’t want something to help you with the pain?”

“I’m fine. I can’t sleep
,
”
she said easing herself up against the
headboard
.

“You want to talk about it?”

“You don’t give up do
you?
”

“No ma’am.
” A grin touched his lips as he helped adjust the pillows behind her back.