Surrender (The Command Series Book 3) (33 page)

Hendrix stopped and moved to give Ethan a hard, evaluating look. “It takes a toll. Believe me, I know that. You’ve been on your own for too long and you need a break. All I’m telling you is to get grounded and come back.” He resumed the stitches.

“Forget it.”

“I’m not asking, Foster. You almost hung me out to dry here. Don’t make me do that to you, too.”

“Is that a threat?” Ethan said, pushing up on his elbows.

“Calm down.” Hendrix peeled off the gloves and dumped them in the trash. “Talk to Langley. Fill out their paperwork, jump through their hoops . . . go visit family. Come back, and if you’re still done, I’ll believe it. But right now, this is a knee-jerk reaction.”

“It’s not.”

“You’re going to get bored.” He sat down so he could face Ethan at eye level. “Fill me in about Ms. Pierce and the nature of your relationship.”

That was a mess Hendrix wasn’t going to like. “We’re involved.”

“Since when?”

“Since South Africa.” The table was uncomfortable. “She had no idea who I was then.”

“Had? She knows now? Is it ongoing?”

“Yes.”

Hendrix blinked with surprise, and then . . . a strange smile. “Well, that’s something. Good for you.”

“You’re okay with that?”

“Of course not, but it’s too late now. I plan to keep you on the job, and it doesn’t sound as if you plan to give her up. I’ll find a way to deal with it.”

Ethan stared at the director in total disbelief. Hendrix hadn’t been questioning him on a professional level, he’d been doing this to glean personal information, knowing this was the only way Ethan would divulge it.

“You care about the personal lives of your agents now? You’re going soft,” Ethan said.

Hendrix laughed. “Not as soft as you, Foster.”

-24-

Like Ethan had thought, Olivia had to have surgery to repair the break. While he waited for her to get out of recovery, he changed into the clothes Hendrix had brought him. Jeans and a t-shirt, making him feel more American than he had in a while. Though they were in Germany, being on a U.S. military base and surrounded by U.S. accents and signs in English made the hospital feel like a home away from home.

Probably not so much for her.

She was in recovery a long time, and because he was exhausted and in pain, he fell asleep. Upright and in the most uncomfortable chair on earth. When he woke, he hurried to the desk to ask for an update. The nurse was confused. She’d already notified the man waiting that Kathryn Pierce was out of recovery.

He tore down the hall, searching for her room number. Had someone from the Abramos been dispatched on a suicide mission of revenge? He didn’t have his SIG now, but he’d protect her with his bare fists if he had to. He burst into her hospital room without knocking, startling the man sitting beside her on the bed.

Oh. That made sense now.

Her father was pushing sixty, with white hair, a strong jaw, and twenty extra pounds around the midsection. He looked exactly like the photo in the file Rance had put together and e-mailed following Jason’s phone call. Ethan pulled in a deep breath and exhaled, releasing the tension. Olivia’s arm was in a cast, resting on a stack of pillows, her mouth hanging open in surprise at Ethan’s abrupt entrance.

He had no idea what to say. “How are you feeling?”

Olivia’s mouth closed. “I’m okay.” Her eyes shifted back to her father blankly.

Ethan glanced down at her chart. Pierce, Kathryn Olivia, it read. Would the media pick up on this? She’d have to forgive him for outing her. He’d do it again if it would save her life.

Her father glanced at Ethan, a discerning, evaluating look. His expression hardened, like he wasn’t pleased with what he saw. Ethan just being in the general vicinity of his daughter made her father nervous. Smart man.

“Dad, this is Ethan Foster,” she said.

“Michael Pierce.” Her father introduced himself and extended a hand.

“Colonel,” Ethan responded. The grip was dominating, but Ethan could respect that.

“And you are her . . . ?” Both men waited for her to jump in. When she didn’t, her father prompted, “Katie, help me out here.”

“He’s my friend.”

Ethan’s mouth tightened in annoyance, the word stinging.

“A good friend,” she continued.
Sorry, Olivia, only marginally better.
“Also, I’m going by Olivia, remember?”

Her father made a sour face. “Yeah. I forget that you’re not using the name your mother and I gave you.”

She scowled back at him. “I’m still using the name you gave me, just not the one you want. It’s easier this way.”

He sat back down beside her on the bed. “Your boss didn’t fly me all the way here for us to get into that again. I’m sorry. I’m just so glad you’re okay. I can’t believe we’re back here.”

Awkward silence filled the room. Olivia stared at her cast, at her father, she looked anywhere but at Ethan. It was because it was Landstuhl and the hell in Vitale’s office, he convinced himself. Yet it hurt anyway.

Michael couldn’t seem to stand it any longer. “Where did you two meet?”

“I’m a friend of Shawn Dunn’s,” Ethan said, “the man who runs Osterhägen Beverage.” It wasn’t a lie, and Ethan didn’t want to lie to her father.

“Oh, Katie’s new boss,” Michael said. “That explains why I haven’t heard about you.”

“Can you give us a minute?” she responded tightly to him. Michael lifted an eyebrow, casting a warning look to Ethan as he stood and exited.

“I didn’t know what to tell him,” she said, when the door was shut.

Ethan walked to the side of her bed, his mind exhausted, his knee aching, his back full of fiery pain that the painkillers barely touched. Every second he remained in this room and didn’t touch her, made things worse between them. She was slipping away.

“So, what did you tell him?”

“That I was stupid and worked for some dangerous people. I thought I had escaped, but they found me. And I said I got lucky that the authorities came to arrest them before it got really bad.”

“Did he believe it?”

“I think so.” Her empty gaze went up to his. “I’m a good liar.”

It was eerie seeing her like this, her whole personality stripped away. Dead. He couldn’t tolerate this space between them anymore. Her left hand was icy to his touch and it was alarming.

“Olivia, are you okay?”

She stared at him, her voice low and flat. “I don’t really feel anything.”

He slipped his hands through her soft hair, leaning down to kiss her, to bring her back to life.

“No, don’t,” she said, her good hand flat against his chest, pushing back. “Maybe I don’t
want
to feel anything.”

It was like he’d just hit a brick wall going sixty miles an hour. “What? You don’t mean that.”

“I do.”

He held his breath, waiting for the tell in her eyes when she was lying, but it wouldn’t fucking come.

“So, where does that put us?” he demanded.

“I don’t know.”

After what they’d just gone through together? If she didn’t want to feel anything, how would she feel anything for him? Anger rose in his chest. This woman was a fighter. It wasn’t in her nature to give up. How could she sit there, silent and motionless?

“I have to go stateside,” Ethan announced finally. “I need to be debriefed at Langley.”

She pressed her lips together. “How long?”

“A week, maybe longer. Where are you going after you’re released? Back to Munich?”

“I don’t know. My father wants me to come home with him.”

“Detroit.”

She nodded. “I might go for a little while. I can’t work while I’m on pain medication.”

Ethan straightened, using all of his remaining strength not to push. The urge to kiss her and force her to feel was strong, but he resisted. He could let her pretend these feelings didn’t exist a little longer. She’d come around. Eventually.

There was a dry-erase board on the wall with a marker. He uncapped it, scribbling his phone number there.

“When you figure out what you need, call me.” The hot words stuck in his throat. “Put that number down somewhere else, or memorize it, just make sure this gets erased.” He went to the door and yanked it open, his stab wound sharp with pain, although the pain felt like it was everywhere. “Goodbye.”

Olivia had been in America for six agonizing nights.

It wasn’t her father’s attempt at cooking. Her agony was six and a half feet tall, and deadly silent.

She’d been a glorious asshole to Ethan at the hospital. Every night she dug the phone number out, the one she’d written on a piece of paper even though she had it memorized, and confirmed the numbers again, repeating them in her head.

They’d begun that horrific, intense day together in bed. Showered, dressed together, like they were a couple, and she’d
liked
it. Then, the airport where she’d jumped out of the car to lay down suppressive fire when Jason had been hit.

It led to the hospital in Munich, and Markus’s pale face. He was still there now, but improving every day, Shawn had said when they spoke earlier in the week. Olivia could barely think about the rest without going numb and empty. Vitale’s office. Landstuhl. It had been way, way too much.

She’d shut down and shut Ethan out so completely that terrible night. Didn’t matter, she couldn’t stop thinking about him. In Germany, it had been bad. In America she was a mess. Wondering where he was, what he was doing, and if he was healing. Whether he was thinking about her. It made her crazy, which was ironic. Staying at her father’s place usually did that.

Her trip was cut short when a man named Hendrix called her and asked her to Washington, D.C. so they could have a meeting. He didn’t say what it was about, only that he worked for the Central Intelligence Agency and was Ethan’s boss. She took the first flight out she could get, and scheduled the meeting for the next morning.

She lay restless on the hotel bed in D.C., staring at the crack in the curtains and couldn’t shut off the thoughts in her head. Had something happened with the Abramos? Was Ethan’s job in jeopardy? Thinking of him sent all the questions she hadn’t gotten a chance to ask him racing through her mind. His choice to join the CIA had to make it difficult to have relationships, but was he allowed to love? Had he been in love before?

Why the hell was she thinking about that?

Enough. She was done behaving like a glorious asshole. It was probably too late to call, in more ways than one, but she dialed the number anyway. Maybe she’d get voicemail.

It rang.

And rang. Then, a click as the call picked up.

“This is Foster,” his sleepy voice said.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.” She glanced at a clock. Holy hell, it was one in the morning. That is, if he was still in Virginia.

“It’s all right,” he said quickly, like he was already fully awake. “What’s going on, Olivia? Everything okay?”

“It’s fine.”

Silence.

She was the one with the bright idea of calling him, and now her brain was empty.

“Can I help you with something?” he asked softly.

She let out a breath. Taking risks, living dangerously, it reminded her she was alive. She wanted to take this risk. “I’m sorry about how I acted. I don’t like how we left it.”

“Yeah,” he replied. “Me neither.”

It fell quiet again.

“So, what are you going to do about it?” She sucked in a breath, pressed her lips together.

“What am I—?” There was a sharp laugh from him. “I’m sure I can figure something out.”

She fell back on the bed, the phone pressed to her ear, relieved he didn’t seem to hold a grudge. He’d come after her, attempted rescue, and called in a strike team. Shawn made it sound like doing that had been detrimental to Ethan’s career. She hadn’t said thank you. Not even given a goodbye when Ethan left. She’d been terrible.

“Where are you, Detroit?”

“Uh . . . no.” He didn’t know she was here? “Are you still in the States?” It was silly, but she hoped they were on the same continent.