Atomic Beauty (9 page)

And yet, he wanted to be with her more than he wanted air, which was foolish and dangerous.

If he told her the truth about what he'd uncovered, why he was on the run in the first place, would she believe him?

Or would she hate him for turning everything she knew about her agency and her father upside down? Jace had allowed her to send data to Sanctuary, where all roads kept leading him, to find out if his worst fear was true—Murdock was the third partner at CorMeds.

Putting together a leader from Exacto and Murdock at Mercer was another calculated risk. Jace had chosen the meeting point because he had a safe house nearby and he could get lost in Canada if everything went south.

And Murdock's next move would tell Jace which side of the fence his boss was playing on.

Northern California

Erika had found her father's cabin nestled among towering sequoias exactly the way she'd last left it last year, clean and secure. She'd left emergency food rations, a habit he'd instilled in her from birth that had intensified over the years leading to his death.

No one knew about the place, save for her. Her father had insisted she keep the cabin a secret. Not even his best friend Murdock knew about the five-room log near the Oregon border. This was the most secure spot in the world.

She was completely off the grid, which also meant she had no internet access. The satellite phone worked, but she'd turned it off and pulled out the battery for extra precaution, so she couldn't be tracked.

After leaving Las Vegas, a migraine had assaulted her without warning and she'd barely made it to the cabin. She wondered if leaving Jace had been the trigger. Everything inside her had felt dead as she walked out of that hotel room. To make matters worse, the headaches were coming faster and harder, becoming more intense each time. And she was beginning to wonder if there wasn't something seriously wrong with her. Not even a day of rest and a full stomach had eased the aftershocks.

No way could she sleep tonight, but that was due to other reasons. In the morning, she'd see Jace again.

She told herself the aftereffects of the headache had her restless and not the fact she felt so alone without him. Leaving was something she'd had to do. She had to have a clear head.

Then there was the mission. Something was off with Murdock, and she couldn't tell what exactly. Something had been building. Was it connected to the impending anniversary of his best friend's death? This year, his emotions seemed stronger, rawer. Did that something have to do with the driving force behind his need to catch Mitchell?

Murdock lived his work. He ate, breathed and slept thinking about Sanctuary. It had been his brain child and he'd been obsessed with nurturing it for as long as Erika could remember. Her dad might have been Sanctuary's best officer and she was now, but Murdock
was
Sanctuary.

And he'd do anything to protect it. She filed that thought away in the back of her mind.

As much as Erika loved her country, she couldn't say she'd joined the agency out of any patriotic sense. She felt she owed it to Murdock for taking care of her. And working there made her feel a connection to her father that she couldn't easily put into words. Losing him had more than rocked her fragile teenage world. Jace had her thinking she might be whole without the job and that scared the hell out of her. The agency was all she knew.

Neither she nor Murdock had been the same since the tragedy, and she wondered if he'd felt an extra burden of responsibility for her. Murdock was right about one thing: Erika was a lot like her father. He was brave, smart and highly trained. And he didn't half do anything.

And she imagined Murdock's devotion to her and her safety had a lot to do with his own sense of duty to a friend. She respected him for it.

The comfort of feeling like she was home couldn't dull the ache in her chest at missing Jace. There was no place on earth where she felt closer to her parents than the cabin. She ran her hand along the fireplace mantle, able to see in the dark because of the glow from the battery-powered digital clock. She ran her finger along the edge of the picture of the three of them that was centered on the fireplace. This was where they'd come to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries. This was where they'd come to get away from the world. This was where she and her father had come to mourn, then her alone. He'd changed after her mother's death, going to a dark place emotionally. Hell, Erika had, too. The evidence came in the form of tiny marks on her arms and legs.

“Don't let anyone see your weaknesses, kiddo. They'll use them against you every time,” her dad would always say as they locked the door and disappeared through the woods to the hidden parking pad.

She glanced at the scar tissue on her arms with an overwhelming sense of failure. Cutting had been her only outlet for the pain she'd felt watching her mother being raped and then stabbed to death. A slow and violent end to a light that had shone so bright in Erika's life.

The remnants of those painful days might be a sign of weakness, but they helped her remember, too. The dark place that had engulfed her when it was over—although, it was never really over, was it? The distance she'd covered since then, the growth.

She'd had to overcome an all-consuming hatred for the men who'd done unspeakable acts to her mother. Did she forgive them? Fuck, no. But she'd survived their actions. Hadn't allowed them to erase her. And, partly, she'd tried to get better for her father whose anger could barely be contained. She'd sensed, even then, that he'd lashed out after her mother's death. And she'd been powerless to help him. A part of her wondered if his actions had led to his death? Had his grief made him careless?

Erika stopped in front of the twin urns flanking the picture, wiping away tears that spilled down her cheeks. A weak part of her wished Jace could be there at the cabin with her. A man like him would truly appreciate the place. In another weaker spot, she wished her dad could be alive to meet Jace. But both of those things were impossible. Jace was brilliant at playing with her blind spots. And, just like her dad had always reminded her, weaknesses could get her killed.

She absently reached for the necklace she always wore. The realization that it was gone came a second too late. Her heart felt thick and heavy in her chest. Turning away from the fireplace, she moved across the room and sank down on the couch, tears streaming down her cheeks.

Being at the cabin comforted her, but there was something niggling away in the back of her mind, so she reviewed the facts.

Jace Mitchell was involved in something. Murdock still hadn't told her what. Maybe if she knew, she'd have a better idea of what she was looking for. But then not even Murdock's people had uncovered any secrets from the hard drive yet. She hadn't had any luck in Vegas, either, except to learn the name Sam Carter when Jace had shown up. Stacy hadn't uncovered anything worth talking about yet, either.

Mitchell had played her well, toying with her emotions. Believing anything else made her vulnerable. She couldn't be sure when he'd figured her out the first time but she had to believe that he knew for certain by the blackout. He couldn't have known for long or she wouldn't still be alive, which brought up an interesting point. Why had he let her live?

Her information must have been valuable to him, especially since he seemed to be trying to gain her trust. Or maybe he was using her to get close to Murdock. Although, Jace hadn't asked about his old boss.

Plus, he had to know if he killed her they'd just send someone else after him. Maybe he'd played with her emotions to stay close to her. Maybe he needed to buy time, which most likely meant he was very close to getting what he needed.

If Murdock had no plans to tell her what was going on, then she'd have to get the information out of Mitchell.

He'd unintentionally given her the name Sam Carter, the CEO of CorMeds. Carter had been killed last year in what appeared to be an agency-ordered hit. She didn't know him and yet the more she thought about him, he seemed familiar.

Why was his name on the tip of her tongue? As CEO, he would've been in the news, especially since he led a high-profile pharmaceutical company. Or was it something else?

Trying to think hurt her brain. It was as if a thick fog had settled over her, clouding her thoughts. Patchy memories of her assignments came back to her, but a piercing pain jolted through her if she tried to concentrate.

Erika got up and made her way to the bedroom. She always kept something from her assignments locked away at the cabin, a habit she'd picked up from her father. Her remnants weren't useful to anyone but her, nothing anyone else could use to connect her to her missions. Just like embedded files, they'd have to know exactly what they were looking for.

Sam Carter.

There was something vaguely familiar about that name now that she really thought about it. But what?

Erika was certain she'd never met him before. Why would she? The CIA never spied on American citizens unless there was overwhelming evidence the person in question was involved in terrorism. Even then, the amount of paperwork involved was staggering.

Erika filtered through the assortment of newspaper clippings, pieces of material, napkins, unsure of what she was looking for but convinced she'd know when she found it.

She checked the few notes she'd scribbled.

A newspaper clipping from a French periodical matched the date of Sam Carter's death. Was she somehow connected to Carter? She searched her memory for answers, came up empty.

She thought back to Jace's password, SexAndMore@69. She grabbed a pen and wrote it down on the back of a newspaper clipping. Why hadn't she noticed it before? If she pulled out the capital letters, they made the word, S-A-M. Sam.

Sam Carter was the key.

If he was a US citizen, had she been sent to save him?

He must've been working on something important, something dealing with national security, to be on her radar. Mitchell had disappeared a year ago, which would have been around the time of Carter's death. Was Jace's disappearance connected to the Carter hit?

Murdock had said the name didn't ring a bell, but his tone belied his words.

So, she wouldn't be getting any information about Sam Carter from Murdock. Fair enough.

There were plenty of other ways to investigate.

Sam Carter and Murdock. Why did that seem so familiar? If Carter was an agency hit, then Sanctuary gave the orders.

Once she left the cabin and crossed the border into Oregon, she'd make some calls. Check in with Stacy to see if her research had unearthed anything.

Shuffling through her papers and keepsakes again didn't jingle any wires in Erika's brain. If Sam Carter was connected to Murdock, then maybe her father knew him, too.

She hadn't thought about going at it from that angle. Could a connection to her father be the reason Murdock hadn't wanted to send her on this case in the first place? Digging deeper was worth a shot. Besides, Murdock was off. Everything about his actions said there was more going on here. And everything she'd uncovered so far pointed right back to Sanctuary.

Erika closed up the box with her trinkets and hid them in the mattress cutout.

Her dad kept his things in his closet in a locked metal box. The key was on the ring in the kitchen.

She palmed the key and moved to her father's closet. The heavy box clunked as it hit the wood floor.

She unlocked it and opened the lid.

Thumbing through his memories took a few minutes. He'd been on hundreds of missions and yet kept fewer items than she.

Midway through the stack, she froze.

There was a picture of a man.

Sam Carter. He was younger, maybe ten to twelve years, but it was him.

Holy shit.

She quickly thumbed through the rest of his belongings.

Murdock had lied.

But how was her dad connected to Carter? Was that how Murdock knew him? Why the man seemed familiar to her?

Studying the rest of the contents did no good as Erika worked the possibilities over and over in her head.

Two hours later, she was no closer to finding a connection.

Exhaustion clouded Erika's thoughts. Her brain had been working overtime. She moved to the living room, curled up on the couch and closed her eyes.

Winds howled outside, banging the wood shutters open and closed, making sleep impossible.

By the time the sun came up, Erika had already made her first cup of coffee on the portable gas stove stored in the kitchen.

There was a cool breeze, which livened the smell of pine and clean air. The scent reminded her of Jace. She needed to kill that thought, and all other sentiment when it came to Jace Mitchell.

The truth was that he was a highly skilled trained killer who'd tracked her to Las Vegas. Granted, she'd made it easy for him and that was weak on her part. She'd made a stupid move in underestimating him.

And he'd been playing his hand to perfection so far.

The entire plane ride out of Canada she'd spent thinking about him instead of what she needed to do next.

He'd capitalized on her weakness, her feelings for him. Hell, he'd been working her emotions since they'd first met.

* * *

Everything Jace Mitchell did was calculated.

Even his charm that first night could be traced back to motive. He'd done an excellent job of keeping her off balance just enough to keep her one step behind, playing with her blind spots. Even now, the feel of his lips moving against hers penetrated her thoughts. How his body felt on top of hers imprinted her.

She should've shot him in that bathroom when she had the chance.

Mercer Island, Washington State

Half a dozen multimillion-dollar houses sat at the southern tip of Mercer Island. Security would be tight. After mapping out the location, Erika opted for a water entry. Because the South End of Mercer was actually a private boat dock. The location was brilliant. Whoever Jace was meeting would be able to see her coming from every angle, except below. Dark blue water would mask her.