Beneath the Fire (A Guardians Novella) (7 page)

She heard a car door slam and Leo’s voice. “No, Papa. We’re taking
 
them with us.”

“Leo,
 
I suspected you were up to something. How could you betray me like this?”

They continued to speak in Spanish. Hurtful and accusatory words were thrown at each other. Unable to stand it anymore, Lucy pulled herself out through the window. Anton and Freddy followed her.

“What? Lucy?” her father said hoarsely. “You dragged your sister into this?”

“I volunteered, Papa.”

“Why?”

“Why? You ask why?” Lucy said angrily. She could feel all her resentment boiling to the surface. “Imagine if it was me being sold to that life, how would you feel, huh, Papa? Those women have families, they have a father who is worried sick about them.”

Her father had the decency to flinch. But the veins in his neck bulged out in fury.
 

“Enough! You will all come with us and we will settle this!” He looked at his men. “Take them away and tie them up.”

Leo drew his gun and pointed it at their father.

“Leo, what the hell?” Lucy yelled.

“There are no half-measures here, Lucia,” Leo said grimly. To their father, he said, “Let us go or I will shoot you.”

Before Lucy could say anything to diffuse the tension, one of her father’s men shot Leo, hitting him in the arm.

That was when all hell broke loose.
 

Mikey, Anton and Freddy started shooting, her father ducked behind his SUV while his men returned fire. All the while Lucy and her father were screaming to cease fire, but no one was listening.

Lucy scrambled to get to her brother who was leaning on the van, clutching his arm. But she felt herself getting hauled against a hard chest and being pulled away from the firefight.

Thinking that it was a cop that had got to her, she started kicking and screaming and landed a blow to her captor’s gut. The man grunted but did not release her until they were behind the last van where she was unceremoniously dropped to her feet.
 

She swung her fist to get a lick in, but it was caught and brought down hard against her side. And she didn’t fight back anymore because as she tilted her head up, she was stunned to look straight into Nathan Stark’s furious face.

***

“What?” Lucy whispered in disbelief and Nathan was pretty that sure if he had not been holding her up, she would have fainted.

“Good to see you too, babe,” Nathan said sarcastically. “Stay the fuck here. Do not fucking move.”
 

His blood was pounding in his head. Maia had held him back at the Tampico residence, telling him not to play their cards yet and see how everything would unfold. His girl sure could drive a mean muscle car and he concluded she was nuts. Nathan almost swallowed his tongue as he watched her drive in reverse against traffic. Maia dispatched the two police vehicles in pursuit with a single shot to the tire, but was not expecting Francisco Cortez to show up with his henchmen.
 

Nathan made his way back to the front line. Maia had taken out several of Cortez’s goons
 
and he positioned himself to take out two more. After Nathan’s successful fatal hits, the older Cortez realized they were up against people more lethal than the garden-variety vigilante like his son. He called a fall back. His remaining men quickly jumped back into their vehicles and they sped off.

“Oh my god, Leo are you all right?” Lucy cried as she rushed to her brother who was by now sitting against the van.

“Shit, are the girls all right?” Leo croaked.
 
Several of the bullets had pierced the windshield of the van.
 

Maia quickly checked the occupants of the first vehicle. Nathan rounded the first van to check on the second.

When he slid the door open, the women were huddled on the floor, they were sobbing silently. For the first time since last night, he realized what Lucy was fighting for exactly, and he felt a surge of pride for what she had done. That still did not diminish the desire to turn her over his knee and blister her ass.

“Are you girls, OK?” Nathan asked.

All the women nodded. Satisfied, he headed back to the front where everyone had gathered in a huddle.
 

“We can’t stay here, the police might show up any minute,” Maia said. “I have a feeling those first responders were on your father’s payroll which explains their swift intercept.”

“Who the fuck are you guys?” Leo asked angrily.

“A little thanks would be nice,” Nathan replied dryly.

“What’s going on, Nathan?” Lucy asked. Her voice was trembling and for the first time, Nathan looked at her. Really, really looked at her and fuck, there was the hurt of betrayal in her eyes.

“There’s no time to explain,” Nathan clipped.

“You know this guy, Lucy?”

“I’m her boyfriend.”

“What the fuck?”

“Not anymore!” Lucy cried angrily.

“Everyone, calm down,” Maia shouted. “Jeez. We’ve been trying to nail down Francisco Cortez. We work with the FBI, but we’ve gone rogue because Stark here, screwed up. We have no time to explain. We need to leave now!”

“We gotta get the car out of the ditch,” Lucy said quietly. Nathan nodded to Anton and Freddy to help him. When the car was on stable ground, Leo and Lucy walked around it. Lucy had wrapped a bandage around her brother’s gunshot wound. It looked like the bullet went through and through.
 

“Damn Luce, there’s a big dent on the back and you’ve probably messed up my axle,” Leo grumbled.

“Suck it up, Leo,” Lucy said as she punched her brother’s good arm.

Nathan watched the exchange for a beat. Mikey got into the first van and was pulling away.

“You driving the Charger?” Nathan asked Lucy.
 

“Yes.”

“I’m riding with you.”
 

 
No way was he letting Lucy out of his sight.
 

“I don’t want to be in a car with you,” Lucy said, glaring at him.

“You have no choice, Lucy,” Nathan said firmly. “It’s a long drive back to Monterrey and I intend to clear a few things up with you.”

“My sister says—” Leo interjected hotly.

“I don’t care what your sister says,” Nathan growled at Leo. “You fucking drew her into this shitstorm. She’s twenty-one for Christ sakes!”

“All right, enough!” Maia declared impatiently. “Nathan, ride with Lucy. You.” Maia pointed at Freddy. “You drive the other van. Leo comes with me.” She looked at Anton. “You can choose wherever.”

“I’ll ride with you, pretty girl.”

Maia snorted. “Don’t get your hopes up, boy, I’m engaged.”

Nathan snickered.
Pierce was a riot
.

Lucy got back into the driver’s seat while Nathan climbed into the passenger side. He decided to let her drive for now.
 

“Here,” Lucy slammed a map at him. “Make yourself useful and navigate. I can get us to Altamira.”

CHAPTER SEVEN

“So, you’re FBI?” Lucy slanted her eyes at the man beside her. Nathan. But not the Nathan she knew. “Is Nathan Stark even your real name?” Lucy wanted to cry, she really did. She could feel the tears burning behind her lids. She realized the implications of Nathan showing up at this moment: their past five weeks together was a lie. He used her to get to her father. But she refused to shed a single tear on a man who had betrayed her.

“No, I’m not FBI, but with an agency that’s close enough,” Nathan said. “And yes, Nathan Stark is my real name.”

“You’re a good actor,” Lucy said bitterly. “You certainly had me fooled.”

“Lucy, whether you believe it or not, I really care about you—”

“Don’t!” Lucy said, her voice cracking. She felt her tears pool before a stream streaked down one side of her cheeks. “Damn it!”

“Lucy babe—”
 

“Don’t. You don’t ever get to call me that,” she said, hiccupping on a sob. “Not anymore! God, why did you have to ride with me?”

Nathan kept quiet, but she could feel his eyes searing through her. He sighed. “You have every right to be angry—”

“You think?”

“Shut the fuck up and listen,” Nathan growled, his tone indicating that he wouldn’t tolerate getting interrupted again. Lucy wiped her tears with the back of her hands. So much for not crying.

“My assignment was to get close to you,” Nathan said. “Our first meeting was premeditated, that I will admit to. But Lucy, the weeks that followed, it became something else. I started to fall for you. Hard. I didn’t know it then, but by the time we slept together, I had developed feelings for you. Those feelings are real.”

“You expect me to believe you?” Lucy asked acidly. “How can I trust what you say, Nathan, when we’ve based our relationship on a lie?”

She shot him a scathing look and felt satisfaction when he flinched.

“I’m not expecting you to trust me immediately,” Nathan said. “Just give me another chance.”

“Why, so you can get to my father?”

“No, damn it! I don’t care fuck all about your father,” he said angrily. “If we wanted to nail your father down, we would have gone after him, not try and help you get the girls out.”

This was true
, Lucy thought.

“How did you find us anyway?”

“Pierce, my partner, figured out who ryker569 was.”

“What? How?”

“Apparently she’s familiar with his MO,” Nathan said. “Besides, he’s her future brother-in-law.”

“Get out!” Lucy exclaimed. “Seriously?”

“Yup.”

“That’s crazy. So what now? Are we going to get swarmed by the FBI when we reach the border?” Lucy asked anxiously. “Are we going to be taken away in handcuffs?”

“What are you talking about?”

“Obviously, what my brother and I have done is considered obstruction of justice. We could have just tipped off the Feds instead of undermining their authority.”

“You watch too many movies,” Nathan said, chuckling. Lucy fell silent. His voice was warm and affectionate, it just melted her heart. But the shock of finding out who he was, was tearing at her. She had no time to process anything. She felt raw.
 

“Besides, like Pierce said, we went rogue,” Nathan said gravely.

“What did she mean by that?”

Nathan sighed. “When we found out from Brett what you guys were really up to, you could say I flipped out. I was coming after you whether they allowed me to or not. Pierce felt responsible for me, and now she’s caught up in my mess.”

“What are you saying? That you guys weren’t sanctioned to come after us?” Lucy asked, worry creeping up her throat.

“Nope. Nobody at HQ knew. Well, they probably know now,” Nathan said wryly.

“Oh my god, could you lose your job?”

“Probably.”

“Could you get thrown in jail?”

“Probably.”

“Nathan!” Lucy cried.
 

“Take a right turn here,” Nathan said calmly like he didn’t just drop a bombshell on her. “Look, I probably won’t get thrown in jail, but there’s a likelihood I’ll get fired.”

What had he done for her? What had she done to him? Lucy’s thoughts were racing.

“Babe, I’d ask you to look at me but you’re driving,” Nathan said softly. His hand reached out and patted her leg. She involuntarily lowered her right hand and gripped his left hand. “If I have to do it again, I would. I would do anything. Anything to keep you from harm. I just wished we could have been honest with each other and I could have helped you sooner.”

“I don’t want you to go to jail,” Lucy wailed suddenly.

“Glad to hear that.”

“Nathan, it’s not funny.”

“I agree. But, I’m sure it won’t get that bad, that’s ultra-worst case scenario.”

“You promise?”

“Does that mean you forgive me?” Nathan asked, hope lightening his voice.

“Not that fast, buster.”

“Babe—”

“We can’t just go back to the way we were.”

“Lucy—”

“We’ll have to start over—”

“I don’t care how many times we start over,” Nathan said fiercely. “No. Let me finish. I understand that you don’t trust me. I get it. But I don’t want you to shut me out. I was doing a job. My one mistake was I got emotionally involved, and right now I don’t give a fuck if I just killed my job. Because I have a feeling if I lose you, I won’t give a shit about anything anyway.”

“Nathan—”

“I love you, Lucy. Just know that while you try to figure out how you feel about us.”

Lucy’s heart swelled with the words that just wanted to tear out from throat, but she held them back. She’d let them stew, let the words vacillate before it felt right to say them back.

***

“Trust goes both ways, Lucy,” Nathan broke into the silence of what seemed like an eternity. Though his was the worst transgression, he couldn’t let it go that Lucy kept secrets from him too. It ate at him. But he understood her.
 

She glanced at him. “I don’t have any other secrets.”

“Good.”

“Do you?”

Nathan sat silently, before his lips curved up. “I’m not married, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

Lucy mentally rolled her eyes. “You’re hedging. I bet you have more secrets that you can’t tell me.”

“Couldn’t is the key. I would if I could.”

“Does it have anything to do with your job?”

“Yes.”

“Is it like you could tell me, but you’d have to kill me.”

“Something like that.”

“OK.”

“OK?”

“Yes, you’re like the CIA, right?”

“Uh, kind of.”

“OK.”

“OK? So you’re fine with me having the job I do?”

“Are you happy doing it?”

“Uh, yes. Unless it keeps me from you. I’ve been enjoying it very much when you’ve been my assignment.”

“Do you have a choice whether to accept an assignment or not?”

“Yes, sometimes.” Where was she going with this.?

But Lucy remained quiet after that last question. He instructed her to take the ramp towards Gonzales/Mexico 81. He looked out his window, a dark chasm of nothingness outside, with a sky full of stars. His eyes started to droop. He had not slept in more than 24 hours. Shit. Pierce was driving. He wondered if she was OK.