Page 39 of Jericho

"It's not deep enough to require stitches but let me get a bandage on it."

Working as quickly as I can manage, I apply a pressure bandage to her wound with some antiseptic cream.

"We have to go," I snap when she turns back to face me, still naked. "Get your towel."

As I close the back of the SUV, she makes her way around to the passenger seat. I climb back behind the wheel, the trackerstill in my hand as we drive away. I don't want Damien to know exactly where we stopped to remove it. If anything, he might think we stopped for another reason.

"What will you do with it?" she asks. "Do you put it in someone else's vehicle?"

I snap my eyes in her direction. "So someone else can get killed when he tracks them down and gets pissed that you're not there?"

"Sorry," she says, a sob rushing past her lips, making me feel even worse. "I didn't think of that."

"No, baby," I say, reaching out my right hand to her. "I'm just a little fucked in the head right now with all this shit. I know you wouldn't want people to get hurt."

I don't know who she is anymore, but years ago, even though she had grown up among criminals, she was always a compassionate person. She helped others as much as she could. She was quick to spend Daddy's money, but she didn't hesitate to give to others in need either.

"Once we get back on the highway, there's a bag in the middle seat with clothes. You can crawl back there and get something more than that towel on your body," I explain as I pull back out onto the road and keep heading in the same direction we were going before I pulled over.

I drive until we get close to an interchange on the interstate, leaving many different directions we could head before throwing the piece of gauze and the tracker out the window.

"Get some clothes on," I tell her when she continues to sit in the front seat with her hand covering the new wound on the back of her neck.

She startles as if she is lost in her own world, and I hate that even though he isn't here, Damien still has the ability to terrorize her in her mind.

I pull my foot from the gas, hovering it over the brake pedal as she unclips her seatbelt and climbs into the back seat. Needing to keep her as safe as possible, I don't pull my eyes from the road in front of me to glance back at her to check her progress. The woman has been violated enough, and the last thing she needs is someone else getting another peek at her body without her permission.

"Are these your clothes?" she asks.

"They're just clothes in case of a situation like this," I answer.

"They're huge."

"That's purposeful. As a team, we never know who would need them, and baggy is better than busting out of them. We have to be able to move when we work."

"Where are we heading?" she asks when I take an exit off the interstate and head southwest.

"Tennessee," I tell her. "Don't forget your seatbelt."

"Is that where your federal office is?"

An ache settles inside of me for the years I feel like I wasted with ICE. The rules and the red tape kept me from doing a lot more than I feel like I could have done. If it weren't for fucking bureaucracy, I have no doubt Nathan Adair would be rotting in the fucking ground. I could've slit his throat at any given moment, but the agency wanted his contacts. That's how it always is. They need the connections so they can work toward taking the next bad guy down. The case we're working on is never the head of the fucking snake, and they wouldn't believe me when I told them that Nathan Adair was the evilest man I'dever met in my life. That's saying a lot since Ivan Reese was the man who ordered my death.

"I'm no longer a federal agent."

"Did that happen after—"

"It's new. I'm not saying this to hurt your feelings, but I'm not going to go into detail about my new job with you, Aspen."

"Because I'm a liability," she whispers, but she dips her head in understanding.

I listen as she pulls in a long, deep breath, releasing it slowly.

"Do you think there's any way to make a stop?"

"What do you need?"

"A chocolate milkshake."

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