Page 35 of Heart of Danger
“That’s not what they think.” Jon shot her an assessing look. “They clearly think there’s something there. Something they want. Something they need. But…looks like they didn’t find what they were looking for, after all.”
The frenzy of destruction was nearly over. No, she thought. It hadn’t been a frenzy. That would imply emotion. It had been utterly cold and calculated.
It had been a declaration of war.
Baring and his two men stopped, conferring in the wasteland of her bedroom. They were speaking in low tones, heads together. Her computer microphone couldn’t pick up what they were saying, but their body language was eloquent. They were angry because whatever it is they wanted from her, they hadn’t got it. They trooped out together from her bedroom into the living room and out the front door. Surfer Dude flicked two fingers and a few seconds later, the vidcam over the lintel of the Fredericksons showed the three men walking quickly to a big black Compass and driving away.
It occurred to Catherine that she was now a hunted woman. Whatever Baring wanted from her, he hadn’t got it. He was acting on orders from a mysterious boss who was clearly her enemy.
Mac spun her around in her chair and for a second she was dizzy, spinning on air. A complete metaphor for her life. Nothing underneath her, nothing holding her up.
“What’s your take on this, doctor?”
She thought, hard.
These three tough men had just become her friends and allies. She hoped. She had to stay here if Baring was after her. There was nowhere else for her to go, because if they were looking for her, no question, they’d find her. She didn’t even remotely know which steps to take to disappear.
That cold, merciless destruction of her pretty little house, put together lovingly piece by piece, has been infinitely more frightening than if crazed methheads had entered her house with a pickaxe.
And—it suddenly occurred to her—Baring was backed up by one of the most powerful corporations in existence. Millon was partially owned by one of the largest companies in the world, Arka Pharmaceutical.
He’d never pay for what he did. She knew enough to know how it worked. Millon and Arka both kept whole flocks of lawyers on call for just such things as this. Hard-pressed and money-starved local law enforcement officers would be no match.
“What’s my take on this?” Her shoulders lifted and fell. She did it more to move her muscles than anything else, because she felt paralyzed with fear. Like some creature caught in headlights, knowing the oncoming truck was coming too fast to escape. Her muscles felt stiff and uncooperative and she had to fight to keep from curling in on herself, just folding in, forgetting the whole outside world. “I have no idea. None. I have no idea what they were looking for, except that they didn’t find it. Which means?—”
“Which means they’ll look again. Harder, this time. And if they can, they’ll pressyoufor answers. And press hard. Those aren’t the good guys.” Mac’s voice was implacable.
She shivered, remembering Baring’s stony, cruel face. “Yes, they will. And no, they’re not.”
“We’rethe good guys,” Blondie said, pointing a thumb at his chest, then Nick. “Even big guy over here, no matter how scary he looks.”
Mac looked over, just moving his eyes. Yes, he did look scary. She had to hope she’d read him correctly. She had no idea whatsoever what the two men were like. All she had to go on were her animal senses, the instinctive low level early warning system all reasonably attractive women developed in urban areas, and that system wasn’t pinging.
“And a good thing, too,” Blondie continued. “Because it looks like what that book said. You can’t go home anymore.”
The dark, quiet man—Nick—was even more explicit. “If you want your life back any time soon, we’d better figure out what they want.”
“You’re safe here,” Mac said quietly. “I’m still not too sure how you got here, but we’re really hard to find. And as you know, we kill any vehicle getting within five miles of this place and kill their commo system too.”
She was having a delayed reaction. Her hands started shaking so hard she had to put them between her knees because though there no crazy vibes were coming from any of the three men, danger vibes were. Whether they were dangerous to her or not, they were clearly hard men, like soldiers or cops, only with something more. Tougher, less friendly.
Talk about being between a hard place and a rock. They had to believe she was harmless. Otherwise they’d MIB her and let her loose like a house-trained pet released into the jungle. She’d wake up somewhere with no knowledge of the past two or three days and no idea whatsoever that Cal Baring and his goons were trying to track her down.
If she asked them not to take her memory away that would raise suspicion like nothing else. Oh God. The thought of waking up in some hotel room with no memory, no way to defend herself…
A chilly wave rose up in her and she shivered, huddling in on herself. It was almost impossible to breathe, her chest would only do this jerky, raspy, panting thing. Spots danced before her eyes.
A huge, hard hand landed on her neck, pressed down until her head nearly met her knees.
“Breathe,” a deep voice commanded from way above her. It sounded like it came from the ceiling. She gasped. The hand tightened slightly. “Breathe,” the voice commanded again.
She did. First one deep breath, then another. Something lightened inside her chest, her heart went from trying to pound its way out of her rib cage to a dull fast rhythmic beat.
“You okay?” Mac asked.
“Never been better,” she gasped, immediately ashamed of herself. A lifetime of hiding her emotions from others and now these three men were watching her naked panic, her humiliating fear and there was nothing she could do about it. Control—the iron control she’d spent a lifetime honing—eluded her, had simply disappeared.
The big heavy hand on her neck squeezed slightly, not painfully. Then the hand lifted and, crazily, she missed it. Only when the hand was gone did she realize that she could have read Mac while his hand was on her neck, but she hadn’t. She hadn’t read him at all. Had no clue what his emotions were. All she knew was the effect he had on her.
