Unmasking the Mercenary (19 page)

Haley climbed to her feet and moved to the lamp beside the bed. She clicked on the light. An Arab-looking man with a thick black beard and cold brown eyes wrestled his way out from under Rem. He staggered as Rem advanced toward him. Grabbing the black-bearded man’s brown T-shirt, Rem slammed his fist into the man’s face. Again and again. The man stumbled backward, falling with his back against the glass door. He turned and slid the door open, stumbling outside onto the balcony. He gripped the stone rail and faced Rem. Pushing off the rail, he charged for Rem. But Rem was ready and deflected the Arab man’s attempt to hit him. He chopped the back of the man’s head with his hand. Rem caught him as he went limp and lifted. Swinging the body over the rail, he let the man’s body fall.

Haley covered her mouth with a startled gasp. She hadn’t expected Rem to do something so drastic. She hurried outside, bracing her hands on the rail beside Rem. They were on the third level, and the man’s body was sprawled on the artfully landscaped ground in broken angles. Was he dead?

Something dark and unwanted curled through her. She couldn’t stop staring at the body. Lifeless. Broken. Flashes of memory assaulted her.

Images of her Iraqi captors hitting her invaded her failing defenses. Slapping her face. Driving the butts of their rifles against her ribs. Slamming the hard metal against her shins. One of them bringing his face close to hers, growling obscenities, telling her what he was going to do to her body in badly broken English.

She heard her own whimper. No. No. She didn’t want to remember any more. What if she hadn’t gone unconscious before they started doing what the doctors had confirmed they’d done?

Her hand trembled over her mouth. Tears burned her eyes.

Ripping clothes. More punching…

“Haley?” Rem put his bloody hand on her shoulder.

She flinched and backed away, looking at him but only seeing the faces of her captors abusing her. More tearing clothes. Another hard blow to her head. It was more than she’d ever remembered.

“No,” she whispered, her whole body quivering. She put her hands to her ears, not wanting to hear her own screams piercing her mind.

“Are you hurt?” Rem advanced toward her. She backed into the room. “Were you hit?” His eyes frantically searched for wounds.

She stared at his hand, only a minor scrape there, but it was enough to keep the haunting memories alive. He looked at his hand as if he’d noticed her fixation. She moved back until she felt the bed and sat down on the mattress, wishing she could push the horror out of her mind.

Rem came to her, kneeling on one knee and gripping her arms. Careful not to look at the blood, she met eyes that were full of intense concern. She didn’t want it. She didn’t want the memories to keep running through her head. Better to put them aside, to not let them linger any longer. Bury them, as always. Bury them like they were dead.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

Shakily, she nodded, digging her fingers through her hair and lowering her hands to her lap.

“What happened to you just now?”

She shook her head. She had to stop him from talking about it. “Did you remember something?”

How did he guess it? She averted her eyes, wishing he hadn’t. “Don’t.”

“You remember?”

She shook her head again. “Don’t, Rem.”

“Haley, you should talk about it. Maybe it’ll help.”

Now she turned to look at him. “No. It won’t help.”

He breathed out a heavy sigh but didn’t push her. “I wish there was something I could do.”

She reached up and put her hand on his cheek. “You can’t bully it out of my head.”

He covered her hand with his uninjured one and turned his head until his lips pressed against her palm. His kisses felt warm and soft, and tingles strummed in her skin. Too soon, he took her hands in his and lowered them to her lap. Then his eyes found hers and the intensity of them made her breath catch.

“If you ever do remember, I hope I’m with you,” he said. “I may not be able to fight them for you, but I can hold you until it passes.”

Such sweet sentiments from such a brawny man seemed at odds, and yet…not. She smiled with the thought.

He smiled back, more of a crooked grin. “How did you ever get Cullen to hire you? Didn’t he think your history would pose a problem? I would have.”

“I knew his secretary. Odelia Frank. I went to see her after I recovered. She told Cullen about me and he invited me to Roaring Creek for a…a kind of interview.”

Rem’s grin expanded a little. “You mean he interrogated you?”

She knew he meant the same way Cullen had interrogated him. “He made sure I was emotionally sound.”

“Were you?”

“Yes,” she answered, a bit too quickly.

“It must have helped that you didn’t remember anything about what happened.”

She was relieved he didn’t press her on her emotional state after returning from the hospital. She’d been so raw on the inside, but she had fooled everyone by hiding just how deep the pain had gone.

“Yes,” she said in a calmer tone.

“What if you do remember?”

“I won’t.”

“But what if you do? Someday you probably will. Someday you might be ready.”

The thought of remembering the awfulness of what happened to her was a horror too great to explore. “Uh-uh.” She shook her head. “No.”

“Don’t you see? What you’re doing, everything you’ve done since Iraq, has led to this. You’re doing this to fight back, but what it’s leading to is remembering. And I think you need to remember before you can put it all behind you.”

“It’s not about whether I remember or not. It’s better if I don’t remember. I don’t want to carry that ugliness with me the rest of my life. This is about fighting injustice. I’m fighting men who do terrible things to innocent people.”

“A noble cause, I won’t argue with you there, but that cause is going to force you to face what you most want to keep buried.”

She stared into his blue eyes. Was she doing that? And how ironic was it that Rem was the man who triggered it. She caught herself.

“I don’t want to remember.” Haley hoped that day would never come. Because if it did, she was pretty sure it would destroy her.

Chapter 12

H
aley glanced at Rem from the passenger seat of the Jeep he’d rented. They bounced and jerked along the shoddy dirt road, the jungle a tangled mess around them. After the way Rem had disposed of the attacker’s body, it was time for them to leave. But taking her to a remote location seemed to go against Rem’s usual tendency to stay in public, in plain sight for Ammar to see.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“There’s a place not far from here.”

“Why so isolated? Are you having second thoughts?”

He glanced at her but didn’t answer. The way he adjusted his grip on the wheel and ran his fingers through his hair told her he struggled with whatever decision he’d made, whatever had made him bring her here, deep in the jungle, away from everyone, including Ammar.

A few minutes later, he stopped the Jeep at a small shack. Haley got out and followed him inside. A small sitting area and adjacent kitchen made up the main room, and two doors led to a bathroom and a bedroom. It was dusty but not disgusting, as she’d been expecting.

“How did you find this place?” she asked.

“I know the man who owns it.”

She nodded. He probably knew a lot of people who helped him along his way.

“What are we going to do?”

He dropped a duffel bag on the bed and unzipped it.

“Why didn’t we come here when we first arrived?” she pressed. “Why the stop at the hotel?”

He took out the satellite phone and put it on the mattress. “I had to make sure Ammar followed. Until I knew he was here.”

“And when he discovers you killed the man he sent after us?”

“He’ll be looking for me.”

“And, of course, you want that.”

“I don’t want him to find us here.”

She raised her brow.

“You’ll be safe here while I go back into town to find him,” he answered her silent question.

“You want me to wait here.”

“Haley—”

“No.” She moved across the small room to stand in front of him by the bed. “I’m not going to let you take on Ammar all by yourself. I can help you.”

“You’re staying here.”

She folded her arms and let her eyes tell him what she thought. She didn’t have to obey him.

“You’ll only get in the way,” he said.

“I will not.” She unfolded her arms and put one hand on her hip. “You know I’m capable, Rem.”

“You’re not coming with me,” he said, his tone delivering more force.

“You of all people should know better than to treat me like a victim.”

“This is going to be dangerous.”

“All the more reason for me to go with you.”

She saw his refusal to bend and gave up arguing. Instead, she decided to change her tactic. “Rem, why are you doing this? Surely you know Farid will have more men than you can fight all by yourself.”

“And you’ll make that much of a difference?”

“We could call Cullen.”

A cynical grunt came from him.

“He can send backup.”

The sound of a car pulling to a stop outside had Haley turning with Rem. He glanced at her once before moving to his gun. Haley found the other one and went to a window, standing off to the side to peer outside. Two men got out of a black SUV.

Shock fired through Haley. “How did he find us?”

“I’d like to know that, too. We weren’t followed.”

She looked at him and he met her gaze, both of them sharing questions neither had to voice.

“The man who owns this place?” she said. “Does Ammar know he’s your friend?”

“I didn’t think so, but he worked on Farid’s ranch. I met him when I was on assignment there.”

“Ammar must have figured it out.”

Rem nodded. “Or someone else did and told him.”

Haley faced the window again. Holding automatic weapons, two of the men stood near the SUV, scanning the area. Ammar climbed out of the vehicle.

Rem put the satellite phone into the duffel bag. “Come on.” He took her hand and led her to a back door. Outside, she followed him along the side of the building.

When he stopped at the corner, she peered around his big arm while he adjusted the duffel over his shoulder and adjusted his grip on his gun. Ammar and one of the men had reached the front door. The third walked to the opposite side of the building, disappearing around the corner. The man still with Ammar kicked the front door in and entered. Ammar followed.

Rem tugged her into a run toward the Jeep. She slammed the passenger door just as Rem started the engine and put it into gear.

Bullets pinged and clanged as Rem drove away. Haley twisted on the seat to see Ammar and the other two men running toward the SUV. Rem sped down the long, bumpy dirt road. Swerving onto the main road, he righted the Jeep. But the SUV was gaining on them.

Haley glanced at Rem. His eyes turned from the rearview mirror to her.

The SUV rammed them from behind. Rem almost lost control. When the SUV drew alongside them and rammed the side, he did. The Jeep rolled. Haley lost her gun as she was thrown from the vehicle. She landed on the soggy edge of a swamp.

Her gun lay somewhere up the slope. Searching for the Jeep, she spotted it right-side-up. Rem stirred, but he seemed to be incoherent.

Up the slope, one of Ammar’s men started down toward Rem. He was a stocky man, maneuvering with ease down the slope. Aiming a pistol, he moved cautiously, as though he were approaching a wild grizzly instead of a man. She looked back up toward what she could see of the SUV. Ammar was nowhere in sight, but the second man made his way down the slope behind the first, making his own path closer to Haley. In fact, he was headed straight for her.

She crawled to where she thought her gun had fallen.

The first man was too intent on Rem to notice, and thick vegetation gave her good cover. She crept like a sniper, spotting her gun. She stopped breathing as the man neared the Jeep. He was going to kill Rem.

Rem moved his head more. He seemed to be snapping out of whatever bang to his head he’d suffered.

Haley slid her hand around the grip of her pistol. Raised it. The man peered into the Jeep. He was looking for the diamonds. But then he looked up and spotted her. Seeing him begin to swing his aim toward her, she fired. At last, Rem came to life. He climbed clumsily out of the Jeep, falling to the ground and disappearing from her view. The man closer to her began firing. She stayed low on the ground.

Rem straightened with a gun in his hand and started firing back at the second man, who found cover behind a tree. Rem’s gun clicked empty. His target eased out from behind the tree and fired. Haley fired to cover Rem and he ducked out of sight again. She checked above him on the road. She couldn’t see the SUV, nor could she see Ammar.

Rem made his way around the Jeep, using it for protection as the man higher up on the slope fired at him. Two clicks signified when his gun was empty. Rem needed no more invitation. He bolted up the hill after him. The other man turned and tried to run to the SUV.

Haley climbed toward the road, wanting to see where Ammar had gone.

Rem and the other man clashed into a roll, fighting on the damp, leafy ground. She climbed faster, aiming her pistol, but was unable to get a clear shot through the trees. Rem overpowered the man, straddling him and punching his face.

Someone grabbed her arm and pulled. She stumbled and almost lost her balance. The hand squeezed her wrist so hard she yelped, then banged her hand against a tree truck until she dropped her pistol. A strong arm hooked her by the waist. Haley arched her neck enough to see it was Ammar who held her. He pressed a gun to her temple.

Haley frantically tried to strategize how to free herself. Rem finished off the other man and pulled a pistol from somewhere on the motionless body. Standing, he turned to face her and Ammar, a pistol hanging from his right hand.

“Drop your weapon or I will shoot her,” Ammar called through the trees.

Rem didn’t move.