Chapter 26
Twenty-Six
Things are dark and quiet when we pull up to the warehouse, and he parks outside on the gravel lot.
“Stay. I’ll be right back.”
He disappears into the darkness of the warehouse, and a moment later there is a soft glow from behind the dirty windows above.
My arm throbs as I hold it, too scared to release the pressure or examine the damage.
My dress is painted with blood, and my shoes are long gone, so dirty feet poke out from beneath the wet hem.
I shiver again, feeling parched and tired as I rest my head against the window.
My eyes pop open to the sound of the trunk closing, and flames dance behind the windows above the warehouse in front of me.
I lean forward to get a better look as a window breaks, but York climbs back into the driver’s seat and fires up the car.
In the side view mirror, I watch the warehouse behind us become engulfed in orange light as we speed away again.
“Here.” He opens a bottle of water and passes it to me. “Try to rest. I’ll get you patched up at the next stop.”
It’s still dark when we arrive at our destination.
At some point, I dozed so I missed the signage and have no idea what town this is, but it isn’t very large.
We pull into an alley just wide enough to get our doors half open.
Steadying me, we stop at a caged door halfway down the alley next to a dumpster where York keys in a code.
The door buzzes, and he pushes it open, guiding me through.
A freight elevator takes us up to the topmost floor and opens into a compact living space.
I’m ushered through a small kitchen to sit on a couch.
The living room sits sunken below the bedroom, which is just a few stairs up onto an open platform separated by an open railing.
A small hallway runs down the side of it, leading, I’m sure, to a washroom.
York pads around the space, collecting items, and disappears into the bathroom before leaving the suite altogether. He reappears with his large black bag over his shoulder and drops it and begins going through it.
I watch numbly as he extracts clothing and a first aid kit, and then carefully removes his tuxedo jacket from my shoulders and lays me down on the couch.
“This is going to pinch,” he warns as a needle goes into my arm. Discarding it on the table, he picks up a bottle and a towel. “And this is going to sting.”
I bite my lip and stifle a scream as the cold alcohol splashes my arm. The pressure from the towel makes my head spin until I feel queasy.
“I might be sick,” I whisper as I take a deep breath.
“Throw up after the bleeding stops.”
There is more pressure and wiping, and I squeeze my eyes shut again when my arms stings sharply.
“It went right through . . . I don’t think it hit the bone, but it was close.”
I nod, looking up at the ceiling as the sharp stinging returns, and I whimper, tears slipping from the corner of my eyes and soaking into my hair. After a few more minutes, he’s unrolling a bandage and wrapping it around my arm.
“Let’s get cleaned up.” He sighs and scoops me up.
Thankfully the dress is easy and quick to remove, and he helps me shower off the blood, keeping the bandage out of the water. Once we’re both clean, I’m put to bed, and he disappears down into the room below.
There is the rustle of plastic and crumpling paper, and eventually the sounds and smell of something cooking. Low music begins, and I close my eyes, but blood splashes across my chest and bodies litter the floor before me, so I open my eyes and sit up, opting to stare off into the distance instead.
Russel Wainwright is very dead. A lot of agents are dead, and if I thought I was a fugitive before, it was nothing like it’s about to be.
There will be multiple agencies looking for me now, looking for all of us.
I thought I’d be able to sneak away after all of this ended, but it seems less and less likely that I’ll ever get out of this country. Not with this amount of heat on me.
York appears at the top of the stairs with a mug in his hand. “Can’t sleep?”
I shake my head.
He hands me the mug, and I take it, the smell of vegetable soup wafting as I wrap it in my hands. He sits on the edge of the bed. “I apologize for having to use you to lure them all into one place. Will . . .”
“William isn’t your fault, and we both know you’ve been using me this entire time.
” I set the mug down. “You brought me into the woods to see if I’d slip up or reveal anything, and you’re fucking me to pass the time—I can’t say I’m not doing the same—but now the job’s done, and I imagine you have an extraction point to get to. ”
“Hm.” He inspects his hands. “You’ve got it all figured out then.”
“Tell me I’m wrong.”
“You aren’t wrong about the woods, and you slipped up plenty out there, but this job isn’t done, and I’m not going anywhere.”
I didn’t slip up. “What do you mean not done?”
“There is intel that needs to be destroyed before I can put a bow on this operation.”
“You’ll never . . . You’d have to access the Agency’s servers to do that, probably through a direct connection to their system from the inside. That’s impossible.”
“Not your problem.” He picks up the mug and hands it back to me.
I watch him closely as I sip the soup.
“What I want to know, Theresa, is why you sent a message from Carter’s phone in the woods and who it went to.” He strokes his jawline with the back of his fingers. “Why did I find a burner under the seat in the car?”
I exhale and let my head fall back. “I told you there were things I was keeping from you that have nothing to do with you or your mission . . . The messages are personal.”
“No, they aren’t.” He stands up and leans into the railing at the foot of the bed with his back to me. “1007 . . . is not a personal message. It’s a code, and it looks an awful lot like you are, in fact, attempting to sell information despite your protests.”
Putting the mug down, I get out of the bed and stop behind him, pushing my forehead into his back. “I’m not selling secrets. I don’t know how else to convince you.”
“You can stop sending cryptic messages.”
“Trust me when I say that if I stop the messages, things will get a whole lot worse for everyone.”
I pull my head back as he spins around and looks down at me. “What does that mean?”
“It means you don’t have the whole picture, and at this point, it’s in my best interest to keep it that way, especially with William around.” I cradle my damaged arm. “You can’t protect me, not from everyone that’s coming now, and certainly not from your own team. Let me protect myself.”
“I’m sorry, but August is already working on tracing the destination of your messages.”
“Tell him I said good luck.” I turn back to the bed and sit. “The messages go to a server and are relayed through an automated Voice Over Internet Protocol, which is untraceable. I know my way around a computer too, York.” I pull the covers back up.
“Just like you know your way around a rifle and pretend you can’t throw a punch?”
Our gaze meets again. “Yeah, something like that.”
“Who are you?” His eyes narrow.
What am I? is the better question.
“Exactly who you think I am, exactly what the file says . . . exactly the person you’ve spent the last week or whatever with.”
“I want to believe you.”
“Then do it, because I’ve started believing you.”