CHAPTER 53
Brynn
Olsztyn, Poland
Day Thirty-Seven Off Grid
I didn’t mean to fall asleep.
I sat down on the edge of the bed for one second, just one, and the next thing I knew, someone was knocking.
A firm, deliberate knock.
I jerked upright, heart slamming against my ribs.
Jameson.
He must’ve forgotten the key. He must’ve circled the perimeter and come back around. He must’ve forgotten one of the things he’d staged so carefully because leaving me behind apparently required props.
Another knock. Firmer this time.
“Jameson?” My voice came out rough, sleep-thick.
I pushed off the mattress and stumbled toward the hallway. The house was dim, shadows stretched long across the floor. My pulse was still catching up, still convinced I’d only closed my eyes for a minute.
But something felt wrong.
The house was too quiet.
No movement in the kitchen. No floorboard creak. No low sound of Jameson checking the locks for the third time.
Just the sound.
And me.
I reached the front door, fingers brushing the bolt.
Then a voice came from just beyond the wood. Low. Smooth. Not Jameson.
“Miss Hunt,” the man said.
My stomach clenched.
No.
No, no, no.
That voice wasn’t tired or rushed or cold from being outside. It was calm.
“I know Jameson told you not to answer the door,” the man said.
I froze.
I edged closer to the doorframe. No peephole. No chain. Just a flimsy bolt and my instincts, neither of which felt like enough.
I swallowed hard.
You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.
I backed away from the door and ran for the bedroom.
My feet hit the cold floor too hard. Too loud. I dropped beside the bed, shoved my hand underneath the frame, and closed my fingers around the pistol Jameson had left there.
By the time I got back to the hallway, both hands were locked around the grip and my pulse was hammering so hard it felt like the whole house could hear it.
Silence stretched.
He didn’t knock again. No footsteps shifted on the porch. No floorboard creaked. Nothing moved beyond the door.
He was just there, waiting, like he knew I was on the other side with a gun raised and adrenaline bleeding into my hands.
Like he knew it wouldn’t matter.
“My name is Graham Whitaker,” he said, his voice smooth as ever. “Something happened to Jameson.”
My breath stopped.
Graham Whitaker.
I didn’t know his voice. I didn’t know his face.
But I knew that name.
I steadied my breath. Kept the barrel level. Let my voice drop to something colder.
“You’ve got five seconds to explain before I empty this clip into the door.”
“I’m MI6, Miss Hunt,” he said.
“That’s wonderful,” I said. “This is Poland...”
A pause.
Then his voice softened. “You don’t want to shoot the one person who can help you help Jameson.”
I pressed my back against the wall, trying to think, trying to breathe, trying to understand why this Graham Whitaker was here and Jameson wasn’t.
Then my gaze caught on the curtains.
Thin strips of sun cut through the cracks.
Sun.
My stomach dropped.
More time had passed than I realized.
Jameson was supposed to be somewhere between here and London by this point.
“Miss Hunt,” Whitaker said again. “Jameson is alive.”
My grip went slack for half a second.
“For now,” he added.
The words slid under my skin like ice.
“What happened to him?”
“My people saw him get ambushed on his way to meet me,” he said.
My fingers closed tighter around the pistol.
Ambushed.
The word didn’t fit inside the quiet little house. It belonged somewhere else. A road. A ditch. A black car pulling too close. Jameson reaching for a weapon he didn’t get to use fast enough.
“Where is he?”
“I can show you,” he said.
“No. Tell me.”
“I need you to open the door,” he said.
“No.”
“Miss Hunt,” he said, still calm, still maddeningly careful. “I’m standing outside in broad daylight because I came here to warn you. Whoever took Jameson may already know where you are.”
Shit. Shit. Shit.
My pulse beat hard against my throat.
Every instinct I had screamed not to touch the bolt.
Jameson had told me not to answer the door. He’d said it like a rule. Like survival. Like the last thing between me and whatever came next.
“Miss Hunt,” Whitaker said. “We’re running out of time.”
My stomach turned.
Because Jameson wasn’t here.
And this man knew his name. Knew where we were. Knew enough to stand on the other side of the door and use him like a key.
My hand moved before I was ready for it to.
I slid the bolt free and opened the door.
Daylight hit me like a slap, bright and harsh enough to leave me blinking.
He stood on the porch like he’d been waiting for me to catch up.
One hand relaxed at his side.
The other held a phone.
For half a second, all I focused on was the phone.
Then the common sense hit.
“Wait,” I said.
Whitaker didn’t move.
“How did you know where to find me?”
His expression didn’t change.
And that was the answer.
“Fuck.” I stepped back. “Fuck. I should’ve trusted myself.”
I shoved the door hard, trying to slam it shut between us.
He moved faster.
His shoulder hit the opening before the latch could catch, and the door bounced back against my hand. Pain shot up my wrist. I stumbled, the pistol jerking off line for half a second.
Half a second was all he needed.
He forced his way inside, controlled and silent, one hand catching the edge of the door as he stepped over the threshold.
I already had my aim back on him.
Both hands steady.
Finger on the trigger.
One breath away from making him regret stepping over the threshold.
Whitaker lifted the phone. “Before you make that decision, you should see this.”
“First, you’re going to tell me how you found me.”
His gaze flicked to the gun, then back to my face. “Estonia.”
My eyes narrowed.
“I was late getting into Tallinn,” he said. “By the time I arrived, you and Mercer were already gone.”
“That doesn’t make any sense.”
“Tomar called,” he said, his voice staying maddeningly even. “I assume you know who that is. Said the two of you walked straight into her little dinner party.”
The room seemed to tilt.
Tomar knew.
She’d been playing us the whole time.
Jesus Christ.
So what the hell had the coat closet been?
Screw the clothes. Screw the makeup. Screw the dark hair and the borrowed confidence and every stupid little detail I’d thought had bought us anonymity.
She’d known it was us.
She’d walked in, looked right at us, and let us keep pretending we were just two strangers making bad decisions in a borrowed closet.
Voyeurism at its finest.
My stomach turned so violently I almost looked away from him.
Of course that bitch had called him.
“You’ve been following us since Estonia?”
“Trying to,” he said.
“Then how did you find this house?”
“Tomar gave you a card at the museum,” he said. “You kept it.”
“The card carried a dormant tracker,” Whitaker said. “It transmitted in short bursts once Tomar activated it. Too brief for your scans to isolate, but long enough for us to follow.”
So not an invitation.
Not flirtation.
Not a door.
A leash.
My stomach turned cold as my brain caught up.
“She opened the door,” he said. “I followed the signal once she shared it.”
“And then,” he added, almost conversationally, “as if God had decided to simplify my life, Mercer called me himself.”
My fingers tightened around the pistol.
“He delivered himself to me, Miss Hunt.” He lifted the phone a fraction. “All I had to do was answer.”
Whitaker turned the screen toward me. “Now, you should see this.”
A still image filled the phone.
Jameson was bound to a chair, wrists behind his back, his head hanging like the weight of the world had finally won.
A bruise darkened his jaw. Blood dried at his temple. The angle of his body told me nothing, and for one terrible second, I couldn’t tell if I was looking at proof of life or proof of what came after.
“You son of a bitch,” I whispered.
He didn’t flinch, just lowered the phone. “As you can see, he’s alive.”
“Barely.”
“Alive,” he repeated, calm enough to make me want to put a bullet through the wall beside his head. “That’s the relevant part.”
I forced myself to look at Whitaker instead of the phone.
“People are being killed!”
“It’s the nature of the business, I’m afraid,” he said.
A bitter laugh scraped out of me. “God, you really do hear yourself talk and think it sounds noble.”
A single, slow movement of his jaw was all I got in response.
“So what is this?” I asked. “What’s your play?”
“Tomar sent me to kill you,” he said.
My finger tightened on the trigger.
“But your death would make Mercer impossible to manage.” His gaze stayed on mine. “So I’m offering you a chance to leave.”
I stared at him.
“There’s a car out back,” he said. “Tank’s full. Keys in the ignition. Money in the glove box, enough to vanish for a while. And a phone. One number. It rings straight to me. I want to know when you’re out of Poland.”
He took a slow step toward the window. “You leave today. Alone. Don’t look back. Don’t contact him. Don’t come near Geneva or Estonia.”
He didn’t look at me when he spoke again. “In fact, stay out of central Europe altogether.”
I laughed.
I couldn’t help it.
It came out thin and ugly, too close to panic to be funny. “Right. Because Mirrorstream wouldn’t be able to find me.”
“It won’t,” he said. “I’ll make sure of it.”
Something in my posture gave, small enough that I hated him for seeing it. “You’ll erase me...”
“I’ll erase every parameter that makes you traceable,” he said.
“No.” I shook my head hard. “No, you don’t get to erase me. You don’t get to tell me to run like some liability while you keep your boot on his throat.”
“You will leave,” Whitaker said.
“I will never leave him.”
“You will,” he said.
“No.” My voice hardened. “I’ll expose you first.”
For the first time, something in his face cooled.
Not anger.
Decision.
Whitaker reached for his phone. “I didn’t want to play this card.”
He typed something anyway.
A second passed.
Then another.
He lifted the phone again, the screen already turned toward me.
Jameson was still tied to the chair, but this time the phone showed a video. I could see the barest movement of his chest as he breathed.