Page 86 of Agent Zero
“N-no, it’s not.”But she wriggled away from him, his arms suddenly cold without her breathing weight.“We still h-have to escape.”Her face was a pale smear in the darkness, her eyes just a glimmering suggestion, but he could see her chin lift a little, her shoulders pushed back.It made his chest feel a funny—loose, and strange.“I’m all right.”
Oh, Christ.Reese lost every battle he’d ever thought of waging with himself, leaned forward, and kissed her.
She tasted like gunsmoke and citrus and adrenaline, like everything that was good and beautiful and maddening in the world.Her hands cupped his face, soft and shaking; he fell into her for an eternity before she retreated, breaking free with a low inquiring noise that tightened every string in his body.She rested her forehead against his, their breath mingled, and Reese realized she wasn’t the only one shaking.
He was, too.
I am never losing you again.
“Good God, you two.”Cal rolled his window down; the roar of the slipstream married to a burst of sage-scented, dusty desert chill filled the car’s interior.“Quit making out on the job.”
* * *
The next morning found them in a dusty, run-down desert back end of nowhere, a hotel that might have been flea-ridden if it wasn’t so goddamn cold.For all that, the cash from dead soldiers’ wallets paid for a room, and the water was hot.It was enough to keep them from freezing to death, and even though Reese and Cal should have shared watches, he realized they hadn’t when he woke on one of the double beds, his arms around Holly so tightly they ached.She was still out like a light, and what had awakened him was Cal’s soft movements.
The door shut, almost silently, and Reese took care not to disturb her as he slid off the bed.They hadn’t even bothered with the bedspread, or taking their clothes off.
Sleep was the best thing for her right now.
Outside held a slowly ripening desert sunrise, the bitter cold turning his breath into a plume, little curls of steam rising from Cal’s forehead as the other man stood staring at the eastern horizon.The parking lot, cracks in the concrete a map of contract and expand, hosted a sprinkling of older cars.Their dusty Ford sedan fit in perfectly, but it needed new plates.They should have taken care of that last night.
Oh, well.He got tired of waiting for Cal to start talking, for once.“Leaving so soon?”
“Got to find me that girl.Trinity.”Stubble rasped as Cal rubbed at his face.“And you’ve got to stash that one somewhere safe.”
Believe me, I will.“And then what?”
“I don’t know.”
Silence.The sun, just peeking over the horizon, was a smear of crimson, faint scattered clouds taking on a rosy blush.A red dawn.
Finally, Cal spoke again.“You were right not to trust me.”
There was a lot that statement could mean.Reese waited, his shoulders tightening fractionally.
“Heming tried to get me, then they nabbed me when they killed Tracy.Bronson sent me out to get you.Figured it took one to catch one, and he convinced himself I wanted to be back in the agency’s good graces.Some of the files were doctored, but I managed to grab others, too.I had agency support until the storm hit, then I dug the tracker out of my hip and I thought, well.So they had leads on you up to Boulder.From there all they had to do was run a sweep with travel parameters, and they probably…” The other agent sighed, a deep, maybe even involuntary breath.“I don’t know.I’m...sorry.”
The chill was all through Reese now, the unforgiving calculation of a mission where an untrustworthy element had now been exposed.There were predictable, trained responses he could give—including tying Cal off.
Then he’d have to hide the body and hustle Holly out of here.
For a moment he was back in the heat and the smoke, the knife clattering on the floor and the wide dark eyes of two children mixing with Holly’s clear, beautiful gaze.
You’re really real.To me.
What would a really real man do?He didn’t know.
So, then, what would Holly do?Something idiotic, like not killing this agent.
Somethinggood.
“You had your reasons.”Reese’s voice surprised him.Thoughtful, and even.“Are you going back into the program?”
“Oh, hell no.”The tension of readiness drained out of the other man.Had he been expecting Reese to smoke him?“Division’s got all the data.They’ll make more.Maybe with less emotional noise.We’re going to be obsolete.”
And you say you’re not good at long-range planning.“Which makes us loose ends.”
“Yeah.You got a plan?”
