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“Then what am I?”
“A nightmare,” she said with a strange sense of private satisfaction. “I wondered if you were with Orion, or Orion himself having fun. But Orion doesn’t work with a partner.”
“Ow. Shit.” Score one for Bailey; her hard head met the equally hard forehead of Heat Seeker. “Now dammit, you didn’t have to do that,” the other man laughed as he backed away a safe distance.
“You’re working with a moron,” she sneered. “Couldn’t you find anything better?”
“Not on such short notice,” Micah said coolly. “Why were you checking me out?”
Bailey remained silent.
“Let’s not go through the whole song and dance again,” he sighed. “Just tell me.”
“Orion killed family,” she finally stated. “I want a piece of him.”
“You and about a dozen other families,” he grunted. “What makes you so special?”
“What makes you so special?” she countered. “How did you figure out where to get in and how so quickly?”
“My business,” he informed her. “Answer the question.”
Her teeth snapped together as John blew another puff of air at her ear.
Bailey had some damned sensitive ears, and Micah knew it. He’d watched her nearly break a man’s neck ten years before when he’d dared to blow in her ear.
“He killed my family, my partner, and he scarred me,” she raged. “What other excuse do I need?”
Did she need more? She had more than he did, but he knew Bailey. She had more.
He shook his head again. “I’m going to start skinning you myself,” he told her. “I’m running out of patience. Why do you want Orion?”
“Because he knows the identity of a monster,” she spat. “The doctor that worked with Clay’s father. A scientist. He’s responsible for the rapes and horrific mutilations of several teenage girls in Ukraine. Girls I knew.” Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Girls I promised to protect.”
Micah closed his eyes and breathed out roughly. He’d had no idea that Bailey had been part of the group of agents that had escorted four teenage girls to a private clinic on the Ukrainian border. Those girls had been taken from the clinic that night by a doctor who had “bought” them from the nurses there. The girls had been found three weeks later in St. Petersburg in a cold dark alley, naked, mutilated, tortured beyond belief.
“I’m sorry about that,” he said softly.
“We were supposed to protect them,” she breathed out roughly. “We swore we would. One of those girls was a damned genius in math. Another was an artist. The youngest wanted to be an astronaut; the oldest just wanted to be safe.”
Risa’s rapist definitely got around. “And how will killing Orion help you to find him?” Micah asked. “He was no more than an employer if he’s involved with Orion.”
“He’s involved,” she answered wearily. “It’s the same doctor one of my family members was tracking. Orion killed her.”
“Ariela Abijah,” Micah said softly.
Bailey stilled as John watched curiously.
“Yes.” She finally nodded, swallowing tightly. “He killed Ariela. Six weeks later my cousin Garren all but killed himself when he rushed a suicide bomber. Two years later, their son, David.” She pronounced his name “Da-Veed,” a sound Micah hadn’t heard for six years. “He was killed two years later when he tracked Orion down to a freighter off the coast of Tel Aviv. Two years later, Orion was hired to kill a Russian double agent I was protecting. He killed my partner and nearly killed me.”
“And six months later you lost the girls from Ukraine,” he stated.
She nodded wearily. “It’s the same man,” she breathed out roughly. “The doctor that hired him to kill Ariela is the same one that tortured those children. And Orion can lead me to him. I’ve been following rumors for two years. It led me here. I almost had him when he attempted to kidnap her.” She shook her head. “In the confusion another vehicle side-swiped mine and I lost him.”
Talk about the mother of all fuckups.
Micah wiped his hand down his face before turning and staring at Jordan where he stood in the open doorway. Jordan shook his head slowly. There was no pulling her in on this, but Micah knew there was no keeping her out of it, either. Bailey was as damned stubborn as her cousins were. She’d die herself before she gave up. Orion had taken too large a piece of her. He’d wounded too much of her for her to ever walk away.
“You’re going to have to let the doctor go,” Micah informed her coldly. “As well as Orion. I’m here to kill him, not question him.”
