“Amber! Amber!” He turned her over. There was blood all over her chin and the front of her shirt. Her eyes were open. He pulled his precious package into his arms, hugging her tightly. “Where are you hurt?”
“I’m…okay. I think I bit off part of Dilaver’s thumb. Hawk…Lily…oh God, Hawk—”
“Shhh…it’s going to be okay. I know, I know,” Hawk told her, wiping her face and mouth with his sleeve. She wasn’t hurt so far as he could see, thank God. He lifted her and started to head out toward the entrance. “We’ll talk as soon as we get you taken care of. Jazz, we’re snatching a vehicle and going to the hospital. Call headquarters. They can land something at the UN base or wherever, I don’t give a fuck. Get them to transport her out of here!”
“Aye, aye, sir!”
“You came for me, Hot Stuff.”
Hawk looked down. “Of course I did. Don’t you know I love you yet?”
She smiled weakly. “I love you, too. Don’t leave me alone at the hospital, Hawk. I don’t think I can stand being without you.”
“I’ll never let you go,” he told her.
Lily looked at the buzzing cell phone on the passenger car seat. It lay there beside the small explosive device. She picked it up to check the ID. Brad. She frowned. Not who she was expecting. He shouldn’t be calling her. Dropping it back on the seat, she ignored the sound and continued driving. The cell kept buzzing. She glanced at it several times as the minutes continued. Finally, she reached for it again. Why would a man who should hate her call? Just to tell her he despised her?
“Shouldn’t you be in the hospital?” she asked levelly, keeping her eyes on the mountain road.
“Surprised I’m not dead?” His familiar voice was low.
“I called your housekeeper to make sure she showed up early, you know. I couldn’t let you die.”
“I know what you’re doing, Lily. You can’t do this. I know what you are.”
“What am I?” she asked calmly.
“You’re a CIA sleeper. They used your anger and hatred and programmed you. They channeled all your emotions into looking for a sister you don’t have so you could have a purpose in life, and then they put a trigger in that they could set off when the time’s right. All those cell calls you have been taking…don’t let them use you, Lily!”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You don’t have a sister. It’s you all along! You know this! Stop lying to yourself, Lily.”
Lily frowned. “Llallana,” she corrected. No one was to know about her sister’s identity or—“Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold.”
Brad’s voice was very sad. “The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere the ceremony of innocence is drowned.What comes next, Lily? Say it and be free.”
He had changed the order of the code. She obeyed. “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”
Her consciousness zapped her like electricity. Lily blinked, trying to understand. That line had never been spoken. She was not to say it until she was told to. Something unlocked inside, like an old creaking drawer, and she was drawn to it. There was something waiting for her in there. Open it. Open it. She pulled at the image in her head. The cell phone fell from her hand as she continued driving, staring into the darkness.
She thought she heard someone calling her name. But it was too late. She had to stop what she was doing. There was only one way to obey and disobey. Detonate here. Now.
She veered off the road and drove a short ways away. She braked to a stop as she came close to a cliff. Darkness out there. Like the darkness in her heart.
She deserved what was coming to her. She released the brake.
25
Amber looked up eagerly as the dooropened. Her nurse pushed her wheelchair forward a little as another nurse followed Hawk, also in a wheelchair. She hadn’t seen him for two days since the initial checkup at the hospital. Not that she had been able to talk much anyway. Her drugged body needed time to get rid of the toxins in her system.
“We really have to stop meeting like this,” he said, a small quirk to his lips. His eyes devoured her, taking in every detail. “Like the similar outfit.”
She grinned back. “You look good in a hospital gown. Nice legs.”
He stretched one out, looking down at it with interest. “Oh yeah? I knew there was a reason why the nurses wouldn’t let me put on my clothes for this. What do you think, Nurse Hill?”
“Nice legs, bruised ribs, bad internal injuries,” Nurse Hill summarized from behind him. She smiled at Amber. “He was quite a petulant child the last few days when he couldn’t get to see you. Like you, his body needs rest, but he doesn’t seem to understand that. And he threw a tantrum about his outfit and the wheelchair. Fortunately, he calmed down quickly.”
