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Everyone thought he was dead. That he’d went over that waterfall.
Everyone thought she was dead. Was it time to rise and show the world she wasn’t?
Carefully, she tiptoed to her mind palace where the memories were locked away of that night. Of Jim Lawrence.
Of Ian Kincaid.
One minute.
What if she came forward and exposed what she knew to the world? Would placing her trust in Beatrice, in Ian, be her undoing? Or would it be true freedom? To rid herself of the very thing that kept her imprisoned?
Backing away from the door of those memories, she blew out a tight, nervous breath. Slowly, she returned to the cot and lay down.
This was it. There wouldn’t be another offer, another invitation. She would rot here or be assassinated. One way or the other she and everything inside her head would be extinguished.
She couldn’t let that happen. Like the heroes whose secrets she had kept, she had to close off the fear and compartmentalize the what-ifs. She had a decision to make, and the former courage she’d always relied on to dig up.
Placing the first gummy bear against her lips, she closed her eyes and prayed that Ian wasn’t the man sent to rescue her. Prayed that when he found out she was alive, that he didn’t hate her for it.
Because in the end, her life had cost him dearly. To believe she was a traitor, had betrayed their country—and him. No amount of compartmentalizing or therapy would ever make that right.
Viv took a deep breath and ate the first gummy bear.
Three
Not her. Couldn’t be. Dr. Genevieve “Vivi” Montgomery was dead.
The weak overhead light made her face wan. Without makeup, she looked younger, tired.
Dead.
“Get her shoulders.” Mick Ranger’s tone had a bite to it, snapping Ian out of his shock. “I’ll get her feet.”
The woman on the cot in this bare bones cell had already been declared dead. He and Ranger were pretending to be from the coroner’s office. Why had no one warned him that he’d be picking up a ghost?
I will kill you, Beatrice.
But not yet. This was his mission. His questions and the goddamn answers he wanted would have to wait.
Ignoring Vivi’s pale skin and unmoving chest, he did as instructed. Ranger had gone over the details and the protocols with himad nauseam, as if this were his first op. Now, Ian knew why—the bastard had known their target tonight was going to shake him to his core.
Follow orders. Don’t get distracted. How many times had Ranger drilled that into his head?
Like he was some newbie, a fresh recruit.
He was in a way. He was new to Shadow Force, but not to covert affairs.
Fuckin’ A. You couldn’t die twice. Maybe this was her doppelgänger. Some long lost twin she hadn’t known about.
Or hadn’t bothered to tell him about.
Neither of them had any family to speak of. Her parents were both dead; he’d never known his. But they’d promised each other they would create their own. That they would…
Ranger cleared his throat.
Under the watchful eyes of the guard posted at the open iron door, Ian grabbed her too-thin shoulders and Ranger said, “One, two, three.” They team-lifted her onto the gurney with the black bag already unzipped and waiting.
I killed her.
