Chapter 19

NINETEEN

Her side hurt like a bitch. Meg stared up at the towering roof filled with broken and jagged skylights above her. The echoes of gunfire still rang in her ears.

Rushing footsteps, Declan’s voice, Tessa crying…it all filtered through her ringing ears, seeming distant and fading.

Dec’s face appeared above her. He sunk to his knees and ran gentle hands over her, assessing her injuries. “You’re going to be fine,” he said, even though he pulled up short when he touched her left side.

She coughed up blood. “Hagar?”

Men and women in dark clothes and caring weapons rushed the scene. Director Flynn appeared beside Dec, his face grim as he stared down at her. “Declan followed orders for once and didn’t kill him. After that snafu with the Romanian police, I decided to step in and take over. Hagar has earned himself a one-way ticket to one of my favorite prisons.”

A black site where he would be tortured and interrogated. Good.

A medic with a severe expression and carrying a duffel with a first aid cross on the end eased down on the other side of Meg. She assessed her in one quick glance, unzipped the bag, and shoved something from it at Declan. “Press this against the wound.” She glanced up at the Director. “She needs a hospital before she bleeds out.”

Flynn moved away, barking orders. The medic set up an IV and poked Meg in the arm with the needle. “I’ll be all right,” Meg assured Declan, even though she felt herself floating away.

He patted her cheek. “You’re brilliant, you know that, right?”

She tried to smile, but her muscles didn’t want to respond. Her body trembled, and her teeth chattered. “I’m cold,” she whispered. “Really cold.”

Then Spence was there, grabbing hold of her hand and squeezing. “You’re going into shock. We’re going to take care of you.”

“Why are you…here?” she forced out.

Come to think of it, why was Flynn?

“Flynn and Del were in Spain, and after they found out I had the USB, they came here. Del has been working on decrypting the security on that drive. I’ve been tracking your phones.” He gave her hand another hard squeeze. “As soon as we found out Hagar had been released and you guys were at the train station, Flynn decided it was time to step in. He claims he came here to fire you, but I think he wants to insert himself in our hunt for Tommy.” He gave her a wink.

The medic handed the IV bag to Spence. “Hold this up and keep it above her head.” She called to somebody over her shoulder. “We need to move her.”

The room was growing dim. Meg blinked at the dozens of black spots blurring her vision. “Is Tessa…?”

Declan shushed her as the medic gave her a shot of something. “Enough talk for now. You need to conserve your strength.”

“I’m fine,” Tessa’s voice called from across the expanse.

“Sanitize the place of our presence,” Flynn ordered those with him. “Blindfold Hagar, and let’s get out of here.”

Someone handed Declan a blanket, and he wrapped it around her. “This is going to hurt,” he said. “I’ll make it up to you, I promise.”

And then he lifted her from the floor. She wished she had something to bite down on, but she didn’t. A scream tore from her throat before everything went black.

Three weeks later

The Farm

Meg thought she was going to die.

In fact, she wished she would.

Death would be a step up from the torture Dec was putting her through on the obstacle course from hell.

He’d already made her run two miles. A slow, grueling two miles since she was still recuperating from the damage Hagar’s machete had done to her.

But, by God, she was up and moving. Her internal organs were on the mend—sore but restored to functionality after emergency surgery and a second follow-up. The puckered skin was still pink, but the stitches were dissolving, and she had found a tiny bit of appreciation for it since Dec had been massaging the area with oil every night before they went to bed.

“Keep crawling, Carson,” he barked, his clipboard and stopwatch in hand. “You’re losing time.”

Sweat poured down her face, and she was completely covered in mud, her body aching from trying to get back into shape. She hated every minute of it but knew she needed it. Her muscles remembered all of this, and yet, in only three weeks, she had lost most of her strength and endurance. She had completed several rounds of physical therapy. It wasn’t enough.

The Farm. Declan. Those were the things she needed.

When she wasn’t training physically, Flynn had her sitting in a cubicle analyzing Hagar, his allies, and the information that Del had so far retrieved from the USB. When no one was looking, she ran searches looking for Tommy. It wasn’t the same as being in the field, but at least she felt like she was doing something.

Flynn knew, of course. He kept tabs on every keystroke and every phone call she made, but he didn’t reprimand her. They all wanted to find him.

As she crawled through the mud, every breath she took was for Jessica. For the Black Swans. For her. She was going to be a team player again, even though Flynn refused to discuss putting her back in the field. She was too much of a wildcard, he said, and she didn’t deserve to lead the swans anymore.

He was full of shit, and she was going to prove it to him. She’d told him so, in fact.

“I look forward to it,” he’d replied like the bastard he was. “Show me what you’ve got.”

Declan’s muddy boots were in sight as she dug her elbows into the mud and grunted. “Come on, Carson. What is this, your day off? Acting like a girl again, are you? Thinking I’m going to cut you some slack?”

Once a marine, always a marine. Once a drill sergeant, always a pain in her ass.

She didn’t have the energy to flip him off, but later… Oh, yeah, later, he would pay for those insults.

She made it to the finish line and collapsed at his feet, barely able to hold her head out of the mud. She heard the click of the stopwatch and his pen scribbling on his clipboard. “Thirty seconds slower than yesterday. Tomorrow, you better pick up the pace.”

He didn’t give her any quarter, which was exactly how she wanted it. She would rebuild her body, her mind, and her relationships. Tawny and her family were at the top of that list. Declan, Tessa, and Spence were too. She would learn to depend on others and not try to do everything alone.

That would be harder than repairing the damage to her body, but she would do it.

“Can you handle a couple of rounds in the boxing ring this afternoon?” Dec asked.

She rolled over onto her back, staring up at his face, framed by the blue sky above. All this physical activity cleared her mind and brought her clarity she hadn’t had in months. “I’d like to visit Jessica’s grave instead.”

He offered her a hand. “Would you like company? “

Typically, she would’ve dismissed his help and gotten to her feet by herself. Today, she slipped her hand into his and bit back a groan as he pulled her up. She didn’t need his help, but she needed to get used to allowing it. “I think I’d like to go by myself.”

He nodded.

Across the way, Spence appeared, waving a hand at them. “Flynn wants us in his office in thirty.”

Her heart jumped. She looked at Dec. “Tommy,” she whispered and moved as fast as her aching body could for the showers.