CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Head pounding, Becca opened her eyes to find herself in the arms of a masked commando. His skeleton face fixed in an evil grin, he stared down at her as he hefted her higher, holding her tighter against his chest.
Oh God! She should’ve been terrified. Scared out of her mind. Shitting her pants. She wasn’t. Black eyes, infinite and deep, held hers. Comfortable. Easy. Intimate. And those eyelashes? So unfair. Super dark. Super long. Super thick.
She’d seen eyelashes like his before.
On another man. In another place. At another time.
“Welcome back, Bec. Can you hear me?”
Bec? She slow-blinked, positive she’d heard wrong.
Only one person had ever called her Bec. Well, sometimes two, if she included her sister when Maya was in the mood to mock her, throwing Jay’s pet name for her out there in a fit of jealousy, like the three-letter word actually contained four letters.
“Are you hurt?”
She shook her head. Aside from the buzzing in her ears and the fact her heart was about to bust its way out of her rib cage due to the familiarity of his voice, she didn’t think she’d suffered any injuries during the gunfight.
“Can you walk?”
She shook her head again. Walking required a functioning body. Muscles and bones working together to support her weight. Her insides? Total mush. Forget about standing on her own. Not gonna happen.
Not until she had her quaking limbs under control and a brain capable of issuing commands worth following. And considering her mind seemed hell-bent on conjuring ghosts from her past, it’d be a while before she’d be able to function normally on her own.
“Where’s Maya?” she croaked, choking on the fear the mere mention of her twin stirred within her. “Is she here? Are you taking me to her?”
Despite her voice barely making it above a whisper, the soldier startled, his eyes flaring wide. “Shit, Cody. Hold up. I need Jamie to look at Becca. I think she might have a concussion.”
“In here.” The reply instantaneous, whoever led their procession ducked into the conference room. “We need to be quick.” Tall, muscled, and intimidating, the man in charge stationed himself near the open door, gun at the ready as the one holding her passed him by to set her down gently on the boardroom table.
“Mac, you got him?” The soldier with the medic bag strapped to his back shoved Roman toward his heavily armed associate.
“Yeah. Back against the wall, asshole.” Another shove, and her tormentor’s shoulders slammed into the plaster. His hateful gaze landed on her from across the room, and the malice it held did wonders for her already over-stressed heart, causing it to double thump painfully.
Did Maya want him alive? Is that why he’d escaped the computer lab unharmed?
“Let me in.” One Kevlar-covered torso replaced another, ice-blue eyes blocking her line of sight.
Nope. Wrong color. She didn’t want to look into those eyes. She leaned to the side, searching for a set of warm black irises as strong fingers pressed against the skin of her neck. In the quiet that followed, she felt the irregular drumming of her own pulse.
Too fast. Way too fast.
“Look straight ahead.”
She did as she was told. An automatic response to the direct command of someone exuding professional authority, and with an audible click, a small flashlight rendered her momentarily blind as it swung left to right and back again.
“Pupils are equal and reactive. Follow my finger without moving your head.” One palm resting on her shoulder, he shifted the pointer finger of his free hand up, down, side-to-side, and back to center. “She’s tracking fine.” He squeezed her collarbone and let her go. A weirdly reassuring gesture. “Let’s get her home, Jay. I’ll do a full workup when we get there, just to be on the safe side. Sound good?”
Her mind blanked. One word taking up sole residence and echoing in the silence.
Jay. Jay. Jay.
The mysterious soldier’s name was Jay? A prickling of awareness flushed over her skin, making her body tingle.
Couldn’t be. Jay Mann? Here? On Big Diomede? With her?
Impossible. Improbable. Inconceivable.
