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He could have given her the hours if she’d asked. Gabe cursed himself. It didn’t please him that he could recall something so painful in such detail.
“That long,” she mumbled.
Yeah, that long. But half of that time she’d been gone. Now, here she was—right back in his life. It had taken him too long to get over her the last time. She’d turned him upside down and hung him out to dry. He didn’t want another dose of that.
Even with the dye job, she hadn’t changed much. A little thinner. And maybe there was something different about her expression. The old Leigh had been so self-assured. Not now though. There was a good reason for that. After all, someone had tried to kill her. That murder attempt no doubt had something to do with what had brought her back to him. Fate working overtime again.
Sometimes fate didn’t know which end was up.
Well, he wasn’t about to buy into anything that dealt with fate.
She continued to stare at him as if sizing him up. “Why didn’t you say something earlier about being my husband?”
“There wasn’t time. You were unconscious when I brought you here.” He knew that wouldn’t be the last of her questions, and he didn’t have to wait long for her to verify that.
Leigh glanced at his hand. “Why isn’t either of us wearing a wedding ring?”
Hell. The woman could certainly open old wounds. Gabe pulled the neck chain out of his T-shirt so she could see the simple gold band that it held. “I’m left-handed, and it catches on the holster. I’m not sure where your ring is. Maybe it slipped off in the lake.”
Or maybe she’d thrown it away. He wouldn’t put it past her. Obviously their marriage vows hadn’t meant much to her. He couldn’t say the same. And that was probably the only explanation he had for why he still wore his wedding ring. One thing was for sure, as soon as he got out of there, he planned to get rid of it. It was something he should have done months ago.
“I have to go,” Jinx announced, the sound of his voice slicing through the heavy silence. “I need to update a few people about what’s happened and try to figure out what we’re going to do. Gabe, you wait here with Leigh.”
Of course. Gabe hadn’t expected it to be any other way.
“I should head out, too,” Agent Walters added after checking her watch. She gave Gabe’s sleeve a tug. “No improvising, all right?”
Gabe didn’t concur either verbally or otherwise. Nor did he disagree with the woman who was coleader of this so-called task force. He just kept his rebellious thoughts to himself. “I’ll walk you two out.” He stood and looked down at Leigh. “Stay put.”
Her unbandaged eyebrow winged up. “Do I have a choice?”
“No,” he clarified over his shoulder.
“I told you to be nice to her,” Jinx said the moment they were outside the door. “I told you to gain her trust.”
Gabe wanted to laugh. “I don’t perform miracles.”
“No, but you will do your job.”
Jinx’s words hit him like a heavyweight’s fist, even though Gabe had tried to brace himself for it. “And what exactly do you mean by that?”
“It means you’ll protect her until we can make other arrangements.” There was no hesitation in Jinx’s tone, and that tone drew a clear line between their friendship and his role as Gabe’s boss.
Gabe scrubbed his hand over his face. “It means you want me to be her bodyguard.”
“If necessary,” Teresa piped in. Jinx gave a nod of agreement.
It would be necessary. No doubt about it. That was the only way Gabe could see this playing out. Heck, if he hadn’t been on the receiving end of this assignment, he might have even considered it a good idea.
There were just a couple of problems with this particular plan that Jinx and Teresa had come up with for him. It would mean he’d have to spend a lot of time with his wife. A wife he didn’t want. A wife who didn’t want him. But she was also a vulnerable woman with a killer after her.
Hell.
He’d do what the Justice Department wanted him to do, and then he was out of there. Leigh could go back to whatever the hell she’d been doing, and he would get on with his life. All he had to do was keep her alive, catch the bad guy and leave. Especially, leave.
There was no way he’d allow himself to be drawn back into her life. No way.
LEIGH WAITED until Sanchez and the others walked out of the room. “Stay put,” she said, repeating the terse order he’d just given her. “As if I had a choice.”
In fact, her choices were extremely limited. Possibly even nil. She had amnesia, was hurt and didn’t know where she could go to get out of danger. That didn’t mean she trusted the three people who’d just left the room. Or that she believed them. She was almost positive they hadn’t told her the truth.
It’s what you have to tell her, Agent Teresa Walters had said before they knew she was awake. People didn’t usually make remarks like that if they planned to tell the truth.
The whole truth, anyway.
So just what did the others want Sanchez to keep from her? She certainly intended to find out.
Realizing that she had to go to the bathroom, Leigh tossed back the covers and swung her legs off the gurney. She was achy, and her vision was spotty. There was a thick white bandage completely encircling her right ankle, and when she stood, the stitches pinched.
She made use of a pair of green flip-flops that were under the gurney and went in search of the bathroom. It wasn’t hard to find. It was the only door other than the one through which her fearless protectors had exited.
The bathroom was enormous and had two vats filled with dirty linen and hospital-style gowns. The laundry chute was as wide as the bins, indicating the need to send plenty of soiled clothing to the laundry room. A regular clinic probably wouldn’t have such a need.
So just what was this place?
Since she hadn’t heard any traffic or sounds normally associated with a clinic, it was probably some secured area. Perhaps a military installation or maybe a safe house used by the FBI.
Now, just what did the FBI and an ATF agent want with a bookstore employee from Austin? Perhaps the books in the store weren’t the run-of-the-mill variety. If so, she was obviously more than just a concerned citizen.
Leigh put that thought on the back burner when she noticed the mirror above the sink. She approached it cautiously, afraid of what she might see in her own reflection. And equally afraid of what she might not see.
Disappointment soon replaced the cautiousness. She didn’t recognize a thing about herself. The face of a stranger stared back at her.
A troubled stranger.
Almost frantically, she studied her face harder, trying to force herself to see something familiar. She was pale and wondered if it was from the trauma or if that was her usual coloring. Perhaps a combination of both.
The skin surrounding the bandage was bruised—the purplish stain bled down to her cheekbone where someone had obviously hit her pretty hard. A blunt object was her guess.
Her features weren’t prominent. Average. She certainly wasn’t beautiful. Her hair was chin-length and cedar-colored, but since her roots were light brown, she figured that she wasn’t a natural redhead. She checked in the most obvious place to verify her conclusion, stretching out the waist of the scrubs to look inside.
No. She wasn’t a redhead.
She leaned closer to the mirror, suddenly puzzled by her eyes. They weren’t the same color. One was dark brown; the other, pale green. She automatically reached toward the brown eye and removed the colored contact that had camouflaged her iris. So, her eyes were really green, and since she could see perfectly without the contact, she had to believe she’d worn them for cosmetic reasons.
Why?
Colored contacts. Dyed hair. She’d disguised her appearance. It made sense. Perhaps she’d been hiding because someone wanted her dead. Too bad the disguise hadn’t worked. Obviously, someone had seen right through it and gone after her.
Leigh noticed the scar then. A puckered dimple on her right forearm. It appeared to be well healed, but she thought it might be a bullet wound. Or maybe her imagination was just working overtime. Just the sight of the injury, however, caused a sickening feeling in her stomach. It was yet another chilling reminder of her past she couldn’t remember.
She finished up in the bathroom, returned to the room and got back on the gurney. A moment later, Gabe pushed opened the door and came in with a large disposable cup in each hand.
“Coffee,” he announced. “I figured you’d need your caffeine fix by now.”
Leigh didn’t know about that, but the steamy brew smelled wonderful. “I’m a big coffee drinker?”
He nodded and glanced at one cup and then the other, apparently trying to decide which one was hers. He finally took a sip from one and grimaced. “Yours. Three sugars, just the way you like it.”
She took the cup, knowing she would indeed like it. Odd. Why had sugary coffee felt familiar and not her husband?
Her husband.
As she’d done to her own face in the mirror, Leigh scrutinized his. Actually, he wasn’t bad-looking. A little on the rough side, and the small scar on his chin only contributed to that image. His skin was a pale bronze, obviously a DNA contribution from the Hispanic heritage that his surname signified. The dark blue eyes, however, indicated some Anglo blood as well. All in all, it was a good mix that had produced an interesting face.
His eyes were…not bedroom eyes, even though it was the first description that sprang to mind. The dark lashes made them look half-closed, dreamy, but there was nothing bedroom about them. Those eyes meant business.
“Is the coffee all right?” Gabe asked when she took a sip.
“It’s fine. So, you know how I like my coffee—that still doesn’t mean I believe everything you’ve told me.” Placing her cup on the table beside his, she glanced at her ring finger and noticed a faint line. Not necessarily from a wedding band. But it was possible. “Did I have any ID on me when you pulled me out of the lake?”
He stretched out his leg so he could work his fingers into the front pocket of his jeans. He fished out a single key. “This was tucked under the floor mat in the car. It had your fingerprints on it.”
“It’s for a car?”
Sanchez shook his head. “You left the keys to your rental car in the ignition. This looks more like a house key. Is it familiar?”
“No.” It looked like a key, that’s all. A key to a house, and she had no idea where that house might be. Austin, maybe, since that’s where she supposedly worked. “You didn’t find a purse or wallet on me or in the car?”
“I think the person who tried to kill you probably took it.”
That was possible, which made her wonder if the attack was robbery related. But she didn’t think so. She probably wouldn’t be here if it’d been a simple robbery.
Leigh glanced at him. So far, he’d cooperated with her questions. Well, some of them anyway, but she had no way of knowing if what he’d told her was the truth or even part of the truth. Heck, she wasn’t even convinced that the man was truly her husband.
“Why didn’t you kiss me when you pulled me out of the water?” she asked. “If we’re really married, wouldn’t a kiss have been the husbandly thing to do?”
It happened so quickly, she didn’t have time to protest or wonder why she’d issued such a stupid invitation in the first place. Gabe slipped his hand around the back of her neck and angled her head. His mouth came to hers. Touched. Brushed. And lingered.
Before he got down to business.
The kiss that followed was hot and clever. Slightly rough and a heck of a lot longer than it should have been. It certainly wasn’t a husbandly peck. It had a slick veneer of all sorts of emotion, including some anger, but that didn’t quite cover up the pure, raw attraction that sizzled beneath.
When he finally set her free, there was no doubt in Leigh’s mind that she’d been kissed by someone who knew exactly how to do it.
Gabe looked deeply into her eyes. “Remember me now, mi vida?” he drawled, his tone a cocky challenge.
Actually, Leigh didn’t, but she thought she might like to remember him. Too bad that kiss muddled her brain even more than it already was.
She pushed him away and turned her head toward the window. There wasn’t much she could do about her erratic breathing, but she didn’t want him to see the telltale bewilderment that had to be in her eyes.
“Look, I may not know who I am, but I’m not stupid,” Leigh said crisply. “Other than the obvious thing of someone trying to kill me, something isn’t right.”
“Funny, it felt right to me.” When her gaze came to his, he rubbed the pad of his thumb over his bottom lip and flashed her a grin that set her teeth on edge.
“I didn’t mean that kiss. There has to be a reason why I have all these crazy feelings.” Leigh aimed her finger at him when Gabe started to speak. “And I’m not talking about your mouth on mine. Why won’t you tell me what’s really going on here?”
Gabe dropped onto the gurney right next to her. “You’ll be safer not knowing.”
“I didn’t buy that from Jinx, and I won’t buy it from you. I could regain my memory in the next minute, and if I follow through with that asinine theory, I’ll be in more danger than I am right now. Somebody wants me dead, and I don’t think they care if I have amnesia or not.”
He nodded eventually. “Okay. I’ll give you the condensed version.”
“Why not the whole thing?”
“It’ll only muddy the waters, and it won’t help you sort things out.” He didn’t wait for her to agree. “A little over two years ago you came across some sensitive information regarding a high-ranking government official named Joe Dayton.”
Leigh gave that some thought. All right. What he said could be true. “I found this when I was working at the bookstore in Austin?”
The corner of Gabe’s mouth kicked up. “No, you were working somewhere else at the time. And don’t bother to ask where, because I won’t tell you.”
“Another of Jinx’s orders, or did that come from Special Agent Walters?”
“Not Jinx. Not Teresa. My order. Like I said, it’ll only confuse you more if I overload you with a bunch of facts that you don’t need right now.”
Leigh wasn’t happy about it, but she’d take what she could get. Besides, on that point he might be right. “Okay, finish the short version. What about this Joe Dayton?”
“He was as dirty as they come,” he answered after hesitating. “We didn’t know if he was working alone or if what you learned would make you a target.”
She shook her head, not understanding. “So, why did he wait two years to come after me?”
“You’ve been hiding all this time.”
Finally, something made sense. But it was just the beginning. She needed a lot more pieces of information for this puzzle to come together.
Gabe’s pager began to beep. He jabbed the button to make the sound stop and sprang to his feet. In the same motion, he whipped out his pistol and reeled toward the door.
Leigh hadn’t thought she could be any more frightened, but that did it. Her heart began to pound. “What’s wrong?” she asked, getting off the gurney.
Gabe motioned toward the window. “See if anyone’s out there.”
She hobbled toward it, ignoring her stitches, and peeked through the side of the blinds. It was dark, and they were several floors off the ground, but she saw six cars in the parking lot.
“Nobody,” she reported. But the words hardly left her mouth when four men exited one of the cars. “Somebody,” she amended. “There are four of them.”
“Watch the door,” Gabe ordered and then traded places with her so he could glance out the window. “We don’t have much time. We have to get out of here.”
Leigh started out the door, but Gabe latched onto her arm and yanked her back. “We can’t go that way.”
