Total pages in book: 153
Estimated words: 140965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 705(@200wpm)___ 564(@250wpm)___ 470(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 140965 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 705(@200wpm)___ 564(@250wpm)___ 470(@300wpm)
“I’m with you, Draden,” she said softly. “I’m right here with you every step of the way.”
He slid the pad of his thumb over her perfect skin. Had there been hurt in her voice? “Baby,” he said softly. “I’m not trying to push you away. I’m trying to save your life. I want you to live. You’re extraordinary. The world needs you.”
She shook her head. Tears glistened on the tips of her lashes. Yeah, he’d hurt her. He slid his thumb over her lips needing to stop the trembling.
“Do you really believe that?”
If she kept blinking and sending those tears trailing down her face, he wasn’t going to be responsible for what he did. “Absolutely.”
“I kill people, Draden. I can justify it and call it everything but that, but I kill people. That’s hardly extraordinary.”
“Of course, it is. Men like the Williams brothers, Agus Orucov and Montgomery are willing to wipe out the population for money or power. Someone has to track them down and take them out. The world does really need you, Shylah.”
There was a long silence while she stared into his eyes, and he felt as if he might be drowning. The sensation was so real he held his breath.
“I don’t want the world, Draden. I just want you. Here. Now. Whatever we’ve got in the time we have left.”
He heard the sincerity in her voice. She knew what she was facing just as well as he did. She’d seen the evidence, the results of such a horrific virus. His heart clenched. No one had ever wanted him, not in his entire life. His own mother had thrown him away, essentially traded him for drugs. It had started there and gone further downhill.
He leaned into her and took her mouth. Gently. His body stirred, a familiar ache now, when she was close. She had captured his heart and he didn’t ever want it back. The taste of her was wild, hitting his veins and spreading like wildfire. He’d never felt so alive and it was rather ironic that he was dying.
He lifted his head reluctantly, knowing that each time he kissed her, he was sealing her fate. He stroked his thumbs down the path of her tears and then brushed kisses over her eyelids. “Let’s go inside. We both need to lie down for a little while.”
She nodded and turned away from him to open the door. They both knew no one was inside. The webs had been intact and neither one of them felt their radar going off as it would have with an intruder, but they still paused to double-check before stepping inside. The habit was ingrained in both of them.
Draden loved that he didn’t have to remind Shylah, that she was already in sync with him about their security. Another person might have been so overwhelmed with the thought of dying that they couldn’t cope, but Shylah was determined to make every second count—and she wanted to spend that time with him.
Once inside the ranger cabin, Shylah went to her backpack. No one would suspect a young woman hiking in the forest to be a seasoned assassin.
“You’ve had some time to poke around. Why do you think Whitney’s virologists took off before they figured out a vaccine? Was it the fact that the World Health Organization had been called in? Or that the Indonesian government were sending their elite to Sumatra?”
“Why do you think they didn’t find a vaccine?”
He shrugged. “No evidence at all. None. No notes, no entries, no coming close.”
“I think they were panicked,” Shylah said. “For sure. They didn’t even take the time to wipe the computer. They ran. That makes me suspect it was more likely the MSS were hunting them. Either for more of the virus, the vaccine or because they hadn’t realized it was that lethal. It makes more sense that they were being hunted. I tracked them to the MSS village, remember? Their tracks showed they left without hurrying, but they never returned to the lab, they fled, using the river as an escape.”
“There’s no sign of the MSS beyond those two villages.”
“Not yet, but the commander of the MSS could have easily said something to the three of them that made them feel threatened enough to run.”
Draden nodded in agreement. The action sent a burst of pain radiating through his head. “I’m really damned tired, Shylah,” he confessed. “More than I’ve ever been in my life.”
“You’re injured, Draden. You need to eat better and sleep the entire day today. That head injury was far more severe than either of us guessed.”
His gaze was on her face while she reassured him. He would have believed her more if worry hadn’t been there so plain in her brown eyes. He glanced down at his watch. He only had a few minutes to rest before he would have to meet the helicopter and Joe. He knew he wasn’t going to have Shylah come with him. This time he was going to make it clear that he wanted her saved. There had to be a way, even if that meant physically removing her to a hospital somewhere.