Sudden Recall, page 7
Parker glanced at the signs for the next exit.
“Are we getting off the highway?” All that was there were two fast-food places and a gas station with a car wash.
He sped up. After they passed the exit, Parker cut right and sailed down the lane at the last minute. Sienna glanced back then. A compact car cut across two lanes in front of a semi and followed them.
“You didn’t lose them.”
“I know.” Parker’s jaw flexed. “But now we know for sure they’re actually following us.”
“So what now?” He’d pulled into the gas station parking lot, but their tank was still almost full. They’d refueled not too long ago. “What are we going to do? Shouldn’t we be trying to get rid of our tail?”
He headed across the lot. “We’re going to get the car washed.”
*
Parker grabbed his debit card and the receipt from the machine, then pulled the SUV into the car wash. “Any idea who it is?”
Sienna glanced back.
“Middle-aged white male, brown cap. Dark jacket. Can’t see any distinguishing features.” She turned so their eyes met. “Is that what you meant?”
Parker nodded. If they’d had more time, he might have touched her cheek. He might have tried to find the words to tell her how amazing he thought she was, facing all this with no memory. No recall of the skilled woman she used to be.
He looked away, out the back window. The man following them pulled out of the line for the car wash. If it was Parker, he’d be driving around to the front to await their exit and make his attack on them before they knew what was happening. But it was his job to stop the man from doing exactly that—and to keep Sienna safe in the automatic car wash while he did.
He slipped the vehicle into Neutral, leaned over and flipped the latch on the glove box. The weapon inside was unloaded. He handed it to Sienna and then passed her the magazine.
“Slide it up hard. Pull back…”
Sienna cocked it.
“The safety…”
She flipped the safety off.
“Okay, then.” Parker couldn’t see the man behind them.
“I didn’t like feeling unsafe. I took a class and learned how.”
He grabbed the door handle by his side. “Stay here. If your life is at risk, you fire at your attacker and you aim to kill. There is no other reason to shoot a gun at someone. But you do not leave this car. That weapon is only for an emergency, and it is the farthest thing from what I want to happen to you. I’ll be back in a few minutes. You only need to sit tight.”
Thankfully, she nodded with no argument.
Parker breathed a sigh of relief and hopped out of the car. He ducked between the swirling brushes and got sprayed in the face as he sprinted to the entrance. With his shoulder against the wall, he checked the area outside. When he was sure it was clear, he raced out, weapon out in front and angled down, two hands on the grip. He circled the outside of the car wash.
Months ago, Sienna would have been right beside him step for step. Just as capable as he was at going up against this assailant. While part of him mourned the loss of the connection they’d had, he was also glad for the opportunity to protect the woman she was now. Not that the helpless female should be grateful the big strong man could keep her safe. Even when there was nothing between them, not a trace of the fact that he might’ve traded everything he’d had for her, he still wanted to be the one she turned to.
He might even go so far as to thank the God that Sienna prayed to for the chance to be the one who kept her safe when she needed it the most.
He glanced around the corner of the building. The sight of the car that had followed them, now angled toward the exit where Sienna would emerge, snapped him out of his thoughts. A man stood between the body of the car and the open driver’s door. His weapon wasn’t visible, but Parker wouldn’t take for granted what he couldn’t see. No one came to a fight without first arming themselves. Not if they expected to live through it.
Parker ducked between two cars parked by the gas station’s small store and pulled out his phone. He only had seconds before the SUV, and Sienna, emerged from the car wash. Phone first, he lifted up, zoomed in and then snatched a picture of the man as best he could from this distance and angle. He would be able to email it in to the office later that morning. Then hopefully they’d be able to get an identity on this man.
His wet clothes were plastered to his body, chilling him in the early-morning air. Parker got close enough so that he saw the man reach into the back of his waistband below his jacket and draw something out.
“Drop it and put your hands on your head.” He used his best “cop” voice.
The man spun. He was older, middle-aged, which to Parker’s late thirties meant the man was pushing sixty. The man’s eyes narrowed and he started to draw his weapon up.
Parker didn’t move except to widen his stance. “Don’t.”
The front end of the car was all the way out. Sienna had climbed into the driver’s seat. She glanced around and spotted him.
“Put it down.” He didn’t want to shoot this guy, whoever he was. But neither could he let the man continue to follow them every step of the way on their search for the flash drive.
The SUV’s engine revved.
The man flinched but didn’t turn to see what was behind him. And he didn’t drop his gun or run away.
Sienna drove toward them. She picked up speed as she got closer and closer to the car and the man. Parker started to back up.
The SUV slammed into the back left corner of the car. The engine revved again as she used the size and momentum of Parker’s vehicle to ram the car. Metal crunched against metal as Sienna pushed the car sideways.
The man yelped and dove out of the way. Parker ran around the car to the SUV. She stopped. The gunman was up. Parker flung the rear door open as shots hit the window on the opposite side. Glass shattered and Sienna screamed.
“Drive!”
The SUV shot away and sideswiped the car once more. Gunshots slammed into the back quarter panel and back window as they bumped the curb out of the gas station.
Parker’s phone rang. He pulled it from his pocket as he climbed into the front passenger seat.
He offered a distracted “Yes?” and swiped most of the glass from the seat with his sleeve.
“It’s Nina.”
“You have interesting timing.”
Karen had indicated Nina wasn’t to be trusted. Unless it was some kind of personal difference that put them at odds, there had to be a reason for it. There was no way of knowing, given he or Sienna couldn’t exactly pick up the phone and call the CIA and ask.
It could just be that Karen simply didn’t want Nina to hinder Sienna’s search. Nina had proven to be helpful so far, and he wasn’t going to completely shut her out.
He glanced at Sienna; her eyes were wide as she gripped the steering wheel. Had the adrenaline of the past few minutes jogged loose any memories? He couldn’t be sure until they got some downtime and he could ask her. “Are you on that guy behind us? Is that why you’re calling?”
He glanced over his shoulder but couldn’t see out the cracked back window.
“What guy? I’m working a different angle. What happened? Is Sienna okay?”
“Just a stray following us. She’s shaken up, but other than that I think she’s fine.” Beside him Sienna nodded. “She’s fine.”
“Good.” Nina sounded relieved.
Parker smiled as he looked toward the side window. This woman wasn’t going to give him any slack if Sienna got the slightest scratch. He would get the full force of her ire in return for any harm that came to her friend.
That kind of love was hard to find. Though Parker had looked plenty—and even thought he’d had it for himself a couple of times. The fact that Sienna had it with her friend was a very good thing, and he was happy for them both even if maybe a little jealous.
If he and Sienna ever got to the place where they could try again to find a relationship, would he be brought into their fold? He couldn’t see how it would happen immediately, but maybe after a time he would feel like part of their makeshift family.
Parker shoved aside the train of thought and said, “What did you need?” He would support Nina’s effort as much as he could.
“Karen doesn’t want me to interfere, but I sent her on a tangent. I want to meet up with you guys. Where are you headed?”
Parker explained about Sienna’s uncle’s ranch.
“That’s the best idea I’ve heard in a year.”
Parker had another one. “Can I send you the picture I took of the man following us?”
“Definitely.”
If she could get an identity for them, it would put them a step closer to figuring out the mission Sienna had been on and what was on that flash drive everyone wanted.
Parker hung up and went in his phone gallery for the one he’d taken of the man. Sienna jerked the steering wheel hard to the right and pulled over. She put the SUV in Park with the front right wheel on the sidewalk. When Parker looked up her attention was on the phone.
Before he could ask, she said, “I know who that is.”
EIGHT
“Wait a second.” Sienna frowned. “Let me gather my thoughts. You look mad. Did I not do the right thing, hitting his car with yours? I was acting on instinct. Was that okay?”
She couldn’t see that too much damage had been done to Parker’s car. The man who’d been following them, on the other hand, his car was crumpled all down one side. She was pretty sure she’d popped one tire. He wouldn’t catch up to them anytime soon.
Parker shifted the phone in his hand. She knew he wanted to talk about the photo, but she had to get past this moment first. The memory was still piecing itself together in her head, and she needed more time.
The adrenaline of the moment rushed through her. It fired synapses and made her feet jittery. She tapped the steering wheel even though they were still parked on the side of the road in the middle of the day. Someone driving past would think they were up to something or in trouble.
“Sienna.”
She glanced at him.
“There’s no reason to second-guess yourself. Don’t worry about the truck—it’s not a problem. Trust what you learned with the CIA, even though you don’t remember it. It’s like muscle memory. Buried in there is everything you need to keep yourself safe.”
She hadn’t even thought of that. Could she really have all those spy skills she saw in movies? Escape and evade tactics, or whatever they were called. Did Sienna have those, buried somewhere in her brain? And why didn’t he act like that was a good thing? Parker was upset about something, or his mouth wouldn’t be pinched like that.
His gaze was like a laser that pinned her to the driver’s seat. “You did what you thought was necessary to save my life, right?”
Sienna nodded. Her only thought had been to keep that man from shooting him. Parker was obviously trained, but tell her nervous heart that in the moment. She’d only been thinking he couldn’t get hurt. That she wasn’t going to allow it.
“Go with that.”
He knew. Sienna looked away, because he knew exactly why she had hit the other man’s car.
The warmth of his fingers touched her chin. Sienna let him turn her head until she saw a matching warmth in his eyes. Had anyone ever looked at her like that before? “Parker.” His name was a whisper from her lips.
His face filled her vision as he shifted in his seat. His lips drew closer to hers until they were only a hairbreadth apart. Why did this seem so familiar? So comforting? Like everything she had ever wanted, and the only place she wanted to be. The peace of being wanted—needed. The comfort of strong arms.
And for some reason…she’d given it up.
“Why did I walk away?”
Parker sucked in a breath and backed off.
“I want to know.”
He was pulling away, and she was going to lose this connection—the chance to find out what she’d done to them. Why on earth would she have given him up? “I want to know why I chose to leave.”
He stared out the front window. “You chose not to come.” All warmth had evaporated out of his voice, leaving only a lack of emotion she didn’t like at all. Why was he doing that?
Parker sighed. “We were supposed to meet up at the airport in Atlanta. We’d talked about nothing else for days, and when the time came…you never showed. You left me standing there, alone, for four hours, waiting for you to show up.”
She’d hurt him.
“I’m sorry.”
He speared her with his gaze. “For what?”
She didn’t know why she hadn’t been there, but she could still be sorry for the pain she’d caused him. Was she so heartless that he wouldn’t accept an apology for the obvious way she’d blown him off? No. If anything, Sienna thought she might have too much emotion.
Either she didn’t know how to divorce her circumstances from her heart and how to compartmentalize the mission and her personal life, or Parker was the one person in the world who blew through her defenses and left her wide open. It was like he’d flooded every part of her since he pulled up behind her in his truck.
She had to know which.
Sienna prayed for courage to accept the answer, whatever it was. “So I just…never showed, and then nothing? I didn’t give you any kind of explanation?”
“It wasn’t that you’d been hurt. Whatever put you in a coma came later. I know that much.” Parker paused. “You did send me a message.”
“I did?”
“Karen showed up at my apartment two days later.”
Sienna studied his face, but he wasn’t giving away anything.
“She said you chose the mission—your work—over us.”
Sienna shook her head. “Why would I do that?”
Parker’s eyebrows lifted. “You just did.”
“That makes no sense.” She could hardly believe she’d chosen whatever there was at work over this man beside her. Karen had to have the answer. Sienna would get to the bottom of it just as soon as this was over.
*
“It doesn’t matter now, it’s done.” Parker’s heart didn’t agree, but he wasn’t going to let Sienna know that.
Just as soon as she remembered why she hadn’t shown up, she would be leaving again. If he let her back in his heart now, he’d only have to try and dig her out when she walked away. Again. It had been painful enough the first time; he didn’t know if he could handle another.
He was weak.
For all his physical strength, on the inside Parker was just like his dad. He was going to spend the rest of his life pining for a woman who didn’t want him. Not that he had any intention of drowning his sorrows in a bottle. So far he’d made sure he never even got into a position where he might fall into drinking just to try and numb the pain. But that only meant he was left with that aching, gnawing wound Sienna had inflicted.
He unlocked his phone so the photo was on-screen again. “Just tell me about this. You said you knew who this was.”
He had to get something from her, and at this point the job was all there was between them. Her last mission. Her memories. Her answers.
And when it was done, he was going to be the one who walked away.
He would have to. It was the only way Parker was going to survive. Enough of all this unspoken back-and-forth between them. They were nothing but acquaintances with a past she didn’t even remember. He should take a page out of her book and choose his life—and his sanity—over her. Thank you, and goodbye.
Sienna studied the picture. He tried not to let the vulnerability he saw on her face penetrate, but it was tough. He had to steel himself against all that she was. Every single part of her beckoned to him like a lighthouse. But lighthouses were meant to keep people away from disaster. And that was what Sienna was to him. She was the potential for a disaster he was never going to recover from.
Parker lifted the phone. “Who is this?”
Her lips moved, her voice a whisper. “Thomas Loughton.”
Sienna clapped her hand over her mouth.
“You remember him?”
She frowned. “I don’t know. I have his name, those two words in my head. Other than that, nothing. I couldn’t tell you the first thing about who he is, or why he might be following us.” She shook her head. “How did I know that? I don’t know you. I don’t know Nina. How do I know this guy?”
Parker shrugged like it was no big deal, though it stung to hear her say she didn’t know him. While he could bring to mind every single word they’d ever said to each other, she didn’t remember him at all.
He blew out a breath and let go of his spiraling thoughts. He opened his browser and did a basic internet search for Thomas Loughton. The results made his eyebrows lift.
“Newspaper article. ‘Former NSA analyst Thomas Loughton was recently fired under suspicion of espionage. He was questioned by an internal review board, but no formal charges were brought. Disgraced, Loughton returned to his childhood home in Connecticut but hasn’t been available for interview since.’” Parker glanced up at Sienna. “That was eighteen months ago.”
Her eyes were wide. “The NSA?”
“That’s what it says. Which begs the question why a former NSA analyst suspected of what I would guess is leaking sensitive information is following us.”
“Me.”
“What?”
It was like she was trying the idea on for size, getting a feel for processing the details in her brain in the hope it would jog more memories loose. “He’s following me.” Sienna glanced out the front window. “The NSA. Thomas Loughton.”
*
Sienna could see the question; it was on his face. But there was so much swirling in her head, what was she supposed to think? She’d remembered something! Sure, it was only one name, but Sienna wasn’t going to miss the opportunity to celebrate this victory.
The fact that she didn’t remember anything else was frustrating to say the least. It wasn’t like that one memory had opened the floodgates and everything came rushing back. Unfortunately. She knew God wouldn’t just hand over everything she wanted right there in the moment. Often there was something to learn that she never would have grasped if He simply gave her what she asked for.
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