Chapter Thirty-Two
“You’ve done well,” Harrison said. “You managed to get the research, which was more than that bonehead Briggs accomplished in Martinique. Bioteric is pleased, and I’m proud of you.”
Mercedes closed her eyes. She used to live for those words from him. For most of her life, her only goal had been to be a perfect little weapon he could aim and fire with deadly accuracy. She’d been blind when it came to this man, but no more. His favor changed as often as the weather, and she was done trying to win it.
“I’m glad.” Her voice came out normal, steady even though she was shaking with fear inside. “Because I have a request. A favor. It’s important to me.”
“Whatever it is, I’m sure we can accommodate you. Within reason, of course.”
Somehow she doubted her request to let Seb leave would be considered “within reason,” but she had to try. She opened her mouth to ask, but never got the words out.
Harrison steamrolled over her. “I’m told Bioteric has a representative in the city. He’s on his way to you to secure the research.”
She glanced over to the elevator Dr. Oliver and her HORNET bodyguards had used. “What about the doctor?”
“Their representative will speak to her, but if she still refuses their generous offer, you know what to do.”
Claws of dread scraped down Mercedes’s spine. She’d killed before in the line of duty, and likely would again, but not like this. They had Dr. Oliver’s research. What was the point of continuing to pursue her?
Maybe Seb had it right. Maybe the only way out was to just leave. Fade away, disappear, and hope to hell Harrison and Defion never found them.
Instead, she said, “I’ll do what needs to be done.” Because it was as close to the truth as she could get. She’d do whatever needed to be done to protect Sebastian, even if it didn’t align with Harrison’s agenda.
“Good girl. You always were my favorite.”
She hated when he said that. She really did. Because it simply wasn’t true. He had a favorite before her, a man who could do no wrong in Harrison’s eyes. Harrison had even let the guy leave Defion—the first to do so successfully. Supposedly her brother had been the second, but she highly doubted Xander had made it out. Every year on their mother’s birthday, he put peonies on her grave. Her favorite flowers. But the bouquet hadn’t appeared this year. If Xander was alive and free somewhere, he’d have found a way to make it happen.
“The Bioteric rep should be there within the hour,” Harrison continued, all business again. “He requests you wear a red scarf, tied twice around your neck, and meet him in the hotel bar.”
She dragged her focus back to the conversation. “That’s…unusual.”
“He’s an unusual man. Just give him the research and your job is done. Unless, of course, Dr. Oliver refuses Bioteric’s offer.”
She drew a breath in preparation to approach the subject of Sebastian, but Harrison hung up before she got a word out. Shit.
She pocketed her phone.
Red scarf.
Okay.
A quick trip through the hotel’s gift shop netted her the requested scarf. It had little gold accents all over it. Ugly, but it did the job. She tied it twice around her neck—a ridiculous look since the temperature sat at eighty-eight degrees with one hundred percent humidity—and headed to the bar.
She may as well have a drink or two while she waited.
She was sipping her third when the Bioteric rep showed just about an hour later. She made the man the instant he stepped into the bar. He wore his salt and pepper hair in a comb-over and dressed like an English professor, complete with the elbow patches on his jacket. Who wore a jacket in this heat? Oh, right. The man who made her wear a scarf.
If that wasn’t him, she’d eat the damn itchy scarf.
He scanned the room. When he spotted her, his pockmarked face showed only the faintest flicker of interest. At least, until he saw the cooler on the floor at her feet, then a polite smile ticked up the corner of his lips. It wasn’t real, though. There was something plastic about it. Calculated. Empty.
He slid into the booth across from her like they were old friends settling in for dinner together. “I’m so happy to meet you. I hope your trip here wasn’t too difficult?”
Although he spoke English well, his accent said he was native to a German-speaking country. But the words themselves… Polite as they were, he delivered them with zero emotion.
It was…disconcerting.
“Uh, it was fine. Here’s the research.” She grabbed the bag from the seat beside her and handed it to him, not bothering to hide her frown.
As a matter of survival, she’d learned how to read people a long time ago and saw through him like glass. His politeness was as empty as his smile. A ruse, a thin layer of manners hiding contempt.
He didn’t like her. Probably viewed her as beneath him, inferior.
That wasn’t anything new.
His gaze dropped to the cooler. “Is that the sample?”
She nudged it out from under the table with her foot and scooted out of the booth. “My job is done.”
He caught her arm snakebite fast. “What about Dr. Oliver?”
Her stomach clenched and all of her internal alarm bells clanged. She’d met a lot of bad people in her line of work, but none had ever made her want to recoil from their touch.
He did.
She scowled at him and shook off his grip. “She’s staying in this hotel. Top floor. She has two bodyguards with her. Good luck with them. You’ll need it.”
“I’m not worried,” he said and sat back with a mildly contemplative expression on his face. “Dr. Oliver will see the good in what I’m doing once I speak with her.”
Having met Claire Oliver, Mercedes doubted it.
She yanked off the red scarf as she left the bar and tossed it in the trash on her way out of the lobby. Outside, she drew in a breath of muggy air and tried to shake off the chill that had invaded her body. There was something not right about that man, she thought as she stepped forward to claim one of the cabs waiting at the curb.
Dr. Oliver will see the good in what I’m doing…
What was he doing, exactly? And if it was so good, why had Claire Oliver been so intent on keeping her research out of his hands? It couldn’t be about money. Dr. Oliver was such a goody two shoes, she’d probably qualify for sainthood. She didn’t have a greedy cell in her body.
Unease rippled through Mercedes and she glanced back through the cab’s window at the hotel. Not much gave her the willies, but she had them now.
Nope, not her problem. She made herself turn around, face straight ahead. She’d done her job and, despite that man sending up all kinds of red flags, she was cleaning her hands of it.
Her only goal now was to keep Sebastian alive.