The room was dim. My head was pounding. My mouth felt like sandpaper.

Get a fucking grip. Panic gets you nowhere except six feet under. Dead was not on my agenda today.

Closing my eyes, I pushed aside the excruciating pain that racked my six foot four frame and focused my mind. My name… what the fuck was my name?

Carter. My name was Carter… is Carter.

Wait… was it? Yes. My name is Carter. Carter Davis. Former Navy SEAL. Four tours in Afghanistan and many more that weren’t on any government record book. Hell, I was fairly sure I didn’t exist anymore, according to dear old Uncle Sam.

I was no longer in the game. I had enemies, but I’d been off the radar for several years now. As far as I knew, Tex was the only man from my old life who had a vague idea where I was and what I used to be. And that loyal son of a bitch would never give me up.

Was it day? Was it night? Fuck…

My body felt like it had been run over by a Mack truck. Opening my eyes took extreme effort. However, the frantic lavender-eyed woman was gorgeous enough for me to make the effort. She paced the room like a caged tiger—long limbs, wild dark blonde hair and a completely freaked out demeanor.

What in the hell was going on?

“Ohthankfreakingod,” she choked out on a single breath, wringing her hands and peering at me with red-rimmed amethyst eyes. “You’re not dead.”

“Debatable. Do I know you?” I asked in a pained voice that sounded like I’d swallowed gravel.

She’d clearly been crying. Why?

“Umm, no,” she replied haltingly, with shaking hands as she tidied the blankets that covered me. “Not really—not yet… I mean no. No, you don’t know me.”

“Where am I?” I asked, attempting to move my arms. They felt like they weighed a ton. What the fuck?

Had I been poisoned? Kidnapped? The woman smoothing the damp hair from my forehead didn’t seem remotely dangerous or the type to kidnap, but…

“Name?” I demanded roughly, narrowing my eyes while slowly and painfully moving myself to a seated position with Herculean effort. “Location?”

“What the hell? You sat up,” she pointed out, dumbfounded.

Raising my brow and taking in my surroundings, I gave her a curt nod. “Apparently,” I snapped. “Answer my questions before I decide to stand up. I can promise you that won’t end well.”

During my time as a SEAL, I’d been shot, tortured and had gone for weeks without solid food. I was familiar with the side effects of those situations… What I was feeling now?

Well, it was fucked up.

“Georgia.”

“Is where we are? Or your name?”

“Actually both,” she said with a giggle that didn’t belong in this particular conversation. At all.

“How about this, Georgia from Georgia… you tell me what’s going on—all of it—and you’ll leave this room alive.”

“Is there another option?” she asked, wrinkling her nose and tilting her head.

Goddamn it, she was stunning.

Inhaling in through my nose and breathing out through my mouth, I gave myself a second to reconsider suggesting she could get naked and crawl into the bed with me. Once a manwhore, always a manwhore. Clearly I’d lost a few necessary brain cells when I was beaten to a pulp… or run over by a truck… or poisoned… or God only knew what. At least I was in still in the state I’d chosen as my temporary home.

Home was a vague term though. I hadn’t had a home in years and that worked for me just fine. Being tied to anything for longer than a month or two made me uneasy. Quite honestly, this situation was making me uneasy. The woman running the show at the moment was not running on all cylinders.

And why in the hell wasn’t I wary of Georgia from Georgia? I wasn’t in any position to be threatening anyone, even a small woman at this point. She could end me with a needle, a gun, or possibly just by leaving me here to die.

Not being in charge was not my idea of a good time. “You have three seconds,” I growled as she watched me like I was a science experiment gone awry.

“Okay,” she said, expelling a long sigh and gingerly sitting down on the edge of the bed.

For a bad guy—or girl—she smelled awfully good.

“I’m waiting.”

“I’m forming my damn thoughts,” she shot back, running her hands through her wild hair and rolling her eyes at me.

Unbelievable. She’d clearly done something to incapacitate me and was now acting the victim? If I could just stand, I could get my bearings and get the hell out of here. Since that seemed beyond the realm of possibilities at the moment, I’d have to listen to her story. However, the longer she paused, the less likely the truth would fall from her mouth… a mouth that was made for sin.

Damn it, I don’t do the enemy. Right now Georgia from Georgia was the enemy until she proved otherwise.

“Now, this might sound a little weird, but…” she said, while twisting her hair in her slim fingers.

“Did you just say weird?” I asked.

Was I being punked? Was this some sort of fucked up joke compliments of my former unit that I’d avoided like the plague since I’d been stateside?

She nodded and then jumped up and began to pace again. “Yep, weird.”

The room was small and her movement made me dizzy. There wasn’t much to the room—more like an afterthought—a bed, a dresser, a chair and a braided rug that had seen better days…

Was this her home? A motel? Shit, as my body began to regain strength, my mind became more muddled.

“Go on,” I said, not letting on that I was able to move my arms and legs with more ease now. I had no clue if my beautiful Georgia was working alone.

“Okay, so Tex told me to find you.”

“Bullshit,” I interrupted her. “Not possible. He doesn’t know where I am.”

Her pacing stopped and I watched her search for her next lie. “True,” she agreed. “He didn’t know exactly where you were, but… umm…”

“Listen lady,” I snapped, quickly losing what little patience I possessed—which had never been much. “Get to the point. Now.”

“I picked you up in a bar because I’m a… well, I suppose the fastest way to explain it is I’m government experiment. You weren’t hard to pick up at all. I figured you’d be… umm, you know…”

“Clearly I don’t know,” I said, closing my eyes for a brief moment and shaking my head. Georgia from Georgia was missing a few screws. A government experiment?

“I thought you’d be old and ugly.”

“Because?” I asked, somehow finding this bizarre exchange amusing.

“I don’t know,” she replied with an annoyed shrug. “Tex said you were a deadly killer. I need a deadly killer and someone who can make me disappear. He didn’t mention you were hot and ripped and really freaking tall. Anyway, I don’t want to live on an exam table or in a cage for the rest of my life. So since it would take a nuclear explosion to kill my abnormal ass, I decided to escape. But escaping from the government when they’ve spent millions of dollars on you tends to be a bit difficult. Plus, I’m pretty sure I might have accidentally killed a few people on my way out. I tried not to, but… you know, they weren’t too keen on me busting out.”

“Are you right in the head?” I asked, trying to follow her ridiculous story. I did have to admit I enjoyed the hot and ripped part, but… she was unkillable? Living in a cage? Accidentally killed people? If her goal was to confuse, she was succeeding.

“Well, no, probably not. But really, who is?” she asked.

“Fine point. Well made,” I said with sarcasm dripping from each word. “Please do go on, I’m sure this gets better.”

“It does,” she assured me, either ignoring my cynicism or letting it fly right over her insanely sexy head. “Well, umm… so after the shit show of my escape and a brief detour, as I said I picked you up and then…”

She stopped, let her head fall back on her shoulders and stared at the ceiling.

“Clock is ticking,” I reminded her.

“This was a bad fucking idea,” she muttered, turning away and lightly banging her head against the wall. “Such a bad idea. Never should have listened to Tex and now I’m stuck with him. Bad, bad, bad idea.”

“Georgia,” I said harshly.

She paused her self-flagellation and glanced over in surprise, as if she was shocked I was still in the room with her. She was off her rocker, but unfortunately I was attracted to trouble that looked like her. And she was clearly going to be a lot of trouble.

“What exactly is the bad fucking idea? And while you’re at it, explain why I can’t move my limbs.”

“Should I start at the very beginning?” Georgia asked.

“It’s a very good place to start,” I replied, trying to bite back the grin that was pulling at my lips.

Her delighted laugh filled the small dingy room and she clasped her hands together in glee. “I didn’t take you for a Sound of Music fan.”

“And why not?” I asked, pretending to be insulted.

What the hell was I doing? Playing von Trapp Family trivia with a lunatic that I secretly wanted to bed? Her laugh was like a gust of fresh air and for a moment I forgot all of the ugliness in my past. My gut said she was for real and my gut had served me well, but far too many puzzle pieces were missing at the moment for me to break into Edelweiss.

And trust me I could. Reciting that movie almost word for word had kept me sane during some of the most horrific moments of my existence.

“Back to the story, Georgia. Now,” I said, getting serious. I would not be seduced by a laugh. I was too far gone for normal.

“Right. The story… You’re not going to believe me.”

“Try me.”