A Thin Disguise by Catherine Bybee

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Olivia remained silent as they backed out of A Róka and away from the city.

Leo jumped in her car when they left and now regarded her with caution. She’d been told something she wasn’t sharing. He could tell by the rapid blinking of her eyes and the way her smile didn’t fall on her lips as easily as it had just a few hours before.

Only once they were gathered did Olivia reveal what she’d learned.

“Leo was the target,” she told them. “I mentioned both Mykonos and Navi as the ones who bankrolled the hit. Friedrich didn’t confirm or deny. When he saw us together, he made the decision to take me down.”

“Why would he do that?” Leo asked.

“Combination of things. Shock of seeing me. Realized if he shot you, I’d come after him. When Amelia was killed, I did everything in my power to take out Pohl.”

Neil stood by the door, arms crossed over his chest. “Schmidt knew you’d retaliate.”

“Yes.”

“Why not make sure you were dead?” Jax asked.

“He’d researched your people.” Olivia pointed between Neil and Jax. “Sasha had some serious clout at Richter. Her records weren’t easily broken, and even if they were, her name was revered. Friedrich knows she’s part of your team. He didn’t want her as his enemy.”

“So there’s a price on my head?” Leo felt his stomach reject that idea.

Olivia shook her head. “Friedrich suggested that was lifted once the trial was over. They wanted to make an example of you.”

A look around the room confirmed he wasn’t alone in his confusion.

“And that’s it? You take the bullet so Friedrich doesn’t gather enemies. Leo is no longer worth more dead than alive, and everyone goes along like nothing happened?” Jax asked with a shake of her head. “I don’t buy it.”

“That’s what he told me,” Olivia reported.

“If Schmidt is Navi and Mykonos’s henchman—”

“It didn’t sound like Friedrich’s loyalties were in any corner.”

“A mercenary,” Neil suggested.

“That’s worse,” Sven added.

Olivia shrugged her shoulders. “He didn’t kill me. He could have.”

“A mercenary with a conscience?” Leo asked. If that was the case, they had something to work with.

“Or at least a past that he was fond enough of to let me go.”

Leo sighed. Her memories were Mr. Wet and Sloppy . . . What were his?

“So Navi and Mykonos know nothing of who you really are?” Neil asked.

She shook her head. “I feel like Friedrich would have told me otherwise if they did.”

“So that’s it? The man shoots you and gets away with it?” Sven asked.

“Considering how many people I’ve put holes in, I’ll count myself lucky.” Olivia looked beyond them as if remembering all those faces.

Leo glanced at Neil. They both watched her.

Neil pushed away from the wall he was leaning against. “Let’s break this location down and move out.”

“Are you having Friedrich followed?” she asked before he had a chance to leave the room.

“Of course.”

Leo walked Neil out of the hotel room they were in, leaving Olivia and Jax to strip out of their costumes.

“There’s something she’s leaving out,” Leo accused the moment they were alone.

“Agreed.”

“What is the likelihood of a hit man leaving the target standing and still getting paid?”

“Slim to none. But if you were still a target . . . she’d tell us. She wouldn’t risk you.”

“If not me . . . then who?”

“The one who ultimately put Mykonos in jail.”

The two of them stared at each other. “Marie.”

“Logical conclusion.”

“She’s deep in the system because of the hit on her,” Leo said.

“But we know who has been hired to kill her.”

“Keep an eye on him and we can intervene.”

“And if Olivia knows this, she will think the same.” Neil sighed.

“What’s it going to take for her to trust us?” Leo asked.

Neil shook his head. “I don’t know.”

Spindly fingers held her against the stacks.

His long, wet, forked tongue attempted to enter her mouth. The spiked ends stung as it passed over her lips.

“You really don’t know how to do this . . . do you?” Friedrich asked.

She opened her eyes, saw the blackness of his.

Behind him, the faces of those who were gone because of them loomed.

“I never wanted this,” she told him.

“Too late to turn back now.”

His tongue lapped up one side of her face.

“I can make it right.” She struggled against his grip, found her arms forced together in iron chains.

“You’re going to lead me to her.”

“I’ll kill you first.”

Friedrich started to laugh, and suddenly the weight of the world dropped from below her feet, and her stomach launched into her throat.

Olivia’s eyes sprung open, her hands reaching out to grip the covers on the bed.

It took a moment for the room to come into focus.

She was on a plane.

Neil’s.

She looked at her watch. Two hours had passed since she asked to be left alone.

It had been nearly twenty-four hours since her meeting with Friedrich.

Her dream swam in her head. The faces, the heat . . . the misery.

The message, however, had changed.

She wanted to break the binds of the stacks . . . the memories of the past. Keeping one woman alive may not be the redemption that would free her, but perhaps it was a start.

If Olivia had concluded that Friedrich still had unfinished business, then Leo and the others would, too.

Why would Friedrich tell her his target?

Never once in Olivia’s time on the other end of a scope had she revealed any names of her victims.

Friedrich had. To serve what purpose?

His words and logic twisted in her head. The forked tongue of the devil in the stacks can’t be trusted.

“Son of a bitch.”

Olivia walked out of the bedroom in the back of the private jet and saw Leo and Neil deep in conversation.

“He’s going after Marie,” she said in a rush. “He’s going to use us to find her.”

Neil sat back in his chair, a smile spread over his face.

Leo walked over, placed his lips to hers. “Let’s find a way to stop him.”

“His story fell apart the moment he said Leo was my man.”

Leo squeezed Olivia’s hand. “Well . . . I am.”

Olivia smiled at the thought. “But you weren’t then. Friedrich had no way of knowing we had zero contact until that night in Vegas.”

“He figured out there was a connection . . . eventually,” Neil said.

“By following me to the hospital and watching. Noticing how often Leo showed up and that guilty ‘you were shot because of me’ look on your face.”

“He admitted he shot you instead of me. So I’m right about that one.”

Olivia rolled her eyes.

Neil waved a hand in the air. “Let’s get this back on point. Can we trust that the hit on Leo is gone?”

Olivia released a short laugh, looked directly into Leo’s eyes. “He’s still here, isn’t he?”

“I haven’t been hiding since Colorado.”

“I’m sure Friedrich had a shot if he wanted to take it. At the hospital . . . the trial . . . on the way to the bathroom after a coffee break.” She could think of a hundred ways to eliminate the heartbeat of someone who wasn’t avoiding a bullet.

“And now the target is Marie,” Leo said.

“We all knew her life was threatened. That’s why SWAT surrounded the courthouse. Why Neil had me on point to make sure all those bases were covered.”

“Friedrich never had a clean shot,” Leo said.

“And when you don’t have a shot, you wait until you do. But the protection program does a good job, and even people in my line of work—”

“You’re retired,” Leo interrupted.

“My previous employment,” she corrected. “Even we have a hard time finding people in the protection program.”

Neil tapped a pen on the notepad in front of him. “Friedrich shoots you but makes sure he’s seen so you’ll seek him out once you’re recovered.”

“Must have been a bitch when he learned you’d lost your memory,” Leo said with a laugh.

“Eventually I show up . . . he tells me how happy he is to see me alive, paints some kind of solidarity between us. Leads me to think this isn’t personal.”

“And what is the best way to get someone to do something?” Leo’s question was rhetorical.

“Tell them not to,” Neil said, deadpan.

“He knows I have people in my corner, and I won’t risk you,” Olivia said. “He thinks I’ll search out Marie myself and go alone to protect her. Two hours ago, that was exactly my plan,” she admitted.

“You’d be walking into a trap.”

“Or leading him right to her. But like any good sting . . . he needs to believe that is still my plan.”

“And if we do nothing? If you don’t search for her . . . what then?” Leo asked.

“His strategy will change. He has a resource order with Marie’s name on it. She dies, or he dies trying. There isn’t a lot of middle ground.” Unfortunately, Olivia understood the rules all too well.

“We need to catch him in the act.”

“Then that’s exactly what we’re going to do.” Neil removed his phone and dialed a number.

Leo sat beside Olivia and grasped her hand in his. “You made the right choice.”

“I’ve never been a team player,” she told him.

He kissed her fingertips. “You are now.”

“You ready for this?” Leo asked as they sat in his car outside of Neil’s headquarters the morning after they’d flown in.

Olivia looked at the nondescript office building with tinted windows and security cameras everywhere. Twice she’d sat across the street watching the space. Or more to the point, the people walking in and out. Once right after they’d all infiltrated Richter and the secret about Amelia’s death had been revealed . . . and another time two years before. The first was to assure herself that everyone had gotten out and was well. The second was because she had started to give up on living. She’d reached out to Neil, and eventually he had a job for her she was willing to take. And since she was basically on her own while playing bodyguard to Marie Nickerson, she’d taken the job.

Only now . . . this.

“I have to be,” Olivia answered.

He reached out, laced her fingers with his.

She squeezed, took a deep breath, and brought her attention back to him. He was dressed in a suit and returning to his office. The plan was for him to keep his day job for the meantime. His job with the FBI would be imperative to their overall plan on how they would deal with Friedrich.

Leo kissed her fingers. “I know I’ll be pulling overtime for the next few days. We can rent you a car if we need—”

“Neil said he had an extra.”

Leo sighed. “I’m going to be a nervous new boyfriend . . . text you, follow you home if you’re still here when I get off work.”

Home.

Was it possible to call any place she stayed home?

The night before, they’d dropped into bed the second they showered the flight away.

The morning had been rushed, and the thought of staying in Leo’s home indefinitely hadn’t quite sunk in.

Until now.

“If I’m crowding you—”

His open jaw and direct stare stopped the words she was going to say. “Okay . . . I get it.”

“Good.” He shifted in his seat. “Listen . . . I know this is new for you. I don’t expect it to go seamlessly. Just talk to me. I’m a reasonable guy.”

She laughed. “You are.”

“Then don’t cut me out.”

“If I was going to do that, I would have done it before now.”

He seemed to like her answer.

Leo leaned forward, pressed her lips to his. “I can walk you in,” he said once he pulled away.

“I think I’m capable,” she said, whispering.

He let go of her hand. “Be safe.”

“Watch your back,” she countered.

“I always do.”

Olivia pushed out of the car and walked to the front door.

One look into the security camera and the door buzzed.

A glance over her shoulder showed Leo waiting until she was inside before he backed out of the parking lot.

She blew out a breath and stepped inside.

“Good morning.” Sasha stood as the one-person welcoming committee.

And for reasons Olivia couldn’t name, unshed tears stung the back of her eyes. She swallowed the emotion and ignored it. “Good morning.”

Sasha let a smile spread over her. “It gets easier.”

Olivia blinked to keep the tears back. “I hope so.”

“I’m glad you’re early. You need to know a few things about the team. First is that Claire is a hugger. No getting around that. Isaac has threatened to tie you up at the first opportunity—”

Olivia laughed, loving the lift in her chest. “He can try.”

“I suggested he would be wasting his time. And Lars might actually cry.”

Her jaw dropped. “You’re kidding.”

Sasha shook her head. “We were worried about you. I know you left to protect us. I know walking through that door today might have been the hardest thing you’ve done to this point.”

“It wasn’t easy.”

“I know. I’ve been there.” Sasha lifted her hands to the building. “The family you choose is often more important than the family you were born to. There’s no judgment here. Everyone has a say. If you have a problem, air it. If you have a need, ask for it. It took a long time for me to admit I had a family. This family. We can be that for you.”

Okay, the tears were back.

Olivia opened her eyes wide, trying to make them go away. “What the hell . . .”

Sasha laughed. “You’ll get used to that, too.” She nodded further into the office. “Let me show you around before the place fills up.”

Olivia fanned her face with her fingertips as they started walking while shrugging off her coat.

Sasha scanned her frame. “We’ll take a couple hours and go shopping.”

Olivia glanced at the dark leggings and skintight shirt. All three outfits she had with her looked exactly the same. “You think I need a makeover?”

Sasha shook her head. “I was more concerned about your condom supply.”

It felt good to laugh.

Sasha pushed through a door into a room filled with floor-to-ceiling monitors. “Welcome to MacBain Security and Solutions.”

Claire was sitting in a chair. She jumped up the second they entered the space and wrapped her arms around her. “I’m so happy you’re here.”

Olivia looked at Sasha and mouthed . . . Help!