A Thin Disguise by Catherine Bybee

CHAPTER EIGHT

The rocks were scalding and jagged. Each step more painful than the last. If only she could breathe, then maybe she could control the pain.

“Breathe through the pain. You know that’s what you have to do.”

Tears stained her cheeks.

“Stop crying, you weak piece of shit.”

It hurts.

“Get over it. And walk. What are you going to do, lie there and wait for the Grim Reaper to come and carry you?”

She took a step, and another, refusing to look up into the vastness of nothing. Nothing but fire, rock, and pain.

Her eyes opened, and with them her lungs pulled a sharp inhale.

The room was dark.

And hot.

Something wasn’t right.

“Nurse?” She cleared her throat. “Nurse?”

Neil’s words swam in Leo’s head as he sat across from his boss, pushing the plan.

“Olivia is a highly skilled operative, if she starts coming out of the amnesia and thinks someone is a threat, there is no guarantee how she’ll react. With my location, and my people, she’ll be safe.”

“Define operative,” Leo had told him.

“I can’t do that.”

“Can’t or won’t?” He knew there was something Neil wasn’t telling him.

“Your choice.”

Their conversation had been short. One where Leo asked questions and Neil avoided the answers.

In the end, Neil gave him an ultimatum. “You convince your superiors that my protection program is far greater than theirs, complete with doctors, nurses, and armed security, and that your people should focus on finding the shooter, or whoever paid the shooter. Or . . . Olivia will disappear, and you’ll never see her again.”

“Not only are they invested, they know the players. From Mykonos, to his cousins, uncles, the two-bit grunts that do the dirty work. Yeah, we could brief the marshals, but why bother?” Leo asked.

Brackett stared. “Where would they take her?”

“No idea.”

“That won’t work. We need to know.”

Leo had seen that expression on his boss’s face before. It said nonnegotiable.

Fitz kept silent at his side. She knew what was being said.

“I have vacation time I haven’t used,” Leo started. “I spent nearly a year of my life undercover on this assignment . . .” Months pretending to be someone he wasn’t. His personal life on hold. “I’d like to take that time now.”

Brackett leaned back in his chair, arms folded. “What are you suggesting?”

Leo leaned forward. “Sign this off to me. I’ll stay with the witness. Along with Neil’s team. You get what you want, and the two people that were shot at disappear until we can guarantee their safety.”

Brackett glanced at Fitz.

Time ticked and ticked . . . and ticked.

He sat forward. “I want weekly updates.”

Leo felt a lion’s smile spread over his face.

“This better not have anything to do with your dick, Grant,” Brackett warned.

Leo shook his head and repeated Olivia’s words. “For all we know, she’s married with two kids and a dog.”

“If that’s the case, someone is bound to look for her. In the meantime, keep her alive.”

Leo stood, shook his hand. “I will.”

Durango, Colorado, was a quintessential western town nestled in the southwestern corner of the state. The mountainous terrain was perfect for the team to hide in plain sight. The summer months were filled with tourists, people that came and went, most of them just passing through. An old narrow-gauge steam train was a major attraction, carrying passengers up to the small town of Silverton, where the population was anywhere between four and five hundred people. That population doubled and sometimes tripled in the summertime when the train was running. All of those passengers started their journey in Durango. A town as small as Silverton would be a place the team would stick out. In Durango, however, that was not the case. Not that the team planned on spending much time in the city itself. With summer sliding into fall, they arrived at the perfect time to blend in. It would take a while before winter brought in the skiers, and tourism was winding down.

The vacation cabin rental boasted over five thousand square feet on nearly twenty acres of land and sat far enough off the main road that no one would accidentally veer down the private driveway.

Neil drove the SUV from the small private airstrip they’d flown in to. Leo sat beside him with Olivia in the back seat. Behind them, AJ and Sasha followed in a four-wheel-drive Jeep.

The nurse he’d hired was already at the cabin, and Lars and Isaac were putting the final touches on the surveillance system that would be monitored from miles away.

They hit a bump in the road, and Neil immediately looked in the rearview mirror to gauge Olivia’s expression.

If she hurt, she didn’t show it. Though every mile they traveled, fatigue settled on her face.

The doctor had taken the chest tube out and followed up with a chest x-ray two days later before okaying her to travel on an airplane. The slight fever she’d spiked the day the tube was supposed to be removed ended up causing a delay and worried everyone that they’d have to postpone the transfer. And with Navi on the move and the sentencing hearing less than a week away, Neil wanted her as far away from Vegas as they could get but still be a short plane ride away.

“How are you doing back there?” Leo asked her.

“Never better.”

Neil eased up on the gas.

“No, really. I’m fine. Not to sound like a child, but how much longer?” she asked.

“Ten minutes to the turnoff, then we’re on-site,” Neil informed her.

She nodded and continued to look at the passing landscape.

Neil couldn’t help but wonder if anything looked familiar. He knew she’d spent several years in Germany, but he didn’t have a lot of information on the woman before that time. And after, well . . . he could only speculate. Her history had been erased long before she was shot.

As they moved toward the gate, AJ drove up first, jumped out, and opened the manual fence. Much as Neil would have liked an automated gate, the homes that had them were in more densely populated areas. That didn’t stop him from securing sensors that let those inside the house know the gate was opening. There were trip wires, electronic and physical, closer to the house. He’d be sure and spend some time with Leo outside before he left.

AJ moved faster down the road while Neil stayed mindful of the patient white-knuckling it in the back seat.

She needed time to heal.

The doctor had joked, telling her to avoid gunshots, car accidents, or bar fights for at least a month.

None of which were off Olivia’s radar when she was in her right mind.

The docile woman staring out the window would have no problem avoiding drama.

Olivia . . . not so much.

I’ve seen trees. They’re pine trees.

The smell reminded her of Christmas. How was it she could remember the holiday, but not a single one with her in it?

Every bump in the road was a knife in her side.

She wanted to look at the bandage on her chest but didn’t desire drawing attention from the two men in the front seats.

She’d been under a microscope for days and looked forward to time alone.

A proper shower. What she would do for a shower.

Neil pulled the car up to what had to be one of the largest log cabins in existence. When she’d heard cabin, she assumed something small and easy to manage.

That was not what he stopped the car in front of.

“Wow,” Leo said for both of them.

“I’m sure it will be comfortable for everyone,” Neil said before opening his door and moving to hers.

Outside the climate-controlled car, she took her first step with Neil close by. He didn’t reach for her, but somehow she knew he would if he had to.

Leo, on the other hand, walked around the car and took her elbow like she couldn’t manage without him. Something about the gesture felt off, but she didn’t know why.

He’d only been helpful the whole time she’d known him.

“Doing okay?” he asked.

She took a deep breath. “Only hurts when I breathe.”

She wasn’t sure, but for a second she thought Neil laughed. Since the man barely cracked a smile, she must have been mistaken.

The home appeared to have two entrances, one on the ground level, the other, larger one requiring a flight of stairs.

She wasn’t about to admit that she appreciated Leo’s arm when she started stepping up. Nearly a week in a bed took a toll on her body. And as much as she wanted to stop and take in the grand vista of trees and forest surrounding the cabin, she was hyperfocused on that shower and a bed. One she could collapse in and sleep for a year. Maybe then her memory would come back, and her life could return to normal.

Inside, Sasha and AJ were talking with two other men, both of whom stopped when she stepped inside the spacious room.

Big furniture, leather accents, with massive logs holding the whole thing together. Huge windows shot up twenty feet taking in the view, with a vast porch that stretched the length of the house. The living room opened to a kitchen and dining area that looked like it seated eight. “This is crazy,” she said softly.

“There are enough rooms for everyone,” Neil pointed out.

She turned away from the windows and found everyone staring at her.

“Hello,” she said to the new faces.

“I’m Lars,” the older of the two said with a slight wave across the room.

“Isaac,” the shorter one wearing glasses added.

“I’m . . .” This was getting old. “Jane Doe, happy to meet you.”

Both men seemed to wince at her introduction.

Sasha stepped around the giant sofa and tilted her head to one side. “You remind me of someone I went to school with.” Sasha glanced at Neil, then back. “Her name was Olivia.”

Olivia blinked a few times, noticed all those eyes on her . . . the microscope dialed in.

“I like it,” Leo said. “It’s better than Jane Doe.”

“You don’t look like a Jane,” Lars told her.

“Olivia,” she said aloud for the first time. Then she shrugged. “You have to call me something. Might as well be Olivia.”

Again, everyone seemed to hang on whatever she was going to say next. “Which room is mine?”

The question had everyone moving.

Heavy footsteps preceded a woman half jogging down the stairs from the floor above. “Is our patient here?”

Olivia turned toward the woman. “That’s me.”

“You look haggard.”

“Great.” What was she supposed to say to that?

“Sorry . . . I’m Pam, the nurse.” She had to be in her sixties, short gray hair, wiry . . . thin.

“I’m a . . . Olivia, I guess. They all just named me,” she told her.

Pam narrowed her eyes, looked around the room. “Are you okay with that?”

“It’s a name.” Just a name.

“Well, Olivia . . . you’ve got to be tired.”

“It’s been a long day.”

Pam nodded toward the stairs. “Let’s get you settled. You up for a shower?”

Olivia sighed. “I’d kill for a shower.”

Someone behind her laughed.