A Thin Disguise by Catherine Bybee

CHAPTER NINE

“Holy shit . . . not one spark of recognition. How is that possible?” Isaac asked. “The woman tied me up and put me in a cell . . . How can she forget that?”

Leo turned to Isaac. “She what?”

Neil stared at his colleague.

Isaac closed his lips. “It was a case. A joke.”

AJ sat in one of the overstuffed chairs. Sasha took up position on the armrest with his hand on her leg. “Not even her name. It’s hard to believe.”

Sasha sighed. “It was only a matter of time before one of us slipped and called her Olivia.”

The close-knit group would keep anything Leo wasn’t supposed to know to themselves. He’d just have to whittle away at them, one at a time. “So, what’s the plan?” he asked, looking at Neil.

“We work in shifts,” he said, lifting himself up from the couch and walking away. Everyone stood and followed. They took a back stairway down to what looked like in-laws’ quarters. The living room furniture had been pushed back, and a set of portable monitors were set up like a workstation.

Cameras had been placed around the inside and outside of the house, and all the feeds funneled into the monitors.

Isaac sat at the chair and started typing. “I’ll show you a shortcut of commands,” he said, looking over his shoulder at Leo. The feed from the living room brightened and then faded when Isaac moved to another one. The camera he was highlighting was one just outside the door of a bedroom.

Leo saw a shadow, then Isaac turned on the audio.

“You’re sure you don’t want something for the pain?”It was Pam’s voice.

“There are cameras in every room except Olivia’s and this one.” He pointed to the bedroom off the living space where they were standing. “And all the bathrooms.”

“I would think Olivia’s room would be the most important,” Leo said.

Lars started to laugh. “Yeah, well . . . when she gets her memory back, I don’t want to be the one to tell her we watched her sleeping . . . or saw her naked.”

“She’d kill us,” Isaac added.

AJ shrugged in agreement.

“I’m sure she’d understand,” Leo suggested.

Sasha lowered her eyes and shook her head. “You don’t know her. Don’t think the woman you’re seeing here is the real person. It isn’t. And Olivia wouldn’t kill you, she’d remove your balls and make you eat ’em. Then if you’re lucky, she’d kill you.”

Lars moaned, shifted his hips a couple of times. “Thanks for the visual, Sasha. We can always count on you.”

Leo couldn’t help but think Lars believed Sasha’s joke.

She had to be kidding.

Isaac pointed to a monitor with an aerial view of the property. There were red lights dotted in a dozen places. “Trip sensors. Red means they’re live. If they’re off, they’ve been cut, or something is in the way of them talking to each other. They work in pairs. If they’re blinking, something has disturbed them. They need to be manually reset.”

Neil glanced at Leo. “You and I will take a walk before it gets dark.”

“We’ve been here for two days. There’s a lot of wildlife out there, so remember that. When the trip sensors go off closer to the house, the lights turn on and the audio sensors enhance.” Isaac brought up a video.

Leo peered closer. It looked like the outside by the driveway, and it was pitch black. The lights clicked on, and a few raccoons stood up, looked around, and then lumbered off. “If they keep coming back, we might have to do some target practice.”

Neil walked toward the other room. Inside was a bedroom, but so much more.

He opened a closet to display a significant amount of firepower. ARs, AKs, several pistols, two shotguns, and a couple of rifles that Leo couldn’t identify. “Do I even want to know how many of these are illegal?”

“It’s Colorado,” AJ said. “People are less itchy here.”

Yeah, sure . . .

Neil moved the closet door to the other side to display vests, both for protection and for carrying ammunition and magazines. “Audio,” he said, pointing to a stack of headgear. “Channel six.”

Leo remembered the first time he’d seen Neil. He and one of his staff were all but jumping out of the rafters of a warehouse dressed for war. Someone on his team kept Claire from a bullet to the head by making a kill shot of their own. Leo looked around the motley crew and wondered which one of them had taken that shot. Neil had said it was him . . . but something told Leo that Neil would take blame, or credit, to take any heat off his people.

“This is one hell of a setup,” Leo finally said.

“She’s one of us,” Sasha said, as if that’s all that mattered.

“How long have you known her?” he asked.

Sasha stared at him as if he were an idiot. “A long time” was all she offered.

Neil closed the closets. “Let’s take that walk.”

Neil waited until he was well outside of the audio feed to start talking.

It was a story he’d repeated with nearly every recruit on his team. One that spelled out just enough facts to let a new employee understand what they were all about and why.

“When I left the Marines, I thought I’d be able to go back to a normal life. But when a war is still playing in your head, that war is around every corner. I started all this as a bodyguard and driver for my now brother-in-law.” Neil offered a rare grin. “Blake shits money in his sleep. The man can’t make a bad investment. I followed his lead. Invested, got a decent return. Was lucky enough to win his sister over.”

“I’ve seen your wife. You’re a lucky man.”

Neil warmed just thinking of Gwen. “She’s not as fragile as she looks. She’s put up with me for nearly twenty years.” He kept walking. “Slowly, through time, this team fell together. Too amped up after being military grunts to see things the way other people do. And too skilled to give up the parts about the service they loved. Big part of our job now is keeping people safe and oblivious to the stupid in the world. Celebrities, politicians, businessmen and women with deep pockets. I have this team and another one in Europe. And on the outside, that’s what we are . . . what we do. But you know we do more.”

Leo knelt down and picked up a stick lying on the forest floor. “Undercover agents tracking down a Russian mob ring selling kids . . . yeah, I know you do more.”

Neil nodded. “Some of our intel might not be gained in ways that your boss would approve of.”

Leo shrugged. “I know that, too.”

“Then you’ll have to respect when I, or my people, avoid your questions.”

“You can trust me, Neil. I’m sure Claire would vouch for me.” While Leo was playing undercover teacher, Claire was playing undercover student. Only for two different departments. He thought the world of the woman.

“She has. Many times. Our secrets aren’t just for us, they’re for you.”

“I’m not following.”

Neil took a deep breath. “What happens if you overhear or obtain information you can’t sit on?”

Leo stopped, turned to Neil. “You’re the good guys.”

“I like to think so. But we don’t call 911. We call each other.”

Leo stayed silent, digesting what that implied.

“We didn’t wait for your people when that scumbag held a gun to Claire’s head. We all know she wouldn’t have made it if we had,” Neil said.

Yeah . . . maybe Leo didn’t want to know all their secrets.

Just Olivia’s.

Or maybe he didn’t.

“I take it Claire’s situation wasn’t unique.”

Neil closed his mouth and stared.

“I allowed you to come here because I do trust you. I also saw something in your eyes that told me you weren’t going to take no for an answer.”

“Got that right.”

“Good. So now that we understand each other, let me tell you why she’s really here. And this is for you, not your boss.”

“I’m listening.”

“None of us are in a hurry for her to get her memory back. In fact, if I could stop it from ever happening, I would. But since the doctors believe it’s only a matter of time, I want to make sure that when it does return, she has healed one hundred percent. That her body is ready to jump out of an airplane and land on someone’s back when her chute doesn’t open.”

“That’s pretty hard-core.”

“It’s not far from the truth.” Neil wouldn’t be surprised if Olivia had taken that leap at some point in her life and lived to tell about it.

“Why?”

“If someone hasn’t already said this, I’ll let you hear it from me. The moment Olivia knows she is Olivia . . . you won’t see it . . . you won’t sense it . . . she’ll just be gone. And it may be years before she contacts me again . . . if ever. And I like sleeping at night. I want to know that we gave her the best chance of survival. You may never know what she saw the night she was shot. She absolutely won’t tell you for the purpose of going after the person who shot her.”

Leo’s expression dialed in on that. “She doesn’t call 911.”

Neil started walking again. “When you report in to your boss, we have a secure line. Give your phone to Sasha when we return so she can shut down all trackers.”

He’d turned off his phone the second they arrived at the airport.

“None of that is enabled,” Leo told him.

“Just give it to Sasha.” Neil found the first set of sensors. “Let me show you how this works.”

Olivia jolted awake.

Her feet tingled from the echoes of her recurring dream.

The room was dark with the exception of a small nightlight plugged into the wall between the bed and the en suite bathroom.

They’d given her the master bedroom, complete with a fireplace and access to one of the patios surrounding the house. The log home would have felt heavy if not for the tall ceilings and windows.

She stretched and turned to look for the time. Only there wasn’t a clock on the nightstand or the wall. She supposed a home like this was meant for holidays, and staying on any kind of schedule became irrelevant when trying to relax.

Her gaze gravitated toward one of the many windows in the room. Outside, the moon shed light on the trees as it descended on the horizon.

The room must be facing west.

Which meant the early morning sun wouldn’t blind her.

“Why do I even know that?” And what did it matter?

She tried closing her eyes and heard her stomach.

“I’m starving,” she whispered to herself. She’d fallen into bed after her shower and Pam’s doctoring. The memory of someone checking on her and the smell of food were there, but sleep was more important.

And now it was God only knew what time, and Olivia’s body was reminding her that she hadn’t eaten since the stuff they passed off as food in the hospital.

She moved the covers back and slowly climbed out of bed.

Her muscles still ached, but she was happy the stabbing pain had eased considerably. Maybe everyone would stop asking her if she wanted pain meds. Just thinking about them made her brain fog up.

I’d rather feel pain than nothing at all.

A pair of slippers sat on the side of the bed, a bathrobe flung over a chaise lounge. They had thought of everything.

Even clothes.

The drawers had jeans, T-shirts, sweaters, leggings . . . a pair of hiking shoes, all-weather boots, and runners. Even underclothes . . . and everything looked like it would fit. Olivia was pretty sure she had to credit Sasha for the outfits. Whoever these people were, they were thorough.

Olivia couldn’t help but wonder what she normally preferred in terms of style. She didn’t look at the pants and wish for a dress or see the black leggings and think she’d never wear that. They were clothes. Cloth that served a purpose.

Forcing her thoughts away, she pushed her arms into the bathrobe, careful to not make too many fast movements and encourage discomfort in her chest. And then decided against putting on the slippers. She’d rather feel the stairs under her feet, even if the floor was cold.

The house was asleep . . . or the people inside were, in any event. She moved quietly through the hallway, past a TV room on the third floor, and down the stairs to the main floor.

At the bottom of the stairs she saw the shadow of a man in front of the window watching the same moonset she had up in her bedroom.

She looked closer.

It was Leo. He and AJ were similar in size and shape, only Leo’s hair was shorter, his shoulders maybe an inch wider.

Olivia stared.

He was wearing a pair of lounge pants, the kind some men wore to bed and others stripped down to after a long day.

No shirt.

A slow smile spread over her lips.

Leo worked out.

Those slightly-wider-than-AJ’s shoulders were sculpted like Michelangelo’s statues. His waist tapered to an ass she couldn’t help but think matched the rest of him. The fact that he was in a house full of people but was walking around without a shirt meant two things . . . it was the middle of the night and he didn’t expect anyone to be up . . . and Leo slept naked. She would bet money there weren’t any boxers or briefs under those pants. Her thoughts led to him dropping the pants before climbing into bed and grabbing them when he needed a quick run to the kitchen or bathroom.

She felt her breath fall from her lips a little faster, a little warmer.

Attraction.

The word floated in her head as if what she was feeling in her belly was more than hunger. Or hunger of a different kind.

She closed her eyes and forced the word, and the heat, out of her head.

Not the time.

Not the place.

Diverting her eyes, she took a couple of steps toward the kitchen.

Because Leo still hadn’t heard her, she softly cleared her throat.

He jumped and pivoted quickly.

“Sorry. I was trying to be quiet,” she told him.

His shoulders relaxed when he saw her. “You succeeded.” He looked at the path she’d just walked.

“I woke up hungry.” She found a light switch, turned it on, and dimmed them to match the evening.

“No one wanted to wake you for dinner, but there is a plate for you.” Leo moved past her and into the kitchen. He opened the fridge and reached inside. “We all thought you needed to sleep . . .”

He kept talking, but his words didn’t register. Mr. FBI had the perfect amount of hair on his chest.

An image of her fingers raking over his pecs settled in a comfortable position in her brain.

Leo turned, a plate in his hand, the light from the refrigerator casting him in a silhouette. He stopped talking and moving . . . and his eyes met hers.

Chemistry. The moment when attraction hits both people at the same time.

Her gaze moved to his chest, then back up . . . slowly.

Leo closed his eyes, shook his head, and blew out a quick breath. “I should, ah . . . put a shirt on.”

That’s a damn shame.

But she didn’t suggest otherwise. Instead, she removed the plate from his hands and walked to the microwave. “Thank you.”

His footsteps followed him out of the room and rapidly up the stairs.

By the time he returned, her food was hot, and she was getting comfortable in one of the bar chairs at the kitchen counter.

Once there, she realized she was missing water and started to get up.

“What do you need?” Leo asked.

“Water.”

Once again he moved to the fridge. The silhouette still nice, just not as distracting. “Sasha insisted on having sparkling.”

“That would be perfect,” she told him. “I think I prefer that.”

He twisted off the cap and set it down.

“Is there a glass?”

He stopped for a moment, smiled . . . then headed to a cupboard. He removed a tall wineglass and placed it in front of her.

“Thank you.”

She picked up her fork and looked at the plate of food. “What exactly is this?” she asked.

“It’s meatloaf. Pretty good, too.”

Olivia was sure she’d heard about meatloaf but couldn’t recall ever eating it. She sliced a small bite off, gave it a quick sniff first, then put it in her mouth. Ground beef, spices . . . almost like a savory hamburger patty only with gravy. “Not bad.”

Leo pulled out a chair beside her and sat. “That’s what I thought. Apparently, it’s Isaac’s specialty. Since we’re taking turns cooking, I have a feeling we’ll be eating this once a week.”

A forkful of potatoes was next.

One taste and she wanted to spit them out. “Oh . . . my.” She looked at her fork. “Potatoes?”

“The kind from a box.”

“Potatoes in a box? Is that possible?”

“Instant mashed potatoes. That doesn’t sound familiar?”

“Sounds awful.” She wiped her fork on the side of the plate and went back to the meatloaf. “Tastes worse.”

Leo smiled and watched her eat. “Interesting,” he said at one point.

“What’s that?”

“You hold your fork in your left hand.”

She looked at her hands. “That isn’t right?”

“No . . . it’s fine. A preference, I guess.”

She took another bite, feeling the edge of her hunger starting to fade. “I don’t know any of my preferences.” Her words paused, her thoughts drifting. “Isn’t that crazy? Like this meal. I know I’ve eaten a hamburger but can’t recall this. The oatmeal in the hospital . . . I ate it, knew what it was, and knew I had tasted better. But when and where I’d eaten oatmeal before . . . I have no idea.”

Leo tilted his head to the side. “That must feel awful.”

“Frustrating.” She closed her eyes, left her knife on her plate, pinched her thumb and index finger together, and brought them in front of her face. “It’s right there. I think it’s all right there, but I can’t seem to sift through the files to find it.” She opened her eyes, dropped her hand to her lap. “When we arrived here, I smelled the pine trees, thought of Christmas lights and snow but couldn’t remember one single Christmas.”

“The doctors said it will come back.”

“They also said the memory loss is a protective thing. What if I remember and something awful is there?” She looked up when Leo stayed silent.

His eyes were razor sharp, his lips pressed together, and his breathing had picked up.

Distress and worry oozed from him about something she’d just said.

He blinked. “It isn’t every day you get shot. That would prove difficult for most people to process.”

She couldn’t help but conclude he was thinking something else when those words came out.

Or maybe she was just imagining things. Everything and everyone was unfamiliar. Maybe the emotions weren’t right either.

“Clearly I’m not going to remember anything today,” she said as she picked up her utensils.

“Want my advice?”

“Sure.” She took another bite.

“Let it go. Don’t think about it. Just do what feels right and don’t question it. And when things start to come back, talk to me. Maybe I can help.”

“Easier said than done.”

Leo laughed. “Yeah, it sounded like a load of shit as I was saying it.”

Olivia laughed along with him. The movement in her chest caught just a little, and she placed her free hand on her side.

“Sorry,” he said.

“It’s okay. It’s better, actually. Much. Maybe the fresh mountain air will help.”

“It can’t hurt.” He leaned back in his chair and appeared to catch himself staring at her and looked away.

“What time is it?” she asked.

“One in the morning.”

She lifted a forkful of green beans to her mouth. “What are you doing up?”

He rubbed the back of his neck. “I don’t know. Considering the handful of hours I’ve slept in the past month, I should be facedown in a bed for a week. But I heard a noise and had to look.” He turned toward the windows across the room. “Then I saw the moon and started asking myself . . . When was the last time I stopped to look at the moon?”

Olivia turned in her chair to see the last of the moon slip behind the horizon. “It is beautiful.”

Leo hummed, his eyes slid to hers.

Her chest warmed.

Yup . . . chemistry. A tiny snap of air.

She directed her attention to her plate, took one last bite, and then pushed it away.

“That’s better than I thought you’d do,” he said.

“Food is fuel. You don’t overfill a gas tank or you’ll just make a mess.”

“What about pizza? Everyone overeats pizza.”

She smiled. “A proper Italian pizza, maybe.” An image flashed in her head. A small outside table with an entire cheese, basil, and tomato pizza sitting in front of her. She closed her eyes, chased the scene.

Nothing.

“Are you okay?” Leo leaned forward and placed his hand on her arm. “You’re trembling.”

“For a second I thought I remembered something. But it’s gone.” And a pulsing in her temple threatened to blossom into a headache.

He ran his hand over her arm through her bathrobe. “It’s going to be okay.”

She covered his fingers, and that snap of air became physical energy at the simple touch. Even that . . . she knew what it was but couldn’t identify the last time it had happened. She squeezed his hand gently and broke the connection. “I appreciate your assurance.” Even if she knew it was speculation at best. There was no way he could predict that things would be okay.

She lifted her plate and started to get up.

“Let me.”

“I’m sure I can . . .”

“Next week. When laughing doesn’t cause you to wince and walking up the stairs is just as easy as walking down.”

She let him have the plate and watched his backside as he turned away with it and emptied what she didn’t eat into the trash.

Stop looking at his ass.

Olivia stood, pushed her chair in. Even that movement took effort. She needed to build some strength.

In the morning. She’d start tomorrow.

Leo turned the water on in the sink.

“Thank you for the company,” she said.

“Anytime.”

She took a few steps from the kitchen. “Try and get some sleep, Leo.”

He looked up. “Good night, Olivia.”

She huffed, the name sounding so odd to her ears. “Good night.”