Amazingly enough, he’d kept his mouth shut. She’d expected him to break the moment she placed the blade to his dick. But he hadn’t, shocking her to the core, and now she would save him.
She wondered what he knew, what surreptitious things danced inside his head. Had to be valuable, perhaps life-altering, otherwise she wouldn’t have been pulled from another job for a simple extraction.
“Think you can walk?” she asked him.
“Who are you?”
His words were slurred, barely understandable. Anger, confusion, and uncertainty pulsed from him. “I’m your new best friend, honey.” Within seconds, she had his ankles and wrists free and was jerking him to his feet. “Your boss sent me.” Kind of.
A hiss of agony escaped him, and he quickly bent one leg at the knee, keeping his foot elevated. “Broken,” he grunted.
She glanced down…down…damn, he was tall. Finally she saw the ankle in question and winced. Broken, yes. Ravaged, most definitely. That ankle was going to make her job more difficult. “Gonna make me carry you out, then?” The words were a challenge, meant to goad him into hopping out if he had to.
“Fuck you,” he said. At least, that’s what she thought he said. Hard to tell.
Her gaze slid over the rest of him. He was well over six feet of pure muscle and brawn. Could she carry him? She was strong. Her creators had made sure of that, but…
His head angled toward her, and his discolored, mutilated lips edged into what might have been a frown. Le’Ace was machine, animal, a bit human—though many would disagree about the last, and all three parts of her sensed his affront.
In this, at least, he was predictable. Alpha male that he was, he couldn’t handle a blow to his masculinity.
But it was something else in a long line of somethings that she hadn’t expected from him. Alpha. His file had said “gentle” and “unflappable.” Even “calming.” The man glaring down at her was none of those things. Guarded, determined, easily razzed. Yeah, he was those.
“Well,” she insisted. “Much as I’d like to take you up on your offer, you didn’t really answer my question. Shall I carry you?”
“What do you think?” he asked in that damaged voice. “Never mind. You might try. No. I’ll walk.”
“Good boy.” She released him.
He swayed to the side and would have fallen if she hadn’t grabbed him again. Le’Ace sighed. Nope, he wouldn’t be walking. The spirit might be willing, but his flesh was too weak. What was the best way to handle the unpredictable Jaxon and the upcoming battle with his other captors? Her mind raced with options. There weren’t many.
All the while Jaxon stared at her, disquieting her, clearly trying to take her measure.
“I guess I need to switch to plan B,” she muttered.
“What’s plan B?”
“I haven’t decided yet. All I know is the ending.”
“And that is?”
“We get out safely.”
“I don’t trust you,” he gritted out. “This could be a trick.”
Great. He was going to be difficult.
Part of her was relieved. Finally, he was acting like the humans she dealt with on a daily basis. Which meant she knew how to handle him.
“Could be a trick,” she told him. “Only time will tell.” Leaning sideways, she tilted him toward the crumbling wall. Weak and damaged as he was, he could do nothing to stop her. She propped him there, made sure he was steady, then strode to her bag of tools and towels.
Statistical read of the surrounding area, she demanded to know from the chip implanted inside her brain. A chip that monitored her activities as well as the energy pulses of everyone around her. She cleaned her bloody hands with a rag. Thankfully, the chip was programmed to only give knowledge when she asked. Otherwise, constant streams of information would bombard her at all hours of the day and night.
The reply was instantaneous, not a voice, but a sudden realization. Four Delenseans and two humans. Upstairs.
Likelihood of attack within the next few minutes?
Eighteen percent. No hostility detected.
Good. Warn me if someone approaches.
Sensors on…now.
Le’Ace reached back into the bag, withdrew a syringe and a bottle of black-market rinaloras.
“What are you doing?” Jaxon demanded.
“Helping you. No need to thank me.” She couldn’t believe how much stamina he possessed. Anyone else with those types of injuries would be dead or sobbing. He had teased her; he now refused to back down. She could only imagine what he’d act like when fully healed and almost wished she’d be allowed to find out.
Truly, she’d never encountered a man quite like him. So strong, so irreverent, utterly capable, unerringly honorable and loyal, yet a little dirty-minded. Where was the reserved and respectful man A.I.R. touted him to be?
Perhaps the torture had changed him, she mused, but she wouldn’t have placed money on that. He’d been gone eight days. That wasn’t enough time to transform a trained agent drastically, no matter what had been done to him. After all, he’d endured similar torture before and hadn’t morphed into irreverence incarnate.
Was she being given a glimpse at the real man, then?
If so, that begged the question of why he usually hid who he really was. And why he was now revealing his true colors. She was intrigued, and she hated being intrigued. He was a job. He could not be anything else.
Her owner would not allow it. Fucker.
Once she had Jaxon safely tucked away, she’d call Estap, her boss and current owner, and Jaxon would be picked up. Most likely, she would never see him again.
“Marie,” he snapped. “You’re drifting now. Do you name your needles?”
“No.” Slowly she turned to him. She held the now full syringe in the light, checking for air bubbles. “And look. My name is Mishka, but everyone calls me Le’Ace.” The moment the words left her, she cursed under her breath. She shouldn’t have told him that. Her real name was privileged information, and he wasn’t privileged. So why had she just blurted it? Why did she suddenly long to hear this amazing man say it? Just once?
“What kind of name is that?” he asked.
Sooo not the response she’d secretly craved. She ran her tongue over her teeth in an effort to hide her irritation. “Appropriate.” She was her creators’ ace in the hole.
“What the hell are you doing?” he asked. “Answer me this time, at least.”