to me, where I know you’ll be safe.”
“Safe? With you?” She crammed a couple of eyeliner pencils into the little bag and glanced up at him in the mirror. “I’m not feeling very safe with you right now, John. I’m feeling used. I’m feeling sick with myself that I came running to you as soon as I got Kyle’s text. Too bad I don’t have the gift of precognition, too, or I might’ve saved us both a lot of trouble.”
With the last of her things stuffed into the cosmetic case, she tugged on the zipper to close it. The lining had a small tear in it near the top, and the loose thread was caught in the zipper’s teeth. Frustrated even more, she yanked on it again, but it didn’t give.
Then she realized why.
The lining wasn’t torn.
It had been cut. A small, carefully opened slice.
She might have never noticed it...
John moved into the bathroom to stand beside her. “What’s wrong?”
She slipped her finger between the lining of the bag. Something small and flat and round was inside. She pulled it out on a gasp.
Her blood ran cold in her veins.
The tiny black disk was a thinner, more compact version of the GPS tracker her pursuers had placed on her car.
13
Duarte’s heart still felt clutched in a vise a few minutes later, as he and Lisa met up with Alec in the empty kitchen of the main house.
“They know she’s here.” Duarte put the GPS tracker down on the white marble countertop, barely resisting the urge to smash it under his fist.
“Holy shit.” Alec’s brows went up in shock. “Where the hell did that come from?”
“My makeup bag. It was hidden inside the lining,” Lisa murmured. She wrapped her arms around herself, looking small and vulnerable—frightened—in her T-shirt and faded jeans. “Now I guess I know what they were doing in my house a week ago. God, I knew someone had been inside my home. They traced my car, probably traced my phone, too. Now this...” She trailed off on a small shudder.
Duarte wanted to pull her into his embrace, but he didn’t expect she’d welcome his comfort. They’d left a lot unresolved back in the guest room, and this new emergency meant they would have even less alone time to talk things out and try to patch things up.
If that was even a possibility now.
He met Alec’s serious gaze. “It’s not safe for Lisa to stay here. We have to get her off this island ASAP.”
Alec nodded. “Agreed. You got an idea where you want to go, or should I arrange for another safe house somewhere?”
Duarte considered his few options. Time would be working against them. Hell, it already was. They’d been on the radar since the minute they had left his cabin. “Another safe house would be best. Your pal Zapata got a place to spare down in Colombia, by chance? The farther away, the more remote, the better.”
“No.” Lisa’s quiet but firm interjection drew both their gazes. “No more running. No more safe houses. I’m not going to live like this. I can’t.”
“You don’t have much of a choice right now,” Duarte told her, as gently as he could. “You have to keep moving. You can’t let these people get their hands on you. Damn it, I won’t let that happen.”
He sounded possessive and overbearing, but fuck it, he didn’t care. So long as he was drawing breath, he meant to keep this woman safe. Whether she felt he had that right or not.
Lisa’s jaw tensed as she stared searchingly into his eyes. “Kyle wanted me to hide. You’re telling me I need to run. But if I do either of those things now, when will I be able to stop?”
“I’ll make it safe so you can stop.” A promise he would uphold with his life, if it came down to that. With her brother’s life, too, even though he knew that price would come with Lisa’s hatred. “I’ll make it safe. You have to trust me, and give me that chance.”
She slowly shook her head. “I can’t do that, John.” The fear he’d seen grip her just a few moments ago began to fade into a subtle, but stubborn determination. “I’ll never have answers if I don’t go after them. I need to know where my brother is, and if he’s in trouble, I need to know why. Even more than you or Alec or anyone else in the Phoenix program, I need to find him. I