Defending Morgan (Mountain Mercenaries #3)(9)
“I’m fine.”
“Hungry?” Arrow watched as her nostrils flared momentarily before she shrugged nonchalantly.
“I’m okay.”
“We need to get something straight right now,” Arrow said sternly, not looking away from her. “You need to stop lying to me. I’m not a mind reader. If you’re hurt, I need to know. If you’re hungry or thirsty, I need to know so I can do something about it. If you don’t talk to me, this entire mission could go down the toilet. Help me to help you, Morgan.”
Instead of getting upset, her eyes seemed to shoot green sparks as she said, “I don’t care about food. Or water. Or about getting clean or bumps and bruises. All I want is to get out of here. That’s it. If that means I go hungry, fine. If that means I have to wait a bit to get some water, no problem. But the last thing I want is for you to take unnecessary risks to try to provide for me and get caught. I know as well as you do that without you, I’m fucked. So I’m fine. Peachy. Golden.”
Arrow couldn’t help but smile. This was the woman he’d come to know in such a short period of time. The practical, no-nonsense Morgan Byrd he admired so much. “So if I told you I had some protein bars in my pocket, you wouldn’t be interested then?”
She swallowed hard and licked her dry lips. “I’m interested,” she said simply.
Leaning over, Arrow pulled one of the meal-replacement bars from his pocket. There were hundreds of them on the market now, but no matter how many he’d tried, they all seemed to taste like cardboard to him. But he couldn’t deny they were healthy as all get-out. He never went on a mission without a few stuffed into his pockets. They’d literally saved his life in the past.
Before handing one over to her, he said, “I’m not planning to leave your side until you’re safe, Morgan. I’m going to do my best to avoid going anywhere without you—even to find food or water. I don’t feel comfortable leaving you alone, not until we’re on US soil. Besides, tonight we’ll get out of these lovely accommodations and find my teammates. If I have anything to say about it, you’ll be neck deep in a bubble bath before another twenty-four hours go by.”
Instead of looking excited about the prospect, Morgan seemed more contemplative than anything else.
“What?” Arrow asked.
She raised her eyes to his, and Arrow couldn’t help but think of the term old soul. She looked like she’d lived a thousand lifetimes.
“I’ve had a lot of time to think about everything that’s happened to me, and I’m not sure I’ll be safe even when I’m back in the States. I mean, that’s where I was taken from. What if it happens again?”
Arrow frowned. “It’s unlikely.” He said the words automatically, but the fact of the matter was that it could be likely. He had no idea who’d taken her in the first place, or why. And knowing someone was paying the thugs down here to prevent Morgan from escaping meant someone was incredibly invested in keeping her exactly where she was.
He thought about Allye, one of his teammates’ women. She’d been kidnapped not once, but twice. Someone who was determined to control and/or abuse another person could definitely make it happen if they wanted to.
Morgan didn’t comment, but simply continued to stare at him.
“It’s not that I don’t want to talk about this. My team and I need to know every little detail about what happened a year ago. Anything you can remember can help us track down who was behind your kidnapping. But, unfortunately, now is not the time or place. We’re as safe as we’re going to get for the time being, but it’s better if we’re as quiet as possible just in case.”
Morgan nodded and brought the protein bar up to her mouth. He watched her nibble on it for several minutes, as if she had to make it last a very long time.
Arrow couldn’t help but say, “I’ve got more. You don’t have to conserve it.”
She sighed and looked away, not meeting his eyes. “I know I’m not in a position to be picky. And what I’m about to say is going to make me sound ungrateful and bitchy . . . but it doesn’t taste that good.”
Arrow did his best to smother the chuckle at her words. “Can’t argue. I know some people love them, and I’ve tried just about every flavor under the sun, but I haven’t found one that I really enjoy eating. I only choke those things down when there’s no other alternative.”
She scrunched up her nose. “And I guess now’s one of those times, huh?”
“Looks like it. You need the calories and nutrients. But that’s not the worst news.”
“What?” she asked, finally looking up at him.
“I don’t have any water for you to wash it down with.”
She grimaced again, but gave him a small smile. “That’s okay. I’ll manage.”
Arrow blinked. He’d seen her smile earlier, but he’d paid little attention to it at the time. He liked seeing the genuine humor in her eyes. Even the small quirk of her lips changed her entire countenance. The dirt and grime seemed to disappear.
The thoughts going through his head were as close to an epiphany as Arrow had ever had.
He wanted to do everything in his power to keep that smile on her face. To make her laugh. To see her relaxed with no worries. He didn’t want her to have to worry about whether whoever had kidnapped her in the first place would manage to do it a second time when she got home. If the thugs in Santo Domingo were going to track her down and drag her back to her own version of hell.