Free Unmasking the Mercenary by Jennifer Morey Page B

be afraid,” he told her still in French, and then, “I’ll protect you.”
    She wasn’t sure she could trust him like that.
    “You’ll be fine if you speak only French. Okay?”
    She nodded even though she was still so unsettled. “Okay. French.”
    He withdrew his hands from her head. “Just stay by me and do what I tell you. They all know me here. They also know if anybody touches you, I’ll kill them.”
    She stopped breathing altogether. Because now she believed him. She also believed he’d done it before.
    “How many diamonds do you have?”
    “Close to ten thousand carats. All rough.”
    She felt her head go cold and closed her eyes. “Oh.” It came out on a breath full of dread. They were in so much trouble.
    “This is no time to fall apart,” he hissed, harsher than before.
    She opened her eyes and found his. “You should have told me what you were planning!”
    “Yeah? If I had, would you have come with me?”
    “No way!” she all but screeched.
    “Yeah. And Ammar would have killed you because I have to do this! ”
    “What do you have to do? What is so important to you that you’d go this far?”
    “There’s no time to explain it now.”
    She glanced out the window of the chopper and saw the armed men waiting for them. A fresh wave of fear renewed her trembles.
    She turned back to him. “You’re crazy.”
    He met her eyes with hard laser sharpness that, absurdly, worked to ground her. “You’re going to be okay.”
    “Can you promise that?”
    He didn’t answer. She knew he wouldn’t be able to. She was going to beat the crap out of him as soon as they were alone. And, oh, was he ever going to do some talking!
    “Come on.” He stood. “Let’s go.”
    He helped her to her feet and faced the door. She put her hand on his back for support, hoping her shakiness wouldn’t be visible once they were out of the chopper. The support left her when he bent to lift the duffel bags. He gave her the same one she’d been charged with before and hefted the other over his shoulder. She tried not to think about all those diamonds in there. Jumping down from the helicopter pod, he reached his arms to help her. Over his head and shoulders, she could see at least twelve armed and unsmiling guards waiting.
    Rem set her feet on the ground and turned with her, sliding his arm around her and pulling her close.
    One of the guards came into stride with Rem as they cleared the still-spinning blades. “I’ll take you to Locke.”
    Haley looked over her shoulder as she walked with Rem, seeing the guards follow and flank them. They walked a few minutes, away from the earthen helipad and toward the largest building she’d seen from the air. She spotted two cameras on the roofline. A man stood on a concrete patio, behind a decorative concrete railing. He was tall and lean and wore all white. White slacks, white short-sleeved silky shirt. His sunglasses and belt were black, though. So were his shoes. As she climbed the stairs with Rem, she noticed the deep creases beside his grim mouth and pocked skin everywhere else.
    “You didn’t mention bringing company,” the man said.
    Rem smiled crookedly, one man to another. “I wasn’t planning to, but…” He looked down at Haley from across his shoulder.
    Haley kept her expression void of her true reaction, which had her envisioning her fist smacking his stubbly jaw. Instead, she looked up at Rem and acted as though she hadn’t understood him but had read his sexy smile and leaned closer.
    Once they were alone, he would be a dead man if he didn’t tell her everything.
    “How did you come to meet a man such as this?” Locke asked Haley.
    She pretended to glance uncertainly from him to Rem.
    “She doesn’t speak much English,” Rem said. “Only French. Her name is Haley.”
    Locke turned to her and said in French, “I am Locke Merchant. Welcome, mademoiselle. I trust your trip here was…uneventful?”
    Haley gave him her best rendition of a bimbo