The Girl Next Door (Shadow Agents #6)(36)
Author: Cynthia Eden

Now, the trick was going to be actually keeping her alive—and convincing Gabrielle Harper that Cooper deserved a second chance with her.

Luckily, Mercer had plenty of resources at his disposal.

Besides, if Cooper was anything like his mother had been, the boy should be able to work his charm.

Mercer would just see how that charm worked on Gabrielle.

* * *

THE DOOR SQUEAKED OPEN.

Gabrielle’s head lifted. Her eyes locked on the man who’d just entered her little prison.

Betrayal stabbed in her gut. She jumped to her feet, but the cuff around her left wrist—the cuff that was currently attaching her to the table leg—prevented her from charging across the room at Cooper.

He stilled. “I didn’t realize… I’ll get that cuff off you.”

He’d better do a whole lot more than just that.

Cooper turned back around toward the door. The dark-haired, green-eyed agent—the one who’d called himself Deuce—stood behind Cooper.

“Give me the keys,” Cooper demanded.

Deuce whistled as he rocked back on his heels. “Are you sure that you want to do that, man? She’s likely to go right for your throat.”

“The keys,” Cooper gritted, and he opened his hand.

Deuce tossed him the keys. “It’s a good thing you had combat training.” His stare swept toward Gabrielle. “I’ll just…ah…leave you two alone.” He backed out of the room.

Cooper hurried toward her.

She was so furious Gabrielle didn’t even know where to start. She had to bite her lip to hold back the furious yells that wanted to erupt.

His fingers closed around her wrist. His touch was warm and solid and— “You really do look good for a dead man,” she told him, her eyes angry slits.

The cuff clicked open. He didn’t let her wrist go. Instead, he lightly rubbed the flesh. She knew he had to feel the frantic race of her pulse beneath his fingers.

“How did you find out?” While her voice had been heated, his was soft.

“Sources, Cooper. Sources. I have them, you know.” She wasn’t about to throw Hugh under the bus. It was a good thing she’d taken the liberty of hiding the flash drive in Penelope’s car. Otherwise, she would’ve lost that evidence during her little confinement time. That flash drive was her ace in the hole. It was her—

“They found the flash drive,” Cooper told her. “And, soon enough, I will have the name of your source.”

Could the night get any worse? “I guess you like going through my things.” She snatched her hand back from him. “I figured it out, you know, that mysterious crash of my computer days ago…that was you, right? You and your EOD buddies.”

She wanted him to deny it. To tell her that she was wrong. He hadn’t really snuck into her house and sabotaged her system.

But he nodded.

Gabrielle took a step away from him as she sucked in a deep gulp of air.

“Let me explain,” Cooper began. To the right, a large mirror stretched along the wall and threw their reflections back at them. She looked tired and scared and angry.

And he, damn him, looked strong and determined and too handsome.

The fact that he looked so controlled just increased her fury. “Explain? I’m a prisoner! This shouldn’t be happening to me. I’ve got rights, but those rights were ignored when your buddies dragged me in here.” She tossed her hands into the air as she backed away from him. “I wasn’t Mirandized—”

“—because you aren’t charged with anything,” he muttered, yanking a hand through his blond hair.

“This is kidnapping.” She wondered if she could run past him and make a break out of the door. They’d blindfolded her before she was brought into this building. She had no idea where she was—or even if she was still in D.C. They’d seemed to drive around for hours in that car.

And she’d been terrified every moment.

Cooper exhaled. “Believe it or not, you’re here for your protection.”

A bitter laugh escaped her. “I’ll go with the ‘not’ option on there. I’m here because I found out your secret and you don’t want me telling the world what I know.”

He stalked toward her.

Coward that she was, Gabrielle backed up even more. She backed up until there was no place left to go, and she hit the wall.

Cooper kept coming.

His hands rose and flattened on either side of her head, caging her between him and the hard wall. He wasn’t touching her, a very good thing, because his touch just twisted things within her even more.

“This isn’t about me,” he said, staring deeply into her eyes. “It’s about the agents in the field. About the work that they do that requires secrecy. You can’t print what you’ve learned about the EOD. You do that, and you compromise their lives.”

“And what if the EOD is killing? What then?” She threw her accusation at him. She wanted to hurt him as she was hurting. I trusted you. More, she’d started to fall for the guy when he’d just been playing her.

She and Lane hadn’t worked out because he wanted to put her in a glass bubble and stop her from doing everything that she loved. They’d crashed and burned fast because she hadn’t wanted to give up the person who she was in order to please him. The breakup had hurt, but—

With Cooper, the pain was worse. So much worse. She’d really thought that he’d been on her side. A true partner, an equal. She’d believed that he supported what she was doing.

When he’d been sabotaging her all along.

She swallowed and tried to calm her racing heart. “Van McAdams left a very clear message—”

“Van was EOD,” Cooper revealed, voice rumbling. “So was Lockwood. Why do you think I’m on the case? They weren’t active-duty EOD any longer, but they were still ours. I’m trying to find their killer, and I’m working to make sure that no more agents go down.”

There was more there. She’d already figured the pieces out. When she’d been cuffed in this room, Gabrielle had been given plenty of time to think. “One of your own is killing. He scaled McAdams’s building, right? He did it, the same way that you told Carmichael you could do it. He got easy access to those men because they knew him. They trusted him. He’s one of yours.”

And that terrified her. Because it sure sounded like EOD agents were trained killing machines.

“The killer is a rogue,” Cooper said as he leaned in even closer. “He killed two other agents that you don’t even know about. He took them out, then he started going after civilians.”