Warped (The Mercenary Series Book 2) Read online

  Harvey shrugged. “I have no idea.”

  “I need to find her. She might be the reason I’d ended up shot and half drowned. She might be able to make me remember everything else.”

  He fixed his eyes on me, his brows knitted, his mouth a thin line. “If she was the reason you ended up shot, do you really think you want to be tracking her down again?”

  I huffed a breath, sudden exhaustion sweeping over me. It had only been a matter of days since I’d woken, and though I felt more or less okay, my body had been through a lot. Even my muscles were weak from lack of use, and just the couple of blocks’ walk had left me exhausted. I hated feeling like this. It wasn’t me. I didn’t know much about myself, but I knew enough to tell I wasn’t someone who took weakness lightly.

  “I don’t know,” I said, my head in my hands. “I can’t explain it, but she’s important. I know she is. Just the way she looked at me …”

  He laughed. “Hey, don’t get me wrong, I’m not blind. I could see she was hot, but are you really willing to risk your life because of some pretty broad?”

  I shot him a glare. “It’s different than that. Sure, she’s beautiful, but there’s more to it. I know it. I can feel it.” I punched my fist to my chest. “Right here.”

  He held up both hands. “Okay, okay. But let me just say the X I knew never did that.”

  “Did what?”

  “Felt anything. He was a cold fish, and sure as hell wouldn’t have lost his head over a girl.”

  “It’s not losing my head,” I muttered. “There’s something. A connection.” I forced my thoughts away from the dark haired woman. “So tell me, if you knew the old me so well, tell me exactly how we know each other. I want to know the story of how the two of us ended up in each other’s lives.”

  I didn’t feel like the type of person who would have friends, and I couldn’t imagine myself ribbing some guy over a beer on a Saturday night, or going to a baseball game and shouting at the players. I didn’t think I was a guy’s guy, so how did Harvey Baglione and I know each other?

  He cleared his throat, suddenly sheepish, and dropped down into the chair opposite me. “I hired you for a job.”

  My eyebrows lifted. “A job? As in a killing job?”

  “I didn’t hire you to do my taxes.”

  I pushed my hand through my hair “Jesus. Who did you hire me to kill?”

  “Some young punk who kept trying to step on my turf. I know I’m not exactly a scary guy, but this little prick was pushing his luck. He’d threatened a few of my businesses, and I’d tried to warn him off, but he wasn’t listening. Thought he was better than me, you know?”

  “No, I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.”

  “I ran out of options, which is why I called you in.”

  “And I killed some kid?” The thought made the blood run cold in my veins. Had I really been that heartless to take out some wannabe punk?

  “He was hardly a kid, X. He was twenty-four, and if you’d seen some of the shit he’d done, you wouldn’t be looking at me in that fucking judgmental way you are now. Believe me, you of all people shouldn’t be judging others.”

  “Like what?” I asked.

  “Huh?”

  “What kind of shit did he do?”

  “He beat the crap out of the wife of one of my store owners. Put her in an induced coma, just like you were. He knocked out all her teeth and broke her nose and both cheekbones. All this as a threat to the husband to start paying him instead of me. The husband looked to me to protect them—that was part of the deal, which is why I brought you in.”

  I nodded slowly. I didn’t recall the exact circumstances, but again it was sounding familiar. It sounded like something I would do. Even though when I reached back into my mind for my memories, I found only an empty space—something that was frustrating and frightening in equal measures—I still felt as though I knew who I was. I couldn’t explain it, except to say that who I was didn’t exist in my head, but more in my heart. In the soul of me—if I had a soul, something, that, considering what I did for a living, was quite possibly optional. But that was also where my memory and feelings about the dark haired woman existed, in the heart of me rather than the mind.

  She would help me find my memories again, I knew she would.

  “I understand you think finding that woman again might be dangerous, but it’s the only shot I have at trying to get my memories back. I can’t explain it, but when I looked at her, something sparked inside me. You say I’ve met you, too, but I don’t feel the same way when I look at you.”

  He cocked an eyebrow. “Glad to hear it, or I might have second thoughts about letting you stay here.”

  “You said something else when you picked me up, about how people wanted me dead. What were you talking about then?”

  I wasn’t sure my head could handle much more information, but I had to know. I wanted this fog to clear so I could get on with my life again. And most of all, I wanted it to clear so I could remember the past I shared with the woman who had known me.

  But Harvey shook his head, frowning. “I don’t exactly know. You took on a job not long ago, but something went wrong. You didn’t go through with it. People are mad with you because of it.”

  “People? What kind of people?”

  I wondered if it had anything to do with the girl.

  “One of the old families.”

  “Families?”

  “Yeah, mafia.”

  “What? Here in New York?”

  “No, I don’t think so. But word spreads fast, you know, especially in our business. Like I said, I don’t know the exact details, but I know you messed up somehow and people weren’t happy.”

  “Could that have been who shot me? The reason I was in the river?” I didn’t know how to explain it, but it didn’t sit right with me. Besides, the girl had said she was the reason I ended up in the river, and that I’d been hired to kill her. Had I not gone through with it because I’d fallen for her, and so someone had tried to take me out instead? If so, why was she alive? If someone wanted her dead badly enough to hire someone to kill her, wouldn’t they have found someone else to finish the job when I failed?

  I didn’t know. None of it sat right with me.

  “I have to find her,” I said again, fighting the exhaustion that seemed to constantly be hovering over me. “It’s the only way I’m going to find out the truth.”

  “She might find us first,” Harvey said.

  My head snapped toward him. “What are you talking about?”

  “I managed to slip her my business card on the street.”

  I nodded, trying not to let myself get too excited by the information. Could she call at any moment? The possibility felt too easy.

  I remembered how she’d turned and run from me on the street, how someone had shouted at her. She’d seemed frightened and nervous, and at first I’d thought that had been because of me, but now I wondered. What if picking up the phone wasn’t an easy thing for her to do? After all, someone had paid me to kill her, and just because I’d lost my memory didn’t mean that she was safe now. What if that same person was still after her?

  My exhaustion condensed into a muffled thumping in my temples, and I put my head in my hands. My legs and arms began to tremble, and Harvey’s apartment began to recede from vision.

  I was barely aware of his voice. “Hey, man. Let’s get you to bed. This is too much. You’re still not back to yourself. You need to rest.”

  I felt him beside me, wedging his shoulder under my armpit to help lift me. I wasn’t a big guy, and the time in a hospital bed had left me slight. I didn’t like the feeling. I preferred to be strong and supple. I felt like I’d literally lost who I was, and not just because of my memory.

  But despite this, I remained resolute. Even as Harvey helped me into the bedroom, placed me on the bed, and lifted my feet to help me lie down, I opened my mouth and said, “I need to find her.”

  Chapter Eleven

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  The two men sat with me while I forced a hotdog down my throat. The smell and taste was overpowering, strong and tangy, in a way I’d never noticed before. I hoped I hadn’t been given one past its sell-by-date. I’d had enough of throwing up for one day.

  But even as I struggled my way through my meal, my head was filled with thoughts of X. I couldn’t believe he was still alive; my heart swelled with hope for him. I’d truly thought I would never get to see him again, and seeing him there had been like someone had struck me in the chest. Like a person whose heart had stopped, only to have it jolted back to life with a defibrillator.

  He was alive. He was walking the streets in the same city I was in. I would be able to speak to him again, to touch his hair and press my face against his chest. I missed having him to talk to and give advice more than anything, even more than the physical stuff, though that had been great, too.

  The business card the other man had given me felt like a massive wedge in the side of my bra. I was terrified they’d notice it and I’d lose my only way of contacting X again. I didn’t know how I’d manage to get to a phone without Tony or one of his gang noticing, but it was now the main focus in my day. Yes, I should have been preoccupied by thoughts of facing my father in court, now the date was imminent, but all I cared about was seeing X.

  Paulie and Warren drove me back to Tony’s place. The gangster was waiting for me when we arrived, and fresh guilt swamped over me. I shouldn’t have felt guilty, but I did. Tony had kept his side of the bargain. He had kept both me and my sister safe when my father could easily have sent someone else to kill me, so removing me as a threat to testify against him. Tony had shot X, something I hated him for, but he’d done so with good reason. X had killed four of his men. X had also been sent to kill me. In Tony’s eyes, X was the enemy, and I guessed a part of me understood where he was coming from.

  Problem was, he was anything but an enemy in my eyes.

  And I wanted him back.

  Tony locked me into his gaze. “So, how did it go?”

  I refused to be intimidated and so stood straighter, lifting my chin. “It went fine. Everything is going ahead as scheduled.”

  I wondered if Paulie or Warren would mention my vomiting incident, or the fact I’d run out on them while at the hotdog place. I didn’t think they’d talk about the running part—after all, they were as worried about getting into trouble with Tony as I was—but I thought they might mention me being sick. Then I realized they hadn’t been in the room when I’d so unceremoniously lost the contents of my stomach into a trashcan. They might have guessed when they’d seen the state of me, but they didn’t know for sure.

  “Do you have a court appearance date yet?”

  I shook my head. “No, but I’ll find out in the next day or two. It won’t be long now.”

  “Good.”

  What would happen to me after my father had gone down for life? Tony would no longer have any reason to offer me protection. In fact, he might even kill me himself. That he was continuing with Nicole’s education made me think he had longer term plans for her. I wanted to know exactly what they were, but I was frightened I wouldn’t like the answer.

  “Actually,” I said, “I’m kinda beat. I might go and take a nap, if that’s okay with you.”

  He gave a shrug, as though what I did was none of his business, though we both knew that wasn’t true.

  I was glad to escape. The business card burned against my skin, and I wanted to take it out and study it, try to figure out where X might be, and put a plan into place. I wasn’t afraid of taking chances, but I was so close to my end goal of seeing my father behind bars for the rest of his life that I didn’t want to mess things up now. However, I discovered as I slipped past Tony and headed up to my bedroom, I was exhausted. It was far too early to go to bed, but that was the only place I wanted to be. The tiredness had taken hold of me, making me want to sleep like nothing else. I must have picked up a virus or something.

  I couldn’t allow myself to fall to sleep. First I needed to check out the card the man had given me and see if I could work out any clues about where X might be. I didn’t want to hide it in the bedroom somewhere. Keeping it on me was probably the safest thing to do. It was uncomfortable, having the card sticking into the side of my skin, making my breast sore and swollen, but other than shoving it down the front of my panties, I didn’t have many other options of places to hide it.

  My sister must have still been in her lessons, or else was doing something different, but she wasn’t in the bedroom. I was pleased to have the privacy. What would she say if she knew I’d seen X again? She wouldn’t be happy about it. She’d chosen to have Tony come and get us, and she knew X had been sent by our father. She didn’t care X had ended up helping me rather than killing me. In her mind, he’d killed the two men Tony had sent to save us, and then killed two more. It didn’t matter to her that we’d believed she’d been in terrible danger. As a typical teen, she only cared about what she wanted, and that was to get back to New York and see our father sent down.

  I threw myself down on my back on my bed and reached inside my bra for the business card. I read the name, Harvey Baglione. Did I know it? The surname certainly seemed familiar. My father knew a lot of the old families in New York, and I’d grown up being bounced on the knee of several of the older members.

  Baglione.

  I ran the name over in my head and then read the card again. I was certain I knew it, though I assumed it was the man’s father I would have been acquainted with at some point. The man who’d handed me the card—Harvey—was too young to have had anything to do with my father. There was nothing to give me an idea of an address, but there was an email address and two phone numbers. If only I had access to a phone or a computer, and I’d be able to look him up. Problem solved.

  I knew one person who did get regular access to a computer, and that was Nicole. Was there any way I’d be able to persuade her to Google Harvey Baglione for me? See if she could come up with an address. I’d have to make up something, though I wasn’t sure what. She’d never look for me if she thought it had something to do with X. But then why would she ever think that? As far as she knew, he was dead, just like I had believed up until a few hours ago.

  I pushed the business card back inside my bra and rolled over onto my side, my hands up under my head. It occurred to me that nowhere on the card did it say exactly what kind of business Mr. Baglione was in. I had a feeling I could make a good guess.

  I thought I’d have lain awake with worries of the court case running through my head, but instead I slipped into sleep with X’s face on my mind.

  Chapter Twelve

  X

  When I woke, the weakness I’d experienced had gone. For a moment, I had no idea where I was, but then I remembered Harvey Baglione had brought me back to his apartment. I tried to search my memories farther back than that—reaching beyond me waking in the hospital and the events that had followed, but still there was nothing.

  I half sat and looked toward the window. The drapes were open, just as they’d been when I’d fallen asleep—or passed out, I wasn’t quite sure which—and it was daylight outside. How long had I been asleep? It felt like longer than an hour or two. Had I slept through the evening and following night?

  I swung my legs out of bed and walked out into the rest of the apartment. Where was Harvey? Was he sleeping? It felt strange to be in the home of someone I barely knew. He said we’d known each other before, and I’d killed someone for him, but of course I had no memory of those events.

  If I killed for a living, I assumed that meant I had money. It wasn’t something I imagined I’d do purely for the love of it, though I assumed I must have some affinity for the act in order to take up such a profession. If I had money, I’d be able to rent my own apartment, though I wondered where I’d go about getting references and other paperwork. Perhaps that was why I didn’t have a home to speak of.

  I padded through the ap
artment, looking out for Harvey. It didn’t appear he was home. I stopped in the bathroom to relieve myself, and then washed my hands and splashed cold water on my face. The staff at the hospital had been kind enough to find me some toiletries—a toothbrush and a razor, a small canister of shaving foam, and some deodorant. I guessed they’d felt sorry for me. The items were in a clear plastic bag, so I used the toothbrush to rid myself of the bad taste in my mouth, borrowing some of the toothpaste which stood in a holder beside the sink. After I’d brushed my teeth, I stood, my hands rested on the basin, as I took in my reflection. I lifted one hand and smoothed it down over my face. A light brown, scruffy beard covered my chin, jaw, and above my upper lip. Above that, my cheekbones appeared sharp, my cheeks hollow. The effect made my eyes stand out, darkened bruises of shadows beneath them.

  I could have passed for a homeless man. No wonder the staff at the hospital felt sorry for me. Despite the credit card and driver’s license, that was probably what they thought I’d been.

  I debated shaving off the beard, but thought I would leave it for the moment. If I should be hiding from people, it might give me that extra bit of disguise they wouldn’t be looking for. Whoever those people might be. I ran my fingers through the beard growth, the blunt edges of my nails scraping through the coarse hair and against my skin beneath. It wasn’t long yet, not too far past some stubble. Maybe I’d keep it. I thought perhaps I liked it after all. The new me.

  Leaving the bathroom, I headed back out into the kitchen. I was starving and craving coffee. I spotted a note on the side, and picked it up to read.

  Had business to attend. Make yourself at home. Do NOT go looking for the girl alone. H.

  The girl. The girl with the dark eyes and hair. I had to find her. I knew it with every inch of my being. I wished I had the slightest clue where to start. New York was a big place.

  Ignoring what Harvey had said, I started putting the possibilities together in my head. The most sensible place to start was where she’d stopped me in the street. She must have been in that area for a reason. I just needed to figure out what that was. Did she live or work nearby? Had she been there for something else? I had no intention of sitting around this apartment waiting for Harvey to get back. He might be hours, and in the meantime I would have driven myself crazy.