The Blonde Identity: A Novel

He was probably wrong, he told himself.

It was probably nothing, he swore.

There’s no way Zoe was actually in danger.

He lied.

And he knew it. He knew it like he knew his heart was fire and his blood was gasoline. Like he knew it was his fault for staying in the safe, cushy confines of the ship. He’d stopped running. He’d stopped hiding. He’d stopped listening to the voice in the back of his head that told him there were no safe places or happy memories, only the missions you live through and, ultimately, the one you don’t.

So Sawyer kept running.

And he prayed he wasn’t too late.

Her

The good thing about being an amnesiac is that when your life flashes before your eyes it doesn’t take very long.

So when the big man began to squeeze, what Zoe felt were Sawyer’s hands on her throat that afternoon, gentle but strong. What she heard was Sawyer’s voice, saying, Tuck your chin down to protect your windpipe. Put your hands here. Put your foot there. Leverage your hips up and—

“Flip.”

Zoe’s voice was full of gravel as she watched the big man fly off the bed and land on the floor. She tried to scramble away, but she was still tangled up in the blankets and a calloused hand grabbed her ankle, pulling her back.

She reached for the bedside table. Clawing. Grabbing. She had to try something . . . She had to do something . . . So when her hand landed on a solid object, she didn’t think. She just grabbed it and swung.

Russian curses filled the air. Blood splattered, red dashes across dark mirrors. But then the door flew open and Sawyer was standing in the dim light of the hallway, looking from Zoe, breathless on the bed, to the big man bleeding on the floor.

“Did you just break an assassin’s nose with a telephone?”

Her eyes were wide. “I think so?”

He absolutely beamed. “Good girl.”

And then he pounced, but the dude on the ground rolled, and the next moment a gun was in the man’s hand and his hand was pointed at Sawyer’s chest.

Sawyer dove as the gun fired. It must have had a silencer, because the noise wasn’t enough to bring security or alert the guests. If it hadn’t been for the shattering of one of the mirrors, Zoe might have thought she’d dreamed it, but the glass was cracking, breaking, and she hoped the bad luck wouldn’t rub off on them. Because the man was turning . . . And firing again—right at Zoe.

She dove behind the bed as the patio doors shattered.

Freezing wind gushed inside, curtains whipping and snapping as Sawyer lunged for the man, pressing him against the bed while the two of them hit and kicked. The headboard banged against the wall, a rhythmic thump, thump, thump that led to someone banging back—Marc’s low voice shouting, “Keep it down over there, you lovebirds!”

Sawyer had a hold of the assassin, and the assassin had a hold on the gun, and the gun was pointed right at . . .

“Zoe!” Sawyer yelled as the shot fired.

In the next moment, Zoe was rolling over broken glass, but she didn’t feel the pain somehow. She was too busy remembering how Sawyer had told her that Kozlov and his men will always find a person’s weakness, exploit it, use it, kill them with it if they have to.

And Zoe knew that, right then, Sawyer’s biggest weakness was her.

When she saw the backpack on the floor, she stopped thinking and dove for it.

“Sawyer!” she yelled, standing and tossing one of the guns in his direction, but she missed, and as he lunged for the weapon she realized her mistake.

Because she was in front of those broken doors now, glass cutting into her feet, curtains and hair whipping around her, and absolutely nothing else standing between her and the railing, and the river.

And the Russian launching himself in her direction.

Beefy arms around her waist like a vise. Railing slamming into her back like a bat. And freezing wind on all her skin not covered by an almost nonexistent nightie.

“Zoe!” Sawyer bellowed, but Zoe could feel herself bending over the rail. She was going to break in two. She was going to black out. She was going to die.

Which was her very last thought before the world turned upside down. And black. And very, very cold.