The Midnight Hour Read Free Page B

only pushed him more over the edge.
    Besides Hawk, the only other person who knew CIA Agent Victoria Green was former Marine Captain Sandy Carroll was the highly skilled doctor who had performed the surgery, Stephen Hunt. By the time Sandy had regained consciousness well over three months later, she had awakened with a new face and a new identity with the understanding that Sandy Carroll had died in that explosion in Haiti and was gone forever. That meant establishing a new life and giving up anything and everything that had been connected to her past, including Drake Warren. There was no way they could ever let Drake know that Sandy had not died in that bombing. Cross's hatred for Drake was well-known and he wouldn't hesitate using Tori again to settle an old score.
    When Drake began working for the Agency a year after Tori had come on board, it was also decided that their paths could never cross. Since Hawk was the boss of both of them, he had worked hard to assure that their assignments took them to different parts of the world, which hadn't been a hard thing to do since Drake Warren was such a loner. Besides, if they had run into each other, Tori would have recognized Drake, but there was no way Drake would have recognized Tori. Her facial features were totally different from those of Sandy Carroll. And because of the extensive nasal and throat surgery she had undergone due to scarred tissue, even her voice was different. Only her eyes had remained a dark chocolate brown. When Hawk had first seen her after the extensive cosmetic surgery, he had been satisfied that there I was nothing about her features to indicate who she'd once I been. Her mannerisms had been another story and she had undergone an entire year of in-depth training for the once right-handed person to become left-handed. That had taken a lot of hard work on Tori's part and in the end she had I again mastered her skills in martial arts and marksmanship. I
    Unfortunately, no matter how successful they had been with Tori's makeover, the one thing they hadn't been able to replace was her heart. Since Hawk at one time had been both her and Drake's marine colonel, he had been one of the first to detect the blossoming romance between them, although Drake had fought it like hell. Tori had been more accepting and Hawk would never forget how, following her rescue, Drake had been the one person she had constantly cried out for during all the pain she'd endured from the trauma of the fire and explosion before lapsing into unconsciousness for those three weeks. "I had to go see him, Hawk."
    Tori's soft voice sounded defeated, filled with grief, loss, but held no remorse. He knew if this situation happened again she would risk everything for the man she still loved. "By going to see Drake you outright disobeyed my am orders, Tori. Sandy Carroll doesn't exist anymore. You know that as well as I do. She died in that explosion and for over five years now I've asked you to get on with your life."
    Tori sighed deeply and wondered how she could get Hawk or anyone else to understand that she had tried getting on with her life and most of the time she succeeded. But there were those days when she wasn't consumed with work, when she suffered from bouts of depression, and she couldn't help but think about the man she had lost forever.
     
    She fully understood that to let Drake know she was still alive would be a terrible risk, especially if Solomon Cross found out. The man was a cold-blooded killer and would hunt her down and kill her just because he would have felt he'd been cheated out of her death. Cross had eluded the DEA and CIA's clutches for more than eight years and was one of the most wanted men in the war on drugs. He had been in hiding for the past five years and for a while everyone thought he was dead, taken out by his own cartel. But recent reports that had been confirmed through several different governmental agencies indicated the man was still very much alive. But