The Phoenix Encounter

by Linda Castillo

  Robert took the file and paged through it, seeing that, as usual, Samuel Hatch and his team had been very thorough. “I guess I’ll need to brush up on my French.”

  “And your Rebelian dialects. All communication will be via the ARIES satellite. I’ve got new encoding set up. Your code name is PHOENIX.”

  “When do I leave?”

  Hatch glanced at his watch. “Two hours. I’ve got a jet waiting at Annapolis that will take you to La Guardia. From there you’ll take the Concorde to Paris then hop on the train to Rajalla.”

  Robert slid the folder into his briefcase and rose. “All right.”

  Hatch stood, regarding him with intelligent green eyes that invariably gave the impression he could read not only one’s body language but thoughts, as well. “Watch yourself.” He extended his hand. “You know what DeBruzkya is capable of.”

  “I can handle DeBruzkya.” As he shook the other man’s hand, Robert knew the real question was whether or not he could handle the ghosts.

  At eight the next evening Robert sat in a greasy booth in an obscure little pub called Ludwig’s and nursed a stein of watered-down beer. The pub was crowded with weekend revelers. The booze was cheap, the cigarette smoke was thick and talk was of the old days and revolution.

  Robert sipped his beer, wishing he were anywhere but this dank little bar in a country he wished to God he’d never set foot in. He’d been in Rebelia less than two hours, and already she dominated his thoughts. The last hours they’d spent together, making love on the narrow bed in her room above the pub. The fight they’d had over her refusal to leave with him. The violence of her death. The black months that followed.

  He knew thinking of her wasn’t going to do a damn thing for his frame of mind or his mission. But he’d never learned how to block thoughts of her. Damn it, of all the places Hatch could have shipped him to, why did it have to be this hellhole? It wasn’t like the world was lacking hellholes. Any one of a dozen or so would have done just fine.

  Restless, he finished his beer and motioned for the bartender to bring another. He wasn’t enjoying it, but he didn’t have anything else to do until his contact arrived. He’d already set up base camp, renting a small apartment above a market in a seedy section of town, where he’d installed the tiny communications satellite dish and left a backup short wave radio per Hatch’s instructions. He knew he should keep a clear head, but for the first time in a long time, Robert didn’t want a clear head. Sometimes all that clarity made life a hell of a lot more difficult.

  “Sir?”

  Robert looked up from his beer to see a young man with black hair and a matching mustache grinning at him, and he took a long sip of beer. “Get lost.”

  “I’m Jacques.”

  Robert watched him closely, zeroing in on his restless hands and nervous fidget and went with the predesignated script. “What’s your sign, Jacques?”

  The other man didn’t blink. “ARIES, sir.”

  “If you’re an ARIES, what does that make me?”

  “PHOENIX.”

  The code words confirmed that this young man with the engaging smile and vivid blue eyes was, indeed, his contact. Robert extended his hand. “I was starting to think you weren’t going to show.”

  “The soldiers set up a roadblock, sir. They’re angry at the rebels again. I had to wait them out.”

  “Hopefully, they’re not feeling trigger-happy this evening. I don’t feel like getting shot at.” Robert rubbed the dull ache in his thigh.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And cut out the sir crap.”

  “Yes, s—” Jacques flushed. “What do I call you?”

  “My close friends call me PHOENIX.” Rising, Robert dug five Rebelian dollars out of his pocket and left them on the table. “Let’s go.”

  The young man glanced toward a narrow door at the rear of the bar. “This way.”

  Looking once over his shoulder, Robert followed Jacques past the bar and out the back door into a narrow alley. Two men clad in ragged coats and dangerous scowls stood against the crumbling brick building smoking Rebelian cigarettes. They eyed Robert with a combination of hostility and suspicion. Robert stared back, keenly aware that if something went wrong he was on his own, outnumbered three to one and without a sidearm to boot.

  “Hey, you the American?”

  Robert glanced at the tall man with a bald head and full beard and mustache. His nerves jumped when the man reached into his coat pocket. A dozen scenarios rushed through his mind. For an instant he considered reaching for the switchblade strapped to his calf, but he knew if the other man had a gun there was no way he’d get to it in time. Adrenaline cut a path through his gut when the man produced a small, lethal-looking pistol.

  Never taking his eyes from the pistol, he raised his hands and took a step back. “What the hell is this?” he growled.

  Turning the pistol so the butt faced Robert, the bald man laughed outright, then passed the pistol to him. “You Americans are so jumpy.”

  The three men broke into hearty laughter. Robert wasn’t amused and snarled a very American profanity as he accepted the pistol and tucked it into the waistband of his jeans.

  “You’re a real comedian,” he said.

  “Thank you.”

  Resisting the urge to roll his eyes, Robert said, “If you’re finished joking around, how about if you take me to my contact?”

  The bald man scratched the top of his head and glanced at the other two men. He spoke in rapid Rebelian. Robert was only able to catch every other word or so, but what he was able to decipher gave him a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

  “Your contact is a very important person within the rebel movement,” said Jacques.

  “Somehow I already figured that out.” Robert stared at him, waiting, wondering what the hell these three men were up to. “Take me to him.”

  “The only way I can do that is to blindfold you.”

  “Look, either you trust me or you don’t,” Robert snapped.

  The three men exchanged looks again. The bald man spoke first. “This has nothing to do with trust.”

  “Then why the blindfold?”

  “Because if the soldiers capture you, they will torture you until you reveal the location of our headquarters. We can’t risk that. The blindfold is for your own protection, my friend.”

  Because of the threat of hostile soldiers, the journey to the rebel stronghold was made on foot. Blindfolded, Robert walked behind Jacques with the bald man and his cohort bringing up the rear. A mile into the walk, his left thigh began to throb. Robert had learned to deal with the pain, mostly by directing his thoughts elsewhere. He was a firm believer in the mind-over-matter philosophy and had decided a long time ago that the injury was not going to limit his physical capabilities. Of course, the injury didn’t always cooperate.

  The cold rain wasn’t helping matters. But Robert used the cold and wet to keep his mind off the pain. Still, after three miles, his limp became so pronounced that the bald man paused and touched him on the shoulder. “Do you need to stop and rest, American?”

  The blindfold pressed soggily against his eyes. Robert smelled wet foliage and damp earth and guessed they were probably deep in the forests to the north of Rajalla. Cold rain dripped down the collar of his jacket, and the material pressed wetly against his back. His leg ached with every beat of his heart. But because stopping wasn’t going to help any of those things, he shook his head. “Let’s keep moving.”

  “It’s not much farther.”

  He concentrated on his mission objectives as he walked, formulating questions for his Rebelian contact. He wanted a run down on DeBruzkya. Rumors about an American who had been captured. Or gems. He tried hard to keep his mind on the business at hand, but his thoughts went repeatedly to a woman with iridescent hazel eyes.

  “You can take off the blindfold.”

  Thankful to be rid of the soggy material, Robert stopped and stripped it off. They were in the midst of a forest th
ick with tall trees and low-growing brush. Ahead, he could just make out the jagged peaks of the mountains and knew they were heading north. Blinking to clear his eyes, he spotted a faint path that wove between the trees to a small cottage nestled beneath the thick canopy of Rebelian pines. Yellow light shone in the windows. Smoke chugged from a stone chimney, and the smell of wood smoke hung in the air.

  “Your contact is inside.” Smiling, Jacques reached over and squeezed his shoulder. “We’re glad to have you here, American.”

  Meeting his gaze, Robert saw the sincerity behind the words, the truth in the other man’s eyes, and nodded. “We believe in freedom in America,” he said.

  Bowing slightly, Jacques backed away. “Your contact knows how to reach me if you need anything.”

  Robert stood in the rain and watched the three men disappear down the trail, then looked through the trees at the cottage. The sight was surreal in the utter darkness, like something out of an old fairy tale. A pretty cottage surrounded by a beautiful forest and the backdrop of breathtaking mountains. He wasn’t sure why, but the sight made him think about Lily. She would have liked it here.

  “Don’t go there, buddy,” he said, cursing the ghosts that refused to give him peace even after so many months.

  He pulled the old revolver from the waistband of his jeans, checked the cylinder and found it loaded. Hoping his contact knew English, he shoved the revolver into the waistband of his jeans, and started toward the cottage.

  His heart pounded hard and fast as he stepped onto the stone porch and knocked on the door. Instinctively, he stood to one side, just in case whomever was on the inside had a nervous trigger finger and decided to shoot first and ask questions later. He saw a shadow move inside the window, and his nerves zinged. Resting his right hand lightly on the butt of the pistol, he knocked again.

  The door swung open. Recognition sparked like a hot wire and sent a surge of shock to his brain. Robert stumbled back. His first fleeting thought was that he was seeing his first ghost.

  Lily.

  He stared at her, aware of his heart pounding in his chest. He tried to utter her name, but his brain was so overwhelmed, he couldn’t speak. All he could think was that he’d seen her die. That it was an absolute impossibility for Lillian Scott to be standing there in a thick cotton sweater and faded blue jeans staring at him as if he were the one who’d come back from the dead instead of her.

  A thousand words tangled inside Robert, but he choked on every one of them as if they were shards of glass. Emotions snapped through him like thunderbolts, shocking his body with their awesome power. He stared at the woman standing in the doorway, aware of his heart raging in his chest, the dull roar of blood rushing through his veins.

  He couldn’t believe Lily was alive. But it was her; he knew it as surely as he saw the flash of recognition in her hazel eyes. There was no other woman like her. No other who could affect him like this. He would know her anywhere and under any circumstance. He would know her in the dark, just by the feel of her, the scent of her. The energy surrounding her.

  Robert stared, speechless and shocked to his bones. Her hair was longer, but still as radiant as burnished copper. She had the same flawless skin, as fragile as fine German porcelain. Only now there was a tiny scar that ran from her left eyebrow to the hairline at her temple.

  “Lily,” he whispered after an infinite moment.

  “Robert. My God. I didn’t…” She blinked, as if trying to wake herself from a dream. “How did you…”

  Neither of them seemed capable of completing a sentence. Slowly, he once again became aware of his surroundings. The ping of rain against the tin roof. The crackle of a fire in the hearth. The smell of bread and wood smoke and woman. His leg ached dully, the way it always did when he overexerted himself, but he barely noticed the pain. And for the first time since receiving the injury, he was glad for the distraction.

  “C-come in,” she said.

  When he only continued to stare at her, she stepped back. “You’re getting wet.”

  “I’m already wet.” But Robert knew the weather no longer rated on his list of concerns.

  His heart raced with his pulse as he stepped into the cottage. Warmth and a startling sense of comfort he didn’t quite trust embraced him. He looked around, seeing immediately that whomever lived here had somehow managed to turn a ramshackle hovel into a home.

  “What are you doing here?” she asked.

  Robert watched as she crossed to the fire and tossed another log into the flames. Before he even realized he was watching her, his eyes swept over her, taking in every detail. She’d lost weight, but the curves he’d once known intimately still defined her shape. Even through the thick cotton sweater she wore, he could see the outline of her full breasts. Her jeans were snug enough so that he could see the gentle roundness of her hips. And in those fleeting seconds her beauty made him remember all the things he’d tried so desperately to forget in the twenty-one months since he’d last seen her.

  Robert cut the thought short with practiced precision. He wasn’t exactly sure what was going on but knew he couldn’t dwell on it. He couldn’t let himself think of her in those terms. Not when he’d worked so hard to get her out of his system.

  “I could ask you the same question,” he said.

  “I—I live here.” She glanced at him over her shoulder as she walked into a small kitchen area. “Were you looking for me?”

  “No,” he said quickly and held his ground at the door. “I was supposed to meet someone here.”

  He watched her pour Rebelian black tea into two mismatched cups. She looked cool on the outside, maybe even a little tough, but her hands were shaking, and for the first time he realized she was merely hiding her shock better than he was.

  She carried both cups to the wooden chairs in front of the hearth. “Your contact?”

  That she knew about his contact shocked him all over again. Lily didn’t know he was an ARIES operative. No one did, aside from his counterparts and other ARIES personnel. There was no way in hell he would ever tell her. The less she knew about him, the safer she would be.

  Because he wasn’t quite sure how to respond, he didn’t answer. Instead, he followed her to the hearth, keenly aware of her scent, that her essence filled not only the room, but the entire house. “I’m doing some missionary work for the French government.”

  She looked at him oddly, a student perplexed by a particularly difficult math equation. “I was supposed to meet someone here tonight, as well.”

  A sinking sensation swamped his gut. And suddenly he knew this was no coincidence. “Jacques brought me here.”

  Her knowing eyes met his. “Jacques is…with me. He’s part of the movement.”

  With me. Of all the words that stuck in his brain, he hated it that it was those two. He stared at her, torn between turning around and walking out and forgetting this had ever happened, and shaking her until she told him how it was that she was alive and he’d spent the last twenty-one months dying a slow death because he’d thought her gone.

  “There’s got to be some kind of mistake,” he said.

  “There’s no mistake.” She handed him one of the cups. “I don’t have any sugar. That’s one of the many things we no longer have in Rebelia.”

  Amazed that she could be thinking about sugar when his world had just been rocked off its foundation, he took the cup and sipped the strong, dark tea, trying desperately to rally his brain into a functioning mode.

  “I just can’t believe it’s you,” she said, sipping her tea. “This has been planned for months. We need your help.”

  “I’m here for information,” he said. “Not to help you.”

  Holding her cup between her slender hands, she looked at him through the rising steam. “I’m your contact. And if you want information from me, you’re going to have to earn it.”

  Chapter 2

  Having spent the last two years in a country decimated by civil war, hunger and indiscriminate
violence, Lily thought she had endured every kind of shock a human being could endure. She’d seen things she couldn’t fathom. Things she refused to think of once the lights were out and she was alone in her bed. A few minutes earlier, she’d thought she could handle just about anything fate saw fit to throw her way.

  She’d been wrong.

  Not even the horrors of war had prepared her for seeing Robert again. She simply couldn’t believe he was standing in her living room, as warm and alive as the last time she’d seen him. The night she’d hurt him terribly and then watched as he’d been cut down by shrapnel.

  God in heaven, how was she going to handle this? How was she going to tell him everything that had happened since he’d left? Things that would change both their lives forever. The questions gnawed at her like voracious little beasts. Questions that terrified her more than the threat of any bomb or soldier’s bayonet or stray bullet. Questions she had absolutely no idea how to answer.

  Standing next to the hearth, Robert regarded her with hard, suspicious eyes. He may look the same, she mused, but the last months had changed him. Made him hard. Maybe even bitter. She considered the bitterness in her own heart and wondered if the last months had been as hard for him as they had been for her. She didn’t see how.

  Still, the steely gaze that swept the length of her remained starkly familiar. The pull was still there, too, she realized, and a shiver rippled through her hard enough to make her hands shake. She endured his scrutiny with stoic silence, hoping he couldn’t hear the deafening rush of blood through her veins or see her shake.

  Refusing to be cowed, Lily stared at him, trying to keep her thoughts on the business at hand and failing miserably. He offered a commanding presence that unnerved her as much as the sight of any enemy soldier. Broad shoulders. Lean hips. Legs slightly bowed with muscle. He seemed taller than she remembered even though she knew that was an impossibility. He had the most fascinating face of any man she’d ever seen. Intelligence and a subtle cunning burned bright and hot behind piercing blue eyes. Laugh lines cupped a mouth that was much more harsh than it had been when she’d known him. A five-o’clock shadow darkened a square jaw that lent him a hostile countenance. Even from three feet away she could smell him, an out-of-doors scent that reminded her of mountains and rain—and a time when he’d ruled her senses as surely as he’d held her heart in the palm of his hand.