Claimed by the Secret Agent

by Lyn Stone

  When they reached the apartment building, police cars blocked the street. People were going in and coming out like ants.

  Marie didn’t envy the police collecting evidence. “Not exactly a secure scene, is it?”

  Grant strong-armed his way through the crowd near the entry, flashed his badge and asked for the chief inspector. Marie held up her badge and followed in his wake, curious to see what he would do next.

  He had a few words with the inspector, who acted friendly enough to a strange American agent elbowing his way into an ongoing investigation.

  Grant could be pushy—that was for sure. She didn’t realize just how pushy until he reached behind him and grabbed her hand, dragging her along to the apartment.

  Cynthia Rivers had fought for her freedom. It hadn’t been nearly as easy as when the kidnapper took her, Marie thought. “Could this have been a different guy, maybe? The timing for one thing. And there were never signs of a struggle.”

  Grant shrugged. “Maybe.” He left her at the door and went inside the room as if he belonged there.

  What the hell was he doing? Contaminating the scene, for one thing. Hindering the forensics person, for another. The gloved woman didn’t look quite as agreeable as the inspector had and was railing at Grant in Dutch.

  He ignored her, picking up first one scattered object, then another and another. Eyes closed and tuning her out. Or maybe tuning in to something else.

  Now he was holding a bath sponge, of all things, squeezing it between his hands. He sniffed it and made a face. Marie felt the hairs rise on the back of her neck.

  Could he really get something like that? She watched as he slowly placed it back on the floor where he’d found it.

  “Enough!” cried the forensics woman.

  “Yes, that’s enough,” Grant agreed. He nodded to the irate examiner as he stood. “Thank you, and I apologize for the interruption.”

  He went over to the window, took out his cell phone and made a call. Marie stayed where she was by the doorway until he joined her.

  “I can’t believe they let you do that,” Marie exclaimed.

  “I told the inspector I was looking for similarities to the last victim of the Embassy Kidnapper. He had orders to cooperate.”

  “What were you doing with that bath sponge, by the way?”

  Instead of answering, he took her hand to lead her back outside. “We’re going to Gouda.”

  She started to jerk her hand away out of habit, but didn’t. It felt somehow right to let him hold it at the moment. She even threaded her fingers through his. “Gouda? Where they make that cheese?”

  “That’s where he was headed with her.”

  “Onders?”

  Grant inclined his head and shrugged. “Like you said, the M.O. is different. He overpowered her, probably knocked her out. There was chloroform on the sponge—pretty much dissipated now, though. Maybe it evaporated too quickly to be effective.”

  “That forensics lady was about to knock you out!”

  “I don’t blame her. But I had to pick up on the kidnapper’s energy.”

  “And you did?”

  Grant nodded. “He carried her over his shoulder. He was thinking about where he could stash her and worrying about the lack of planning. This was a rush job, maybe to make up for losing you.”

  “So how’d you get Gouda out of all that?”

  “He was going there with her. Had to. That means there’s probably someone there calling the shots.”

  Marie hated to leave without seeing more of Amsterdam, but finding this woman was the top priority. Catching the kidnapper ran a close second. She was as eager as Grant was to take up the chase.

  When had she begun to trust his instincts or whatever it was that led him? Marie wondered. Looking back, it was probably when they found that Onders was actually in Amsterdam.

  “What about Onders? Is he still under surveillance?”

  “I hope so. Call and inform them we won’t be relieving them today, would you?” He reached in his pocket and handed her his phone and a card with the number. “This is the force coordinator. Don’t mention the lead we’re following just yet. I could be wrong.”

  “You? Wrong?” She laughed as she punched in the number. “Oh, right, that 20 percent margin of error we have to worry about.”

  “I’m pretty sure about it,” Grant said, obviously not taking offense. He even seemed amused by her doubt.

  Minutes later she related the news to Grant. “Onders is in the wind, and they just discovered it. He must have sneaked out of his hotel somehow and grabbed the clerk.”

  “It seemed like a different energy. Not the same thought patterns.”

  “You want to explain that?” she asked, trying to sound polite when she wanted to shake him till his teeth rattled.

  “Later. I’m thinking right now.”

  Fortunately for him, Grant didn’t sound petulant or annoyed, only distracted, so she let it go.

  The ride to Gouda proved uneventful and silent. Marie wondered if he thought talking about his findings would jinx the op.

  She gave him his time to think and enjoyed the scenery. The day was great, sunny and cool and perfect for open windows to enjoy the sweetness of the air. Small wonder it smelled sweet, since this was the flower capital of the world. Acres of them somewhere nearby she imagined as she inhaled.

  It seemed so unreal that they were out chasing evil on a day like today. Even more so when they arrived in the picturesque little town of Gouda.

  “What a fairy-tale place! Look at that spire. Wow, that has to be a thousand years old! And they have an open-air market. Turn—you can’t drive through there. Pedestrians only.”

  “I know. I’ve been here before, but it’s been a long time. My dad was stationed in Germany, and Holland was one of our favorite vacation spots.”

  “You mentioned before that you were a military brat. That must have been interesting.” She had another piece of the Grant Tyndal puzzle. He hadn’t shared much about himself at all since they’d met, and she was curious. “It’s not fair that you know almost everything about me from my file and I know hardly anything about you.”

  “Not much to know,” he replied, “and none of it secret except what I do for a living. You already know that.”

  None of it secret, huh? Well, that was one thing they didn’t have in common, and she wasn’t inclined to share any of her own Kodak moments. The personal Q&A should end right here. He might have the facts in her file but nothing she hadn’t been willing to reveal.

  “So what do we do now?” she asked.

  “Find a place to stay, I guess, since there’s nothing else we can do for the moment. We’ll have to wait for the commissioner to return my call. He promised to get an address here for a phone number.”

  Marie resented his keeping things from her. “What phone number?”

  He sighed, pulled up on the sidewalk in front of a three-story building and parked. “He was thinking of a number he had to call. So far, that’s all I know. With any luck Onders is headed here, too, if he isn’t the one who took her.”

  “They’re with the Hofstad Group, you think?”

  “Maybe, maybe not. This…well, it feels like its motivated more by greed than a zealous political or religious act. At least where this perpetrator is concerned.”

  “Vibes again, huh?” she asked, realizing only after the words were out that she sounded condescending.

  He shot her a look of exasperation. “Look, I get that you think I’m making this up as we go, but spare me the sarcasm, will you?”

  “Sorry,” she said, ducking her head a little and wincing. “It’s just strange, that’s all. You have been on the money so far—I’ll give you that much. Maybe if you explained it more, if it can be explained, it wouldn’t seem quite so hocus-pocus.”

  He looked her straight in the eye. “I touch objects and through residual energy I collect their history, initially their most immediate history.”

  �
��For instance?”

  He thought for a minute, his hands still resting on the steering wheel. “Say I’m holding a very old clay pot. The energy would have, like, layers. First, I’d get the person who evaluated its age, then the archaeologist who discovered it, the ancient who used it and finally the one who created it. I’d get what they felt at the moment, general emotions or impressions. Now and then, words, if they thought in words. People don’t always. And sometimes they think in a language I don’t understand.”

  “What about the people who owned it in between?” she asked.

  He shook his head. “Only if they spent a lot of energy on it or a lot of time handling it. I have to concentrate, then stop at the level that reveals what I need. It’s taken years of experimenting and training to control it. Well, usually I control it. As I told you, my success rate is only around 80 percent.”

  “So, that sponge you found. The kidnapper had it last and invested a little time doctoring it up.”

  “Then tossed it as useless,” Grant said. “It belonged to Cynthia. He found it in her bathroom. That’s where he waited for her.”

  She still didn’t believe it, but she believed he believed. “What about touching people? They’d have a purer energy, right? Why can’t you read minds?”

  He smiled and placed a palm on the side of her face. “Right now you’re humoring me. You think I’m a pretty good guesser. The list we found was in Dutch, so Amsterdam was a fair bet. You can’t explain Gouda, but they make great cheese here so you decided to come along for the ride.”

  Marie brushed his hand away and scoffed. “I wasn’t thinking that at all.”

  He laughed. “Sure you were, but no, I’m not telepathic. It’s just written all over your pretty face.”

  Pretty? Without any makeup, wearing her worst color, hair hidden under a baseball cap? He thought she was pretty. She felt herself blush. “Now who’s being sarcastic?” she demanded with a grin.

  “False modesty doesn’t become you a bit, Beauclair. You know how beautiful you are. You work on and use it, too. You already admitted that.”

  “I’m not working on it now. And I’m not telling you anything else.”

  He tapped a finger on her nose. “I’ll bet when you applied to the Company, you played it down then, too. No war paint, hair pulled straight back, maybe even darkened a few shades. Wore a gray suit not designed to flatter, pants to cover up those fantastic legs.” He paused, squinting at her face. “And glasses, I’m thinking. Yeah. You’d have worn those, ugly horn-rims. Close?”

  She simply stared at him. How could he possibly know that? “You’re guessing, that’s all. Any idiot would know I wouldn’t apply for a job looking like a brainless twit, even if I was going to use it as a cover later.”

  He laughed. “Come on, mouse, let’s go register. Want to share quarters again? You know it will be more convenient if we do.”

  She opened her own door and hopped out, not waiting for him to play the gent. “Well, I’m not sure about that, Tyndal. Knowing you think I’m pretty might just make me nervous.”

  He grabbed their bags out of the trunk, tossed her hers and grinned. “Even if I promise not to touch your…things?”

  Lord, she hadn’t had time to consider that. What if he really could get feelings, emotions and even words?

  She grasped her little tote closer to her body, then shook her head at the weird thought.

  But he had known about the gray suit and glasses. A good guess, indeed.

  Chapter 9

  M arie didn’t bother offering any more objections. She didn’t really want to stay alone, especially not after hearing about the latest kidnapping. Only one chance in a million it would happen again to her, but just having Grant around had seemed to give her a feeling secure enough to let her sleep. She still could hardly believe that.

  “You must be trying for some kind of brownie points with whoever foots your expense account,” she said.

  “The taxpayers, honey, of which you are one, hopefully, now that you have a steady career. So you can thank me for saving you money.” He held open the door to the ancient building and stood aside for her to enter.

  “Thanks…honey,” she replied as she brushed past him.

  She was beginning to like him more and more. Even if he was a little off the wall. Okay, a lot.

  He hadn’t hit on her, and she trusted his word that he wouldn’t. Trust was a fine commodity she found extremely hard to come by.

  She actually had gone to sleep in the same room with him and had slept better than she usually did. Maybe that was due to exhaustion from the kidnapping ordeal and all that followed, but she didn’t think so.

  Tonight she would find out, and that was another reason she didn’t protest sharing a room with him again. She needed to know if that purely instinctual episode of trust was an aberration or if she had actually unloaded some of her past baggage.

  They approached the desk and were greeted by a tall, handsome fellow with an ingratiating smile. He introduced himself as Pieter Selton. Grant presented their passports and offered his official credit card.

  “You are with the American government, I see. Welcome to Gouda. If I may be of assistance to you, please do not hesitate to ask.”

  Grant thanked him and refused the offer of help with their bags, since they had only the two.

  There was no elevator, and the stairs to their room were very steep and narrow, as they were in most old buildings. He insisted on her preceding him up the stairs, and she felt a little self-conscious, knowing his face was only inches from her behind.

  Was he checking out her buns? She tried not to twitch as she climbed. No point in teasing him. It wouldn’t gain her anything. Still, she wondered what he would do if she weren’t so careful not to do anything provocative. Would he cave on his promise and make a pass?

  Well, he might. And wasn’t that what she feared the most?

  Not necessarily, a little voice inside her head answered. In fact, what she would normally term fear felt more like anticipation. This was not good.

  He placed his free hand on her waist as they reached the top of the stairs. “To the right,” he said.

  The urge to jerk away from his touch just didn’t occur, she noted. How strange was that? Of course, she had learned to repress that urge when she knew it would make her seem standoffish.

  Men touched her fairly often, and she allowed it if they were merely being polite. Handshakes were almost mandatory in her business, and she could even manage the occasional hug without an openly negative response. But with Grant she no longer felt that automatic wariness.

  She could appear sexy and approachable and sometimes used that in her line of work. Okay, often used it. But she never followed through. All in all, she figured she did pretty well in disguising how she really was.

  Grant was smiling at her when she looked at him. Had he guessed she was mostly show? Was that why he had assured her that their temporary partnership would stay platonic?

  He unlocked the door to their room and went in first to check it out. “Hey, this is quaint, don’t you think?”

  “Nice,” she agreed, dropping her bag onto one of the single beds. They were antiques, as were the dresser, desk and chairs. “No television, I see. This place is really old world!”

  “No bath in the room, either. It’s down the hall.” He walked over to the window. “Nice view, though. See?”

  Marie joined him at the window. “Is this some kind of trip down memory lane for you? I get the feeling you’ve been here before.”

  “As a kid. It hasn’t changed much. New linens maybe, but the rest looks the same. My parents and I were here about twenty years ago. Had a great time.”

  He looked down at her, still smiling. “Don’t you like to revisit old times?”

  Marie tore her gaze from his and looked out the window again. “Not especially.” Not at all, under any circumstances.

  “Ah. Well, I guess I was spoiled by my folks. They always foun
d the neatest things to see and do when we were on vacation. Probably because we had so little time together, the three of us. It was always quality. Still is.”

  “You’re an only child?” she asked, curious about his nostalgia. She had none of that, for sure.

  “Oh, yeah, and I loved every second of it,” he admitted. “With the possible exception of when my dad was away and I was responsible for looking after my mother. That’s a heavy detail for a kid, and I always worried I wouldn’t live up.”

  “But I’ll bet you did,” she guessed and sighed, feeling a longing she couldn’t explain. “You’re close, you and your parents.”

  “Except for minor upheavals. Dad had a fit when I joined the navy instead of the army, but he got over it. Mom wasn’t crazy about my wife—said we didn’t suit. Turns out she was right and I should have listened.”

  Marie backed away from him. “You’re married?”

  “Not anymore. Long time ago. It lasted about a year, and enough said about that,” he declared. “We all make mistakes and learn from ’em.”

  Marie didn’t push, even though her curiosity was killing her. What had happened? Had his mother come between him and his wife? None of her business.

  She did appreciate how open he was, though. Not a speck of hesitation in answering her questions, and he even volunteered information. Every agent she had known so far had been a closed book and she hadn’t cared. This one intrigued her. He was actually very friendly. She sort of envied his outgoing nature, wishing she could be more like that.

  “I never took the plunge myself,” she offered, testing the newness of real congeniality. “I was engaged once, but it didn’t work out.”

  “Better to know up front, that’s for sure. What about your parents? You said you didn’t know where your mother lived. I read in your file that both your parents live in Atlanta.”

  They had. Maybe they still did. Marie had no clue where they were now. She wished she did so she could avoid the place at all costs. Grant was waiting for a reply, but she didn’t give it.

  She turned away from him and the window. “Shouldn’t the police have called with that address by now?”