Catalyst (Flashpoint Book 2)

by Rachel Grant

  Her appearance triggered a mix of lust and regret. Gone was his Brie. In her place was the polished, wealthy woman he’d met ten years ago. The years had added maturity, which only deepened her beauty. She exuded class and poise. But she wasn’t the woman he’d gotten to know in South Sudan, which was where the regret came in.

  Her short dark hair was styled in a way that sold the cut not as convenient for an aid worker in a country that lacked safe water, but as a fashion choice, similar to one of P!nk’s shorter styles. She wore a simple dress that looked like something Audrey Hepburn might’ve worn. The wind swept across the deck, causing the hem of the skirt to ripple and reveal the lower edge of the bandage around her thigh.

  Bastian felt a surge of possessiveness as the world was getting a glimpse of this brave, strong, fierce woman. This thing between them, it wasn’t a fling, and it had nothing to do with Savvy’s orders. It went far deeper, and for the first time since he broke Cece’s heart, he wanted more than a sexual relationship.

  But shit, right now she wasn’t even talking to him. His thoughtless words had cut deep—because this was more than a fling for her too. His opinion mattered to her.

  Her limp was pronounced in spite of her flat shoes as she walked without smiling, her gaze fixed in the distance, not on the senator, not on the press. Not on him.

  She reached the microphone set up in front of the admiral, captain, and senator and nodded to the three men before turning to the press corps, sailors, and airmen. “It is with utmost gratitude that I thank Special Operations Command and the members of the Army Special Forces and Navy SEAL teams who rescued me and my coworkers who were kidnapped during the assault on our USAID facility in South Sudan twelve days ago. I’m told I can’t name the soldiers who participated in my extraction, but I hope someday they will receive the recognition they deserve.”

  She nodded toward the senator in the slightest acknowledgment. “It is my understanding that Senator Jackson had been planning this trip for some time, but the date was moved up once he learned I was recovering here on Dahlgren, a kindness because he has been a friend of my father’s for many years.”

  Bastian noticed she left out any reference to the man being her friend. She also didn’t explicitly thank the senator for the visit.

  “Finally, I need to thank the men and women serving aboard Dahlgren, for their kind treatment of me, excellent medical care, and their ongoing service to our country. I know how hard it is to be away from home for months at a time, and appreciate the sacrifices they make for our protection.

  “I don’t have a prepared statement from USAID about South Sudan and the work I did there. At this time, I will not discuss my abduction, rescue, or if my work for the organization will continue. I believe there has been some misreporting as to my role with the organization, and I wish to make it clear I am a federal employee. My work for USAID is not in any way associated with Prime Energy or its subsidiaries.”

  Standing behind her as he was, he could hear the edge in her voice as she included that dig, but the polish remained.

  “I’m exceedingly proud to have worked for an organization devoted to helping people less fortunate across the world. USAID’s work in South Sudan to stave off famine in the midst of civil war cannot be lauded enough. In the days since my rescue, dozens of children have died of hunger. Others were conscripted to fight, and still others were sold into slavery.

  “While we don’t yet have statistics to back up my words, I have seen those atrocities with my own eyes, and in one way or another, I intend to keep fighting for those children, to make sure they aren’t forgotten. I want to see an end to famine. An end to Lost Boys. An end to slavery in all its forms.

  “As the richest, most powerful nation on earth, it is within our ability to achieve this. To that end, I ask the senator, upon his return to Congress, to insist upon more funding for South Sudan aid and to fast-track refugee programs to find homes for these starving children orphaned by ongoing war. Thank you.”

  Reporters shouted questions, but Brie stepped back from the microphone. She turned and shook hands with the captain and the admiral, and briefly met Bastian’s gaze before looking away.

  The makeup made her eyes huge, and her skin had a warm glow. She was beautiful. So achingly perfect.

  Jackson smoothly stepped up to the mic, while she was shaking the other men’s hands, and Bastian wondered if that had been choreographed to allow her to avoid Senator Jackson.

  Was Jackson somehow involved? Sure, this was a great opportunity for him to have a big photo op, but flying all the way to the Gulf of Aden… There had to be more to it than that.

  The CIA couldn’t monitor Jackson, meaning Savvy wouldn’t have intel on the man unless the FBI was sharing—assuming the FBI was even investigating the senator’s activities, which they probably weren’t. Likewise, Savvy couldn’t put the Prime men under surveillance, which had to be Savvy’s justification for asking Bastian to get Brie to talk.

  Brie was a back door to intel that was otherwise out of the CIA’s reach.

  Jackson was a powerful senator, sitting on a number of important committees, but to Brie, Senator Jackson was just creepy Uncle Al. Which also begged the question, what other men did she know, and what power did they wield?

  Savvy sat in the club, watching the flight deck ceremony on a big-screen TV with Bastian’s A-Team and the SEALs who’d been on the op. The men were ostensibly being honored in the ceremony, even if they weren’t standing next to Bastian behind the podium.

  “Holy crap. I forgot how hot Princess Prime was,” a sailor said when Brie began her statement. “Think your buddy’s hitting that?” he asked, looking at the assembled A-Team.

  “Shut the fuck up and show some respect,” Espinosa responded. The rest of the team glared at the sailor and his buddies, and it was clear that if the sailor didn’t listen, things could get ugly, fast.

  Thankfully, he wasn’t so dumb as to further piss off an A-Team and SEALs.

  Savvy watched Bastian’s face, which gave the answer to the crass question. No, he wasn’t hitting that, but his feelings for Brie were clear for all to see.

  Guilt jabbed at Savvy, but she hadn’t given Bastian his orders lightly. This was a high-stakes game and the Intelligence Community was limping—nearly shattered—by ongoing leaks and political corruption. Several Americans in high government offices, up to and including the former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, had been compromised by Russia. The whole IC was scrambling and the net result was Savvy currently operated with a degree of autonomy. Her assets were safe as long as the intel she gathered wasn’t reported all the way up the line.

  But she only had a narrow window of time before Senator Jackson applied pressure to get Brie out of the region in an attempt to make it harder for the IC to connect the dots. He’d already asked to escort Brie back to the mainland, a request that had been flatly refused before Savvy was certain Brie would reject the offer.

  Brie knew all the major players in the oil business, had been in the market, and had once met Lawiri in person. Savvy didn’t believe that was an accident, especially considering a Russian mercenary had told her, “My boss has been looking for you for some time.”

  There was a power play happening in South Sudan, and somehow, Brie was part of it. Savvy knew it. She just needed all the pieces.

  Pieces Senator Jackson didn’t want her to have. Senator Jackson, former Texas oilman and current member of the Armed Services Committee. Senator Jackson, who’d groped Brie when she was a teen. Senator Jackson, who’d flown from DC to Djibouti the moment he learned where Brie was.

  It only raised the question, could Senator Jackson have been looking for Brie for some time, or was he acting as someone’s puppet?

  Savvy couldn’t rule anyone out.

  23

  Brie’s phone rang the minute she was back in her room in the medical ward. It could only be Savvy—given that Savvy was the only one who had the number to her new phone. “I
stuck to the agreement,” she said defensively.

  “I don’t remember the line about Prime Energy having nothing to do with your work for USAID, but I don’t really give a crap about that,” Savvy said.

  “Then why are you calling?”

  “The doctor plans to release you tomorrow so you can finish your recuperation at Camp Citron.”

  Brie frowned. The military base would be a welcome break—she could walk outside without having to get special permission to be on deck—but Savvy just wanted her at Camp Citron so she could pick her brain for intel. Brie had told her everything at least three times.

  She wondered if Bastian was being released as well, but then, she’d been surprised he’d remained on the carrier, considering his concussion treatment seemed to be simply to rest. He didn’t need a massive aircraft carrier for that.

  “Why Camp Citron? Why not just send me home?”

  “Where would that be?” Savvy asked.

  “Seattle, I guess.” The moment she said the words, another option occurred to her: she could go to the villa in Morocco. Her father had transferred the estate into a trust in his children’s names before he divorced her mom when she was fourteen—presumably to keep her mother from getting it—and then hid the paperwork so she and her brothers didn’t know they owned it.

  Brie learned of the sketchy deal nearly a year and a half ago, when one of JJ’s lawyers contacted her about the property. The trust included a stipulation that the house and its contents could not be sold or dispersed without the consent of all three siblings, and JJ wanted to sell.

  Brie had immediately killed that deal for no reason other than spite. It was ironic that the estate was worth at least seventy-five million, and Brie couldn’t tap any of that money. But she could live there.

  The Casablanca villa was her favorite of all the family homes, partly because it was ridiculously over the top. A literal palace, fit for a princess. She’d spent the month of May there a year ago, a grand vacation before heading off to South Sudan in September.

  “Seattle?” Savvy said. “Haven’t you had enough rain to last you?”

  “At least the roads are paved in the Pacific Northwest.” She’d keep her Morocco plans to herself for now.

  “Well, don’t get too excited because it’s going to take the State Department a few days to issue you a new passport. You’ll be stuck at Camp Citron until then.”

  She should have known she wouldn’t escape Savvy’s brain picking that easily. “Fine,” she said without hiding her sigh.

  “You’ve already been assigned a private wet CLU,” Savvy said.

  The wet Containerized Living Units had an attached, shared bathroom. As if that was the worm that would entice her to bite. After living in South Sudan, she could handle a unit without a sink and toilet. Besides, the house in Morocco had twenty-two bathrooms. And two swimming pools—one an indoor Turkish bath, the other outside and surrounded by a lush garden. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” she said and hit the End button.

  She didn’t bother to wonder how the CIA knew her doctor’s orders before she did. The woman had taken undue interest in Brie, which meant she wanted something from her. But damn if Brie knew what it was. She’d told her everything she knew about the market. Three times.

  Months ago, she’d filed a report on the market with USAID. The report had eventually landed in Savvy’s lap, and the woman had insisted Brie fly to Djibouti for a face-to-face briefing. Basically, Savvy had wanted to recruit Brie as an asset. Brie had shunned official involvement with the CIA—spying could harm USAID’s mission—but she’d agreed to share what she learned through non-covert, non-deceptive means. Now that the market was destroyed and her employment with USAID likely over, she didn’t see what use Savvy had for her.

  Brie stepped out to the reception area, where a monitor was showing the ongoing ceremony on the deck to the staff stuck in the medical facility.

  Bastian was in the background, behind the senator, just another face in the crowd. But not for her. Her eyes latched onto him and her stomach twisted.

  Right now she was Oil Company Barbie except for the shoes. Barbie always wore high heels, but after being shot in the leg, high heels were out. Good riddance. She liked cute sandals with heels but had never been a fan of stilettos, especially after having to wear them five days a week for work.

  The tire-tread sandals were a thousand times more comfortable and functional, even if they didn’t force her into a posture that made her ass look good.

  “Is the senator as big an asshole as he sounds?” the hospital corpsman working the desk asked.

  “He’s worse. Groped me when I was fifteen. Total creep.” It was freeing to just speak the truth. This not-hiding-her-past thing would be good for her.

  He curled his lip. “Figures. Asshole. What is it with politicians?”

  The corpsman was handsome, with rich, deep mahogany skin, a nice smile, and friendly manner. He took his job seriously, and if he judged her for being Princess Prime once upon a time, he didn’t show it.

  The ceremony on the deck wound down, and she returned to her room, not eager to see Bastian again. Had she overreacted earlier?

  Probably.

  But damn. His words had come at her like a fist to the belly. She cared about his opinion of her more than anyone else in her life. Because she didn’t have anyone else in her life—no one who really knew her, anyway.

  She grabbed the makeup bag and slipped into the shared lavatory. Head? What term was used on an aircraft carrier? She stared into the mirror holding the makeup remover in one hand and a washcloth in the other.

  She studied the stranger in the mirror. She hadn’t looked like this since her month in Morocco, when she’d dated a wealthy Spaniard who moved in their neighborhood’s social circles, and she’d accompanied him to several parties.

  Part of her missed it. She’d enjoyed feeling pretty and wearing nice clothes. Did that make her shallow?

  Or just human?

  She warmed the washcloth, but at the last moment, turned off the faucet. Screw it. She’d face Bastian as the woman he believed her to be. After all, Gabriella Prime was part of her too. If he couldn’t accept this part of her, then this thing between them was over before it started.

  She looked down at her arm and the exposed track marks. No more secrets.

  She pulled the lipstick from the bag and put on a fresh coat. At least she’d look pretty for the kiss-off.

  Bastian waited inside Brie’s room. She might kick him out again, but he didn’t want to face her with the entire staff of the medical ward watching.

  She entered the room and came to a dead stop. She frowned, then turned and closed the door behind her. She paused with her back to him, hand on the door, and took a deep breath. “If you’re here to insult me for looking like a Barbie, you can leave now.”

  He stepped up behind her, not touching her, but still trapping her against the door. “You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, with or without makeup. In a torn-up tobe or a designer dress. You’re smart and dedicated and kind and nothing like the woman I saw at that meeting ten years ago. I’m sorry for referring to you in that way. Sorry I hurt you.”

  Her shoulders relaxed, and she let out a slow breath. “I might have overreacted.”

  “No. I called you a shitty name I’d mentally given you ten years ago, which has nothing to do with the woman you are now.”

  “And what if…I like dressing up sometimes? What if I’m both Brie and Gabriella?”

  He placed a hand on the door and leaned to whisper in her ear. “You look fucking hot right now. I want to hike up your dress and bury myself inside you.”

  She turned, her shoulder brushing his chest as she did so. With her back to the door, she leaned against it and looked up to meet his gaze.

  A vibrant light lit her eyes. Her lashes were impossibly long, her lips a deep, full red.

  “Apology accepted,” she said and pressed a hand to his chest. For a moment,
he thought she was going to push him away, but then her hand curled around the buttons just below his collar and pulled him closer. “You look hot in your uniform, yet all I want to do is tear it off you.”

  She kissed his neck, then moved upward to his lips. He took what she offered and slid his tongue in her mouth, telling her with slow, deep strokes how much he wanted her.

  He scooped her up and braced her back to the door. Her skirt hiked up, and she wrapped her legs around his hips and let out a little pant as his erection pressed between her thighs. He held her in place with an arm under her ass, but pulled back to look into those luminous brown eyes. “Your leg? Does this hurt?”

  Her lips trailed along his cheek; her teeth nipped at his chin. “A little, but it’s worth it.”

  He dropped a kiss on her lips before lowering her to the floor again. “Anything that hurts you isn’t worth it to me. We’ll rain-check this.” It might kill him, but he could wait. They’d do this right.

  She kissed his neck. “Rumor has it I’m being sprung tomorrow, although the doc hasn’t mentioned it to me yet.”

  “Are you being sent to Camp Citron?”

  She nodded.

  He smiled. “Well then, we can continue this in my CLU. As second-in-command of my team, I have a single.” He kissed her brows, her cheek, her lips. He was eager to explore all of her with more privacy than the carrier hospital allowed.

  “According to Savvy, so will I.” She played with the buttons on his ACU. “Savvy said it will take a few days for the State Department to issue me a new passport. I haven’t decided where I’m going to go once I’m free, but we can enjoy a fling before I disappear.”

  He stiffened. “Disappear?” But what he really wanted to question was the fling part. His hands rested on her hips, and he pulled her closer to him.

  “I have no intention of becoming a Prime Energy PR tool, so I’ll have to lay low.”