by Cassie Miles
“Mom told me to run and hide in the bathroom whenever anybody came into the room, and that’s what I did. I stood on the other side of the door and listened really hard. They never hit her again. If they had, I don’t know what I would have done.” She shook her head. “After a week, we went home.”
“Were you ever given an explanation? Did your parents ever talk to you about what happened?”
“Never. We accepted that a bad thing had happened, and we moved on. Literally, we moved. We went to Washington, D.C., for my parents’ next assignment.”
Because of the kidnapping, their cover story had been compromised. He knew that the Laughton family never returned to South America. Her father had gone on short assignments in Europe and the Middle East. But it wasn’t until both of their children graduated from high school and went to college that Richard and Sharon returned to regular work in foreign embassies.
Troy respected her parents for making the safety of their children a top priority. It was going to be difficult to tell them that their daughter was almost, once again, the victim of a kidnapping. Still, they needed to know. The intruder at Olivia’s cabin had taken a photo of the entire family.
* * *
THE LODGE-STYLE hotel where he had reservations was four stories tall, and their suite on the top floor had deluxe amenities. After the bellman left her suitcase and his duffel, Troy inspected their space with an eye to security, prowling through the spacious sitting room with its cream-colored leather furniture, the bedroom, bathroom and the tiled area with the hot tub. He positioned a chair in front of the door so anybody breaking in would make a lot of noise, then he stepped onto the balcony that looked toward the moonlit slope. In a few months, the groomed mountainside would be filled with skiers and snowboarders.
Olivia stepped outside and stood beside him at the metal railing. “Are we safe?”
“A determined kidnapper could climb from one balcony to another and get up here. But I think we’re okay.” He lifted his face to the cool night breeze. “Nice place.”
“Very nice.”
“When I’m deployed, the conditions are usually awful. I like to treat myself to good hotels.”
“With room service,” she reminded him.
“Hungry?”
“You can order for me, as long as it’s fish, rice, a veggie and maybe a little something sweet.”
“A healthy meal for mom and baby.” He looked down at her bulging midsection, glad that she was taking good care of their unborn son. “Before you get comfortable, you should call your parents.”
“I don’t know what to say to them.”
She strolled inside, gingerly lowered herself onto the leather sofa and stretched her legs out. Her feet were already bare. She must have kicked off her sneakers as soon as she’d entered the room. In her purple scrubs, her shape reminded him of a ripe eggplant—a comparison he knew he shouldn’t mention. They were just beginning to connect, and he didn’t want to do anything that would jeopardize his chance to get close to her.
There was one thing all women loved. “Foot rub?” he asked.
“Yes, please.”
He sat on the sofa and lifted her feet onto his lap. Her toes were a little puffy. When he took her heel in his hand and gently kneaded her instep, she responded by wriggling herself into a comfy position against the sofa pillows and closing her eyes. Her fingers laced on top of her belly.
As he stroked and rubbed, he studied her face. Seldom had he had the chance to observe her at rest. She was lovely. Though she had dark circles below her eyes, her lightly tanned complexion was flawless—not exactly glowing, but close. Tendrils of blond hair curled alongside her high cheekbones.
“That feels so good.” Her lips parted as she made a low, sensual hum. “I don’t want you to stop, but I do want you to call room service.”
“You have a call of your own to make,” he reminded her.
“Mom and Dad.” She sighed. “My father is going to love you. The way you poked around the suite when we came in was exactly what he would do.”
Checking the security was a natural instinct for anyone in the intelligence community. “Your dad and I have a few things in common.”
“More than a few,” she said. “You’re a lot like him.”
“I doubt that.” Troy had seen photos and had read dossiers on the career of Richard Laughton. He was the kind of spy who looked good in a tux and worked in a high-class political arena. “From what I can tell, your father is slick and sophisticated. That’s not me.”
“And what’s your style?”
“Down and dirty,” he said.
“But you’re both spies. I know that military intelligence is different from the CIA, but you’re still gathering information. You’re still tracking down the bad guys.” As he continued to rub her feet, she kept humming. “What are you working on right now?”
He was making a transition in his work, preparing for the next phase of his career. “Let’s just say that it involves a terrorist cell.”
“In the United States?”
“That’s right.”
She wiggled her toes. “Unfortunately, I have to use the bathroom. Can we do more foot rubbing later?”
“As much as you want.”
She pulled her feet away from him, sat upright on the sofa and confronted him directly. “I knew from the first time we met you that you were involved in dangerous work.”
“Like any soldier,” he said with a shrug.
“Like my father.”
He met her gaze. Though she was obviously tired, her blue eyes glowed with an inner strength that reminded him of the seven-year-old girl who had fought to protect her mother. Her childhood trauma formed a basis of fear for the adult woman. “You blamed your father when you and your mom were kidnapped.”
“It wasn’t his fault,” she said, quickly defending him.
If she was thinking rationally, she had to know that her father hadn’t done anything that he thought would bring danger to his family. After the incident in South America, he’d gone to great lengths to protect them, bringing his wife and daughters to Washington, D.C., to live. Those were the facts.
But reality was always colored by emotion. He imagined that when Olivia thought of kidnapping, she remembered the feelings she’d had as a little girl. At some level, she would hold her father responsible.
“I promise you,” he said, “that my work will never endanger you or our child.”
She jabbed her forefinger at the center of his chest. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep.”
Her sudden hostility ticked him off. He hadn’t yet told her about the changes that were coming up in his career, and he couldn’t expect her to know what he was giving up. Nevertheless, she ought to know him well enough to understand that he was, above all, responsible. “What are you getting at?”
“Has it occurred to you that the intruders at my cabin might not be enemies of my parents? They might be someone connected to your terrorist cell.”
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he had acknowledged and dismissed that possibility. “They wouldn’t know about you. You’re not my wife.”
“Over the past couple of months, you’ve sent me a lot of baby presents, emails and flowers. It wouldn’t take a genius to figure out our relationship.”
She was right. The attempted kidnapping could be because of his work. It might be his fault that she was in danger.
Chapter Four
After he’d ordered room service and Olivia had retreated to the bedroom to contact her parents, Troy used his secure cell phone to place a call to Gunnery Sergeant Blaine Nelson, who had recently taken Troy’s place as the leader for their seven-man special ops team.
Nelson answered his phone with a yawn. It was two hours later at Camp Lejeune on the North Carolina coast but still too early for Nelson to be asleep. Troy wasted no time with pleasantries. “I have a situation.”
“Where the hell are you?”
“Wake up, Gun
ny. I need intel on the whereabouts of the terrorist cell, and I need it now.”
“Yes, sir, Captain Weathers, sir.”
Troy couldn’t help grinning at the overly formal form of address. “What are you trying to tell me, Nelson?”
“That you’re being a pain in the butt, sir.”
“Duly noted,” Troy said. “Give me an update.”
“Nothing’s changed since this morning when you left. We can’t pinpoint locations, but chatter indicates that they’re planning their attack in New York City.”
“I want you to trace any possible connection to Colorado. There’s been a threat.”
“No joke? Fill me in.” Nelson was now fully alert. He and Troy had worked together for eight years. They were more than associates, more than friends. They were as close as brothers. “What’s the nature of this threat?”
“Somebody’s after Olivia,” he said. “She’s had the feeling that she’s being watched. About an hour ago, an intruder broke into her cabin. It could be a kidnap attempt.”
“Do you think the guys we’ve been tracking are behind it?”
“I don’t know.”
Their code name for this terrorist group was Hatari, the Swahili word for danger, and they were based in Rwanda. Troy and his team had been responsible for capturing two of their leaders while they were investigating a totally unrelated issue in Africa. If the cell in the U.S. planned to grab Olivia, it could be meant as payback for Troy.
“You said they were tailing her,” Nelson said thoughtfully. “That doesn’t sound like Hatari.”
Troy agreed. The M.O. for these terrorists was anything but subtle. In their home country, they were responsible for wiping out villages, poisoning wells, burning fields and decimating entire families. They went in with guns blazing, operating under the premise that more firepower was better. If they wanted to threaten him using Olivia, they would have killed her.
But Colorado wasn’t their homeland. And the U.S. cell of Hatari was operating under a different set of priorities. They had hooked up with a man whose alias was Kruger—the name he’d used when he’d disappeared off the radar twenty-two years ago. Kruger was under such deep cover that he was nearly transparent. Though he’d lived in the United States, his current identity was unknown. He had no fingerprints on file. There were no existing photographs of him.
“Kruger could be running the show,” Troy said. “He might be inclined to pull a kidnapping and use Olivia to force my hand.”
“Wish we knew more about him. He’s a ghost, an old-school kind of spook.”
Similar to Olivia’s dad and mom. “I’ve got to go. Look into the Colorado angle and keep me posted.”
“Yes, sir.” Nelson yawned again.
“Missing your beauty sleep? It’s a little early for you to be hitting the sheets.”
“It would be...if I was sleeping alone.”
Troy grinned. “Carry on, Gunny.”
When Olivia made the call to her parents, it might be smart for him to talk to them, as well. Kruger was something of a legend in CIA circles, and her mom and dad had been part of that inner circle for years. They might have useful advice.
He crossed the sitting room and tapped on the closed bedroom door. “Is it okay for me to come in?”
“Sure thing.”
He pushed open the door and stopped dead in his tracks. She’d changed from her hospital scrubs to a long, cream-colored, cotton nightgown with lace and satin ribbons around a neckline that was low enough to showcase her full breasts. The light fabric draped gently over her rounded body. Her golden hair cascaded around her shoulders. She looked like a goddess.
“I thought I’d get changed,” she said, “before I made the phone call.”
Struck dumb by the abundance of her beauty, he could only stare and nod. This was his woman. She was carrying his child.
She frowned. “What’s wrong?”
“Not a thing.” He swallowed hard. “You’re stunning.”
“No need to worry,” she joked. “I promise not to knock you over with my giant belly.”
“I like the bulge. I like the whole package.”
“It’s a pretty nightgown. It was a gift from one of my baby showers. I’ve had four. I guess that’s a benefit of being a midwife. Most of the people I know have recently given birth.” She swept across the room, majestic as the QEII. At the desk near the window, she picked up her cell phone. “I should probably make this call.”
“When you’re done, I’d like to speak with your dad.”
“Why?”
If circumstances had been different, he would have met her father before he’d asked for her hand in marriage. “The terrorist cell my team is investigating has a CIA crossover. Your dad might have intel I can use.”
“Let me get this straight. You want to talk to my dad about spy stuff?”
“He’s a source.”
“I hadn’t planned for you to meet my family.” She lowered herself into a padded chair beside the desk. “Certainly not like this.”
Though he’d prefer to keep his phone conversation with her father on the level of an intelligence briefing, they couldn’t ignore the personal. He and Richard Laughton had more in common than their occupations. “How much have you told them about me?”
Avoiding his gaze, she stared at the phone in her hand. “They know that you proposed and that I turned you down.”
“Did you give them a reason?”
“I tried.” She shook her head. “I told them pretty much the same thing I told you. You’re a great guy, but we don’t have a relationship. And I’m not interested in being married to someone who’s always traveling and putting himself in danger on a regular basis.”
“What if my career was different?”
She shot him a questioning glance. “Different in what way?”
“What if I wasn’t in the field?”
“But you love your work.” She rose to her feet and stalked toward him. “Please don’t tell me that you’ve resigned from special ops.”
He gave her a weak grin. “Surprise.”
“No way. I won’t let you quit doing something you love because of me and the baby. That’s the worst way to start a relationship. You’d blame me for ruining your life.”
He hadn’t been expecting her to turn handsprings, but he didn’t think she’d be outright hostile. Damn it, this was his decision. His life. “You know, Olivia, not everything is about you.”
A knock at the front door to their suite interrupted any further explanation. A voice called out, “Room service.”
Before he left the bedroom, Troy drew his gun. “I’ll deal with this. You stay here and make your phone call.”
He went to the door and cautiously eased it open. The same bellman who’d carried their suitcases to the suite stood outside with a cart. While Troy watched and kept his weapon hidden behind his back, the young man wheeled into the room and unloaded the plates onto a round table.
Hoping to pick up information, Troy commented, “This must be off-season for the lodge. Are many people staying here?”
“There’s a lot more when the ski slopes are open, but you’d be surprised. We get golfers, hikers, mountain bike riders and people who are up here for river rafting.”
There wasn’t a clever way to ask if the bellman had seen possible Hatari terrorists or a spy named Kruger from the last century. “Mostly families?”
“That’s right. And we’ve got a wedding party coming in tomorrow for the weekend.”
Troy gave him a generous tip before he locked the door and shoved a chair in front of it. If he’d been in the field, he never would have tasted food that hadn’t been prepared in his sight, but he had no reason to believe Olivia’s intruders had followed them to the hotel. He would have noticed a tail.
She emerged from the bedroom. “I talked to my sister and warned her about a possible threat. After she told me I was nuts, she reminded me that her house has an excellent alarm system. They’ll b
e safe.”
He held out his hand for the phone. “Can I talk to your father?”
“Mom and Dad are asleep. They were exhausted after the flight from Cairo, and my sister didn’t want to wake them.”
“I guess I’ll have to wait.” He was a patient man, almost to a fault. Patience and persistence were useful traits in his business, but Olivia was straining his reserves. She had a real talent for driving him to the edge and making him want to jump.
He went to the table and lifted the lids off their separate dinners. Pan-fried trout for her. A T-bone steak for him.
As she took her place, she gazed across the table with a guarded expression. “You said the decision to change your career wasn’t about me.”
“Correct.” He sliced into his steak, cut off a chunk and stuffed it into his mouth so he wouldn’t have to talk. The consequences of his decision were still painful, and he knew better than to look toward her for understanding.
“I’m listening,” she said.
He shrugged. “It’s time for a change.”
“Is this a military thing? Some kind of requirement?”
“The T-bone’s great. How’s the fish?”
“Delicious.” She poured water from a carafe into her glass and took a sip. “I didn’t realize how hungry I was.”
“I thought pregnant women were always eating for two.”
“Oh, I’ve done plenty of that. I’ve packed on thirty-three pounds, probably more than that. I quit weighing myself two days ago.” She picked up her fork. “And you’re changing the subject. I want to know about your career.”
Telling her about the career change was one of the reasons he’d come to Colorado. He was looking at a change in his life that might affect the way she felt about him. From the first time he’d proposed, she had made it crystal clear that she didn’t want to be married to a man whose occupation was full of danger and uncertainty. Now that he knew more about her family history, he had a greater understanding of that fear. But he still wouldn’t have quit if he hadn’t been ready to make the change. As it turned out, the timing was right for him to settle into a different phase of life.
