Strike Force

by Beth Rhodes

  Where her uncle was resting was not part of the main living or guest quarters.

  Dimitru stopped in front of a door and opened it. “I must leave you to answer a few calls.”

  Her heart raced. Was this her chance? Already?

  Then he took her chin in his hand and lifted it. “Sometimes I think you are incredibly readable. But then I think, how can that be of this con woman? You want the gold. I know it because I know your family. Don’t get greedy. Don’t break my trust. If you do, I will kill you.”

  His thumb caressed the length of her neck as she swallowed, hard, revealing to him she wasn’t unaffected. She wanted to break her gaze free of his but couldn’t. She was trapped in some kind of spell.

  “Good.” He turned and left, his phone already at his ear.

  She slowly let out the breath she was holding and pressed a hand against her stomach. “Fuck.”

  ***

  “Fuck.” Malcolm tossed his headset to the flat surface where his computer sat in the back of the van, slammed the back door of the van open, and stepped to the ground. He wanted to call her, text her, get a message to her.

  Don’t break my trust.

  He couldn’t now. Not without possibly sending the wrong message to Dimitru…and Gregory.

  Before he could change his mind, he clicked off his phone.

  He could hear through the device she had in her earring. It was going to have to be enough. He wasn’t going to be part of any supposed betrayal. She was on her own because she’d wanted to go in.

  “FBI report.” Hawk stuck his head out the back of the van, and Malcolm climbed back in.

  “The Coast Guard and border patrol are tracking a container ship off the coast. Been hanging out in the High Seas for thirty-six hours. Activity from the Dimitru end doubled. Someone’s blowing up his phone.”

  Malcolm suppressed the urge to panic, to go in there and break this whole assignment wide open. He trusted her, no matter how convincing she sounded. He trusted Dimitru to be the son of a bitch who would sell women to the highest bidder.

  “Good,” he finally answered. “This is what we need. Dimitru to be moving things around, taking the next step. It proves he’s trusting Marie, not letting her reappearance in his life stop him. Radio check.”

  John checked in, as did Emily and Jamie.

  Craig sat in the front of the van.

  Stacy checked in from the police station in Portland, where she was working with the FBI, DEA, and immigration.

  The next step would be the hardest—waiting.

  Malcolm picked up the small Bluetooth receiver and hooked it on his ear. He pulled his leather jacket over his shoulders.

  “Where you going?”

  “Taking a walk, sir. Five minutes.”

  Hawk nodded. “Take it easy, man.”

  He kept to the darkest part of the forest, climbed the hill to the rocky crest, always keeping the estate to his east, until he pulled up onto the ledge. He sat to the south and watched Dimitru’s home over his left shoulder.

  Windows were dark now.

  Night had come.

  The truck bay on the back of the house had the one spotlight.

  He knew where each and every camera was located. He could picture every hallway and could imagine every room, every dark crevice.

  He rubbed the heel of his hand over the scar on his chest. She’d helped him when it was his turn to prove his spot on the team, to show he was back at a hundred percent. He’d been ninety-nine percent, and the one percent could have cost them both their lives.

  Despite how she’d slid back into her old habits, he wanted to help her prove her place as well, because he couldn’t imagine the team without her on it.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The pickings were slim. Her image in the full-length mirror on the wall showed a black miniskirt. She dug deep, deep into the closet, for the slightly less revealing top. Even so, the neckline scooped way too much.

  There were high heels galore, and she thought of who might have worn them before her—poor, helpless women, gold diggers, misguided innocents? She didn’t know. Marie was fairly positive this wasn’t where he was keeping women he’d brought in from overseas, but it was at least the place where his latest conquest or love interest stayed.

  Her boots would do fine and keep her mobile.

  She looked more goth than she had since high school. A shiver ran up her spine, and she swallowed hard.

  A knock sounded on the door.

  Unarmed, she opened the door with more than a little of the Bălan pride guiding her steps.

  “Mr. Dimitru would like to see you now.” Burly Guy—she couldn’t seem to stop thinking of him as Burly Guy—stood back to let her by.

  She stepped up and then turned so they could walk together. “If you don’t mind,” she said, “I prefer if you weren’t behind me while I’m unarmed.”

  He grunted and kept moving, down one hallway and up another, then finally down a set of stairs, ending up back by the security office where Malcolm and she had worked.

  It seemed like forever ago.

  Gregory opened the door and then stood back.

  “Oh, good. You’ve made it.”

  “Not like I had a choice.” Her answer made Dimitru chuckle. She leaned against the door and looked around. Something was different. She looked over the equipment and computer screens and then back to Dimitru. “What can I do for you?”

  “Lot 26.”

  “Yeah,” she said slowly. “You want to start planning right now? We could start in the morning, you know. Get a good night of sleep. The shipment isn’t even going to be stateside for five more days.”

  “I’ve been thinking about the armband.”

  “You know the armband is mine.” Marie walked over to him. “And I am happy to help you acquire more, but the armband will remain in Bălan hands.”

  Dimitru grinned and ran a finger down the slope of her neck to hook into her shirt.

  She smacked his hand aside. “Don’t.”

  Undeterred, he hooked his finger into the material and pulled her closer. “This isn’t only business, was never business—you know it and so do I. We are the last two. Each family vying for the greatest power. This is personal. Two hundred years of Dimitru purpose—to bring down the Bălan house and take rightful ownership of the power the armband endows—will finally come to be. Do you really think this is about gold?”

  The back of his knuckles brushed her skin, sending goosebumps down her arms.

  Without letting go of her, he nodded to Gregory, who leaned over and pulled a switch.

  The room went dark and silent. Only the glow of emergency lighting in the hall spilled into the room and lit Dimitru’s eyes. “This is about immortal power.”

  She swallowed the bad, bad feeling.

  “Living forever—”

  “You don’t really believe.” Marie laughed nervously. “If it were true, my parents wouldn’t be dead. As a matter of fact, I’m positive the amulet brings nothing but bad luck.”

  She was about to break his wrist and the wandering hand at the base of her neck. His gaze moved over her, from the top of her head to her face and down. This time she gave in to the urge to cover herself, pulling on the material covering her breasts.

  “Then you don’t know the whole truth,” he muttered as his hands tangled with her hair. He tucked the length behind her ear, gently touched her earlobe, and then, with little to no care, pulled the stud earring from the top of her ear.

  Marie gasped, as pain shot through her and she bent over, covering her ear. “Shit, Dimitru.”

  He dropped the piece to the floor and crushed it under his heel. “I have cut off all security, all means of contact with the outside world.”

  All communication lost. “That was my mom’s, you jerk.”

  “Do you want to know why your mother is dead?” he asked.

  “What?” The breathless shock, no doubt, gave her away.

  The glee in his
eyes gave him away.

  Shit.

  “She denied me.”

  Good for her.

  “A Dimitru must marry a Bălan. Only then will the power of the armband be released to the next generation.”

  Her frown deepened. “Hold on a second. Listen, if this was true, the power of the armband would have been released two hundred years ago when a Bălan did marry a Dimitru.”

  He sneered. “The bastard daughter of my great-great-grandfather? That was never going to happen. Another Dimitru fixed things last time. Now it’s my turn.” He pulled her forward into his space with a bruising grip.

  “You’re going to kill me?”

  “Oh no, my dear. I’m going to marry you.”

  “Fuck that,” she said as the strongest visceral response pulled at her spine and kicked her in the gut. Never before had the words of a man affected her so strongly.

  “So confident,” Dimitru said with a smile. “I do like that about women these days. They think everything is going to go their way. You’ll see, though.”

  “Tell me about my mother,” she insisted. Had he really courted her? Tried to convince her to marry him?

  Sadness, real or imagined, she couldn’t tell, wrapped around him.

  “She was a lovely woman. Not only beautiful—you do look like her, you know—but a pure soul as well. And powerful. She was to have been the one. I offered her everything. I asked her to marry me. Did you know?”

  Marie shook her head. Her stomach fell. Ew. She was what? Second best? The last resort?

  “No, you didn’t. Of course not. She never looked twice at me, not after your father came along. He was never good enough for her. But then she was pregnant with you.” He looked to her, his steely gray eyes sharpening on her, piercing her with a crazed light. “You were my last chance. So, I waited. I can be very patient.” He shook off the melancholy.

  “Let me help you,” Marie said, her stomach hurting with the lie. “Let’s do this heist together. If”—she cleared her throat—“if we’re going to marry, we should get to know each other first, don’t you think?”

  She really hadn’t thought he was as old as he must be, not unless he pursued her mother when he was merely a child. Ew. Now he wanted to marry her to fulfill some wicked spell he believed in. Double ew.

  He’d expected her to refuse. When he looked at her again, there was hope in his eyes.

  “We don’t have to marry tonight, right?” She smiled, trying to impress him with the possibilities.

  Dimitru laughed then cupped her cheek with his hand. “You might do after all,” he mumbled, and then kissed her on the forehead. “Every generation has its greed. Perhaps I have finally found my match in a Bălan who wants the gold and power as much as I do.”

  Marie held on to his arm, even as the urge to kick him in the balls almost gave way to action. “Tell me about tonight. You must have something big going on. I’m good with details. I can help. Please.”

  “You ask so nicely.” His smile turned sad. “Too soon, though. Tonight, begins something that will make me”—he paused, his smile turning tender—“us. It will make us very rich.”

  With her heart in her throat, Marie gave in to the smile he expected. She reached for him. “I have worked a long time”—the tightening in her throat again—“outside the law to gain riches and wealth, sometimes to get by, and sometimes for the pure pleasure of it.”

  When he gripped her neck, almost gently, and he looked into her eyes, she lifted her chin. Believe me, she screamed inside. And his gaze fell to her lips. Oh, no.

  “Perhaps you are even more beautiful than your mother,” he whispered.

  “Mr. Dimitru,” someone said behind her.

  Dimitru’s hand tightened on her neck, squeezing at the tendons, scaring her as his eyes glittered with displeasure at the interruption.

  Saved by the bell. Fucking bell, as Malcolm would say. And she was doing whatever she could to keep her mind on nicer things than Dimitru’s hand on her neck, cutting her air off.

  “There’s another call for you.”

  “Thank you,” Dimitru said, anticipation vibrating through his body as he let her go.

  She gulped in a breath. The women, here already?

  “Be ready tomorrow morning, my dear. It’s your turn to prove your loyalty.”

  “I’m loyal to a fault.”

  Vladimir chuckled, stooped down, and picked up the shattered earring. “But who are you loyal to? Hm?” He touched her face as he passed by her. “Go to bed, Marie Bălan—”

  “Feur,” she said.

  “Tomorrow, we will talk about what you need to do.”

  Anger streaked through her, but she curbed it and gave him a sweet smile.

  He leaned in, and she held her breath as his lips closed in on hers. The kiss was chaste, cold, limpid. She pulled away first, turning her face as if embarrassed. “Even in marriage, this is business,” she reminded him.

  Dimitru walked away, his steps sure. She blew out a breath and entered the hallway to make her way back to her room, but Burly Guy came around the corner with three very big, very hungry-looking guard dogs.

  “Well, dang,” she whispered.

  “I’m here to escort you to your room.” He sounded less than pleased.

  She didn’t blame him at all.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  “It’s been two hours since the lights went out and we lost our feed,” Malcolm reiterated. “We need eyes inside.”

  “We have eyes inside. Marie.”

  Stacy had pulled up on the narrow side street and parked. Hawk was headed to town, following on Dimitru’s heels. Malcolm wasn’t leaving Marie without backup. He would stay. There might be a bigger purpose to this assignment, and he understood cooperation was needed, but he also understood Hawk Elite Security took care of their own.

  The FBI wouldn’t give a shit about the thief who had fucked up their plans to take down Dimitru. He didn’t trust them to have her back.

  With the systems down, he was completely in the dark.

  On the other hand, so was Dimitru. There was comfort in the knowledge.

  He wished he’d told her how to mess with the computers. A quick trip to the computer hub and she could give him access. He was working from his end, but the problem was they weren’t blocking him at all. They were not using any system.

  Dogs and guards. Totally old school.

  He’d seen the dogs right away. One guard doing a walk-through, another doing the exterior check. Some of the windows held a glow, the kind a hospital would have when generators were turned on.

  Malcolm focused on those and kept at his efforts on the computer to see if he could find an open link to the security room. But it wasn’t long before he was merely clicking between windows, hoping. “Staring at it won’t make the power come back up, asshole.”

  “Talking to yourself?” Stacy laid a hand on his shoulder.

  “Yeah.”

  “I do that too.” She paused. “You okay?”

  He wanted to blow off the fear, but it gripped him. “I don’t know.”

  “Marie’s different for you.”

  Malcolm didn’t play dumb. He knew she was talking about his feelings for her. “Maybe.”

  “Have you told her what happened with Heather?”

  He’d kept it locked up for so long that he’d forgotten Stacy was one of the few who knew what had happened. He shook his head. “We aren’t. It’s not. I don’t know what we are.”

  Stacy tilted her head.

  “Yet,” he added.

  “The waiting is the worst.”

  Malcolm nodded. “She could be tied up in his creepy mansion.”

  “She’s not.”

  He couldn’t figure out why everyone was so confident. He’d never doubted Marie had the ability. But sometimes a bullet came out of nowhere. Rubbing a hand over his scar, he squeezed his eyes shut and shoved aside the worry.

  “Hawk and I are ready to take off,” Stacy sa
id.

  Her other half interrupted by opening the door to the back of the van. Hawk was without his dark glasses, which meant he had some vision. And he proved it by walking directly to Stacy and running his hands through her hair. “Anything from John yet?” he asked Malcolm.

  “Not yet.”

  “Soon, then.” Hawk took Stacy’s hand. “Marie?”

  “No,” Malcolm answered. “It’s been two hours since we had ears in the estate.”

  Hawk’s phone rang and he answered, putting it on speaker. “We’re here, John.”

  “Nothing happened, Hawk. Graham is pissed. He thinks Marie’s presence added a variable and scared Dimitru off. He came to town and had dinner. Nothing else.” Motors ran in the background of the call, and Malcolm was sure he could hear the wind whipping by the speaker of John’s phone. “Everything hinged on the intel Graham gathered about the Indonesian link. But the deal didn’t go down. The meet never even happened.”

  His voice crackled then came back strong. “Looks like we wait. Looks like Marie’s going to need to pull out all the stops. If there are women being brought in, it isn’t through the container—”

  The call dropped.

  “I’m going back out,” Malcolm said, before anyone had moved.

  I’ll see you soon. She’d said it herself. He wasn’t going to sit by anymore. Support position or not, he needed to be in the field. The gut feeling about Dimitru hadn’t changed. He was playing all of them.

  “We wait,” Hawk said. “For Marie.” He put a hand on Malcolm’s shoulder. “She is ours. If we have to sit outside the estate for hours on end, we’re ready. We’ll be there when she needs us. Until then, we wait for her to contact us. That’s the job. She can do it. Give her some more time. You would for anyone else on the team, right?”

  Fucking right.

  “Maybe you should go take a break,” Hawk said, pressing his fingers into his eye sockets.

  “I’m fine,” Malcolm replied. He wanted to go somewhere, but he hadn’t been invited.