Agent of Desire
By Charlie Evans
Copyright © 2013 Charlie Evans
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.
This book is a work of fiction and any resemblance to any person, living or dead, or any events or occurrences, is purely coincidental. The characters and story lines are created from the author’s imagination and are used fictitiously.
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Cover design: Kanaxa
Edited by Kristina Cook
Dedication
For Jo, my sexy French army man.
Best 2 ½ weeks in the Caribbean ever!
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty One
Six Months Later
Acknowledgements
About the Author
Desert Heat (Jessica Booker #2)
Chapter One
My handler is late. I’m on my third Chardonnay of the evening, waiting in the dimly lit bar of my two-star hotel. I should stay sober and keep my wits about me, but we’re supposed to blend in, and nothing says I’m not normal like going to a bar alone and drinking soda. Still, I may have overdone this one. I glance at the door, wishing he’d get here already so I can get this over with and go out and enjoy the rest of the night.
“Bonjour,” the guy next to me says in the worst American accent ever. He’s pretty hammered, holding onto the bar in an effort to stay on his stool. “Tu as une bonne ass, tu sais?” Great, he’s using his horrid first-year French to compliment my backside. Just for that I should kick his butt. I could. I’ve had superior ass-kicking training. But I don’t want to attract attention, so instead I settle for an internal eye roll, turn to face him, and smile.
He looks a year or two younger than me, maybe twenty-three. Most likely he’s just out of college, backpacking around Europe trying to find himself. He’s cute in a frat boy kind of way; his T-shirt and worn jeans are tight enough to show that he has muscles in all the right places. But I’m working tonight, no time for fun. Besides, playing with drunk boys is risky—there’s no satisfaction guarantee.
His eyes drift lazily down my body. I’m wearing a short, black, skin-tight dress that shows off my long legs, with a low neckline that calls attention to my ample cleavage. My friends back in training called it my “Yes Dress” because boys tend to say yes to me when I wear it.
“Voulez-vous coucher avec moi, çe soir?” he says, quoting old song lyrics.
“Um, no,” I say. I can’t help laughing.
He chuckles. “Oh, thank God you speak English. Are you here with someone?” He stares at my chest, unable to hide his desire because he’s so plowed. This guy is ballsy, I’ll give him that.
My breasts are already billowing out for attention—it’s all part of the game. Still, I lean forward and cross my arms underneath my chest to give them an extra boost. It’s cruel, but I’m bored and decide to entertain myself.
“I’m waiting for someone,” I say.
“Huh.” He continues to stare at my cleavage with his mouth open. “You’ve been waiting here a long time. Are you sure he’s coming?”
He’s right. I‘ve been here for an hour and a half. It shouldn’t take this long.
I scan the bar. A homeless woman moves from table to table, peddling roses likely rescued from a dumpster behind a flower shop. My handler is supposed to come to me with a flower. That’s how I’ll identify them. I find myself hoping the woman selling flowers is my handler. Maybe one of those roses is for me.
“I said, are you sure he’s coming?” Drunk guy moves closer, his bare arm brushing against mine, giving me goosebumps. His arm is warm. It’s nice.
“I’m sure he’s just held up,” I say.
“Hey, he’s crazy for keeping you waiting. Tell you what. I’ll give you my number and you can call me when you find out he’s not coming. We’ll have a good time.” He leans back to reach into his pocket. I can’t help but notice the bulge in his pants. It affects me more than it should. I guess it’s been a while, and the wine isn’t helping. I redirect my gaze to his face, which is set in a drunken grin. He pulls a scrap of paper from his pocket and scribbles his number.
I may not have time for extracurricular activities right now, but I fold up the paper and put it in my purse for later.
As he gets up he manages to kick over his stool, and has to grab onto me to regain his balance. “Sorry. Sorry. Why anyone would keep you waiting is beyond me.” He staggers off across the bar.
I turn back to my wine and take another sip. This is only my second assignment for the CIA, but I’m already over the whole international-woman-of-mystery thing. My first assignment had me collecting information on the Irish government for a year, which ultimately meant eavesdropping on the prime minister and his deputy who brought me little to no action. It was the equivalent of a desk job. That’s not to say I didn’t take my job seriously, but it was nothing like the spy films with exotic locations, heart-stopping danger, and smokin’ agents with telling scars. Those assignments exist, sure, but they’re given to senior agents. I’m only twenty-five, and to the CIA that means green and inept. So, I’m forced to keep myself entertained. Which I do. Because all work and no play …. But all the romantic rendezvous I have are off the clock.
I finish off my glass of wine and order another. It’s a good thing my room is upstairs, because I won’t be driving anywhere tonight.
“Hi, Lori,” a man says, using my new cover name as he approaches the bar. My heart quickens when I recognize the low, raspy voice.
“Sims.” His real name jumps out of my mouth before I can stop it. He was one of my instructors during training. Sims is in his mid-thirties. Courtesy of his job as a hand-to-hand instructor, he has an amazing body. Six-foot-three of pure muscle, combined with short dark hair, chiseled cheekbones, and cool blue eyes. He was definitely the “hot teacher” at training camp.
I had no idea he was in the field now—and apparently my new handler. I sit up straight and throw my shoulders back, hoping I’m giving him the impression that I’m in control.
“I got held up,” he says.
He waves over the bartender, and while he orders himself a shot of bourbon, I notice the white calla lily in his hand.
He moves in close. “Don’t be so obvious, Jessica,” he says under his breath, calling me by my real name. “I knew they shouldn’t have sent me someone so new. You’re not ready for this kind of job.”
I tear my eyes away from the flower. He’s right—all my actions scream newbie. First announcing his real name for the whole bar to hear, and now ogling the lily like it w
as a flipping diamond. I need to reel myself in. I let his comment roll off the way an experienced agent would, and turn to him, smiling. “Nice to see you.”
His expression eases. “Enchanté.” We lean in and kiss once on each cheek like proper Parisians. His five-o’clock shadow scratches my face. “You look lovely.” His eyes glide over my body—not in the sloppy way the drunken kid’s did. Agent Sims’s eyes hunger over my tight dress and flow down my hips to my legs, finally resting on my six-inch heels. Keeping fit so that I can both attract men and fight them is my job. I’ve got it, and sometimes I like to flaunt it. Now that Agent Sims is here, I’m glad I wore the Yes Dress. It’s normal for an agent and their handler to have some contact over the course of the job. The type of contact—and how much—is a gray area.
An area I’d like to explore.
I glance at the flower. “Is that for me?”
“It is.” He clears his throat and hands me the lily.
I bring it up to my nose to smell it. The elegant white bloom with its single swirling petal makes me think it will smell like expensive perfume, but it’s odorless. There’s a small card tied to the stem with a black ribbon. It looks like one of those standard flower shop cards. The front has a crimson heart in a silver frame. I don’t look at the back, but I know there will be a string of numbers and letters, looking like a product number. They are the key to my mission, the code that will unlock the detail files waiting for me in my laptop upstairs.
I open the card. Inside in neat cursive is written, You complete me.
“Aw.” I smile at Agent Sims and wink. He looks like he might be blushing, but the lighting in the bar is too dim to tell for sure.
The bartender comes back with his drink.
“You look all grown up.” Sims takes a sip of his bourbon without breaking eye contact, and I can’t help but feel like he’s drinking me.
My body tingles, and I calculate the distance to my room, just three flights up. “I wasn’t that young when we met,” I remind him. I was pretty sure he wasn’t allowed to date his students back then. Though it wouldn’t have mattered if he could. I was just one in a class of twenty female agents. All of us flirted with him. He could have had his pick.
“Things are different now.” He rests his arm on the back of my barstool and I get a flash of heat. I ease back into his arm just a little to let him know I like where he’s going, but I can’t seem to make any more progress with him. As we sit chatting about the weather in Paris, I try touching his shoulder, touching his leg. I even do the “accidental” breast contact, turning suddenly and letting my chest brush against his arm. He glances down briefly, but doesn’t make a move, and the only one I’m turning on is myself. He sits with me making small talk as he finishes his drink in record time, and gets up to leave.
“What’s your rush?” I ask.
“I’ve got somewhere I need to be. It was great to see you.” We exchange pecks on the cheek again.
How very French.
He leaves too soon. I still have a half a glass of chardonnay. I down it. Looks like I can’t call this my Yes Dress anymore.
“Mademoiselle.” The bartender eyes my empty glass, waiting to see if I’ll take another.
“Non. Merci.” I get up, glancing at the white lily that rests on the bar. A year of pushing paper in Paris. This is what I trained for. There should at least be some good shopping here. Maybe I need a new dress.
“Hey, beautiful.” It’s the drunk American. He is swaying on his feet. “Where’d your date go?”
I pick up the flower. “We’re going to reschedule.”
He sees the lily in my hand and looks down at the floor. “Oh, well. I’ll give you this anyway because I got it for you.” He hands me a red rose. The petals are wilted, and the leaves are brown and frayed. The head of the flower is bent down. It’s the saddest flower anyone has ever given me, but I’m still touched.
“Thank you.” I put it together with the other flower. The lily is new, strong and fresh, while the rose is tired and wilted. It’s the oddest pair I’ve ever seen.
“Well,” he says. “I guess I’ll see y’around.” He turns to leave.
I smell the rose. “Wait,” I say.
Chapter Two
It turns out the American’s name is Lincoln. He’s just out of college—as I suspected. He majored in forestry at the University of Oregon, and has a scar just below his ribcage. I don’t know how he got the scar because by the time I found it we had already given up on the whole talking thing.
If Agent Sims could take his time getting to me, I had a few minutes to spare before I had to dive into my new assignment. Besides, after the way Agent Sims and Lincoln had been looking at me, I needed a release.
College graduate Lincoln was the perfect outlet. We stumble up the hotel steps, pawing at each other on our way to his hotel room. My body moves against his hands, needing his touch, and pressing hard against it. There’s no time for foreplay, and no need to pretend that this is anything other than raw desire. My body is so hot I think I’m going to combust.
Halfway down the hall to his room he pushes me against the wall, pressing his hard body against mine as he takes my breasts in his hands with no regard for the fact that someone could come by at any moment. His thumbs brush lightly over my nipples, making me arch into him. Leaning down to kiss me again, he bites and licks my lips, and I grab his hips and pull him even closer as the kiss intensifies. And then he’s pulled me away from the wall and we are moving again. By the time we make it to his room, the sexual tension is too much. I rip off his T-shirt and he tries to do the same to my dress, but I delicately shove him on the bed.
I look down at him, lying on his back. I want to take charge, to have my way with him, but as I reach back and unzip my dress, a thought reaches through my buzzed and horny mind, halting me where I stand. Sims words play back in my head. “You’re not ready for this kind of job.”
I re-zip my dress.
How had I not caught it? A year working a desk job in Ireland had made me lax. I should have noticed. He said, “this kind of job.” Which can only mean that my new job requires more skill, more experience, and might even involve some of the adrenaline-packed excitement I signed up for.
Lincoln is sprawled out on the bed, hovering somewhere between turned-on and passing out, if that’s even possible.
I search for my shoes. One of them is by the door, but I can’t find the other one. Lincoln’s eyes follow me as I move about the room. He doesn’t get up. Poor guy is confused.
I find the calla lily on the chair where I’d tossed it with the dying rose. I have to get going. I have a job to do. “Sorry, I have to go. Thanks for the flower.” I pick up the flowers and walk to the door with my shoe.
“Hey,” he says.
I stop to look at him.
“Uh,” he runs his hand through his messed up hair. “Call me?”
I nod and walk out. My other shoe is in the hallway, thank goodness, because they look really good with this dress.
* * *
In my room, I pull open my agency-issue laptop. A new message blips into my inbox. It’s double encrypted, of course. My laptop is secure; I send and receive messages from it all the time, but they’re not able to email this information without added security. It’s too sensitive. I open the email, and the encryption key box pops up.
I pull the card off the lily and turn it over, typing the series of numbers and letters on the back of the card into the key box. The computer thinks for a moment before opening up my documents.
From the mission summary I can already tell this is no desk job.
A French technology company, Intelex, is working on a program that has the ability to take over and shut down any website anywhere. I’m no hack, but I imagine that in this age of communication technology, someone might be able to shut down entire countries with this program.
The French are our friends, our allies. But this is a private company, and there is a very real possibi
lity that they could sell this technology to the highest bidder. We have no guarantee that said party would be a friend of the United States. As long as that is a possibility, the U.S. needs to know how the technology works, and how to defend against it. So I’ll be stealing it.
The information in the email gives me a list of codes and contacts, and outlines my next steps, the first of which is to make friends with a man named Geoffrey Pinot.
This is part of the job—a job that women have been doing just as long as men. A job we can do better. We have something that men don’t have: the ability to turn even the most levelheaded control freak into a blob of putty.
Most of the trainers said it was up to our discretion, and that we never had to use sex unless we felt it was necessary. Wink, wink. They also said that we should do whatever it takes to get the job done. For my last assignment, it wasn’t an issue because it wasn’t that type of job. This time, though, it could definitely go there.
The one thing that was always in the back of my mind was, what if the dude was ugly?
I was about to find out. These attachments include photos. I close my eyes as I click open his headshot. Peeking through one squinted eye, I allow his head to come into focus.
He doesn’t look that bad. He can’t be more than thirty. That’s a plus. I don’t like the idea of having to go for some old guy, at least not on my first real mission. Geoffrey has potential. He has dark hair and olive skin, maybe Mediterranean. His face is slender with a defined jaw and a slightly crooked nose. In the photo, he’s clean-shaven and wears dark-framed glasses, making him look straight-laced, like the wife-and-two-kids type, but according to his file he’s never been married. Not sure I’d do him in my free time, but he’s not bad.
Someone has already been watching him for a while. There are several surveillance photos of him at work and near his home. There is also a detailed schedule of what he does each day. My first move is to initiate contact with him on his way back from the café. He goes to the same one every evening and has a regular route home.
Agent of Desire (Jessica Booker) Page 1
