by Carla Cassidy, Evelyn Vaughn, Harper Allen, Ruth Wind, Cindy Dees
Lynn sat up straighter, a burst of adrenaline flooding through her veins. “What kind of artifact?”
“A solid-gold vase that is believed to have belonged to Queen Hatshepshut. It was unearthed and smuggled out of Egypt by an American archeologist, and Egypt wants it back.”
“What are the details?” She sat forward on the sofa.
“I don’t have many to give you. The piece is currently on display at the Markham Convention Center. That’s all I know at this time. You’ll need to research it while I’m away.”
Lynn frowned, remembering the questions that had bothered her the night before when she’d retrieved the diamond. “I don’t understand. If the piece is stolen and is being displayed in a public place, why can’t the police just go in and arrest the person who has possession of it and give it back to the Egyptian government?”
He finished his drink and stood and faced her. “These things are complicated, Lynn. There are all kinds of political ramifications concerning the work we do. I’m sure you’ve noticed there is never any publicity about the treasures you’ve managed to retrieve.”
She nodded. “And I’ve wondered about that, too.”
“Lynn, if you aren’t comfortable doing this kind of work anymore, you certainly aren’t obliged to continue.” His voice held a slightly cool disapproval. “I can just let my contact know that we’re no longer interested in working for them. I’m sure they have other people as skilled, as competent as you.”
“No, it isn’t that,” she said hurriedly. “It’s just that it’s all rather confusing to me.” She couldn’t stand the thought of disappointing Jonas.
“My dear, working for the government is always confusing,” Jonas said with a laugh. He sobered. “You have to trust me, Lynn. What we’re doing is a service to our country.”
“Of course I trust you,” she replied. How could she not trust him? He’d acted as her mother and father since she’d been a baby. She adored him with all her heart.
“Then we can depend on you in this matter?”
“Of course you can…always,” she replied.
“Good! And now I must say good-night,” Jonas said. “I have an early flight in the morning.”
She wanted to protest. They’d scarcely had any time together, and he’d be gone in the morning. But she didn’t protest. She’d learned long ago to merely accept what little time her godfather had to give her.
“Good night, Uncle Jonas.” She stood and kissed him on the cheek. As she watched him disappear up the staircase toward his master suite, she realized he hadn’t really answered any of her questions at all.
The next day as she sat with several friends at a table in the Coffee Cloister, an upscale coffee shop near the college campus, the last thing on her mind was the work she did for the government and her godfather.
The conversation between the four young women, as always, revolved around clothes and guys, sex and love. As the three others talked about their problems with their boyfriends and ex-boyfriends, Lynn’s thoughts turned to Nick.
There had been something in his eyes last night, an expression that had made her slightly breathless with excitement. He hadn’t looked at her as if she was the boss’s daughter. He had looked at her as though she was an attractive, desirable woman.
She had access to his personnel files through her godfather’s computer. She made a mental note to check him out, see what she could learn about the handsome Nick Barnes.
“Earth to Lynn,” Jenny Walbrook said, the impatience in her tone indicating it wasn’t the first time she’d spoken to Lynn.
“Sorry, what did you say?”
“I asked if you’ve been to that new little boutique that just opened over on Palm Drive.”
“No. The last thing I need is more clothes. Uncle Jonas brings me something new to wear every time he goes out of town. I’ve got things hanging in my closet with the tags still on them.”
“Honey, a woman can never have too many clothes,” Jenny said.
“Or too-thin thighs,” Vicki added and they all laughed. The ring of Lynn’s cell phone interrupted the laughter. She rummaged in her purse to get it.
“Right on time,” Sonya Kincaid said dryly as she looked at her watch. “We’ve been here fifteen minutes and he’s checking up on her.”
Lynn ignored her friends as she answered the phone. “Hi, Uncle Jonas,” she said, knowing it could only be him. He was the only person who ever called her cell phone.
“Where are you, my dear?” he asked.
“At the Coffee Cloister with some friends,” she replied.
“How long are you planning on staying?”
The phone call and the question weren’t unusual. Jonas often called to see where she was, whom she was with and how long she’d be gone.
His overprotectiveness had never bothered her much before, but today she found the phone call irritating. She was an adult, yet she had to answer to Jonas as if she were ten years old and spending time away from home for the very first time.
“I’ll be home when we finish having coffee.” She rolled her eyes for the benefit of her friends and tamped down an unexpected edge of resentment toward her godfather.
“You know I worry when you’re out and about,” he said.
“I know, but I assure you I’m fine and will be home later.” It was the same conversation she had with him over and over again on a daily basis. They said their goodbyes and Lynn hung up and dropped her cell phone back into her purse.
“Honestly, Lynn. I don’t know how you stand it,” Vicki Taylor said the moment Lynn had hung up. “I mean, we all have people who care about us, but your godfather definitely takes the prize for being the most obsessive.”
“I know,” Lynn replied. She also knew that within the next fifteen or twenty minutes Jonas would call again to see if she’d made it home yet or not. It was rare that he didn’t call three or four times during the time she spent with her friends after classes.
“I don’t know how you can have a normal life with him calling you all the time,” Vicki continued. “I mean, don’t you ever just want to take that cell phone and toss it into the ocean?”
“Only about twice a day,” Lynn replied, then breathed a sigh of relief as the conversation moved to other subjects.
Lynn couldn’t very well tell her friends that her safety had always been an issue. Not only did Jonas worry about her being kidnapped for ransom because of his incredible wealth, but also because of the special powers she possessed.
She’d often wondered where she’d gotten the special skills that came so naturally…the acute hearing, the unnatural strength and speed, the sharp senses of smell and sight and feel.
Jonas had always told her they were gifts of nature. He’d had a large part in honing those gifts, seeing to it, also, that she had been trained in self-defense and martial arts.
Yes, she loved Jonas dearly and knew he’d done wonderful things for her and worried obsessively about her. But lately she was growing more and more irritated by all of the constraints he placed on her.
She wondered what would happen if she just didn’t answer the phone. What would Jonas do if several hours passed and he couldn’t get in touch with her? She was surprised to realize the thought held a certain appeal.
“Why don’t you meet us tonight, Lynn?” Sonya said as she flipped a strand of her platinum-blond hair behind her ear. “It’s Friday night and you never go with us to Sensations.”
Sensations was a popular Miami nightclub where Lynn knew her three friends hung out regularly on the weekends. She’d never gone with them. In fact, Lynn had never been inside a nightclub before.
“Oh, I don’t know,” she began her usual protests.
“Come on, Lynn. What’s one night of cutting loose a little bit? All you do is go to classes and study. It’s not natural. Come out with us and have some fun tonight,” Vicki said.
“Do it, Lynn,” Jenny reached across the small table and grabbed Lynn’s hand. “W
e usually meet there around nine and we always have such a good time. It just isn’t normal for a twenty-two-year-old to spend every night at home.”
Lynn’s usual protest rose to her lips, but this time, instead of voicing it, she swallowed hard. Did she dare? Jonas would have a fit if he knew she was even contemplating a night at a club.
“All right, I’ll meet you all there around nine this evening.” The minute the words left her mouth a thrill of anticipation whirled through her.
Tonight she would go to the club and hang out with her friends. If Jonas called her on the cell phone she wouldn’t answer it. She was twenty-two years old. It was time for her to rebel a bit against the lifestyle that had become far too constrictive.
It was time she got a life, a real life. She couldn’t wait.
Shy and beautiful, those were the words to describe Lynnette White. Nick sat in his office in the outbuilding that served as security headquarters for the compound and thought about Lynnette and the few minutes they had spent alone together the night before.
She was like a hothouse flower, and why wouldn’t she be? For the two years that Nick had worked for Jonas, and from everything he’d learned in that time, she’d certainly been treated like a hothouse flower.
Homeschooled through high school, driven back and forth in a car with a bodyguard through college, she’d definitely not had what could be considered a normal lifestyle.
He checked his watch and jumped up out of his chair. She should be pulling through the gates in the next ten minutes or so and he intended to be waiting for her.
As he left the outbuilding, his gaze automatically swept the grounds. Jonas’s illegal activities paid very well. It was Nick’s job to see that his security wasn’t breached.
Surveillance cameras were hidden throughout the property, keeping electronic vigil to make certain the perimeters of the grounds weren’t breached.
Behind the main house was a small shed where Nick and his team did most of their work. There, a huge bank of video screens monitored every area of the property.
There was also a force of security guards that kept an eye on the area immediately around the house. Jonas didn’t take his security lightly and neither did Nick.
As he walked, thoughts of Lynnette once again played in his mind. Somehow the fact that she was shy and so protected made his job to seduce her all the more distasteful. If she were worldly, savvy to the ways of people, and men in particular, he wouldn’t feel the tinge of regret that played in him now.
Still, it had to be done. He’d worked for two years to get into the inner workings of Jonas’s illegal activities and had yet to fully gain the man’s trust. His supervisors at the FBI had decided the way in was through Lynnette, so that’s the way Nick would go. He had his orders, and Nick tried to always follow orders.
Of course, it had been his penchant for not following orders that had first garnered him attention as a raw recruit years ago. He’d gone from raw recruit to deep undercover in the space of weeks. He knew part of his notorious quick climb through the ranks was not only because of his skill and commitment, but also who and where he’d come from.
He shoved these thoughts aside as he reached the front of the mansion and looked at his watch once again. There was no routine when it came to Lynnette’s near-nightly sojourns, but during the day you could set a clock by her comings and goings.
She left the house at seven-thirty in the morning on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays for eight-o’clock classes and returned home between three and three-fifteen in the afternoons.
He knew her classes ended at two and she often went to coffee with friends afterward, but she never stayed longer than an hour or so.
He leaned against the garage to wait for her arrival home. The July sun beat down relentlessly but Nick didn’t mind the heat. He’d been born and raised in Florida, and heat and humidity were part of the package. He could smell the faint briny scent of the ocean and couldn’t imagine living anywhere else.
He straightened as he saw Lynnette’s smart little red sports car pull up in front of the heavy iron gates of the compound. She had the convertible top down and her chestnut-colored hair sparkled with blond highlights in the sunshine.
He knew the moment she spied him. As she pulled her car up toward the garage and where he stood, he saw her cheeks flame with scarlet color.
She shut off the engine, and in three long strides he was at her door. “Hi,” he said as he opened the car door.
“Hi,” she replied. “Thank you,” she said as she grabbed her books and laptop computer and got out of the car.
He slammed the door shut behind her, noticing as he had the night before that she was much prettier up close than her pictures depicted.
The photos he’d studied of her hadn’t begun to capture the intriguing hue of her eyes, a green-and-gold blend that was distinctly unusual. “How was school today?” he asked.
“Fine.” She shifted her books from one arm to the other, not quite meeting his gaze.
“Beautiful day, isn’t it?” Who would have thought when he’d joined the FBI that part of his job would be making small talk with a shy, beautiful woman?
“Yes, it is pretty.” She met his gaze for the first time since she’d gotten out of her car. There was an unexpected boldness in those eyes. “What are you doing, Nick?”
“What do you mean? I’m standing here talking to you.”
Her eyes narrowed slightly. “And why are you doing that? I mean, you’ve been working for Jonas for a long time and you’ve never really talked to me before.”
Nick was slightly taken aback. He reminded himself that just because she was shy didn’t mean she was stupid…quite the contrary. “I don’t know. I enjoyed seeing you, talking to you last night. I realized I’d like to talk to you some more, get to know you better.”
“Why?” Dark distrust shone from her beautiful eyes, making them more green than gold.
A small laugh burst from him. “Why? Why not?”
The distrust in her eyes grew more pronounced. “And it doesn’t hurt to brown-nose the boss’s daughter, right?”
“Is that what you think this is about?”
“Isn’t it?” She held his gaze for another long moment. There was an edge to her, an edge that hadn’t been there the night before. He didn’t know what had caused it, but there was a spark in her eyes that looked mischievous, almost dangerous. It was definitely intriguing.
“No, it isn’t,” he protested, although she was too close for comfort with her assessment of his intentions. “Lynnette, I don’t know whether you’ve noticed or not, but you’re a very pretty woman. You’re twenty-two, I’m twenty-nine. I work here and you live here. I’d say it’s only natural that I’d take an interest in you.”
He held his breath, waiting for a response from her. He hadn’t expected her to be so suspicious. He hadn’t expected her to have such a low opinion of herself that she would just assume any interest on a male’s part would be because of ulterior motives.
She frowned and cocked her head to one side. “Richard’s coming.”
“Excuse me?”
“Richard Dunst,” she replied, and looked toward the gate.
Nick followed her gaze, and a moment later Richard’s car came into view. “How’d you know?” He turned to look at her once again.
Her cheeks blushed with color. “I heard his car engine. It has a distinctive sound.”
Nick had heard nothing until Richard’s car had pulled up to the gate. But he got no opportunity to ask her about it as Richard parked his car behind hers and got out and approached them.
Nick felt himself tense as Dunst drew closer. He sensed Lynnette tensing, as well. As far as the FBI was concerned, Jonas White was the devil himself. But the devil had a right-hand man and that was Richard Dunst.
“Nick…Lynn.” Richard greeted them with a curt nod of his closely shaved head. “I need to get some papers from inside for Jonas.”
Rumor had it th
e man had at some point in the past gone under the knife of a bad plastic surgeon. Something had gone wrong and that’s why Richard’s face appeared masklike, incapable of displaying any real emotion.
Nick could tell the man wore contacts, but nothing could hide the cold evil that resided within. Nick hoped that when they brought down Jonas, Richard fell with him. Nothing would give Nick more pleasure than to slap a tight pair of handcuffs on the man. Maybe then his features would express some emotion.
Dunst’s gaze went from Lynnette back to Nick. “Is there a security problem?”
“No, nothing like that. I was just visiting with Lynnette.” As if it were any of Dunst’s business, Nick thought.
“And I was just on my way inside,” Lynnette said. She moved past Nick and toward the front door, Richard just behind her.
When she reached the door, she opened it to allow Richard to precede her, then she turned back to Nick. A tiny smile curved up the corners of her full lips.
“My friends call me Lynn and tonight around nine I’m going to be at Sensations, a dance club in Miami.” With these words and a sweet blush, she turned and disappeared into the house.
He reared back on his heels and shoved his hands in his pockets as he took in her words. It had sounded like an invitation to join her.
Maybe seducing Lynn wasn’t going to be quite as difficult as he’d initially thought.
Chapter 3
It was about a thirty-minute drive from Jonas’s house to the outskirts of Miami where the club Sensations was located. As Lynn zipped down the highway toward the club, her heart beat rapidly with excitement.
She’d spoken with Jonas only an hour before and didn’t expect him to call the rest of the night. When she’d spoken to him, she’d told him she was lying on her bed studying, which had been true at the time. She just didn’t mention that she intended to get up and go out.
She didn’t want to lie to him, but she knew he’d disapprove of her plans for the night. He’d fill her head with stories of danger and kidnapping and he’d wear her down until she agreed to stay home.
