A Secret Life

by Laura Peyton Roberts

  Her mind was working so fast, she felt dizzy. She had thrown him off for the moment, but Arnaud looked like the kind of guy who'd only put up with so much small talk. She needed a story and she needed one now. Casting about for inspiration, her gaze fell on his still-burning cigarette.

  “Do you have any matches?” she asked.

  He looked at her strangely. “Matches?”

  “I was just going to sneak out back here and have a cigarette. I would have gone out front, but my husband's in the showroom and he thinks he's the nicotine police, I swear. Don't you hate it when people hassle you about smoking?”

  Arnaud's lips hesitated on the verge of a smile. And then he remembered something.

  “What were you doing in that room?” he asked accusingly.

  “I told you. Looking for matches.” She let her tone get a little offended. “I didn't touch anything, if that's what you're worried about.”

  “We'll see,” he said, striding past her into the office.

  For a moment she was alone in the hallway. Instinct took hold of her again, insisting that she run. She had a clear shot at both stairways now. . . .

  “All right,” Arnaud said, reemerging. “I see you are telling the truth.”

  Sydney's legs almost buckled with relief.

  The man fished in his pocket. “Here. Use my lighter,” he offered, flicking it into flame. “I'll light your cigarette for you.”

  “Aren't you sweet?” she murmured, nearly passing out.

  He had just hit on the flaw in her little cover story: She didn't have any cigarettes.

  Arnaud stood looking at her expectantly, his lighter still at the ready. Sydney began rummaging through her purse, hoping for a miracle. She didn't smoke, but SD-6 seemed to have packed everything else. . . .

  Except cigarettes.

  “I can't believe this,” she said desperately. “I had them when I left the hotel. I must have lost them in the limo.”

  Looking up, she dared to meet his eyes, only to find him smiling at last.

  “I hate it when I lose them,” he said. “Here. Have one of mine.”

  “Thank you!” she exclaimed.

  Taking the cigarette he offered, she put it in her mouth and leaned over his lighter, hoping she wouldn't choke. Except for a couple of rebellious attempts at boarding school, she had never smoked at all. She hated the smell of cigarettes, and the cancer part was a big minus too.

  She had just succeeded in lighting up when Yvette came barreling down the stairs. Exhaling quickly, Sydney put the cigarette behind her back, pretending fear of being caught.

  “Vous voilà!” Yvette exclaimed. “What are you doing down here?”

  “I, uh . . . I was just looking for the bathroom?” Sydney said, intentionally unconvincing.

  Arnaud snickered. Sydney nudged him in the side, managing to pass her cigarette to him behind her back.

  Yvette sniffed the air, not fooled.

  Summoning up her most winning smile, Sydney appealed to the saleswoman. “We don't need to tell my husband about this, do we? It would be worth an awful lot to me. In fact, I feel a real shopping frenzy coming on.”

  Yvette laughed. “Your husband believes you are in the bathroom,” she reported with a conspiratorial wink. “He implies you spend much time there. Something tells me this is not the first time you have used this excuse, oui?”

  Sydney shrugged, still working the smile. “There are some things a man doesn't need to know.”

  “I agree. But since he knows you are missing now, perhaps we should go back upstairs?”

  “Lead the way,” Sydney told her, amazed that she'd pulled it all off. “See you around, Arnaud!”

  The big man tipped his beret at her, an amused grin on his face.

  Nearly two more hours elapsed before Sydney and Noah collapsed into the safety of their waiting limousine.

  “I think that went well, don't you?” Sydney asked the moment the driver left the curb. She had tried on countless samples and lost track of the outfits she'd ordered, but the most important thing was that she'd distributed all of SD-6's bugs and cameras without arousing suspicion.

  “As long as you got what you want, I'm happy,” Noah said.

  “What do you mean what I want?” she protested.

  His knee nudged her sharply, his gaze shifting meaningfully from her to the driver. The glass divider was up, but Noah obviously didn't want to take a chance on being overheard.

  “That, uh, that red dress was all for you,” she covered.

  He smiled. “I'll have to admire it later.”

  Later, right. I get the picture, she thought sarcastically.

  But she wasn't mad at Noah anymore. How could she be, after what they'd just been through together? Aside from that one close call with Arnaud, everything had gone perfectly, and Sydney was still buzzing from the adrenaline rush of danger and success.

  “I'm going to call my friend Francie,” she announced, taking her cell phone from her purse.

  Noah cocked an eyebrow at her, but she ignored him. She was dying to talk to someone, and she couldn't tell Francie anything it wouldn't be safe for the chauffeur to overhear anyway.

  Dialing quickly, Sydney waited for ages before Francie finally picked up.

  “Hello?”

  “Francie! Hi! It's me.”

  “Sydney?” Francie said groggily. “What's the matter? Is something wrong?”

  Sydney caught her breath as she realized her mistake.

  What time is it in L.A.?

  “No! Nothing,” she replied, doing frantic math in her head. Add the twelve, subtract the nine . . . “What makes you say that?”

  “Oh, I don't know. Maybe the fact that it's still dark outside.” Francie sounded more awake, but not especially happy about it.

  “You're kidding! It is?” Sydney covered the phone with one hand while she pretended to go check. Let's see, that would make it . . . just after four in the morning there.

  She waited a few more seconds, then took her hand off the phone. “Francie! I'm so sorry. The clock in my room is wrong, and with the blackout drapes and everything, I didn't even notice. I just wanted to say hi before you left for class.”

  “What are you talking about? Aren't you coming home today?”

  “I wish I could, but I'm really busy here.”

  “So now you're missing school? You're insane. I don't know why you work for those people.”

  “I know. Listen, how was the Delt party? Did you go?”

  “It was okay. I didn't meet any interesting guys, but some other girls from our floor were there, and we danced until two in the morning. The band was the best part, and they're playing at the Lion's Den next weekend. If you can tear yourself away from the bank.”

  “We should go,” Sydney said. “We will.”

  “Don't say it unless you mean it.”

  “We'll try,” she qualified hurriedly.

  She wasn't even positive she'd be back home by the weekend. The first stage of the recon was over, but she had an appointment with Yvette on Wednesday to try on some of the clothes she had ordered. Was Noah going to expect her to stay?

  “You sound like my mother,” Francie grumbled.

  “I do? Well, then, eat your vegetables, I guess. Do your homework, and I'll see you when I get back.” She managed to get off the phone without Francie asking her exactly when that would be, but just barely.

  “Still working out the kinks with the time change, huh?” Noah said, amused.

  “No,” she replied, not about to admit her mistake to him. “Everything worked perfectly.”

  Besides, even if she'd had to lie about her reason for waking Francie up—and pretty much everything else—it had been worth those few moments of panic just to hear her friend's familiar, grounding voice.

  The limo pulled up outside the hotel, and Sydney could barely keep from opening the door herself in her excitement to get upstairs and rehash the mission with Noah. Somehow she restrained herself long en
ough to wait for the chauffeur, but by the time she and Noah stepped out of the elevator on their floor, she was positively bursting.

  He'll have to admit I did a great job now, she thought, trailing him down the hallway. Their door came into sight. Suddenly Noah stopped short.

  “I had the Do Not Disturb sign out. Did you move it?” he asked.

  His voice was so low and intense that Sydney froze in her tracks.

  “No,” she whispered, peering at the doorknob over his shoulder. There was nothing hanging there now.

  “Do you have your key?” he asked.

  Sydney produced it from her purse and held it out to him, but Noah shook his head.

  “Stand to the side of the door, and open it on my signal,” he directed, pointing her into position. Then he reached under his jacket and pulled out a gun.

  Sydney took her place, wondering if her eyes were as wide as they felt. She hadn't even known Noah was armed.

  He gestured for her to use the key: “Ready . . . set . . . now!”

  Sydney threw the door open and Noah burst inside, his gun leading his body. She held her breath, waiting for the ensuing firefight.

  Nothing happened.

  Daring to peek around the open doorway, Sydney saw Noah in the living room, still in a shooting stance. But his only opponent was a newly cleaned room, complete with fresh flowers and fruit.

  “It was only the maid!” she exclaimed, laughing.

  Noah spun around, his expression warning her back to silence. Moving cautiously, he crept out of view in the direction of the bedroom and bathrooms. Sydney remained paralyzed, not daring even to breathe until Noah reappeared and put his gun back in its holster.

  “Nobody's here,” she concluded, walking inside and closing the door behind her.

  But again he shook his head, holding a finger to his lips.

  Reaching into a jacket pocket, Noah produced what appeared to be a silver fountain pen. She watched as he removed the cap, then unscrewed the nib as well. From inside the case, where the ink should have been, he removed a long, slender instrument capped by a tiny red light. The light was blinking.

  Sydney looked at him questioningly.

  “Come out on the balcony,” he said calmly, slipping the instrument into his pocket. “I want to show you something.”

  He opened the balcony door and stepped outside, motioning for her to follow. Sydney joined him silently, not sure what was going on. Noah shut the door firmly behind them.

  “Pretty, huh?” he said, turning to gesture toward the Eiffel Tower. “The air is so clear today.”

  Sydney gave him a disbelieving look. He had brought her outside for that?

  “Romantic, don't you think?”

  Her disbelief turned to shock.

  “There's something I have to tell you.”

  His gaze locked with hers, and suddenly Sydney felt breathless. They had never stood quite so close before. She saw flecks of amber in Noah's brown eyes. If she lifted her hand, she'd be able to trace the scar beneath his chin.

  “What is it?” Her voice came out a whisper. The way he was looking at her . . .

  And then, just as she'd known he would, Noah reached out and took her into his arms. She stiffened as he pulled her tight to his body, but the way his lips brushed against her ear did strange things to her pulse.

  “Can you hear me?” he breathed, so low it was almost like hearing his thoughts. His breath was warm against her neck. His mouth nuzzled her ear. Her heart pounded out of control as his hand ran up into her auburn wig.

  “Yes,” she forced out somehow.

  He pulled her even closer. “Our room's bugged. Somebody's made us.”

  8

  “CAN I SAY SOMETHING now?” Sydney asked.

  Noah finally nodded, allowing her to blurt out the question that had been tormenting her for the past hour.

  “Noah, what are we going to do?”

  They were standing beside the Trocadéro Fountains, a long, shallow pool filled with sequencing fountains directly across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower. Between the splashing from various vertical jets of water and occasional lengthwise volleys from the powerful water cannons at one end, the noise would cover their conversation.

  “Well, first of all, try taking a breath,” he said. “Are you feeling okay?”

  Sydney nodded, but his question made her realize how stressed out she must look. From the moment they'd discovered their suite had been bugged until just then, when they'd arrived on foot at the fountains, everything that had happened had passed in an anxious haze.

  Per Noah's whispered instructions, they had both showered and changed every article of clothing they'd worn to the couture house, in case they'd picked up a listening device there. Sydney had ditched her wig as well, dressing quickly in a loose printed dress with a sweater tied across her bare shoulders, her money, passport, and phone secreted in the pockets of the hidden belt around her waist. Dark glasses, a wide-brimmed hat, and flat sandals completed her touristy ensemble. She had seriously considered wearing her running shoes instead, in case of a fast getaway, but had reluctantly decided the look wasn't stylish enough for Carrie Wainwright—assuming anyone still believed that was her name.

  “Rule number one: We stay calm,” Noah said now, keeping his voice low despite the splashing fountains. “We got this far in one piece, so they must not be sure about us. My guess is that right now we're only under suspicion.”

  “But how?” Sydney asked. “What did we do wrong?”

  Noah shrugged. “Most of the time you never find out. Something put somebody's radar up. Maybe finding you downstairs?”

  “No way. I totally covered that,” Sydney insisted. “Yvette and Arnaud were both convinced I went down there to smoke.”

  “Right. And you weren't lying to them, so they couldn't have been lying to you.”

  “Noah,” she said, a terrible new thought occurring to her. “That K-Directorate agent who disappeared . . . you said he was a big guy, right?”

  “Anatolii? Yeah.”

  “Bald, with a huge gut?”

  “Blond. And more like the Terminator. Why? What are you thinking?”

  “Arnaud. But no.”

  “I heard his voice over your transmitter, remember? That wasn't Anatolii.”

  “Oh. Besides, he and Yvette are both really nice. I don't think they could have anything to do with K-Directorate.”

  Noah laughed, a short, humorless bark. “You think you can rule people out as agents just because they're nice? How about you? Are you nice?”

  She didn't answer, embarrassed.

  “Listen. If you want to stay alive in this game—and I'm starting to think I'd like that a lot—don't trust people because they're nice. Nice doesn't mean squat, understand? Meanwhile, a total jerk might risk everything for you. You have to learn to see past that stuff.”

  She nodded, instinctively knowing he spoke the truth. And had he just said he'd like her to stay alive?

  Well, obviously he doesn't want me killed. We're on the same side.

  But his tone had seemed to imply something more. Something personal. She was dying to ask what he'd meant . . . except that then he might think she cared.

  “So what do we do now?” she asked instead.

  “We stick to our cover. We're here as tourists—we act like tourists. Maybe we can throw them off by playing our roles perfectly. We're just Nick and Carrie Wainwright, young marrieds with too much money.”

  “But we can't even talk in the hotel,” she protested.

  “No. And I'm not completely sure that there aren't cameras in that suite too. Or, if there aren't, that there won't be by the time we get back. The less time we spend at the hotel now, the better.”

  “I agree.”

  “I have an errand later, but I'll take you with me. You've got your passport?”

  “Yes. Have you?”

  Noah put his hand to his abdomen, indicating that he, too, wore a money belt beneath his button-down
and khakis. A blazer hid his gun. “Always. That and cash are your tickets out.”

  “My plane ticket!” she groaned, remembering. “I should have brought that too.”

  “Well, it's not important—as long as you have money.”

  “Wilson gave me half a bank. It's making my waist sweat.”

  “Good.” He smiled. “That's very good.”

  An unwelcome thought struck her. “You're not sending me home today?”

  “Not yet. If you bail before that appointment on Wednesday, it will look suspicious now. I just want to be sure we can get out of here fast if we need to. Call it paranoia.” He shrugged. “Or call it experience. In the meantime, we're just sightseeing fools in Paris. Is there anything you'd like to do?”

  Sydney immediately pointed across the Seine to the Eiffel Tower. It loomed over the river, dominating the view. “I want to go to the top.”

  Noah laughed. “You really are a tourist, aren't you?”

  “You asked,” she reminded him defensively.

  “Okay, Mrs. Wainwright,” he teased, giving her shoulder a gentle push. “Your wish is my command.”

  “Too bad the restaurant isn't serving now,” Noah said. He and Sydney were riding a crowded double-decker elevator up from the second level of the Eiffel Tower, where the closed restaurant was located. “I've heard it's excellent.”

  “I'm sorry we missed it,” Sydney replied, but only to be polite. Who wanted to waste time eating when the entire city of Paris was stretching out beneath their feet?

  “No, you aren't.”

  She couldn't help smiling at his cute, sulky expression. “If it doesn't break my heart, does that make me a bad person?”

  “It makes you a lousy gourmet.”

  “I can live with that. Besides, I'd much rather get up to the viewing platform.”

  “Well, you're finally getting your way,” he said, making his point about the length of time they'd had to wait for one of the yellow elevators. Tourists had flocked to the famous monument that Monday, eager to see the view from the top in such exceptional weather.

  “And it was worth it,” Sydney rejoined. “I can see for miles from right here.”