But it was the couple on court two that riveted Mike’s attention. Gillian’s blouse and thigh-skimming pleated skirt were both pristine white, but she’d topped them with a hot pink sleeveless V-neck sweater. Her sun visor was the same neon pink, trimmed with sparkling crystals. And when she stretched to return a killer serve, she flashed a glimpse of matching briefs.
Mike’s throat went dry. He knew damned well tennis stars like Venus and Serena Williams were glamming up the courts with colorful outfits and sequined shoes. He just wasn’t prepared for the sight of Gillian Ridgeway in pink panties with a crystal heart etched on the right butt cheek.
Or for her partner’s reaction when she scored the winning point. Whooping with delight, the jerk caught her up and whirled in a full circle before planting a kiss on her laughing lips.
“Game, set and match to Ridgeway and Olmstead,” the announcer intoned while Mike’s eyes narrowed to slits behind his sunglasses.
The urge to smash his fist in this guy Olmstead’s face was completely irrational. That didn’t make it any less atavistic. Jaw tight, he jammed his hands in his pockets.
They were still there, bunched into tight fists, when Gillian gathered her gear and came off the court. She accepted the congratulations of several spectators before she spotted him off to the side of the crowd.
“Mike!”
A smile sparkled in her vivid blue eyes. A friendly smile, he lectured himself sternly, the kind she’d drop on any casual acquaintance.
“Did you see the match?”
“Only the last few minutes.” Which would, he knew, replay repeatedly in his head for nights to come. “You’re good.”
“I’m okay. My golf game is better, though.”
Dragging up one end of the towel draped around her neck, she daubed at the sweat plastering tendrils of her jet-black hair to her temples.
“I understand you’ve been known to hit the fairways,” she commented. “Maybe we should get up a foursome some weekend. You and I could take on Uncle Nick and my father. Dad is always looking for fresh blood.”
Mike couldn’t think of anything that would throw off his concentration more completely than sharing a golf cart with Gillian Ridgeway while two of OMEGA’s most lethal operatives watched their every move.
“Or I could pair up with Dayna,” she suggested with a grin, referring to an OMEGA operative who just happened to be an Olympic gold medalist. “We girls could take on you boys.”
He was still trying to adjust to being classified as a “boy” when Gillian’s partner strolled up and draped an arm across her shoulders.
“Hey, Jilly. We need to sign the score sheet.”
Mike had made a career in the profession of arms. He could bring up his weapon, fix a target in his crosshairs and squeeze off a shot in less time than it took other men to chamber a round. With the same split-second precision, he sized up Jilly’s partner as arrogant, over-confident and possessive.
“In a minute.” Looking too damned comfortable in the circle of the man’s arm, Gillian made the introductions. “Wayland, this is Mike Callahan. Mike, Wayland Olmstead.”
Mike knew the name and the rep, if not the face. Yale undergrad. Harvard law. Hotshot young attorney carving a niche for himself at the National Security Agency.
“Good to meet you, Callahan.”
The grip went with the man. Too strong and too long, as if signaling his power. Mike resisted the impulse to crunch the jerk’s knuckles.
“I see you’re a shooter,” Olmstead commented, eyeing the Military Marksmanship Association patch.
“Not just a shooter,” Gillian corrected. “A world champion. Mike instructs at the Federal Law Enforcement Academy at Quantico,” she added, supplying his civilian cover. “He’s the man my father strong-armed into teaching me to shoot.”
Adam Ridgeway was more than capable of teaching his daughter how to handle weapons. So was her mom, for that matter. Maggie Sinclair’s exploits were still the stuff of legend at OMEGA. But both parents had preferred a professional instructor, insisting that Mike could be more objective in assessing Gillian’s strengths and weaknesses. Shows what they knew.
“You did a heck of a job,” Olmstead said, squeezing her shoulders. “Jilly knocks down more sporting clays than I do every time we take out the Blassingames.”
The message was about as subtle as a rifle butt to the bridge of the nose. A used Blassingame, if you could find one, went for a cool fifty thousand.
Idiot.
“I think you should know,” Gillian warned, her eyes twinkling. “Samantha and Tank have been pestering Dad for lessons, too.”
Mike had no problem with teaching Jilly’s college-aged sister to shoot, but the prospect of putting a gun into the hands of her teenaged brother drained every ounce of blood from his face.
Gillian had to laugh at his expression. He couldn’t have looked more horrified if she’d shrugged off Wayland’s arm, gone up on tiptoe and given him a class-A liplock.
Something she’d thought about doing more and more frequently, she mused as a roar rose from the bleachers surrounding court three.
“Game, set and match to Jensen and Jensen.”
“Good for Nick and Mackenzie!” With another squeeze, Wayland steered Gillian back toward the courts. “Let’s go congratulate each other.”
“Coming, Mike?”
“I’ll wait here.” He adjusted his sunglasses and gave her one of his Uncle-Mike-to-little-Jilly smiles. “Tell Nick I need to talk to him when he gets a minute.”
One of these days, she vowed as she accompanied Wayland through the milling crowd, she’d have to convince him she was all grown up.
After consulting with Lightning, Mike waited until he was back in the Blazer to contact Cutter. Traffic was a bitch, crawling along like a snail on tranquilizers, belching diesel fumes into the slowly gathering dusk.
The traffic snarl matched Mike’s mood. He could have gone all month without that glimpse of Olmstead tipping a champagne glass to Gillian’s lips.
Hell, all year.
With a surly sneer for the unbroken stream of red taillights ahead, he punched a two-digit code into his phone.
“Lightning gave the green light,” he relayed when Cutter’s image appeared on the screen. “You can read Dawes into the op.”
“Roger that.”
The leap of satisfaction in Cutter’s face had Mike biting back a warning. Slash knew what he was doing. He wouldn’t fall for another female with a soul as flawed as the one who’d damned near killed him.
“When do you plan to tell her?”
“First thing in the morning.”
“Good luck.”
“Thanks, Hawk.”
Cutter woke early the next morning.
A cold wind rattled the windows, causing the château to creak and groan with the prerogative of age, but he didn’t hear a sound from the suite next door.
That was fine with him. He needed a good run to clear his head. He’d lost several hours of sleep to the image of Mallory’s angry face and stormy eyes when she jerked away from his touch. Even more to the vivid memory of her slick flesh and low, throaty moan when she’d climaxed in his arms. He’d have to talk hard and fast to recover the ground he’d lost last night. Faster still to get her into bed again.
With various strategies for how he’d break the news that she was the primary suspect in an identity theft of massive proportions kicking around in his head, Cutter pulled on the jogging suit OMEGA’s Field Dress Unit had included in his hastily assembled kit. He would have preferred his usual Nikes and well-worn gray sweats but had to admit the chocolate-brown velour designer job felt as soft as a fuzzy kitten against his skin.
He followed the scent of fresh-brewed coffee and rising yeast to a kitchen aglow with copper pots. Gilbért was seated at a peg-and-board oak table with his jacket hooked on the back of his chair and the remains of his breakfast in front of him. Madame Picard stood at a granite slab of a counter and rolled pastry
dough with floured arms.
“‘Morning.”
Abashed to be caught in his shirtsleeves, Gilbért scrambled for his jacket. “Excusez-moi, monsieur. I did not hear the bell.”
“I didn’t ring. Please, sit down. I just want some coffee before I head out for a run. May I join you?”
“But of course.”
The coffee was thick and tarry black, the cream light and frothy. One cup led to another, then to a brioche fresh from the oven. Regretfully, Cutter passed on a second until after his run.
The morning mist swirled gray and thick when Gilbért disarmed the security system and Cutter exited into the cobbled courtyard. Discreetly placed cameras tracked his progress through the gate and onto the long, sweeping drive.
Instead of following the drive to the main road, he opted for a path that led along the cliffs. A mile at a slow trot loosened muscles that hadn’t been exercised in several days. With the ocean hidden by the fog but roaring loudly in his ears, Cutter gradually lengthened his stride. Salty mist dewed on his face. Damp air filled his lungs. Thoughts of Mallory Dawes looped through his head.
Six miles later, the velour was drenched with sweat and Cutter had decided on a direct approach. He wouldn’t gain anything by pussyfooting around the issue. First he’d shower and shave. Then he’d tell Mallory about the disk, inform her that he’d had her under close surveillance since Paris, and brace himself for the firestorm that would follow.
He accomplished the first two items on his agenda with minimum fuss and maximum speed.
His cheeks tingling from the rapid scrape of his razor, he tugged on slacks and a lightweight knit sweater in a peacocky blue, compliments of Field Dress, and rapped on the door to Mallory’s suite. When she didn’t answer, he tried the small dining salon, the oak-paneled library and the music room before once again making his way to the kitchen. Madame Picard was still at the counter, peeling apples for the pie shell she’d baked while he was running.
“The run?” she inquired politely. “It is good?”
“Very good. Has Mademoiselle Dawes come down?”
“Oui.” The paring knife made a small circle in the air. “She comes, she goes.”
“Goes?”
“Oui. The telephone rings, and mademoiselle, she asks Gilbért to drive her.”
“Drive her where?”
“Into town, to the train station.”
Cutter smothered a vicious oath. “How long?”
“Pardon?”
“How long have they been gone?”
Her shoulders lifted in that quintessential Gallic shrug. “Five minutes, perhaps ten.”
Cutter spun on his heel and sprinted for the stairs to retrieve his car keys, cursing all the way.
Chapter 10
Mallory stared unseeing at the mist-shrouded pines drifting past the windows of Madame d’Marchand’s Rolls Royce Silver Cloud. Beside her, Gilbért hummed to himself as he steered through the forest that edged right down to the cliffs on this stretch of coast.
She should have been feeling like a princess. After all, she’d spent the past two nights in a castle and was now being conveyed to town in a chrome-laden behemoth that glided along with slow, ponderous grace. Instead, she wanted to bite something. Or someone.
She supposed she should thank Cutter for waiting until last night to bring the walls of her fairy-tale castle tumbling down around her. At least she’d got to spend a whole day roaming the French countryside, lazing in the sun, sipping apple brandy. An evening filled with sparkling crystal and le veau de la Normandie. And let’s not forget that hot, sweaty session between the sheets.
She ground her teeth, and Gilbért raised an inquiring brow.
“Yes, mademoiselle?”
Shifting in her seat, Mallory glanced at the stately majordomo. He appeared so calm, so dignified, with his salt-and-pepper hair, neatly trimmed mustache and spiffy tweed driving cap.
“Mademoiselle is disturbed?” he asked, unbending enough to tip her a look of friendly concern.
She started to deny it. Shielding her thoughts and emotions had become a necessary survival mechanism over the past months. She was feeling just raw enough, though, to blow a long huff of self-disgust.
“Did you ever make a fool of yourself over someone? A total, twenty-four-carat fool?”
“But of course. I am French. It is required.”
“Wish I could use nationality as my excuse,” Mallory said glumly. “With me, it’s just plain stupidity.”
“What is life without such folly, eh?” His lips curving, Gilbért relaxed his gloved hands on the steering wheel. “Madame Picard was the belle of our village. All the men puff their chests and strut like the peacock when she strolls by. She tortures me, ma petite Jeanette, until I go mad with despair and decide to drown myself in the village well. It is a gesture, you understand, a foolish gesture. I have gone down the well many times as a boy, but now I am too big and become stuck. It takes a team of horses to pull me out, while the whole village watches. We laugh about it still, Madame Picard and I.”
Gilbért’s rich chuckle invited Mallory to share in the absurdity of life in general and love in particular.
Okay, she thought, smiling at his tale, so maybe she wasn’t the only woman in history to fall for a sexy smile and a body to match. Throw in a propensity to appear just when a girl needed him most and a seemingly sympathetic ear, and it was no wonder she’d let desire cloud her judgment where Cutter Smith was concerned.
The stupid thing was, deep down inside she still wanted to trust him. Against all reason, despite every bitter lesson she’d learned in recent months, she wanted to give him the time he’d asked for. How stupid was that?
She was squirming inwardly at the answer when a figure darted out of the forest. Planting himself in the middle of the road, he waved his hands above his head and signaled for them to stop.
With a low grunt, Gilbért stomped on the brakes. His eyes narrowed under the brim of his tweed cap.
“I know this one. He is the son of the baker in town.”
Judging by the curl to Gilbért’s lip, he didn’t hold the baker’s son in particularly high esteem. Mallory’s glance cut back to the man on the road.
Skinny and spike-haired, he looked to be in his early twenties. His jeans were fashionably ragged, showing large patches of bare skin. His jacket was also denim. The black T-shirt he wore underneath sported a heart skewered by a stiletto dripping blood.
“Wait in the car, mademoiselle.” Gilbért put his shoulder to the Rolls’ heavy door. “I will see what he wants.”
Whatever it was led to an escalating exchange of words and gestures. Mouths twisted into sneers. Arms were flung. Chins were flipped. When the kid dragged an arm across his nose to wipe it, an obviously disgusted Gilbért turned and stalked toward the car.
Before he’d taken more than a few steps, the baker’s son whipped something out from under his jacket. Mallory caught only a glint of metal before he raised his arm and brought it down on Gilbért’s skull. The older man crumpled like an old suit of clothes.
“Hey!”
Mallory was out of the car before Gilbért hit the ground. The kid spun toward her, clutching what she now saw was a small but lethal-looking revolver.
She froze, her breath thick in her throat, as he let loose with a torrent of French. The volume rose with each agitated phrase, until he was almost shouting at her.
“I don’t understand.” Her voice cracked. Her mind fought to find the right translation. Je, uh, ne comprend … “
“I will have it!”
“Have what?”
“Everything. The purse. The wallet. What you carry in the car.”
Drugs, she thought when her brain unfroze enough to register anything except the gun barrel aimed at her midsection. The wild eyes. The runny nose. He had to be on drugs. Only someone really messed up in the head would risk a robbery in broad daylight with a man who could easily identify him lying in the dirt at his feet.
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The realization she was facing an armed junkie would have scared the crap out of her if a second realization hadn’t hit right on top of that one. Because the man lying in the dirt at this guy’s feet could identify him, he might not be inclined to leave either Gilbért or Mallory behind as witnesses.
“The purse,” the kid shouted, his gun shaking with the effort. “Throw it down, in the road. Then move away from the car.”
Struggling desperately to recall the tips imparted in her self-defense course, Mallory tugged at the strap of the purse draped across her chest and one shoulder. Most of the advice had to do with avoiding dangerous situations. Never pick up hitchhikers. Stick to well-lighted areas. Travel in pairs.
The options narrowed down considerably when confronted by an armed robber. Don’t resist. That was rule one. Her life was more valuable than her possessions. Except in this case, she didn’t have many possessions and she couldn’t shake the sick certainty that her life hung by a very thin thread with this guy.
Rule two, don’t make any sudden moves that might make the attacker think she was reaching for a concealed weapon. Dear God, what she wouldn’t give for a concealed weapon!
Rule three … Do whatever you could to get away if he tried to force you into the car and run like hell in a zigzagging pattern.
Her hand shaking, Mallory dragged her purse over her head. She could zigzag it into the trees lining the road. Maybe. If she ran, though, she’d leave Gilbért at the mercy of this crackhead.
“Here.” Her mind racing in frantic circles, she dangled the purse. “This is all I have. Just take it, okay?”
“Throw it down onto the road and move away from the car.”
She tossed the purse, but not onto the pavement. With a twitchy jerk that was ninety-nine percent nerves and one percent desperation, she managed to land it in the weedy grass beside the road.
Okay. All right. Mallory’s breath came fast and shallow as the kid stalked towards her to snatch up the purse. He was closer now. Almost within reach.
Ready for Anything, Anywhere! Page 30
