by Mallory Kane
Deke didn’t say anything for a couple of seconds. “Or,” he said slowly, “trust your best friend to shoot you in the chest without killing you?”
Rook was stunned by the emotion in Deke’s voice. He knew he’d asked a lot of his friend, but it hadn’t really hit him until now just how much. He’d essentially asked Deke to kill him.
And let him think he had. What kind of arrogant bastard was he, to do that to his best friend?
And his own wife.
“Deke, I—”
“I’ll get back with you,” Deke said quickly, and hung up.
Taylor pulled up in front of a nondescript government building in Sundance. A weathered sign out front identified it as a U.S. Treasury building. A smaller, dimly lit sign beside the front door read Census Bureau.
Rook nodded. “Good cover,” he said.
Taylor nodded. “The Treasury guys moved to the downtown federal building several years ago. Secret Service took over this building when they arrived.” He smiled. “Nobody bothers the Census Bureau. The first floor is mostly empty. A receptionist desk that’s never manned. We’ve got locks on the elevators, so no one wandering in can get upstairs. Third floor has been converted into sleeping quarters for the agents.”
He led Rook through the lobby and into an elevator. “We’re holding the prisoners on the second floor. No one-way glass, but I do have monitors.”
“What have you gotten out of them?”
“Nothing yet. They’re acting like they don’t understand English. I’m trying to locate a translator, but—”
Rook blew out a frustrated breath and shook his head.
Dan raised his brows. “Are you thinking about—”
“Jackson? He speaks the language,” Rook replied. “We’d need to record and verify what he says, though.”
“We can send the recording to Homeland Security’s language lab, but I don’t know what kind of lag time they’re experiencing right now.”
“Can’t we claim executive order as a top priority? We’re listening to people who are directly linked to the most murderous, most elusive terrorist on the planet.”
“Colonel, I wish it were that easy.” Taylor shook his head. “But at any one time Homeland Security is listening in on dozens of conversations from different sources, not to mention other agencies. Any one of those conversations could be a discussion of a plan to attack the U.S.”
Rook knew Taylor was right, but it still chafed. “Let’s do it. Let’s bring him in to translate. You call your boss, and I’ll put a call in to the Pentagon.”
As they stepped out of the elevator on the second floor, Taylor pointed to a door several feet to the right. When he unlocked and opened the door, a man in a white T-shirt and blue jeans with a shoulder holster got up from a table where three monitors and three keyboards sat.
He picked up a half-eaten burger and tossed it in the trash. Then he picked up a cup of coffee.
“This is Special Agent Shawn Cutler. Shawn, this is Colonel Rook Castle.”
“Pleasure, sir,” Cutler said. They shook hands.
Rook sat down in front of the monitors. Two were trained on the two prisoners. One a wide-angle shot of the entire room, the other at a much closer angle. The third was a high, exterior view of the door.
“What’s been going on, Shawn?”
“Not much. They’re not talking. Not even to each other.” He looked at the paper cup in his hand and shook his head. “This stuff is cold. I’m going to make some fresh. Can I bring you a cup?”
Rook shook his head. “Thanks, Shawn. I’m fine. Why don’t you take a break while we’re here.”
Shawn nodded and left.
“I have two men posted outside that door,” Taylor said. “As you see, the prisoners are stripped down to their underwear. They’re handcuffed and hobbled. They’ve been thoroughly searched.”
Rook grimaced at the tactics necessary for dealing with individuals who represented threats to national security. He understood that the safety of the nation and the free world was more important than the comfort and even dignity of a single criminal, but he didn’t like it.
“Can you get me a closer look at their faces?”
“Sure.” Taylor typed a few commands, and the monitor zoomed in.
Rook studied the men, who sat unmoving. One had his eyes closed. The other was staring at a spot on the table.
Rook shook his head. “It was a long shot. I hoped that in the flesh I might recognize one of them. But I’m sure I’ve never seen either of them before.”
He sat back. “Where’s the casualty? I want to see him, too.”
“He’s in the morgue at Crook County Medical Center. I don’t advise going there, after all the business Black Hills Search and Rescue has given to the hospital in the past two weeks. There are already reporters waiting outside the gates at the ranch every day. If they find out you’re alive, we won’t be able to control them. In fact, we’re lucky the networks haven’t picked up on this yet.”
“Good point,” Rook said. “Okay. Let’s get Jackson in here to question them. Are these monitors recording?”
“Not now. I can make them, though.”
“Do it. Make sure you record Jackson’s face, as well as the prisoners’. I’ll get Matt to put together a word-for-word script for him to follow. We can send that in with the recording.” Rook stood. “What about prints or DNA? Anything?”
“No ID on any of them. One had a push-to-talk, but we haven’t found any others to connect it with. We’re trying to trace it through the carrier. We’ve sent prints and DNA swabs, but I don’t hold out much hope there. These guys are almost certainly here illegally.”
“Okay then, what next?”
“I haven’t had a chance to talk to you about Jackson, Gold and O’Neill. I questioned them individually after our meeting. Their stories seem to hold up, as far as they go. Not a one blinked. If one of them is the traitor, he has nerves of steel. If it’s Jackson, I’d say more than just his nerves are made of steel, to come walking up to the booby trap like that.”
“Right. It shocked him to see me, but he recovered quickly.”
“For that matter, what about Brock? I agree with Deke. I think Brock is least likely to be the traitor. I’ve known him a long time, and I trust him almost as much as I trust Deke and Matt. But if it is him, then he walked right into the trap he set himself.”
“Speaking of recordings, what about the meeting this morning. Do you have those disks ready?”
“Yeah. Haven’t had a chance to go over them yet, though.”
“I want to do that first thing in the morning. I want to study each specialist—see their reaction to the pictures of Ordo and Frank James. And then I want to call a meeting with everyone, talk about Brock’s near miss and see what happens when I announce that they’re all suspects.”
“What about meeting here at 8:00 a.m.?”
“Okay, but let’s get Deke and Brock over here by seven. I want to hear what they think about the sniper’s nest before I face the other two. Get one of your agents to get them in here by 8:00 a.m. No, make it eight-thirty.” He covered a yawn and continued. “Can we meet in your observation room?”
Dan nodded.
“When Aaron and Rafe come in, have those monitors running. Record them watching the prisoners. Unless I’m badly mistaken, one of them betrayed me.”
Dan jotted some notes on his dog-eared notepad and then stood, looking at his watch. “I’ll take care of all of that. It’s after seven. This has been a long damn day. Even longer for you, I imagine.”
Rook was taken aback. “Are you saying it’s still Thursday?”
“I am. Why don’t we got you away from here. Maybe take you to D.C., where we can protect you properly.”
“No. I’m going back to the ranch. That’s where my staff is—my family. Do what you have to do to keep us all safe there.”
“Yes, sir. I suggest we get going then. I’m guessing you haven’t slept since you got
back to the States.”
Rook thought about it. He actually couldn’t remember the last time he’d really slept. The short nap earlier hardly counted, considering that he’d been dreaming he was in Mahjidastan when Irina had startled him awake.
ROOK WAS PREPARED to spend the night in the guest suite. But when he got back to the ranch, he realized all his stuff was with Irina, in the suite that used to be theirs.
He unlocked the door as quietly as he could and slipped inside, easing it shut behind him. A pale night-light kept the room from being totally dark.
When had she started sleeping with a night-light? His heart squeezed in his chest. He knew the answer to that question.
When he’d died.
He glanced around the shadowed room. There near the door to the dressing room was the battered fake-leather bag that he’d lived out of for the past two years. He picked it up and headed for the suite across the hall.
Just as his hand closed around the door handle, he heard her stir.
“Rook?” Her voice was soft and blurry with sleep. He closed his eyes, pushing away memories of her words, her touch, her taste, in the middle of the night.
“Just getting my bag,” he said tightly.
“You should stay here.”
“I need a shower, and I need to stretch out, get some rest. The sofa doesn’t quite fit me.”
“You don’t have to sleep on the sofa. I mean, there’s plenty of room here on the bed.”
Her sleepy words awakened his body. He felt himself respond. Felt himself grow.
He clamped his jaw. His hand tightened on the door handle. He should refuse. If he stayed, he wouldn’t get a wink of sleep.
With a sigh, he dropped his hand and turned around. “If you’re sure,” he said.
Her eyes glittered in the glow of the night-light. “Like I said earlier, it will avoid unnecessary awkwardness.”
The sleepy sexiness was gone from her voice. Her tone was even. Her words crisp and clear. Their intent unmistakable.
I’m willing to do you this favor. Don’t make any assumptions.
“Fine. I’ll try not to disturb you.”
She didn’t say anything more. Rook heard the rustle of silk against satin as she lay back down.
For a few seconds he stood there, unmoving. Whether his senses were unnaturally heightened or whether his eyes had dark-adapted, he didn’t know, but he could see her pale shoulders and arms against the paler sheets. He saw the undulating curves as her breasts rose and fell with her breaths. And he remembered, for the first time since the bullet slammed into his chest, how they felt—warm and firm and supple under his fingers.
Her body had always turned him on. It was perfect. The long, delicate bones, the generous breasts and buttocks, the tiny waist. And those legs that went on forever. She was so perfectly proportioned that she was almost a caricature of herself. A mockery of the perfect woman.
He ached with want, with need. His erection rubbed against the material of his briefs, ultra-sensitive. He didn’t know what to do about it.
If he hadn’t been dead in body for the past two years, he’d certainly been dead in soul. The long months stretched out behind him—an emotional black hole. He remembered nothing. No feelings of any kind, except a vague sense of emptiness, and an obsessive need to find Novus Ordo.
Now his body was reawakening, and lying beside her was going to be torture.
So he picked up his bag, went into the dressing room and turned on the water in the shower. After a second, he sighed and, with a small shudder, twisted the knob to cold.
IRINA TOOK A long breath and relaxed more deeply. She was deliciously warm, and she couldn’t remember the last time she’d slept better. The familiar scent of soap and clean hair filled her nostrils. Smooth flesh, like silk over steel, was vibrant and warm under her fingertips.
How she loved waking up like this. Warm and safe and relaxed. She couldn’t remember what day it was, and she had no sense of the time, but it didn’t matter. It was night, and Rook was beside her.
She slid her fingers down from his chest to his flat stomach, and back up, feeling the ridge of breastbone under his warm skin. She turned her nose into the hollow of his shoulder and breathed deeply of the clean scent she could never get enough of.
Then she slid her fingers across his right nipple, pausing to tease it until it hardened under the slight pressure she brought to bear on it.
He stirred, and she laughed softly. He’d never been quite comfortable when she played with his nipples. He wasn’t sure if he was supposed to like it.
But she knew he did. She knew how sensitive—how erotically charged—they were. It turned him on when she touched them. She knew. Just like she knew that nibbling on his earlobe turned him on.
She knew because she knew his body.
With her eyes closed, she trailed her fingers across his pecs and up the side of his neck to his cheek, where she laid her open palm and pressed gently, turning his head toward her.
He turned slightly toward her, enough that she knew he was aroused, and splayed his hand over her tummy, then slid his palm upward and caressed the underside of her breasts.
He pressed his lips against her forehead and drew in a ragged breath. “Irina—”
A quiet whimper escaped from her throat. He’d said her name in his warning, longing voice. The voice that too often reminded her that he needed to get up and race to a meeting, or that she was late for an important charity event, or even just that he was too tired after some long, drawn-out mission.
“No,” she whispered. “No protests. You do not protest. Not right now.”
Something niggled at the edge of her brain, trying to interrupt her slow, lazy seduction of her husband. But she pushed it away. She’d woken up with a fiery need blazing deep within her, and life, with all its drudgery and problems and monkey wrenches, was not going to intrude, at least not until morning.
“Irina, it’s—”
“I don’t care what time it is, or what day. Right now you are under my spell.” She lifted her head and sought his mouth, kissing him with languid, relaxed lips, darting her tongue in and out, teasing him the way she loved to do.
Rook Castle spent most of his life in a type A personality jet stream. She herself was focused, deliberate and slightly obsessive, but Rook was the poster child for type A.
Just about the only time he relaxed was when they were making love. And for some reason that she was too drowsy and too lazy to explore right now, it seemed particularly important to hold him with her in this erotic netherworld between sleeping and waking for as long as she could.
She nipped at his mouth with her teeth, then ran the tip of her tongue across his lips and down his chin to its soft underside. Just as she knew it would, his head lifted and his breath caught. Another erogenous zone she’d discovered.
Maybe today was the day to find a new one. She started on her quest. She trailed her fingers down his neck, following them with her mouth and tongue.
He cradled her head in one hand and groaned low in his throat as she slid farther down, getting into position to lave and suck on his nipple.
Good, she thought. She had him. She slid her leg up his and nearly moaned herself when she felt his erection pulse.
Flattening her hand against his rib cage, which rose and fell rapidly with his breaths, she tasted his skin, inch by inch, as she crept toward his left nipple.
Then her lips hit a rough spot.
She froze.
Rook’s fingers curled inward, fisting in her hair. “Irina, I tried—”
She sucked in a long breath. It cleared her head. Her sleepy, erotic haze vanished.
She looked at his chest and saw the round, rough-edged scar where the bullet had hit him.
“No,” she whispered as the swirling special world dissolved and the nightmare trapped her again. The nightmare that had haunted her for two years.
Rook, rising above her, moving within her, then sinking into the dark
bloody waters of the Mediterranean.
She raised her gaze to meet his eyes. They burned into hers and she knew that this was no nightmare. It was her life.
“Please,” she begged. “Stop haunting me.”
A strong arm tightened around her bare shoulder. Panic built inside her. Why couldn’t she wake up?
“Irina, shh. It’s okay. I’m here.”
His voice slid through her like the reverberation of a kettle drum—low, ringing, real. His breath whispered across her cheek.
She was in his arms, her head resting in the hollow of his shoulder. He was here.
No. She shook off the fantasy. He wasn’t here. Not really. He was dead. Her loving, gentle husband was dead. She’d been dreaming again.
Beneath her cheek, his chest expanded and he sighed. Her fingers tingled with the life, the vibrancy that pulsed beneath them.
He was here.
She stiffened. He’d come back from the dead, and brought danger with him. Danger to her, to himself, to the people who depended on them and cared about them.
She pushed away and sat up.
“Did you have a bad dream?”
She laughed. “A bad dream?” She pushed her fingers through her hair. “No. Not a bad dream. I am having a bad reality.”
She scooted across the bed, away from him, alarmed at how easily and instinctively she’d gone to him and slept in his arms, as if he’d never been gone.
Desperately, she struggled to grasp onto reality. To think about anything other than her pathetic reaction to his presence.
“Oh—Brock.” Something had happened to Brock. She rubbed her eyes and pushed her hair back. “Brock was shot? How is he?”
“He’s fine. The bullet went through his biceps.” Rook threw back the covers and got up with his back to her. He was dressed in nothing but briefs. He reached for his pants.
