Splendid Isolation

by Helena Maeve

  “No need.”

  Cold metal bit into Manuel’s palms as he tightened his grip around the armrests of the garden chair. “Back so soon?” he muttered. His breath fogged the crisp afternoon air.

  Cole didn’t come into view. He didn’t move an inch, but Manuel could feel his presence like another throbbing bruise. The hand on his shoulder remained in place, dangerously warm.

  “I hear you had quite an eventful night.”

  “I checked in this morning,” Manuel shot back, pre-emptive. “Said I fell asleep… I think he bought it.”

  “Heard that, as well.”

  He had little doubt that every phone in the Cottage was tapped, every word exchanged dissected by analysts in a Section basement somewhere. Still, it was worthwhile to mark the point.

  I remembered my part of the deal. For all the good it did him.

  When Cole didn’t ask what happened or why, Manuel relaxed fractionally in his seat. The sad reality was that he couldn’t justify his reaction. He had no desire to try. Some quarrels were between men, not men and institutions. He hadn’t been trying to escape Section’s clutches. The proof was in his continued presence here, at Cole’s mercy, in this safe house-cum-prison.

  “The doctor did his due diligence?” Cole wondered, at length. “Nothing serious?”

  “Nothing new.” Nothing you should lose sleep over.

  “I see.”

  Somehow, it registered as a slight when Cole retrieved his hand.

  Manuel suppressed a shiver. After much hemming and hawing, he had caved and allowed Arthur to set him up with an alpaca blanket. The afternoon chill didn’t bother him. Whatever drugs Doc had pumped into his system, they were doing a fine job of making the world fuzzy and pleasant.

  Throat clamping tight at the sound of a chair scraping the flagstone patio, Manuel couldn’t help think that he should have requested a higher dosage.

  Cole sat at an angle from him, still turned toward the garden but well within reach of Manuel. “Would you like some more tea?” he asked, already filling Manuel’s cup.

  “No,” he said, just to aggravate. The handcuffs around his wrists connected to the ones around his ankles. They made reaching difficult.

  Unperturbed, Cole manipulated the teapot with care before sitting back and claiming Manuel’s mug for his own. He wore charcoal gray today, his sleeve visible between the folds of a camel hair coat and black gloves.

  He might have passed for a city banker, if it not for those gloves. They screamed spook.

  “I thought you should know your attackers have been dismissed.”

  “Attackers?” Manuel smirked. “Don’t overstate it.”

  Cole’s icy expression barely shifted. “Suppose next you’ll tell me you walked into a door?”

  There had been a time, not so far back, when Manuel would have yearned for Cole’s scrutiny—a time when his jaw didn’t ache and his body wasn’t dark with purpling shiners. Now, it only served to make him bitter.

  “Ah, but you should see the other guy,” he retorted mirthlessly.

  “I have. Kazinsky had a few choice words for you… And here I thought you were the sociable one.”

  “What, the Baby to Posh and Crazy Spice up there?” Manuel jerked his head toward the rooms where his fellow inmates slept.

  None were peering out their windows at this hour. Silas went for walks with two handlers in the afternoons. The mute liked to paint in the attic. Her handlers weren’t afraid she’d stab herself in the neck with a paintbrush, but when Manuel asked to partake of the privilege, he’d been rebuffed.

  It didn’t matter. He didn’t have an artistic bone in his body, anyway.

  Cole offered him the vague suggestion of a smile. It didn’t last. “You’ve been stalling us. And you’re picking fights with the staff…”

  “Oh, this is the part where you tell me I’m more trouble than I’m worth.”

  “Yes,” he confirmed. “I take no pleasure in it.”

  “So I’m to be transferred.” Pleasure or not, Manuel could read between the lines. “You forget,” he added, when Cole seemed slightly bemused, “I used to do what you do. I sat where you’re sitting. Hand-holding is not in the handbook, is it? So…where am I going?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “There’s an expression you Englishmen use… Codswallop?” It applied.

  Cole scoffed, tapping his wedding ring against the mug. “I would tell you if I knew. I’m not heartless.”

  Manuel dissolved into laughter, a harsh, jagged sound that tore out of his throat with little thought. “Now I’ve heard everything. I know I look pitiful, but come on, Stephen.”

  “I’d appreciate it if you didn’t call me that,” said Cole, in a tone of voice more like himself than any he employed with his underlings. He tipped forward, over his so far untouched tea mug, and sighed. “Look, I tried to fight the order, but last night’s events…”

  “Do you think about it?”

  Cole met his gaze, eyebrows hitching up. Think about what?

  “Havana. You and me in that little café in Plaza Vieja.” Manuel smiled at the memory. “You’d just bought that ridiculous Panama hat.”

  “Ancient history,” Cole scoffed.

  “Only a couple of decades.”

  “Maybe now is not the best time to reminisce. Are you listening to me? They’re packing you off for the airport.” Cole lowered his voice, urgency coloring his expression. “I think you’re being extradited.”

  “Ah.”

  Truth be told, that particular scenario had not crossed Manuel’s mind before.

  He refused to let himself crumble before the news, no matter how his heart rattled in the cage of his ribs. “Doesn’t seem fair… Your people did all the hard work getting me nice and colorful, and now you don’t even reap the spoils? My heart breaks for you.”

  “I didn’t realize you were wanted elsewhere,” Cole muttered, shaking his head.

  It might have been naive of Manuel, but he wanted to believe it. He flicked up a hand, steel cuffs clicking. “You think you’re the only people I’ve crossed?”

  “Manuel—”

  Cole slammed the teacup down onto the table. He was fuming. His empty hand came up, but whether he meant to strike Manuel or shake sense into him, it didn’t matter. It never touched down.

  He didn’t get the chance.

  The upper windows of the Cottage exploded with a sickening, eardrum-shattering blast. A wide scattering of splintered glass and pulped wood whipped out, pelting the garden hedges as far as the sycamore.

  The force of the explosion catapulted Manuel out of his seat. And though he threw his hands forward as he went down, his palms still scraped the flagstone, grit and broken glass slashing skin.

  He landed badly, one shoulder slamming into the patio floor. He made to cover his face out of instinct more than sense, but his bound wrists arrested the movement.

  It had been years since he’d last been in a war zone, yet old instincts never quite faded.

  Cole slammed into him, the folds of his camel hair coat blanketing them both like a pair of wings. Through the ringing in his ears, Manuel registered the throb of his heartbeat, of Cole’s pulse beneath his fingertips. His scent, everywhere.

  It was foolish and it was hopeless. It was adrenaline pumping through his veins like a powerful drug. Manuel tipped up his head, disoriented, and brushed his lips to Cole’s.

  Just once. Just for one last time.

  For old time’s sake.

  He could have sworn he felt Cole sigh.

  Another explosion shook the ground beneath their feet. The roar of blood in Manuel’s ears became the groan of crumbling mortar.

  * * * *

  “I hear you were very lucky,” the nurse said. She was bent over his hands with tweezers and a magnifying glass, like a jeweler judging the purity of a gemstone. “They’re saying—” With a quick glance over her shoulder, she lowered her voice. “They’re saying the house just collapsed.
Down to the foundations.”

  “Hmm.”

  “Apparently the chimney was struck and it took out part of the roof and, uh… Well, I don’t know much about architecture, but it sounds serious.”

  “It was.”

  The nurse looked up, her large black eyes widening. “For real? Bloody hell… Good you made it out. Were there any—”

  “Yes.” Manuel couldn’t help be a little short. He had watched as the body bags were wheeled out over the debris. By his count, there were at least three more caught under the rubble, two of them SIS agents.

  With a butcher’s bill like that, they had no room for elation.

  A doctor in a white lab coat strolled in through the glass doors of the infirmary. The cacophony outside poured in like water through a sieve. One voice rose higher than all others.

  “Rubbish,” Cole thundered. “We know who the target was. The blast radius centers on his room—”

  “Could be a diversion,” insisted the other suit.

  In years past, Manuel might have been able to guess at his identity, but the spooks he’d once known were dead or gone, and in their place had risen a new crop of loyal officers, ready and willing to serve in Her Majesty’s service, no matter the cost.

  “A diversion,” Cole repeated, disbelief thick in his voice.

  “They may have been trying to bump—”

  The infirmary doors slid shut before Manuel could make out the tail-end of that final burst of speculation. He squinted, but the suit was facing just slightly away from the door, enough to make it impossible to read his lips. Whatever he said had an effect on Cole. When their eyes met through the glass, Manuel read consternation in his gaze.

  We’ll finish this later, Cole snapped. He knew that Manuel read lips. He was too clever not to take his secret debriefings elsewhere.

  It was a surprise to watch him stride into the infirmary instead.

  “How are we doing?” That false note of cheer he put on left a lot to be desired.

  The nurse glanced up. “Almost done. I was just telling Mr. Sosa he was very lucky.”

  “Yes,” Cole agreed. He wasn’t looking at the nurse.

  Manuel didn’t know how to decipher that hefty, searching stare. He returned it brazenly, teeming with false confidence. “With all this excitement, I’m a little worried I won’t make my flight.”

  “Your… Oh.” Cole cleared his throat and folded his hands behind his back, pulling his shoulders straight like a soldier at parade. “Change of plans. You’re not flying out tonight.”

  “What a shame.”

  Cole shifted his weight. He still looked a million bucks, despite the dirt smudge on his collar. It took a lot more than impromptu demolitions to spoil his armor.

  “Thought you’d be pleased.”

  “I’m trying to contain my joy so I don’t disturb Samantha’s work. She’s very diligent.”

  The nurse tittered. “All done. Just have to wrap this up and you’ll be good to go.” She pushed back her chair. “Be right back.”

  “She has no idea who I am, does she?” Manuel wondered, once they were alone.

  “None at all. Listen,” Cole said, taking another step closer. There was maybe a foot of space between them. Cole seemed to notice it at the same time, because he arrested his progress and shifted his weight. “I’m trying to have you moved to another safe house.”

  “In Britain?”

  “Yes, in Britain. I’m not a bloody travel agency,” Cole grumbled, sotto voce.

  His vehemence would’ve been surprising if Manuel hadn’t seen his wide-eyed shock when he pushed himself to his knees a mere ten feet from the ruin of the Cottage.

  What Hitler’s bombers failed to accomplish in a months’ long campaign, two explosions had managed in a single afternoon.

  The bodies in the wreckage could just as easily have been theirs.

  Cole tugged a bandaged hand through his slicked-back hair. He had doffed his glass-sprinkled coat and gloves, perhaps consigning both to the forensic team as evidence. His shaking, wounded hand was the only part of him to show the slightest hint of disarray.

  “There are some complications.”

  “No one’s claimed the attack,” Manuel guessed.

  “Precisely.”

  Cole traced his lips with two fingers—a nervous gesture that Manuel would have thought he’d shed by now. It had let him down time and time again at the gaming tables back in Havana.

  Manuel tried not to let his mind wander. “Could be you have a mole inside Section…”

  The response was predictable and petulant. “That’s the logical conclusion, is it?” Cole scoffed. He looked away crossly. “At any rate, an investigation is already underway. In the meantime, you will remain in our custody and—”

  “Lovely Samantha will keep me company until you’re ready to move me to my new digs?”

  “I’m sure Samantha has other duties.”

  Manuel didn’t deny it, but Samantha was sweet and jovial, and better company than the stern-faced agents he usually entertained for hours in their interminable, miserable tête-a-têtes. He waited for Cole to say something else, to throw another barb. Sticking pins was like sparring—cathartic only as long as he had a worthy rival.

  “Cole.”

  He already had a foot out the door, the hubbub of the facility reaching its claws in to pull him away. But he turned at Manuel’s call, which was more than Manuel had anticipated.

  “I’m sorry,” Manuel said, too little too late. “About everything.” The explosion, the dead officers—but also the kiss. Especially the kiss.

  They had known each other long enough that there weren’t very many ways left to inflict hurt. It stung to think that Manuel had come up with the last.

  Cole held his gaze for a beat before turning on his heel and stalking away.

  Sorry had never gotten Manuel far with him anyway.

  Chapter Four

  English countryside raced past the tinted windows of the Land Rover in an endless succession of yellow fields and green pockets of woodland. Here and there, Manuel glimpsed a town tucked into the side of a hill or else sprawling liberally into the belly of a gorge. He spent a very pleasant hour trying to imagine what it might be like to live like that—to live at all without looking over his shoulder every minute of every day—and promptly gave up the sport.

  Sighing, he tipped forward in his seat. “Not to be a pain, but—”

  “You can call him from my mobile.” Cole reached into his inner pocket.

  Manuel tensed in his seat. A small, irrational, impossible to shut up, part of him instantly wondered if he could deflect a bullet before Cole took out their chauffeur and drove them all off the road.

  If he didn’t know that Cole was a worthy opponent, he wouldn’t have worried.

  “Thanks.” The cell exchanged hands without their fingertips touching.

  Cole didn’t so much as acknowledge him.

  The silent treatment was by far the least of the tools he could use against Manuel. His arsenal was full. And now he would have Robin’s number right at his fingertips.

  Manuel entered it and pressed Call. It took two rings before the call connected.

  “You’re not at the house,” was Robin’s opening volley. It put one fear to rest, at least, because if he knew where Manuel was calling from, then he was aware that everything they’d ever said was on record.

  The little bird wasn’t half as naive as Manuel had once feared.

  “You could say it’s…undergoing rigorous renovation?” Manuel stared at the back of Cole’s neck. “I felt like a change of scenery, anyway, so it works out.”

  On the other side of the world, in whatever hellhole Robin had made his home, computer keys clacked and clicked. “That explains the chatter. You okay?”

  “Paint’s a little scuffed, but otherwise…” Manuel stared at the thin sliver of skin he could glimpse between the collar of Cole’s shirt and his severe haircut. His nape always gave him a
way with a rosy blush when he was tired or annoyed—or aroused.

  It was those kinds of details that made it hard to separate business from pleasure in his vicinity. Manuel cleared his throat. “I’ll call again when I know more.” Which was to say, if I’m not driven into a field and executed. If this isn’t all a botched attempt at arranging an accident.

  Anything was possible in their line of work.

  He waited for acknowledgment.

  Robin said nothing for a long beat. “Did they tell you why the sudden…renovation?”

  “Yes.” It was a split-second decision—to lie or not to lie—and Manuel didn’t regret the words that came out of his mouth.

  Even Robin, who seemed ready and willing to martyr himself for the good of an amorphous, unorganized mass of ex-agency operatives gone rogue, might be tempted to up the ante if he heard that Section could still be taken by surprise. Manuel had no desire to start another war. He had turned himself in as a show of good faith—and to save his own skin.

  One of those two ends had to survive the oncoming storm. His skin was long overdue to become a lampshade in the Macias house of horrors.

  “Talk to you soon,” he said and quickly hung up.

  “That was brief,” Cole opined from the front seat.

  “Mhm. Seemed wise to save the phone sex for another time.”

  The mobile passed back into Cole’s hands, slower than it had the other way around. Manuel dragged a fingertip down Cole’s lifeline—because he could, because he had nothing left to lose—and sat back with a rustle of seatbelt.

  Cole’s gaze returned to the silver ribbon of the motorway ahead, nonchalant and robotic. Nothing in his posture suggested he’d felt the caress.

  * * * *

  Their precise location was impossible to pinpoint, but Manuel had seen signs for Sheffield and Birmingham both, so he figured it was safe to assume they were no longer in Dorset, at least. It didn’t make much difference. The driver pulled up in the driveway of a house that looked nothing like the Cottage but which boasted the same subtle signs of resident paranoia.

  CCTV equipment surveyed the grounds from atop tall metal posts. The front door, Manuel noticed once he’d stepped out of the car, had an eight-point locking system.