More Than a Mission

by Caridad Piñeiro

  “Lizzy?” Aidan asked and placed his fist beneath her chin, applying gentle pressure so that he could read her face.

  “Sometimes you’re alone even when you’re surrounded by people.”

  He cursed beneath his breath, slipped his hand to the nape of her neck to draw her close for a kiss. “I’m sorry,” he whispered afterward. “For everything,” he said and Lizzy got the weird sense he wasn’t just talking about her parents.

  Chapter 21

  He didn’t know how many times they made love that night. He had run out of condoms and Lizzy had supplied some more.

  Enough times that he was sore. Dead tired. Exhausted.

  Thoroughly satisfied. Totally confused.

  Rolling onto his side, he propped his head up with one hand and glanced at her as she lay sprawled on her back beside him. A rumbly and all too regular noise came from her.

  She was a snorer.

  How long had it been since he’d spent enough time with a woman to know something like that?

  Too long.

  That had to be the explanation for his abandon. For the feelings he was having toward her. Walker could surely explain how it was transference or some other such psychological issue.

  It certainly couldn’t be love.

  Her eyelids drifted open slowly and as she saw him there, a broad welcoming smile erupted on her face. “G’mornin’,” she said, her voice husky.

  He shifted over, dropped a quick kiss on her lips. “G’mornin’. Do you have any plans for today?”

  A tired sigh escaped her. “Some errands to run in town before work. And you?”

  “I’m supposed to meet a friend,” he lied since he couldn’t risk her going with him. Not when he had to report in and possibly go back to investigating her. Back to proving she was a killer.

  She glanced at her wristwatch and grimaced. “I guess we should get going.”

  “I guess we should,” he replied, but made no motion other than to shift closer, until he could lay his hand beneath the sheets on the indentation between her hip and waist.

  “That’s not going to get me moving.”

  “No? Then how about this?” He slipped his hand downward, parted her thighs and found the tender bud tucked between them.

  “Oh. O-o-h. That might work,” she answered and gripped his shoulders with her hands, urging him over her.

  “I thought so.”

  Inside the hotel suite, Walker and Lucia were waiting for him.

  He shot a quick look at his watch. Barely eight o’clock. “What’s up?” he asked as he strolled in and then plopped himself on the couch next to Lucia.

  “Besides you? All night?” Lucia teased and Aidan blushed as it occurred to him what Lucia might have seen during her surveillance.

  Walker silenced her banter with a harsh glare and a sharp slash of his hand.

  “Is this mission compromised, Spaulding?” Walker asked, clearly all about business this morning.

  Aidan was not about to let the other man dictate to him as he seemed so fond of doing. He had always found Walker to be a fairly easygoing kind of guy, but he’d been anything but during this assignment. Not to mention that Walker chastising him for his arguably less than professional interest in Lizzy was kind of hypocritical to the max.

  “Jealous? Not getting any from the doc?” Aidan shot back, referring to Walker’s ongoing affair with the royal physician.

  Walker was on his feet in a second, fists clenched at his sides. When he took a step toward him, Aidan rose, picked up his chin and stepped right up to him, spoiling for a fight.

  They were of a like height and similar build. He knew he could hold his own, but this little show was accomplishing nothing. “I did what I had to for information,” he said from behind gritted teeth, trying to defuse the situation.

  “Was that the only reason?” Walker wondered aloud and arched a sandy-colored eyebrow to emphasize his point.

  Lucia seemed to think it best to intervene, since she stepped between them and laid a hand on each of their chests. “Down boys. I’m overdosing on all the testosterone.”

  After a final exchange of glares, they all sat down again, an uneasy silence filling the room.

  “Report, Spaulding. What did you learn during your midnight escapade that we can tell the duke? He is expecting us to find the prince’s killer.” Walker pressed and stared at him intently.

  He had to give the other man credit. He had perfected the whole bushy-eyebrow, give-you-guilt look. And it worked. He was unable to meet his gaze as he said, “Nothing.”

  At least nothing that he would share. Like that Lizzy was an aggressively passionate lover. One who pleased as much as she liked being pleased. And that she snored…

  He smiled at that last recollection. The seemingly perfect woman had at least one flaw.

  Besides being an assassin? the voice in his head questioned snidely.

  “The Quiz plans on going to press tomorrow with a story on the prince. It seems they’ve got more information than we do.” After he spoke, Walker clasped his hands together and laid them across his midsection. It was a pose that seemed comfortable at first glance, but was anything but if you looked closely at the tight set of his jaw.

  “We’ve got this,” Lucia said and tossed something small, black and plastic on the coffee table before him.

  Aidan picked up the object and examined it. He recognized it immediately. He had designed his share of jamming devices. This one was compact and well-made. Besides the on/off switch, there was a dial, he suspected for modulating the strength of the signal. It called to memory a similar device he had seen. “Where did you get this? It looks like MI6 issue.”

  “In the reeds behind Ms. Moore’s cottage. It was on for the earlier part of the night until I was able to home in on its signal and retrieve it.”

  His relief that his time with Lizzy hadn’t been monitored was short-lived. He inspected the device again and racked his brains for any moment he wasn’t with Lizzy, trying to figure out when she could have planted the device. Nothing came to mind. “When did—”

  “I don’t know when she put it there. As far as I could tell, she was with you the whole time,” Lucia admitted, but then pressed onward. “What I can tell you is that there were no prints, but there was DNA. She must have had it on a belt clip or something else that rode against her skin.”

  “And?” Walker asked, leaning forward intently now as he awaited her answer.

  Lucia weakly motioned with her hands. “Xander is running the PCR tests as we speak. We’ll have the results later today.”

  “We need more.”

  Aidan glanced at Walker after those words. “And how do you propose we get more?”

  “As far as I’m concerned, you’ve jeopardized your position, Aidan. There’s no sense in not coming clean with Ms. Moore.”

  He pictured telling her. If she was the Sparrow, he would be prepared to deal with the reaction. If she wasn’t…

  “I’m not sure—”

  “Be sure,” Walker jumped in. “The Quiz hits the streets tomorrow with whatever information they have. Real or imagined, we’d better have something to tell the duke so that he knows his money is being well-spent.”

  Risking a glance at Lucia, he realized she was as uncomfortable as he was. “What do you think, Lucia?”

  “I don’t like being rushed. If Ms. Moore is the Sparrow, I don’t think she’s going to give herself up just because you admit you’re an agent for the Lazlo Group. She has no reason to fear us.”

  Walker confirmed his agreement with a quick nod. “You’re right. But if she isn’t the Sparrow—”

  “She’ll be afraid? I don’t think you know Lizzy. She doesn’t strike me as the type to be afraid.”

  “Lizzy, huh?” Walker said in low tones before shifting to the edge of his seat and leaning forward to emphasize his point.

  “Be ready to deal with her if she’s the Sparrow. Lucia and I will have your back.”

 
He met Walker’s gaze and surprisingly saw commiseration there. After all, the other man had fallen for the royal doctor during his assignment. He knew what it was like to mix pleasure and business. The difference was, Aidan could see no happy ending in his mission.

  “Let me get cleaned up. Liz…Ms. Moore said she would be running some errands in town. If I can’t find her there, I’ll head for the restaurant.”

  Lucia rose and said, “We’ll be there when you need us.”

  Aidan had no doubt they would be. Only, if Lizzy wasn’t the Sparrow, the kind of support they could offer would do little to help the situation.

  Less than half an hour later, he was back in the main part of the hotel suite, watching Lizzy in the monitors. Like him, she had showered. He wondered if, like him, she had thought of him as she’d run her hands over parts kissed during the night.

  The reaction of his body was unwelcome right now given what he would shortly have to do. He muttered an expletive beneath his breath, drawing Lucia’s attention at a nearby monitor.

  “You ready?” she tossed over her shoulder as her hands flew over the keys on her laptop.

  He wondered what she was working on so intently and approached. “What’s up?”

  “You got me thinking yesterday when you mentioned how our histories were altered. I’ve been trying to track down more info on Ms. Moore. Old info. Pre-alteration, if something like that occurred.”

  He leaned his hand on her shoulder and peered at the screen. It was a listing of past students from the Leonia High School Alumni Association. “Looks normal,” he replied.

  “It does, but I want to dig deeper. See if I can’t hack into the server and check out their other files,” she advised and chanced another glance at him. “You ready to go?”

  He motioned with his head in Walker’s direction. “What about him?”

  She shrugged while typing. “Some kind of urgent call from Corbett. Said for you to go ahead and he would be ready whenever you needed.”

  Which was fine by him. He didn’t need Walker to watch his tail. He was perfectly capable of taking care of himself. Besides, first he had to meet up with Lizzy.

  Returning to the far monitor, he realized she was no longer in her room. Flipping from one camera shot to the other, it became obvious that she was nowhere on the premises of either the restaurant or the cottage. Accessing the earlier images stored on the hard drive, he realized Lizzy had left the cottage. Picking up his binoculars, he scoped out the beach front and then tried to see if he could pick her out along the streets of Leonia.

  Damn. Nothing. Time for him to hit the bricks.

  “I’m out of here. The code word if I need assistance is…” He stopped dead, wondering what they might be discussing in those moments after he made his revelation. Lucia turned to face him as he considered it. But it suddenly occurred to him there was one last thing he wanted the Sparrow to hear if that’s how it played out. “The code word is Mitch.”

  She uneasily acknowledged it with a nod and he was out the door, hurrying down the stairs and onto the main street. Where might Lizzy be headed this morning? The docks and markets for food? One of her friends’ places or the WAC?

  He was closest to the latter and so he drifted by there, seemingly to check out what the WAC would be offering. The doors were closed as was the ticket office. Still, he lingered by the posted schedule, checking it out as any normal patron might. Anything to lessen attention.

  After a few minutes, he ambled back in the direction of town, hands tucked into his jacket pockets. The reassuring weight of his HK Mark 23 dragged at one shoulder. At his ankle, the Glock 36 rubbed his pant leg.

  He was ready for battle.

  Once on the main street, he opted for Samantha’s shop, which was closest. Inside the store, calm reigned, unlike the other day during the sale. Unfortunately, Samantha had taken the morning off, her sales clerk advised.

  As he stepped out of the store, he wondered if Samantha had taken the time to be with Lizzy. If so, would Kate also be in on the outing?

  Hurrying up the block to the next shop, he noticed a familiar figure up ahead on the opposite side of the street. Lizzy. Dressed in black jeans with a black leather jacket covering a figure-hugging white T-shirt. She looked stunning. Not at all tired. He called out to her, but she seemed not to hear.

  Raising a hand and giving a wave, he once again yelled her name.

  She finally noticed and looked his way, but acted as if she didn’t even recognize him. Puzzled for a moment, his delay allowed her to turn down the side street before he could react.

  Fixated on following her, he jumped into the street, but stopped short at the strident blare of a horn. He glared at the driver who had nearly hit him and who shook a fist at him angrily.

  Aidan ignored the driver and continued across the street, past the traffic in the opposite lane and onward to the corner of the block onto which Lizzy had turned.

  No Lizzy anywhere on the street. There were a number of shops, however, and so he walked down the block, pausing at the shop windows to peer within searching for her, but she was nowhere to be found. At the end of the street, which had turned out to be a dead end, he paused, wondering where she could have gone when Lucia came on over the wire.

  “Blender Boy. The Sparrow’s returned to her nest.”

  He examined the street, unable to determine how she had eluded him. “Confirm, Red Rover. Cottage or restaurant?”

  “Cottage.”

  “I’m on it,” he said, and foregoing any further exploration of the dead end, he rushed back to the main road and then to the restaurant. Once he was within sight of the low stone wall for the building, he said, “Red Rover. What’s your ETA?”

  “Walker and I are already in position about ten yards behind the cottage along the shore. Just say the word.”

  Mitch, he thought, a second before confirming Lucia’s communication. Funny how after nearly two years of searching, his goal was within his grasp, but it gave him no satisfaction. No relief.

  Entering through the gate to the restaurant, he cut across the front yard, straight to the back patio and the granite stepping stones that led to Lizzy’s cottage. At the door, he hesitated and took a deep breath.

  No matter the outcome of this confrontation, whatever was going on between him and Lizzy would never be the same.

  Chapter 22

  The knock at the door surprised her. She hadn’t been expecting anyone, only possibly hoping for…

  She smiled as she opened the door and her hope was fulfilled. A fierce and all too serious look marred his face. One that warned trouble was ahead. “You okay?”

  “May I come in?” he asked and motioned to her front parlor. The parlor where, the night before, they had done wonderful things both to and with each other. She suspected that wouldn’t be the case this morning.

  “Sure,” she said and extended her arm in invitation.

  He walked in, but didn’t sit. Just stood there, obviously awkward.

  “You okay?” she asked again as she closed the door and went to stand before him.

  He shrugged and the movement pulled the front of his jacket open slightly, revealing a quick glimpse of something at his side a moment before the black leather dropped down again, hiding it from sight.

  “Saw you in town. Waved to you.” A puzzled look crossed his features. “You were dressed differently.”

  Town? She’d been in and around the house and restaurant all morning. “I’ve been here,” she said, but then it occurred to her what might have happened.

  “Dani. She must have come home as a surprise.” Joy swept over her at the prospect of seeing her sister.

  “Dani? Who’s Dani?” he asked, another quizzical look on his face.

  “Dani’s my twin sister. She must have—”

  Aidan raised his hands and waved them while shaking his head vehemently. “You don’t have a twin, Lizzy. Look, if you’re having any kind of mental problems—”

  Now
it was her turn to silence him with a slash of her hand. “If anyone’s gone mental, it’s you. How the hell do you presume to know—”

  She abruptly stopped when Aidan took out some official-looking badge from beneath his jacket and the movement also revealed the gun tucked into the holster. She realized then it was what she had spied before.

  Barely glancing at the badge, her gaze snared by the weapon, she said in soft tones, “Who the hell are you?”

  He hesitated, clearly troubled, before slipping the badge back into his pocket. “Aidan Spaulding. I work for the Lazlo Group. We’ve been hired to track down Prince Reginald’s killer.”

  “You lied to me,” she said and stepped close to him, wanting to see his eyes as he answered.

  “I had to. I—”

  She slapped him, hard enough to snap his head back. “You prick. You’ve been lying to me the whole time. You were lying to me when…”

  She went for him again, but this time he snared her hand in midair. “Don’t,” he warned.

  “Or what?” Anger drove her to taunt him.

  “You have no twin. Nothing in the files supports that,” he advised and released her.

  She let out a harsh laugh. “Your files are wrong, Aidan. Danielle Elizabeth Moore is my twin sister. My older sister by half an hour.”

  Aidan examined her features carefully, but the lady was either an amazing liar, telling the truth, or totally demented. He didn’t know which of the three possibilities he preferred. But two of them could be easily eliminated.

  “Prove it,” he said.

  Lizzy immediately sprang into action. Striding to the bookcase at one side of the room, she knelt before it and rummaged through some of the books before saying, “It’s gone.”

  He stood behind her and asked, “What’s gone?”

  She was shaking her head and flipping through the books once more. “Our high-school yearbook. Weird. But it doesn’t matter. There’s pictures in here.”