by Leslie North
Heath answered on the second ring. “You got him?”
“No.” Murphy exhaled slow and scrubbed a hand over his face. “He bolted before I could grab him.”
“Seriously? You must be losing your touch, man.” Heath said, his tone wry. “If some businessman can outmaneuver a Navy SEAL then we’re all—”
“He didn’t outmaneuver me, okay?” Murph stepped against the wall to allow an older woman past him in the hall. “There were extenuating circumstances.”
“Like what?”
“Like Daveed’s ex, Shayma. She ran into me and her stuff went flying everywhere and next thing I knew the guy was scurrying into a limo and taking off.”
A deep chuckle echoed through the phone line. “Sounds like somebody got distracted.”
“Fuck you, dude.”
“Not my type, man.” Heath’s smile was visible through his tone. “Where you at now?”
“The girls invited me to lunch with them, so we’re waiting to order now.”
“Girls?”
“Yeah, Shayma was meeting Mel.”
“Shit.” The smile in Heath’s tone turned into a frown. “That’s the second time this week. They’re getting awful chummy, right? Seems weird to me.”
“Hey, don’t ask me.” Murphy gave a curt nod as the same little old lady who’d passed him earlier returned, this time from the direction of the bathroom. She gave a slow appraisal then kept moving. He felt like he’d just been checked out by his grandmother. Ugh. Shuddering, he got back on the line. “I gave up on understanding women a long time ago. Just tell me what you want me to do next and I’m on it.”
“Stay put.” Scuffling noises sounded over the phone. “I’m meeting Daveed and we’ll be over. What restaurant is it again?”
“Greek place called Nerai. On East 54th.”
“Cool. Hang tight, be there in a bit.”
Before Murph could say anymore, the call ended. Great. The last thing he wanted to do was sit around this place lusting after the last woman on planet Earth he should ever want, but it looked like he was stuck. He visited the men’s room, splashed cold water on his face, straightened his hair, and basically wasted as much time as humanly possible before heading back to the table with the women. Unfortunately, Mel and Shayma were still there and still talking. At least they’d had food delivered. His stomach growled and he realized he’d not eaten since the night before.
He took his seat again and Mel passed him a plate. “We weren’t sure what you liked so we ordered a bunch of different appetizers. There’s tiger shrimp cocktail, spinach pies, and crispy calamari. Help yourself.”
“Thanks.” He reached for a spinach pie at the same time Shayma did and their fingers brushed. Tiny sparks of awareness jolted up his arm from the contact and he pulled away fast. “Sorry.”
“No, no. Go ahead.” Shayma gave him a shy smile, that pretty pink color rising in her cheeks again. Apparently, he’d not been the only one who’d felt that jolt. Mel, of course, sat across from them, watching their interaction with interest.
“So,” Mel said, nibbling on a piece of calamari. “You’re not dating anyone right now, are you Murphy?”
He nearly choked on his bite of spinach pie and hurriedly gulped water to avoid embarrassing himself. “Why?”
“Just wondering.” Mel gave him an innocent smile. “Shayma’s here through the holidays and she’s alone too. I thought it might be nice if you two spent some time together, kept each other company.”
“I’m working this afternoon,” Murphy said, swallowing a lump of tiger shrimp, though it could’ve been cement, for all he tasted it. He gave Shayma a quick glance. “Sorry.”
“No need to be sorry. Mel and I have plans today anyway. We’re going wedding dress shopping for her.” She shrugged and sighed. “I believe she was talking about later, like tonight or tomorrow.”
Murphy knew damned well exactly what Mel was talking about and he didn’t appreciate it one bit. Just because she and Daveed had hooked up and were full of pink hearts and rainbows for each other didn’t mean the rest of the world had to join in. Bah humbug was right. Maybe old Scrooge wasn’t such a bad guy after all. He grunted caveman-style in reply, then shoved the rest of his shrimp in his mouth and washed it down with another gulp of water. He was going to float away pretty soon if he didn’t get a handle on himself. Normally he kept his emotions under a tight lid, safely tucked away deep inside where they belonged. But there was something about Shayma that seemed to bring out the beast in him, and not in a good way either. Seemed all it took was one flick of those pretty brown eyes of hers his way and his hormones switched into the red-zone.
With more effort than he cared to admit, Murph forced his attention away from the tantalizing, totally confounding woman across from him and back to Mel’s incessant chatter. He didn’t know wedding dresses from work clothes, nor did he really want to either.
“I honestly have no idea what to get,” Mel said, admiring the sparkling engagement ring on her left hand for the umpteenth time. Murph would bet that rock cost his pal Daveed a pretty penny. Not that the guy couldn’t afford it. He was frigging Middle East royalty after all, due to inherit the sheikhdom of Al Dar Nasrani from his father one day. And yeah, there’d been a bit of turbulence following Daveed’s sudden breakup with Shayma in favor of America’s Favorite Socialite Mel, but apparently that had all been smoothed over, at least according to what Daveed had told him yesterday.
“Why don’t we start at Bergdorf’s?” Shayma suggested. “Then we can branch out from there.”
“Yikes. That’s all designer though.” Mel frowned. “Daveed’s still rich, but I really want to learn how to live on a budget. I’ve kept my job at MAC too, so I can earn my keep.” She tossed her napkin down and grabbed her impossibly tiny purse off the table. “I need to hit the ladies’. Be right back.”
Like the rest of us humans, Murphy wanted to add, but refrained as he watched Mel walk away. Mel’s parents had forgiven her too, after they’d discovered Daveed would be the proud ruler of an entire island someday. Ugh. Murph shook his head and sat back. He wasn’t usually so pessimistic about everything. Had to be the holidays getting him in such a dour mood. All their excessive cheerfulness and emphasis on family always made him painfully aware of what he didn’t have.
He glanced up to find Shayma watching him again, her gaze far too perceptive for his comfort. Then she shocked the hell out of him by saying, “I know what you’re doing.”
Brows knitted, he scowled. “Huh?”
“Working with the guys. You need to find your sister, before the people who took her hurt her.”
Yep. That about summed it up. And also had him pushing to his feet. Sitting here snacking on overly-priced seafood wouldn’t help find Aileen. “I need to go.”
“Violence won’t solve things. That’s why I stopped you out on the sidewalk. You can’t go beating up everyone you think is responsible for your sister’s disappearance and expect anyone to talk to you or want to help.” Shayma crossed her arms, highlighting those perfect breasts of hers, and not for the first time Murphy wondered why the hell Daveed hadn’t married her. Yeah, Shayma could be a bit nosy, as evidenced by this lunch, but she was downright, stunningly beautiful. She sort of reminded him of that actress, the one from Israel everyone was talking about from the new superhero movie—except even more gorgeous, if that were possible. If Murph had a gal like Shayma waiting for him at home, he’d never leave the house. Hell, he’d never leave the bed, for fuck’s sake.
She leaned closer, near enough for him to catch a hint of her spicy, sweet perfume mixed with warm, clean woman and shit if his cock didn’t twitch. He shifted in his seat to hide his growing arousal. Not acceptable. No way. He just needed to get laid. It had been too long. That was all.
“Mel told me your sister was doing a story on a clean energy firm—EnKor—and that you think they know something about what happened to her,” Shayma said, her low whisper brushing over him like
crushed velvet. His skin tingled and his throat constricted and Murphy knew right then and there that he was in more danger from this woman than he’d ever been in from deadly snipers out in the Afghan deserts. “I can help you with that.”
It took Murph a second to realize she was talking about Aileen’s disappearance and not his rapidly hardening cock. Grateful for the change of topic, he sat forward. “You know about EnKor? Tell me.”
“Must be nice to take leisurely lunches anytime you like,” Heath said as he plopped down into the empty chair at the table beside Murphy. “Where’s Mel?”
“Bathroom,” Murph said, scrubbing his hand through his hair, thankful the napkin in his lap hid the evidence of his still persistent arousal. Damn. He’d been so distracted by Shayma that he hadn’t even noticed his buddies come into the restaurant. As a trained SEAL, used to being in the roughest, toughest hotspots around the world, such lapses were unacceptable. Such lapses would get a man killed. “I was just getting ready to head back to my post and see if I got another chance to nab one of those EnKor bastards for questioning.”
“I told him I have a better idea,” Shayma said, giving Daveed a quick nod of greeting as Mel returned from the restroom. “My father is minister of energy in Al Dar Nasrani. Chances are good he can get us in to talk with them. If you’d like, I can call him when I get to my hotel room later and ask him to set something up for us.”
“There is no ‘us’,” Murph said, giving her a stern look. “This mission is for me and the guys to handle. Thanks, but no thanks on the help. We got it.”
“Seriously?” Heath stared at him flatly. “Stop being a stubborn ass. Aileen been missing for a few weeks now. Every day that goes by the trail gets colder. We can use all the help we can get right now. Go ahead and call your father, Shayma. Then let me know once the meeting’s set up.”
“Hey, wait a minute.” Murphy sat forward and glared at Heath. “This is my sister we’re trying to save here. Don’t I have any say?”
“After the way you looked ready to murder that poor man earlier today, I’d say you could use some time to unwind,” Shayma said. “I studied psychology in college and you showed all the classic signs of impending violence out there on the sidewalk earlier. Agitation, increased physical tension, hostile stares.”
Heath snorted. “Like the one he’s giving me right now? Don’t worry, I’ll kick his ass before he ever leaves that chair.”
Murphy took a deep, calming breath and prayed for patience. “I was trying to apprehend that man for questioning. He knows something about my sister and I damned well intend to find out what it is.”
“And I just told you I have a way to get the same information without resorting to smashing anyone’s face in.” She patted his hand, and fresh awareness zinged through him despite his overloaded nervous system. “Don’t worry, I’m trying to help. We’ll make a good team.”
“Oh, I’d worry all right, if I was you,” Daveed said, shaking his head. “Last time I heard those words come out of her mouth was the day my parents forced us to get engaged. You’ve seen how that turned out.”
“Well, I think it turned out perfect,” Mel said, leaning over to kiss Daveed on the cheek. “Everything always works out for the best in the end.”
“Ah, my darling optimist,” Daveed said, cupping her cheeks and kissing her sweetly. “Have I told you today how much I love you?”
No holding back the eye roll this time. Murphy swallowed hard to keep his lunch down and gave Heath a deadpan look. “See what you started? I hope you’re happy.”
“Not yet. But I will be. As soon as we figure out what happened to Aileen.”
At the mention of his sister, worry overtook the resistance in his system and he slumped back in his seat. The last thing he wanted to do was have Shayma more involved in his life than she already was. She was a distraction he didn’t need, on so many different levels. But if she had access to information that might bring Aileen home again, he couldn’t turn his back on that—no matter how badly he might wish to. “Fine. But you don’t make a move unless you run it by me first, understand?”
Shayma smiled slowly, a glint of heat and knowing in her dark eyes. “Understood. I’ll call my father tonight after Mel and I get back to the Plaza.”
2
The next day, Murphy sat in his sister Aileen’s apartment alone. He was still waiting to hear back from Heath about the meeting Shayma’s dad was supposed to be arranging for them with the EnKor people and his nerves were on edge. He couldn’t seem to sit still and his neck felt stiff from tossing and turning all night. Funny enough, it wasn’t the impending meeting that was getting to him, it was the woman arranging it.
Thoughts of Shayma had kept his mind racing on an endless loop all night. The way she’d felt pressed against him out on that sidewalk when she’d purposely crashed into him—all soft curves and heated flesh. The way she’d smelled when she’d leaned in close to him at the table yesterday—cinnamon and cloves and sinful desire. The way she’d looked at him with more than casual interest lurking in the depths of her dark, doe eyes. Lord help him, it was enough to make a lesser man drop to his knees and beg for mercy. Good thing Murphy wasn’t a lesser man.
He took a seat at his sister’s desk and booted up her laptop, hoping to find a new email lead or maybe something they’d missed the first fifty times they’d checked the dumb thing, but there was nothing new.
Shit. Shit, shit, shit.
He sighed and let his head fall back, stared at the white ceiling above then scrubbed a hand over his face. He and the guys had been over this place so many times over the past few weeks there couldn’t have been an inch of it left unturned. Yet the only thing they’d found so far had been the address of the building downtown that housed EnKor Corporation, the clean energy company, along with some fancy law firm that Murphy’s gut told him had to be a front for something. But what?
Damn it. That was why he needed to talk to Frank Kent so badly. Guy seemed more squirrelly than the ISIS spies he used to interrogate. And Murphy had a feeling that if anyone would’ve seen or heard anything about Aileen’s disappearance, it would be Kent. But EnKor’s CEO had remained as elusive as a frigging unicorn these days. Fuck. If it hadn’t been for Shayma and her meddling the day before, he might’ve finally had his chance to talk to him and—
A knock on the door jarred him back to reality and set his instincts on high alert.
Who the hell could that be? Heath and Daveed both had keys and they’d talked to the doorman downstairs and told him not to let anyone up without notifying them first. On edge, he checked the Glock he kept in the shoulder holster beneath his black leather jacket, then strode over to the door.
One glance through the peephole had his muscles tensing. Not from danger, though.
From pure unadulterated—and unacceptable—lust.
Shayma.
How the fuck had she even known where his sister’s apartment was? The answer came as quickly as the question had. Heath. Shit.
She raised her hand to knock again, but he yanked the door open before she could.
His scowl was meant to intimidate and discourage. “What do you want?”
She just smiled in that irritatingly endearing way of hers and held up a six-pack of his favorite Goose Island Ale. That had to be courtesy of Heath too, the traitor. “I come bearing gifts. And good news.”
Reluctantly, he stepped back to allow her inside, exhaling hard as he checked the hallway then closed the door behind her. “It’s a little early for booze, isn’t it?”
“Save them for later then.” She glanced at him over her shoulder as she bent to put them in Aileen’s fridge. And damn if that fine ass of hers didn’t all but beg him to cup it in his hands and pull her tight against him. Shayma turned fast and caught him staring, then raised a brow like she was challenging him to do something. “So, I talked to my father last night,” she continued, shrugging out of her coat then making herself at home like she planned to stay a
while. “He’s going to call EnKor today and set up a meeting for this afternoon. Heath said you and I are to go in and pretend to be representatives of Al Dar Nasrani’s largest energy producer. I spent enough years listening to my father’s phone calls with his business colleagues that I think I can bluff my way through a conversation with them and—”
“Wait a minute.” He crossed his arms. “If you’re the pretend boss, then what am I?”
“My security, of course.” She smiled up at him. “It’s quite normal in my country for corporate dignitaries to travel with their own security entourage. As you well know, serving in the region for as long as you did. Why? Do you have a problem with working for a woman?”
“No. Not at all. Some of the best bosses I’ve ever had have been women. It’s just—” He sighed and turned away.
“Then you have a problem with me, you mean.” The disappointment in her tone nearly had him rushing to her side to apologize. Instead, he dug in his heels and remained where he was. Getting too close to her now could only spell trouble with a capital T. “Look, I apologized already for running into you the way I did yesterday and I’m so sorry for messing up the plans you had to question that man, but I was truly concerned for his safety at that point. And I didn’t want to see you get arrested for hurting him. You’re having a hard-enough time finding your sister. Being in jail would only make things that much more difficult.”
Damn. When she put it like that, the whole mess almost seemed logical. Almost.
“Why won’t you accept my help?” she asked quietly when he kept silent. “The truth.”
A strange intimacy settled over the place as he stood in his sister’s quiet apartment. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d talked to anyone about his past. There were some things best kept locked away. They were too painful. Yet, for some reason he didn’t want to think about too much, Shayma made him want to open up to her and tell her all his secrets. He slumped down into the arm chair across from where she sat on the sofa and rested his forearms atop his spread knees. Murphy stared at the floor as he spoke, fearing direct eye contact with her might break the spell. “My sister and I grew up in a household where asking for help was discouraged. You learned to depend on no one but yourself from early on. And you think I’m bad? Aileen’s five years younger than me and twice as stubborn. Little thing too, yet she thinks she can take on the whole world. I remember the day she called to tell me she’d scored the job here in New York. Nearly broke my eardrums screaming her excitement into the phone.” His grin fell and his eyes burned. He squeezed them shut. He wouldn’t cry. He never cried. Hadn’t shed a tear since he’d been six years old and his mother had walked out on their family forever. Hell if he’d start now, no matter how badly he missed Aileen.
