Match Play

by Merline Lovelace

  “You gave us all one heck of a scare, girlfriend!”

  “I gave myself one, too. But the docs say I’m good to go.”

  “Hawk told me.”

  Jilly’s blue eyes raked Dayna from head to toe, as if to verify her condition for herself. Whatever she saw drew her inky black brows into a V.

  “You’ve got some kind of a rash on your neck. Did you show the doctors? It might be a reaction to whatever those bastards put in your champagne.”

  Dayna took a quick look in the mirror over the console table in the entryway and saw that the cowl of her silky turtleneck had slipped down enough to expose the skin reddened by Luke’s whiskers. Shooting him an accusing glare, she tugged up her collar and turned back to Jilly.

  “It’s not a rash. Just an itchy patch.”

  When her friend looked unconvinced, Dayna distracted her with introductions. “This is Captain Luke Harper. Luke, meet Gillian Ridgeway. She’s currently on sabbatical from the State Department and filling in at the agency Hawk and I work for.”

  Jilly didn’t appear overly impressed by Luke’s rugged good looks or friendly smile. Probably because Dayna had let down her guard after a couple of glasses of wine one evening and described how a certain jerk of a pilot had bruised both her heart and her ego.

  Gillian shook his hand with a hurt-my-friend-again-and-you-die look in her eyes. Then her expression suddenly altered. Sniffing delicately, she glanced from Luke to Dayna and back again.

  “That’s a very distinctive after-shave, Captain Harper. What is it? Garden rose? Magnolia?”

  “Gardenia.”

  “Interesting,” Jilly murmured, with a speculative glance at her friend.

  The exchange baffled Hawk, which didn’t particularly improve his mood. He and Jilly must have duked it out royally at the airport. Dayna couldn’t wait to get a private report from one or both of them.

  “Did you talk to hotel security?” he wanted to know.

  “We did.”

  All business now, Dayna related the sequences she and Luke had viewed on the security videos. She relayed, as well, the grim news that the waiter who delivered the champagne to her room had gone missing.

  “No one’s seen or heard from him since he finished his shift last night.”

  “Has anyone contacted the police?”

  “Woodhouse said he was going to talk to the mother again and ring the police if she didn’t. The guy has been missing less than twenty-four hours, though. They probably won’t launch a formal investigation.”

  “They will once I brief our counterparts in British Intelligence. MI-6 needs to know about this and the possible source of the orchid extract.”

  Possible being the operative word. They still had no hard and fast proof the Koreans had supplied the substance or injected it into the champagne. The circumstantial evidence was starting to stack up, however.

  “If it came from sumo-mama’s bag of tricks,” Dayna said grimly, “I’ll get a sample. The question we haven’t addressed yet, though, is why the Koreans would try to sideline me.”

  She’d been thinking about that. A lot.

  “Kim Li’s watchdogs have seen us talking. I don’t think she was wired but I could have been wrong. If they heard talk of defection, they may have decided to make a preemptive strike.”

  “That’s one possibility,” Hawk agreed. “We also have to consider the odds Kim Li knew her conversations with you were being monitored. She and her father could be setting us up to take a fall and make the U.S. look bad in the process.”

  “There’s another consideration,” Luke put in. “Dayna burned up the links in the initial rounds. The media were all over her when she came off the course yesterday morning. Could be Tigress Wu decided to pull a Tanya Harding and eliminate her competition.”

  The same thought had occurred to Dayna. She knew she wasn’t any real threat to Wu, but she’d competed in too many national and international events to minimize the desperation or greed or twisted hopes that drove some athletes. And Wu Kim Li hated to share the spotlight as much or more than she hated to lose.

  “Until we know for sure she or her father had a hand in the attack, we have to operate on the assumption they still want to defect.”

  Hawk nodded. “So we don’t let any of the Koreans, including Kim Li and her father, know we suspect them. Speaking of Dr. Wu…” He raked a hand through his hair. “I planned to bend an elbow with him in the bar again this afternoon, but you’ll need back-up at the news conference and afterward.”

  “I’ll cover her back,” Luke stated flatly.

  The two men locked stares.

  “You know how to arm and fire anything smaller than a ten-thousand-pound bomb, Harper?”

  “I can put a bullet where it needs to go. I’ll have to swing by my flat and pick up my service pistol…unless you have a weapon here I can use.”

  Hawk hiked one leg of his jeans and loosened the Velcro on an ankle holster. “Take this. I’ll carry my Sig.”

  He watched with a professional’s keen eye as Luke angled away, slid the snub-nosed .38 from its holster, opened the cylinder and checked the rounds.

  “Remington Gold Sabers.” Luke snapped the cylinder back into place. “They’ll do. What about you?” he asked Dayna. “Are you armed?”

  “I am.” She patted the fancy designer fanny pack that went everywhere with her. “A Kahr PM40 micro-compact double action.”

  The realization she’d been armed the entire time they’d spent together put a kink in Luke’s gut. He’d accepted the fact that she and Callahan worked for some super-spook agency he’d never heard of. He’d almost accepted the danger that obviously came with her job. The knowledge someone had spiked her champagne with a potentially lethal substance fueled a cold, deadly fury in his heart.

  “I’ll help, too,” the black-haired looker who’d just joined their group asserted. “I didn’t have time to work a permit to carry a weapon through airport security, but if either of you has another spare I…”

  “No way!”

  Callahan’s flat negative cut her off in midsentence. Unruffled, she met his glare head-on.

  “You of all people know I can handle a weapon, Hawk. Or don’t you have any faith in your instructional skills?”

  “We agreed, Gillian. At the airport. With Rogue back in the game, you’re here strictly as an observer. You don’t leave my sight while you’re in St. Andrews. Or Rogue’s,” he amended through clenched jaws. “And I’m sure as hell not answering to your father if I let you carry concealed without a permit, here or anywhere else.”

  “Fine. Then I’ll simply provide Rogue and Captain Harper with another set of eyes and ears. What time is this media event, anyway?”

  “Four this afternoon.” Dayna checked her watch and swore under her breath. “That gives me less than a half hour to bring you up to speed on my contacts with Wu Kim Li. Or has Hawk already done that?”

  “He’s filled me in on the basics. You and I can talk as we walk.”

  Slinging her purse strap over her shoulder, Jilly accompanied Dayna to the elevators just across the hall. They left the door open for Luke. While he bent to strap the borrowed .38 to his ankle, Callahan muttered a less than complimentary remark about long-legged, hard-headed females with more brains and beauty than common sense.

  Luke jerked his chin up. “Are you saying she’s a loose cannon?” he asked sharply. “If so, we don’t need her adding to the mix.”

  “Too bad you couldn’t convince Rogue of that,” Callahan shot back. “You must have had plenty of opportunity for chitchat, seeing as the two of you waltzed in here wearing the same perfume.”

  “It’s bubble bath, not perfume, and this isn’t about Dayna and me.” Dragging the hem of his jeans over the holster, Luke rose and hooked a thumb in the direction of the two women. “It’s about that blue-eyed bombshell out there in the hall. Is she or is she not a liability?”

  “Our boss doesn’t think so,” the agent ground out. �
�Neither does Rogue.”

  “But you do.”

  “Yes. No. Hell, I don’t know.” Huffing out a frustrated breath, he shoved a hand through his hair again. “I’ve known Gillian Ridgeway since her high school days. As she indicated, I was the one who taught her to shoot. She’s smart, she’s quick and she has sound instincts on the firing range.”

  She also had Callahan torqued so tight a hydraulic power wrench wouldn’t loosen his screws. Luke could sympathize with the man.

  “Guess we’ll both have to learn to live with long-legged, hard-headed females.”

  “Live with?” The other man’s glance whipped back to Luke. “You planning to make this temporary arrangement with Rogue permanent?”

  “I’m thinking about it.”

  “Does she know that?”

  “Not yet.”

  For the first time since he’d opened the door, Callahan’s mouth relaxed into something approaching a smile.

  “Good luck breaking the news. I’ve worked several ops with Rogue. She doesn’t take kindly to being surprised.”

  “You handle your woman, I’ll handle mine.”

  Callahan’s near-smile disappeared. “Gillian isn’t my woman. She’s engaged to an Ivy-League type.”

  “I didn’t see a ring.”

  “It’s not official yet, and even if it wasn’t…”

  He bit back whatever he was going to say, leaving Luke with several unanswered questions.

  Not least of which was how the hell he was going to break the news to Dayna that he didn’t intend to let her walk away from him again. He’d figure that out later. Right now his number-one priority was keeping her alive.

  Out in the hall, Gillian was putting her friend through a similar inquisition. “What’s happening with you and the studly Captain Harper?”

  “It’s…complicated.”

  “Not that complicated, or you two wouldn’t smell like identical spring gardens.”

  Hoping to escape, Dayna stabbed the elevator button. Jilly refused to be deterred.

  “C’mon, girl, give! Last time Harper’s name came up in conversation between us, you said something about roasting his chestnuts over a slow fire. When and how did he get a reprieve?”

  “He hasn’t. Not completely.”

  “Sure smells like it to me.”

  Trapped, Dayna threw a look over her shoulder at the two men. “We were playing to the cameras. Pretending a reunion to divert attention from the contacts Hawk and I made with the Wus. We got a little carried away with our roles, that’s all.”

  Jilly heaved a long-suffering sigh. “Do I look stupid?”

  “Okay! All right! What’s between us is as much pleasure as it is business, and that’s all you’re going to get out of me.”

  “Until later,” her friend predicted.

  Luke joined them then, putting an end to that conversation and kicking off another as the doors pinged open on an empty elevator cage.

  “If you don’t want to tip off the Koreans that we suspect them, what do we say caused your attack?”

  “We’ll leave it at cause unknown. Could have been anything. Overexertion, a twenty-four-hour virus, an allergic reaction…”

  “Too many bubble baths,” Jilly offered with an innocent air.

  Dayna ignored her. “And we probably shouldn’t label it an attack. More like an episode. I got a little short of breath and we drove to the hospital to have it checked out.”

  “Don’t forget the ambulance crew,” Luke reminded her. “The reporters will have ferreted out the fact that they responded.”

  “Then they’ll also know the EMTs didn’t provide any medical assistance. I was back to normal—almost—when the crew arrived.”

  They had the details hammered out by the time the doors open again. The lobby was as crowded as usual. Dayna responded to the questions and concerns of a half-dozen golfers, sportscasters and tournament officials before escaping. Once out on the cobblestone street, she was stopped several times by well-wishers and fans requesting autographs. It was close to four when she, Jilly and Luke approached the Royal and Ancient Clubhouse, standing in majestic splendor just off the eighteenth green of the Old Course.

  Dayna remembered the thrill that had raced through her when she’d first spied the stone pillars and chimneys just a few days ago. The prospect of playing the oldest course in the world had ranked a close second to whisking one of North Korea’s top nuclear scientists out from under his watchdogs’ noses.

  The thrill was still there, but tempered by the grim realization that whisking Dr. Wu and his daughter anywhere might prove even tougher than anticipated.

  She didn’t appreciate how much tougher until the last few minutes of her news conference.

  The media center was packed. Seated at a small table, Dayna baked under the intensity of the klieg lights while she responded to the barrage of questions that ranged from general to highly personal and intrusive. Nothing was sacred, from her EKG results to what she wore for the treadmill test to where she and Luke had spent last night.

  He stayed off to the side, making no comment when the cameras swung toward him, and left it to Dayna to supply the answer.

  “We stayed at a hunting lodge north of Dundee. It’s isolated enough that not even you guys tracked us down.”

  “How did you find the lodge?”

  “It belongs to an RAF officer Captain Harper works with.”

  She made a show of checking her watch. An hour under the lights was enough.

  “Sorry, guys, I need to wrap this up.”

  “A moment, Ms. Duncan,” a female with a heavy local accent called from the back of the room. “Let’s talk aboot these RAF officers Captain Harper works with.”

  Dayna tried to peer through the lights, but all she could see was a figure with a thickened waist and square shoulders.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t make out your nametag. Who are you?”

  “Eileen Brodie.”

  The woman shouldered her way to the front. In her tweeds and stout walking shoes, she looked like the stereotypical English or Scottish matron out for a pleasant afternoon stroll. The determined set to her several chins said otherwise.

  “What media outlet are you with, Ms. Brodie?”

  “I report for the Uplands Daily.”

  “I’m not familiar with that paper? Is it local?”

  “Aye. We feed to the Guardians’ Gazette.”

  The stir that went through the TV crews and correspondents raised a red flag. Luke’s sudden stiffening also signaled that Ms. Brodie and the Guardians’ Gazette represented trouble. Dayna switched instantly to damage-control mode.

  “I’m afraid I’ve overextended my time here at the media center, Ms. Brodie.” Smiling, she shoved back her chair and rose. “If you have a question for me, perhaps we could talk later at the hotel.”

  “My question’s not fer you, Ms. Duncan.” She zeroed in on Luke. “Is it true yer a bomber pilot, Captain Harper?”

  His training, weapons specialty and previous assignments were a matter of record, so he made no attempt to deny any of them. Instead, he treated the woman to a cocky grin intended to defuse the situation.

  “I am, and one of the best, I might add, although your Tornado pilots have been teaching me some pretty slick maneuvers during my exchange tour at RAF Leuchars.”

  Moving to Dayna’s side, he grasped her elbow. “We’d better hustle, Pud. You’re due at that cocktail party.”

  “You’re right. Thanks, folks.” With a smile and a wave, she made for the exit. “I’ll see you out on the course tomorrow.”

  Ms. Brodie didn’t give up easily. Pushing past the cameras and lights, she came after them. “Do ye fly a weapon of mass destruction, Captain Harper? Do ye deny there are B-2 bombers at Leuchars?”

  Luke dodged the questions with practiced ease. “Come out to the Leuchars’ air show next month. We’ll have all kinds of aircraft on display.”

  “The B-2, Captain Harper? Will ye be showin�
�� us the B-2? Och, now!” Scowling, Brodie glared at the woman who cut in front of her.

  “I’m so sorry.” Oozing penitence and charm, Gillian planted herself squarely in the older woman’s way.

  “Have a care, missie.”

  The older woman tried to wedge past the younger. Gillian didn’t budge.

  “I just want Ms. Duncan’s autograph. Well, darn,” she pouted when the exit door swished shut. “There she goes. I guess I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to get it.”

  Chapter 12

  Jilly caught up with Dayna and Luke outside the media center. Her glossy black hair tossing wildly in the wind, she hooked an inquiring brow.

  “What was that all about?”

  Luke explained during the short walk to the hotel. “The Guardians are a group of rabid antiwar protestors. They’ve designated themselves as unofficial weapons inspectors and have made it their personal goal to uncover and eliminate all so-called weapons of mass destruction in the U.K.”

  “Judging by our Ms. Brodie, they sound like a pretty determined group.”

  “They are. They staged a protest and sit-in at RAF Fairford. That led to a joint U.S.–U.K. decision to base our B-2s here at RAF Leuchars instead.”

  “The B-2 is that weird, wing-shaped bomber, right?”

  “Right. Weird and wing-shaped, with a sortie-reliability rate of just over ninety percent.”

  “What does that mean in plain English?”

  “In plain English, two B-2s armed with precision weaponry can do the job of seventy-five conventional aircraft.”

  “Hence the objections of the antiwar protestors.”

  “Exactly. Luckily, the local cadre is small and not as well organized. So far, we’ve managed to fly under their radar.”

  “Thanks for running interference back there.”

  Dayna’s comment won a breezy smile from her friend. “Glad I could help. Despite Hawk’s low opinion of both my intelligence and capabilities, I don’t plan to be a nuisance or get in the way.”