Great, he thought. Smooth. Joshua Carter was nothing if not smooth.
“You have the women begging now, Josh?” a man asked, the voice heavily accented, familiar, but one he couldn’t quite place.
Josh turned around, working hard to keep his expression carefully blank, the odd sensation of being rocketed from one place and time to another shooting through his brain. He forced the corners of his mouth to spread wide into an easy smile, all the while his senses were screaming.
“Rudy?” He stuck his hand out. “What a surprise.”
A damned nightmare was more like it.
Rudy Olivara was five-ten, with jet-black hair and a silly little mustache, a wicked gleam in his eyes and an Italian accent that got thicker the closer he came to a beautiful woman. He flitted across the continents from one rich man’s playground to the next. At times in the past he’d actually been useful to Josh, and at other times Josh wondered if Rudy might slit his throat the next time they saw each other. The last time, in particular, Josh had wondered if Rudy knew exactly what Josh was doing.
Josh didn’t want the man anywhere near Amanda.
“Never stop, do you, my friend?” Rudy asked.
“What?”
“The woman.” Rudy grinned wickedly. “Most men are home in bed at this hour. Or, at least, in someone’s bed. You’re out after another one.”
Josh said nothing. He wasn’t discussing Amanda with Rudy.
“Or is this one left over from last night?”
“She’s a friend,” Josh said, glancing toward the back of the shop, where Amanda had disappeared, hoping she wouldn’t come back anytime soon.
Rudy laughed again. “A distracting friend. You didn’t even see me.”
Josh smiled, while inside he was berating himself. Obviously he hadn’t been aware of anything. If he had been thinking at all, he wouldn’t have stopped here.
The place was close to his apartment, and he met people here from time to time. People like Rudy. He never should have brought Amanda here.
“I didn’t know you were in town,” Josh said.
“I just arrived. I haven’t been in the States in a long time. The last few years… They have been difficult.”
“Oh?” Josh said, feigning innocence.
“I ran into some trouble. Right after I saw you in Milan, in fact.” Rudy’s eyes narrowed, and he idly stroked a dangerous-looking scar on his jaw, a scar he hadn’t had the last time Josh saw him. “Coincidence, I’m sure.”
A bald-faced lie, Josh thought. Was Rudy on to him?
“But what does it matter?” Rudy said dismissively. “How was Paris?”
“Crowded,” Josh said noncommittally, swearing inside. Rudy knew he’d been in Paris? Josh shouldn’t be so surprised considering his current mission. Rudy was a middleman, someone who put people like the man Rudy believed Josh to be in touch with people selling certain illegal substances. In this case, the makings of a nuclear weapon. So, Rudy was going to be part of this.
“Ah.” Rudy looked past Josh. “Here comes your most charming companion.”
Josh turned to find Amanda by his side, Rudy looking at her as if she was a seven-course meal he might devour in one big gulp. Biting back a growl, Josh slid an arm around her waist and pulled her to his side, a direct, hands-off sign to Rudy.
Amanda tried to pull away, but Josh held her firmly.
Rudy wouldn’t be dissuaded. “You will not even introduce me?”
“No, I wasn’t going to.”
Rudy laughed and held out his hand to Amanda. “My dear, I’ve never seen him so territorial where a woman is concerned. Good brandy, a fast car, but never a woman.”
Mutely Amanda held out her hand, and Rudy bent at the waist, theatrically bringing her hand to his lips. Josh felt her tremble at the touch and tucked her more tightly against his side. She didn’t object this time.
Rudy’s eyes shone wickedly. “You must be someone very special. And since he is not going to do the honors, allow me. I am Rudy Olivara.”
“Amanda Wainwright,” she told him, ignoring the warning Josh shot her.
“You live here in the capital, Ms. Wainwright?”
“Yes,” she said.
“And you and my friend…?”
“—have to go,” Josh cut in. “Sorry. We’re late.”
“Of course,” Rudy said.
Josh turned to leave. Amanda didn’t, no doubt caught between his rudeness and her own good manners. Finally she said, “It was nice to meet you, Mr. Olivara.”
“It was my pleasure, I assure you, my dear.”
Josh turned, ready to hustle her out the door.
“You know,” Rudy said, “I’ve taken a suite at the Drayton. I’m having a little dinner party next weekend. I’d love to have you both there.”
Josh frowned. “Amanda’s busy, I’m afraid. But I’d be happy to come.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that, my dear. I hope you’ll reconsider. Saturday night. Nine o’clock sharp. I’ll set a place for you, my dear. Just in case.” Rudy turned to Josh. “I meant to ask. Did you happen to find what you were looking for in Paris?”
Josh swore silently, knowing what was coming. He’d known it all along. “No,” he admitted. “I didn’t.”
“I might be able to help you with that.” Rudy grinned. “You know, I like the idea of you being distracted, Josh. Saturday. Nine o’clock. Bring her.”
Josh swore and headed for the door. He dragged Amanda to the car and put her inside it, then took a long, careful look at the surrounding area, cursing himself for being so caught up in her he hadn’t even noticed Rudy Olivara standing right there.
“What happened, Josh?” Amanda was pale, her eyes wide. “You’re frightening me.”
“Not now.” He pulled the Jag onto the street and started zigzagging left and right through the narrow streets of Georgetown. “Buckle your seat belt.”
Her mouth dropped open. “You think he’s coming after us?”
“You should always buckle your seat belt, Amanda.”
“I don’t want a traffic-safety lesson, Josh. I want an answer.”
“I don’t know yet if anyone’s coming after us, but if someone does, I want you buckled in.”
“I can’t believe this,” she said. “You know him? Because of work? Because of those trips you take where things get blown up and people get killed?”
“No one’s getting blown up today,” he promised rashly. “It isn’t Rudy’s style.”
Neither was chasing them down in a car, but Josh didn’t intend to take any more chances. Rudy liked knives, he’d heard. Occasionally a nice, odorless, tasteless poison, something he could easily slip into someone’s dinner.
“Oh, my God,” Amanda said.
“It’s all right,” he claimed. “No one’s following us. That was probably nothing more than a coincidence, seeing him there.”
“You’re worried,” Amanda accused.
“I’m careful.” Normally he was very, very careful. Maybe not with women, but for damned sure with his job. Who would have thought Rudy Olivara would have seen him in Paris? Maybe tailed him here? Josh was concerned that Olivara had seen him with Amanda.
“He’s…what? A contact of yours?”
“Yes,” Josh admitted.
“Does he know what you really do? Who you work for?”
“I hope to hell not,” Josh said. Although running into Rudy here, on Josh’s home turf…
“What was he doing?”
“Fishing would be my bet.” But it was more than that. It was an invitation. More like a dare. Not to dinner, but to play a game. A very dangerous game. Rudy liked games. He’d implied that he could help Josh with that little problem in Paris. But the kicker was Rudy was also suspicious of Josh’s true motives, his true loyalties, after that mess in Milan.
“He scared me. And he saw me with you, Josh. He knows my name.”
“Amanda—”
“You’re worried. I don’t think I’ve
ever seen you worried.”
Then her memories of the days right after her fiancé’s death weren’t very clear, because he’d been plenty worried. About her. “Look,” he said, “whatever happens, I can handle it.”
He often conducted business with a woman by his side, beautiful, smart, dangerous women, women who were nothing like Amanda. Women he seldom worried about, seldom felt guilty over. This…this was totally different.
“Can you tell me about it?” Amanda said.
“I shouldn’t, but…” He would. He needed her to understand how serious this was. “I saw him at a party in Italy a couple of years ago. I was working, trying to buy some uranium.”
“Uranium?”
“A component in nuclear weapons. Rudy thinks my family fortune’s gone. Or maybe it’s just insufficient to meet my needs. I have very expensive tastes, you know? Or maybe he thinks I’m in this for the thrill of it. He thinks I make a little money on the side on the black market. Weapons trading.”
“You?” She said it so innocently, with such astonishment.
Josh smiled gently. “What did you think I did on all those trips abroad, Amanda? Did you think I was there for the champagne and caviar?”
“I don’t know. I guess I didn’t think about it.”
“My father’s a diplomat, and he’s filthy rich. I’ve lived all over the world. I know people—good and bad—all over the world, because of the way I grew up. And this image of me—the rich boy with so few responsibilities, with nothing to do but go from one party to the next? It’s useful. It lets me move from place to place, to see all sorts of people without raising suspicions.”
“You’re telling me it’s all the job? This life you lead? The women, the parties?”
He frowned. “I’m telling you it’s useful to me—useful to the agency—for me to maintain that image.”
“Josh—”
“Never mind,” he said, impatience eating at him. “Believe what you like about me. The important part is that the last time I saw Rudy, he gave me some information. He thought he was helping me buy uranium, and a few months later the uranium was gone. We intercepted it, and I’m worried somebody blamed Rudy… That scar on his face?”
“Yes?”
“He didn’t have it the last time I saw him. I think he blames me for it.”
“But he just asked you to a dinner party.”
Josh nodded. “We’re not a couple of thugs who hang out in dark alleys, Amanda. Rudy generally does business in a suit and tie, over things like dinner at the best hotel in town.”
“Oh,” she said. “So he may just want to…sell you something else?”
“Maybe. Either that or…”
“What? What do you think he wants?”
“Well, if I were in his position…if I thought someone had double-crossed me and nearly gotten me killed in the process?”
“Yes?”
“I’d want to kill him.”
Amanda gasped.
“I just want you to be careful. Promise me that, Amanda. That you’ll be watching, too. Just in case. “Let me know if anything out of the ordinary happens.”
“Like what?”
“If he tries to see you. To talk to you.”
Her jaw dropped. “You think Rudy might come after me?”
“No, I don’t. I just want you to be careful.”
“Okay.” She looked a bit dazed and confused. “What about you?”
“Worried about me? I’m flattered.”
She made a face. “Do you joke about everything?”
“Most things,” he admitted.
“Well, I don’t know how you can joke about this.”
“It’s my job, Amanda,” he said, taking her hand in his, liking the idea immensely that she was worried about him. “I’m just doing my job.”
Chapter 3
Nothing happened. By Monday morning Amanda had forgotten all about how frightened she’d been, and for the first time in months she felt curiously free of that whole mess with Rob.
Her only problem was Josh. She couldn’t quite get her mind off him and how kind he’d been to her. Pushy, arrogantly sure that he knew what was best for her, but in the end basically kind. If she discounted the kisses—the amazingly unsettling one on her forehead and the frothy, almost-kiss at the coffee shop—she’d have said he was a perfect gentleman.
She still hadn’t reconciled the image of Josh the playboy with Josh the agent who acted as an international arms dealer. She knew the agents at Division One had dangerous jobs; she just seldom saw evidence of it. For all the top-secret things that went on at the agency, Amanda’s job was quite ordinary. She was a secretary. She answered the phone, made appointments, ran interference for her boss, kept him organized. Weapons dealers and uranium and people out for revenge were totally out of her league.
But it had been two days since she and Josh had run into Rudy, and nothing had happened. She felt fine.
Monday morning, as she locked the front door behind her, she turned around and nearly tripped over a huge vase of flowers left by her front door.
Startled, she jumped a bit, saw the huge bouquet in an ornate, cut-glass vase rolling back and forth on her porch, the water spilling out. She grabbed the vase, admiring the flowers and sniffing the obviously expensive arrangement. It had been a long time since anyone sent her flowers.
Josh, she thought. He wasn’t done with her.
Irritated and flattered at the same time, Amanda opened the card. Oddly, there was no address or logo identifying the flower shop. Her address wasn’t on the card, either. Just her name, handwritten in a large, flowing script. It wasn’t Josh’s handwriting, either, she realized. It was too legible to be his.
The first flicker of alarm trailed through her. Amanda removed the card, made of heavy, obviously expensive paper and scanned the message:
“Until Saturday. Rudy.”
Amanda gasped, squeezing her eyes shut. Not that. Anything but that.
Rudy Olivara hadn’t forgotten her. He’d gone to the trouble of finding out where she lived. She dropped the flowers, the vase breaking as it hit the steps, the flowers falling in a heap. She left the soggy mess on her porch, staring at it for a minute, stunned. She did remember to take the card with her. She shoved it into her purse and drove in a daze to Division One headquarters, praying she was wrong about this. Praying she had no reason to be afraid.
Dan Reese was in his office, along with his wife, Jamie, who also worked at Division One, and Josh. Amanda stammered about the flowers and handed over the card.
“Josh was just filling us in on what happened.” Dan frowned at Josh. “Tell me who this guy is again?”
“Rudy Olivara.” Josh stood in the corner, leaning carelessly and elegantly against the wall. “He’s Italian. Nasty temper. Not as much money as he’d like everyone to think. Has a distant cousin who’s a count. Used to be on the Grand Prix circuit. I’ve run into him five or six times over the years. He’s been useful at times.”
“Does he know it? How useful he’s been to you?”
“Maybe.” Josh shrugged. “I got something from him on that thing in Milan two years ago.”
“Beirut, too,” Jamie added. She was pregnant now, working strictly inside the office, but she and Josh had spent several years as partners.
“And he knew you’d just gotten back from Paris?” Dan asked.
“Yeah,” Josh said.
“So Rudy saw the two of you at a coffee shop in Georgetown at seven o’clock on a Saturday morning…”
His voice trailing off, Dan looked to Amanda to finish the explanation. She blushed, stammered, no words coming out.
“Having coffee.” Josh jumped in, his tone daring anyone to ask for more of an explanation than that.
Amanda groaned and thought about lies. If anyone was keeping score, would that one count? They had gone in there for coffee, had in fact purchased coffee. Amanda drank hers. But Rudy Olivara had found them in each other’s arms, Josh licking t
he froth off Amanda’s lips. From his reaction, Dan obviously knew there was more to this than either of them admitted, but he let it go at that.
“Do you think Olivara followed you here from Paris?” he asked Josh.
“It’s possible,” Josh conceded.
“Find out. Because, if he did follow you? If he blames you for what happened in Milan? If he knows what you really do—?”
Josh nodded. “This could get messy.”
Messy? Amanda felt faint. She didn’t want to be in any more messes. “So, what are we going to do?”
“You aren’t going to do anything,” Josh said. “You’re done.”
“Wait a minute,” Dan said. “Rudy obviously wants Amanda there. You said he was insistent on that. Why?”
“Because he likes women. And—”
“And?” Jamie prompted, looking as if she was enjoying this.
Josh was fuming by then. “Because Rudy’s decided I can’t think straight when there’s a woman around. I guess he wants every advantage he can get.”
“I can’t imagine why he’d think that,” Jamie quipped.
Josh glared at her. “It’s no problem. I’ll give him what he wants. I’ll take someone else. Who’s in the office right now? Who’s available?”
Amanda sank back into her chair, relieved. Josh could just take someone else. He could lick espresso off someone else’s lips. It meant nothing to her.
She and Josh were done.
She was glad.
“Wait,” Dan said. “This man has Amanda’s full name. He went to the trouble of finding her address, maybe of hand delivering the flowers and the invitation. He wants her at that dinner.”
“I’ll tell him she dumped me,” Josh said. “I’ll tell him I found someone else. Oh, hell, it’ll have been a whole week by then. He knows me. He’ll believe that.”
“But what if Olivara’s interested specifically in Amanda? What if he knows about Rob Jansen. What if he thinks he can use her to get to you? Or all of us?”
“What?” Amanda gasped. Rob? Again? It was a nightmare. One that never seemed to end. “How could Rudy Olivara know about Rob?”
Cinderella and the Spy Page 4
