The Mind Thief

by Vicki Hinze

  Darcy began transmitting the contents of the book, pulling the numerical sequences from memory. She included when to start new lines and new pages. Those specifics could be imperative to accuracy in the decoding process. Between potholes and ruts, the ride was rough, but with Ben doing the driving and Santana puttering along fat, dumb and happy, she could forget worrying about him being suspicious. There was only one road into town, so them following was a given. And that left her free to focus entirely on relaying the code.

  Ben gave her numerous curious looks, but he didn’t interrupt once. He just drove the Jeep down the winding dirt road, choking on Santana’s dust.

  In Devil’s Pass, Santana pulled into a hole-in-the-wall hotel with a pink neon sign out front. Traveler’s Inn. The parking lot was pretty full, so Ben looped around the two-story white stucco building, turned off the Jeep’s lights and then drove out and parked on the far end.

  With a perfect view of the entrance, Darcy finished her report to Maggie. “I’ll transmit the photos as soon as I can.”

  “Great,” Maggie said. She paused, clearly hesitant, then added, “You are doing okay, right?”

  “I’m fine.” At least she thought she was. She looked over at Ben, hiked a shoulder, checking with him.

  He nodded.

  “Yes, I’m fine.” She ended the call and dropped the phone into her purse. “Great view of the entrance,” she told Ben. “I can see why General Shaw wanted you in the S.A.S.S. Do covert tactics come naturally to you, or were you trained?”

  He didn’t answer. “Santana’s got company.”

  Darcy swung her gaze to the porch in front of the entrance. Two men in dark clothes approached Santana. She grabbed her camera and snapped off shots of each of them. Red shirts. Interesting. The trio talked briefly, then the two men walked back toward the hotel entrance.

  “Do you recognize them?” she asked Ben.

  “No, I don’t.” Worry edged his voice. “Who do we follow?”

  Santana was walking back to his car. “Santana.” The two men likely were hotel guests; easy to pick up on later.

  But Santana didn’t leave. He grabbed a suitcase and walked back to the entrance, then into the hotel.

  A feeling Darcy often had gotten on missions awakened inside her. A feeling that all the puzzle pieces had gathered in one place and she didn’t have enough eyes to watch them all. She hated to call in overt backup without first verifying specifics—but this mission was too important. Later, she’d prove she could handle her job. Now, too many lives were at stake. Her ego would just have to take the hit.

  Again, Maggie answered the phone at Home Base.

  Darcy quickly explained the situation and Colonel Drake got on the line.

  “Darcy?”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I’m up to speed on this. I have Kate requesting overt resources to tag Santana and his friends. Get those photos to us ASAP, and as soon as backup is on-site, you concentrate on Wexler. Nothing’s going to cross that border without him being there to let it in.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” She stared at yet another Independence Festival poster taped to the hotel’s front wall. They were plastered all over town.

  “It’ll be a couple hours. FBI,” Colonel Drake said, tagging the type of overt backup that would be arriving.

  “No problem.”

  The colonel’s tone shifted, turned less strident. “Darcy?”

  “Yes?”

  “You—you are all right? I mean, all pretense aside.”

  Though her teeth ached from clamping her jaw tight, she held back a snapped response. They were justified in their concern. Still, if they were that worried, she shouldn’t be here. “Yes, Colonel. I’m fine.”

  “Of course.” Her sigh of relief blew static in Darcy’s ear.

  Less appreciative of their concern and more irritated by it, Darcy glared out the window. “Colonel, do you doubt I can handle this mission?”

  Silence.

  “Do you?”

  “I don’t doubt you can, Darcy. I’m concerned that you doubt you can.”

  “Well, put your mind at ease. I don’t doubt it anymore. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Darcy hung up without a goodbye. Then what she’d done hit her and she nearly stroked. “God, I’ve lost my mind.”

  Ben’s eyes stretched wide. “That’s an overstatement, right?”

  “Not by much.” She glanced over and answered honestly. “I just yelled at and hung up on my commanding officer.”

  Ben grunted. “Almost like the old days, huh?”

  Shock bolted through Darcy and the truth hit her. “Well, yeah. I guess it was.” And why knowing that made her feel infinitely better, she had no idea. In the old days, Colonel Drake had threatened to fire her for insubordination at least once a week.

  She looked back at Ben.

  “It feels good to be treated normal.” He winked.

  Darcy grunted. It did.

  Chapter Five

  Two hours later, two backup male FBI officers arrived. Colonel Drake officially passed the torch of monitoring Santana and his two cohorts to them, and then turned Darcy and Ben loose.

  Ben drove by Wexler’s house on Palafox Street. His red truck sat parked in the drive. “Looks like he made it home,” Ben said.

  “Yep. Pull up by that clump of trees.” She pointed and when he had, she added, “This is good.”

  Weary to the bone, Darcy got out. She made her way over to the truck then pressed a hand flat against its hood. It was cold, and all the lights were off in the house. He was down for the night. Just in case, she attached a magnetic tracking device under his rear bumper and activated it to Home Base. If the truck moved, they’d notify her. Done, she slid back into the passenger seat in Ben’s Jeep.

  His hand on the gearshift, he asked, “Where to?”

  “Home.” She needed sleep. More than needed it, she craved it.

  Ben stopped at the deserted intersection, then turned right and made his way to Dove Cove. It was a short but pleasantly quiet ride. Not another person was out and about, save an old man sitting on his front porch drinking a tall glass of something light colored like lemonade.

  Soon Ben turned onto a single street and, at its far end, Darcy saw it was a cul-de-sac that afforded a lot of privacy. He pulled into his driveway, and then cut the engine. It ticked loudly in the silence.

  “The guesthouse is back there,” he said, pointing beyond the end of the drive and the back of his two-story home.

  The white clapboard looked inviting, and the house had a yawning front porch. One heavy rocker sat near the front door. Since his divorce, a loner like me.

  “Come on. I’ll walk you back and show you around.”

  “What about my Jeep?” Darcy climbed out of his.

  “You can ride to work with me.”

  “But my things are in it.”

  “Didn’t think of that.” He looked abashed. “I’ll get you settled and then run over and get them. That’ll give you a little more downtime.”

  Thoughtful. “Thanks.” Truthfully, she needed the downtime too much to object. While she wasn’t suffering her normal post-hyperstimulation symptoms after the light attack at Mick’s bar, she was weary to the bone and needed respite. The attacks were a lot like allergic reactions. Once you had one, it didn’t take as much to trigger the next one. To avoid that, she needed to be careful in this critical time.

  The cottage was white like the house with sun-yellow trim. Pink roses grew on a lattice trellis outside the door. Inside, the cottage was calm and comforting in soft creams with splashes of blues and greens. “Very pretty.”

  “Thanks,” Ben said. He stood in the small living room attached to the kitchen and pointed out the amenities. “Bed and bath are down the hall. Basics like coffee and tea are in the pantry. Fridge is nearly empty, but there are canned goods and juices. Make yourself at home.” He backed out the door. “I should be back in about an hour.”

  A
n hour. “Wait.” She’d forgotten it was so far from Devil’s Pass to Los Casas. “If you can spare a T-shirt, I can make do until morning without my things.”

  “Sure. There’s a couple in the bedroom dresser. Feel free to use anything else around, too.”

  “Thanks, Ben.”

  He stood there a long moment, just looking at her, as if he felt torn between staying and going.

  Odd to feel much less admit, but she wanted him to stay. Heat rushed up her neck to her face.

  “Will you be all right here?” He licked at his lips, leaned against the open door. “You seem to be feeling okay. Are you?”

  After the incident at the bar, she couldn’t object to his asking. Again, his worry was just. It was kind of everyone, but she sure was getting weary of all the concern. It made her feel even less able than she already felt. “I’m fine, Ben.” He was worried, not attracted. “Just a little tired. I’m going to transmit the photos to Home Base and then sleep awhile.”

  “Do you need a computer?”

  “No. I have a satellite-based transmitter.” She pulled it from her bag. “It’s much more secure than a computer or phone line—at least until Thomas Kunz gets his creepy hands on the technology. Then he’ll have GRID sell it to anyone who wants to destroy us.”

  “It’s sick to live with so much hate.”

  “The things he does? It’s even sicker than you imagine, Ben. Trust me on that.” She set up the transmitter, connected the camera, and transmitted the photos.

  “Maggie said you’re really wired after an attack. But you don’t seem wired.”

  “I always have been, but tonight I’m not,” she confessed. He’d never before been around to talk her down. Odd. A man she’d known such a short period of time had so quickly come to mean so much. “You’ve changed things for me.”

  “Me?” He walked back to her. “How? Am I doing something wrong?”

  “Not at all.” She looked up at him, touched a finger to his jaw. “I’m not sure how you’ve done it, to be honest. I guess, by being you.”

  “So it’s not a bad thing.”

  “It’s a very good thing.” She let him see it in her eyes.

  His own reflected that he was pleased by that. “It’s personal, isn’t it, Darcy?” He cupped her chin in his hands. “For you and me.”

  The unsteady crackle in his voice proved he had mixed emotions about that. Well, so did she, so they were in good company. “Yeah, it’s personal,” she said, then lifted her gaze from his chest to his eyes. “At least, it is for me....”

  “For me, too,” he said straight out. “I don’t like it, and I doubt you do, either. But it’s there. It’s been there since I first heard your voice—outside Regret, when you cleared me through the gate.”

  “Wow,” she said, a little breathless, a little stunned and starry. “Since then? Really?”

  He nodded.

  She watched his mouth, his lips, the softening of the look in his eye. He was going to kiss her. It had been over five years since she’d been kissed, and excited and fearful of what her reaction would be, she welcomed and shunned it.

  He didn’t move. Just held her face in his big hands and looked into her eyes. Intent shone in his own, intent and uncertainty. He was worried about her reaction, afraid he’d do something to send her over the edge. Would it be okay? She had no idea. She could lose it. Could be wired for sound for three days. Could suffer all the horrible symptoms she’d suffered on other attacks that had knocked her to her knees.

  Or maybe it wasn’t her reaction but his own that worried him. He’d made no secret of it that he’d avoided women since being burned so badly with Diane. In his own way, he was every bit as fearful of entanglements as she.

  A full minute passed. Then another. And still another. Darcy inwardly cringed. One of them had to take the leap. Could she? Well, if one was going to be taken, she supposed she’d have to do it. He’d be afraid of sending her reeling. Should she?

  She definitely should not. Not with everything else going on. Yet he looked so... She slid her hands at his waist. And he felt so... She inhaled deeply. And he smelled so...

  Oh, forget it. No guts, no glory. She pressed her lips to his. Her senses wide open, she captured every minute detail, took in every nuance, got lost in sensations born in attraction and tempered into more like steel by fire. Deliberately firm, he gentled the kiss to tender and hinted at passion, though cautious and controlled. But the kiss demanded more, deepened, and caution disappeared, control surrendered questing to be swept into an assault on the senses that washed over in battering waves. Heat swelled and spread through her chest and a tingling seeped into cell and pore, awakening her from a long, lonely sleep.

  Swimming in sensation, she wound her arms around him, splayed her fingertips on his broad back; felt his fingertips glide dancingly down her spine from nape to waist. He tugged her closer and his body heat bombarded her. She let out a little gasp.

  He eased his mouth from hers, his breath rough and uneven. “Darcy, is the sensory input too much for you?” He looked worried and a little baffled. “I didn’t mean to let things get so intense. I’m not sure how it—it just...happened.”

  The transmitter beeped, signaling it had finished forwarding the photos of Santana’s cohorts to Home Base. It returned photos of the FBI agents so Darcy would recognize them.

  Ben jerked, startled. He pulled back to better look at her, and grimaced. Slowly, hesitantly, he released her and stepped away. “I think we’re in trouble here.”

  She blew out a hot breath, half-expecting to see steam rolling off them both. “Definitely.”

  He might not like it, but he wanted to touch her; he clasped her hands and the grimace left his face. Despite an obvious attempt to be neutral, hope burned in his eyes. “Do you mind, Darcy?”

  She should. She’d like to. She wished she could. Life was so much simpler without relationship entanglements that always led to complications, and her personal challenges ruined her and her partner to even more of them. After what happened to her friend Merry in the fire—as a direct result of being Darcy’s friend—it was only right that she should mind. Yet truth was truth. “No, I honestly don’t. It’s selfish not to mind—if I had half a brain I’d run like the wind, but I’m not going to run, Ben, and I really don’t mind. So, if there’s running to be done, you’re going to have to do it.” Fully expecting him to do just that, she held her breath.

  He ignored that aspect of what she’d said and focused on another. “Why is it selfish not to mind?”

  She tilted her head back to look up into his eyes. He wasn’t joking. That made her frown. “The fire where I was injured...” She paused, awaiting his nod. When he gave it to her, she went on. “It was my house that burned. My friend, Merry, died in it, Ben.” Darcy’s voice faded and she pushed strength back into it. “She died that night because the terrorists who set the fire thought she was me.”

  Pain flashed across Ben’s face, settled his mouth in a grim line. “I’m sorry, Darcy.”

  “Me, too.” He had no idea just how sorry—no one did.

  “Merry’s death, your injury, the fire—it’s all their fault, not yours.” When Darcy looked up at him, he added, “It’s written all over you that you feel guilty about this.”

  “Of course, I feel responsible—and guilty. It was my house. She was my guest.”

  “You didn’t start the fire.”

  “There’s more to it, Ben.”

  “What more?” He stood still in the center of the living room, waiting.

  This couldn’t go any further, not another step, without saying what needed saying. It wouldn’t be fair or just, much less honest. “You know I spend a lot of time in isolation. I have to do it. Anyone with me would have to, too.” She resisted the urge to walk over and rub their thumbs. Such a little gesture but one that had an amazing impact on calming her. “I don’t think it’s fair to ask that of anyone else—to ask of you. I shouldn’t do it.”

&nbs
p; He grunted and rolled his gaze heavenward. “Darcy, would you quit worrying and think. Where do I spend most of my time?” He ticked off his own response. “Los Casas. Here at home. At Mick’s, at church, rocking on the front porch—and once a year, at the festival. I like isolation. After the constant upheaval and upset with Diane, I needed it.” He looked away, then back at her. “For a while, I needed it. Then I spent a lot of time thinking about my life and what I wanted from it.”

  “Did you find your answers?”

  “I did.” He nodded. “I discovered what I most wanted was one thing, and whatever life I built from then on would have it.”

  “What one thing?”

  “Peace.”

  Her chest went tight, then expanded. “Like me.”

  “I choose to spend a lot of my life isolated,” he said softly. “Living in peace.”

  “You do, don’t you?” Being with her wouldn’t be a major life-altering experience—at least, not on the isolation front. He already lived that way by his own choice. He considered it essential to his peace. Relieved and excited, Darcy smiled. “I’m so happy to hear this.”

  “Yeah.” He lifted a hand. “Come here.”

  Still smiling, Darcy walked into his arms.

  Long hours later, Darcy’s phone rang.

  Sitting beside her on the sofa, Ben reached over and rubbed her arm, wrist to elbow, then lowered his outstretched legs from the coffee table to the floor. “It’s yours.”

  “Aw, I don’t want to move.” She snuggled closer to his side, her legs folded, and placed a hand against his chest. For the first time in a long time, she was totally relaxed and comfortable. She really didn’t want to move.

  He dropped a light kiss to her temple. “Then don’t.”

  Tempted, but that wouldn’t go over well at Home Base. “Have to, but hold my place for me.”