by Cindy Dees
She wrestled back into her clothes, buttoning her shirt hastily. Brian was flushed and his hair suspiciously tussled when the hostess came in—very carefully—to ask if they’d like dessert. Brian said something in Japanese that made the woman fling a hand in front of her mouth and twitter with laughter. The woman bowed herself out of the room, blushing furiously.
“What did you say to that poor woman?” Sophie demanded.
“I told her I’d already had dessert. Peaches and cream.”
Sophie rolled her eyes. “As much as I hate to do this, we need to talk.”
“About?”
“About what comes next.”
“What is there to talk about? We’re in agreement. We’ll go away together in the morning and start over.”
She sighed. “It’s not that simple. We need to consider other alternatives.”
His brows slammed together. “Why? We’ve got a perfectly workable solution.”
“For the short term, maybe. But I’m worried about the long term.”
“How so?”
She really didn’t want to debate the possibilities of the future with him. If he even wanted a future with her. She trusted her gut, and it said Brian would come to hate her if she let him throw away everything for her now.
Ignoring his question, she said, “Freddie has obviously done something to up the stakes. Enough that Major Hollister thinks my death is a worthy trade to stop Freddie’s latest plan. Right?”
Brian frowned. “That makes sense, yes.”
She continued, “I’m supposed to mark Freddie so the Medusas can kill him. Is there another way I can do that? Can I stand off with high-powered binoculars and point him out to the Medusa’s sniper?”
“You couldn’t pick him out of a stack of photos. What makes you think you’d recognize him at long distance? Besides, he won’t show himself now that he knows you’re working with us.”
“Good point.”
“What if I go to the Sollem compound when Freddie’s not there? I can just visit Grandma Sollem and wheedle a picture of Freddie out of her.”
“Pictures of him likely don’t exist. He’s not dumb enough to leave any photo sitting around, not even with his grandmother.”
Sophie frowned. “There’s got to be another way.”
“Why are you suddenly so determined to go through with this? Are you already having second thoughts about us?” Brian demanded.
“Not at all. That’s exactly the point. I want a shot at a future with you. But I don’t want it under a cloud. I want us to be together free and clear with no restrictions.”
“You can’t always have your cake and eat it, too.”
“No, but we can try. Help me out, here, Brian. You’re the experienced field operative. How can I get close to Freddie and still get away from him alive?”
“Don’t you think I’ve racked my brains over this? There isn’t a way. As soon as he sees you, he’ll kill you. It’s that simple.”
Sophie closed her eyes for a moment. Gathered her strength. And then said, “Then I guess I’m just going to have to die.”
He huffed in frustration. “What do I have to do to talk you out of this?”
“There’s nothing you can do. Don’t you see? I’m doing this for you.”
“Right. You’re going to throw yourself in front of a bullet to prove how much you care for me. Explain how that makes any sense at all,” he snapped.
Sophie sighed. “Let’s just go to Canada. Continue with whatever training I have left. If we try hard enough, we can cook up some way for me to do the mission and live.”
“And if we can’t?”
She shrugged. “Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it. How many times have you told me before? Stay in the moment. Let’s take this thing one step at a time.”
In San Diego, Hollister’s phone rang. An unfamiliar male voice said, “Agent Maloney here, sir. FBI, Los Angeles.”
Hollister sat up straight in his chair. “What have you got?”
“I acquired your subjects in a sushi house. They’re in a private dining room in the back of the joint. They’re arguing.”
Hollister snorted. “I bet. Do you have a parabolic microphone? What are they arguing about?”
The field agent laughed. “No parabolic. I do, however, have a highly effective, one each, high-tech water glass applied to the wall.”
Hollister grinned.
Agent Maloney continued. “The man wants to leave and the woman is insisting on going through with the mission.”
Hollister lurched in surprise. “The woman’s insisting?”
“Correct.”
“Have they discussed their specific plans?”
“If the woman gets her way—and it sounds like she will—she wants to go to Canada and continue her training. The male subject is not happy about it, however.”
“Son of a gun.”
“What are your instructions for me, sir?”
Hollister thought fast. “Don’t reveal yourself to them. Tail them for now. At all costs, don’t let them get on an airplane at LAX. They’re scheduled to drive to San Francisco, check into a hotel for a few hours’ rest, then board a flight for Calgary in the morning. As long as they do that, let them continue. Any deviation, however, and I need you to take them into custody. The woman must not be harmed. She’s an emphatically non-expendable asset.”
“Understood.”
“Pull in whatever resources you need. Sky’s the limit. Have anyone with any questions contact me directly. And my office is paying the tab.”
The FBI agent chuckled quietly. “I have a blank check out of your checkbook, eh? This could be fun.”
“Don’t mess this one up, Maloney. It’s a matter of national security.”
Chapter 13
Brian surveyed the breathtaking view from the top of the mountain, a study in black and white, snow and stone.
“I can’t do this,” Sophie quavered.
Outstanding. That was exactly the point. If she couldn’t conquer her fear in a situation where no one was trying to kill her, she certainly had no business proceeding with the Sollem mission.
He replied briskly, “Fear is no more than a primitive part of your brain triggering chemical and physiological reactions in response to a perceived threat. So, there are two ways to attack fear. One is to control your thoughts and perceptions. To talk yourself out of being afraid of whatever initial impulse leads you to fear. The other way to combat fear is to learn to control your bodily reactions. Fear causes an adrenaline dump that, in turn, causes the heart and breathing to accelerate, preparatory to fleeing or fighting. You can calm both reactions by using self-relaxation techniques.”
Sophie stared uncomprehendingly at him, as if one more glance down the mountain was going to send her screaming into his arms. He’d intentionally picked the steepest, iciest, scariest downhill run this part of Canada had to offer for today’s exercise. If he seriously wanted to help her overcome her fear, he’d have started her on a bunny hill and worked her up gradually to a monster like this mountain, desensitizing her along the way. But that wasn’t the point. The idea was to scare her away from the mission entirely.
“Do I have to learn to overcome fear this way? Couldn’t you make me hold a rattlesnake or something?”
He shrugged. “This is your most powerful phobia. If you can overcome this fear, you can overcome any fear.” A pang hit him at how frightened she was. This was a mean stunt. Meaner given how truly afraid he knew she was. It was a downright cruel thing to do to someone he loved. But it was the only way to save her from herself, dammit! He hardened his resolve for the hundredth time. He had to go through with this. He hated to hurt Sophie, but what other choice had she left him?
“Are you ready to go?” he asked.
“No!”
“We can’t stand up here all day. Time’s a wasting.”
She took a deep breath. Squeezed her eyes closed. “You’re sure my knee will hold up to this?”
“Your knee is irrelevant. It’s encased in titanium. The doctor said the brace would hold up to anything you could throw at it.”
“You have a lot of confidence in my brace.”
“It’s not some off-the-shelf number you’d throw on a casual athlete. That brace was designed to withstand the rigors of life as a Navy SEAL. It’s a high-tech marvel.”
“You’re not going to let me off the hook, are you?”
“Nope. You’re going down that hill or you’re going home.”
She sighed and mumbled more to herself than him, “I’ve learned to shoot a gun. I can drive a car a hundred miles per hour. I know how to rappel down the side of a building. I’m in the best shape of my life. I can ski down some damned hill.”
If he weren’t praying so desperately for her to chicken out, he’d be amused at her pep talk. He turned the screw a little more. “The ski-patrol guys said this run is wicked icy in the middle. Watch the big turns when you really build up speed.”
She stared doubtfully down what looked like a cliff.
He continued implacably. “They said top speed on this course can reach ninety miles per hour.”
She murmured absently, “Velocity is related to body weight. Women lose about ten miles per hour on men because they weigh less and lack the strength to let the skis run flat out.”
“Eighty miles per hour is still booking,” he commented.
“Yeah, it is,” she mumbled, frozen as still as an ice statue.
“Look. We don’t have to do this. We can jump back in a gondola and get out of here.”
“No,” she said slowly. “I want to do this. I’ve carried this fear around inside me for too long. It’s time to kill the beast once and for all.”
Damn, damn, damn! He asked casually, “How long has it been since you skied? Fifteen years? Beware of your brain sending remembered commands your body can’t deliver on. You haven’t necessarily developed any skiing muscles in the course of all the stuff you’ve been doing the past couple of months.”
“Good point.”
“I’ll follow you. You set the pace.”
She nodded. She hadn’t bothered to ask if he was a competent skier. He probably ought to be complimented by her assumption that he was professional caliber at this sport. Truth be told, this mountain was intimidating even to him.
He planted a pole in the snow and leaned against it, ostensibly settling in to wait for a while.
Sophie closed her eyes and began swaying back and forth gently, leaning left and right in a rhythm only she could feel. After a solid minute of this strange behavior, she opened her eyes.
“You okay?” Brian asked, concerned. Had he pushed her over the edge up here?
“Yeah. I was chair-skiing the course.”
“Chair-skiing?”
“Yes. I was visualizing the course and planning my track, anticipating tricky spots, and skiing down the mountain in my head.”
“How do you know this course?”
“I looked at the map in the gondola on the ride up the mountain.”
He frowned. He recalled her spending a couple moments looking at the resort map…and she’d memorized the entire course in that short a time?
She nodded resolutely. “Okay. I’m ready.”
No! She couldn’t go down that mountain! But how could he stop her? If she found the strength to do this, how was he supposed to stop her from going ahead with the Sollem mission? “Don’t do it,” he blurted.
“I beg your pardon?” She looked up at him sharply.
“If you conquer this, what’s to stop you from going to Bhoukar?”
Enlightenment dawned in her dark gaze. “Ahh. That’s why you’ve been so grouchy today.”
“I’m not grouchy.”
She smiled widely at him. “Sure you are.”
“I am not.”
She sidestepped until their arms touched through layers of nylon. “Brian, I’m not going anywhere on you. I’m right here.”
He burst out angrily, “For how long? Another week? Two? And then you’ll head into Sollem’s compound and it’ll all be over.”
Her eyes clouded over. “Thank you for your anger,” she said quietly.
“What?”
“It’s your way of showing how much you care.”
His fury evaporated in an instant. She was right. It was actually fear he felt. Here he was lecturing her, all superior, about controlling fear, when his was galloping away with him, wildly out of control.
“Don’t do this, Sophie. You don’t have to prove to me how brave you are.”
She smiled gently at him. “I’m not doing this for you. This one’s for me.”
That’s what he was afraid of. The decision was out of his hands, and he didn’t deal well with not being in control.
“C’mon,” she said. “I won’t take a racing track. I’ll cut back and forth across the mountain face and keep the speed down.”
He closed his eyes. He’d lost. She was going to take on the mountain, and then she was going to take on Freddie Sollem. And she hadn’t the slightest idea how completely unprepared she was for that challenge. If this mountain was an anthill, Freddie Sollem was Mount Everest.
But he knew what she was up against. All too well.
If only he had more time to teach her. A few more weeks. Hell, a few more years. There was so much information she needed…and they were out of time. Panic tightened in a band of steel across his chest.
Okay, buddy. Apply your own lecture to yourself. He counted his breaths, forcibly slowing down the count while he released the tension in all his major muscles. And all he accomplished was making himself lightheaded and faintly sick to his stomach—and still scared spitless.
And then Sophie plunged off the precipice. One second she was standing beside him, and the next she was a dark streak swooping across the face of the mountain. Swearing, he pushed off and went after her.
The trip down the mountain was nothing short of a nightmare. The downhill run was absurd. No human being was meant to fly down this atrocity. It fell away at a crazy angle, cut back on itself at the most awkward possible moments, and it went on for an eternity. At one point, he was sideways to the hill, which was so steep, he could reach out and touch the slope by his ear. And he started to slide downward, his skis skidding sideways across the ice. He gathered speed, going faster and faster, and there wasn’t a damned thing he could do about it. Sophie, experienced skier that she was, had shot across the patch of ice and executed a neat switchback turn in the soft snow to the side of the run. She actually laughed at him as he slid past her helplessly.
But eventually, the torture came to an end. Somewhere in the last half of the course, Sophie began to smile, and by the time they reached the bottom, her exultant laughter was drifting back to him. She even assumed a credible racer’s tuck and picked up speed at the end, flying toward the finish area. He followed more leisurely, allowing her the moment before he arrived and rained on her parade.
He skied up to her and she lifted her goggles, revealing a radiant expression. Pride in her accomplishment surged through him. No matter what the consequences, she’d done something very few people ever even tried. She’d faced her fear and won.
“Wanna go again?” she panted.
“Hell no!” he replied fervently.
“Chicken,” she teased.
“I like to think of it as enlightened self-preservation.”
“Right. You’re chicken.”
“Damn straight.” She laughed up at him, and he couldn’t help but smile. “How about we try some other trail not guaranteed to break my neck?”
“Let’s go.”
He followed her eager form toward the line of skiers waiting to board the gondolas. Stay in the moment. Cram as many memories into today as possible. For tomorrow would come soon enough, and with it a pale rider called Death.
“What do you mean, you missed?”
The man cringed, his skin crawling with terror. He’
d have preferred the Leader to scream and yell. But this sibilant hiss was almost more than he could stand.
“You failed me.”
“I will not give up, my Leader. I will continue without resting or stopping until I succeed.”
“You won’t get another shot at her. The U.S. government will wrap her in so much security you’ll never even get near her or her family.”
“I have contacts. People who owe me favors. I can find her.”
“Shut up, you fool.”
The man’s jaw snapped shut.
“Where are you now?”
Sensing the ship sinking around him, he looked out of the phone booth at the hazy Los Angeles skyline and bailed out on the spot. “I’m back in Utah, my Leader. I thought to return to her home and pick up some sort of lead as to where she is now.”
“Stay put. I’ll send someone to help you. Time is of the essence.”
“As you wish.”
No way was he sticking his neck into the noose and kicking the chair out from under his own feet. He would gladly martyr himself for God, but letting the Leader kill him as a failure would condemn him to the vaguest margins of Paradise. No thank you. He knew enough to organize his own attack on the infidel horde. He didn’t need the Leader and he was not yet ready to die. Not until he could go out in a blaze of glory.
He hung up the phone and stepped out of the phone booth. He dropped the cell phone into a trash bin and walked away quickly.
Sophie had to give Major Hollister credit. He hadn’t skimped on getting a nice room for them. This suite, a condo really, was nearly as large as the beach house back in San Diego. It could easily sleep another half-dozen people, and the view of the mountains was spectacular.
She lounged in the hot tub on their private balcony, letting the steaming water soothe away the day’s fatigue. Brian was right about one thing. She’d found muscles today that she hadn’t used in fifteen years. But it felt good. Really good.