She wanted to believe him, but he didn’t add up. He’d spent the entire flight trying to learn her travel plans, then pumped her for information about her research at dinner, only to dump her in her hotel room with nary a good-night kiss after seeming to want nothing more than a tryst with her. Now, slightly more than a half hour after he’d claimed to be exhausted and jet-lagged, he was here, just in time to save her.
She squelched a gut-level needy response to his worried gaze and glared at him. “Go away.”
The compelling concern disappeared as his eyes flattened. “Um, why not try ‘thank you for saving my ass’?”
She wasn’t taking any of his bullshit. “What are you doing here?”
“I told you, I’m in private security. Some of the VIPs who are coming to Van for the high-level meeting will be arriving by train. I came here to check the security of the facility. Clearly, it sucks.”
“This time of night?”
“Yes.”
“After you gave me the brush-off because you need to sleep.”
He sighed. “I had no plans to come here tonight. I told you the truth. When I got to my hotel room, I received a message from my client expressing security concerns about the inbound train. I decided to check it tonight so that tomorrow night—if I could convince you to have dinner with me again—I wouldn’t have to cut our evening short because I need to work.”
His claim that he’d planned to ask her out again caused an annoying girlish flutter. Could she be more pathetic? She wouldn’t even be in Van tomorrow night. “Who’s your client?”
“I’m not at liberty to say.”
“Who’s the guy who just ran after my mugger?”
“Sabal. He works for me.”
“I saw him. Earlier. When I was waiting for Berzan. But I didn’t see you.” The implications of that stole her breath. John had me followed by someone I wouldn’t recognize.
The man on the ground next to her groaned. John kicked him in the head, and the groans stopped.
The violent act was so casual. So chilling. And yet it was directed at the man who’d pulled a knife on her, so she could hardly condemn John for it.
He took her hand and pulled her to her feet, then tugged her toward him as though he might hug her. She resisted.
“I’m not the bad guy, Crista. I called Sabal—he’s one of our local contractors—to meet me here. He arrived first. I walked up just as the train arrived. I saw you, but given how I screwed up tonight, I was afraid to let you know I was here, so I hung back. When I heard the ruckus on the platform and saw you were being mugged, I was shocked and tried to get to you, but couldn’t. I’m sorry I didn’t stop the attack.” He looked down. “If I hadn’t screwed up earlier, this never would’ve happened. We’d be in bed right now. Together.”
Don’t give in.
“I’m sorry. I was stupid and never should have left you like that.” He touched her cheek, tracing downward along the column of her throat, lightly touching her raw skin, which had been abraded by the strap of her purse. His jaw tightened as he studied what she imagined must be an ugly welt across her neck.
His gaze and touch said he cared.
She glanced away, ashamed of the suspicion she’d felt. What was wrong with her? Like there was some vast conspiracy in Van that involved her? Narcissistic much?
John had beaten the crap out of an armed man to save her. It was as simple as that. She glanced at her attacker and shuddered when she again saw the eight-inch knife. She shook her head to clear it. “Thank you. I think you saved my life.”
He placed a finger under her chin and raised her face. She met his gaze. His eyes were clear and earnest and warm. “You’re welcome.” His fingers caressed her cheek. “I do this for a living, you know—assess threats, provide personal security. The first rule—never fight or chase down a mugger.”
She wanted to look down, but his hand prevented it. “I guess that was pretty stupid. But he got my money. My passport.” Panic shot through her as she mentally inventoried her purse. “My phone. Christ, John, what am I going to do?”
He pulled her against him, wrapping her in a warm hug. One hand cradled the back of her head and pressed her to his chest; the other stroked her back. “I can help you.”
“The nearest US Consulate is in Adana. I can’t afford to go all the way to Adana.”
“Where are you headed from here? Back to your underwater dig, or back to the US?”
“Back to the dig in Antalya.”
“With a police report, you should be able to fly back on your return ticket. You can deal with the passport in Antalya.”
“But my research—it will take me close to the border with Syria. There are so many checkpoints…”
“I work security. I know people. I’ll see what I can do.”
His words and the embrace were exactly what she needed, offering strength, courage, and hope. She absorbed what he offered, grateful beyond words for this man’s skill and incredible timing.
Footsteps approached, and he gently released her. Sabal, the man who’d pursued her mugger, stood before them. John spoke to him in Turkish. Sabal responded and shook his head in a sharp negative. She supposed it was too much to hope he’d be able to recover her purse so quickly.
They exchanged more words she couldn’t understand, then Sabal approached her attacker. He lifted the man’s head by the hair and turned his face side to side, as though inspecting him.
With an arm around her shoulder, John led her away from the train. “Wait. Shouldn’t we stay and talk to the police?”
“Sabal will handle it.”
“Don’t I need to make a statement?”
“Sabal will tell them everything. We’ll go to your hotel room, get you cleaned up, then go to the police station.”
She glanced down at her clothes. Her top was filthy and her slacks torn—a big slice ran down her hip. The situation felt surreal. The mugging. The knife. John coming to her rescue. She was freaked out by everything, but the loss of her passport and cash was her first concern. Trina could probably wire money to get her through the next few days, but she hated the fact that she’d have to hit up a friend for financial help.
Trina wasn’t going to believe this story.
Cressida stopped short. “Wait. Sabal is going to talk to the police?” She sounded dense, she knew, but it had taken her that long to put the implications together. A violent mugging could do that to a person, apparently. “He’s going to tell them what happened?”
“Yes.”
She looked down. Damn. Time to fess up. “He needs to know—my name isn’t Crista. It’s Cressida. Cressida Porter.”
John raised a sardonic eyebrow and flashed a teasing smile. “Fake name? I guess I really did come on strong on the flight.”
She grimaced. “All my friends have hounded me about being careful on this trip. It seemed like the right thing at the time, but I regretted the lie at dinner.”
He shrugged. “I understand. Security is my business. But you should know a fake name isn’t much protection, not unless you have fake ID to back it up.” He paused. “Cressida.” His low tone made it sound as if he were tasting the syllables, and the heat in his eyes said he liked the flavor. “Shakespeare? Troilus and Cressida?”
She experienced a slight frisson. The man could speak and read Turkish, and he knew the title of one of Shakespeare’s lesser-known tragicomedies. She was impressed. “I’m actually named for the car—Toyota Cressida—you know, conception story and all that.”
“Is it okay if I make a joke here, or is it a sensitive subject?”
“Have at it.”
“Good thing it wasn’t a Unimog.”
She laughed. “Good one. Usually people say Gremlin.” She leaned into him, shocked to feel so comfortable, when just minutes ago she’d been full of distrust. Even terror.
He glanced around the long spit, which had gradually emptied as people transferred from ferry to train and train to ferry. “You used a fak
e name, and yet you went out alone after sunset?”
“I figured Berzan wouldn’t have said to meet him here if it wasn’t safe.” She glanced around. “Wait. Berzan. He was supposed to be coming in on the ferry.”
John nodded toward the dock. “The ferry has already unloaded.”
But there was no young Kurdish man looking for her. Unease slid through her. “Where is he?”
“Berzan is your translator’s brother?”
“Yes.”
“I hate to say it, but it appears Berzan lured you out here and mugged you.”
His words stunned her to the core. “You think Berzan was my mugger?”
John shrugged. “Or the guy with the knife.”
She came to a dead stop. “I lied to you about my name to stay safe, then made plans to meet with an armed mugger?” But it was worse than that. Hejan. “What does this mean about my translator? He was helping me. I trusted him.” Had he really done the translations she’d paid for? Were the phrases on the digital recorder to be trusted?
Sonofabitch. The digital recorder! It was inside her purse.
Had Hejan set her up? Why would he do such a thing?
Chapter Nine
Ian had fucked up his mission. His one job was to go after the mugger. Stupid, foolish, fatal mistake to have taken on the man with the knife.
Primary objective: Don’t lose the fucking microchip. And he’d failed. Cressida—no matter how sexy or innocent—became expendable the moment the chip left her possession.
He knew that. Better than anyone.
But he’d been blind to the mugger’s escape at the sight of her struggling against an armed assailant. Something in him snapped, and he’d FUBARed the mission.
They walked silently back to the hotel. She battled panic at the loss of her purse, but from his perspective, it was better that she’d lost everything instead of just the microchip. Without her money, phone, and passport, she needed him, and he was ready to be her knight in shining fucking armor. Which was necessary, thanks to his massive lapse in protocol.
He’d stopped to save a woman who could well be complicit, and in so doing had lost a chip a terrorist organization had killed for once already.
Worse, Sabal hadn’t been able to raise Zack on the phone, nor had Ian. He had no clue what they’d find when they got to the hotel. All he knew was he couldn’t let Cressida out of his sight.
What did it mean that Hejan had told her the guide—his brother—was named Berzan? The name was a signal intended for Ian. He needed to know everything she knew about her supposed guide. It was his only hope of picking up the trail to the chip.
He’d already sent Cressida’s cell phone number to Stan. If the mugger still had the phone on him—and if he was a complete fool—they might find him when the phone pinged cell towers. He’d receive a text if they got a lock on “Berzan’s” location.
Ian was good at his job and prided himself on his tradecraft. He’d been based in Ankara for the last two years. Before that, he’d been in Bahrain. During his time in the Middle East, he’d recruited a record number of spies. But if they didn’t get anything from Cressida’s phone, then this was the fuckup of all fuckups and could end his association with the Company. This kind of disaster didn’t just get a covert case officer fired, it could get him killed.
Beside him, Cressida was anxious. Rattled. Scared. He’d ruthlessly broken through her caution and distrust both on the jet and again next to the train. He had to remain ruthless in his dealings with her. He couldn’t let himself be swayed by pretty, innocent eyes. But he had to do it while playing the mild-mannered prick John Baker.
Jesus, he’d wanted to screw her brains out earlier—and not because he was playing her. In his personal rulebook, kissing, even sex for the job were fine, but honest desire, when there was doubt about her loyalty? It bothered him that he even felt it.
He’d screwed up the mission because of that desire. Because of her.
She was an unknown risk, and until he had the microchip, he had to control her. The fact that her tradecraft sucked argued against her being a spy. As it was, the team in Ankara had gathered more intel on her background, which he’d read this afternoon while she napped.
He knew about the blank space on her birth certificate where a father’s name should be. Now he had another piece: Cressida Porter knew the make and model of the car in which she was conceived, but not the name of her biological father.
Dubious paternity was one thing they had in common.
He draped an arm around her shoulders, and she leaned into him. Good. She was already relying on him.
The facts of her life were simple and sad. Her pregnant mother had been tossed out by disapproving parents at the tender age of fifteen. It appeared Cressida had never met her maternal grandparents, who lived in a wealthy, gated community outside Baltimore.
When Cressida was born, the hospital sent the bill for the uninsured labor and delivery to her grandparents, but they refused to pay it. Both mother and child were minors, and when threatened with court and public shaming, the Porters quietly paid the bill, then paid their daughter, Sarah, to move across the country with their granddaughter. Monthly payments halted on Sarah’s eighteenth birthday.
With cold parents like that, it was no wonder Sarah had gotten knocked up at such a young age. But life in California wasn’t much better for baby Cressida. The police visited her home often due to Sarah’s loud, violent fights with her various boyfriends. Cressida received her own bruises, and CPS intervened a few times, culminating in a stint in foster care before she ran back to her mother’s house.
In spite of all this, according to school records, Cressida had been a brilliant student. She graduated near the top of her high school class and received a full scholarship to Berkeley. She turned Cal’s graduate school down in favor of the underwater archaeology program at Florida State.
Nothing in her background added up to someone who’d become disillusioned with her country and joined a terrorist group, but he still had questions.
No doubt Cressida’s childhood had been the stuff of nightmares, but her struggle wasn’t the sort that generated anti-American sentiment. No. Her background was a breeding ground for depression, low self-esteem, and abusive boyfriends of her own.
International terrorism wasn’t on the long list of side effects, let alone the short one.
But he couldn’t ignore the boyfriend with Jordanian ties who’d stolen Lidar equipment and implicated her in the theft. Now, here she was in Eastern Anatolia, hoping to use Lidar to find ancient smuggler tunnels.
As Ian escorted her through the lobby of the old hotel, he slid his hand down her spine, settling on the small of her back. That Lidar theft nagged at him. Had she fooled everyone?
Was Ian simply another dupe to a sexy spy with exceptional acting skills?
* * *
The hotel clerk’s eyes widened when Cressida entered the lobby all torn and dirty. He spoke rapidly to John, who answered in Turkish, explaining, she assumed, her mugging. After a moment, the man produced a new key to her room and slid it across the counter. To John, she said, “Thank you. I don’t know how I would have explained the situation without your help.”
His jaw tightened as he touched her cheek, his thumb lightly tracing what she suspected was a raised welt. She had to look like hell, which matched how she felt. “We’ll just have to make sure you don’t go anywhere without me from here on out,” he said.
The idea of him feeling even slightly protective of her made her pathetic heart beat a little faster. “That’s impossible. I have research, and you have work—”
“I’ll clear it with my boss. You need an escort, and I’m volunteering.”
She didn’t understand him. One moment he could be too nice, too accommodating. Then she’d get a hint of…something… A darker nature, maybe. Or a dangerous vibe. Whatever it was lurked deep, telling her that Mr. Affable wasn’t necessarily the real John. And if she were being honest, she
was more attracted to the man he hid than the one he presented. It appeared she’d inherited her mother’s poor sense of self-preservation.
There was more to it, though. She couldn’t meet his gaze without returning to the moment he’d swooped in and saved her. The knife still loomed large in her mind. She could so easily imagine it finishing the arc and slicing into her.
John had fought with a brutality that in any other circumstance would horrify her. The dangerous vibe wasn’t in her imagination. That was the real man, buried under that amiable demeanor. And he’d unleashed that ferocity to save her.
She was no stranger to violence. She’d witnessed her mother take blows and had received a few herself when she was younger. Never, not once in the darkest times of her childhood, had anyone been there to help her when she needed it. His presence and action had fulfilled a long-buried childish dream of rescue.
Then there had been that moment right after he’d knocked out her assailant, when he’d looked at her with an intense, concerned expression that spoke to her core. He was a stranger, yet he’d looked at her like she was something to be treasured, protected. She’d felt as precious as an ancient, gilded vase inscribed with secrets of the past.
She’d waited her whole life to see that look on a man’s face.
There was something seriously wrong with her if she could flip from terror to lust to distrust in the flash of a second, but it had happened as they stood next to the train, and now here she was, leading him to her hotel room, hoping more than anything that once they were alone, he’d kiss her.
A kiss could make her forget the terror. Forget her lost passport and money. Forget her stupidity. She wanted, more than anything, to forget. Just for a moment.
Todd had ruined her last night in Antalya, and now she’d been mugged in Van. In true Turkish fashion, she wondered if she were cursed. Without thinking, her fingers strayed to the evil eye pendant, which hadn’t protected her. But then again, John had come to her rescue, so maybe it had.
She thought of a way to thank John for his services, proving she was as foolish as her mother, a woman whose sexual history was a textbook of don’ts.
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