by Linda Howard
The flight took less than an hour and a half. The transport landed with a hard thump that jerked her in the web seat, then taxied for what seemed like an interminable length of time. Finally it rolled to a stop, and Major Hodson stood, plainly relieved to be free of his unpleasant burden.
A door was slid open, and a flight of steps rolled up to it. Clutching the black robe around her, Barrie stepped out into the bright Athens sunlight. It was full morning now, the heat already building. She blinked and lifted a hand to shield her eyes. It felt like forever since she’d been in the sunshine.
A gray limousine with darkly tinted windows was waiting on the tarmac. The door was shoved open, and her father bounded out, dignity forgotten as he ran forward. “Barrie!” Two days of worry and fear lined his face, but there was an almost desperate relief in his expression as he hurried up the steps to fold her in his arms.
She started crying again, or maybe she had never stopped. She buried her face against his suit, clutching him with desperate hands. “I’ve got to go back,” she sobbed, the words barely intelligible.
He tightened his arms around her. “There, there, baby,” he breathed. “You’re safe now, and I won’t let anything else happen to you, I swear. I’ll take you home—”
Wildly she shook her head, trying to pull away from him. “No,” she choked out. “I’ve got to get back to the Montgomery. Zane—he was shot. He might die. Oh, God, I’ve got to go back now!”
“Everything will be all right,” he crooned, hustling her down the steps with an arm locked around her shoulders. “I have a doctor waiting—”
“I don’t need a doctor!” she said fiercely, jerking away from him. She’d never done that before, and his face went blank with shock. She shoved her hair out of her face. The tangled mass hadn’t been combed in two days, and it was matted with sweat and sea spray. “Listen to me! The man who rescued me was shot. He might die. He was still in surgery when Major Hodson forced me on board this plane. I want to go back to the ship. I want to make sure Zane is okay.”
William Lovejoy firmly took hold of his daughter’s shoulders again, leading her across the tarmac to the waiting limo. “You don’t have to go back to the ship, sweetheart,” he said soothingly. “I’ll ask Admiral Lindley to find out how his man is doing. He is one of the SEAL team, I presume?”
Numbly she nodded.
“There wouldn’t be any point ingoing back to the ship, I’m sure you can see that. If he survived surgery, he’ll be airlifted to a military hospital.”
If he survived surgery. The words were like a knife, hot and slicing, going through her. She balled her hands into fists, every cell in her body screaming for her to ignore logic, ignore the attempts to soothe her. She needed to get to Zane.
Three days later, she stood in her father’s office with her chin high and her eyes colder than he’d ever seen them. “You told Admiral Lindley to block my requests,” she accused.
The ambassador sighed. He removed his reading glasses and carefully placed them on the inlaid walnut desk. “Barrie, you know I’ve denied you very little that you’ve asked for, but you’re being unreasonable about this man. You know that he’s recovering, and that’s all you need to know. What point would there be in rushing to his bedside? Some tabloid might find out about it, and then your ordeal would be plastered in sleazy newspapers all over the world. Is that what you want?”
“My ordeal?” she echoed. “My ordeal? What about his? He nearly died! That’s assuming Admiral Lindley told me the truth, and he really is still alive!”
“Of course he is. I only asked Joshua to block any inquiries you made about his location.” He unfolded his tall form from the chair and came around to lean against the desk and take her resistant hands in his. “Barrie, give yourself time to get over the trauma. I know you’ve invested this…this guerrilla fighter with all sorts of heroic characteristics, and that’s only normal. After a while, when you’ve regained your perspective, you’ll be glad you didn’t embarrass yourself by chasing after him.”
It was almost impossible to contain the volcanic fury rising in her. Nobody was listening; no one wanted to listen. They kept going on and on about her ordeal, how she would heal in time, until she wanted to pull her hair out. She had insisted over and over that she hadn’t been raped, but she had fiercely refused to be examined by a doctor, which of course had only fueled speculation that the kidnappers had indeed raped her. But she’d known her body bore the marks of Zane’s lovemaking, marks and traces that were precious and private, for no one else’s eyes. Everyone was treating her as if she was made of crystal, carefully not mentioning the kidnapping, until she thought she would go mad.
She wanted to see Zane. That was all. Just see him, assure herself that he would be all right. But when she’d asked one of the Marine officers stationed at the embassy to make some inquiries about Zane, it was Admiral Lindley who had gotten back to her instead of the captain.
The dignified, distinguished admiral had come to the ambassador’s private quarters less than an hour before. Barrie hadn’t yet returned to her minor job in the embassy, feeling that she couldn’t keep her mind on paperwork, so she had received the admiral in the beautifully appointed parlor.
After polite conversation about her health and the weather, the admiral came to the point of his visit. “You’ve been making some inquiries about Zane Mackenzie,” he said kindly. “I’ve kept abreast of his condition, and I can tell you now with complete confidence that he’ll fully recover. The ship’s surgeon was able to stop the bleeding, and it wasn’t necessary to remove his spleen. His condition was stabilized, and he was transferred to a hospital. When he’s able, he’ll be sent Stateside for the remainder of his convalescence.”
“Where is he?” Barrie had demanded, her eyes burning. She’d scarcely slept in three days. Though she was once more impeccably clothed and coifed, the strain she’d been under had left huge dark circles under her eyes, and she was losing weight fast, because her nerves wouldn’t let her eat.
Admiral Lindley sighed. “William asked me to keep that information from you, Barrie, and I have to say, I think he’s right. I’ve known Zane a long time. He’s an extraordinary warrior. But SEALs are a breed apart, and the characteristics that make them such great warriors don’t, as a whole, make them model citizens. They’re trained weapons, to put it bluntly. They don’t keep high profiles, and most information about them is restricted.”
“I don’t want to know about his training,” she said, her voice strained. “I don’t want to know about his missions. I just want to see him.”
The admiral shook his head. “I’m sorry.”
Nothing she said budged him. He refused to give her even one more iota of information. Still, Zane was alive; he would be all right. Just knowing that made her feel weak inside, as the unbearable tension finally relaxed.
That didn’t mean she would forgive her father for interfering.
“I love him,” she now said deliberately. “You have no right to keep me from seeing him.”
“Love?” Her father gave her a pitying look. “Barrie, what you feel isn’t love, it’s hero-worship. It will fade, I promise you.”
“Do you think I haven’t considered that?” she fired back. “I’m not a teenager with a crush on a rock star. Yes, I met him under dangerous, stressful circumstances. Yes, he saved my life—and he nearly died doing it. I know what infatuation is, and I know what love is, but even if I didn’t, the decision isn’t yours to make.”
“You’ve always been reasonable,” he argued. “At least concede that your judgment may not be at its sharpest right now. What if you acted impulsively, married this man—I’m sure he’d jump at the chance—and then realized that you really didn’t love him? Think what a mess it would be. I know it sounds snobbish, but he isn’t our kind. He’s a sailor, and a trained killer. You’ve dined with kings and danced with princes. What could the two of you have in common?”
“First, that doesn’t just so
und snobbish, it is snobbish. Second, you must not think much of me as a person if you consider your money my only attraction.”
“You know that isn’t what I meant,” he said, genuinely shocked. “You’re a wonderful person. But how could someone like that appreciate the life you live? How do you know he wouldn’t have his eye on the main chance?”
“Because I know him,” she declared. “I know him in a way I never would have if I’d met him at an embassy party. According to you, a SEAL couldn’t be kind and considerate, but he was. They all were, for that matter. Dad, I’ve told you over and over that I wasn’t raped. I know you don’t believe me, and I know you’ve suffered, worrying about me. But I swear to you—I swear—that I wasn’t. They were planning to, the next day, but they were waiting for someone. So, though I was terrified and upset, I haven’t been through the trauma of a gang rape the way you keep thinking. Seeing Zane lying in a pool of blood was a hell of a lot more traumatic than anything those kidnappers did!”
“Barrie!” It was the first time her father had ever heard her curse. Come to think of it, she had never cursed at all, until rough men had grabbed her off the street and subjected her to hours of terror. She had cursed them, and meant it. She had cursed Major Hodson, and meant that, too.
With an effort, she regulated her tone. “You know that the first attempt to get me out didn’t quite work.”
He gave an abrupt nod. He’d suffered agonies, thinking their only hope of rescuing her had failed and imagining what she must be suffering. That was when he’d given up hope of ever seeing her alive again. Admiral Lindley hadn’t been as pessimistic; the SEALs hadn’t checked in, and though there were reports of gunfire in Benghazi, if a team of SEALs had been killed or captured, the Libyan government would have trumpeted it all over the world. That meant they were still there, still working to free her. Until they heard from the team that the rescue had failed, there was still hope.
“Well, it did work, in a way. Zane came in alone to get me, while the rest of the team was a diversion, I guess, in case things went wrong. He had a backup plan, what to do if they were spotted, because you can’t control the human factor.” She realized she was repeating things Zane had said to her during those long hours when they had lain drowsily together, and she missed him so much that pain knotted her insides. “The team was so well-hidden that one of the guards didn’t see Spooky until he actually stepped on him. That’s what gave the alarm and started the shooting. A guard had been posted in the corridor outside the room where they had me tied up, and he ran in. Zane killed him,” she said simply. “Then, while the others were chasing the team, he got me out of the building. We were separated from the team and had to hide for a day, but I was safe.”
The ambassador listened gravely, soaking up these details of how she had been returned to him. They hadn’t talked before, not about the actual rescue. She had been too distraught about Zane, almost violent in her despair. Now that she knew he was alive, even though she was still so angry she could barely contain it, she was able to tell her father how she had been returned to him alive.
“While I stayed in our hiding place, Zane risked his life by going out and stealing food and water for us, as well as the robe and chador for me. He took care of the cut on my foot. When scavengers were practically dismantling the place around us, he kept himself between me and any danger. That’s the man I fell in love with, that’s the man you say isn’t ‘our kind.’ He may not be yours, but he’s definitely mine!”
The expression in her father’s eyes was stunned, almost panicked. Too late, Barrie saw that she had chosen the wrong tack in her argument. If she had presented her concern for Zane as merely for someone who had done so much for her, if she had insisted that it was only right she thank him in person, her father could have been convinced. He was very big on preserving the niceties, on behaving properly. Instead, she had convinced him that she truly loved Zane Mackenzie, and too late she saw how much he had feared exactly that. He didn’t want to lose her, and now Zane presented a far bigger threat than before.
“Barrie, I…” He fumbled to a stop, her urbane, sophisticated father who was never at a loss for words. He swallowed hard. It was true that he’d seldom denied her anything, and those times he had refused had been because he thought the activity she planned or the object she wanted—once it had been a motorcycle—wasn’t safe. Keeping her safe was his obsession, that and holding tightly to his only remaining family, his beloved child, who so closely resembled the wife he’d lost.
She saw it in his eyes as his instinct to pamper her with anything she desired warred with the knowledge that this time, if he did, he would probably lose her from his life. He didn’t want occasional visits from her; they had both endured that kind of separation during her school years. He wanted her there, in his everyday life. She knew part of his obsession was selfish, because she made domestic matters very easy for him, but she had never doubted his love for her.
Pure panic flashed in his expression. He said stiffly, “I still think you need to give yourself time for your emotions to calm. And surely you realize that the conditions you describe are what that man is used to. How could he ever fit into your life?”
“That’s a moot question, since marriage or even a relationship was never discussed. I want to see him. I don’t want him to think that I didn’t care enough even to check on his condition.”
“If any sort of relationship was never discussed, why would he expect you to visit him? It was a mission for him, nothing more.”
Barrie’s shoulders were military straight, her jaw set, her green eyes dark with emotion. “It was more,” she said flatly, and that was as much of what had happened between her and Zane as she was willing to discuss. She took a deep breath and pulled out the heavy artillery. “You owe it to me,” she said, her gaze locked with his. “I haven’t asked any details about what happened here, but I’m an intelligent, logical person—”
“Of course you are,” he interrupted, “but I don’t see—”
“Was there a ransom demanded?” She cut across his interruption.
He was a trained diplomat; he seldom lost control of his expression. But now, startled, the look he gave her was blank with puzzlement. “A ransom?” he echoed.
A new despair knotted itself in her stomach, etched itself in her face. “Yes, ransom,” she said softly. “There wasn’t one, was there? Because money wasn’t what he wanted. He wants something from you, doesn’t he? Information. He’s either trying to force you to give it to him, or you’re already in it up to your eyebrows and you’ve had a falling out with him. Which is it?”
Again his training failed him; for a split second his face revealed panicked guilt and consternation before his expression smoothed into diplomatic blandness. “What a ridiculous charge,” he said calmly.
She stood there, sick with knowledge. If the kidnapper had been using her as a weapon to force her father into betraying his country, the ambassador most likely would have denied it, because he wouldn’t want her to be worried, but that wasn’t what she’d read in his face. It was guilt.
She didn’t bother responding to his denial. “You owe me,” she repeated. “You owe Zane.”
He flinched at the condemnation in her eyes. “I don’t see it that way at all.”
“You’re the reason I was kidnapped.”
“You know there are things I can’t tell you,” he said, releasing her hands and walking around the desk to resume his seat, symbolically leaving the role of father and entering that of ambassador. “But your supposition is wrong, and, of course, an indication of how off-balance you still are.”
She started to ask if Art Sandefer would think her supposition was so wrong, but she couldn’t bring herself to threaten her father. Feeling sick, she wondered if that made her a traitor, too. She loved her country; living in Europe as much as she had, she had seen and appreciated the dramatic differences between the United States and every other country on earth. Though she liked
Europe and had a fondness for French wine, German architecture, English orderliness, Spanish music and Italy in general, whenever she set foot in the States she was struck by the energy, the richness of life where even people who were considered poor lived well compared to everywhere else. The United States wasn’t perfect, far from it, but it had something special, and she loved it.
By her silence, she could be betraying it.
By staying here, she remained in danger. Kidnapping her had failed once, but that didn’t mean he, the unknown, faceless enemy, wouldn’t try again. Her father knew who he was, she was certain of it. Immediately she saw how it would be. She would be confined to the embassy grounds, or allowed out only with an armed escort. She would be a prisoner of her father’s fear.
There was really no place she would be entirely safe, but remaining here only made the danger more acute. And once she was away from the enclave of the embassy, she would have a better chance of locating Zane, because Admiral Lindley’s influence couldn’t cover every nook and cranny of the globe. The farther away from Athens she was, the thinner that influence would be.
She faced her father, knowing that she was deliberately breaking the close ties that had bound them together for the past fifteen years. “I’m going home,” she said calmly. “To Virginia.”
Two weeks later, Zane sat on the front porch of his parents’ house, perched on top of Mackenzie’s Mountain, just outside Ruth, Wyoming. The view was breathtaking, an endless vista of majestic mountains and green valleys. Everything here was as familiar to him as his own hands. Saddles, boots, some cattle but mostly horses. Books in every room of the sprawling house, cats prowling through the barns and stables, his mother’s sweet, bossy coddling, his father’s concern and understanding.