by Gayle Wilson
Nate laughed, the sound abrupt, lacking any hint of amusement. The blade didn’t waver. Although he was holding the knife properly—blade up, handle down—there was something about his stance that spoke of desperation rather than intimidation.
“Just like before, I guess.”
“Kid, I don’t know what happened to you, or who did what, but I didn’t come here looking for you. I’ve never had any contact with you before yesterday.”
For the first time, doubt touched the determination in the boy’s face. A doubt he quickly denied. His features hardened again.
“You’re a liar. You’ve been at me since you got here.”
“Because I thought you might know something about what’s going on up here.”
“Like what?” The confusion seemed genuine.
“The blood samples for one. The people who drift in and out.”
“Why do you care about any of that?”
Michael weighed how much he could say. He needed to win the boy’s trust, if for no other reason than to keep him from sticking a knife in his back the next time he decided Michael should be the target of his paranoid fantasy.
Paranoid. Maybe the kid was crazy. After all, it wasn’t exactly normal to react to a few unwanted questions by pulling a knife.
As much as he’d like to know what Nate Beaumont had observed in the months he’d lived here, when you were working undercover you had to pick your snitches as carefully as your allies. He wasn’t sure the boy could ever become either.
Neither could he be allowed to continue to pose a threat. The kid looked like some wild animal, cornered and defending itself because that’s all it had ever known. Fighting for survival. And the only way you ever tamed a wild animal…
Broken-down has-been or not, if he couldn’t put some fear—if not some respect—in those hostile baby-blues, he needed to call Colleen and tell her to get one of her hotshots up here to check this place out. And it would be a cold day in Hell before he’d be willing to do that.
“Look,” he said persuasively, taking the critical step forward.
The boy lost his chance when he didn’t use the knife as soon as Michael moved. By the time Nate realized what was happening, Michael had already grasped the wrist of his right hand, the one with the blade. He jerked it upward, having more success than he’d expected because the boy was clearly surprised by the move.
At the same time Michael gritted his teeth, dreading the agony he knew would result, and put all his weight on his damaged leg. He used the sound one to sweep the boy’s feet out from under him.
They fell together, Michael on top. He held onto the boy’s wrist, which was now stretched above his head, in order to control the knife.
For a moment he could do nothing but lie there speechless, stunned by the bolt of lightning that had seared through his knee as they’d gone down. It didn’t matter. The breath had gone out of Nate’s lungs in a satisfying whoosh, leaving him openmouthed and gasping on the ground, Michael’s body spread on top of his.
The kid was nowhere near as solidly built as those layers of clothing seemed to indicate. Now, his body pressed closely along the entire length of Michael’s, Nate seemed much thinner. More fragile. More—
Sensations bombarded Michael’s brain in rapid-fire sequence as the pain in his knee faded to a level that would allow him to think. The last thought that registered on his consciousness was immediately rejected as impossible.
And then, all those small, telltale anomalies he hadn’t been able to put together fell into place in one fell swoop. His fingers still gripping the wrist of the hand that held the knife, Michael pushed himself away from the torso of the slender body beneath him to look down into dark blue eyes and the too-delicate features that surrounded them.
“What the hell—?” he breathed.
Although the woman who lay beneath him, firmly pinned to the ground by his weight, was no longer fighting to pull air into her lungs, she didn’t bother to answer. She continued to look up into his eyes, her own filled with fear and despair.
Then, even as he watched, too shocked by his discovery to think of anything else to say, they slowly began to glaze with tears.
Chapter Six
Damn it. Damn him, Nicki raged inwardly as she struggled not to cry.
With what appeared to be very little effort, the man who called himself McAdams had thrown her to the ground, at the same time totally negating the threat of the knife. She had been armed and he hadn’t, and he had still gotten the best of her.
All these months, she had thought about what she would do if she were again confronted by her attacker. She had foolishly imagined she was prepared for that eventuality. Determined and desperate enough to kill in order to protect herself.
McAdams, however, had moved so quickly that she’d had no time to react. His fingers had fastened around her wrist, and she’d been flat on her back almost before she’d realized what he’d done.
Yet she had been prepared for something like that to happen from the time he’d dismounted. Prepared, but obviously not ready, she admitted bitterly. And now he was going to kill her, just as he had tried to do before.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
She turned her head to the side, closing her eyes. Refusing to look into his. It was over. She had failed, and she knew she was about to pay the price for that failure.
She wasn’t going to watch while he did it. And she certainly wasn’t going to respond to his questions.
“Answer me, damn it. Since you obviously aren’t Nate Beaumont, who the hell are you?”
It was only with the second repetition of the question that she recognized its significance. If he didn’t know who she was, then he hadn’t tracked her here. He couldn’t be the man who had attacked her in Washington. A man whose arrival she had been dreading since she’d chosen this—of all places—to hide.
Almost unwillingly, she turned her head so that they were again face-to-face, the weight of his body heavy on hers. To see her face, he had lifted his torso so that the hard wall of his chest no longer crushed her breasts. Along the rest of their length, they were still pressed together intimately. As if they were lovers.
Bizarrely, she found that intimacy neither terrified nor repelled her, maybe because of the insight she’d just had. Whatever the reason, she was no longer afraid of the man who pinned her to the ground. Although she was very much aware of him. No longer as an enemy, but as a man.
Something of what she was thinking must have been reflected in her eyes. Looking into them, his began to change, their dark pupils expanding outward into the rim of color.
That wasn’t the only change she was aware of. Despite the fact that they were adversaries, despite the dangerous scenario that had put them into this position, through the thin fabric of the jeans he wore she felt the first stirrings of his erection.
“Answer me,” he demanded again, choosing to ignore what was happening to his body. “I asked who you are.”
Nicki closed her lips, swallowing against a new fear. Maybe this wasn’t the man who had tried to kill her, but if the senator learned she was here, she opened herself up to the possibility that that man would find her. Or that Gettys would send someone else. Mutely, she shook her head.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” McAdams said. His voice had softened persuasively. “I might even be able to help.”
For someone who had been alone so long, there was an undeniable emotional pull to that promise, even if she couldn’t afford to believe it. She had made it this far by keeping her mouth shut. Besides, why would someone be willing to accept any part of the risks she faced by helping her?
“How?”
She listened to her own question with a sense of disbelief. She hadn’t intended to answer. She had intended to stay silent, no matter what he said. Somehow, the thought of having assistance, even from a stranger, had been too tempting not to respond to.
Her heart seemed to stop, every fiber of her being waiting
for his answer. It took him so long to give it that the fragile hope his offer had engendered began to die.
“I have friends in high places.”
She’d been warned by the self-mocking tone even before she saw the small, upward lift at the corners of his mouth. A very attractive mouth.
She couldn’t remember the last time someone had smiled at her. That ridiculous burn of tears stung at the back of her eyes again.
“They better be in some pretty damned high ones,” she said, relieved there was no hint in her voice of the ongoing urge to cry.
It took him maybe a second to figure that out. “Whoever you’re afraid of is influential as well.”
After another moment of internal debate over the wisdom of telling him even that much, she nodded. She was finding it very difficult to trust him with her secret. To let someone else into this world of deception she had constructed to hide in. Once she did, she knew there could be no turning back.
“Drop the knife, and I’ll let you up,” he offered as she tried to think.
Instead, her fingers tightened over its handle reflexively. To let go of the knife required yet another dimension of trust. Another step out of the shadows, and she still hadn’t decided why she’d made the first.
Maybe because she’d reached the end of her own resources. She’d been here for months, and she was no closer to knowing what had set off that attempt on her life back in D.C. than when she’d arrived.
She still believed that this isolated ranch held the key to why someone wanted her dead. She just hadn’t yet found the answer that she’d hoped would set her free. By now she had begun to fear she never would.
McAdams was interested in whatever was going on here. His questions, although discreet, had made that obvious to her from the first. Was it possible that someone else, perhaps those friends he’d mentioned, was also interested in Gettys and the Half Spur? If so, this man might represent the only chance she’d ever have to get her life back.
She forced her fingers to unfold from around the handle of the knife, an act of will. The hilt lay exposed on her outstretched palm as her eyes held his. He lifted her wrist off the ground and shook it, causing the blade to fall away. She didn’t turn her head to watch, but she heard the small thump as it hit the dirt.
He moved then, releasing her hands and putting his right knee and palm on the ground. He pushed his upper body erect until he was on his knees, straddling her.
Without the warmth of his body over hers, she felt naked. Exposed. More vulnerable somehow than she had been while he’d held her prisoner.
He struggled to his feet. The process was not only awkward, but painful as well, judging by the small grunt of discomfort as he put weight on his left leg. McAdams might be practicing his own deceptions, but whatever was wrong with his knee didn’t seem to be a part of them.
The stumble that had thrown him off balance, causing him to grab her shoulder, had been genuine. And she had reacted to it as if it were the attack she’d been expecting since he’d made his comment about needing a knife.
As soon as he was standing, he leaned forward, holding out his hand. For some reason she was reluctant to take it.
She had been the recipient of numerous offers of hands-up throughout her formative years. She had accepted all of them with a deep sense of gratitude. Including the one from Franklin Gettys.
Her belief that Senator Gettys was involved in the attempt on her life had created a deep-seated mistrust that had become almost impossible to overcome. Maybe accepting McAdams’s help would be the first step in that direction.
She put her fingers into his and allowed him to pull her to her feet. As soon as he had, he bent to pick up the knife. He folded the blade inward and then held it out to her, the gesture mocking her suspicions.
Maybe that was the intent, she thought cynically. He had already demonstrated his ability to disarm her, even when she had thought she was prepared to kill him.
Without a word, she took the knife, sliding it into the pocket of her jeans, which were loose-fitting enough to hide its shape. When she raised her head again, she found he was watching her.
“I’m Michael Wellesley,” he said, sticking out his right hand.
She didn’t take it. Nor did she reciprocate with her own name. She was still struggling with the notion of giving up the information that she had protected so long.
“Are you FBI?” she asked.
“What makes you think the FBI would be interested in the Half Spur?”
She recognized the question as another attempt to find out what she knew without giving anything away himself.
“You said you have friends in high places.”
“Not those places.”
“But you are…” She hesitated, uncertain what she needed to hear him say.
“On the side of the angels?” he responded, his lips tilting again.
She wasn’t sure this time if he was mocking himself or her. She hadn’t been sure of that before, and yet she had trusted him enough to reveal that her enemies were also well placed. How much could she trust him now?
“I think I need more specific information than that.”
But it was a start, she admitted. FBI or not, she really needed him to be one of the good guys.
“Michael Wellesley,” he said again. “Formerly with military intelligence and the CIA.”
The CIA? There was no way she could fit the agency in the framework of any scenario she’d imagined during the past eight months. For one thing, she thought they only worked internationally. Of course, he had qualified the information as “formerly.”
“And currently?”
“For this to work, it’s going to require some mutual sharing of information. I’ve told you my name. I think it’s time for you to reciprocate.”
“How do I know that’s really your name?”
“If you’re looking for identification,” he said, letting his amusement show again, “that would be the last thing I’d have on me during an assignment.”
“Then…you are on assignment?”
“I’m not here voluntarily. The accommodations alone should convince you of that.”
Everything about him screamed something other than a drifter. It had from the first, which was the reason she’d been so wary. And he hadn’t killed her when he had the chance. Not even when she had given him cause by pulling a knife on him.
Besides, the man in D.C. hadn’t been interested in what she knew. All he’d wanted was to cut her throat.
“Nicki Carson,” she said. “Nicola, actually.”
She expected her name to mean something to him. It was obvious that it didn’t.
“That’s a start,” he said. “Keep going.”
“I was an intern for Senator Gettys.”
“Franklin Gettys.”
The inflection hadn’t really been questioning, but she nodded. “I had worked for him for almost a year when…”
She let the explanation trail. She had never resolved her own doubts about what had happened. Now that she was being asked to explain what had sent her into hiding, her suspicions seemed almost too flimsy to share. They were also completely unsubstantiated, despite her attempts to investigate the Half Spur.
“Go on,” Wellesley urged.
She shook her head, the movement slow. Unconscious. “It sounds unbelievable. I know that. I just can’t come up with anything else that would explain what happened.”
“Why don’t you tell me what you think without trying to justify why you think it?”
Accepting his reasoning, she nodded and plunged on. “I think I saw something I wasn’t supposed to see. A tax document that pertained to the senator’s ownership of the Half Spur. He was out in the hallway when the fax came through. I thought it was important, so I took it to him.” She mentally reconstructed the events as she talked, reliving them as she had a hundred times. “I don’t know. Maybe I should have waited. Maybe that’s what upset him, rather than what the fax contained
.”
“And what was that?”
She took a calming breath, trying to frame what she needed to say into a rational argument. It was hard, because she had never been able to convince herself that what she’d seen that day could possibly be important enough to make the senator want her dead. She had finally arrived at this explanation because she couldn’t think of anything else that important either.
“I didn’t read it. Not the whole thing. I realized pretty quickly that it had to do with Senator Gettys and some property. Nothing involving the campaign or politics.”
“And the part you did read?”
“My impression was that it was just a quarterly report on the ranch. Probably for tax purposes, like I said. Nothing incriminating.”
“You’re sure it was this ranch?”
She nodded. “It was named in the document. When I brought it to him, he was…furious. There’s no other word for it. I’d never seen him like that, so it made his reaction more frightening. He grabbed the fax out of my hand and starting yelling at me. I still didn’t understand what I’d done wrong. It was more a personal attack than a correction of office protocol. And he’d never spoken to me like that before.”
She didn’t mention the other thing that made the whole episode even more shocking—the senator’s previous kid-glove treatment of her. When she had first started working for him, his manner had verged on flirtatious, especially for a man who was a relative newlywed. She’d tried to put it down to an old-fashioned idea about how men should treat women—some kind of misplaced gallantry.
Long before the night of his blowup, however, Gettys’s manner had become suggestive enough to make her consider leaving, despite the fact that being an intern for the senator had represented a dream. One of the many that night had shattered.
“And then?”
The hard part. The part that would make her sound paranoid. Like some idiot who would let an attempted mugging send her into a tailspin.