Strangers When We Meet

by Merline Lovelace

  “I saw it.”

  “He has friends in Moscow, Dodge. FSB friends. They will hurt her. I asked my colonel to take her and keep her safe, but they will find her and hurt her if I speak of what he did.”

  “No, they won’t.”

  “They will!” Her fingers dug deeper. “They have ways. Many ways. I must go home at once. I must protect my daughter.”

  “Lara, listen to me. He won’t hurt your daughter. He has no reason to.”

  “He has every reason!” She tore out of his hold, incredulous at his seeming incomprehension. “He started the fire that took my husband. Last night he tries to kill me.”

  “And until we have Katya safe, we’ll make damn sure he thinks he succeeded.”

  “What do you say?”

  He speared a glance at the still-blazing farmhouse. No media on the scene yet, only police and fire personnel. He’d make sure that when the media did descend, every agency involved in this operation sang from the same sheet of music.

  With a grim smile, he turned back to Lara. “You’re dead, sweetheart. Better get used to it, because you’re going to stay that way for a while.”

  Chapter 12

  “You’re gonna wear a hole in that floor. I don’t mind, you understand. Just don’t want you to trip over ragged floorboards.”

  Sam Hamilton’s laconic comment spun Lara around. She glared at him before turning her ire on the honey-haired woman sitting at the kitchen table with him.

  “I have been hiding here at the Double H for four days. Four nights! The world thinks my charred bones were found in the farmhouse. My mission was terminated. The others on my team have gone home. Barlow has been allowed to leave the hospital. Yet all you can tell me is that Dodge is working with Colonel Zacharov to uncover the pigs in FSB who take money from Barlow.”

  “You know what we know,” the woman responded.

  The calm reply took some of the heat from Lara’s simmering impatience. This one was used to being active, too. She’d graduated from the U.S. academy for air-force officers. Then she’d flown jets. Big ones. Now she worked for the same shadowy agency Dodge did. Even her code name sparked interest. Rebel. She’d shared enough of her past during the days they’d been at the Double H for Lara to believe the name was well and truly earned.

  Yet you would not think her an undercover agent to look at her, Lara thought with a nasty little dart of envy. More like a sultry model, in those black leather pants and leather jacket with so many silver studs. She wore both with the sinuous grace of a panther. Small wonder the face of Dodge’s cousin, Sam, had lit up like a child with a new toy when she arrived.

  Even less wonder that Lara felt like a colorless wraith in comparison. She’d scrubbed the soot from her pores and dressed in jeans and a red flannel shirt Sam had appropriated from the clothes Dodge kept at the ranch for his visits. Her hair had been washed and brushed to a silvery sheen. She’d even applied some lip gloss that Rebel had given her to use. Despite the touches of color, she couldn’t compete with the other woman’s blatant sensuality.

  She had come to keep Lara company. That was the bland explanation Dodge had given before he thrust his hands through Lara’s hair for a kiss that left her reeling, then promptly disappeared.

  To keep her in her coffin was closer to the truth, Lara fumed. As far as the rest of the world was concerned, she’d perished in the fire. She could only pray that no one had told Katya her mother was dead. Dodge had promised they would not. Colonel Zacharov, too, when he’d called to assure Lara that he had her daughter tucked away in his dacha outside Moscow.

  And there she would stay until Dodge and Zacharov and top officials from both governments rooted out the rot on both sides of the Atlantic. For that, they needed Lara to remain dead and Barlow to believe he’d silenced the only witness who could pin him to a deadly fire.

  They were monitoring the bastard’s calls. Watching his every move. Tracking down every suspicious contact. While she sat here doing nothing!

  Frustrated all over again, Lara resumed her pacing. Long, stalking steps took her from the stove to the sink with its breath-stealing view of the corrals and snow-peaked mountains beyond. So she was the first one to spot the vehicle that turned onto the long, winding road that led to the ranch house. A moment later it bumped over the cattle guard and set off a low, beeping alarm inside the house.

  Rebel extracted a weapon from her boot and flowed out of her chair in one fluid move. Sam snatched up the rifle propped beside the table. It was one of two he’d kept loaded and ready over the past few days.

  “Lara, you need to stay put,” he said quietly. “Let us check this out.”

  Enough was enough. She’d not been trained to stay put. Jaw set, she stalked over to the spare rifle.

  “Jesus, Lara! Dodge will skin me alive if I let you get caught in a shoot-out.”

  She slapped his hand away. “And I will skin you alive if you do not.”

  “You, er, know how to use that?”

  Her chin came up. The proud blood of her ancestors rang in her reply. “I am descended from Cossacks.”

  Sam sent Rebel a silent plea.

  “Don’t look at me, big guy. I’m not going to tangle with a Cossack.”

  Feeling more kinship with the other woman than she had since her arrival, Lara took up a position at one window. Rebel covered the other. Sam kept one eye on the door and another on the monitor showing four different surveillance screens. When the hidden camera panned the driver’s side window of the vehicle, he let out a satisfied grunt.

  “It’s Dodge.”

  “And Blade,” Rebel added, eyeing the screen.

  Lara’s pent-up emotions shot to a fever pitch. She had yet to come to grips with the chaotic feelings Dodge roused in her. He annoyed her intensely at times. Reminded her all too sharply of their different loyalties at others. Then he swept her into his arms and she found herself almost—almost!—believing those differences could be overcome.

  That mix of confusion, hope and eager anticipation washed over her again and propelled her out the door. She waited with Sam and Rebel until the dusty vehicle spun to a halt. Dodge climbed out and tipped two fingers to his hat brim, then turned away.

  Lara’s joyous anticipation took a dip. She’d imagined this moment so many times in the past three days. She had not imagined that he would nod and turn his back on her. She stood stiffly, refusing to let her hurt show, until the rear passenger door slammed and Dodge reappeared—holding the hand of a small, wide-eyed girl clutching a stuffed pony almost as big as she was.

  Lara’s legs went weak. Tears rushed to her throat. All she could do was sink to her knees and open her arms.

  “Mama!” Shrieking, Katya flew across the gravel drive. “Mama!”

  Dodge had figured nothing could give him more satisfaction than personally delivering the news that he and Colonel Zacharov had squeezed confessions from three highly placed FSB officers that they’d taken hefty bribes from Hank Barlow.

  He’d figured wrong, however. The incandescent joy on Lara’s face as she smothered her child with kisses relegated Barlow to no more than an annoying blip on the radar screen.

  Rebel sauntered over to join her fellow operatives. “You done good,” she murmured to Dodge. “And you…”

  Arching a brow, she studied the bruise darkening the left side of Blade’s chin.

  “Forget to duck?”

  “Something like that.”

  “Well, don’t expect me to kiss your boo-boo and make it better.”

  She turned away and missed the sudden gleam in Blade’s eyes. Dodge caught it, however, and hoped he was nowhere in the vicinity when the whatever the hell these two had bubbling below the surface exploded.

  Then he swung his attention back to Lara and felt everything inside him turn to Silly Putty.

  It wasn’t until hours later that mother and daughter could be separated. While Blade entertained Katya with a trip to the barn to see the horses, the others clustered
around the kitchen table with the remains of supper still in the sink and a second pot of coffee brewing. If either Rebel or Sam noticed that Lara’s hand had found a home in Dodge’s, they didn’t comment on it.

  “I’ll say this for your Colonel Zacharov. The man’s a bulldog,” Dodge related with a wry grin. “He’d already ferreted out the prime suspects when Blade and I got there. All it took was some, uh, intense interrogation to give Zacharov enough for an extradition request on Barlow.”

  “What is this extradition?”

  “They want us to send him back to Moscow to stand trial for black marketeering, bribing public officials, and for the murder of Elena Dimitri, your husband and the others who died in the fire.”

  “And the United States will do this?”

  “After we nail him for attempted murder and arson here in the States.”

  “How long will it take for such matters to hap pen?”

  “We’ll try to speed the process along, but Barlow’s going to hire a battery of lawyers. It could take months.”

  “And until then, Katya must be protected.”

  Dodge rubbed the side of his nose. “Yeah, well, the colonel and I talked about that. He thinks, and I agree, that both you and Katya should continue to lay low until Barlow’s in a cage.”

  “I cannot remain dead for a month! I have a job, responsibilities, people under my supervision.”

  “We talked about that, too. Just how long has it been since you took any vacation time?”

  “Katya and I went to the Black Sea just last year.”

  “For three days, according to your boss.”

  “We went to the Urals to ski the year before.”

  “Over a long weekend.”

  “How do you know this?” she demanded, exasperated.

  “Like I said, your colonel and I had a chat. We think you should…”

  “Yes, yes. You told me what you think.” Her chin came up, and a hint of her former ice coated her reply. “I do not need men making decisions for me.”

  Rebel grinned. “You tell ’em, girl.”

  Ignoring the aside, Dodge leaned forward and held Lara’s hand captive. “Zacharov cares about you, Larissa Petrovna. I care about you.”

  He didn’t need Rebel’s disgusted snort to know that had come out with about as much kick as week-old chili. Or the cool look Lara gave him as she pushed away from the table.

  “I must see to Katya.”

  Sam eyed her retreating back and shook his head. “Smooth, Hoss. Real smooth.”

  “Hope you do better next time,” Rebel drawled.

  “I will,” Dodge vowed.

  He waited to make his move until Lara had tucked Katya in bed. The oversize stuffed horse Dodge had picked up at the Cheyenne airport snuggled beside her. Her tentative smile when he came to say good-night pulled at something deep inside him.

  He returned the smile and leaned a shoulder against the doorjamb while Lara crooned softly to her daughter in Russian, smoothing her hair, stroking her cheek, as if she couldn’t get enough of touching her. After the long plane ride and excitement of seeing her mother again, Katya dropped right off.

  Still Lara sat with her. She knew Dodge stood behind her, knew she owed him much for helping to put the ghosts of the past to rest. Yet now that her initial euphoria had passed, she felt almost reluctant to face him. It would be hard to say goodbye. Harder still if she and Katya stayed here for weeks, seeing him whenever he could spare time from his duties. Best to break it off now, while she could go home with only an ache inside her for what might have been.

  Drawing in a long breath, she smoothed her daughter’s hair a last time, rose and faced him. Soundlessly, he held out the flannel-lined jacket she’d appropriated as her own.

  “Moon’s full,” he said quietly. “Let’s talk outside.”

  The sky was an endless sea of stars. They were so brilliant, these Wyoming stars. And the moon hanging low in the dark velvet sky was round and full and bright. Lara breathed in the sharp, clean tang of pine resin and walked with Dodge to the now empty corral.

  Pushing her hands in the jacket pockets for warmth, she leaned against the corral’s top bar and studied his face, shadowed by his hat brim. So strong, so confident, so ruggedly handsome. To forestall argument, she smiled and shook her head.

  “Dodge, I thank you from the bottom of my heart for all you have done. You and Sam and the others. But you know I cannot stay here.”

  “Not forever,” he agreed. “But certainly long enough for us to figure out where we go from here.”

  “Where can we go? You’re a spy. You work for an agency even the FSB has no data on. I’m an officer in the Russian Air Force. I will have to answer many questions about you—about us—when I go home.”

  “All you have to do is tell them the truth.”

  “Tell them I was so reckless? So lost to all sense of duty that I…that I…”

  “Consorted with the enemy?”

  Her brow furrowed. “What is this, ‘consorted’?”

  “Stopped his heart with your smile.” He braced his hands on the top bar, caging her between them. “Kissed him until he couldn’t remember his name. Made love with him a dozen times.”

  “A dozen? We slept together but once!”

  “True, but the night’s young.” He brushed his mouth over hers. “And I intend to make the most of it.”

  Her palms flattened on his chest. He could see the want in her face, and the regret.

  “We must be rational, Dodge. We come from different worlds.”

  “It’s the world we make for each other, and for Katya, that counts from here on out.”

  “It’s impossible!”

  His mouth made another lazy pass over hers. “How do you know unless we give it a shot?”

  She ached to wrap her arms around his neck. To bring that so-skilled mouth crushing down on hers. To feel his hard, muscled body against and on and in hers just once more. Instead, she bunched her fists and kept them stiff at her side.

  “I cannot live with you passing through my life—and Katya’s—whenever business or chance or whim brings you to Moscow. I want more for her, Dodge. For myself.”

  “I wasn’t planning on just passing through. I’m asking you to marry me, Larissa Petrovna.”

  “What!”

  He had to grin at her openmouthed shock.

  “Colonel Zacharov and I worked it out. He thinks you’re perfect to fill the assistant defense attaché slot at the Russian Embassy in D.C. That’ll keep you on this side of the Atlantic for the next four years. After that, I have business interests in Moscow that could keep me there for four or five. Then we’ll see what comes.”

  Her head spun with disbelief, with confusion, with the first electric sparks of excitement. “The assistant attaché position is that of a lieutenant colonel,” she protested.

  “Zacharov seems to think you deserve a promotion for nailing a mass murderer and busting up a black-market ring involving several FSB officers. He also thinks it would be good for you and Katya to remain in the States for a while, until Barlow and his buddies are behind bars.”

  “But…”

  “Katya thinks it’s a good idea, too. Especially after I promised to get her some Silly Bandz and bring her to the Double H for every vacation.”

  “But…”

  “What the hell are Silly Bandz, anyway? A rock group?”

  “No, no! My God, Hamilton, you do not give me time to catch my breath.”

  “That’s the general idea.”

  He smiled down at her, and the denials piling up by the dozens in her thoughts didn’t make it to her lips.

  “I love you, Larissa Petrovna.”

  He framed her face with his palms. His touch was warm against her cheeks, and strong, and so achingly tender.

  “I love your dedication to your duty,” he said softly. “Your coolness under pressure. Your incredible bravery and the savage way you fight to protect you and yours. I love the heart that
beats inside the body I’ve lusted for since the moment we met.”

  She stared up at him, her eyes a dark cobalt-blue in the moonlight. They showed doubt, amazement, confusion still. But the ghosts were gone, Dodge saw with fierce satisfaction. If he’d done nothing else, he’d helped her put them to rest.

  “I loved once,” she said after a long moment. “With all my heart. I never thought to find such a gift again.”

  Her smile came then. Wide and full.

  “It will not be easy, having me as wife. These differences you brush aside so lightly go bone-deep in both of us. But I tell you this, Dodge Hamilton, I ache for you in ways I never ached before.”

  With a silent vow to keep her aching for the next fifty or sixty years, Dodge folded her into his arms and sealed their personal treaty.

  Epilogue

  The wedding was an elegant affair. The entire Russian embassy staff filled the pews on the bride’s side of the flower-draped aisles. Squeezed in among the dignitaries in the front row was the woman who’d taken care of Katya during Lara’s military absences. Colonel Zacharov had arranged a visa and had flown her to Washington several weeks ago to assist the embassy’s assistant defense attaché as she adjusted to her new position. Zacharov was at the church, too, resplendent in his dress uniform with medals adorning one entire side of his chest.

  Dodge’s family, friends, military associates and fellow operatives filled the pews on the other side of the aisle. His family and friends had come to share his joy. Sam led the pack, riding herd on an assortment of sisters, aunts, cousins and their numerous offspring.

  The OMEGA cadre, on the other hand, had come primarily to see the Russian officer who’d roped, hog-tied and was about to put a ring through Hamilton’s nose. A fat wad of bills had changed hands among the operatives at the previous night’s bachelor party. When the losers of the pool had forked over several hundred to a grinning Victoria Talbot, she’d scooped up the cash and freely admitted she’d gained the inside track during the time she’d spent cloistered with Major Petrovna at the Double H. After watching Dodge and Lara together, she’d known it was only a matter of weeks before the Russian brought ole love-’em-and-leave-’em Hamilton to his knees.