by Pamela Clare
He was supposed to be a writer working on a story about his years in Delta Force. It was an attempt to explain his scars, why he never left the house, and why he spent so much time on the computer.
He opened the drawer of the nightstand.
Condoms.
The Agency really did think of everything.
He would need to install a gun safe. In the meantime, he’d stow the go-bag high in the closet, keep the Ruger MK III close by in the nightstand, and carry the SIG concealed. He couldn’t be certain trouble wasn’t headed his way—word was the Georgian mafia was looking for payback for Dudaev’s death—and he didn’t want to get caught with his pants down. Especially if his pants were down.
As he unpacked two bricks each of .22 long rifle subsonic and .380 ACP anti-personnel rounds, he found himself hoping he didn’t have to plant one of them in Holly Bradshaw’s pretty skull.
* * *
Holly awoke to find a man sitting in a chair beside the bed. For a second, she thought it was her case officer, but then she saw. “Joaquin.”
There was a worried look on his sweet face, his camera bag resting on the floor near his feet.
“Hey.” He smiled and took her hand, lacing his fingers through hers. “How do you feel? I hear they’re giving you the good stuff.”
“You came.” Holly was happy to see him. “They quit giving me morphine a little while ago. I’m just taking pain pills.”
She still felt queasy and exhausted, but her headache was better.
“I’d have been here sooner, but it was a busy news day.” His expression grew serious. “I got a hell of a shock when they wheeled you out on that gurney.”
“I got a hell of a shock when I woke up next to a dead guy.”
“I heard some of the hotel staff talking about it. They say someone shot this dude point blank in the head while you were unconscious in the bed naked beside him. You’re lucky the killer decided not to kill you, too—or to take advantage of your situation.”
Holly thought she knew where this conversation was going.
Joaquin released her hand and leaned forward in the chair, resting his elbows on his knees, his gaze fixed on hers. “The way I see it, this was a wake-up call.”
Here we go.
Holly knew her friends thought she was a bit of a slut. They didn’t know that it wasn’t quite what it seemed. There were men she dated as part of her personal life and men she dated for the Agency. She slept with some of them. Others she didn’t. But she couldn’t settle down, not until she’d left the Agency. How would she be able to explain to a potential boyfriend that she moonlighted for the CIA and that he would have to share her in the name of national security?
“Joaquin, I—”
“Hey, let me finish, okay? I’ve got something I’ve been meaning to say for a while now.” His brow bent in a thoughtful frown, and he seemed to hesitate. “How you live your life is your business, but as your friend I got to say that these men—they’re not good for you. They don’t care about you. You are worth so much more than they know.”
He took her hand again. “You’re so beautiful on the outside that a lot of guys don’t look beyond that. They have no idea how funny you are or how much you do for your friends or what an amazing reporter you are. You’re smart, too. Oh, chula, I know you’re smart. Your mind runs a million miles a minute so that sometimes you have no idea what’s going on around you and you say things . . .”
He laughed, smiling as if he were remembering something funny.
But Holly didn’t laugh. There was a rock-hard lump in her throat, his words cutting too close to something soft and sore inside her.
His laughter faded, and his smile disappeared. “That man who got popped last night, the one cops say might have drugged you, the one who’s going to be stuck in your memory for the rest of your life—all he saw, all he wanted, was the package. He didn’t care about who you are beneath your skin. You got to stop wasting time with these cabrones and find the man who does.”
Holly blinked back the tears that were forming in her eyes. She swallowed—hard—and gave Joaquin’s fingers a squeeze. “I wish it were that easy.”
After a moment, she asked the question she’d always wanted to ask him. “Why have you and I never gotten together?”
There’d always been an intense and mutual attraction. They both knew it. They’d never acted on it or even talked about it.
Joaquin gave her a sad smile. “Because, chula, I’m looking for happily ever after, and you’re just looking for your next adrenaline rush.”
Chapter Six
Nick spoke into the listening device, chuckling. “Hey, Nguyen, fuck you.”
The device was one of five he’d found in the place—a hazard of the profession. He, like all SAD officers, had to assume he was under Agency surveillance much of the time. But that didn’t mean he had to like it.
He deactivated the bug, tossed it into a small biometric safe with the others. This was his form of protest. They put in the devices, and he removed them. He couldn’t be certain he’d gotten them all, of course, but at least Langley had no doubts about his point of view on the subject.
He went into the kitchen and tried out the espresso maker, getting three shots out of the thing. He drank it straight, not bothering with steamed milk, then tossed the cake of grounds into the sink and left it there, adding to the mess he’d made this morning. Thanks to some dirty dishes, pizza boxes, dirty clothes, old newspapers, and full trash bins, the condo now looked less like an IKEA floor display and more like someone’s home.
The espresso cleared the fog from his brain, got his pulse going. He’d put in far too many hours last night getting the computers set up and installing the special software. Now he had six CPUs running at once, all trying to recover Dudaev’s password and open the encrypted drive. Once the password was cracked, Nick was pretty certain he’d find the key for decrypting the encoded files on the hard drive. But cracking the password wouldn’t be easy.
Dudaev’s mother tongue was Georgian, but he also spoke English, French, and Russian. He could have chosen a password in any of those languages. He could have used the Georgian or Cyrillic alphabets, or he could have used the standardized US keyboard to spell out transliterations of Georgian or Russian words. In case that wasn’t challenging enough, there was more than one way of translating the characters of the Cyrillic alphabet into data streams—ASCII, Code Page 855, Code Page 866—and Nick had no idea which one applied in this case.
It made him want to break open a bottle of tequila.
Cryptography wasn’t his strength. While he’d sat there fucking around with something that could earn him a quiet cell in federal prison or a nice bullet to the brain, he’d found himself wondering once more whether he’d gone out of his mind.
He glanced at his watch.
Zero-nine-twenty.
Bradshaw would be discharged from the hospital soon.
He needed to get moving.
Wearing nitrile gloves, he used the key he’d created to open the deadbolt on Bradshaw’s back door, stepped inside, and disarmed her security system, taking advantage of her absence to have another look around. True, he’d put her in the hospital, but given what she’d done, she was lucky to be alive.
Had he known that night what he knew now . . .
Bauer had insisted Bradshaw was a professional, but Nick was holding out hope that Dudaev represented her first foray into espionage and treason. Maybe someone had heard she was dating him and had paid her to double-cross Dudaev. Maybe the person who’d hired her had given her only part of the truth and had made her believe she’d be doing something good for the country by getting sensitive data away from Dudaev.
Regardless, her life was about to get ugly.
Nick had searched her condo the day he’d arrived in Denver three weeks ago and had been back a few times since to check her mail and to go through her trash and her recycling. The first time through, he’d been looking for evidence tha
t she was involved in Dudaev’s underworld dealings. He hadn’t found anything to tie her to any covert activity, and he wasn’t expecting to find anything like that today. He had to assume that she still had the special cell phone with her and that the Agency was holding eyes on her in case someone tried to make contact with her. This time he was searching for clues about Ms. Bradshaw herself—clues that would help him break her.
She’d left the air conditioning on, so the place was cool despite near triple-digit temps outside, the blinds still drawn. He started in the kitchen, working his way systematically through the room, which clearly doubled as an office. She had pens, paper, and a laptop on the kitchen table, and even a paper shredder, but the cupboards held few pots and pans or even silverware. That meant she probably ate out a lot or brought home carryout—something he would remember.
He opened the shredder and found nothing more than junk mail and shopping receipts—exactly what he’d found every time he’d searched her house.
After searching the bathroom, where he’d taken in the soft floral scent of her shampoo, he started in the bedroom, sniffing the contents of perfume bottles, then going through her drawers. Soft silk and sexy lace. And . . .
Holy shit.
He held up a pair of what looked like crotchless panties, the back side done up with tiny laces. He’d gone through these three weeks ago, but that was before he’d seen her lying on that bed wearing only a thong. An image of her came to his mind—breasts bare, that fat sapphire lying against a rosy nipple, diamonds glittering against the skin of her throat, those long silky legs. He dropped the panties, slammed the drawer shut.
Get your mind on the job!
How was he supposed to stay in control and get the better of her when just being alone with her panties gave him wood?
Her bed was neatly made, shams resting on top of a coverlet of blue cotton. The sheets were made of white cotton and fringed with lace. Fluffy flokati area rugs dotted the wooden floor, perfect for her polished toes and soft, pedicured feet.
On her dresser sat a photo of a sweet little towheaded girl holding the hand of a man in a US Army uniform. It was Holly and her father. Interesting that it was the only family photo in the house—and that she was so little.
The book on her nightstand had changed. He picked it up, glanced at the title. Theories of Modern Art.
She’d been boning up for her “date” with Dudaev.
She had a vibrator in the top drawer, along with a box of condoms. Because Nick had been running surveillance, he knew she used the vibrator, coming with a quick inhale and a long slow exhale that, truth be told, had turned him on. But the point was that she had enough libido left over from her nights on the town to do herself. Then he remembered what she’d said to McMillan about too many men not caring what their partners needed.
It’s the clit, stupid.
Maybe she didn’t find her nights out all that satisfying. It was hard for him to say, given that she hadn’t had sex with anyone but herself in the three weeks he’d been keeping a watch on her. Then again, she’d been dating Dudaev that entire time, and he knew she hadn’t had sex with him.
That was revealing, too.
He moved into the living room, searching in and around the cream-colored sofa with its pastel blue pillows and throw blanket, noticing for the first time how soft the colors and fabrics were. He searched the cabinet of distressed white wood where she kept her DVDs and saw that the shelves held lots of popular romantic comedies, as well as some documentaries, art films, and Hollywood classics. He checked the framed prints on the walls, this time looking at the content of the art—black and white photographs of landscapes, old French theater posters, prints of Impressionist paintings. He flipped through her books one by one, a mix of non-fiction, literary fiction, and popular fiction. She’d obviously read Jane Austen to death—and Dickens. Then his gaze was drawn to a dog-eared romance novel with a man’s chest on the cover. It was bookmarked at an explicit scene of some guy going down on a woman.
He’d remember that as well.
He turned on the light and entered the massive walk-in closet that had once been a second bedroom. A chaise lounge in dark blue velvet sat in the middle of the room, one wall entirely of mirrors, more flokati rugs on the floor. He ran his hand over the velvet of the chaise, inhaled the hint of perfume that lingered in the air.
The woman was a sensualist to the core. That might be the most important thing for Nick to know about her. She wouldn’t like discomfort.
He glanced around, but he knew what he’d find here. She had easily two hundred pairs of shoes, all neatly organized. Her clothes were organized, too, arranged on racks according to length and from casual to formal—blouses; skirts; pants; dresses; long, glittery gowns.
He stepped out, glanced around.
This was Bradshaw’s home, her sanctuary, and everything about it was soft, feminine, tasteful, even sweet. It was easier for him to believe that she’d been deceived into helping someone steal those files than it was to believe she enjoyed playing dangerous games with dangerous men for a living.
And that was another mystery.
How was she being paid for this? There’d been no suspicious activity in any of her accounts before she met Dudaev or since, no fat deposits from off-shore . . .
An engine. A car door.
He glanced outside and saw a black SUV roll up, an unmarked police car behind it. Julian Darcangelo got out of the car and motioned for Bradshaw, who sat in the passenger seat of the SUV, to stay in the vehicle. Nick recognized Darcangelo from the files he’d made on her friends and acquaintances. Nick was certain the man, who was former FBI, would clear the condo before he let Bradshaw enter.
Time for you to go home and get pretty, Andris.
He already had his chance encounter with Bradshaw worked out, the accidental meeting that he would make certain turned into something more. He activated the alarm and slipped out the back, making it inside his own condo just in time to avoid an unnecessary and painful confrontation with Darcangelo.
Mr. Creeper she’d called him.
She had no idea how creepy he could be.
* * *
Holly set aside the note the florist had left on her door—they’d left a bouquet of flowers from Beth Dailey, her boss, with Mr. Creeper—and made a pot of coffee. She set mugs on the table for Chief Irving and Julian, trying to stay focused on the conversation, her mind fixed on the classified files that were still in her possession.
Why hadn’t her CO contacted her yet?
She fought back a trill of panic. The situation must be hotter than she’d imagined. Even if they felt she was compromised, the Agency would want to retrieve the intel she’d recovered. They wouldn’t leave the cell phone and its precious contents in her hands any longer than they had to.
She realized that both men were silent and looking at her expectantly. “I’m sorry. I got lost in my own world.”
Pull yourself together!
Julian stood, pulled out one of the chairs. “Sit.”
“I was going to get you sugar.”
“Tell me where it is, and I’ll get it.”
Holly sat. “There—next to the toaster.”
Chief Stephen Irving had been at the helm of the Denver Police Department for as long as Holly had lived in Denver and had been sleep-deprived for that entire time, judging by the bags beneath his blue eyes. “I asked you whether your laptop was stolen from the hotel room. One of the security guards said you asked for your laptop. If it was stolen, I’d like to include it in the report.”
“My laptop?” Holly feigned confusion. It wasn’t hard. “I don’t even remember asking for it. I must have been really out of it. My laptop is right there.”
She pointed, hoping they would buy it.
Chief Irving nodded—and that seemed to be the end of it.
“Whoever did this was a professional,” he said. “The security system was hacked. It took more than five hours for the security desk
to realize they weren’t getting live feed. By the time we arrived to investigate, the hotel’s footage from that night had been destroyed. The killer left no prints. There were no witnesses, no one who heard the gunshots, which means he probably used a suppressor.”
“That’s a silencer?” Holly knew perfectly well what a suppressor was.
“Yes.” Chief Irving reached for the sugar, dumped a teaspoon into his coffee, then stirred with the same spoon. “Whoever it was didn’t steal your necklace or touch you. He also didn’t touch the money Dudayev had in his safe. Put all of that together, and it looks like a professional hit. The rounds he used were designed to . . .”
Julian frowned, and Chief Irving let that thought trail off with a cough.
Holly was touched by the effort that Irving, Julian, and the others were making to shield her from the ugliness of this. Some part of her wished she were that innocent, but she knew more about what had happened that night than they ever would.
“Why would someone hire an assassin to kill an art dealer?” she asked, but the questions running through her mind were altogether different.
Who was the killer? Had Dudaev been betrayed by a prospective buyer? Had someone in Dudaev’s organization turned on him and decided to take the files and the profits? Had a foreign government penetrated US security, learned about the files, and taken advantage of Dudaev’s theft to grab them and run?
Julian answered. “McBride was looking into that, but the moment he reached out to the federal boys, they swooped in and took over the investigation. The case is now in the hands of the FBI. I’ve got some contacts there, but they’re being tight-lipped about this one.”
Holly had been expecting this. Soon, the investigation would be in Agency hands—and then it would quietly disappear.
Then it dawned on her.