Along Came a Husband

by Helen Brenna

  “What about your renegade agent?”

  The man who may have foiled Mason’s plans to be on a tropical beach in about three weeks with a couple million in an offshore account? “We’ll find him.” He pulled out his switchblade. “Before he does any damage. You have my word.”

  “Your word doesn’t mean shit to me,” Delgado bit out. “You don’t get your money until my deal goes through.”

  “That goes without saying, but it might not be a bad idea to move up your timetable.”

  “Impossible. This deal is done. It’s going down in three weeks, regardless. I want this taken care of before I get back to the States next week.”

  “I’m working on it.”

  “I get busted, my men get busted, or my inventory is confiscated and you’re a dead man.”

  Click.

  “Son of a bitch!” Mason shoved his phone in the holder at his waist and then slashed open a cushion with his knife. He gutted the couch. Nothing. The chair. More nothing.

  Frustrated, he flung his knife across the room, and it stuck with a satisfying thud in a kitchen cabinet. He’d torn this damned apartment to pieces and had come up with zilch. No addresses or phone numbers. No laptop or memory devices. Not even a single cell phone record. The man took the concept of anonymity to an entirely new level. How were they going to find him when they had absolutely nothing to go on?

  As Mason stood there his cell phone rang. He glanced at the display and answered. “Tell me you found him.”

  “Not a trace.”

  “Dammit!” he bit out. “I want—”

  “Relax, Mason. With all that blood in the alley, he’s dead or dying.”

  “Not good enough.” Mason paced around the mess he’d created of furniture stuffing, hunks of broken dishes and fractured picture frames. An end table was the only piece of furniture still standing. “This is your fault. You told me he’d turn. You told me—”

  “So I was wrong. Shoot me.”

  “I want the body.” Mason struggled to keep his voice down. “Then I want it never found.”

  “What do you think I am, stupid? If he’s identified, people are going to start asking questions. Did you tell Delgado?”

  “I didn’t have to tell him. His people did.” Mason closed his eyes. “If I go down, I won’t be going alone. Understand?”

  “Oh, I understand. Do you?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “We’re working outside the lines right now, remember? This is no-man’s-land. So don’t give me any more orders. Understand that?”

  “Yeah,” Mason muttered. And when all this is over and done with, you’re dead, no matter what.

  “Good. ’Cause we got bigger problems on our hands than you think.”

  “How could this get any worse?”

  “He kept files.”

  “Of what?”

  “All the evidence he turned over to you over the course of the last four years. He backed up everything on a memory stick.”

  Mason broke out in a cold sweat. “You gotta be shitting me.”

  “If we don’t find him soon, he could turn everything over and we’re dead anyway.”

  “Why didn’t you grab his files while you had the chance?”

  “Why didn’t you kill him in the alley? If you had this wouldn’t be a problem. Did you find anything at his apartment?”

  “What do you think?” Mason barely held his temper in check. He hadn’t really expected anything to be here, but every base had to be covered. “I have meetings tomorrow in D.C.”

  “I can handle things on this end.”

  “I’m telling you he’s hiding with someone he knows. Someone he trusts. His father. His wife.”

  A loud laugh sounded over the line. “There is no one. Why do you think I suggested him for this assignment in the first place? No one in the world gives a rat’s ass whether Jonas Abel lives or dies.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  JONAS WOKE TO THE SOUND of a robin warbling loudly and quite happily outside the bedroom window. He glanced through the filmy pale green curtains and located the noisy little bastard perched on the branch of a massive elm tree. Lacking the energy to blow the damned thing to kingdom come, he squeezed his eyes shut and tried to ignore the sound.

  What do you think you’re doing?

  Get up. Get it done. Do your job.

  Sighing, he tried to sit and pain sizzled through him, knocking him back down. Damn, it felt as though his body had been first tenderized and then run through a man-size meat grinder. Apparently, that’s what first getting jumped by four men, then shot, and then losing half the blood in his body did to a guy. He was in no shape to do anyone any damage.

  Rolling over in the hopes of falling back asleep, he buried his head under a pillow. On his next breath the scent of something hauntingly familiar came to him. Something sultry and lush. Something that oddly enough had him feeling at once content and restless.

  Screw sleep.

  He cracked open his eyes to find a set of pale gold orbs staring back at him. Cat eyes. Short-haired and black, but for a slit of white on its chest and a white sock on one rear paw, the cat sat serenely at the edge of the bed and studied him with curious disinterest. The animal had the muscular build of an outdoor cat and one of its ears was notched, most likely from a fight, ramping up the tough guy look.

  “How did you get here?” he murmured.

  From what he remembered, Missy had been frightened of cats since as a youngster she’d tried breaking up a couple of toms going at it. A nice long scar on the back of her left hand was all she had to show for her good-natured efforts. He, on the other hand, had absolutely no good reason for his dislike of cats.

  The cat, taking his life in his own paws, crouched down and rubbed the side of his black head against Jonas’s hand. Jonas’s instinctive reaction was to flick the thing off the bed, but then the silkiness of the animal’s fur against his calloused hands registered. It’d been a long time since anything that soft had touched his skin.

  Unable to resist, Jonas turned his hand and scratched the underside of the cat’s chin. The animal purred and pushed harder against Jonas’s hand. The more he scratched the louder the purr. Before he knew it the damned thing was inching onto Jonas’s chest looking for more.

  “Oh, no you don’t.” He lifted the covers, unseating the animal and forcing it to the ground. Instead of being upset, the cat stretched languorously as if it’d been his plan all along to jump to the floor before walking slowly out of the room. “Cocky little shit.”

  Jonas chuckled, and another wave of pain moved through him. Considering taking something to make it through the day, he glanced at the bedside table. Clustered together were several small sample containers of prescription medicine and a large cup with a bendy straw that appeared to hold water. Apparently, the good doctor had left some halfway decent painkillers as well as an antibiotic and a sleep aid.

  Awfully nice of Missy’s boyfriend. And he was her boyfriend. Jonas was sure of that. The man had looked at her last night with a distinctly protective and proprietary air. How long had they been seeing one another? How much had she told the doctor about Jonas and their past?

  Why should he care? He set the bottles down and knocked back a couple of ibuprofen. Movement sounded upstairs, followed closely by the running of a shower. Missy was not only awake, she was also most likely naked and wet. Now there was an image he didn’t need running through his mind. Come to think of it, he was buck naked himself under the covers. How had that happened?

  Missy. He had a vague recollection of her hands brushing his skin, her fingers on his stomach as she worked the zipper on his jeans. Think of something else, you idiot. The last thing he needed in his sorry state was a hard-on.

  After prepping himself with a slow, measured breath he threw back the green leaf-printed comforter—knowing Missy, it was probably organic cotton—then gingerly rolled onto his good side and slowly pushed himself to a sitting position. Damn, he felt w
eak. As he waited for the rush of light-headedness to pass, he located his pack on the floor by the door, looking as though it’d been left unopened. Good. That was good.

  Still waiting for equilibrium, he glanced around the room. The woodwork was enameled white, but the rich, milk chocolate-brown on the walls seemed to curiously vary in shade from one side to the next. Knowing Missy, and her tendency toward impulsiveness, she’d changed her mind while in the middle of painting.

  The furniture was a mishmash of wicker, metal and some kind of natural hardwood. A big, leafy plant hung from the ceiling near the window, and a couple smaller pots sat on the dresser and bedside tables. A collage of different shaped and sized photos covered the wall above the headboard of the bed.

  He might’ve thought it a guest bedroom but for the jewelry lying atop the long dresser. Beads, crystals, metal pendants or Chinese coins. It was exactly the kind of stuff Missy would wear—

  He’d slept in Missy’s room. In her bed. No wonder the scent on the pillow had felt so familiar. That’s when he noticed something hanging over the arm of the nearby wicker chair next to his jeans. He picked up the pale yellow scrap of fabric and held it out. A nightgown. Flimsy. Lacy. Sexy as hell, especially if he imagined Missy in it with her long curls, her beautiful shoulders, her breasts—

  Full-blown hard-on. He swallowed and hung his head. What a loser. After all these years, after the way she’d turned on him and broken his heart, how could he still want her?

  The gown felt soft and slippery in his hand. Had she ever worn it for the doctor? Was she sleeping with him?

  That’s none of your damned business. She doesn’t want your sorry old ass. She made that more than clear, remember? Besides, you’ve got work to do, so get to it so you can get off this hunk of rock floating in the middle of nowhere.

  He grabbed his jeans, dug out the memory stick attached to a lanyard he’d hidden in a secret pocket in the thick waistband and hung it around his neck. After releasing a deep breath, he stood, tested his balance, then rummaged through his pack, verifying that his laptop had not been compromised.

  After pulling on some clothes and tucking his gun inside the waistband of his sweats, he made his way slowly down the hall and into the main living area of the house. The space felt airy and open without any barriers between the kitchen and living room, living room and all-season porch.

  Footsteps sounded behind him and, instantly on alert, he spun around. Pain shot up his side at the sudden twisting and he cringed.

  Missy was coming down the stairs. “We have to talk.” She barely glanced at him as she moved past to put a teakettle on the stove.

  The pain, mostly, subsided. “I’m not sure we have anything to say to one another.”

  “Well, I have plenty to say to you, but first I want some answers.” She scooped some loose tea leaves into a metal mesh container and then focused on him. “Why aren’t you dead?”

  Oh, yeah, that.

  Jonas carefully eased himself onto one of the bar stools at her kitchen counter and studied her. Apparently having grabbed what she’d needed for today before she’d left him last night, she’d dressed simply, in a pair of straight-legged jeans and a long, loose, short-sleeved brown sweater. With naturally clear skin, she’d never needed much makeup. Her hair hung in damp curls. The only jewelry she wore was a necklace, a couple of hefty faceted quartz crystals strung on a strip of woven leather.

  But it was the way she carried herself that set her apart. He couldn’t believe he hadn’t noticed it the first time he’d met her, the way she held herself, so straight and confidently. The regal set of her chin, angled slightly downward as if she were looking down upon the masses. Her hands. Long, royal-looking fingers and bones so fine she looked as if he could break her in half.

  There were changes, too. Not a lot, not enough that most people would notice, but noticing things was part of his job. Her easy way of smiling seemed to have been replaced by a touch of seriousness about her mouth. There was more depth to her eyes, a more sober line to her brow. Was it possible she’d matured inside as well as out? He wasn’t holding his breath.

  “I’m not dead because there was no helicopter crash,” he finally answered. “It was staged.”

  “Brent Matthews? The other agent in the helicopter with you?”

  “No one died, Missy.”

  “There were two bodies,” she said as if she couldn’t quite wrap her mind around this twist in the past. “I saw them. I saw…your body.”

  If he didn’t know better, he’d have said a shadow of something damned close to sadness momentarily passed over her features. “John Does from the morgue.” He shook his head. “They put the bodies in the shell of the chopper before they blew it up.”

  “Why?”

  “Because they didn’t expect me to live through the undercover assignment I’d accepted.” He almost hadn’t. “On top of that, they knew it would be long-term and they wanted absolutely no contact with family or friends. I received a totally new identity, and I’ve been on that same case ever since.”

  “So you’re still with the FBI. How long were you undercover?”

  “It took us a couple years to infiltrate the group. Since then, it’s been another two years.” He sighed. “Plus.”

  “You’ve been living someone else’s life for four years?”

  “It’s my job.”

  “Your job.” Clearly disgusted, she shook her head. “You’re the same as you’ve always been, aren’t you? The job is still the only thing that matters in your life.”

  How often had she thrown that accusation in his face? Well, it may not have been as true all those years ago, but it sure as hell was true now. After all that time undercover, living as he had surrounded by lawless, disrespectful thugs, getting hardened to seeing things he hadn’t wanted to see, there were days even he didn’t recognize the man he’d become.

  “Why’d you agree to do it?”

  “I think the more appropriate question is why not?” After watching his father stand ineffectively by while his mother slowly died, Jonas had wanted nothing to do with the dead-beat. He’d never had any siblings, no relatives at all, really. At the time Stein had come to him with the risky undercover opportunity, Missy had been his only family. When she turned her back on him, he had nothing left in the world.

  “Why not?” She glared at him. “Because you had a wife and a father. A life.”

  “Did I?” he bit out. If he hadn’t felt so weak, he would’ve stood and paced the floor of her kitchen. As it was, all he could do was sit there. “You filed for a divorce, Missy. Remember that part of the equation?”

  The morning she told him she’d seen an attorney, he’d felt as if he’d been hit dead on by a train. Bam! Life gone. Rejected. Start over. That’s exactly what he’d deserved for letting himself get carried ass-over-teakettle away by an immature young woman. He’d thought himself in love, and he’d found out the hard way there was no such thing.

  Love. Right.

  If Jonas had known the truth about her age, about who Missy really was when he’d first met her, he never would’ve married her, let alone had sex with her in the back of his SUV the first night they’d met. Hell, there had to be any number of women in the world who shared her name. Who would’ve ever guessed she was the Melissa Camden? He was still pissed she hadn’t told him the truth about her background until a few days before their wedding.

  He’d tried, he really had, to look beyond it, to see Missy for who she was and not what her family had made her, but his pride had been hurt too much to recover. He’d soon had to face the fact that he could never have supported her in a lifestyle in any way, shape or form close to what she’d been used to. From the beginning, the deck had been stacked against them.

  “The way I see it,” he said, unable to keep the bitterness from his voice, “my death just made things easier for you.” Not to mention that a small, stupid part of him had inexplicably reasoned that she’d still be his wife.


  “Easier?” She laughed, but the sound was laced with what sounded a lot like desperation. “How was that supposed to make it easier? For me?”

  “Bang. I was out of your life. No attorneys. No messy division of assets. One little funeral and it was over.” He shrugged. “I’ll bet you didn’t even cry.”

  She fell silent. Then that damned cat jumped onto the counter and rubbed against her. She snuggled the animal to her chest, scratched its neck and glanced back at him. “No, you’re right. I never cried. Not one single tear. Satisfied?”

  No, he wasn’t even close to being satisfied with what had happened between him and Missy, but he’d accepted the fact long ago that he’d made a rash decision in marrying her. Everyone knew a man didn’t need to care deeply about a woman to be elementally and viscerally attracted to her. What a lot of people didn’t realize was that some women—women like Missy—could be the same way.

  Apparently, if the quick rise and fall of her chest were any indication, she hadn’t changed. As if she remembered the heat that had unfailingly risen between them, the long hours spent simply pleasing each other, her gaze caught with his and held.

  He’d never known a more passionate, uninhibited woman than Missy. All he’d ever had to do was touch her face and she’d melted in his hand. Caress her breast and she’d arch to meet him. Touch his tongue to hers and she’d do anything he’d ask. What he wouldn’t give to find out if he still held that kind of power over her. All it would take was one touch to find out. Just one.

  The teakettle whistled in the heavy silence and she spun around. Damn. After putting down the cat, she flipped off the burner and poured steaming hot water into a metal travel mug. “Your dad was at your funeral,” she said softly, dipping the mesh tea holder into the hot water.

  When the cat walked toward Jonas, clearly looking for more affection, he quickly stood and searched through her kitchen cabinets for something to eat. All those years ago, he’d been sorely tempted to go to his own funeral, but life as he’d known it was over. A clean break had been for the best.