by Kaylea Cross
Her being female made it even worse. Not to mention the risk of blowback that could be unleashed on an informer.
They had a list of other suspects as well, of course, their pictures all mapped out on the wall of their temporary “war room” here at Bagram, where she’d been since Agent Khan—Zaid, she corrected herself sternly—had escorted her and the others here right after the bombing.
Ridiculous, to think of him in any kind of formal way whatsoever after what had happened in her hotel room. She still couldn’t believe she’d kissed him like that, stunned by her immediate and visceral reaction to the feel and taste of him.
The intensity of it had taken her completely off guard. She blamed it on a moment of weakness, a combination of curiosity, desire and adrenaline that had momentarily destroyed her common sense and objectivity.
While she was embarrassed about her lapse in judgment, she wouldn’t go so far as to wish it hadn’t happened. That kiss had been the most romantic, erotic of her life, and it had woken a kind of yearning inside her that she’d never felt before. But that’s as far as things could go between them, and she’d have to make that clear to Zaid the next chance she had to speak to him in private.
The door to the war room opened and several Afghan military commanders walked in in full uniform. Colonel Shah and General Nasar. Their units had been assisting Jaliya’s team with the investigation into the bombing, as well as searching for leads on The Jackal.
Shah was as rigid as ever in his bearing. He took one look at the wall they’d constructed and began demanding information about the bombing investigation.
Jaliya complied, mentally gritting her teeth at the disdain in the man’s eyes as he listened to her. When she finished he conferred with David. Behind him, General Nasar spoke in a low voice to two of his men. He oversaw the operations of the NIU and had just returned from the site of the bombing in Kabul with an explosives team.
He didn’t say much, preferring to observe and come to his own conclusions during meetings and briefings, and only offering his opinion if asked. Jaliya had worked with him several times on various things during this deployment. The DEA and other American assets frequently worked with him and his units in investigations and on operations.
Turning from Shah, her boss shook Nasar’s hand. “General. Thank you for coming.”
Nasar nodded and stood beside her to peruse the board, his hands clasped behind his back and his feet braced apart in parade rest position. Even in this casual setting, he was ever the soldier, his uniform and grooming impeccable, and his men were the same. He had a calmer, quieter demeanor than Shah.
“You’ll note we’ve just added a new face to our list of suspects,” David said to Shah and Nasar.
“Is this a joke?” Shah demanded, his flinty gaze cutting between her and David.
“No, it’s not,” she answered, tamping down the anger surging inside her. Did he seriously think they would make this up for fun?
Nasar made a sound of acknowledgment but didn’t speak, still studying the photos on the board. Nine of them. A damn sight fewer than the twenty-seven they’d started with a few weeks ago, but still not narrow enough.
“All the threads we’ve gathered since the hotel bombing seem to lead back to him,” Jaliya told the men, pointing at the police chief. “And we’ve managed to interview two men who claim to have proof of his involvement with The Jackal. Our legal team is working on putting together a case against him right now.”
“The whole thing is ridiculous,” Shah snapped. “He’s no more The Jackal than I am,” he said of the police chief.
“Until we can prove that, he stays on the board,” Jaliya said, steel in her voice. Sod him if he didn’t like it. She and her team were being thorough.
“It’s an insult,” Shah said, anger burning in his gaze.
Nasar turned his head and regarded her with his dark, deep-set eyes. He was one of the handful of high-ranking Afghan military officials who didn’t seem to look down on her because of her gender, but she had no illusions that he liked working with her. “You have someone willing to testify against The Jackal?”
She cleared her throat. “Not yet.” A wrinkle she was trying to iron out.
Both men had talked of having proof to indict The Jackal, yet neither of them could be persuaded to go so far as to give sworn statements or testify in court. Things worked very differently over here compared to in the U.S. A legal team was hard at work gathering enough evidence on The Jackal’s crimes so that when he was identified and captured, they could extradite him to the States to face charges there.
Nasar nodded once, his response telling her he wasn’t the least bit surprised, then turned his attention back to the board. She had the feeling that he’d already memorized every name and face on it. “A very serious accusation you’re placing on him,” he said of the chief of special police.
Shah folded his arms and gave her a hard stare.
“Yes. But there’s too much evidence to ignore his involvement on some level. At this point he’s our lead suspect,” she answered calmly.
Out of the corner of her eye she caught sight of someone approaching the glass door to her right. Zaid and Agent Hamilton.
Her cheeks heated. When they entered the room she nodded at them by way of acknowledgment and quickly went back to studying the board while Nasar and Shah spoke to her and her boss.
The lack of progress was frustrating everybody.
Try as she might to be one hundred percent focused on the discussion at hand, part of her remained intensely aware of Zaid standing behind her and slightly to her right. It unsettled her. No matter how she tried she couldn’t forget he was there. One hot kiss and her body had become a Zaid radar.
“I’ve heard enough. Until you have something more solid on a man of his position than mere suspicion, leave me to oversee my men,” Shah said.
He’d just spun on his heel when Nasar spoke up. “I think Agent Rabani and her team are conducting a rather thorough investigation.”
Shah snorted and walked out, and Jaliya couldn’t help but smile at Nasar for the show of support. “Thank you.”
He shrugged. “An intelligent man can see that.” He and the other men left with David for another meeting on base, and Jaliya breathed out a silent sigh of relief when the door shut behind them. At least now she could relax her guard a little, without her boss and the others around.
Although nervous butterflies stirred in the pit of her stomach with Zaid so close. “Need me to go over any of that with you guys?” she asked him and Hamilton.
“No, I think we’re good,” Hamilton said. “I’m gonna follow them and listen in on the meeting with the NIU staff, so I’ll see you later,” he said to Zaid, and left.
Jaliya was torn about him leaving. Part of her was glad to have this chance to talk to Zaid in private, set things straight between them. The other was nervous as hell at being alone with him again.
Zaid stayed where he was, perusing the board one more time before settling that hot hazel gaze on her. “You find out anything more about the target of the bombing?”
He wasn’t going to like it. She didn’t like it either. “All the signs point to it being an attack on our team. Someone had apparently been asking about us while we were at breakfast in the lobby several hours earlier.”
“Casing the place and trying to lock down your location.”
She nodded. “Seems that way. They must have thought we were still in the building.”
He eyed the board once more. “Looks like your team is making good progress with the investigation.”
“We hope so.” She really should talk to him about that kiss.
To buy her a few moments to work up her courage, she fiddled with some paperwork spread out on the long table beneath the board. Zaid stepped closer, standing near enough that she could feel his body heat licking along her side.
Without looking at him she opened a drawer and pulled out a stack of files she had to go thro
ugh, all too aware of the way he watched her. “You’re distracting me,” she muttered and glanced up at him, annoyed that she couldn’t concentrate with him around.
A slow grin spread across his lips. “Am I?”
“Very much so.” And that was a first.
“I’d say I’m sorry, but then I’d be lying.”
Fighting a smile, she picked up another file from the desk and attempted to kick her brain back into gear. If her team truly had been the intended target today, it meant someone knew not only about their movements, but their involvement with The Jackal investigation as well. And every time they left the relative safety of Bagram, they did so with targets painted on their backs. They couldn’t afford to waste any time in finding the man responsible.
Zaid took another step closer, stopping mere inches from her back. Jaliya’s spine snapped taut, every nerve ending in her body going haywire at his nearness. He was so close she could hear the slow, steady breaths he took. And when she inhaled, she got a breath of his clean, slightly spicy, masculine scent.
“What are you doing?” she managed without turning around, her voice a little breathless. Besides crowding me and ruining my concentration. If he thought they could pick up where they’d left off in the hotel, he was dead wrong.
“Reading over your shoulder,” he answered softly, his breath caressing the sensitive skin of her cheek with every word.
Her nipples went rock hard and the muscles low in her belly clenched. Time to go. But first, she really had to make things clear. “About the other day,” she began, unable to look at him. Four days ago, to be exact.
“I can’t stop thinking about it.”
At his low, impassioned words, her brain hit delete on the speech she’d been about to give him. The one about how things couldn’t progress between them, for various reasons, blah, blah. Gone. She had nothing. Could only gape at him as every detail of the kiss came back to her in vivid color.
He laughed softly at her. “Okay, guess you weren’t expecting me to say that.”
“Um, no,” she mumbled, scrambling to get her thoughts together. Reasons. She had reasons why they couldn’t get involved. “Just to be clear, I won’t sleep with you.”
He jerked his head back slightly in surprise and raised his eyebrows. “I don’t remember asking you to.”
Bollocks. She was making a total ass of herself. “I just…” She cleared her throat again, her cheeks burning. “I thought I should tell you that up front. In case you thought otherwise.” Because, reasons. Reasons that were hard to think of when he was standing right here in front of her, all hard-bodied, alpha male sex appeal.
He watched her closely for a long moment, a slight frown pulling the dark slashes of his eyebrows together. “Is there someone else?”
It took her a moment to understand what he was asking. Did she already have a guy. For a second she thought about lying, to make it easier to put distance between them. But she couldn’t do it. “No. You?”
He shook his head. “No.”
Why the hell did that make her so happy? “Do you date much?” It was embarrassing, how few words she could string together into a coherent sentence at the moment. She was totally fishing, wanting to find out more about him and maybe see if she could discern whether he was online Zaid.
He lifted a shoulder. “Haven’t for a while. I even tried the whole online dating thing for a bit.”
Her heart drummed fast against her ribs. This was the perfect opening for her to dig a little. “But it never worked out?”
“No.” His gaze dropped to her mouth before coming back to her eyes, making her lips tingle. “There was someone I thought I had a real connection with a few months back, and then she disappeared.”
She hid a wince, feeling half-naked under that stare. “Why, what happened?”
He gave her a funny look. “You really want to know about this?”
“Yes.”
He relented and shrugged. “I dunno. She was overseas all the time on business, so we’d never met in person. We set up a meeting for when she came into town and then she cancelled on me the night before.”
Oh, shit, he was talking about her. He was online Zaid. The blood drained from her face.
He cocked his head, his frown deepening as he watched her. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” Whirling around, she frantically fiddled with the files, trying to look like she was busy organizing them when in fact her brain was in full panic mode. What now? “Were you upset?”
“A little, yeah. I thought we clicked. Didn’t see it coming when she bailed on me like that.”
“Maybe you came on too strong. Too macho or something, and scared her off.” Dammit, she must have completely misunderstood his meaning in that email. Maybe he’d been teasing her, because the man she’d come to know would never have said it to be offensive.
“Too macho?” He sounded insulted. “I don’t think so.”
Now she felt awful, both for taking his comment the wrong way, and for cancelling on him like that. After getting to know him better over here, she realized that Zaid wasn’t chauvinistic or controlling. But she didn’t have the guts to come clean here and now.
“I’ve got a meeting to get to.” She gathered up a couple of the files and took her sidearm out of a drawer.
“With who?”
“A source. He says he’s got some more info for me.”
“And you have to meet him in person?” He followed her to the door. Yes, she was in full retreat mode, and didn’t care. She needed time to think, to regroup.
“At this point, yes. I don’t trust anything someone tells me over the phone or in a message. I need to look a source in the eye to know if they’re feeding me a line of bullshit or not.”
Five steps down the hallway, her phone rang. Her boss. “Rabani speaking,” she answered.
“You’re gonna have to postpone your meeting,” David said, his voice tight with frustration.
“Why, what’s going on?”
“Our number one suspect just got taken out. His vehicle blew up when he left the station about fifteen minutes ago. It was surgical. Nothing else around it was damaged except for a few windows blowing out on other cars parked along the street.”
Jaliya stopped, rubbed at her forehead. Another targeted bombing. “You’re sure?”
“Yeah, and since I doubt very much that The Jackal would blow himself up, we’re at another dead end.”
Oh, God, they’d have to go right back to square one again. “Dammit.”
He grunted in agreement. “Meet me out front of my office in ten minutes. We’re heading out to investigate.”
“All right.” She tucked her phone away and faced Zaid, who was watching her intently. “Our police chief suspect just got blown up on his way home from work.”
Zaid’s expression darkened. “So what now?”
“I go to Kabul, to try and find out what the hell is going on.”
“You taking protection with you?”
She paused. “I assume so. David will handle it.”
“I’ll go.”
He’d been acting overprotective since the bombing. Texting her to check on her. It was starting to annoy her a little, even though the sentiment behind it lit a warm glow inside her. She liked knowing that he cared. “No need. I’m sure David’s got it covered.”
He wasn’t listening, already edging away from her back down the hall. “Gimme ten minutes. I’ll go find us some backup.” Before she could argue further, he turned and jogged away.
****
SA Reid Prentiss’s stomach dropped as soon as he saw the email from his ex sitting in his inbox. He fought back an aggravated sigh and leaned a forearm on the table in the corner of the storeroom where the team had set up the laptop for everyone to use.
Change of plans, it read. Even though he could already guess what it would say, he opened it.
His jaw tightened when he began reading. As per fucking usual, Sarah had screwed with
the timeline, and he had no doubt that it was on purpose. Last night he’d finally managed to get her to agree to a Skype call between him and their daughter at oh-nine-hundred Eastern time, so there would be no miscommunication, no chance of him missing it.
My parents have invited us over for a family get together before brunch, so we have to leave here before nine a.m. Sorry.
His jaw ached from the pressure of his teeth grinding together. Bullshit you are. Like she hadn’t known about it weeks ago? This was par for the course with her. Had been since the day he’d left the marriage.
With a glance at the digital clock on the screen he mentally calculated the eight-and-a-half hour time difference back to D.C. The call he’d fought to set up in advance so he could at least spend some time with his daughter on Christmas Day would now be only a few minutes long—if he was lucky.
Anger and frustration swelled inside him, pushing his mood from bad to worse. He took a deep breath, deleted the email and opened Skype to place the call.
There was dick all he could do about his ex and the way she kept interfering with his attempts to maintain a relationship with their daughter. None of that was Autumn’s fault, however. If all he got was a couple of minutes, he’d have to make the most of them.
His heart beat faster as he waited for someone to answer. Had Sarah assumed he hadn’t gotten the email and decided to leave early? It would be just like her, using it as an excuse to punish him.
An image popped up on screen. Autumn’s excited face appeared, looking far older than nine years old. “Dad! Hey.”
And just like that, all his anger vanished. One look at his baby girl, and all was right in his world. “Hey, sweetheart. Merry Christmas.”
“Merry Christmas to you too.” She leaned closer to the screen, a frown pulling her dark brown eyebrows together. “What time is it there?”
“Just before five in the afternoon.”
“Are you going to get a turkey dinner there?”
“I think so. We’ve been looking forward to it all day.”
Her happy expression faded as she gazed back at him through the computer screen. “You look tired.”