“No. Well, not just that. Perhaps the investigation brought things to a head, but I’ve been overdue to step back and take a look at my life for some time now. Several events conspired to force my hand. Don’t be sorry. I’m certainly not—because that investigation was the reason I met you.”
She downed her wine in three successive gulps. “More wine?” she asked, beginning to turn back inside.
He set the glass aside. “No. I’m going to need to have all my wits about me tonight.”
Her “why” was muffled when he moved in—his hands on her hips, lips brushing hers—softly at first, and then with more command as he pulled her closer.
She let him—that was what would amaze her later on. She let him because he was warm and familiar yet exciting and mysterious. She let him because, whatever else she didn’t know about him—and there was a lot she didn’t know—she knew him in essentials. Down deep, she saw him so clearly: brave, clever, strong, confident, passionate. And hot.
His hands slid up her sides so his palms brushed her breasts. She gasped, and he plundered her opened mouth.
***
Heat shot through him when that little whimper escaped her throat. His hands moved from her sides around to her back—one hand grasped the back of her blouse, one hand tangled in her hair. Always acutely aware of her, he watched her eyes slide shut, felt her hands outline his shoulders, and clasp around his neck. He didn’t need the wine; he was drunk with her. She reached behind her, fumbling for the door handle, and he nudged her back inside. Control—he had to keep control even though his mind and body wrestled each other in a desperate struggle for restraint.
She backed away, clinging to his hand as she meandered toward the bedroom.
“Are you sure?” he asked.
“I…I’m sure about tonight. I can’t think any farther ahead than that.”
“Then that’s what I’ll take.” He ran a finger down the line of her breastbone. “And then, perhaps, you’ll let me take a little more.” He undid the top two buttons of her linen blouse and flipped open the catch on the front of her bra, slipping his fingers inside to cup her breast. He thrilled to the sound of her sigh when he rubbed a thumb across her nipple, and marveled at the contrast between his tanned, brown arm and the ivory of her chest. How different they were, and yet how right they seemed together. He backed her to the bed as he pushed her top over her shoulders and down, and laid her in front of him, one knee on the bed between her legs. The linen bound her arms to her side. Fortunate that, as it let him look and touch as much as he liked. He spread the blouse and bra apart then traced her body with his fingers before leaning over her to trace the same path with his lips. She squirmed, trying to get her arms free, but he shook his head. “If you touch me now, Elizabeth, I’m liable to take you apart. I want you that badly, and I’ve wanted you for that long.”
“Since Virginia?”
“Since the first moment I held you in my arms on a dance floor in Budapest.”
“I…I didn’t know.”
“You know now.” He stood, rucked up her skirt, and smoothed his hands from her ankles to her knees and beyond. His hands wandered over her inner thighs and up to her hips before drawing down her panties. He stared down at her, his icy blue gaze intense. Then he knelt down, drew her toward him and with great tenderness, he used his mouth on her.
***
The room spun as she cried out in surprise. He kept on, bringing heat and the temporary insanity of desire, murmuring unintelligible words against her skin. Her body arched involuntarily, and she almost sobbed when he took his mouth away.
“You’re as slippery as dew on the grass,” he said as he replaced lips and tongue with fingers. He ran his nose over where the heat and urgency coalesced under her skin. He smiled up at her, a wicked, fiery smile. “And you smell just as sweet.”
Her breath burst from her in a groan.
“Yes, darling, call to me.” He kissed the juncture of her hip and her leg as his hands worked some kind of dark magic in her. “Come to me.” He rubbed a stubbly cheek against her hipbone. Then, almost delicately, he bit it.
She erupted under him.
When she was able to open her eyes, he was staring at her in fascination. “Beautiful,” he whispered.
He stood, drawing her skirt down until it made a puddle of linen on the floor. She watched him simply because she couldn’t tear her eyes away. He stared back, absolutely still, watching her, like a panther watching its prey.
“Take your clothes off,” she commanded, still gasping. “I want…”
He complied, pulling his polo shirt over his head and doffing the khaki shorts, before leaning over her on the bed. “You want…?”
“I want…”
“I want, too.” He levered her hips up, a guiding arm underneath her, and entered in one swift stroke.
***
Another cry from her, and he closed his eyes, forcing himself to stop. Months of physical deprivation and longing threatened to overwhelm him. “Elizabeth, dear God. Elizabeth.”
She reached up to draw him close. “Now, you come to me.”
He rode her in a blind delight, roused still further by her ability to keep pace with him. The world narrowed to the two of them, and as he went over the threshold into oblivion, he pulled her over with him.
I’m not pleased with this turn of events. This isn’t what I wanted, but all these things you set in motion, starting way back in Prague, have led us to this point. You’ve forced me into this. You’ve brought Elizabeth into this mess. Can’t you see what you’ve done? I don’t want to kill her, but I have to. She knows, she knows. And if she puts her head together with the FBI, she’ll know it’s me. I had to get her away from her notes and her files, and that bitch she pals around with at the Hoover Building. Keep her busy, keep her occupied. Keep her thinking that the answer is out there, not here inside the walls of Langley. I needed a decoy. And I found one—you.
Chapter 26
“Arise, Sleeping Beauty.” Darcy leaned across the bed, brushing her hair from her face. Her eyes opened suddenly, full wakefulness—a quirk he’d learned about her over the last several days. It charmed him. No sleepy, slow-eyed mornings for his Elizabeth. She woke instantly, ready to face the day.
“Is that coffee I smell?” She rolled over and stretched her arms to the ceiling.
“Yes, ma’am. I brought you a cup.”
Pushing up on elbows, she grinned at him. “My hero.” The smile turned sultry.
His heart started pounding, but he squelched desire beneath a laugh. “Don’t tempt me, darling. We can’t spend all day in bed. I’ve got a mission for us today.”
“A mission? You’re kidding!” She flopped back on her pillow. “I don’t want to think about work. I’m on vacation. Sort of.”
“It’s not an agency mission.”
“Then what is it?” She sat up and took the coffee cup he offered her. Sipped. “God, this is good.”
“Nothing like the fresh-roasted, local stuff.”
“I agree.” She set the cup aside and crossed her arms over her knees. “So what’s the mission?”
“It’s not what. It’s where.”
“Huh?”
“Let’s take a run. I’ll fill you in.” He jerked back the covers and took her hand to pull her to her feet.
“Here’s your hat, what’s your hurry?”
Laughing, he turned to the door. “See you downstairs.”
They set a leisurely pace, barely making indentations on the hard sand under their feet. Although it was right at dawn, they’d each worked up a sweat in the tropical morning air.
“Ok,” Elizabeth reminded him, “so, what—no, where are we going?”
“Barbados.”
“Barbados? How long will we be gone? I can’t ju
st pick up and go away with you, Darcy. I have to be here to—”
“Just ’til tomorrow, maybe the next day.”
“What’s there?”
“It isn’t what’s there…it’s who.”
“First it was where and now it’s who.”
He broke stride. “I’m not saying this right.”
When they slowed, she took his hand. That one gesture brought him such joy. He squeezed her hand and smiled at her. She. Just her presence gave him hope, gave him courage.
“Did you watch the Ramsgate debriefing interviews? Read the reports?”
“I did.”
“So you know MI6 found Jirina Sobota. Alive.”
She nodded.
“We’re going to see her today.”
“She’s on Barbados?”
“Yes.”
“Mm, okay.”
“There’s more…” He dropped her hand and looked out to sea.
She took a moment to catch her breath, arms akimbo, watching him while he watched the horizon and concentrated on something beyond the sea and sky. “William Darcy,” she said in a gentle voice. “You can trust me.”
He turned back. “I know I can. That’s why we’re doing this.” He led her to a rock and sat down with a weary sigh.
“You have to understand: Jirina isn’t just an asset. Not to me.”
“Yes, I know. You feel responsible.”
“I do, even more so because…”
“There’s something else to this, isn’t there? Something besides a professional relationship.”
“Yes, but not the way you’re probably thinking. She and I weren’t romantically involved—ever. We never even met before the Brits rescued her. She was Wickham’s lover, and that’s still a hard thing to articulate even after all this time because…” He blew out a breath. “Jirina Sobota is my half sister.”
Elizabeth’s eyes widened. Finally, in a whisper because her voice failed her, she spoke. “I see.”
“I sure didn’t. Not until it was way too late.”
“How did you find out?”
“It’s a long, convoluted story.”
“I’ve got nothing but time today.”
He face broke into a quick, sad smile. He kissed her to fortify his own resolve.
“When I came back from Prague, I spent all that time being debriefed. While they had me captive at Langley, I got roped into some of those lectures at The Farm, like the one where you saw me for the first time.”
“I remember.”
“I bet. I wasn’t myself really during that period. I’m sorry I was rude to you.”
“You were rude, and not just to me. But there were extenuating circumstances, and I realize that now. In essentials, where it counts, I believe you are pretty much the way you’ve always been.”
“That’s a kind way to say it.” He rested his arms on his knees. “The debriefing was arduous, and afterward, I went back to my parents’ house in Baltimore to recuperate, rest a little, get away from Langley. My mother was gone, spending the winter in Florida the way she does, and I had the house to myself. I rumbled around, searching through boxes in the attic, old things Mom had packed away. It was just past the holidays, and I was missing my father.”
“When did he pass away?”
“It’s been almost seven years ago now. He had a heart attack. It was unexpected. I was actually in the States when it happened, but there was no time to say goodbye. I guess I was trying to do that by going through his things. He and I, we had a…tumultuous relationship.”
“Why?”
“He never wanted me to join the military, but I was set on the Air Force. Before I went in, he wanted me to join the CIA, but afterward, he suggested I go into the family business. I considered it for all of half a second. It wasn’t for me, even though a part of me wanted to please him. In the end, I opted for the CIA as a compromise of sorts. They recruited me pretty hard, and I felt the need to…break away, be my own man.”
“I know what it’s like to live in the shadow of a parent. My dad was larger than life to me—more an idea than a person.”
“We all want to make our own mark.”
“True.”
“Anyway, I knew he had traveled a lot in his career. Darcy Shipping conveys, among other things, glass for automobiles, airplanes, and the like, so he’d been all over the world. If you’ve done your research, you know he lost his CIA contracts after Playa de Giron.”
She nodded.
“And in 1962, he was in Czechoslovakia for a time. If you watched the Ramsgate tapes back at Langley, you know the rest of his story while he was there. It’s Jirina’s story.”
“But on the tapes you said Jirina’s father found out about her when she was fourteen. Why didn’t he tell you about her right after he found out himself?”
“I think perhaps he planned to after he got her to the West, but he died before he could make that happen.”
“Does your mother know?”
“No, I don’t believe so. Their marriage wasn’t the best, especially in those last years. They were separated off and on, so he wouldn’t have confided in her, and I doubt she’s found out on her own.”
“So if he was gone and she didn’t know, how did you get wind of it? How did you even begin to suspect?”
“When I was home, those weeks after the Prague debriefing, I found a safe deposit key in his things. As you know, no intelligence officer can resist a mystery like a key with no lock. It took some doing, but I found the bank, and as his heir, I had access to the safe deposit box. Inside was a letter from Jirina’s uncle; he wanted her off his hands. Her mother had always been trouble for him, ensconced in the government as he was. And Jirina, the rebellious artist’s daughter, wasn’t an asset to a man who was trying to climb the ladder of the political elite.”
“Poor Jirina.”
“Yes, she was telling us the truth. We knew that her father was American from our intelligence sources. We just didn’t know he was my father too.”
“How did you confirm?”
“Our ambassador showed Jirina’s family a picture of my dad. Jirina also had a picture Dad had given her when he’d visited—a picture of him and her mother together. When he returned from Czechoslovakia that last time, he had been gathering evidence of paternity, including tissue, blood, and serology typing. All the results were in the safe deposit box with the letter. He was trying to build a case so the government would be more likely to give her exit papers. After comparing the photos, we compared his blood and tissue test results with Jirina’s, and voila—instant sibling.
“I was prepared to squawk until the agency agreed to keep her parentage compartmentalized information, but it wasn’t much of a fight. It must have been an awkward situation for them—a young woman, daughter of a disgraced civilian contractor, former asset, sister to a current agent, placed in a Communist government official’s household? Yeah, awkward at the very least. As for me, I was adamant Wickham not find out. I wanted him as far away from her as possible. So, I brought her to a private villa my father owned on Barbados. She has round-the-clock nursing and supervision and an agency-vetted psychiatrist. I sneak away to visit her when I can.”
“That’s why you were off the grid before Budapest,” Elizabeth muttered to herself.
“Found out about that, did you?” He tugged her up by the hand and began the walk back to his villa. “I have to warn you, Elizabeth, she still isn’t well. The KGB broke her. She’s docile and sweet, but she coped by dissociating. As her brother, I’m her anchor to reality. She’s fixated on me as her rescuer even though, to my shame, I had precious little to do with it.”
“You’re making sure she’s cared for. That counts as rescuing in my book.”
“I’d like very much to in
troduce the two of you. For a couple of reasons. One, I’ve seen how you were with Johanna Bodnar, how she came out of her shell. I know it’s not the same kind of illness, but I hope that, over time, maybe you could help Jirina too, even if it’s just a little bit. And two, I want to share this part of my life with you. It’s a painful piece of my history to be sure, but Jirina’s important to me. She’s my only sibling. I’ve spoken with her, and she wants to meet you.”
“I’m honored, Darcy. Truly. I’d love to meet her.”
“One more thing—when we get there, you should call her by the English form of her name. She wanted to change it, to embrace her new life—or so the psychiatrist said. I thought it was a good idea because her English name would help safeguard her anonymity on Barbados.”
“Oh, okay.”
“Her mother named her after our father.”
“So I should call her…”
“Georgina.”
Chapter 27
Darcy helped Elizabeth into the small plane and turned to speak to the mechanic on the ground. They were on an isolated runway, miles from the small airport in Scarborough. Elizabeth saw a bill exchange hands and a handshake before Darcy climbed into the cockpit and began flipping switches in preparation for takeoff.
“Off the grid again?”
“I paid him extra. If I don’t call in, he’ll give the authorities a flight plan so they’ll come looking for us.” He grinned. “But don’t worry, darling, I’m an excellent pilot.”
“Good to know.”
A short time later, they touched down on an airstrip much like the one they left on Tobago. An abandoned Jeep was waiting with the keys inside. Darcy certainly had the connections to get what he wanted, when he wanted it. After several minutes on a gravel road, they turned up little more than a well-worn path of tire tracks. After a steep uphill climb, they broke through the trees, and Elizabeth had to swallow a gasp.
The house—no, the mansion—was beautifully nestled within a grove of trees. She could barely glimpse its columns and verandas. The roofline was gently sloped with red clay tiles, and the gardens were lush with poinciana, palm, and various flowering shrubs. Darcy rumbled to a stop beside a guard shack, and a burly man in sunglasses and a uniform of khaki shorts and camp shirt stepped out.
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