Limbo Man

by Blair Bancroft

  “. . . thousands of lives are at stake, maybe a whole city. So stop playing games and concentrate on the problem, instead of making like some sex maniac without a care in the world.”

  Bozhe moi! Some Homeland Security whore had to point out his duty. He was in even worse shape than he’d thought. He pushed himself up out of the chair and stalked to the window, deliberately turning his back on the siren who was surely hand-picked for his downfall. What now? His head was so messed up he couldn’t be certain of anything except the enormity of the disaster that loomed over them all. Thousands of live at stake. She had that right.

  But just because he and Blondie both wanted to keep an antique nuke from killing thousands of innocent civilians didn’t put the two of them on the same side. Glasnost and perestroika were almost as dead as the old Soviet Union. The chilly tentacles of the Cold War were creeping back, sometimes, as in Georgia, exploding into the heat of invasion.

  Losing ten nuclear bombs was a never-ending humiliation. Added to that, the knife-twist of the Americans locating three of them. One more than he had found.

  He needed the Americans’ help. Yet his mission was so secret he could never ask for it.

  Inwardly, Sergei winced as he considered how well he’d done on his own. Half-killed and thrown into the East River was no part of success. And yet, if he could remember what was said at that meeting . . . or if he ever got to the meeting.

  Blondie was standing beside him, blue eyes wide with anxiety, her patrician forehead wrinkled in a frown. His thoughts had wandered off, and it was her job to care, to track any wayward wisps of thought or speculation like a bloodhound on the scent. Or did she have personal concerns about the man she called Nick? What hadn’t she told him about the time they spent in the old house on the island?

  “Nick?”

  He couldn’t do it alone. He’d already proved that at an almost fatal cost. Maybe Blondie could be persuaded . . .? It wasn’t as if there were any handy alternatives.

  She had been put into place to acquire the information locked in his head, to secure his cooperation for the Americans. So why couldn’t he turn the scenario around? After all . . . women were such fools.

  Sergei smiled and took her arm. “Come. Let us explore our prison.”

  “Nick!” She planted her feet, jerking him to a halt. “We’re having a serious discussion here. You can’t just slither off—”

  “I have heard enough to know you must pamper me.” He brushed a kiss over the lines wrinkling her brow. “Kindness is the only magic that will unlock the secrets in my head.” He bent his head still farther, testing her resolve. “You must be nice to me, yes?” His lips brushed hers.

  She stomped on his foot and stalked out, slamming the door behind her.

  Chapter 9

  Pizza. A heavenly smell. Vee drew a deep breath as she opened the resort’s stainless steel oven to check on broad shelves filled with everybody’s favorite food. She had spent the last few hours reaching a first-name basis with each of the other agents in the safe house, and now she was helping warm the contents of the stacked boxes two of the guards had brought back from the nearest town.

  All in all, not a bad feeling for a girl who waked to her own nine mil being waved under her nose less than twenty-four hours ago. Security, food, a new identity. Less than an hour ago Bill Grimes had handed her all the necessary papers for Mark and Kim Wilson of Oklahoma City. Drivers’ licenses, Social Security cards, even a shiny new credit card. Great. She’d just married the Russian mafia.

  Vee had managed a hearty thanks, stowing the papers in her shoulder bag along with the bulging envelope of cash she’d been given before their ill-fated drive down Thirty-fourth Street.

  Nick was still sulking, and she’d left him to it. Just because Agent Tingley had made it clear that her orders were to do anything necessary to gain the mystery man’s cooperation didn’t mean that—

  Yes, it did. He’d made a pass, and she’d stomped on his foot. Great going, Frost. Your country needs you, and you blew it.

  Too bad. Not even for the good old U S of A was Vee Frost going to be an easy lay. Particularly not in front of eight flint-eyed witnesses. If there was seduction to be done, she would initiate it, thank you very much. And, besides, it was Sergei who tried to kiss her, not Nick. And she didn’t like Sergei.

  But I am Sergei. You, however, may call me Seryozha. An odd statement, now that she thought about it. Seryozha was the Russian diminutive of Sergei. A nickname used by close friends and family. His mother would have called him Seryozha. His girlfriend, his wife. Did he have a wife? He was certainly old enough to have a wife and a whole slew of children. Not remembering them didn’t mean they didn’t exist.

  And wasn’t that enough to make her forget the warming pizza! Dammit! Vee grabbed two oven mitts and started flopping the slightly over-browned pizzas back into their cardboard boxes. Rick, the guard who had volunteered to put away the groceries—also bought in town—stacked up three boxes and headed for the dining room. Vee followed with two more.

  “Hey, Vee, it’s about time,” called Steve, the guard with a blond brush-cut almost as short as Nick’s fuzz. “Thought you and Rick had decided to keep ’em all to yourselves.”

  The men had shoved several square tables into one long communal dining space. As they hurried to find seats, Vee looked for Nick and surprised an odd look flickering across his face. Because she’d deigned to look at him for the first time since the abrupt end to their conversation that afternoon? Or was he as confused as she about the next step in their relationship. Friends? Enemies? Wary partners? Lovers? No description worked. Was she as much a mystery to Nick, Vee wondered, as he was to her?

  Nick took a seat at one end of the long table, with Agent Grimes at the other. An interesting placement. Maybe Nick didn’t care to sit next to the Feds. As Vee set the pizza boxes down, she noticed the men had carefully left one seat vacant, the one to Nick’s right.

  Okay, no need to be subtle. They all knew why she was here.

  Right. She was Nick’s personal bodyguard, his minder. Of course she belonged on his right hand.

  She was fooling nobody but herself. She was Nick’s assigned companion. Sergei Tokarev’s pacifier, his whore. Facts didn’t matter. Only the thoughts firmly planted in the agents’ heads. So suck it up, Frost. You accepted this gig. There had even been moments when she wondered what making love with Nick would be like. And then she’d remember the leering Sergei. Oh, hell.

  With a magician’s flourish, Vee opened the pizza boxes at her end of the table, and the men dug in. Two guards on patrol outside, so they were eight around the table. Some eyed Vee’s improvised hot sauce with suspicion. Others grabbed the bottle of olive oil mixed with red pepper flakes with enthusiasm. “Did you make this, Vee?” Stan Kessel asked.

  “I had plenty of time while they were getting the pizza. That’s how they do it in Europe, and I found I liked it.”

  “Not bad.” Stan nodded. “They do this in Russia, Tokarev?”

  “In some places.” Sergei regarded the raised eyebrows, the hands arrested in mid-air, with mock surprise. “Gentlemen, I may forget many things, but not how to eat pizza.”

  Vee came close to choking on a pepperoni. She coughed, and Nick patted her on the back. His hand glided up to cup the back of her neck. He leaned in. “You did not tell me you could cook. I keep you, I think.”

  “Sergei Tokarev speaks with a heavy accent,” Agent Grimes challenged from the opposite end of the table. “So who, or what, does that make you?”

  “Sergei must have been a slow learner,” Nick returned easily. “His subconscious was not. The new me does much better.”

  Once again, jaws froze in mid-chew, eyes widened as they gaped at him. Vee felt an annoying surge of pride. The blasted man had actually come up with an explanation for his remarkable transformation.

  Bill Grimes turned to Vee. “You’re sure this guy is Tokarev?”

  “All I know is that Agent Wade
Tingley told me he was Tokarev. I didn’t meet him until well after the beating. Tingley showed me a ‘before’ picture, but his face is so battered I can only see a vague resemblance.”

  “So you really don’t know?”

  “I doubt your bosses would be making such a fuss over him if they weren’t certain. Interpol had his fingerprints on file.”

  Agent Grimes gave a curt nod. “Seems damn peculiar,” he muttered. As he reached for another slice of pizza, the other men ducked their heads and returned to what was on their plates.

  Bill Grimes’s cell phone rang. He snapped to attention. “Yes, sir. I understand. I’ll inform my men.” He looked at Vee. “Agent Tingley is ten minutes out. He’ll be taking over as Agent in Charge.”

  Oh, shit! She’d by-passed the chain of command, and good old Dad had called her on it, putting Tingley back in the loop. A Tingley who was going to be breathing fire.

  Vee forced herself to chew and swallow her last bite of pizza, even though it seemed determined to form a lump in her throat. She stood and began to gather up the now-empty pizza boxes. She could use a few moments alone in the kitchen.

  Which didn’t happen. Nick followed close behind. “Tell me about Tingley.”

  Head drooping, Vee leaned on the stainless steel counter. “He’s Homeland Security. He found me in the FBI’s Sarasota office, recruited me, sent me to New York to be your minder.”

  “Gave you the orders to do whatever was necessary to find out what I knew. Lie, cheat, whore?”

  “Yes.” She kept her eyes fixed on the vinyl tile floor.

  “Tingley was running the show when we made the run to Teterboro?”

  “Yes.”

  “So you don’t trust him.”

  Vee thought about it. “I got the impression he was totally devoted to his job, that protecting the U. S. was his sole life’s work. That he’s a genuine, flag-waving warrior against terrorism. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have taken the job. But that doesn’t mean his office is squeaky clean, that his second-in-command is trustworthy. Or his secretary or his second’s secretary. Or the guy who expected to be promoted and wasn’t. Or the cleaning crew. Or the wife or girlfriend, or even the one-night stand. It might have been your people, but that wasn’t a chance I could take. So I cut Tingley out. Evidently, dear old Dad decided to put him back in. Hopefully, with orders not to tell anyone where he was going.”

  “What’s he like?”

  “A cross between a prize fighter and a pit bull, and he’s going to come in raging. Maybe more like a bull who’s been gored a few times and wants to destroy everything in sight.”

  “Not a good time for political in-fighting.”

  “Good luck with telling him that.”

  Agent Grimes stuck his head around the kitchen door. “Everything okay in here?”

  “Vee expects Tingley to charge in like a wounded bull,” Nick offered in an easy manner, as if he and Grimes were long-time colleagues. “We must protect her, I think.”

  Not until Nick said her name did Vee realize she hadn’t heard him use it since . . . since they first settled in their seats on the Gulfstream. Odd. As was the look she’d seen on his face when one of the guards called to her as she brought the pizza from the kitchen. He couldn’t have forgotten. Could he?

  Who knew? Nick’s mind seemed to be jumping around faster than his accent. Call me Seryozha. And as they got off the plane, he’d been slow to answer to Nick.

  Not now. Tingley’s coming. Not now. But something was screwy, she knew it. Tingley. Vee steepled her fingers in front of her face and reminded herself she was a professional. She could take it.

  A peremptory knock sent Steve rushing to unbolt the double doors of carved wood. Agent Grimes broke off a low-voiced conversation with Nick to welcome the new top dog from DHS. After a brief introduction to Stan Kessel, Tingley fixed on Nick, inflicting a slow, deliberately insulting inspection from head to toe before he turned to Vee. “Agent Frost,” he snapped, “a moment in private. Lead the way.”

  Vee had already figured that one out. The small computer room for guests off the main lobby was close enough to the others that she wouldn’t feel isolated with Tingley. Not that he looked the way she expected. Instead of raging bull, he was more like a great menacing iceberg. It almost seemed as if his short gray-flecked hair was standing up in icy spikes.

  He followed her into the computer room, closing the door behind them with exaggerated care.

  In addition to pizza and groceries, the men who went to town had brought back a newspaper. Sergei snagged it before settling into an overstuffed chair in the lounge area, not more than eight feet from the computer room door. He unfolded the paper. Surprise. They were in Wyoming. He settled down to catch up on the news he’d missed while he was some mindless nobody called Nick.

  Tingley’s voice rose, the words indistinguishable, the tone as lashing as cat-o’-nine tails. Sergei’s fingers tightened on the edges of the newspaper. He stopped reading. Behind him, conversations faded as the other men in the room shamelessly eavesdropped. The only sound was the hiss and snap of logs in the lobby’s great stone fireplace. And Agent Tingley’s words, carrying clearly into the silent room.

  “You weren’t hired to investigate, girl. I didn’t ask you to think. I sure as hell didn’t tell you to run to papa at the first sign of trouble. You’re bait, Frost. Nothing but juicy blonde bait. Your job is to make nice, find out what he knows, no matter how you do it. Is that cl—”

  The door slammed open with a satisfying thud. Sergei left it open. Let them all watch if they wanted to. Tingley was on his feet, looking remarkably like the cross between a boxer and a pit bull that Vee had described. She was sitting on one of the computer chairs, and he thought he caught a distinct flash of relief in her blue eyes before he turned his attention back to the boss creep from Homeland Security.

  “Never lose your temper, Tingley,” Sergei advised kindly. “It makes you vulnerable. Not one of us missed you abusing the agent who saved my life when your arrangements failed—”

  “Three of my men died!”

  “Because there was a leak, very likely in your office. No wonder Agent Frost cut you out. I would have asked Daddy to quarantine the lot of you. I don’t give a damn if you’re the rah-rah superpatriot of all times or maybe Father Frost’s best friend. I wouldn’t have let you come within a thousand miles of either of us.”

  When Tingley started to open his mouth, Sergei bared his teeth and held up his hand in the universal “stop” gesture. “Let’s remember that I’m the guy with vital information locked in his head. It’s not just Ms Frost who has to make nice with me. It’s all of you. I guarantee—repeat, guarantee—you will not get one crumb of information from me unless you treat Special Agent Frost with the respect she deserves. I’m only alive because of her. Do. You. Understand?”

  Tingley’s face had gone from overheated red to a green-tinged pallor. He managed a nod.

  “From now on, she doesn’t see you alone. You want to talk with her, you talk with both of us. Is that clear?” Again, the Homeland Security agent nodded.

  “Vee?” Sergei held out his hand. She shot out of her chair and grasped it. And to think that until someone had called out “Vee” when she brought in the pizza, he hadn’t even known her name. He was almost as surprised by his rush to her rescue as Tingley was.

  Silently, the crowd outside the door, with Agent Grimes at the forefront, parted to let them through. The men looked nearly as stunned as Tingley. Had they thought him an invalid with no teeth? A prisoner who wouldn’t dare?

  Well, hell. Surprise, surprise.

  When the door to their private sitting room clicked shut behind them, Vee withdrew her hand from his. She sank down on the burgundy leather couch and waved him to a seat beside her. “Okay,” she declared, her eyes holding his in as penetrating a stare as she’d ever turned on him, “what just happened in there?”

  Sergei summoned his innocent look. “I told Agent Tingley to mind his
manners?”

  “And quite magnificently.” Vee sighed. “I’m eternally grateful, but that’s not what I meant. “You certainly weren’t Nick, the beating victim, and you were a great deal more than Sergei, the arms dealer. You sounded more like my father in his better moments. You assumed command like an experienced general. You were the man in charge.”

  Sergei shrugged. “Tokarev operates independently most of the time. The Organizatsiya leaves him alone.”

  Vee leaped on his words. “And you know that how?”

  “I just know.” He’d done it again. She dazzled him, and he’d been careless.

  Vee shook her head. “You didn’t sound like a wiseguy, even a boss wiseguy.”

  “And how would you know what a wiseguy sounds like, my little Feeb from Florida? You have great experience with the mob, yes?”

  “Leave Sergei out of this,” Vee snapped. “He annoys me.”

  “But he also is me.”

  “Don’t remind me,” Vee muttered. Her shoulders stiffened, eyes sharpening as she switched back to interrogation mode.

  Mentally, Sergei applauded. Good girl.

  “When you were telling off Tingley,” Vee asked, “did you notice that even Agent Grimes didn’t interfere? Everybody froze, like you were the President or Vladimir Putin. Or an Avenging Angel from on High.” Vee gave him a look aimed straight for his soul. “What aren’t you telling me, Nick? You’re holding back, I can feel it.”

  He was tempted to say it. Hell, woman, don’t call me that. I’m not Nick the nice guy. I’m Sergei, the arms dealer, even if he’s only an act. But she already knew that. Not hard to figure out when he’d started babbling perfect English. And none of it mattered, except those lost moments of the meeting in New York. And getting Vee to trust him, to help him get away from this mountain prison.