by Cindy Dees
Carter helped Lily to her feet and the two of them followed their guide to a state-of-the-art teleconferencing room. The cabinet members were trickling in and standing in small clusters, talking quietly.
“What’s happening?” Lily whispered to him.
“The Russian prime minister must be about to call back.”
He heard Lily’s gulp and knew the feeling. He had to believe the Russians were sensible people with no desire to allow a global catastrophe. They would turn off the machine.
A door on the far side of the room opened, and everyone turned. The president walked in and took his seat at the head of the table. “I’m told my Russian counterpart expects to make a call to me momentarily.”
The cabinet members took their places and an aide gestured Carter and Lily to chairs along one side of the room. Her hand crept into his and he gripped it reassuringly.
“Greetings, Henry.” The Russian prime minister’s voice came through the surround-sound speakers in the room.
“Hello, Boris. You have good news for me, I hope?” President Stanforth replied.
“This is very interesting report you send me. My scientists take some time to verify the mathematics. They send compliments to Dr. James on her work. My staff also finds your Captain Baigneaux’s conclusions plausible, if rather far-fetched.”
Stanforth made an impatient sound. “Then you are absolutely satisfied that no threat exists? I can go to bed tonight with your full assurance that I will wake up tomorrow to just another normal day?”
The Russian prime minister didn’t hesitate. “You have my absolute assurance of it, my friend. There will be no accidental launch of anything as a result of this asteroid of yours. I have seen to it personally.”
Stanforth made a slashing gesture with a hand across his throat, and a man seated at a computer console in the corner nodded. “You are off speakerphone, Mr. President.”
“Do we all take that to be the Russians saying they’ve turned the thing off?”
Nods passed all around the table.
“Captain Baigneaux?” Stanforth was looking right at him. “Are you satisfied?”
Tension climbed the back of his legs ominously. But then Lily’s hand squeezed his, and the seizure retreated, the monster sliding back into the abyss for the moment. “It’s not my call to make, sir. But, yes. That is how I would interpret his remarks. Shy of forcing him to admit outright if the device exists, this is the best assurance we can expect from him.”
Stanforth nodded. “I’m not willing to force him to make that concession as long as the damn thing’s turned off.”
The president gestured to the technician again. “Boris, I am relieved to hear this. I have always said you are a reasonable and intelligent man.”
A gust of laughter filled the room. “Henry, you and I both know you think I am a born-again bastard whom you would spit on rather than save from drowning.”
Stanforth grinned. “Now, now, Boris. I’d save you from drowning…after I spit on you.”
The Russian laughed. “Thank you for bringing this situation to my attention, Henry.”
“My pleasure. Thank you for looking into it so promptly.”
“Speaking of which, I have question for you. Where do you hear of this supposed device of ours?”
“The pictures of the asteroid came from the Hubble, I believe,” Stanforth answered, looking over to Carter for confirmation. Carter nodded, wincing. He saw where this was going, and there was no way to get out of this conversation well. He made a cutoff gesture at the president.
“One moment, Boris. My aides are confirming the source of the photographs.”
The technician went off speakerphone.
“What’s up, Captain?” Stanforth asked sharply.
“Some of the pictures and all of the information about the doomsday machine came from a highly classified surveillance facility that our government does not acknowledge exists.”
“And?”
“Sir, I believe the Russian prime minister is about to ask you about it point-blank. Maybe he wants to even the playing field now that we know about the doomsday machine. He wants us to verify the existence of H.O.T. Watch to him.”
“And you want me to lie to him about it?”
Carter winced. “In a word, yes.”
Stanforth leaned back in his chair. “The balance of world power is extremely delicate, son. As you saw tonight, trust between world leaders is imperative in situations exactly like this one. Boris and I have to know we will always speak truthfully with one another. We may speak in diplomatic hyperbole, and we may evade various issues with great care, but we do not lie.”
“Then, sir, I respectfully offer myself as the sacrificial lamb.”
“I beg your pardon?” Stanforth looked startled.
Carter had no idea what came over him. Maybe it was that foolishly heroic streak that drew him and most of his kind to the Special Forces in the first place. “You’re going to need a fall guy. Fast. And I’m offering to be it. Tell the Russians I infiltrated Siberia and got the data on the doomsday machine. They’ll come after me as a matter of retribution, but H.O.T. Watch will be safe, everyone’s honor will be served, and your delicate balance of power will be maintained.”
Stanforth stared at him hard. “Are you sure?”
“Yes, sir.”
Lily was all but crushing his hand, but to her credit, she said nothing. She understood why he had to do this. He might be done as a field operative. He might be screwed up in the head and carrying a burden of guilt he wouldn’t shed in a lifetime of trying. He might be a mere husk of the man he’d once been. But he could do this. He could die for his country.
And what more could he ask for? What more could any man ask for than for his death to have great meaning? If he protected the secret of H.O.T. Watch with his life, countless other lives would be saved by the facility’s continued ability to function in secret.
Stanforth gestured at the technician and spoke to the Russian prime minister again. “I’m told by my staff that although the pictures came from Hubble, the other information in the report came from direct observation. Captain Baigneaux is with me right now and he vouches for all the data personally.”
Lily leaned close to breathe, “What does that mean?”
“Stanforth just told the Russians I personally collected the intel on the doomsday machine by infiltrating the facility it’s housed in.”
“But you didn’t—” She fell silent, her expression horrified. Then she breathed, “They’ll kill you.”
“They can try. They’ve already failed to get you several times and me twice. I’m feeling confident about my odds.”
“But—”
He gestured her to silence. The Russian prime minister was speaking angrily. “…take a very dim view of such operations against our nation…must express our outrage and protest in the strongest possible terms…”
Carter tuned out. Fair warning being served by the Russians that they planned to eliminate him. A few old-school spies were left who played the game in a marginally gentlemanly way. Apparently, the Russian prime minister was one of them. Carter’s jaw tightened. Message received, loud and clear. He was about to go to ground for a very long time. Alone.
But there was one more thing he had to do first. He had to say goodbye to Lily. And of everything he’d had to face on this mission, he dreaded that the worst of all.
Chapter 13
Carter closed the door to their casually chic Camp David bedroom behind Lily, wincing as he waited for the explosion to come.
“Are you nuts, Carter?” she demanded angrily.
“It’s my job. My duty. You don’t have to like what I did, but it’s done now. And,” he added, “I’d do it again if I had the choice.”
She glared at him for good measure, but she knew when she was beat in an argument of logic. “I still don’t like it,” she announced.
“I don’t like it either, but it was necessary to protect H.O.T.
Watch.”
She sighed.
“The good news is we got the machine turned off,” he said in a blatant attempt to distract her. It worked.
“We did it, didn’t we?” A smile broke across her face.
He smiled back at her. “Seems like it.”
“Is the world really safe? We’ll go to bed tonight and wake up tomorrow just like nothing happened?”
“Well, I hear a few rabbits in Siberia aren’t going to have a very good day tomorrow.”
“Sad, isn’t it? They didn’t asked to be squished.”
“Better them than us.”
“Still…”
He thought it was sweet that she was worried about the bunnies, but really. “Lily, take a perspective check. Rabbits breed and die by the thousands every day on Earth. You just saved the lives of seven billion human beings. A few rabbits are not worth getting all worked up about.”
She nodded, serious for a moment, and then she twirled in a circle and laughed at the ceiling. “We really did it! The rest of our lives are waiting for us. Family and friends and kids and… Oh, and I can get tenure, and then I can tell Bill Kaplan to take a long hike off a short pier. And I can find out if my calculations about the impact were accurate. And I’m going to Venice. I’m not putting it off any longer. As soon as the school year ends, I’m traveling. Come with me.”
He’d had a chat with Jennifer Blackfoot before they’d come back to their room about that very subject. Lily fancied herself in love with him now, but he had faith she’d get over her infatuation once they’d been apart for a few months. He knew her well enough to be dead sure she wouldn’t let him go into hiding alone without a fight. So he’d decided to be proactive about it.
“Speaking of travel,” he said casually, “how would you feel about going to Siberia to have a look at the damage your asteroid caused?”
She stopped dancing around to stare at him. “I beg your pardon?”
“I had a little talk with the folks at H.O.T. Watch while the president was thanking you for saving the day. Turns out the U.S. government would like to fund your ongoing research into asteroid and meteor damage forecasting. They’re as interested as you are in seeing just how accurate your algorithms turn out to be. How would you like to tell Bill Kaplan to take his tenure and shove it, and instead go to H.O.T. Watch headquarters and continue your work from there?”
“That would be amazing! You’ll come with me, right?”
He shook his head. “I’m going to be persona non grata with the Russians for a while. They’re going to be looking for me, and I can’t lead them to the H.O.T. Watch facility.”
“Too bad we can’t watch the asteroid hit from H.O.T. Watch headquarters.”
“I actually might be able to arrange that. They have the capability to send images just about anywhere, and I hear there’s pretty good technical capability around this place.”
She grinned at him. “Really?”
“Let me make another call.” He got Jennifer on the phone again and she readily agreed to his request to point one of H.O.T. Watch’s cameras at Siberia the following afternoon.
Lily was waiting impatiently when he hung up the phone, all but bouncing on the edge of the bed.
He grinned and leaned down over her, forcing her to lie back. As he followed her down to the mattress, he paused, his mouth inches from hers. “What’s it worth to you to see that asteroid hit?”
“A back rub for you.”
He considered, frowning. “That’s all?”
“A back rub and I’ll finally model that red teddy.”
“That’s better, but still not quite good enough.”
She gave him one of her flirty looks out of the corner of her eye that never failed to make his gut tighten. “Okay, then. This is my final offer. A back rub, the red teddy and you get to do whatever you want with me for the next hour.”
The idea made his whole body clench in anticipation. He laughed. “Now you’re talking.”
“You’re sure it’s not inappropriate to fool around in a place like this?” she whispered.
“What? You mean in a bedroom?”
She slapped his upper arm lightly. “No! Camp David.”
“I expect President Stanforth is celebrating the same way we are right about now.”
“Eww. I didn’t need that visual image.”
“Just because he’s president doesn’t mean the guy’s a monk.”
“Still, it’s like thinking about your parents having sex.” She shuddered dramatically.
He kissed all that joy flowing from her, absorbing it straight into his soul. He was going to miss this about her.
But then her arms came around him and she kissed him back, and maybe that was what he was going to miss about her most. Her tongue stroked his lips, inviting him to come and play in her garden of delights, tempting him to taste her. She grew more bold and he opened for her. Her fingers laced into his hair, tugging him closer so that she could plunge her tongue into his mouth and engage in a duel that left him breathless.
“I surrender,” he mumbled against her honey-tasting mouth.
“Surrender? You’re surrendering, Mr. Big Bad Soldier?”
“You do have some mouth on you for an astrophysicist.”
“And what are you planning to do with it?” she asked saucily.
He wrapped his arms around her and rolled with her until she was sprawled beneath him in the middle of the bed. That red teddy might just have to wait a while tonight. One thing he knew for sure, that boring suit had to go. But not until he had her hair down out of that uptight bun.
Hairpins went flying as she laughed in protest. “Don’t you like the schoolmarm look? I thought all boys have naughty fantasies about their teachers.”
“Maybe if you’re their teacher, they do. You should have seen the guys in your class that first day I saw you. They were all but drooling on their notebooks. I bet half the males in your class don’t give a flying flip about astronomy. They were there to look at you, Professor.”
A blush climbed her cheeks, and he kissed it across her face and down her throat to its source. “I’d have been an astronomer for sure, if you’d been at MIT,” he murmured.
“Yeah, but I always went for the math geeks.”
He grinned against the hollow of her throat. “So all I have to do is whisper quadratic equations in your ear and you’ll melt in my hands?”
“Oh baby, oh baby, oh. If you whisper a Fourier series to me, I’ll go positively wild. Calculate parallax on a distant star and I’m yours forever.”
God, he was going to miss the laughter.
“Stick with me, sugar, and I’ll show you the stars.”
“Hey, that’s my line!”
She’d already shown him the stars and beyond. He figured he owed her one last trip around the universe before he destroyed hers. He took her clothes off slowly, peeling away the wool and silk by inches, kissing each bit of flesh as it was tantalizingly revealed. Lily was squirming with impatience by the time he finally disrobed her. She didn’t understand. He was memorizing every inch of her, every sigh, every whiff of peaches and cream and honey, every satin-smooth contour of her flesh.
He was a damn fool for putting himself in a position to have to leave this. But what choice did he have? Duty resonated from the very depths of his soul. Honor. Country. It wasn’t what he did; it was who he was.
It was time for him to face facts. He was never going to be a field operator again. His head wasn’t in the game any longer and he would never be able to be certain if and when he would have a freeze-up. Life as he knew it was over. He’d had a good run. Saved the world. He supposed he was okay with checking out of the mortal coil. But he damn well wouldn’t ask that of Lily. She had so much life in her. So much living to do. Who knew what contributions she would make to the field of science in the remainder of her career?
No way was he going to endanger Lily’s life by inviting her to go with him when he ran. He shouldn’t hav
e tried to tough out protecting her as it was. They were incredibly lucky to still be alive. But no more. If he really cared about her, he would let her go for her own safety. Let her get over him and get on with her life. He loved her. He’d rather live without her than see her harmed.
And besides, what kind of life would it be for her? Living under an assumed name. Having to abandon her family, her work and her research. Never sure from day to day if someone was about to show up and kill them. It was no way to live. How could they even think about having children and subjecting them to that sort of danger? They’d never have any kind of a normal life. He couldn’t do that to her.
She deserved better than him. She deserved someone who could be there for her all the time. Someone who wouldn’t threaten to turn into a statue every time the going got rough. Hell, who wouldn’t bring killers to her doorstep. It was a bitter pill to swallow.
“Earth to Carter. Come in, please.”
“What?” He blinked down at her.
“You checked out on me for a second there. Everything okay?”
He sighed. “Yes, I’m fine. The past few days have just made me think about a lot of things.”
“I know the feeling. Thinking you’re about to die sort of reduces life down to the essentials, doesn’t it?”
He smiled down at her, his heart in his throat. “Yeah, it does.”
“Is that why you do a job like this? To feel this alive?”
“It’s certainly one of the side benefits.”
“Well, then, let’s get on with celebrating being alive, already. You, sir, are far too clothed for my taste.”
“Oh, really? And what do you plan to do about it, short stuff?”
She shoved at his shoulders and he rolled over obligingly. She treated him to the same slow, kiss-laden stripping that he’d subjected her to, and he all but quivered with need before she was done with him. But he supposed he deserved it. Turn about was fair play.
She crawled across his chest, her firm, pert breasts pushing against him. “Carter?”
“Hmm?”
“Make love to me like the world’s still about to end.”
“Honey, the world is about to end. We’re leaving this planet behind and heading out into your precious cosmos and never coming back.” God, if only they could. He’d go with her in a second.