by Amelia Autin
“What about the extradition to Zakhar? Cate told me Vishenko is facing unrelated charges there, as well.”
“Yes, and the US has an extradition treaty with Zakhar. But Vishenko’s lawyers will fight it. It could drag out for years. And Vishenko will be free on bail in the meantime, just as he is now. Do you really think he’ll meekly let himself be dragged off to Zakhar for a trial that will be little more than a formality given how the Zakharians feel about the monarchy?” D’Arcy shook his head. “I don’t think so. If this conspiracy trial tanks, Vishenko will fight extradition all the way, and in the end I’ll bet he skips bail rather than go to Zakhar, extradition or no. He has the money...and the connections, to go anywhere in the world. There are countries without extradition treaties with the US and Zakhar that would harbor him as a refugee...for a price.”
* * *
Liam stood just inside the closed door to his bedroom, with his back to it. At first he thought about what D’Arcy had said about Vishenko. Then his thoughts moved inevitably to Cate, and the need to keep her safe. Not just for the trial...for himself, as well. And wasn’t that a kick in the teeth. He hadn’t seen it coming. Not at all.
He needed to get himself under control. Cate wasn’t his woman, and he had to stop the damned knee-jerk reaction every time she mentioned Alec’s name. So she had a thing for Alec. So what? Alec was a prince of a guy, and she wouldn’t be the first woman attracted to him. What the hell business was it of his anyway?
Problem was, Liam wanted it to be his business, and that was crazy. He’d known Cate a day. Just a day. Twenty-four hours, maybe a little more. Okay, it was a jam-packed twenty-four hours, with dead assassins, a dead prosecutor and three others in the hospital. Closely confined with Cate—in his SUV, then in the first safe house, then driving to where they were now.
Watching her shy away from him yesterday, as if he would ever—ever—strike a woman. Watching as she turned those betrayed eyes on him in the kitchen this morning, an expression that tore his heart out. Then watching as she placed her hand in his. Touching him voluntarily for the first time. Trusting him...at least a little.
Then she’d withdrawn. Oh yeah, he’d sensed it immediately. She didn’t like him acting as if she belonged to him. Has to have something to do with Vishenko, he told himself roughly. Vishenko...and those scars on her wrists.
So he needed to get himself under control. Especially if they were going to be in close proximity from here to Wyoming. On the military plane...then sharing a hotel room tonight—or a two-bedroom suite if they could get one—because it would be dangerous not to have Cate constantly under his eye, constantly under his protection. Dangerous for her.
But that would be dangerous for him. Not the same kind of danger she faced, but dangerous just the same. Because the knight-errant in him was already infatuated with her—any more time in her company could push him right over the edge. And that was crazy. Just crazy.
But true.
Love at first sight was a fantasy, not a reality. Sexual attraction—yeah, he wouldn’t deny a man could see a woman and instantly be drawn to her sexually. He’d been physically attracted to Cate from the beginning, despite thinking the worst about her. But love? Wasn’t possible. Love was a combination of many things, all of which took more than twenty-four hours to come to fruition. Liam had never been in love, but he knew that much at least. He’d been in lust—heavy lust, on occasion—but no amount of lust for a woman had ever turned into love.
The closest Liam had ever come to being in love had been the six months he’d guarded Princess Mara with his brother and Trace McKinnon. He’d been drawn to the princess from the beginning, despite his assignment as one of her bodyguards, but he’d quickly nipped that in the bud for two very good reasons: he couldn’t let himself be distracted from his duty guarding her...and he’d seen the way she looked at McKinnon from day one.
He’d even taken McKinnon to task for being so hard on her—telling the other man to cut her some slack—wondering in the back of his mind if something would eventually develop between the two of them...and it had. Liam had taken it well, mainly because he hadn’t let himself grow to care for the princess too much since he’d known there was no future in it. But he still had a soft spot for her.
Oddly enough, Cate reminded him of the princess. Not in looks, but in that innocent way she had. Even though he knew she’d been through hell, even though those scars on her wrists told their own sickening tale, there was still something untouched about her. Something pure. Inside, where nothing that had happened to her could really touch the woman she was. A core of untarnished steel.
Which brought Liam right back around to the realization he was falling for Cate. Hard. And that was crazy. Wasn’t it?
Chapter 7
Liam and Cate left right after lunch. D’Arcy had already departed to catch his flight back to DC, but before he went he gave Liam detailed instructions for the trip, including how to contact Callahan once they arrived in Black Rock.
Liam was amazed at how quickly the agency had provided everything he and Cate needed, especially the false identification, credit cards and gun license in his new name. Not to mention the wad of cash he’d been handed, which they didn’t even make him sign for. “Receipts if you can,” was all they’d said, and he’d nodded as he folded half the bills into his wallet and tucked the other half into the duffel bag he’d received at the first safe house.
Liam had already programmed the GPS for Pope Air Force Base, so all he had to do when they got themselves situated in the SUV was plug the GPS in, turn it on and select his preprogrammed destination. He glanced over at Cate sitting so quietly in the seat next to him, and smiled. “You ready?” She nodded. “Then let’s go.”
He waved at the couple who ran the safe house, and in no time at all they’d left the safe house behind.
Even though the drive would be short, Liam turned the radio on and fiddled with the selection until he found a National Public Radio station. Then he realized Cate might prefer something else—music possibly—so he quickly asked, “Do you mind? I’m not much for music when I drive. I’d rather listen to NPR. But if you’d rather...?”
Cate shook her head. “No. Whatever you want to listen to is fine with me. You’re the one driving.”
After that she lapsed into silence. She didn’t say another word until they drove into the entrance of the base. She was so quiet and still, if Liam wasn’t so attuned to her—to everything about her, including the way she breathed—he would scarcely have known she was there. Although he was focused on his driving and listened to NPR with a fraction of his brain, the rest of him wondered about that. About why she didn’t talk the way most women did, needing to fill the silence between themselves and the man they were with. About why she kept herself so motionless. Then it came to him. Cate didn’t want to draw attention to herself...in any way. She wanted to be invisible.
* * *
They settled into their seats across the aisle from one another in the very rear of the Beechcraft C-12 Huron twin-engine turboprop plane that would take them to Colorado. The plane was only half-full, but Liam wanted distance between the four officers who were also taking this flight and the woman he was guarding, so he’d steered Cate into the back of the plane. He hadn’t missed the marked interest on the faces of the other passengers, all male, as they passed through. Cate’s natural beauty—which she did nothing to enhance—meant she would always draw male attention wherever she went. And there wasn’t a damned thing she could do about it. Not a damned thing I can do about it, either, Liam told himself. Except keep the wolves at bay as best I can. Keeping the wolves at bay might turn out to be an even tougher mission than keeping Cate alive.
* * *
They’d been flying for nearly half an hour and Cate hadn’t spoken one word. Liam hadn’t either, other than to ask her if she was comfortable, to wh
ich she’d nodded. Then she’d turned her face to the window, effectively shutting him out.
He knew he should respect her right to privacy. Knew he shouldn’t try to force the issue. But he wanted to know her better. Needed to know her better. And since she wouldn’t volunteer information, that meant he had no choice but to ask. He searched for an opening, one that would be innocuous enough to start with, and he settled on, “Tell me about your cousin. About growing up with her in Zakhar.”
Cate turned away from the window to look at him. “Angelina?” Warmth colored the one word, and her lips curved in a reminiscent smile. “Angelina was wonderful. Like a big sister. I adored her. I still do.”
“She’s what? Five years older than you?”
“Almost. When I was little I wanted to be like her. But then I knew I couldn’t—she was so much smarter than me, you see. So I decided to do something else.” Her breathing quickened, and she turned away to stare out the window in silence, and Liam knew somehow she’d gone down a path in her mind she didn’t want to talk about.
Feeling as if he was treading in a field of land mines, Liam asked, “What’s your earliest memory of your cousin?”
At first Cate didn’t answer, then she turned toward him and said, “I must have been about three. Angelina would have been eight, I guess. We were in the park, and she was rolling this large ball for me to chase. I wasn’t very good at it, but she didn’t mind. Now that I look back, I see she was very patient with me, always. Very protective. This huge dog came rushing up to me, barking—wanting to play, I imagine—but he scared me and then knocked me down. I started crying. Angelina was like a whirlwind. She chased the dog away, then picked me up, dusted me off and soothed away the tears. Then she bought me a big red balloon to distract me.” The reminiscent smile was back. “It probably cost her all the pocket money she had, but that didn’t matter to her. She tied the string around my wrist, tucked the ball we’d been playing with under one arm, took my other hand and walked me home.”
Cate glanced at Liam, her eyes bright. “I have not thought of that day for years. Thank you for making me remember a good memory.”
“What other good memories do you have of your childhood?”
“Oh many. Too many to recount. But looking back, remembering how protective Angelina always was, it’s easy to see why she went into her line of work. When she told me she began her career as a prosecutor, then joined the Zakharian National Forces when the king opened them up to women, I was surprised at first. Not that being in the Zakharian National Forces isn’t an honorable job,” she quickly explained, “but a prosecutor—even starting out—makes more money than a soldier. Even when she was selected as one of the queen’s bodyguards, that job still wouldn’t have paid as much as her starting salary as a prosecutor.”
“It’s not always about money,” Liam threw in.
“I know that. For people like Angelina—and Alec, too—the jobs they do mean everything to them. They are protectors. It’s in their nature.” Her voice dropped. “You too, Liam. I haven’t thanked you for saving my life. I should have thanked you yesterday, but I...”
“I’m not looking for thanks.”
“I know you’re not. But I’m grateful anyway.” She drew a deep breath. “I don’t want you to think I take you for granted. That I take your protection for granted. I... I don’t. Even though it may have seemed like it this morning.”
Liam wasn’t sure what to say. Part of him wanted to tell Cate the truth—that she’d hurt him immeasurably when she’d assumed he was abandoning her. And that he was falling for her. But another part of him knew it was best not to say anything about that. She was starting to trust him. Trust was a huge step for Cate. He didn’t need to throw anything else at her. Not now. Not yet. Time enough for that later...assuming what he was feeling was the real thing, and not some crazy, misguided knight-errantry.
So all he said was, “I understand. So long as you understand me. So long as you understand I care about keeping you safe.”
“I do.”
“Okay then.”
Another long silence was broken only by the voices from the front of the plane. Then Cate said, “Tell me about your family. About your brothers and sister.”
“What do you want to know?”
Her tone was wistful. “I was an only child, and after her brother’s death so was Angelina. That’s one of the reasons we’re so close, I think. It must be nice being part of such a large family.”
Liam chuckled. “Well, when I was little I wanted to be an only child, so what does that tell you?”
“You did?”
“Don’t get me wrong,” he said. “I love my family. But sometimes a kid can feel as if he’s lost in the shuffle when there are so many.” He caught the quizzical expression on her face. “I wasn’t the baby of the family. That was Keira, my younger sister. But I was the last boy out of four boys. It seemed as if anything I wanted to do had already been done by my older brothers. Better than I could do it, too.”
“I don’t believe that.”
“It’s true. And being as I was only eleven months younger than Alec, we were always competing with each other when we were younger.” He laughed abruptly as a cherished memory rose in his consciousness. “I can’t tell you how thrilled I was the day I gave Alec a black eye.”
“You fought with your brother?”
“Hell yeah, all the time.” He cast her a rueful grin. “Shane and Niall—my two oldest brothers—were constantly at each other’s throats, despite the fact that they presented a united front to the world if an outside threat should arise. Alec and I were the same way. We could fight with each other, but woe betide anyone who tried to take on either of us one-on-one. He had my back and I had his in that situation.”
She shook her head in disbelief. “But if you love your brother, how could you fight with him?”
Her disbelief amused him. “It’s what boys do, Cate. And in a large family, competition for attention and affection can get pretty fierce at times. Studies show that sometimes children act out—misbehave—if that’s the only way they can get their parents’ attention.”
“Is that what you did? Misbehave?”
“No more than any normal kid. I won’t try to tell you I was an angel growing up, but neither were any of my brothers. Our parents grounded us occasionally, but we deserved it—even if we would have denied it at the time. And there were times we deserved it that we skated by.”
Her face crinkled in puzzlement. “Grounded? Skated? I don’t think I—”
“Skated means we got away without punishment, kind of like an ice skater scooting away from trouble. Grounded is a type of punishment that can be particularly effective for kids—it means being confined to the house, or your room, or something like that, except for school and church.”
“Oh.”
“I’ll bet you were a perfect little angel growing up,” he teased. “You probably were never grounded.”
She laughed. “No, I wasn’t perfect, but I never gave anyone a black eye, either.”
He laughed, too. “Alec and I don’t fight like that anymore. Actually, I don’t think we physically fought each other once we entered our teens. But competing—yeah, we continued to compete until the day I turned eighteen and joined the Marine Corps. After that, we only competed against ourselves. The Marine Corps has a way of turning a boy into a man despite himself.”
She was quiet for a moment as she digested this. “So tell me about them, about your brothers and sister. What are they like?”
Liam considered this. “Shane—he’s the oldest. He was the first to enter the Marine Corps, and stayed the longest. He rose through the ranks the hard way, starting out as a buck private and rising to the rank of colonel. He’d still be in the Corps if not for a domestic terrorist incident that happened a few years back. Shane wa
s home for Christmas on leave—pretty rare for him. He was at the shopping mall with my sister the day after Christmas when a pipe bomb went off in a bookstore. Shane threw himself between the explosion and a woman who was seven months pregnant at the time. He suffered a brain injury—not debilitating, but bad enough for the Marine Corps to give him a medical discharge. Pretty devastating for him—the Corps was his home.”
Cate blinked rapidly, and Liam suspected she was moved by the story but didn’t want him to know it. He continued. “Shane knocked around for a couple of months afterward, unsure what he wanted to do with himself. Then he went into politics, heart and soul.” He couldn’t repress the pride he felt in his oldest brother when he said, “He’s Senator Shane Jones now.”
If Cate was the type to say “wow,” Liam knew she would have said it. Instead she said softly, “You must be as proud of him as I am of Angelina.”
“Yeah.”
“What about the next brother after Shane? Niall, yes?”
“Niall,” he confirmed. “I can’t really tell you what he does because none of us know. He spent four years in the Corps—same as Alec, me and then Keira. After he left the Corps he went into... I guess you could call it black ops, although that’s not really the name for it, and you didn’t hear it from me.”
“Black ops?”
“Covert operations on behalf of your government. But not something the government wants the world to know about. Deniable. Governments do it all the time. In fact, Zakhar carried out several covert operations in Colorado a few years back, when I was one of Princess Mara’s bodyguards.” Cate turned startled eyes on Liam. “Oh yeah,” he told her. “I can’t tell you the details, but trust me, they happened. All in the name of protecting Princess Mara.”