She nodded.
“All right. Good. If anyone asks about the man in the photo, just tell them he was someone you knew from London but you ended your relationship because of your ordeal.”
“I don’t know if that’ll wash.” Mae tapped the newspaper with her finger. “Look at that. Neither one of them looks ready to give each other up.”
Sabine did not want to see that picture ever again. “Don’t worry, Mom. I’m never going to see him again and I’m okay with that.” She looked at her father. “Trust me. I’m more than okay with that.”
Cullen didn’t straighten in the leather chair as Noah Page leaned over the conference room table and dropped a copy of the Washington Daily in front of him. It was a day old.
“What the hell is the matter with you?”
Looking at the front-page photo, reading the headline, Cullen had to cover his alarm.
“Current Events wants to interview my daughter on national television. What do you suppose they’ll want to talk about?”
Cullen’s mind raced. Where had the photographer been? It must have been a tourist or someone passing through the airport who recognized Sabine. The media couldn’t have known they’d be there. Noah hadn’t told a soul and neither had he. Not when someone close to the mission had leaked information about the rescue.
But how had he missed someone shooting pictures of him? Details in the photo came into sharper focus and he got his answer. Kissing Sabine had sapped his usual awareness. All he’d felt and thought while his tongue was in her mouth was how much he wished he’d spent more time with her in Kárpathos.
He raised his eyes. With his hands braced on the gleaming mahogany table, Noah’s brow creased above his nose like the face of a hawk while he waited for some kind of reaction from Cullen.
Cullen hid it from him. He was too thrown by how easily Sabine had distracted him. In Kárpathos, when she’d kissed him, he’d been taken off guard by the strength of his passion. Kissing her in London had brought it all back. He couldn’t, wouldn’t, make the stretch and call it love, but sex with her had been equal to nothing he’d ever experienced. How was he supposed to explain that to Noah, a man who’d trusted him to save his daughter’s life? A man he owed, at the very least, respect.
He looked down at the photograph again. Sabine’s face had taken the brunt of the camera’s lens, but it was where their lips joined that snared his attention. He could feel what it did to him. Even now. It could be the very thing that destroyed him.
If his commander learned of his mission, there would be no way to explain himself. If his contacts in the government learned of it…He swore inside his head. They were few but went all the way up to a senator. He had to protect them all. No matter what happened to him personally.
“Has anyone recognized me?” he finally asked.
“Not that I’m aware.”
Cullen let go of his held breath. Maybe he’d gotten lucky and no one had seen enough detail to make a connection. The photographer hadn’t been able to get a clear shot of him. At least he’d been careful about where he chose to part ways with Sabine. Good thing he was never going to see her again. Being with her consumed him to an unnerving degree.
“It’s not like you to risk your career this way,” Noah said.
Cullen kept his hearty agreement to himself. To think how close he’d come to losing himself in her….
“Judging from the looks of that picture, I can hardly believe you’re the same man I sent to rescue my daughter.”
Hearing the leashed anger in Noah’s voice, Cullen knew what really bothered him. “Nothing happened that she didn’t want, Mr. Page.”
Noah lifted one of his hands from the table and pointed a finger in front of Cullen’s face. “Don’t ‘Mr. Page’ me. This is my daughter we’re talking about. I asked you to get her out of Afghanistan, not screw her on a Greek island!”
Cullen looked unflinchingly into Noah’s raging eyes. “I wouldn’t have touched her if I didn’t think it was mutual.”
“She might have been vulnerable from being held captive by terrorists,” Noah said caustically. “Did you ever think of that?”
Cullen pressed his mouth tight, unable to argue. Noah’s daughter was a beautiful woman, and that beauty had muddled his brain. He wasn’t accustomed to that kind of weakness.
Once Sabine started kissing him, he’d been lost in her. All thoughts of resisting had fled right along with the consequences. His career had no room for a woman like her. She needed a man who could invest the time to devote himself wholly and completely to her. He’d gleaned enough from her relationship with her father to know that much. Cullen didn’t want that kind of love.
“Was she upset about never seeing you again?” Noah sounded like a worried father and made Cullen feel like a teenager in trouble for corrupting his little girl.
He faltered for words. Sabine had been upset, but not because she didn’t understand the situation between them. Noah saw his hesitation, and his expression tightened with renewed rage.
“She knew I wouldn’t be able to see her once we returned to the States,” Cullen said quickly. But inside he wondered if she had. Before they’d made love, had she known? Even so, he doubted she’d considered the consequences until the next morning. He sure as hell hadn’t.
Noah straightened and turned his back, moving to the window at one end of the conference room, where sunlight streamed through tinted glass and a view of the Miami skyline sprawled. “You shouldn’t have let it happen.”
Cullen lowered his gaze to the newspaper on the conference room table, studying the photograph that was sure to stir imaginations everywhere. He didn’t think he could have resisted her even if he’d tried harder. The strength of it crept from nowhere and threatened to smother him.
“I’m sorry, Noah. If I hurt her, I never meant to.”
Noah moved back toward the conference room table, stopping opposite from where Cullen sat.
“I owe you my life. The last thing I want to do is dishonor you or your daughter.”
The rest of Noah’s anger left his eyes. “You don’t owe me your life. I’m more grateful to you for bringing Sabine home than you can possibly imagine.”
Cullen pushed his chair back and stood, tucking his hands into the pockets of his white cotton shorts.
“What are you going to do about that?” Noah gestured to the newspaper on the table.
Knowing Noah was referring to the media, Cullen answered with his only option. “Wait until the curiosity dies down.”
Noah smiled wryly. “That might take a while. Reporters are romanticizing Sabine’s rescue to the hilt. It’s on every channel. Everyone’s wondering who the big, tall, dark-haired man is in the photo. It’s you they’re curious about, Cullen. More than her.”
Cullen slid his hands from his pockets and lifted the newspaper to skim the article. Noah was right. In all, the article and photograph did a fine job of stirring interest in the identity of Sabine’s rescuer. Sighing, he rubbed his eyes and ran his hand down his face. Kissing Sabine in the middle of an airport had to be one of the stupidest things he’d ever done.
“Well, look on the bright side,” Noah said. “Even if you wanted to see her again, she wouldn’t have anything to do with you anymore.”
He lowered his hand. “Why not?”
“You’re lower than dirt by association,” Noah said, trying to sound flippant but failing.
“To you?”
“She thinks I’m a mercenary who prefers traveling the world spreading mayhem to settling down with her mother. Since I hired you to rescue her, she’ll pin the same label on you.”
“Mercenary.”
Noah nodded.
Memories of dinner with Sabine made him chuckle.
“You find that amusing?”
“She’s got fire in her, that’s for sure.”
Noah nodded again, looking rueful. “Got her mother’s temper.”
Cullen rolled the newspaper up and held it
in his hand at his side. “Is that why she despises you? She thinks you’re a merc?” He already knew but wanted to hear Noah’s side of it.
“I was, at one time in my life. Now I just hire them.”
Noah ran a private military company, but its purpose was security. Executives and foreign dignitaries hired his services, as did corporations with assets in foreign countries that needed guarding and natives who needed protection against rebel groups. For Noah, humanity came first on every mission. Sabine was wrong about him.
“You never lost sight of what was right,” Cullen said.
“That’s not what Sabine thinks.”
“Sabine has never gotten over growing up without a father around.”
“If I could have been around, I would have. I swear it.”
“You don’t have to convince me.” Cullen smiled a little.
“She doesn’t understand why I had to stay away, after years of trying to make it work with Mae.”
“Why couldn’t you?”
Noah turned his back, a clear attempt to hide his emotion. “I wasn’t ready to give up my profession for Mae, and she wasn’t willing to leave her hometown. At the time, I didn’t think small-town life was for me.”
“Isn’t asking a man to give up his career a bit much?”
Noah faced him again. “Not if the career is controversial and keeps him from the woman he loves.”
Cullen saw the genuine emotion in Noah’s eyes and felt a flash of contrition. It was too close to what he’d done with Sabine—acted on concern for his career and left behind anything that might have sparked in Kárpathos. Or had it been more than that? Waking up after making love to her had knocked him off balance. The way he’d felt. He’d wanted nothing more than to get rid of her, to cut short the uneasy sensation crawling up his spine that she was like no other woman he’d met. He could fall into deep love with her. And deep love he did not do. Deep love wasn’t for him. Not ever.
“It may be too late for Mae and me, but I want to make things right with my daughter,” Noah said. “I want to know her and have a good relationship with her. You’ve given me a chance to do that, Cullen.”
But not without a price. He’d lost four good men saving Sabine, and it never should have happened. No matter how many times he went over it in his head, he saw nothing he could have done differently. His plan had been solid. Nothing in the intelligence indicated they were dealing with anything other than terrorists. How could he have predicted that someone other than the kidnappers wouldn’t want Sabine to make it out of there alive?
He’d have to work in the background to avoid the press, but he’d help Noah find those responsible. He wouldn’t rest until he had retribution for his team.
As though reading his thoughts, Noah walked over to the center of the table and leaned over to press a button on the phone. The speaker came on and a woman answered.
“Yes, Mr. Page?”
“Bring me the al Hasan file.”
“Have you found something?” Cullen asked, wondering if it would support his suspicions.
Noah didn’t answer. Seconds later the conference room door opened and Noah’s assistant entered the room. The slender brunette eyed Cullen up and down. Noah took the file from her.
“Thanks, Cindy.”
Cindy smiled at Cullen with a smoky look. Cullen didn’t encourage her. He turned his attention to Noah, and the woman left the conference room, closing the door behind her.
Noah handed him the file. He took it and put the newspaper on the table to free both hands. Opening the folder, he found a picture of Isma’il al Hasan, the leader of the group who’d kidnapped Sabine and Samuel. He flipped through other pages containing background information.
“I’ve confirmed he was killed in the explosion you and your team set,” Noah said.
That came as good news to Cullen, for Sabine’s sake. And Samuel’s.
“He was a rebel who came from a wealthy family that has ties to al Qaeda,” Noah went on as Cullen read. “He had the means to have a helicopter in the abandoned village where Sabine and Samuel were taken. He could have had it there all along as a precautionary measure.”
Cullen shook his head. “It didn’t show up in the satellite images. And that doesn’t explain why someone was waiting for us in Egypt. Isma’il kidnapped your daughter, but he didn’t do it for terrorism.”
Noah sighed with frustration. “I’ve searched every angle. Why would Isma’il kidnap two American contractors for any other reason? He had confirmed ties to al Qaeda.”
“Isma’il couldn’t have known about the rescue mission. None of his men were expecting us. It wasn’t until we were in flight with Sabine that things started to go wrong. Someone was waiting for us outside the village with the helicopter…like they didn’t want Isma’il and his men to know they were there any more than we did. And mercenaries were waiting for us in Egypt like somebody hired them for the job. Whatever reason Sabine and Samuel were kidnapped, that same somebody wanted them dead.”
“You think the men who attacked you knew about the kidnapping? Knew where Samuel and my daughter were being held and that Isma’il would kill them?”
Cullen said nothing, just let the plausibility of his assessment sink into Noah’s mind.
“What you’re suggesting is unthinkable! Who would do that? Sabine doesn’t know why she was kidnapped. She couldn’t tell authorities anything. She isn’t a threat to anyone.”
“Maybe whoever tried to stop her rescue didn’t know that, or didn’t want to take the chance that she did.” But they must have had a reason to think she was, or might be, a threat. “Isma’il could have told them anything.”
“Except he didn’t.”
“And now he’s dead.”
Noah ran his hand over his face, blowing out another long sigh.
“Sabine’s kidnapping was all over the news,” Cullen went on. “Her rescue is even more of a splash. What would happen if the truth got out? Who would it expose? Why did Isma’il kidnap the contractors to begin with, and why would someone want him to kill them?”
Noah stared at Cullen, his expression tight as he absorbed it all.
“Find the person who leaked the mission details, Noah. Then you’ll find whoever did this.” He paused. “My secretary is prepared to help in any way you need her.” Odelia Frank wasn’t just any secretary. The woman was amazing.
“No one in this organization would betray me like that.”
“There’s no other way it could have gotten out.”
“The only person other than me and the operatives on your team who had access to that kind of information is Cindy, and I never told her where Sabine was, or your refueling locations.”
“Could she have overheard you sometime? Maybe she or someone else stole the information without your knowledge.”
“Why would she do that? Cindy is young, and she’s not very bright.”
Cullen didn’t expect to solve everything right now. “Your daughter is in danger until you find that person, Noah. Nobody goes to that much trouble to try and kill someone if they don’t have a reason to feel threatened. You can’t assume it’s over just because she’s in the United States now.” He put the file down onto the conference room table. “If I were you, I’d start with taking a harder look at Aden Archer and his company.”
“Aden has been nothing but distraught over all this.”
“It doesn’t have to be him. It could be anyone working on that contracting job or anyone close to it.”
“Sabine was there to assess groundwater conditions.”
“A perfect cover for some other nefarious activity. Do you want to risk your daughter’s life again?”
Without hesitation, Noah shook his head. “I’ll dig deeper. I’ll find who leaked the information. I just wish I had more to go on.”
Gnawing dread churned inside Cullen. He was in danger of involving himself in this situation more than he could afford. This could destroy a career he’d worked years to dev
elop. Did he want to throw it all away for a woman? No. No matter how great the urge was to go to Sabine, he had to stay away. No one could learn the truth about his company, however noble its purpose, and he had to protect the men he served. Men who could not admit to having anything to do with the creation of such a company.
“Maybe you should send someone to Roaring Creek to keep an eye on her,” he said. The best he could do was make sure Sabine was safe. “The press has done a good job of convincing everyone she doesn’t know why she was kidnapped, and the publicity might have scared whoever tried to kill her away for a while, but that could all change. What if Sabine gets too curious or remembers something she didn’t think was significant before?”
“Don’t worry. I already have someone on her. She’ll be watched until we get to the bottom of this.”
Wondering if the man Noah had assigned to Sabine was competent enough, wanting to ask but refusing to let himself, Cullen picked up the newspaper from the table. The photo drew him in, brought him back to the moment, and convinced him he hadn’t imagined the way it felt with her. He didn’t feel comfortable leaving her safety up to Noah. Or any other man, for that matter. Noah’s men had experience guarding people and assets in foreign countries from rebels and other extremists. But would they know what to do with a more sophisticated foe?
He tucked the paper under his arm. “I’ll have Odie call you.”
Noah nodded. “I’ll let you know if anything comes up.”
Cullen moved toward the conference room door. The choice had been made. He’d made it when he left Sabine in London. No looking back.
Chapter 6
The media were really starting to annoy her. Sabine lifted a fondue set out of a box. In the four weeks since her return, they’d hounded her for information every chance they’d gotten. While she was no longer a headline, every now and again she’d catch a snippet about her, along with a photo. Her father’s opening an office in Denver only kept the intrigue alive. He’d told the press he was doing it to be closer to his daughter. The gesture threatened to soften her defenses, something she’d done one too many times as a child—trusted her hope when she should have known better.
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