And he was smart.
She had lived abroad for years. Ex-pats heard things. Mr. Downing, she suspected, was with CSIS, which meant he was a spy. That was the only reason she could think of for why he’d be working at the Canadian Embassy, yet hanging out in Khao San at this time of night wearing those ridiculous clothes. Plus, Khao San wasn’t a place where foreigners spent more than a day or so, really, and he obviously knew the area reasonably well. She didn’t get the vibe of a man interested in late night sex shows, or child prostitutes, either. He paid close attention to his surroundings, radiating an intensity that kept her on edge, as if she were waiting for a bomb to go off or some other tragedy to strike. His eyes, a clear, hazel color in the artificial lighting, never stopped moving. She’d bet he could tell her the exact number of tuk-tuks—unauthorized taxis that looked like three-wheeled golf carts—that had gone past since they sat down. That was how he’d noticed what she’d been doing.
CSIS. Without a doubt.
He was asking too many questions. Those hazel eyes had fixed on her face in a way she didn’t like when they spoke of her father. She searched through everything she’d said and could find nothing that would warrant such a reaction. She loved her father deeply. It had been just the two of them for as long as she could remember. But from the age of fourteen, she’d known his work for an international security management company occasionally skated on the fringes of the law, offering protection to people who might not deserve it. Thank God she knew nothing about his recent activities—or current whereabouts.
She forced herself to eat even though her appetite was long gone. She had no idea when she might get another meal, and it gave her time to think. Even if Mr. Righteous saw her deported back to Canada, she’d have nothing when she got there. No money. No home. No family except for grandparents she hadn’t seen since she was a very small child, and who’d expressed no interest in her. Educated in a number of boarding schools, and sometimes by satellite from remote locations, her friendships, casual at best, spanned three continents. But Canada was where her father wanted her to go if they were ever separated, so that’s what she intended to do. Besides, it was far better to be destitute in Canada than penniless on the streets of Bangkok. The thought of ending up in one of the local strip shows in order to feed herself didn’t appeal in the least.
“Where do you think your father is now?”
Isabelle lifted a napkin to her lips, then crumpled it in her hand. “I don’t see what relevance this has, Mr. Downing. I’m an adult,” she repeated. “He’s not my keeper.”
“Garrett.”
That threw her off, and she slipped into her native French without thinking. “Pardon?”
“Call me Garrett. And it is relevant. How old are you, Isabelle?” He cast a disarming, crooked grin her way that unsettled her further. “Don’t make me check your passport.”
“I’m twenty-four.”
She could tell that surprised him, which came as no shock. She knew very well how young she looked. How plain. Women who traveled alone as much as she did went out of their way not to draw too much attention to themselves. She’d broken that rule today.
She ran through what she knew—or at least suspected—in her head. He was no doubt CSIS. He was curious about her father, who’d planned to meet her in Bangkok. And her father was missing.
But what if she was wrong and Garrett Downing wasn’t CSIS, or even with the Embassy at all? What if he was something else entirely? And what if he hadn’t stumbled on her by accident, but because he’d been looking for her?
How much trouble was her father in?
She itched to examine his ID more closely.
“I’d like my passport back,” she said.
“I can sympathize with your situation. I really can. Well,” he amended. “Trying to sell your passport, not so much.” His eyes glittered with humor, making him seem more human and less like a spy. Or killer. Worse, a white slaver. “But unfortunately, the best I can do for you is to help collect your belongings and escort you to the airport. You can have it back once we get there.”
“I have no money,” Isabelle reminded him.
“I’m going to buy your ticket for you.” He held up a hand before she could interrupt. “I’m also going to go to the gate with you, make sure you get on the plane, and have someone waiting for you when you arrive in Canada. I can at least help get you back on your feet.”
Tears of relief, hot and unexpected, welled in her eyes. Then a lifetime of caution reasserted itself. The possibility of white slavery wasn’t a joke. She blinked the tears away. “Why would you want to help me?”
This time, he was the one to hesitate. “I have two sisters. I’d hate to see one of them in your situation.”
She wasn’t a lost twelve-year-old. He had another motive, one he didn’t plan to share with her. She could hardly question him about it.
Or turn down his offer, either.
The sweating glasses of cola had left large rings of water on the table. Isabelle dabbed at them with the crumpled napkin still clutched in her fingers. “I can’t pay you back.”
“I don’t expect you to.” He finished the last piece of flatbread and washed it down with his drink. He flashed that grin at her again. “Besides, there’s a good chance that whoever meets you at the airport will confiscate your passport again.”
Chapter Two
Nova Scotia, Canada, one month later
Kiefer Mansford, three years old and squealing with glee, did a running cannonball off the diving board that never failed to make Isabelle’s heart stutter no matter how many times his mother assured her he could swim like a fish. He landed with a splash, washing a tidal wave of water onto his shrieking older sisters, Beth and Chelsea, who were dipping their toes at the side of the pool.
The toddler popped to the surface, a huge grin on his face.
Beth, seven, plopped her hands on her hips and did an excellent impression of her mother. “If you do that again, you’ll be sorry.” Kiefer stuck out his tongue. “Izzy, make him stop!” she demanded.
“The best way to make him stop,” Isabelle said, “is to get in the pool.”
Five-year-old Chelsea, her saucy red curls already spilling out of the ponytail Isabelle had fashioned only moments before, folded her arms across her chest and stuck out her lip. “The water’s too cold.”
“The pool is heated.”
It was also early July in Nova Scotia. The afternoon temperature had already topped ninety degrees and was steadily climbing, and for her part, Isabelle was more than happy to get wet and cool off. The children’s mother wanted them tired out and ready for an early bedtime because they had a surprise guest arriving. If a swim didn’t wear them out, the gorgeous, family-friendly backyard provided plenty of other entertainment options for three active children.
She’d been with the Mansfords less than a month, but she’d already learned the best way to get the girls to cooperate was to start having fun.
“Kiefer’s got the right idea. I’m going in.” She headed for the diving board. She was adjusting her bikini top, making sure it was secure, when she heard male voices in the house, near the open patio doors off the deck.
“Daddy’s home!” blonde-headed Beth shrieked. She and Chelsea ran for the house, ponytails swinging and bobbing in tandem.
Isabelle stepped off the board and scooted around the side of the pool to help Kiefer out of the water, grabbing a towel off one of the lounge chairs as she passed, conscious she was wearing nothing but a few scraps of colorful fabric linked together by string. She hadn’t bothered bringing a wrap outdoors with her because the house was supposed to be empty all day. While far from conservative, when it came to her body she’d learned to be cautious around her employers.
She was lifting Kiefer’s slippery, round little frame from the pool and drying him off with the towel so he wouldn’t track water through the house when the patio screen slid back and footsteps could be heard on the deck behind her.
The girls’ cries of “Daddy!” quickly shifted to squeals of “Uncle Garrett!” and an even higher level of agitated excitement, if that were possible. Kiefer struggled free and darted for the deck, leaving Isabelle with the damp towel clutched in her hands.
Garrett. A sense of impending doom crawled around the pit of her stomach.
I have two sisters.
Never, in a million years, and given the circumstances under which they’d met, would she have considered the possibility he’d arrange for her to work for one of them. Please let it not be him.
She turned around.
And there he was.
She hadn’t seen him since Bangkok. This time, instead of CSIS, everything about Garrett Downing screamed money. He still wore the Tilley shorts, but the Ecco sandals and ugly tourist shirt were gone. He’d replaced them with soft leather, slip-on driving shoes and a dove-gray polo shirt. On his left wrist he wore a diver’s wristwatch that no doubt cost more than she’d earned in the entire past year. Familiar hazel eyes, as direct and all-seeing as she remembered, met hers over the children’s heads, just for a second, but long enough to ratchet up her anxiety level. He didn’t seem at all pleased to see her, which struck her as odd, since her being here hadn’t been her idea. But it was his look of surprise as it traveled from her face to linger at the glittering navel piercing above her bikini bottom that annoyed her, although she couldn’t say why.
He’d escorted her to the airport and seen her off, just as he’d said he would. She’d been met at the Ottawa airport by an off-duty RCMP officer who’d shown her his ID and politely asked for her passport, then chauffeured her to a downtown hotel and said she could order room service if she was hungry. The next day Peter Mansford, a Nova Scotia Member of Parliament, had arrived to see her, and after a two-hour interview, offered her a position as nanny to his three children for the summer.
She’d liked Peter at once. He had a quiet manner, very polite, and when she’d met his wife Cheryl, she’d liked her, too. Still, it wasn’t as if she’d had a whole lot of choice in accepting the offer. While his name had never been mentioned, it was clear Garrett intended to keep close tabs on her. Right now, pleasant as it was, Isabelle was under what was unquestionably an unofficial house arrest.
She wrapped the towel around her hips so she wouldn’t feel quite so naked. Either she was under arrest or she wasn’t. There was only one way to find out. She crossed the wet grass between the pool and the deck, and while the children mobbed their father, thrust out her hand to his guest.
“Mr. Downing,” she said. “We meet again.”
* * *
It turned out that Isabelle Beausejour had hidden layers. He didn’t recall her being quite so…attractive.
The entire package appealed to him, he decided, once the initial shock wore off. On the surface, there was nothing remarkable about her, but there was nothing displeasing, either. Average height, average features, average coloring. Brown hair, brown eyes. If she were a bird, she’d be a pretty little wood thrush. The toned body was what caught him off guard. So did the navel jewelry.
He’d asked Peter to check her references and find her work. He’d told him nothing more than that. To say he hadn’t been pleased when he’d first heard the news that Peter and Cheryl had hired Isabelle was an understatement of colossal proportions. She was a smart girl. They might as well have hung a sign around her neck that read I’M UNDER SURVEILLANCE. He’d felt sorry for her predicament, yes, but not sorry enough to want her around his own family.
His brother-in-law hadn’t ended up as his riding’s Member of Parliament by missing opportunities, however. He’d viewed the situation through a different filter.
“I checked her references, just like you asked. I had the RCMP run a background check, too. Hell, they even consulted Interpol, given how much she’s traveled. When someone with excellent references, who’s well-traveled and speaks four languages fluently, with no criminal record, lands on my doorstep needing a job when I need a nanny, I’m not slamming the door in her face. It’s a win all around.”
The RCMP and Interpol, and therefore Peter, didn’t know she’d tried to sell her passport, though. Garrett had gotten an RCMP officer friend to pick her up at the airport on his own time, and take her passport from her, because he didn’t want word to get out that CSIS had any interest in her. Neither body knew how deeply involved in organized crime her father, Marc Leon Beausejour, had become. He was only a small fish in a big, murky, cesspool of a pond, true, but hopefully, he’d lead CSIS to bigger catch.
Garrett’s greatest concern right now was how much involvement Beausejour’s daughter might have with organized crime too, and any potential danger she brought to his family. He’d searched Interpol’s databases himself and found nothing on her. Peter’s reports claimed she’d been an exemplary employee to date. The children liked her. She never went out alone, although distance and a lack of a driver’s license no doubt accounted for that. She was quiet, and for the most part, did very little to draw attention to herself. When the children went to bed, she watched television or read books in her private suite. She had a preference for Russian literature. Cheryl had loaned her a laptop and Garrett had been monitoring her online activities for weeks. She’d contacted no one, not even friends. There appeared to be no significant other in her life.
So here he was, about to spend a month of vacation visiting his sister and digging for dirt, because Bangkok had been a bust. He’d found the Thai maintenance company that had been brokering the stolen weapons systems, but the only clear Canadian link appeared to be Isabelle’s father, and he hadn’t shown up for his last scheduled meeting with them. It was as if Beausejour had dropped off the face of the earth. If he was alive he had to be somewhere in Europe, where he could move across borders without having to present a passport. CSIS had already investigated the possibility he held more than one, and under different names, but no database photos had matched.
Isabelle’s movements over the past five years had been easier to track because of her employment history, but before that, other than an occasional trip to Montreal, they were anyone’s guess. Garrett was counting on at least some of her father’s recent travels reflecting hers, especially around holidays and her birthday. Unfortunately, on her last birthday, she’d been in Bangkok.
Where her father hadn’t shown.
He took the slender hand she offered him. “Well, well, Ms. Beausejour.” He skated his eyes over her in a way that would have had his sister slapping him if she’d been here to see, but he was curious to see how she’d react. Maybe simple friendliness was the wrong approach to take with her if he wanted information. “What a pleasant surprise.”
He meant the bikini, all skinny strings and tiny triangles of turquoise, and she had to know it, but if she did, she didn’t let on.
“It’s a very small world,” she replied. She turned to Peter. “The children and I were about to go for a swim, but I think they’ve lost interest now. Would you like me to get them dressed?”
Peter lifted Chelsea, who’d been tugging on one of his fingers, into his arms, and kissed her plump little cheek before answering. “I’ve got some paperwork to do. I bet Uncle Garrett would love to go for a swim with them, though. Wouldn’t he, guys?”
What Garrett would love more than anything was to spend time alone with Isabelle, figuring out what made her tick, but separating her from the children wasn’t going to be easy. Peter knew that, so he’d handed him an excuse to stay close to her for the afternoon.
“Just let me go drop off my suitcase upstairs and change into my swim trunks,” Garrett said.
He went to get his belongings from where he’d left them in the kitchen, then dragged his suitcase up two flights of stairs to the third floor. The Mansfords’ house was a roomy, three-story dwelling on property owned by a third generation family farm in the middle of the province’s largest dairy region. Peter had gone to law school, and then entered politics, while two of his o
lder brothers ran the family business. Cheryl, Garrett’s sister, worked in the nearby city of Halifax as a public defender with one of the law firms.
The third level of the house had two suites of rooms—one for long-term guests, like Garrett, and the other for any live-in help the Mansfords might hire, such as Isabelle. Each suite had a sitting room, bathroom, tiny kitchenette, and bedroom. The door to Isabelle’s suite was closed.
He tried the knob. The door wasn’t locked, nor had he expected it to be. He decided to have a quick look inside before she could hide anything she didn’t want him to find. He propped his bag against the wall and opened the door.
The sitting room was neat and tidy, and identical to the one he’d be occupying, right down to the furnishings. There was a sofa, a flat screen TV, and DVD player. A closed laptop sat charging on the small glass coffee table. Next to it was a dog-eared copy of Anna Karenina. To the right of the room were the kitchenette and bathroom. Straight ahead was the bedroom.
Garrett poked around. Everything in the suite was neat and tidy. Isabelle didn’t have many possessions, or if she did, she didn’t carry them with her. He found her ancient canvas duffle bag in her closet, the one he’d helped her drag to the airport in Bangkok, along with a few articles of clothing on hangers. In the bathroom, her toiletries lined up neatly on the counter beside the sink. A clear plastic, zippered makeup bag had been tossed carelessly in the cupboard with the towels and spare rolls of toilet paper.
It was obvious Isabelle wasn’t a hoarder. High maintenance, either. He tried to imagine his sisters surviving for more than a day with so few belongings. This visit, however, wasn’t so much about unraveling secrets by prying into Isabelle’s life as it was to win her trust, and hopefully track down her missing father.
Her Spy to Have (Spy Games Book 1) Page 2