Isabelle set the tray of coffee and cocoa she carried on the round oak coffee table in the center of the room. Garrett placed dessert plates and a basket of muffins and cutlery beside it. Cheryl and Peter were in the kitchen, making bacon and eggs. Later on in the day, everyone was headed to the main farmhouse for Christmas dinner with Peter’s family.
“Overwhelmed?” Garrett whispered in her ear.
“A little.”
She wouldn’t trade this for anything. Yet, as happy as she was with her new family, it bothered her that her father would never be welcome at these gatherings. She hated to think of him all alone. He’d loved the holidays.
“Want to try out your new snowshoes?” Garrett asked. They’d opted not to buy anything unnecessary or overly expensive for each other. He’d suggested snowshoes, which they could leave at the farm for their winter visits, because running on roads that could sometimes be icy wasn’t always an option.
“I’d love to.”
They trudged through the snow-covered fields until they came to a small path in the woods. Garrett rubbed the tip of his red nose with the back of his glove. “I have one more gift for you.”
She frowned up at him as she tried to wiggle the tip of one snowshoe free of a tangle of underbrush. “We agreed not to do this.”
“It’s nothing big or expensive.” He hesitated. “It’s two plane tickets for tomorrow. I thought we’d fly to Ottawa for the day and visit your father.”
The thoughtfulness of the gesture, combined with the wind whipping the snow in little whirlpools of white that stung her cheeks, had her blinking her eyes. Her father had been extradited to Canada the previous summer. His trial was scheduled for this coming March. Although she’d spoken to him a few times on the phone, she hadn’t seen him since Amsterdam. She’d deliberately stayed away.
“Are you sure you don’t mind?” she asked.
“Of course I don’t. He’s your father. Since I’m not likely to get his vote for son-in-law of the year any time soon, though, if he doesn’t want to meet me, I’m good with that.”
“I love you,” Isabelle said. “You have my vote.”
Garrett laughed. The sound of it never failed to send a hot jolt of pure pleasure through her. He was a completely different person when he was alone with her.
“Yours is the vote that matters the most. I love you, too.” He tugged the hood of her parka more securely around her wind-bitten cheeks, then bent forward at an awkward angle over their toe-to-toe snowshoes to give her a kiss. “You’re thinking something. What is it?”
She grabbed for the sleeve of his coat with clumsy, mittened fingers to keep from tipping over into the snow. “That if I’d known how much a Canadian passport was going to be worth to me in Bangkok, I’d never have waited two weeks to try and sell it.”
Garrett’s hazel eyes smiled into hers. “Just imagine how much it will be worth in another forty or fifty years. Its value is only going to appreciate.”
Happiness soared through her. She’d be spending those years with Garrett. The future was no longer something to fear, but to look forward to.
“Mais oui, mon cher. I’m counting on it,” she said.
The End
Note to Readers
Thank you for choosing Her Spy to Have, the first book in my Spy Games series. I hope you enjoyed reading Garrett and Isabelle’s story as much as I enjoyed writing it.
Canada prides itself on its freedom of information policies and public disclosure, and CSIS, Canada’s spy agency, isn’t exempt. If you read the actual Canadian Security Intelligence Act, however, as Isabelle did, you’ll note there’s a great deal of ambiguity to their mandate, and my characters have chosen to exploit it. They are spies, after all.
Next up is Kale and Irina’s story in Her Spy to Hold. These two have a far different relationship from Garrett and Isabelle. Even I was taken by surprise.
And the Spy Games series doesn’t end here. The third book, His Spy at Night, is currently in the works.
Acknowledgments
I’d like to thank Author E.M.S. for their formatting expertise; Syd Gill of Syd Gill Design for the beautiful cover; and Nancy Cassidy of The Red Pen Coach for her editing skills.
And of course, a special thanks to Annette Gallant for being my first reader and a great friend.
About the Author
Paula Altenburg lives in rural Nova Scotia, Canada, with her husband and two sons. Once a manager in the aerospace industry, she now enjoys working from home and writing fulltime. Visit her at www.paulaaltenburg.com to view more of her work and to sign up for her newsletter. You can also follow her on Twitter @PaulaAltenburg and friend her on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PaulaAltenburgAuthor/.
Other Contemporary Romance Titles
by Paula Altenburg
Spy Games series:
Her Spy to Have – Book One, available now
Her Spy to Hold – Book Two, coming in May 2016
His Spy at Night – Book Three, TBA
Broken Hearts series:
I’ll Love You Forever – Book One, available now
Book Two – TBA
Book Three – TBA
From Tule Publishing:
Her Secret Love
From Entangled Publishing:
Her Secret, His Surprise
Desire by Design
Read on for an excerpt from Her Spy to Hold, Kale and Irina’s story.
Excerpt from
Her Spy to Hold
Kale and Irina’s story
by Paula Altenburg
Irina was cooking dinner when the knock came on her kitchen door.
She froze with the steel butcher knife she’d been using to chop green onions for an omelet suspended in midair. She wasn’t expecting visitors.
She laid the knife on the wooden cutting block, then crossed the kitchen to the two-panel steel side door of her bungalow, the one that led to her carport, and peered through the curtain. All of her doors and windows were locked. The air conditioning took care of the summer heat and humidity.
Thor stood on her doorstep, hulking and blond, and scary.
He wore his hair in a man bun. The wide smile on his lips and the ridiculous courier uniform did nothing to offset the alarming effect of the shiny black eye and the darkening bruise on his forehead.
Adrenaline kicked her heartrate into high gear. She left the chain in place on the inner door, opening it only far enough so she could speak through the crack. The locked screen door added another layer of protection. It wouldn’t stop him if he tried to force his way in, but it would slow him down enough for her to slam the inner door shut and shoot the deadbolt.
“You must have the wrong address. I’m not expecting a delivery.”
“Dr. Irina Glasov? My name is Kale Martin. Detective Buchanan suggested I pay you a visit. He said you’d asked for a meeting.” He fumbled in his shirt pocket for a piece of ID. He flipped it open and held it up.
She couldn’t get a close enough look at it through the screen, not that it mattered. She’d never be able to confirm the legitimacy of it even if she did. Hope warred with suspicion. “Do you mind waiting a few minutes while I give Detective Buchanan a call to confirm it with him?”
The giant didn’t take offense to her caution. “Not at all.”
She left him on the doorstep while she dug her cell phone and the business card Detective Buchanan had given her out of her purse. She punched in the number.
As it turned out, the detective had, indeed, asked Mr. Martin to stop by. The description he gave her matched the man at the door, right down to the black eye, courier uniform, and running shoes, but Irina continued to hesitate even after she disconnected the call. While this seemed a little elaborate for a hoax, whoever had managed to hack into her computer wasn’t trying to be subtle. The implicit threat had been frightening.
She wished she were taller and more assertive. A self-defense course wouldn’t have been remiss, either. She’d let Mr. Martin
in, but she’d stand at the counter so she’d have the butcher knife close at hand. She’d never be able to use it on anyone, but he didn’t need to know that.
She slid back the chain and unlocked the screen door. She didn’t open it but retreated to the counter, leaving him to let himself in.
The Norse god stepped over the threshold, his sheer size swallowing what she’d considered a spacious kitchen. If he lifted his hand above his head he could plant his palm on the ceiling. Fine gold hairs sprinkled tanned calves and forearms. Bulging biceps and broad pectoral muscles strained the seams of the gray cotton, short-sleeved shirt. Faint blond scruff, caught in the light from the bay window, stubbled his jaw.
The guy was beautiful. She had a difficult time believing he was an intelligence officer. Weren’t they supposed to blend in?
The only place he’d go unnoticed was Asgard.
Her Spy to Have
Copyright © 2016 by Paula Altenburg
All rights reserved.
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not real. Any resemble to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Cover design by Syd Gill/Syd Gill Designs
Digital formatting by Author E.M.S.
Edited by Nancy Cassidy/The Red Pen Coach
Published by Paula Altenburg
Stewiacke, Nova Scotia Canada B0N 2J0
ISBN: 978-0-9937166-1-4
www.paulaaltenburg.com
Table of Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Note to Readers
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Other Contemporary Romance Titles by Paula Altenburg
Excerpt from HER SPY TO HOLD
Copyright
Her Spy to Have (Spy Games Book 1) Page 19