by Unknown
Chapter Eighteen
“I found her! Dexter, I found her.”
Dex looked up from his desk, frowning as his wife bounded into his home office waving her cell phone.
“Who?” But he knew. Deep in his heart, he knew.
Anne shoved the cell phone up to his face. “Lila Wickham. That’s what you said her name is, right? Though this woman looks nothing like Isadora.”
He tried to focus on the phone.
“Well, here she is at a resort in Florida. I Googled her name, and got a thousand hits, but this one was near the top and it says she has a job like James Bond. She looks like the right age, too. Is that her?”
Dex took the phone and frowned at it. “Casa Blanca Resort & Spa in Barefoot Bay?” Not possible. Lila would never reveal herself openly like that.
“Look!” She tapped the screen again, and there was a second picture of Lila. In this one, she was walking hand in hand with a dark-haired man who looked vaguely familiar. “There’s her name on one of those celebrity gossip sites. Plenty of rich and famous there, too. Some billionaire who owns a baseball team, and that woman who’s on that new TV show Nocturne Falls. They’re all guests at this resort on an island.”
Dexter peered at the phone, shaking his head. “Something isn’t right.”
She put the phone down. “You can say that again. Dexter, I want to talk to her, and now I know where she is. I’m going there.”
“No, you’re not.” Anger and frustration propelled him out of his chair. “This is a breach of security even a rookie wouldn’t make. She’s way too smart for this.”
He folded his arms, trying to decide if he should call Lila, text, or go straight to the director and have her pulled back in.
Or if he should—
“Dex, listen to me.” Anne grabbed his shoulder and forced him to look at her. “Maybe she’s not thinking straight. Maybe she has a tumor and it’s growing. She has to be made aware of this.”
“I’ll get the information to her. Trust me.”
She leaned back, agony in her eyes. “You really won’t allow me to go to her? Even if you came with me?”
“You don’t even know what you’re talking about.”
“Then call her. With me here. I want to hear her voice. I want to talk to her.” She grabbed his cell phone from the top of the desk. “At least put it on speaker so I can hear her voice.”
“Okay. I’ll call her. But not…with that.” He opened his drawer and pulled out the phone used exclusively to communicate with Lila. Anne leaned against the desk, waiting, skimming her own phone, sighing heavily.
“I miss Isadora so much,” she said. “And I can’t believe this is her. How did they do it?”
“Surgery, mostly. And she’s a pro.” The call went to voice mail, and Lila’s clipped British accent invited Dex to leave a message.
“Only you?” Anne asked. “You’re the only person who calls her on that phone?”
“As a precaution for her safety.”
She put her own phone against her chest. “I’m worried about her.”
“I am, too,” he admitted. “But let me get some work done, Anne.”
On a sigh, she shook her head. “It’s like mourning her all over again.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ll let you know what she says when I talk to her.”
She left, and Dex sat down again, picking up his regular phone and dialing the director. He had to let the CIA know where she was.
It took a few seconds as the call was forwarded and clicked through to the familiar voice of Jeffrey Hollings.
“I know where Lila Wickham is,” Dexter said.
“So does the free world,” Hollings replied. “We’ll be paying her a visit, believe me.”
“To do what?”
“Senator Crain, this isn’t your problem anymore.”
“It’s my problem if she loses her mind, for whatever reason, and starts talking about an operation that was supposed to die and be buried.”
“We’ll handle her.”
What the hell did that mean? “I have an excellent relationship with her, and I can—”
“Senator, we’ll handle her. We’re already on it. We appreciate your concern, but you have nothing to do with her anymore.”
“I have plenty to do with her. She’s like a daughter to me.”
The director laughed softly. “I’m sorry. I have another call.”
He disconnected the phone, and Dex picked up the other device, already planning his text.
But then he knew, the phone wasn’t that secure. Not when the CIA was involved.
There are spies among us.
Maybe Anne was right. Maybe he needed to get down there and make sure Lila remained silent about this operation.
*
Holding Rafe’s hand and walking up the sidewalk to the bungalow where Nino and Gabe lived seemed like the most natural thing in the world. Bringing him “home” was the easy, smart thing to do.
Especially since “home” was next door to the resort’s security headquarters, and Gabe had already instructed Luke to put a hedge of protection around this bungalow that a bulldozer couldn’t get through. Chris was part of that crew and was, in fact, talking to Luke about heading it up.
It made sense. Having a face Rafe recognized in this sea of change would be good for the kid, Gabe grudgingly admitted. But Rafe would stay safely ensconced in the bungalow with Nino.
Gabe was sure whoever was after Lila had sent the text and watched to see which villa they’d left from, pinpointing her location. But they would be in another villa, and all eyes would be on Rockrose to wait for their catch to take the bait, which could take hours or days.
The plan was in place, and it was smart.
But when Nino opened the front door and wiped his hands on a mopina, frowning at the child, Gabe realized that nothing about this handoff would be natural, normal, easy, or smart.
He should have warned Nino, but how could he? Better to let him be surprised.
“Well, what do we have here?” Nino said, opening the door.
“This is—”
“Your new best friend!” Rafe broke free and ran to Nino. Gotta give the kid mad props for no fear of strangers. Obviously, he didn’t have Gabe’s trust issues…yet.
If there was one thing he’d like his son to avoid, it would be that.
“Who are you?” Rafe demanded.
“I guess I’m your new best friend.” Nino’s voice was just a little shaky as he looked from boy to man and…saw the obvious. “Gabe…”
“This is Rafe,” Gabe said quickly. “Lila’s son.”
“But he’s—”
Gabe shut him up with a look. “Very young and very uninformed about”—he narrowed his eyes in a silent plea—“cooking. He needs to learn.”
Nino backed up, his creases deepening with a mix of a frown and a smile.
“Rafe,” Gabe continued. “This is Nino, your great…” Great-grandfather. “Great new friend.”
“Yay!” Rafe plowed into the house like it held his next big adventure. And it kind of did.
“Be cool, old man,” Gabe whispered as he brushed by Nino. “Where are Chessie and Mal?”
“They went to the mainland for the day. I don’t know—”
“Get them back here to stay with you.”
Rafe ran through the house like an F3 tornado. “This place is coooooool!” He jumped onto the sofa, then to the floor, then—
“Whoa!” Nino snagged his little body with a giant dinner-plate-sized hand. “There will be none of that.”
Rafe stopped for a second, sized him up, and tried to start running, but Nino lifted him up by the shirt and his little legs spun in the air.
“Look at that,” he said, scowling at the child. “You got egg beaters for legs. Let’s put them to good use.”
“Egg beaterrrrrrrrrrs!” He flailed, but even in his eighties, Nino was still an ox and didn’t give an inch.
Ga
be couldn’t help smiling. “I guess you can handle this,” he said.
“Ya think?” Nino shot back, lowering Rafe to the nearest stool. “Oh, and I may be old, but I’m not dumb, Gabriel.”
Gabe just looked at his wise and all-knowing grandfather. Hiding this was impossible, but who cared?
“I got eyes, son,” the old man said. “And a memory.”
Rafe started to spin on the stool, but Nino grabbed him. “Hey.”
For a long minute, those two just stared at each other. Gabe braced for Rafe’s reaction—running around, screaming, demanding something—but he just stayed pinned by the power of Nino’s glare.
“I have to leave him here with you,” Gabe said.
Nino finally looked up, and all threat was gone from his old brown eyes. Replaced, in fact, by an unmistakable dampness that he’d probably blame on the nearest onion. “Go do whatever you need to do, Gabriel. Me and young Rafe will be just fine.” Nino leaned in closer to the child. “Bad boys don’t scare me. You know why?”
Rafe shook his head.
“They make the best cooks. Can you cook?”
Another shake of the head, his eyes wide. “But I can eat.”
“That’s a start.” He nudged him off the chair. “Come on, short thing. We’ll start with something simple. You like eggs?”
“Yeah.”
“We put peppers in ours.”
“Ewww.”
“Can it, kid. You’ll cook ’em, you’ll eat ’em, and you’ll like ’em. Right, Gabriel?”
Gabe just nodded, backing toward the door, almost unable to take the punch of emotion. He snapped a mental picture of the two of them and vowed to move heaven, earth, and hell to keep these two Rossi men together.
Chapter Nineteen
Lila smelled garlic. Onions. Tomatoes. Heaven.
She opened her eyes and realized she’d fallen asleep, tucked into an oversize bed in a resort villa that bore the name Saffron.
Maybe she smelled a little of that spice, too. She blinked into the darkness, judged the time to be…dinnertime.
Well past.
And no one had shown up yet to kill her. Unless Gabe was doing it with marinara sauce.
After a moment, she sat up on her elbows and did what she always did when she woke: stayed very still and waited for the pain.
Nothing.
That was too good to last long. But since a deep sleep left her headache-free for an hour or more, this could last at least that long. Those hours had always been her best times with Rafe, waking and knowing she had a little slice of time to love him with all she had before the pain started.
She sniffed again, picturing Gabe at the stove. A glass of wine in one hand, a wooden spoon in the other. Teasing, cooking, tempting. All the things Gabe did so well.
Might be time to love him with all she had, too.
She pushed off the bed, stopped in the en suite bathroom, and took a minute to brush her teeth and wipe away the smudges of makeup under her eyes. She wore the same simple cotton dress she’d had on all day.
She should shower and fix her makeup, maybe put on something pretty since Gabe was out there cooking for her, but she didn’t have time for that. She had to beat this headache and get what she needed and wanted most in the whole world.
Him.
Opening the door, she was assaulted by the scents. And the memories. One whiff and she was transported to a “kitchen” that consisted of a hot plate, sink, and fridge in the corner of a studio apartment outside of Guantanamo Bay. There, they languished in lazy Sunday afternoons of nonstop lovemaking that ended with red sauce and pasta consumed while sitting on the floor and eating off the coffee table.
Gabe had navigated that pathetic kitchenette with the same ease and mastery he used in bed, using his skilled hands, clever imagination, and expert mouth to taste, test, and, ultimately, delight Isadora Winter.
She hesitated in the hall, lolling about in the memory. It wasn’t that she wanted to go back in time and be that woman Gabe loved so much. No, that feeling slipped away each minute that they were together. She wanted him to love Lila, to want her with the same ferocity, to start something new, not just relive those halcyon days in Cuba.
Could she ever have that?
Maybe…tonight. Once. Now.
She padded barefoot down the hall, following the aroma…and her heart.
His back was to her as he worked at the stove, a simple white T-shirt and jeans still the sexiest thing Gabe Rossi could wear, if he had to have clothes on. And, yes, a glass of red wine was on the counter next to him.
“How was your nap?” he asked without turning.
She smiled, drawn to him like he was—what was that game Rafe liked to play? “Magnet Man,” she whispered as she came up behind him and put a hand on his strong shoulder, physically incapable of not touching him.
“Don’t make me pick you up and throw you on the bed,” he teased, turning to her and letting his gaze slide up and down. “Although…on second thought. Make me.”
Heat curled through her, tightening her tummy, quickening her breath.
She lifted his wine to her lips. “I don’t have a headache.”
A slow smile lifted one corner of his mouth. “Code word.”
“Yep.” Leaning over the onions and tomato sauce sizzling in a pan, she waved her hand to bring the aroma right to her nose, moaning with appreciation. “I love this dinner, by the way.”
“I remember the last time we had it together.” He stirred the ingredients but looked beyond the pan, his mind hundreds of miles away…back to Cuba, she guessed.
“It was about two weeks before you left,” he said softly. “Only, I didn’t know you were going to leave.” He turned to her, all humor gone from his eyes, just smoky intensity. The way he’d looked at her in bed that day.
“I remember the day.” Because she’d interviewed for the job the Friday before and had made the decision not to tell Gabe until she knew if she got it. But that whole weekend, she’d known they were coming to an end, and every moment had been bittersweet. “It rained,” she said. “Poured, as I recall.”
His eyes shuttered for a second, as though just remembering the sound of the rain on the metal roof that cozy, cloudy, sexy day hit him as hard as it hit her.
“We spent the day in bed, all day.” His voice was gruff and low. “Just me and…you.” He swallowed.
He put down the spoon and pressed his hand to her cheek, looking hard at her, making her whole body ache and sing and hope for that impossible dream…a future.
“We set some records that day, didn’t we?” He stroked her cheek with his thumb.
His words fried every nerve in her body. “We sure did,” she agreed.
“I remember looking down at you that day. I was inside you. All the way.”
She bit her lip so hard it hurt. All the way. That feeling. That insane, perfect, over-the-top feeling of Gabe in her body. She wanted it so much. It was all she wanted, everything she wanted. Right now.
All the way.
“And before it was over…” He leaned closer, as if he had to say the rest with his lips touching hers. “I realized that I could not ever be whole, happy, or sane without you.”
But he still didn’t have her. Not really. He had Lila. Could it be the same? Better? “Gabe.”
He exhaled, pure resignation, and pulled back.
He picked up a wooden spoon, then put it down again, definitely not done. “I loved you, Isa.”
She let the name slide, but mostly because emotion had her throat thick.
“I loved you,” he repeated. There was no sentiment coloring the statement, no sweet admission. This was Gabe, pissed. “I fucking gave in and gave up and loved you.” He sounded disgusted. “I loved you.” Barely a whisper, and she could have sworn his voice cracked. “And you left.”
“I loved you, too.”
He shook his head. “But not enough to stay.”
She took his shoulder and turned him.
“You know what you would say if the tables were turned and you’d left me and I was still whining about it?”
“Ancient fucking history?”
“Exactly.” She squeezed his arms and pulled him closer. “I know we have a past, Gabe, and I have no idea if we could ever have a future. But we have a present. A little sliver of sacred time when we’re together, alone, and my head doesn’t hurt.”
He studied her for a moment, his eyes so deeply blue and intense, his lips parted, and took the first ragged breath of a man who was losing control. “No,” he said. “I refuse to give you a headache.”
“I’m going to get one anyway.” She reached up and rocked her hips into him, letting out a tiny whimper against his growing erection. “Now, Gabe. Right this minute. Now.”
“Lila, don’t.” He visibly fought for control. “It hurts you too much.”
She closed her eyes. “I will take the pain of an inevitable headache for just one chance to have you inside me again. One time…all the way.”
“No.” He turned back to the stove, squeezing the wooden spoon so tight it was a miracle it didn’t crack in his hands. “Too much pain.”
She inched back, the rejection stinging. “For you or for me?” She turned around and started out of the kitchen. She’d take that shower now. Icy cold and—
He grabbed her elbow and spun her around with one hand. “You want to know what my pain is?”
He pulled her closer. “My pain is when I think about how much I loved you. How sure I was I wanted to spend my entire life with you. I wanted to marry you and have five kids with you and get old and wrinkled with you and end up in the ground next to you.”
Oh God.
“But you wanted to do the Company’s business.”
The words smacked her, but she refused to look away.
“And then my pain changed. My woman died. My kid was buried. My hope was gone…until you showed up. You. Not Isadora Winter. You. Lila.”
The next breath nearly strangled her.
“And now?” He choked the question. “Now, every time I touch you, it hurts you. You cringe. You flinch. You rub your head and stifle a moan. I hurt you.” She blinked at him, pressed back from the intensity rolling off him as he kept up the assault. “My pain starts with how much I want you.” He pulled her all the way into him, his chest pressed against hers so close she could feel his heart hammer. “How much I need to get all the way inside you and stay there, pounding and grinding and dying until neither one of us knows our fucking name.”