They’d finally gotten a solid lock on Chuck’s tracking device, finally had a concrete mission to fly with a chance of rescue. Rescue, not just a body recovery.
He chose to believe the vital signs detector had merely shorted out, which channeled more power to the signal when it resumed. He filed the possibility away for future testing.
Right now, however, he could only think of locating Chuck.
Lieutenant Colonel Scanlon folded the mission chart in front of him. “We have enough pilots. Vapor and I can handle the stick. You’re already tapped elsewhere, Captain.”
“But if Chuck isn’t even around here—”
“Nunez still thinks part of the network responsible for taking Chuck works out of the Oasis. That’s the reason we started here in the first place.”
Vapor snagged his helmet bag from the ground. “Hey, be grateful you’re getting out of this place for a while. Maybe you can grab a shower. You’re really getting ripe, pal.”
Jimmy ignored Vince and stayed focused on the colonel. “Are you ordering me to stay, sir?”
“If that’s what it takes, but I suspect that won’t be necessary.”
“Of course, sir.”
“Jimmy”—the colonel rarely used first names, usually opting for the rank or call sign—“you’re a hell of an officer, focused and talented, but you can’t be everywhere at once. Push that drive too far, and you’ll burn out before you become a general. And make no mistake, I predict a star in your future.”
That was one fat-ass bone to wave under a guy’s nose, but stars weren’t going to keep his friend breathing.
“I just want Chuck found alive.”
Scanlon clapped him on the shoulder. “You need to accept it may be too late. But damn it all, we will bring him home.”
He wanted to believe that, except the thought of Socrates’ empty grave told him the fallen didn’t always make it home. Jimmy resigned himself to the inevitable. He wouldn’t be on this flight. He had another mission to perform.
Still, his slacks and bogus silk shirt he had to wear itched a reminder of his more comfortable flight suit.
Jimmy powered down the corridor toward the glowing Exit sign. Outside he would hook up with a small contingent of Nunez’s CIA paramilitary dudes wearing civvies and looking like airmen out on the town, too. They would watch his back and gather intel around him.
He cleared the doorway near the small lot of official buses. At the end of the row waited two rental cars, one for him and one for Nunez’s men. He picked up his pace toward the cars. Heat enfolded him in an oppressive blanket.
A body rammed into his chest, someone short and curvy, with a whiff of baby powder.
“Chloe.”
She stared up at him, squinting in the late afternoon sun. “You’ve been tough to locate lately.”
He wouldn’t exactly say he’d been hiding since their discussion about her transplant, because that would be wrong. He’d just been slammed with work. Right? “Why aren’t you with the rest of your group?”
“I’ve been trying to find you for the past hour.” She flattened her palm to stop him from forging past. “What’s going on around here?”
“What do you mean?” he hedged, eying the parking lot where he expected his “drinking buddies” to show up soon.
“Everyone’s in a frenzy. Plowing through the halls. Extra cops everywhere I turn.” She waved her hand toward the military personnel weaving in an out, security high due to the threat and the impending flight. “Just look around.”
Time to divert her attention. “They must have heard there’s been a new shipment of baby wipes at the Base Exchange.”
“Not amused.” Her lips pulled tight. “I thought we reached an understanding last night that we would be honest with each other. I’ve held up my end of the deal telling you huge and private pieces of my life. Answer me this one question, please.”
The last thing he needed now was to worry about her, too. Analysis of the navy speedboat wreckage indicated a bomb had been planted, making the military or the USO the target. While Nunez’s time was being devoted to finding Chuck, the base security had a whole other mission looking into who might want to disrupt a peaceful group of entertainers.
Why didn’t the higher-ups just cancel this ill-fated USO tour and send the people home? “People are busy with repairs. Water lines should be running again within a couple of hours.”
“So I hear, but I’m not worried about my next bath. Damn it, Jimmy, I know you’re avoiding my question. I’m worried about—”
The rest of her sentence played out in his mind and kicked him in the gut. “Me? Don’t be. This is what I do, and I’m good at it.”
“Crying shame you have such self-esteem issues.” Her green eyes snapped with anger, and she had a right.
He was dodging her questions. He’d been dodging her rather than risk hurting her by saying the wrong thing.
“You have to realize I can’t talk to a civilian about military business.” He gripped her shoulders, her soft flesh giving beneath his hands.
Soft and vulnerable.
He stole a look over his shoulder at the fence separating the base from the threats in the outside world. How many pipe bombers or car bombers or suicide bombers waited for their shot at the U.S. stronghold on foreign soil?
Nunez’s people were scrambling to discover any possible connection between the bomb in the marketplace and the stepped up violence against servicemen and service-women. In Jimmy’s head the events had to be tied. Clearly, the suicide bombers had targeted the military in choosing a watering hole well known for its service member patronage, followed by an explosion outside Incirlik’s front gate. Given that all the supposedly AWOL personnel had disappeared in this corner of the world—
Chloe snapped her fingers in front of his face until he looked down at her again. “Is there going to be another attack on the front gate? Is the power going to be blown next? Or the whole base? I believe I have a right to know that much.”
“I don’t have any reason to think so.” He tightened his hold. “But I want to stress how important it is for you and your USO friends to stay on this side of the fence.”
She met his eyes dead-on. “You’re going to tell me to leave, aren’t you?”
His fingers flexed on her shoulders, and before he could think, he pulled her in for a kiss. Yeah, he needed to feel her softness against him.
She tasted like toothpaste and something more, something unmistakably her. He knew intellectually that the upcoming mission had him pumped with adrenaline, which spiked his sex drive. But it was more than that. His arms tightened around her, wanting her, needing to keep her safe.
He suddenly remembered her scar and what it meant. He backed off. “Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”
His gaze dropped to her side, the place where he’d seen her transplant scar after the marketplace explosion.
She took his hand from her shoulder and drew it to her side, sliding it under her shirt to rest on a thin, puckered line of scar tissue.
He fought the urge to tug away. He hated himself for being a lowlife bastard and letting his own screwed-up business show around Chloe. For some reason he still didn’t understand, he couldn’t walk away from her.
“Jimmy, I know that some folks get freaked out by this. I don’t agree with people who think that way, and I’m not even sure I can respect their feelings. However, I do accept it’s a reality I have to live with, since this is the only way I can live.”
Jimmy angled closer to her, dodging her eyes by resting his cheek against hers. “My sister had leukemia as a teenager.” He swallowed hard. “She died while waiting for a bone marrow donor.”
Her hands slid up to squeeze his arms. “I don’t know what to say other than I’m so sorry.”
“I shouldn’t let it mess with my head around you.”
“I can see how you would look at me and think of your sister given how we’ve both faced such major health problems.”
<
br /> He lifted his head and locked eyes with her. “You’ve only got a part of that right. Jenny’s death may have left me with baggage about protecting women, but when I look at you, my thoughts are anything but brotherly.”
He let all the heat he was feeling shine through—no barriers there and no chance of acting on it out here. Chloe’s eyes widened in surprise, then answering heat. Strong. Tempting.
Dangerous to his concentration.
He broke away. “I really have to go.”
A tentative smile tugged at her mouth in time with the confusion now flickering across her face. “Go save the world.”
“Catch ya later, maestra.” Jimmy dodged around her before he could be tempted to stick around, because, well, now that he looked, two of his CIA “companions” were already waiting for him.
“Jimmy?”
He glanced over his shoulder but didn’t turn to face her. “Yeah?”
“Whatever you’re doing, be careful.”
This woman definitely jabbed a weakness in him. She drew him in a way he couldn’t recall any other woman managing so quickly. He had to keep things light until he figured out where—if anywhere—they could take this.
Jimmy reached in his pocket for his keys and winked. “I’ll bring you back some baby wipes.”
FIFTEEN
No one could totally wipe away his or her own existence. He should know. He was an expert at erasing his identity as much as humanly possible.
Sometimes Mike Nunez just needed a hint of where to look for the connection. Luckily for him, Anya Surac had provided more than a hint. By listing a few of Aunt Marta’s bars, Anya might as well have given him Map-Quest directions to others.
A few clicks through top secret land on his laptop had filled in the blanks. Parked in his cover-story hotel room in downtown Adana, he typed through the log-out menu to exit the NSA site and layer a Carvalho menu in place in case anyone tried to break into his computer.
Only one tiny piece of himself remained: a screen saver depicting a garden meditation labyrinth. He’d chosen an image of one in Spain to tie into his current cover, if anyone turned on his computer. He resisted the urge to lose himself in the twists and turns of the unicursal path. The time for release would come when this mission ended, and he left this upscale luxury behind in favor of his own spartan apartment in D.C.
Nunez stuffed his wallet into his back pocket and strapped his Glock to his calf. Marta Surac was, in fact, Anya’s aunt. The woman owned eleven bars under different names. Two of them she shared ownership with none other than a corporate conglomerate that traced back to Spiros Kutros.
Interesting that the man had never mentioned Anya was his partner’s niece or about his other holdings. His and Marta’s joint and individually owned clubs were scattered through Turkey, Greece, and a handful of small countries in Eastern Europe, all situated near a military base or consulate.
Follow the money. It always painted a green path straight to the bad guys—or gals.
Almost certainly Chuck Tanaka had been stashed in Pasha’s Palace in Istanbul, but for some reason the woman was moving him frequently. First south, on the outskirts of Adana, and now the tracking device indicated a north-east locale, deeper into the countryside.
All of which his people would investigate with the help of Lieutenant Colonel Scanlon’s flight.
Nunez needed to get his head on straight for another night at the Oasis, laying the groundwork for Jimmy as a target—with Anya there in the possible line of fire. She appeared to be innocent in her aunt’s business dealings, but he couldn’t ignore her association with one of Marta Surac’s bars.
He flicked his wrist to check the time. If he didn’t get his ass in gear, he would be late meeting Anya for their supper together. Nunez locked his room and rode the luxury lift down to the lobby. The velvet-lined doors parted to reveal Spiros Kutros standing by a towering grandfather clock, his bodyguard nearby.
Nunez shoved his hands in his pockets to restrain himself from grabbing the gun strapped to his calf, pressing it to Kutros’s temple, and demanding that the bastard talk. Adrenaline gushed through his veins as the op’s momentum gained speed like a snowball rolling downhill, growing as everything came together. He could all but hear the thunder in his ears.
“Carvhalo,” Kutros called, crossing to pass him a piece of paper, a printout with the hotel logo along the top. “I have covered the bill for your stay here thus far, plus an additional week.”
“Gracias, but you did not need to do that.” Even though that was exactly the bait Nunez had hoped the man would take.
“I know.” Kutros clapped him between the shoulder blades. “I sense in you a kindred spirit, and I understand how inconvenient pride can become.”
Nunez let Kutros play out the game. Sources indicated that the man had been very busy over the past three days checking into Miguel Carvalho’s finances, which included a carefully constructed collapsing portfolio and a penchant for skirting the law.
Kutros had every reason to believe Miguel Carvalho was a flat-broke crook. The CIA and NSA had spread information building his playboy cover story well. All of which should bring him to the final stage in reeling the man in and saying good-bye to this region of the world. And Anya?
His adrenaline rush evaporated faster than if his snowball hit hell.
Nunez folded the invoice in half, then quarters. “I will pay you back.”
“Of course you will.” Kutros gestured toward two claw-footed chairs tucked beside a gold fountain conveniently sloshing loud enough to dull conversation. “I have some business ventures that have proved profitable in the past. If you’re interested.”
“I’m interested in listening.” He took a seat, back to the wall for a better view of the bustling lobby full of tourists and bellhops pushing loaded luggage carts. The revolving door gusted the cigar smoke from the hookah bar across the street.
Kutros stretched his legs in front of him. “My work isn’t for the squeamish.”
“I am only nauseated by the thought of bunking in three-star accommodations.”
Kutros threw his head back with a bellow laugh that echoed up to the gilded dome ceiling. “Definitely a kindred spirit.”
Nunez waited. The less a person said, the more others spoke. And revealed.
“Do you have plans for this evening?”
Shit. Anya. Their supper date. He should be halfway to her place by now, but he couldn’t afford to let this opportunity pass. “What do you have in mind?”
Kutros pushed to his feet. “Let’s go to a place where we can talk freely. I will have supper catered. If you are on board, you will be a richer man before the night is over.”
That fast? Of course they would move that fast, because once Miguel entered that world, there was no leaving. If he turned down the offer, he might as well sign his death warrant. Those who knew even the smallest details of these kinds of plans could only comply.
Nunez stood and gestured toward the revolving door spilling out of the hotel and closer to this mission’s end. “Lead the way. You’ve piqued my curiosity.”
“I am pleased to hear that.” Kutros smoothed the fine fabric of his suit jacket over muscles surprisingly pumped for a man of leisure, especially for one who kept a bodyguard lurking nearby at all times. “You’ve chosen well. I’m going to make you very wealthy before you see forty.”
“I cannot think of anything that would make me happier.”
Starting now, Miguel Carvalho could only surrender to the inevitability of becoming the evil he worked to bring down. What a difference a few days and indiscriminate spending could make.
And Anya? He wouldn’t have time to meet her and didn’t have a number to call. On the positive side, if she was innocent, he intended to do his damnedest to keep her clear of the action. However, if she was in collusion with her aunt? Then he would almost certainly see the beautiful Anya at the shakedown.
Because if his instincts were right, tonight he would kidnap J
immy Gage.
Captivity sucked.
Chloe huffed a lank curl off her forehead as she rolled off her bed and to her feet. Her iPod thunked onto the carpet. Not even Debussy’s entire body of work could bring a woman peace when she was this cranky.
How much longer until security concerns eased, and they could carry on with the performances? Maybe she should just go home after all and sign on for another USO trip later.
Except Jimmy wouldn’t be around for the next tour.
Cranking open the window, she inhaled the fresh air to ease the encroaching claustrophobia. Surely if she blasted the AC and opened a window, she could achieve the best of both worlds in a cooler but aired-out bedroom.
As it stood now, her small space with a double bed and desk grew more oppressive by the second. From the heat and kitchen smells weighting down the air, of course. Not because she’d spent the past four hours chewing her nails to the quick worrying about Jimmy, a situation she could do nothing about. So she focused on what she could fix: her smelly room.
A gentle breeze drifted inward and over her, carrying the soothing scent of spring blossoms. Oh yeah, pump that window wider. Chloe stuck her whole upper body through and into the small courtyard. Security lights played off the pink and deep purple flowers. She thought about plucking blooms to scent her room, but the rustle of night creatures in the bushes kept her hands firmly planted on the windowsill.
A movement outside, larger than from any rodent or animal, startled her back into her room. Then curiosity drew her forward again. The sill bit into her palms as she squinted to peer into the dark, and yes, someone was darting around trees. Her stomach knotted. She cranked the window closed again, her body already stretching toward the door so she could alert security.
The intruder sprinted across a bare patch of lawn, under a lamppost. Chloe relaxed.
Livia.
Everybody seemed to have somewhere to be tonight. Chloe tugged a peasant shirt on over her tank top and khakis, and shoved her feet into sandals, hopping on one foot, then the other on her way to the door. She cleared the exit without finding a guard in the hallway. She shivered at the possibility that they might all be on call for whatever dangerous mission Jimmy was off to tonight.
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