by Cindy Dees
She gazed at him quizzically. “What are you up to?”
A faint frown crossed his face, but then his features settled back into patience. “I haven’t been exactly good company the past few days, and I owe you an apology.”
“You have a lot on your plate,” she commented carefully.
“But that gives me no right to treat you badly. You’re in as much danger as I am and certainly under as much pressure as I am.”
She shrugged. “It’s my job. I’m accustomed to functioning under high levels of stress.”
“Tell me more about your work.”
She frowned. “Why do you ask?”
“It’s important to you. Therefore, I’m interested in it.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Tell me about these women you work with.”
Crud. Not territory she wanted to explore too deeply. “Some women work in the Special Forces. I’m one of them.”
“What’s that like? Do the men treat you all right?”
She laughed shortly. “What are you going to do? Beat them up if they don’t?”
“If you need me to. But I suspect you could teach them a lesson all by yourself without any help from me.”
She leaned back in her chair, studying him intently. Why the sudden and complete change in his attitude? Was this some new head game from him? A new and improved tactic to maneuver her back into his bed?
He leaned forward. “Casey, I’m sorry for whatever I’ve done to make you angry and uncomfortable. I know this business of publicly posing as my girlfriend has been difficult for you, but I wanted to tell you I think you’ve done a magnificent job.”
She glanced down at the stack of gossip rags beside his plate. “How many did we make it into today?”
“All of them. We’re the hottest gossip in Europe. They’re starting to talk about your career as a dancer.”
“Have they called me a stripper yet?” she asked drily.
He threw her a sympathetic glance. “A few have. Sorry.”
“Why? It’s exactly what we were hoping for. The more sensational your behavior, the more it’ll infuriate our terrorists. Dating a stripper, and an American one no less, is quite a slap at the terrorists’ extremist values.”
“I hope you know I don’t think of you that way.”
She stared at him, startled. It dawned on her all of a sudden that she did think he saw her that way. Furthermore, it had been sticking in her craw for the past week or more. Was she starting to see herself as some kind of high-priced call girl, throwing herself at him indiscriminately every night?
He grimaced. “I can tell by your expression that you don’t believe me. I really am sorry we have to…perform…the way we do in public.” He added, “I won’t deny that I enjoy our flirting. You, of all people, know exactly how much I enjoy it. I only wish we could be more private about it. It’s disrespectful to you.”
She shrugged, stunned. “It’s the nature of the beast,” she mumbled.
“For the record, I do respect you. I think you’re smart and classy, and you deserve better than this. If only I could be the man to give it to you.”
And with that salvo, he got up and left the table. She stared at his back in shock. What did that mean? Did he still want her for real? Or maybe he’d just told her he was giving up on trying to get her back into his bed. Common sense chose the latter.
Tears stung at the backs of her eyelids. All of the wildly inappropriate gifts and steamy flirting from him in the clubs might have driven her crazy, but at least she’d known that, at some level, he was interested in her. Who was she kidding? She was still the plain, boring person she’d always been.
She picked at her brunch listlessly but suddenly didn’t feel much like eating. She retreated to her room and tried to study a map of the polo club, but it was all a blur. Her phone rang and she pounced on it desperate for a distraction.
“Hey, kid. It’s me.”
Roxi.
“How the heck are ya, Case?”
She’d known Roxi long enough to hear the false cheer in her friend’s voice. Sure, the girl was always perky, but this was too much. “Why do you ask?” Casey asked cautiously.
“Just thinking about you. Did you get the dresses I sent over yesterday? I had to get those from Paris. I gotta say, you’re getting expensive to dress. But we have to make each outfit more spectacular than the last if we want to keep the press’s attention.”
Casey frowned. “Something’s up with Hake. He’s acting weird.”
“Weird how?”
“I think he’s sick of me. I don’t know if he’s going to be able to keep up the boyfriend-girlfriend charade much longer. I think you need to warn the gang to start thinking up a Plan B.”
Roxi laughed. “Not a chance.”
“You should’ve seen him this morning,” Casey said glumly. “He was all distant and polite. He wanted to talk about my job, of all things. It’s the kiss of death, I tell you.”
Roxi laughed harder. “Good for him.”
“Excuse me?”
“The only kind of sick your boy is would be lovesick.”
“Have you lost your mind?” Casey demanded.
“Chica, he called me yesterday, hat in hand, to ask for advice.”
“About what?”
“About you, Einstein.”
Casey’s jaw fell open. “Oh, my God. What did you tell him?”
“I told him you don’t like arrogant jerks, you take your career very seriously and you expect unconditional commitment from the men you commit to.”
“No wonder he treated me like I had horns coming out of my head and a third eye in the middle of my forehead just now.”
“Girlfriend, you’ve got him completely off balance. He doesn’t know which end is coming or going.”
Puh-lease. Hake off balance? Over her? Not in this lifetime. She forced herself into soldier mode and replied seriously, “I don’t want him off balance. We need him alert and focused. I think our terrorists will strike soon. They’ve got to be gnashing their teeth at the shenanigans he and I have been up to.”
“Any shenanigans happening off camera?”
Casey snorted. “No. I’ve been ducking and weaving like a prizefighter to keep it that way, though.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t dodge so hard. He sounds truly smitten with you.”
“You don’t know Hake El Aran. He snaps his fingers and women come running. I’m not about to be at his beck and call. The two of us would never work.”
Roxi sighed. “Too bad. He seems like the kind of guy who, if he opened up to a woman, would be a heck of a catch.”
“That’s a big if. An impossible if. He’ll never open up to anyone,” Casey retorted. She didn’t mean for the comment to sound bitter, but she feared it did.
“Well, hang in there, kiddo. And keep your chin up. No telling what’ll happen.”
Casey scowled. “In our line of work, we’re supposed to anticipate events before they happen. And I’m seeing a big fat nothing in my future where Hake El Aran is concerned.”
“You know what they say—love is blind.”
“Ha. Hake is so not in love with me.”
“Time will tell.”
“Stuff it, Rox.”
Laughing, her friend ended the call, leaving her scowling at herself in the mirror. She was not in love with Hake. Far from it. She wasn’t even in like with him.
A quiet knock sounded upon her door. Hake’s voice floated through the panel. “Casey, it’s almost time to leave. Do you need a few more minutes?”
She checked her hair and makeup quickly. Both were fine. She opened the door to frown at Hake. Since when did he fetch her personally for their dates? He held out his arm to her gallantly.
Lovesick, huh? No way.
Chapter 14
H ake idly watched the polo ponies charging up and down the field. The match was actually a good one with a top Spanish team matched against the ever-powerful Argent
ineans. However, he couldn’t seem to keep his mind on the action. His thoughts kept straying to the woman beside him.
She’d reacted with caution toward him at brunch, suspicious of his change in attitude. He supposed he couldn’t blame her. If only he knew what she was thinking right now. But no such luck. The woman was a mystery.
How could Casey think that men were only good for one thing? Outrage at the notion soared through him yet again. He was intelligent. Highly educated. Successful. The kind of man any woman would be proud to have.
Sure, the irony of her observation wasn’t lost on him. Casey treated him like he treated most—okay, all—women. But that was how the world worked. Men like him attracted a certain kind of woman, and the formula was always the same. Beautiful, ambitious woman seeks rich, handsome, successful man. She would give him all the sex and domestic backup for his career he needed, and in turn, he would provide a lavish lifestyle for her. There was nothing wrong with that, if everyone got what they wanted. Just because he hadn’t entered into such an arrangement so far didn’t mean it was a bad business model. He merely hadn’t found the right woman yet.
A tiny voice in the back of his head suggested that the vast majority of the women he’d dated over the years would have been thrilled to live out that exact relationship model with him. He shoved the thought away, irritated.
What did Casey want anyway? True love? A soul mate? A man who would worship the ground she walked on? Well, she could look somewhere else, then, thank you very much. Women groveled for him. Not the other way around. Liar, liar, pants on fire.
Damn that little voice in the back of his head anyway. He wasn’t missing any important point here! He liked his life just the way it was. He enjoyed the women in his life just the way they were. Except for the woman in his life right now. He wanted to understand her. To know her. To get what it was she expected of him. But are you prepared to deliver what she wants? All right, that little voice could shut up now.
When this cursed deal was done and his family safe once more, Casey would go her own way and he would get back to his life. And by then, his father would have forgotten all about this stupid business of forcing Hake to marry.
“Everything all right, Hake?” Casey murmured, leaning over and placing a hand high on his thigh, ostensibly to balance herself. The touch was intimate and possessive and set his blood on fire.
He forced a smile for her. “I’m fine. Enjoying yourself?”
“I had no idea polo was so rough, with the horses slamming into each other like that. It’s like hockey, but on horseback.”
He smiled. “That’s an excellent analogy.”
She leaned closer to him, and his arm naturally went around her shoulders. She snuggled against his side, and damned if she didn’t feel exactly right there.
He murmured, “What would you like for dinner?”
She made a sound that could’ve been a laugh, or maybe half a sob. “Some privacy.”
“Done,” he answered promptly. Profound relief coursed through him. The idea of having Casey entirely to himself, to treat her the way she deserved to be treated for once, was a breath of fresh air to him. He glanced over his shoulder. “Tomas, Casey and I will be dining in, tonight. Could you ring up the hotel and have them prepare something special for two?”
“Of course, sir.”
Hake did his best to ignore the grin on his security chief’s face.
Tomas stood up. “I’m not getting cell phone coverage here. I’ll be back in a moment.”
A tiny frown crossed Casey’s brow. She reached into her purse and pulled out her cell phone to check it. Her frown deepened. “Are you getting cell coverage, Hake?”
He fished out his phone and glanced at its face. “No. Why do you ask? We’re probably just in a dead spot between towers.”
“My phone works off satellites and so does Tomas’s—”
And that was when all hell broke loose. An odd whoosh sounded nearby, followed by four loud explosions so close together they sounded like a string of firecrackers but much, much louder. Glittering flecks of something flew in every direction. That was all Hake saw before Casey’s weight threw him over backward in his chair. And then the screaming started. Horses and humans, men, women and children, all screaming. It was a horrible sound.
He didn’t need to ask what was going on. He knew. It was the terrorists.
Casey rolled off him and bit out, “Injuries. Report!”
All but one of Tomas’s men responded. Hake craned his head and looked up to see blood covering several of his bodyguards. But then Casey was snapping orders again. “Claude, Thierry, you’re on Franz. Help him if he’s alive. Get him to a hospital and see to your own wounds when you get there. The rest of you, on me and Hake. Let’s go.”
Franz had been sitting directly in front of Hake. Whatever had sliced the man to ribbons had been aimed at him. Cold horror washed over Hake. Just like the night of the restaurant bombing, Casey put a protective hand on top of his head and dragged him along in a half-crouching run. Tomas came up, panting, along his right side.
“Bounding fragmentation mines,” the Swiss man grunted.
“I know,” Casey replied. “I’ve run into them before.”
Where in the hell had she run into something like that? The disjointed question stuck in Hake’s head, probably some sort of mental buffer in lieu of the revulsion and shock trying to crowd their way into his mind.
“The limo?” Tomas bit out.
“No!” Casey answered sharply. “Hake’s the target. It could blow. Into the city.”
“On foot?” Tomas squawked.
“Will they expect that and be prepared for it?” Casey retorted.
“Good point. But we’re down on men.”
Hake thought he glimpsed a humorless grin flitting across Casey’s face. “But not on women. As soon as we get beyond the terrorists’ cell phone jamming, we’ll have plenty of backup.”
They ran in silence then. Ran being the operative word. He was huffing hard to keep up with the blistering pace Casey set. They sprinted the length of the huge polo field, past the barns and parking lot, and burst out onto a city street. Sirens began to wail. It was eerily reminiscent of that first attack in London.
“C’mon,” Casey ordered. She moved in front of him, taking point as one of the other men slid in beside him. She continued to run at a breakneck pace, turning corners and crossing streets unexpectedly, making cars slam on their brakes and honk their horns. But always, she pressed forward, deeper into the heart of Nice. After maybe ten minutes, she gave a grunt of satisfaction and ducked into a bookstore. She raced toward the back of the place, startling several customers. She barged through a door marked Employees Only, and blessedly stopped.
Hake caught his breath while she rapidly dialed her cell phone. “Scorpion, here. The attack happened. The principal is unharmed and with me. We’ve got one man down, possibly dead. I left two men behind to render aid. I have five men with me and the principal. I need a safe house and quickest route from my current position. Request immediate backup from the Medusas.”
Medusa? Hake frowned. The original man-hating woman with snakes for hair?
“Roger. Copy.” And then Casey tucked her phone back into her pocket. She shoved a wireless earphone into her left ear and gestured for them to move toward the rear exit.
“Where are we going?” Hake asked.
“Someplace safe. We’ll hook up with my team there.”
“These Medusas?” he asked curiously.
She gave him a sour look. “Yeah.”
They ran for a few more minutes but didn’t attract much attention in the growing chaos. Word of the attack was spreading fast across town, and the traffic had come to a standstill as emergency vehicles and bystanders made their way to the scene of the explosion.
Casey careened around a corner and ducked into a doorway without warning. She hustled him and the others inside and slammed the door shut. She spent several long minutes
peering out the door’s peephole. Finally, she announced, “We’re clear.”
Tomas and Hake traded relieved looks and the Swiss man muttered, “Damn, she’s good. Where did you find her?”
“She found me,” Hake grunted back.
“Hell, if you don’t marry her, I will,” Tomas commented under his breath. Hake wasn’t sure he was supposed to have heard the comment and he chose not to respond. But his gut twisted hard at the notion of another man having Casey.
She took off again, racing up the stairs, gesturing them to follow. The woman’s stamina amazed him. He kept up with her on pure adrenaline at this point. The attack hadn’t gone at all as planned. The terrorists were supposed to show themselves when they tried to kill him, not leave anonymous land mines buried in a polo field to shred everyone indiscriminately.
Casey knocked on an apartment door on the fourth floor and it opened immediately. He and the others raced inside. He came to a halt in the middle of a living room that looked like a military surplus store. Weapons and electronic gadgets were neatly stacked all around the room. Several phones sat on the dining-room table, holding down the corners of a detailed map of Nice.
“Welcome to the snake den,” a tall, blonde woman said drily.
“I know you!” Hake exclaimed. “You were in London. Told my men how to do their jobs!”
She held out her hand. “I’m Monica. Nice to meet you. Sorry it has to be under these circumstances.”
Hake recognized the almost imperceptibly quick up and down she gave him, noting his brand of watch, the designer who did his suit. This woman was someone intimately familiar with his world. She knew the rules of engagement with men like him. But then the look was gone, replaced by grim focus.
“Early reports are that four bounding fragmentation mines were buried at the edge of the polo field,” Monica said tersely. “At least ten dead. A hundred or more wounded. You guys were lucky to get out of there with only one man down.”
“Any word on Franz?” Tomas asked quickly.
An Asian woman, who had a phone plastered to each ear across the room, answered, “He’s at a hospital. Alive on arrival. Multiple severe lacerations and serious blood loss.”