“No, I’m not. What are you talking about?”
“Right.” I want to believe him, but I can’t afford to rely on my battered emotions right now. Obviously my intuition has been way off when it comes to Danny.
He keeps talking. “I’ve never seen these guys before, and I just met Timofeyev Wednesday—”
“You know Timofeyev?” Elliott asks at the same time I say, “You know Fyodor?”
Danny looks around the shower slowly, borrowing my imaginary audience. “Uh, yeah?”
“How?” I demand.
“He toured NRC Aerospace this week. Wednesday. Right after I came to see you. How do you guys know him?”
The corporate bigwig he had to run off to see was Fyodor? Why didn’t we know — we lost Fyodor Wednesday. Elliott lost him.
I backhand his back and glare down at Elliott. “You should’ve stayed on him.”
“Yes, that’s what we need, to harp on the past.”
The past. Tonight replays in my mind in reverse, running backward through the park to Signatures. Where Danny had tried to take me earlier this week. Fyodor said a friend recommended it. I lean over Elliott, my hands on his shoulders, to address Danny. “You told him to go to Signatures, didn’t you?”
Danny squints up at me like he’s not following, and how could he? “Yeah, he said he met someone and wanted to take her somewhere special. How did you know?”
“You answer my questions first. Prove to me you’re not working with the Russians.”
“Hello?” He shakes his bound wrists. “They just marched me down here at gunpoint.”
That’s no guarantee. I’m pretty sure he’s in here to make a statement to me. But were they always going to drag him in, regardless of what I did? “How long have you been on the boat?”
“An hour and a half, maybe two. Since Dow’s Lake.”
The whole time. He was here the whole time. Oh, those liars are going to answer for this. But first, I have to deal with Danny. “Swear to me you’re not working with them.”
“The Cold War ended before I can remember. It’s not the big bad Soviets versus all that’s right and good in the world anymore.”
That’s not a denial — and that’s a very, very bad sign.
“Tell. Me.” I know a heck of a lot more about Russians than Danny would, enough to love the people and the language, and enough to know our aerospace and tech secrets do not belong in their hands.
Danny’s seriously? flashes over his face, but he angles his wrists to raise one hand like he’s taking an oath. “I’m not working with the Russians. I gave Timofeyev a tour of my corner of NRC. I spent an hour with the guy. That’s it.”
There’s the denial. Direct, upfront, devoid of qualifiers, convincing statements, unnatural pauses and other deceptive cues. Still, I jump into observational overdrive. Though they’re not 100% reliable for lie detection, I watch his eyes. I should know him well enough to tell when he’s lying.
No unnatural eye contact, like he’s trying too hard to hold or avoid my gaze. Pupils normal. Blinking normal. No change in his expression. No hand-to-face activity. His feet, his anchor points — he shifts his weight when he’s bluffing. Not now. From my perch on the bench, I glance down at Elliott in front of me to double check my assessment. He gives a tiny nod, almost a twitch.
He’s not lying.
I could kiss Danny now. And then a swift shock of sorrow in my heart reminds me of the fundamental shift in our relationship.
“He showed up at my place right after I got home.” Danny barely acknowledges Elliott untying the ropes. “I mean, after I . . . made it inside. I didn’t even get to the living room first.”
“Let me guess, he had pictures of me and said he’d hurt me if you didn’t come along.”
Danny shoves his shirt cuffs back to rub his wrists, his eyes averted. “How could I not? I mean, I still—” He stops abruptly.
They’d played us all the same way, using someone we care about against us. The fact they hadn’t tracked down Shanna (we hope) was at least a minor consolation. I look down. “That’s how they got us, too.”
“What, with pictures of one another?”
I fold my arms above Elliott’s head. “No, he showed me pictures of you.” I bite back the “you jerk” I want to add at the end. I think my tone has that covered.
“But how do you know Timofeyev?”
The last drops of my relief at Danny’s innocence evaporate. I’m going to have to answer that question with a lot more of the truth than I’ve ever planned to give Danny.
No. I can’t. My mouth goes dry at the thought, like it can’t either.
Elliott glances over his shoulder. “Tell him.”
“Tell me what?”
I glower down at Elliott again. If they’re monitoring us, I’m certainly not going to be the one to give something away. Not like that. “If you’d stayed on him, we would’ve been able to work around this mess.”
He bats those stupid baby blues up at me. “You know you can’t blame this face.”
“I want to do a lot more than blame to that face.”
“I’m right here,” Danny interjects.
Elliott drops the pretense as smoothly as if he never used it. “You need to tell him.”
“Tell me what?” That saucer-eyed and scared look from earlier resurfaces in Danny’s eyes. The tables have turned now: I know I can trust him again, but now he’s wondering the same thing about me.
“He’s practically read himself into the case file.” Elliott, ever helpful.
I punch him in the shoulder blade. “I will decide when and how I tell him.” And the official rules say we can’t tell until we’re engaged.
Which we would be, maybe, if I hadn’t screwed this night up so badly.
Danny’s saucer eyes travel from me to Elliott, and I can just see he’s getting the wrong idea all over again. “Don’t tell me he’s married to you. I’d rather not know.”
“Yeah, no.” I shake my head and Danny puffs out a breath. Elliott’s right, I have to tell him something, but the truth isn’t much better than the lie.
Suddenly the irony of our positioning hits me: for all the times Elliott’s come between us this week, now he’s actually, physically between us. We can’t have this conversation this way. I hop off the bench and try to push Elliott aside. “Move it.”
He turns so I can edge past. Elliott backs himself into my corner and I cross the distance between me and Danny. Okay, it’s only like a foot, but it’s very awkward to be this close to him after . . . tonight. Especially with what I’m about to tell him.
“Maybe you should sit.” I point to the wrap-around bench behind him.
His eyes still round and wary, Danny sinks onto the bench. I follow, but our knees touch, and somehow that feels too close — and I can’t stop picturing Kozyrev in here, his naked butt — shudder. I jump back to my feet.
“Can I make sure I have this all straight first?” I ask. “You met Fyodor on Wednesday to give him a tour of NRC Aerospace, right?”
“Right.”
I can’t help the caution that creeps into my voice. “And it came up that he met someone here and wanted to take her out for a special evening, so you suggested Signatures, right?”
“He said they’d already been to Wilfrid’s.”
“And since then, you haven’t seen or heard from Fyodor Timofeyev until you walked in your house tonight, right?”
“Sounds like you get what’s going on here. Now can I?”
I don’t know where to start. I glance back to Elliott’s corner. He holds out a hand in a gesture of you go right ahead.
Yeah, thanks.
Danny stands. “Look, if this is about the two of you, consider me informed, okay?”
“It’s not about him.” I drop my voice to a whisper. “Elliott is married and we are leaving his wife out of everything tonight. It’s bad enough you’re here.”
Danny furrows his brow. “Wait, what? Are you saying I’
m here because of you?”
“Uh . . .” I check Elliott’s reaction. This time he offers that dunno palm again. “Why else would you be here?”
Danny turns his head to regard me at a skeptical angle. “Which one of us has the information Timofeyev wants? You? Elliott?”
“D,” Elliott says, and I think he’s given Danny a nickname until he adds, “all of the above.”
“What would Timofeyev want with either of you?” Danny asks.
Fyodor has no idea what he could really get from us, and that’s not why we’re here. I touch Danny’s arm, but I still can’t meet his gaze. I try to ease him back down to the shower bench, but think better of it again. Finally, I look up. “The girl you were helping Fyodor romance tonight?”
His eyes lock on mine and we can all hear him swallow hard. “Yeah?”
I can’t say this; I can’t break his heart and mine all over again. My throat starts to ache with tears and protest.
But I have to say it. “It’s me.”
I expect Danny to get mad, to yell, to throw things. (I’ve rarely seen him yell and never throw things, though it seems appropriate right now.) But his gaze drifts downward until he’s looking at the floor and our feet. “I’m an idiot.” He says it like it’s a deep thought occurring to him for the first time. That or already insanely obvious.
“No, it isn’t like that—”
“It’s not like that?” He laughs with one humorless breath, then turns on the attack. “How many other guys do you have to date before it’s ‘like that’?”
“Danny—”
“The client who picked up on you. Him?”
“Sort of.”
He scoffs in utter disbelief. “You’re out there playing me and I’m sitting in Wilfrid’s planning to — and you — ”
“Please, let me explain.”
Elliott snorts. “You’re doing a great job so far.”
I whirl on him. “Will you shut up?”
“Well, I hope you and Timofeyev are very happy together.” Danny holds up his hands and backs away two steps. I want to follow, but he hits the corner and I won’t pin him down.
I want to let him get away from me. Because I know I’m a terrible person.
“Danny.” I keep my voice soft, like that will retroactively soften the blow. “There are a thousand reasons I could never be with Timofeyev. Fyodor doesn’t know who I really am.”
“I guess that makes two of us,” Danny spits out. The words hit me like a punch to the gut. I stand there, stunned, and he brushes past me to stand in front of the shower door, bracing himself when the boat moves forward. It’s not easy to avoid one another in these cramped quarters, but he manages not to touch me at all.
“That went well.” Elliott’s muttered sarcasm really makes me want to believe him. Not. “Next time, try—”
“Seriously, Elliott—”
“You need to tell him the rest.”
Danny cuts in. “Pretty sure I’ve heard more than enough.”
Before I can figure out how to say it — any of it — the bathroom door swings open.
And Fyodor Timofeyev makes his entrance. The first time I’ve seen him since the park.
The trickle of ice water fear runs down my spine again, and the nausea returns full force. Could this turn into a reprise?
“You know,” Fyodor begins in English, “this whole evening, perhaps I have it backward.”
I cut him off. “I’ll say. Think kidnapping’s the best way to apologize?”
Elliott edges forward, placing one shoulder between me and Fyodor. Danny doesn’t look at me, but steps up at my other side. As if the bulletproof glass weren’t protection enough. (I do feel better to have them there.)
“Oh, Natalia.” Fyodor’s voice drips with derision and pity. “Natushka.” The pet version of my cover’s name. “Natushenka.”
“Cute, but you’re a couple years too young to be my dad.”
His lips twist. He clasps his hands behind his back to pace the three-step-wide space between the sink and the toilet. “I might have been wrong tonight.”
“You think?”
“You are very brave from behind your gentlemen friends.” He flips the ring box opens and smirks at whatever’s inside.
I maneuver around Danny and his attempt to block me. “I’d be happy to talk face to face. Yesli ty nastovashchiy muzhchina.” I toss aside my eavesdropping on Kozyrev’s Russian card with a lift of my chin. If you’re a real man.
He calls me a name I know, but won’t translate.
“You kiss your mother with that mouth?” I fire back in Russian. “Oh, let me guess, she’s the only one who’ll let you.”
“Will you not shut up?”
I switch back to English. “I’m sorry, I thought you wanted me to talk. I can see how I’d be confused, though, since usually when you want something from me, ty menya nasiluyesh′.” Which basically means you take it from me by violence, but the primary meaning in Russian is a lot closer to you violate me.
Fyodor snaps the ring box shut, tosses it into the sink and strides from the bathroom.
“You speak Russian?” Danny asks.
I meet his eyes, but can’t hold his gaze (again). “Yeah, well, when I said I served my mission in a bunch of small towns on the border of Georgia . . . I didn’t mean the state.”
He just shakes his head, like he can’t believe he fell for yet another of my lies. My heart tumbles down two steps. I try to console myself that at least he’s not reaching out to Timofeyev to build on their common ground of Talia the traitor.
Fyodor marches back into the room, this time with a gun. My heart wedges itself back into its now-too-small place. “Are you done talking?” Back to English.
“It’s bulletproof glass, you idiot.”
“Willing to bet his life on it?” He aims at Elliott. “Or his?” He swings to Danny, sweeping me in the process. Does he know what he’s doing with that weapon?
I seal my lips. As thick as the glass (well, plastic composite) is, I don’t have a guarantee it’ll stop a bullet beyond Kozyrev’s word. Not exactly the greatest confidence builder.
“Now that you are listening.” He holds the gun on Danny, and I don’t dare take my eyes off Fyodor. “When I saw you two together, I thought Fluker was coming after me, through you.”
“Why would he do that?” I risk a glance at Danny, but all I read in a second is tension.
Fyodor is staring at Danny, too. “He knows. He knows exactly why I went to a great deal of trouble to have you both tracked home.”
Elliott interrupts with a sighs as if he’s already bored with the monologuing.
Fyodor steps closer to the glass. “At the most, I thought you had cheated on me. But then, once I had the two of you taken care of, I turn around and find another familiar face waiting. I get back to my hotel and your savior from the park just happens to appear?”
“I barely know this guy.” I jerk a thumb at Elliott. “Pure coincidence. Ottawa’s not even as big as Rostov.”
Fyodor cocks an eyebrow. At least it’s not the gun. It’s a double action, so he wouldn’t need to cock it, but still. “And you have only one swimming pool?” he asks.
“One good one.” Elliott’s playing his cover to the end.
Fyodor ignores him. “And then it was so obvious. Fluker is not the center of the whole thing. It is you.” He swoops the gun back to me. “Da?”
There’s no right answer to that question. I’m not sure there’s an answer that won’t get someone killed.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I try my best this-is-ridiculous pose. “I don’t know what any of this is about, and I don’t know what you want.”
“Who do you work for?” When I don’t answer, he holds the gun higher, aiming for Danny’s head. The back of my neck breaks out in a cold sweat.
I have to play my cover harder, too. “Parliament.”
Fyodor leans even closer, until his nose is almost against the door
. “Parliament has no interest in me, and I do not believe they have the means to organize you and him.” He nods to Elliott. “Or him.” Danny.
“Oh, honey. Nobody has the means to organize that poor guy.”
“Hey,” Elliott and Danny protest together, though I don’t mean either of them.
“Much as I am enjoying your comedy hour, I do not believe you will keep it up for long.”
I hold up a hand to cut off another humor salvo from Elliott. “Fyodor, it doesn’t matter if you believe me. You’ve kidnapped a government official. If you don’t let every one of us go, the consequences will be a lot more than you can handle.”
“Oh, Zhzhyonova, I can handle more than you know.”
Now they can’t even get my cover name right? I can feel Danny’s eyes on me, but I don’t look back. “Let me out and we’ll see how much you can handle.”
He tosses back a classic example of Russian mat, obscenity so profane it’s actually illegal. I jerk my chin at him. Danny and Elliott each place a hand on my shoulder, like they’d hold me back if I wanted to rip Fyodor’s face off. (You know, them and the inch-thick glass.)
“Sexy when provoked.” Fyodor turns to Danny. “You agree, da?”
Danny just glares back. I’ve never seen him look at anything with that much hate.
Fyodor laughs, then launches into a complicated insult that . . . well, let’s leave it by saying if Elliott and Danny spoke the language, I’d be the one holding them back. Or not.
But now that I know he’s messing with me for his own twisted pleasure, it’s easier to ignore his mental jabs. “Your little boyfriend promised us something to eat. Where is it?”
He flinches and blinks. The basic demand seems to have shattered his train of thought. The boat lurches forward. I’ve lost count, but we must be nearing the bottom of the locks.
Have I really been trapped in this shower for over two hours?
“And what are you going to do when we have to go to the bathroom?” I pick up the mental assault on Fyodor.
“I’m thirsty.” Elliott barely suppresses a grin. “Tell me you have bottled water.”
Danny folds his arms. “Are we there yet?”
Spy Another Day Box Set: Three full-length novels: I, Spy; Spy for a Spy; and Tomorrow We Spy (Spy Another Day clean romantic suspense trilogy) Page 19