Black Ops Warrior

by Amelia Autin

  “I should go next door for my belongings,” he began, but she stopped him.

  “First I need to know who you are. You said we’d talk about it later. Well, now is later.”

  His eyes creased at the corners as if she’d called him a liar. “I wasn’t lying. I don’t work for the Defense Security Service.”

  She thought for a moment, trying to remember Niall’s exact words the few times they’d discussed his work. “You said you’re a troubleshooter, that you plug security leaks. What did you mean by that?”

  He grinned. “You have a mind like a steel trap. Anyone ever tell you that?”

  “Yes, and don’t try to change the subject. What exactly do you do?”

  He removed his own jacket and turned to hang it in the closet. Then he faced her again. “Before the Corps and I parted company eighteen years ago, I looked around to see what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. When I found it, I went to college and got dual degrees in criminology and computer programming to make it happen.”

  “And?”

  “And I went to work for a security firm after I graduated three years later.”

  She was distracted for a moment. “You finished your undergraduate work in three years?” She had, too, just another little thing they had in common, but... “Dual degrees?” She couldn’t help but be impressed. She’d only earned a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics before she’d entered grad school at twenty-one.

  “Yeah. Tested out of a bunch of GenEd classes, then took the max credit hours I could take every semester. Money wasn’t the main factor—I was on the GI bill—but I was itching to get out into the real world and start doing.”

  She brought her focus back to her original question. “Doing what?”

  He smiled faintly. “I was a hot commodity in those days. The explosion of the internet and cyber security—or rather, the woeful lack of cyber security—combined with my Marine Corps experience and my degrees meant I could pretty much write my own ticket. Heady stuff for a twenty-five-year-old. I started out earning almost triple what I’d been making in the Corps, and it was all due to Uncle Sam.”

  She digested what he’d said, then nodded thoughtfully. “I see. Thank you for telling me.” She forced a smile onto her face. “I’m sorry for being so suspicious. Blame all the security briefings I had when I was working for my former company—you can easily get paranoid, seeing spies everywhere.”

  He returned her smile. “Not a problem. I’d have suspected me, too, under the circumstances.” He took the two steps that brought him right up in front of her and touched her cheek. “Are we good now?”

  She put her hand over his. “We’re good.”

  “Then let me go get my things, and we can head down to lunch. Okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Bolt the door behind me.”

  “You’ll only be gone a few minutes,” she protested.

  He held her gaze. “Please.”

  “All right.” She followed Niall to the door and bolted it. Then sagged against it and stood there long after he left, a band of pain tightening around her heart. Because she realized, despite his long and involved explanation, he’d never told her how he knew she was a doctor, nor why he’d used the word we.

  And though she still loved him, though she believed much of what he’d told her was the truth, somewhere in all those details he’d lied to her. She was sure of it.

  * * *

  Niall checked his suitcases and backpack before he picked them up. Not just that they were still securely locked, but that they were precisely where he’d left them, and that his little markers hadn’t been touched. They hadn’t. His bed had been made and the towels in the bathroom changed, but otherwise the room was undisturbed.

  He headed for the door, a suitcase in each hand and backpack over his shoulder, wondering if he’d dodged a bullet with Savannah. She seemed to believe him, but he couldn’t be positive. Everything he’d told her was the God’s honest truth, except for one thing. One lie—that he’d gone to work for a “security firm” after college—buried in the middle of his otherwise truthful story.

  You’re a very convincing liar, Niall, she’d told him at dinner the other night. You mix bits of the truth with your lies, which makes it easy to believe you.

  He’d learned the art of deception so long ago it was second nature to him now. He could still recall sitting in a class he’d been sent to when he’d joined his agency, a class taught by a famous spymaster.

  Try to avoid an out-and-out lie if you can. Divert attention whenever possible instead, kind of like the sleight of hand a magician does. Humor helps. When people are laughing, they’re not dissecting your story word for word. And afterward, all they’ll remember is the funny parts.

  But if you must tell a lie, remember that listeners tend to focus on the first and last sentences in a story. To make a lie convincing, bury it in the middle of truthful statements.

  Which is what he’d done with Savannah. He’d been watching her reaction closely with every word he’d said. And though she’d apologized at the end for her suspicions, though she’d told him they were good now, there’d been that one second when he’d thought he’d seen something in her eyes. It had vanished so quickly he’d almost convinced himself he’d imagined it, but...

  He put one suitcase down and rapped on her door. “Savannah?”

  “Just a minute.”

  He heard the metallic click of the bolt being pulled back and the sound of the handle being turned, which released the automatic lock. Then the door swung inward, with Savannah framed in the opening. And in that instant before she composed her face into a welcoming expression, he knew she knew he’d lied.

  Chapter 15

  “Do I need to bring my carry-on bag?” Savannah asked Niall after he’d moved into her room and put his gear down. “Are you planning to steal more glasses at lunch?”

  “Steal?” he joked. “I don’t steal, I just borrow. I always return things after I lift the fingerprints.”

  Her answering smile came and went quickly. “Borrow, then. Do you need me to be your partner in crime again? Should I bring my carry-on bag to stash them for you?”

  He shook his head. “Let’s hold off on any more fingerprints for now, until we cross-reference the lists. We have quite a few sets already.”

  Why did you even pack a fingerprint kit anyway? It’s not something one would usually bring on vacation.”

  He skirted that land mine by shrugging and saying, “Habit. And the possibility I could always be called back if there was an emergency. I have a bunch of stuff I carry with me when I travel for work, and I automatically packed it just in case.”

  “Oh, I see. That makes sense, I guess.” She picked up her purse. “But I wouldn’t want a job where I could be called back from vacation at a moment’s notice.”

  He shrugged again. “It’s not so bad. I’ve only been recalled three times in fifteen years, and every time the company reimbursed me for the busted travel plans. But it’s always a possibility.”

  “‘Plan for the worst and hope for the best.’ My mom always said that.” Her smile was a little twisted and it touched something deep inside him, because he understood the loss she still felt keenly. “Is that how you process the fingerprints, too? With stuff you always carry with you?” Her tone conveyed merely casual interest, but he knew it wasn’t.

  “Yeah. I have a miniscanner attachment for my laptop.”

  “Ahhh, I should have guessed. Who’s checking the fingerprints for you?”

  A grenade this time, one he tried to deflect with humor. “What is this, Twenty Questions?”

  “Nice try,” she said softly. “Just answer, please.”

  If he hadn’t known before, he would now—Savannah no longer trusted him. “Colleagues where I work,�
�� he said levelly. “And that’s the last question I’ll answer on this topic. You ready for lunch?”

  * * *

  The ship was passing through Wu Gorge during lunch, so Savannah was grateful she and Niall were early enough to get a table by the window. Lush, green and shrouded in mist, the Twelve Peaks that lined the gorge rose majestically and impressively on both sides of the boat.

  “It’s so beautiful,” she murmured to the woman who’d taken the chair next to hers at the table. Her nametag read Debbie S. “So peaceful. Don’t you think, Debbie?”

  “Absolutely. This is the second time Bob and I have taken this cruise,” she replied, indicating the smiling man on her other side. “I came down with a horrendous sinus infection the first time, even though I had a mask with me to wear in crowds,” she explained. “I missed most of the side excursions. Poor Bob had to go by himself. But even though I felt terrible, I sat on the balcony outside our room because the scenery was just too beautiful to pass up.”

  Conversation at the table segued into discussions of other places people had been, especially other river cruises the tour company offered in the heart of Europe, the Baltic states and Scandinavia that these seasoned and well-heeled travelers had taken.

  Niall, on Savannah’s other side, was noticeably silent. And she wondered about that. He’d always been an excellent raconteur, holding his own in any table conversation and making the other guests laugh uproariously at times with his amusing banter.

  Then it came to her. It made no sense whatsoever, but somehow she’d wounded him with her questions earlier, questions that clearly conveyed she didn’t trust him anymore. She hadn’t thought she could hurt him, but she had. And her tender heart gave her no peace.

  But he lied to you, she reminded her heart. He lied. Probably from the beginning.

  Out of the blue, she remembered two seemingly contradictory quotations her mother had often used: Tell the truth and shame the devil, a commonly used variant of a line from Shakespeare, and Robert Louis Stevenson’s: The lie of a good woman is the true index of her heart.

  And when Savannah had questioned her mother about it, she’d explained they weren’t really contradictory at all. The first merely meant that honesty—as a general rule—was usually the best policy, though not always. Sometimes silence was best; to spare someone’s feelings, for instance, rather than speak an unpalatable or hurtful truth. And sometimes a lie was warranted. A lie with the best intentions.

  She glanced at Niall, who was turned away from her and gazing out the window at the gorge through which they were passing, and it suddenly occurred to her how like these mountains he was. Despite his seeming conviviality, he was really a solitary man. Stoic. Aloof. There was a quiet strength about him, too. A strength he’d never used against her, only to help her. Guarding her back as they climbed the Great Wall. Carrying her out of the crowd at the terracotta warrior museum. Chasing away the masked intruders outside her hotel room.

  And making love to you as if it were the most important thing in the world, she remembered with a flush of warmth. Proving you were wrong about yourself. Don’t forget that.

  It all boiled down to a man she could trust, the lies notwithstanding. She reached under the table without thinking and clasped his hand, squeezing it reassuringly.

  He turned around and their eyes met. She saw an apology in those dark brown depths for having deceived her. And at the same time, a steadfast determination to maintain that deception—whatever it was—for a reason only he could comprehend. Just as she’d known he’d lied to her, she knew this was the truth, too.

  This didn’t make everything miraculously all right between them. And though she hoped, she wasn’t counting on anything after the end of this trip. But she was returning to her original resolution.

  She was going to live her life one day at a time. She was going to accept the gift of this wonderful man for as long as she was allowed to have him. She was going to trust he’d never deliberately hurt her and make love with him secure in that trust for whatever time they had left. And she was going to love him unreservedly...for the rest of her life. Even if she never saw him again.

  * * *

  The man looked at the woman with dislike, masked by the role of loving husband he was forced to play. He leaned over to whisper in her ear, ostensibly a private word between husband and wife, but in reality a criticism he was burning to unleash.

  “We could have been at their table if you’d noticed I’d left my jacket behind a little sooner.”

  She turned disbelieving eyes on him and whispered back, “Your jacket. Yours. You took it off on the sightseeing boat and left it there, not me. It’s not my fault we had to go all the way back for it.”

  “Quiet! A fine partner you turned out to be. We would have been finished if you hadn’t screwed up last night.”

  “Are you on that again? It was an accident. Just like you forgetting your jacket today was an accident.”

  He straightened and smiled for form’s sake, then made a joke that had the whole table laughing. But when his gaze fell on his pseudo-wife, he made sure his eyes promised retribution.

  * * *

  Niall and Savannah detoured to her stateroom after lunch to don their jackets against the cool outside air, then took another stroll around the boat. Remembering his idea the first day on board, he led her to the prow of the ship.

  “Titanic moment?” he murmured, drawing her out to the farthest point they were allowed to go. He set her in front of him while he stood at her back, his arms enfolding her like the couple in the movie, but careful not to take her by surprise.

  She laughed, obviously delighted when the cool wind blew her hair out of its careful chignon. Then she dug a hand in her jacket pocket and pulled out her camera, holding it out at arm’s length. “Smile.”

  A half dozen photos later, each one showing them both with crazy, wind-tossed hair, she gave up. “I don’t care,” she said, stowing her camera away. “I’m saving them, not deleting them.”

  He chuckled. “There goes your theory that I never take a bad picture.”

  “Hah! You still look gorgeous, even with wild hair.”

  He turned her in his arms. “You’re the gorgeous one,” he whispered as an ache built in his chest. Then he captured her lips for a kiss that couldn’t even begin to convey what he felt because that couldn’t be put into words, either. She was trembling when he finally let her go, and he pressed two fingers beneath her ear, just as he’d done last night. “Your pulse is racing again.”

  She nodded slowly, her gaze glued to his. “But this time I am turned on.”

  He kissed her eyelids closed. “I want you, Savannah,” he breathed, realizing how pitifully inadequate that word was to describe how he felt. “God, how I want you. You’re sweet and good and funny and sexy and so damn smart. But I...”

  Her eyelids slid up slowly, as if she were surfacing from a drugged state. “You can’t hurt me by wanting me, Niall. Not when I feel the same way. You can only hurt me by not making love to me.” She smiled up at him and his heart ached again at the delicate beauty of her smile. “I seem to recall someone saying that love in the afternoon sounded pretty damn good.” She tapped her lips with the tip of one finger as she pretended to be puzzled. “Hmm. Now who could that have been?”

  * * *

  Love in the afternoon wasn’t better than make-up sex, Savannah acknowledged, but it was pretty darn close. At least with Niall.

  “What happens when we run out of condoms?” she asked as she pulled down the covers and plumped up the pillows.

  He laughed softly and jerked the drapes closed, giving them privacy. “I bought the jumbo box. Forty-eight. I think we’re safe for this cruise.”

  “I bought some, too,” she volunteered, pulling the box out of the drawer where she’d stashed it and handing it to him.
“The day we met.”

  His lips quirked. “Nice to know your intentions, but...” He put her box down and pulled his box out of his suitcase and handed it to her. “Yours are the wrong size.”

  “Oh.” She glanced from one box to the other. “They don’t...stretch?”

  His hearty laugh made her laugh, too. “Yeah, they do, but not that much. And besides, you should know that if you stretch a condom past the tension limit, you run a greater risk of tearing.” A semiserious, semihumorous expression crossed his face as he began stripping off his clothes. “If that happens, then why bother?”

  “Good point.” She thrust the box of condoms she’d bought back in the drawer, and when she turned around he was completely naked. Naked, and already impressively aroused.

  Not quite comfortable just flinging her clothes off the way he had, she stalled and drew one of the packets out of the extra-large-size box. Suddenly curious, because he’d always donned a condom himself without her assistance, she ripped the packet open and stared at it in her palm for a moment, then glanced at him. Or rather, at a certain portion of his anatomy. And back at the condom. Then at him again. In all seriousness, she said, “I think this one might be too small, too.”

  His teeth flashed in a grin, and he drawled, “Why thank you, darlin’.” He took the condom from her hand and efficiently rolled it on, proving her wrong. He then proceeded to undress her. Slowly. Torturing her with appropriate kisses in the most inappropriate places.

  When she was finally as naked as he was and shaking from the force of her desire, he drew her onto the bed and pulled her on top of him. “What are you—” she began, but he cut her off.

  “How about you do all the work this time?”

  * * *

  They dozed in the aftermath, and when they woke they just snuggled. This was almost as good as the sex for Savannah, lying in Niall’s arms, listening to his heartbeat and watching his chest rise and fall. Sliding her fingers through the silky hair on his chest that was only a shade darker than his light brown mane. Running gentle fingers over the scar that could never be ugly to her because of what it stood for. Exploring the ripple of muscles that made her wonder how he stayed in such incredible shape.