“But it wasn’t.” Alexis struggled to moderate her voice, but all that buried heartbreak and betrayal was burning a hole in her heart. “The dacha is where those career-ending photos were snapped. That photographer must have been hiding in the bedroom before we even arrived!”
“I can’t deny this.” His movements sharp with agitation, he ground out his cigarette in the brass ashtray. “That was my miscalculation. Although I’d used a public telephone to contact my friend’s housekeeper and arrange our evening, I learned later that I’d been bugged, and my instructions had been recorded. This explains how the agency learned our destination and managed to beat us there.”
A part of her yearned to believe him. But this tale he was spinning was just too far-fetched. He’d deceived her repeatedly, and she wouldn’t take the chance of letting him make a fool of her again.
“Somehow,” she said tightly, “I’m having a hard time believing the SVR would let you simply say ‘nyet’ and walk away from their little scheme. They’re hardly known for their forbearance.”
“They didn’t simply accept this, of course.” He paced before the fire. “In the following days, the agency continued to demand my cooperation, employing various threats in an effort to force my consent. This was when I realized, once and for all, that I could no longer remain loyal to an employer I despised. I wanted to prove my father’s innocence—to myself most of all—or at least to develop a plausible alternative hypothesis for his conduct. But the SVR was tying my hands.”
“That was when you purchased our train tickets, right?” She nodded. “But you were still carrying your SVR identification card. Clearly, they hadn’t cut you loose.”
“You’re quite correct. Ultimately, it took kicking Admiral Ivashov in the head to inspire them to sack me,” Victor said dryly. “If I’d known they would react so obligingly, I would have assaulted him years ago, and spared myself considerable annoyance.”
Damn it, she wanted to buy his story. But she couldn’t just let him play her like a violin, could she?
He’d stopped pacing to watch her, that furrow digging between his brows as he clearly figured out she wasn’t buying it. His fists knotted at his sides.
“Listen to me, Alexis,” he said intently. “When you shoved those bloody photographs at me and walked out of that nightclub, I wanted like hell to go after you! But I knew we’d been observed entering the alcove with Ivashov. For both our sakes, I needed to create a cover for what happened to him, which was no simple matter.
“Then the man needed to be driven to hospital, since he’d suffered a concussion.” Victor grimaced. “As soon as I dumped him on a gurney and left those incompetent physicians wringing their hands over him, I raced back to the hotel—committing numerous traffic violations en route, as I’m certain it will amuse you to learn. But it was all to no avail, since you were no longer in residence.”
His words picked up speed, clipped and precise as his accent thickened. “I checked the train station, the airport, the major hotels, the U.S. Consulate. I woke your Consular General—an extremely unpleasant woman at that hour, I must say—pleading to find out where you’d gone. Of course, she would tell me nothing.”
He raked a hand through his hair, tight movements telegraphing his frustration. “Finally, I went to Geoffrey Chase’s hotel at 3 a.m., pounded on the door and shouted until he opened it. At which point, your ex-husband spoke to me through ten centimeters of space, with the chain engaged. Clearly, he believed he was dealing with a lunatic.”
“I’m sure you had him scared to death.” Despite the turmoil churning through her, Alexis couldn’t contain a wicked grin at Geoff’s expense. He’d been steering clear of her since that fiasco, thank God, and now she knew why. So Victor’s scare tactics had served one useful function, at least, and gotten her ex off her back.
“Obviously you weren’t with him, and just as obviously, Mr. Chase had no idea where you’d gone.” Shifting to his staccato Russian, Victor prowled before the fire. “I was reduced to driving through the streets of St. Petersburg at random, hoping that somehow I’d spot you. Christ, I smoked two packs of cigarettes in less than three hours. I thought I was losing my bloody mind.”
“You’re fortunate your lungs survived it,” she murmured. Though she couldn’t deny a certain smugness that her frantic strategy that night had succeeded in throwing the canny captain off the scent. “As it happens, I rented a car and drove back to Moscow. I needed some time alone to think things through, and I didn’t want the SVR on my tail.
“Anyway,” she finished pointedly, reminding herself that she still couldn’t trust a word he was telling her. “You look fully recovered from your so-called trauma. Like you’ve taken a nice vacation, in fact.”
“A vacation?” He shot her a narrowed look. “I spent the next two interminable weeks catering to the constantly-changing whims of your presidential advance team, Counselor. I drank too much, barely slept, and terrorized my subordinates until the entire collective threatened to resign. I couldn’t get you out of my head, Alexis, and it was a living hell.”
Despite her skepticism, his aggravation vibrated like sonar through the room. Jesus, the guy looked like he was ready to launch into orbit. She supposed he probably hadn’t been a happy camper when she dumped those damning photos in his hand and took off. Since he was used to being the one who called the shots.
But even if he was telling her the truth—for once—where the hell was this going to go? She’d just as soon skip another fun-filled journey with him down the Heartbreak Highway. Been there, done that, didn’t buy the t-shirt.
“President Cartwright’s wheels-up from Moscow took place a week ago,” she pointed out. “And you’re sporting a fresh suntan.”
“I’m pleased that my agitation entertains you, Ms. Castle,” he said icily. “As you can clearly observe, I’m not very skilled at this. But since you’ve raised the issue, after your president thankfully exited Russian airspace, I did take several days of so-called vacation on the Red Sea in Egypt.”
“How nice for you, captain,” she said bitterly. While I packed my bags and resigned from a once-in-a-lifetime position in order to get away from you.
“During that time,” he said flatly, “I completed the sale of my entire portfolio of casino assets. I used the proceeds to endow several scholarships at the National Museum of Ukrainian History in Kiev in my father’s name.”
Alexis blinked in surprise, her body going limp as she slid from the arm of her wingchair onto the cushion. She hadn’t expected that one, and she didn’t think he’d make it up. Not when she could simply call the museum or the U.S. Embassy in Kiev—which she would certainly do—to confirm the story.
Bristling with tension, Victor rocked on his heels. “So as you can see, I have divested myself of all my questionable assets. Anticipating that you might not readily accept my word for this, I have the relevant financial and legal documents in my coat there, if you’d care to examine them. Your own analysts can easily confirm that the police investigation against me has been closed, with no charges filed.”
Wow. She couldn’t deny that he’d taken her aback with this chain of landmine confessions. One by one, he was systematically blasting away many of her justifications for walking out of his life. Still, she had to be real with herself. Even though she was leaving her U.S. government position and he’d left the SVR, where could they ever be together without “outside interference”—or the suspicion of it—screwing up their lives? Any relationship between them was a dead-end street, just as it had always been.
“So let me get this straight.” Keeping on her game face, she planted her empty glass on the coffee table. “You claim you’ve resigned from the MFA—and quit the Defense Ministry too, I take it? You’ve been fired from the SVR. You’ve sold your casino shares and cleared your name from the militsia’s bad book, and shed your Mafia connections. Which means you’ll be surviving how exactly?”
“As you know, I own an adventure trave
l business in Egypt.” Now he was watching her with the fixed intensity of a sub skipper who’d just nailed down a target. “I’ve decided to expand that business, and to do so directly from Cairo. Therefore, I have utilized the past several days to hire additional staff on the ground, find a suitable apartment in Cairo, and arrange other necessary details.
“Christ, Alexis, I’m in hell here!” Abruptly he strode toward her, bearing down on the wingchair before she could scramble away. He crouched to bring them eye-to-eye, trapping her in the high-backed chair.
She hadn’t been expecting it—him—to get so close. Her breath snared, her heart thudding like she’d just logged two hours at the dojo in a hard sweat. By reflex she leaned away, needing to keep her distance, and pressed her back against the chair. But he gripped the upholstered arms, closing off her options for evading him. Her body tingled and pulsed with his nearness, which she strove not to notice.
“Alexis,” he murmured, eyes kindling with electric heat. “I know you’re furious with me, and I can hardly blame you. But I can’t—I don’t want—damn it, I don’t know how to think about the future without you in it! Do I have to spell this out?”
By now her heart was pounding so hard that her head was spinning. And despite her triple-time heartbeat, she could barely drag enough oxygen into her lungs.
“I think you’d better spell it out,” she whispered, moistening her lips. “I don’t want to misunderstand you.”
“I told you I’m a disaster at this.” His hands clenched on the chair, but his eyes locked on hers like their lives depended on it. “Alexis. Somewhere in the middle of this whole bloody mess, I fell in love with you.”
Alexis uttered a strangled sound, her hands flying to cover her mouth, as if otherwise she’d blurt out every secret in her heart. She was scared to death of believing him. But what reason did he have for lying to her now? Fourteen hours from now, she’d be nothing to his government, and no one worth cultivating.
Gradually, the realization crept through her brain that his story made sense. Everything he’d said held together with what she knew or could easily confirm, and it all locked into place.
Besides which, sometime during the last few roller-coaster weeks with him, she’d figured out what made him tick. She knew Victor Kostenko now, like she knew her own face in the mirror. And she knew he wasn’t faking this.
As she stared at him wordlessly, fingers trembling as she pressed them to her lips, he exhaled a harsh breath.
“What else can this be, Alexis?” he said hoarsely. “I don’t know how to handle these feelings, but I am trying. Christ, I know all my shortcomings. I can’t be easy for a woman to love. If you want to fly to Bangkok and knock around Southeast Asia, I can—oh, hell, be your bodyguard or teach you Chinese or something. Or if you’re willing to come to Egypt for a while, I can teach you to dive or desert trek or—whatever pleases you.”
“Victor,” she whispered, but he wouldn’t let her finish.
“And in time, if you find you can tolerate me,” he pressed on, “perhaps we can…consider a more…permanent arrangement. Damn it, I sound like a blathering idiot!”
“Victor,” she breathed, her hands knotting against her chest. Then she gave in to what she’d been aching to do since he walked through her door, but hadn’t let herself think about. Carefully she touched his powerful shoulders, smoothed her palms over the bulge of muscle beneath his sweater.
Her eyes followed her hands, still a little afraid to meet his gaze, to show him the terrifying extent of what she felt for him. But she couldn’t hold back for long. Her palms slid over his hot bare neck, felt the rasp of gold-dust stubble against his jaw, then his butter-soft hair brushing her fingers.
“Do I understand your position correctly, Captain Kostenko?” she murmured, with a perverse sense of wickedness. “Are you saying you’re in love with me?”
“I’m dying here, Alexis,” he husked. “Have a little mercy. I said I’m in love with you. And now I’ve said it twice.”
“Don’t get excited, captain.” A smile curved her lips as she leaned forward and whispered in his ear. “The feeling is mutual.”
Afterward, she’d always laugh when she remembered his reaction. That when she finally confessed she loved him, he’d actually cursed. Which, she would always tease him, really wasn’t a very lover-like reaction.
Upon which he always promised her, grinning as the laugh-lines creased around his cobalt eyes, that somehow he’d make it up to her.
But for now, she couldn’t say much of anything. Because he was kissing her like the fate of the free world depended on it.
THE RUSSIAN TEMPTATION
CHAPTER ONE
Hanging Pawns: In chess, two pawns abreast without friendly pawns in adjacent columns. Can be a strength (because they can advance) or a weakness (because they can’t be defended by other pawns).
When the Trans-Siberian train chugged into the secret city of Khimgorod, Skylar Rossi was ready. Despite the uncivilized hour—five a.m., and the landscape still shrouded in ink-black arctic night—she’d gotten up early and reviewed her talking points one last time. On this tricky, first-ever mission to a city that didn’t exist on any map, a city whose very existence the Russian Ministry of Defense continued to deny, she needed to be prepared for a rocky reception.
Still muddled from her sleepless night, she stood swaying in the dimly lit corridor of her second-class carriage, beside the row of closed doors that secured the tiny passenger cabins. Gamely she battled the urge to scurry back to her own narrow bunk, bolt the little door behind her, and pull the scratchy blankets over her head.
Instead, she stood and shivered as the sharp January wind knifed through the ill-fitting windows and whistled down the corridor. The cold sliced through the ivory wool of her knee-length coat, slid cruel fingers beneath her conservative pantsuit, and raised sheets of goosebumps on her skin. Inside fur-lined boots, her feet were chunks of ice, already numb and aching.
Beyond the grimy windows, the white blaze of artificial light flashed into view like a holocaust, exposing the barren stretch of platform that marked her destination. As the train jerked and slowed, she gripped the attaché case that held her instructions from Washington. Thankfully, neither the precious documents nor her diplomatic passport had been in her purse, snatched yesterday at the train station in Novosibirsk.
Once more, the seething tension of the past twenty-four hours constricted her lungs, and threatened to trigger her asthma. Oh, hell. Seemed she’d been fighting for air since she left her Moscow apartment yesterday, when all the careful arrangements she’d made for this dangerous trip began to unravel.
Grimly, she fought to release the pressure in her chest. Producing her inhaler would only signal weakness to the Russians.
From the rattling platform between the cars, the broad-chested provodnitsa shouldered into the carriage. Her blocky frame filled the corridor, fuzzy overhead light glinting on the epaulets of her military-style uniform. Beneath them, the train clattered and rocked to a halt.
“City of Chernov,” the attendant muttered. Unfriendly eyes darted over Skylar, probably checking for contraband, before she unbolted the door.
You mean city of Khimgorod, Skylar thought. One of the best-kept secrets of the old Soviet Union, a closed city hidden in the hostile northern tundra, hundreds of kilometers from anywhere. If not for the satellite photos and that lone defector, her government would never have known it was there.
Even for a senior official like Skylar, the place was only accessible from the isolated provincial capital of Novosibirsk where she’d boarded this train last night. And Novosibirsk itself, with its thin pretensions to civilization, was a terrifying half-day flight in an aging Tupolev from Moscow.
Even now, she could hardly believe she was here, preparing to enter the complex where the Soviets had conducted their secret research on novel and highly lethal compounds like sarin, soman, and VX—the most toxic nerve agent ever synthesized. So toxic, i
n fact, that a miniscule dose of less than .003 milligrams would kill 50% of the population exposed to it within five minutes. Khimgorod was also the complex whose massive factories still belched out metric tons of chemical weapons, in blatant violation of international law. The isolated citadel where the Russian Munitions Agency was, even now, continuing its illegal and deadly efforts.
“Remember,” the provodnitsa grunted, unlatching the ugly steel doors, “no photographs.”
“Thank you,” Skylar said in polite Russian. “I’ve been briefed on the security procedures.”
Hoping to project the necessary resolve, she glanced at her blurred image. From the window, pale blue eyes stared back at her, wide and anxious. Unfortunately, she looked like hell after that sleepless night, and her cosmetics had vanished along with her stolen purse. Uneasy, she swept a few tendrils of chin-length black hair behind her ear, and fidgeted with her faux white leopard hat.
You have exactly one chance to get this right, so settle down and focus. It had taken Washington two decades to pry open this Pandora’s box, plus six months of her own relentless effort to convince the Russians she was the one to deal with. If the deal went wrong, it would probably take another twenty years before the Russians let anyone else sniff around.
Although, given the fact that a micro-particle of VX was lethal when touched or inhaled, she planned to do all her sniffing through a gas mask.
She was still struggling to ease the tightness in her lungs when the train doors clattered open. Freeze-dried oxygen from the Siberian night slapped her face and seared into her lungs like battery acid. Convulsively, she coughed, releasing a cloud of frosted breath that froze instantly at minus forty Celsius. So much for my gravitas. Gripping her rolling suitcase, she muscled the luggage down to the ice-rimmed platform.
Warily, her gaze swept the unfamiliar scene. All around her, a chain link fence topped with spirals of barbed wire enclosed the platform. Beneath the barricade, piles of grayish snow marked the impenetrable boundary of this no man’s land. Under the train’s muted chug, still huffing behind her, the white hush of the tundra enveloped her, then the pure high whistle of the Siberian wind.
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