“I have more than enough for a conviction, I assure you,” Mann replied. “The fact that your brother is not standing here today speaks volumes. Dmitry Ivanov is a known hacker, his skills legendary. Do you wish to continue to argue your brother’s innocence to me? We both know he’s guilty, and when he’s found, he’ll be punished to the full extent of the law.”
Panic crept into Elena’s eyes. Jim’s gaze fell on her fingers as they twisted around the third finger on her left hand in an anxious gesture. It was almost as if she were winding a phantom ring and he realized that’s exactly what she was doing. Beside her, Lucas stilled, her movements catching his attention and his sharp mind most likely processing she no longer wore her wedding band, her pale finger devoid of a tan line. It had been some time since she’d removed the last visible link to her husband.
Lucas shot the secretary a death look at impugning Dmitry’s nature. Jim was fully aware how much Lucas admired and trusted the man. Any slight against Dmitry would also be against Lucas.
“You don’t know my brother,” Elena said. “He is a patriot. He would never willingly put anyone’s life in danger.”
Lucas placed his hand on Elena’s back, and her stiff body softened as she leaned into his touch.
“I understand you want to protect your brother. Unfortunately, that time has passed. If he turns himself in now, the U.S. Attorney will take that into consideration.”
“I will not send my brother to be unfairly accused.”
“You have twenty-four hours to recover Sundown. If you fail, or if we find him first, your brother will be arrested on treason and attempted terrorism,” Mann declared. “And you may be charged as an accessory.”
Lucas stiffened.
“And what will you be charged with? Unwittingly putting the security of the nation in jeopardy?” she snapped.
The secretary’s face turned red. “Now, see here Ms. Ivanova—”
“You address me as Agent Ivanova, Secretary Mann. Be sure to remember that. And I will not allow you to railroad my brother because of your foolish mistake.”
“Although I appreciate your position, the truth is that your brother hacked the Department of Defense. That sort of thing isn’t punishable by a mere slap on the hand. It’ll be best if he gives himself up. The charges will be more lenient. I suggest you try to persuade him.” Mann stalked out, slamming the door behind him.
Lucas stepped toward the window overlooking the parking lot, and stared out. Elena slumped into the visitor’s chair and crossed her legs as Jim perched himself on the edge of his desk.
“He’s screwed, isn’t he?” Elena asked, sounding dejected. He could see she was fighting tears. “Even though he acted under duress. There’s no way he can redeem himself.”
“So he is guilty.”
Elena gave him a look. “I never said he wasn’t.”
“Yes. I noticed that,” he replied wryly. She was a very smart woman. Lucas would need to watch out. She was sure to keep him on his toes.
“When Dmitry called me in Moscow, he told me what happened and how Ivan was murdered. He knew they planned to kill him, too, once he retrieved the file, so he ran.”
“Understandable. I take it you have him working on it now? If there’s anyone who can get him out of this, it’s Dmitry himself.”
“We have him looking into the man who hired him, under false pretenses I might add.”
He nodded. “Good. If you can find the man responsible, you can make your own case to take to the U.S. Attorney. I will be happy to provide support to your brother and back his character. Of course, I can’t guarantee he will not be charged.”
“Thank you for believing in him. You don’t even know my brother.”
“But I know you, and if he’s anything like you, Dmitry Ivanov must be very special.”
Elena appeared to relax. “Thank you,” she said, rising from her seat. She surprised him by wrapping her arms around his ever-expanding form, and kissing him on the cheek. “Please don’t do anything that could cost you your career,” she added.
“My dear, if I can’t help innocent, patriotic people, then what good is my career? I will not let a good man be persecuted.”
She blinked back her tears, and gave him a grateful smile as she stepped back toward her chair.
“What about Sundown?” he asked. “Is it out in the open?”
“Yes and no. Dmitry is the only person in the country who can retrieve Sundown from its locations.”
“Locations…as in more than one?”
Turning to face them, Lucas leaned against the wall. “Hundreds, actually.”
He frowned. He didn’t understand computers, let alone the skill and knowledge it took to bypass several security features he’d been told were impenetrable. He wouldn’t even know where to start.
“My brother used one of his own programs, so that when the system was hacked, the information would be sent out to anonymous servers,” she explained.
Lucas stepped forward. “Dmitry is good at what he does. He won’t let anyone else get Sundown as long as he’s alive. It’s safe where it is—for now.”
Elena chewed on her lower lip, drawing attention to her lush mouth. Even he, a happily married man, had a hard time ignoring her desirability. He could only imagine the torture Lucas experienced.
“Relax, Elena. We’re not going to let anything happen to Dmitry,” Lucas reassured her.
“I know, but I can’t help but worry. At least until he’s out of the woods. So much could happen before then.”
“Such the pessimist.”
“A realist. Where do we go from here?”
“We check in with Dmitry, see how it’s going.”
Elena snorted. “You can do that. My brother gets extremely annoyed when I interrupt him when he’s in the zone.”
Lucas’s eyebrow rose. “I can’t imagine Dmitry pissed.”
“Oh, trust me, he can be cold and indifferent. But by all means call him and see for yourself. Speaking of, I need to check my messages. I’ll just be a moment.”
Lucas frowned and followed her to the door, watching as she walked down the hall. Jim chuckled from his desk, and Lucas scowled at him.
“What are you cackling about?” he demanded.
“You, my boy. Can’t half tell what you’re thinking and feeling. Got hit hard, didn’t you? Well, about fucking time, and that little bombshell out there is just the woman to keep you in check.”
“I hate that you know me so well.”
“Give her time, Lucas. I don’t think she quite knows what she wants at the moment. Her brother is in trouble. A friend has died. Any more on her plate, and she could collapse under the strain.”
“I know.” Lucas let out a deep breath as he ran stiff fingers through his blond hair. “I just need to know where we stand.”
***
Elena cringed when she heard her boss’s voice. He didn’t sound happy—not that Vladimir ever did, but this time it seemed worse. She had an idea what had made the man so upset. She called him back straight away, deciding against prolonging the lecture. Best to get it over with so she could focus on Dmitry and getting him out of his current predicament. Then there was Lucas, something else she couldn’t hold off any longer. She needed to hash out their relationship—if they had one. She needed to know once and for all if he still wanted her or if she’d lost her chance. She feared that the most. She had no one but herself to blame if Lucas had finally given up waiting for her and moved on. She felt tears burn in her eyes at the thought, and swallowed the lump in her throat.
She desperately needed to know the answer to her many questions. The not knowing only made things worse.
“Tell me you are not in Washington sticking your nose in their business,” Vladimir Mishkin said instantly once the call connected.
“You’ve heard?” she asked, surprised. Her boss wasn’t usually interested in foreign affairs. If it wasn’t happening in Russia, he didn’t hear about it.
“That your brother is wanted by American authorities for hacking into a secure government site?” he retorted. “Yes, I know, and I think you should leave this to your American friend to handle and get yourself back here on the next plane.”
“You know I can’t do that. I won’t leave my brother to his fate.”
She knew he’d be sent to Guantánamo Bay as a terrorist if caught, and she might never see him again. She would break any law to keep that from happening.
“You know I don’t condone this kind of lone ranger behavior,” Vladimir said. He always followed the rules, and at one time, so had she. Things changed when she met Lucas. “I gave you leeway last time due to unforeseeable circumstances,” he continued, “but if you’re not on a plane within twenty-four hours—”
“I understand, sir. If you don’t see me in forty-eight hours, you won’t see me at all.”
She hung up and turned off the phone. She didn’t want Director Mishkin calling her back, especially if she was unprepared to give him answers. She had dismissed his warning. It would take as long as it took, and she wouldn’t leave Washington without her brother.
Chapter 14
Elena climbed into Lucas’s government issued car, on edge and frightened. Her brother was being hounded by the American government, as well as the man who’d tried to kill him. She still had no idea how she could help him, and felt useless.
Then, there was Lucas. Her heart beat quicker in his presence. She wasn’t even sure how to broach the subject of their relationship. Regardless, now wasn’t the time.
They were on the way to the morgue on Massachusetts Avenue where Ivan’s body was being held. Her nerves were already frayed, revved up for a fight. The arrogant secretary could do with being taken down a peg or two. She had a desire to ram Sundown into the man’s throat until he choked. He was the one at fault for allowing the country’s entire security protocol to be uploaded into cyberspace. Surely, he knew how vulnerable it could be despite being heavily guarded, and now because someone else wanted the bloody thing, he placed the blame squarely on Dmitry’s relatively innocent shoulders. She would not let her baby brother take the fall, even if she had to declare war on the United States to achieve it.
She didn’t even allow herself to think of Director Mishkin’s ultimatum. She closed her eyes and wished for silence. There were so many threads in her mind, and the more she thought on them, the more tangled they became.
“Are you okay?”
Her head jerked toward Lucas. He’d been so quiet since they’d left Langley she’d almost forgotten he was there. Almost because no matter how distracted she was, in the back of her mind she was always aware of his proximity to her.
“No,” she replied. “What part of this would make me okay?”
Instantly contrite, she apologized for her brusque reply. Lucas had been so wonderful to her, and certainly didn’t deserve her snippy attitude. He was the one man who’d always stood beside her in a battle. She blinked at the tears gathering in her eyes. It seemed crying was all she’d been able to do since arriving in the States. It was humiliating. She hated being seen as weak and emotional, but she couldn’t seem to stop herself. She wrapped her arms tightly around her body as if that was the very bind that kept her from shattering into a million pieces.
“You’re not alone in this. I’m right here with you and I’m not going to let anything happen to Dmitry. I promise.”
Her heart skipped a beat and her stomach did a flip. He promised; those two words meant everything to her. From a man whose word was the very embodiment of his being, it was about as secure as she could get.
Despite the niggling doubts she had about them. She closed her mind from those dark thoughts.
“Thank you, Lucas. That means a lot to me, and to Dmitry,” she added, not wanting him to read too much into her words. The last thing she wanted was to make a fool of herself if he didn’t want the same thing she did.
Her fingers moved to twist the ring on her finger, as she always did when she was anxious, only to find it naked. She hadn’t worn her wedding band since Lucas had walked into her quiet life and disrupted it. From the moment she’d met Lucas, she had begun to feel as if she no longer belonged to Nikolai and didn’t feel right wearing the ring he’d given her when her heart yearned for another. Most days, she didn’t even notice it was gone but during moments of high stress she instinctively reached for the one thing that helped soothe her. She missed the loss acutely—a familiar thing she could cling to while everything around her fell apart.
Desperate not to show her discomfort, she twined her fingers together to keep them occupied and dropped her hands to her lap, hoping Lucas hadn’t noticed her near panic attack.
“Dmitry’s a good guy,” he said. “He doesn’t deserve any of the shit that’s happened to him since he arrived, that’s for goddamn sure.”
“You’re a good man, Lucas, you really are,” she said, her voice quivering. She let out a deep sigh.
“Elena—”
She held up a hand, stopping him. “Don’t. I just want to get this over with and then you can take me to my hotel.”
Lucas took his gaze off the road and gave her a long considering look for as long as he dared before returning his focus to the street.
“Hotel?” He shook his head. “No, Elena. You’re staying with me. I’ve got plenty of room.”
She chewed nervously on her bottom lip. “I don’t want to impose. I wasn’t sure—” She broke off, not wanting to ask the question. She knew she wouldn’t be able to take the answer—either of the answers.
“What, that I might have changed my mind about us?”
A frustrated breath escaped, her mind muddled with too many thoughts. She could barely keep up with one thing let alone another, and wished she hadn’t opened her mouth.
“Can we not talk about this just now?” she asked, her voice almost pleading. She was a coward. For all her talk about hashing things out, she was too afraid of walking away with nothing. What would she do without him? The pain inside her expanded and she almost gasped aloud. She’d never given that much thought to all her worrying over it, and now that the stark reality slapped her in the face she found herself terrified. She didn’t think she could survive losing Lucas—especially not to her own stupidity. A tear escaped her eye and she quickly dashed it away.
Lucas pulled into the parking structure of the Metropolitan Morgue. He stopped at a large boom gate and showed his credentials to the guard on duty. When the barrier lifted, he drove through and parked the car further on down.
“We will talk about this,” he said, following a brief silence between them.
She nodded as she gathered up her purse and followed him into the building. They found the bank of elevators and Lucas pressed the down button. She noticed the glass panel directory where it stood mounted to the wall above the elevator call button. The Metropolitan Morgue was in the sub-basement.
“So what did Mishkin want?” he asked. “You didn’t look too happy when you got off the phone with him.”
“How did you know it was Director Mishkin?”
“The tone of voice and the scowl on your face,” he said. “I figured there was only one hobbit in all of Russia who could make you that mad.”
Smiling, she smothered a giggle. Vladimir Mishkin was roughly her height, and they stood eye to eye, which meant Lucas towered over the little man. She’d always thought he looked a lot like a Russian Hercule Poirot. Mishkin and Lucas had never liked each other, ever since their first meeting in the conference room at SVR Headquarters. She remembered him telling her not long after they met that he only spoke two languages, English and body language, the latter having come in handy more than once.
“Oh, you know Mishkin. He doesn’t approve of me being here and getting caught up in an American investigation.” She waved her hand in dismissal, downplaying it as they entered the elevator. The lift doors closed, and they headed for the morgue.
***
Luca
s watched her face closely, reading her. For a woman who hadn’t gotten much sleep the previous night, clearly distressed over her brother, she looked really good. She had swiped her lashes with mascara, making her grey eyes seem larger, bringing more attention to her already beautiful face. She had also added some gloss to her naturally pink lips that made him want to taste them.
He sensed the tension beneath her words. There was something she wasn’t telling him and he hated that she wouldn’t confide in him. If only she’d let him in. “It’s more than that, isn’t it?”
She waved off his concerns, which annoyed him. “Nothing to be worried about, I assure you.”
She gave him a smile that he didn’t buy. He knew her too well to believe that. But he also knew if she wasn’t willing to tell him, he wouldn’t get an answer. Not without torture, at least. A few techniques came to mind, some he was dying to try out on her. He shook his head to clear it, then opened the outer door to the morgue and waited until an attendant arrived to escort them to the observation room.
“Dmitry’s going to be fine, Elena. You know that, right?” He needed to know that she believed and trusted in him to help her.
“Yes, Lucas, I do. Between you and SAC Fitzgibbon, my brother is quite safe or at least will be by morning. Thank you. I don’t think I got a chance to say so before, but I really am very appreciative of what you’ve done despite my complaints.”
She could complain all she wanted, so long as she was near. He glanced down at her finger, noting the absence of her wedding ring. Did he dare to hope? He wouldn’t push, not while she was so fragile, but soon they would hash this out. With any luck they’d be on the same page.
A tall thin man sporting a white lab coat and identification badge joined them. A faint scent of formaldehyde clung to the man’s pores that no amount of scrubbing and washing would remove. His eyes were a warm blue and his hair a real ginger that seemed to stand straight up in the air without the use of gel.
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