by Misty Evans
Her stomach continued doing flips. Breaking eye contact, she was suddenly self-conscious about him seeing her in nothing but her bra again. Extra self-conscious that she needed to ask for his help getting the shirt off since she could no longer lift her left arm.
Stubbornness bloomed in her chest. With difficult, painful movements, she used her right hand and arm to maneuver the shirt up her belly and tug it off her left arm.
“Here,” Michael said, moving so close to her his body heat warmed her inside and out. “Let me help you.”
The softness of his voice, the true concern in his gentle touch, set fireworks off in her lower stomach.
A hot cup of Earl Grey on a cold day was heavenly. Michael Stone’s hands on her body, his warm breath on her skin, was ecstasy.
Chapter Twenty-One
Michael clamped his back teeth down hard as he examined Brigit’s wound.
Pity-blocking was a skill he’d learned after his father’s death and continued to hone as an adult. He’d recently taken it to an art form after surviving his encounter with Fayez Raissi. Being at the mercy of a sociopathic prick was the epitome of loss of control.
The moment Brigit mentioned it and he’d frozen, he’d registered pity in her eyes. He could read her mind. He could hear her voice in his head. You poor thing…
His expression must have said it all. She’d apologized and then made a joke, almost daring him to flirt with her. Which he appreciated. He didn’t have to call up one of his pity-blocking defenses and shift the conversation to safer ground.
The nightmares he’d experienced after the hostage situation were rare these days, but no less extreme when they hit. Even awake, when he looked at the den where Raissi had tried to blow him and the others sky high, the nightmares hung like phantoms in the air, toying with him. They were in the bullet holes he’d diligently patched, the blood he’d scrubbed repeatedly from the rug, and all over his desk where Raissi had sat and tormented him. The phantoms jacked memories and emotions best left alone.
That was another reason he spent so much time at Langley now. People there treated him with professionalism and respect, never mentioning the ordeal. They may have looked at him with pity early on, but never to his face. At CIA headquarters, he was Deputy Director Michael Stone, powerful and in complete control. Protector and defender of his country. Second in command of the world’s premiere intelligence agency. There, in that role, he could face the world with the strength and determination he used to feel no matter where he went, where he ate, where he slept. Now, when he was home, he wanted—needed—to be back at the office and in the skin of his job.
Just thinking about Raissi made the old anger ignite in his stomach. It flared into rage over the helplessness he’d experienced against the man, the futility of wanting to raise Raissi from the dead so he could kill him all over again. Fighting terrorists these days had new meaning for Michael. Every one of them had Raissi’s face.
It wasn’t just his job anymore, it was his personal vendetta.
Using a wet cloth, Michael dabbed at the drying blood on Brigit’s skin and she winced. “How long’s it been since your last pain pill?” he asked.
Her face was turned away from him as if she didn’t like the sight of blood. “I haven’t had anything since they stitched me up.”
No wonder she looked like hell. “Why?”
“Don’t like drugs.” She glanced at him, down at her shoulder and away again, blowing her tough-soldier façade. “Right now, though, I’m totally rethinking my stand on narcotics. My whole side hurts. Unfortunately, the scripts the doctor gave me for Percocet and an antibiotic went up in the fire.”
She had to be in some serious pain. He rose from the barstool and rummaged through a nearby cabinet where he stored his vitamins. After finding his prescription bottle of Vicodin, he set it on the breakfast bar in front of her. “I’m out of antibiotics, but you’re welcome to my pain meds.”
She looked the prescription painkiller over and gave him an impish grin. “You’d share your drugs with me? Even when you think I had something to do with Ella’s kidnapping? How noble.”
Noble had nothing to do with it. His gut still told him Brigit was innocent—at least in the case of Ella’s kidnapping.
Knowing people the way he did, especially spies, the only sure way to disarm them enough to get them talking was to pretend to be their friend. Get them to trust you.
He filled a glass of water and set it on the bar counter before fishing a pill from the bottle, admitting his concern for her well-being trumped his desire to get her to spill her guts. “You should take one now since you just ate.”
An internal debate played across her face. “Will they make me sleepy?”
“Do you care?”
She took a deep breath and dropped her head so her hair screened her face. “I’m a walking zombie already, and I’ve got nowhere to crash. I take one of those and you’ll have an overnight guest for sure.”
“Like I said earlier, I planned on keeping you here anyway.”
There was a pause. She spoke through clinched teeth. “Provided I tell you what you want to know.”
“That was our deal.”
“What about Julia?”
Michael took a step back. “What about Julia?”
Brigit shifted, looked up at him and then broke eye contact to stare at the counter. “Overstepping my boundaries again, but I assume she won’t like you keeping me as an overnight guest.”
Perplexed, he frowned. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Her gaze came back to his. “You and Julia…you’re not…you know? Together?”
Michael’s pulse kicked under his skin. The expression on her face was almost hopeful. Usually if anyone asked, he denied there’d ever been anything between him and Julia. His gut, and his heart, rebelled when he did it, because he’d loved her deeply. “We were once. Not anymore.”
Brigit’s shoulders loosened and her dark lashes dipped for a second as she closed her eyes. Then she nodded and eyed the white pill in his hand.
Funny she’d pitied him after the crazy two days she’d just experienced. She’d been the target of a sniper, had spent a cold night in a giant concrete caterpillar, had her apartment burned down and been accused of a kidnapping. Truth be told, he would have a hard time kicking her out even if she didn’t tell him her story.
“You’re in pain, and it’s only going to get worse when I sew up the wound where the sutures blew out. The doctor knotted them securely, but you must have put a lot of stress on them.” He took her hand and put the pill in it. “Take the Vicodin.”
“You’re going to stitch me up?”
“Unless you want to take a trip back to the ER.”
She shuddered and turned her face away from her shoulder and the bar top of first-aid supplies. Her voice was barely above a whisper. “Go for it.”
Her skin was so pale, it was almost translucent. He could see a delicate blue vein running along her hairline. “You sure? I’m going to have to pour alcohol into the wound to cleanse it and the only needle I have is a fat little thing for sewing upholstery. It’ll probably feel like an elephant pushing its way through your skin.”
She slipped the pill into her mouth and swallowed it down with a gulp of water. Then she turned her head away again and squeezed her eyes shut. “Please tell me you’ve done this before. I really don’t want a scar.”
“All lacerations leave scars.” He grabbed a tube of skin adhesive, pinched a glob onto a Q-tip and dotted it over the opening. “But I guarantee, my work will not leave a bigger scar.” He added another layer and picked up the large sterile bandage he’d already unwrapped.
Brigit, her eyes still closed, gripped the edge of the bar with her right hand. “Tell me when you’re going to start sewing.”
“Okay.”
“Okay, you’ll tell me? Or okay you’re ready to start sewing?”
He pressed the bandage onto her arm, hating her wince, and
smoothed the adhesive edges. “All done.”
She cracked one eye open and glanced at her shoulder. “All done?” Her other eye opened and she looked up at him, confusion evident in her features. “What about the stitching?”
He dangled the tube of skin adhesive in front of her face. “Dermabond. Needle-free.”
“You said you had to stitch me up.” She huffed out a breath. “I took the pain pill.”
Shrugging, he kept the grin off his face as he gathered the bandage wrapper. “You pulled two sutures on the edge of the wound where it’s not deep. The adhesive will hold the skin together unless you do something stupid and rip more sutures out.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You tricked me.”
“I did.”
“Why?”
As he walked away to return his first-aid supplies to the bathroom, he wondered the same thing himself. She’d expected him to be the hard-ass, to interrogate her. Instead he’d done the opposite.
He stopped in the doorway and turned back. “It’s all part of my evil plan. Feed you, doctor you and give you a place to sleep since you don’t have one.”
“So I’ll be in your debt and at your mercy.”
“Exactly.” He was definitely enjoying that idea.
She mulled his confirmation over for a few seconds. “It’s working.”
“Yeah.” He grinned. “I know.”
While he was putting the bandages back in the vanity’s drawer, his cell rang. Caller ID showed it was the president. Michael hadn’t spoken to him since the previous day when he’d called the hospital, and the president never used anything but landlines. Curious, he hit the green talk button as he shut the bathroom door. “Stone.”
“Michael, how’s Ella?”
“Doing well, thank you, sir.”
“Good, good.” Under his usual smooth tone, the president’s voice sounded tight, strained. “My sources tell me the FBI believes Brigit Kent had a hand in the kidnapping.”
Since it was all over the news channels, Michael figured the president’s sources were CNN and MSNBC. “I’m sure their investigation will be thorough.”
“Yes, thorough…” President Jeffries’s voice drifted off, and Michael’s gut niggled. The president was worried about something.
An image of Brigit in her suit and heels outside the oval office flickered in his brain. As if someone clicked a hyperlink, pieces of the puzzle fell into bed with each other.
A thorough investigation into Brigit Kent might lead to the president and he was worried.
But why? What kind of relationship did they have?
Jeffries spoke again. “My sources tell me you removed her from the police station. She’s in your custody?”
“Yes, sir.”
“You pissed off a lot of people with that move today. Mind explaining to me what you’re doing?”
In the world of diplomacy and persuasion, explaining logic directly to people like the president never worked. Indirect speech was Michael’s savior—to save face, to persuade, to escape from showing his hand. “I have knowledge a sector of international security beyond the kidnapping is at issue here. I’m duty-bound to investigate it and interrogate Dr. Kent before turning her back over to the FBI.”
“I see.” The clipped tone again made Michael’s gut send a warning cruising through his body. “In my opinion, Dr. Kent would never be involved with anything so cruel as child kidnapping.”
“I agree.”
Silence reigned. Michael let it. Few people could stand forced silence. Human nature wanted to talk, to confess, to keep communication flowing.
The next words from Jeffries were calculated. “With your impeccable career, you should consider your actions carefully in this, Deputy Director.”
Veiling a threat in a backhanded compliment was one of the president’s linguistic specialties. Politicians as a whole often came across like Mafia wise guys offering protection in the form of concern or advice. Their soft sells were lined with a razor-edged threat, though. Ante up or say goodbye to your job, your family, your life.
Michael decided to answer more directly this time, and as was his way, he threw a giant dose of politeness on top of the pointed back off message. “I always consider my actions carefully, but thank you for the reminder, Mr. President.”
There was a slight huff on the other end. Message received. “I expect you’ll keep me posted of your findings with Dr. Kent. If international security is an issue, I want to be the first one to know the who, what, where and how. We clear?”
Absofuckinglutely. “Of course, sir.”
The president disconnected and Michael shook his head as he stuck the phone back in its clip on his belt. What was in Brigit Kent’s closet that made the president of the United States jumpy?
Time to find out. Michael opened the bathroom door and headed back to the kitchen.
Two steps down the hallway, he stopped. He had a straight view of the breakfast bar and the empty barstools. Brigit had disappeared.
Picking up his pace, he stepped into the room, took one look around and confirmed she was gone. He checked the back entrance but the door was locked, the green light on his security dashboard near the door still on. Unless she could dematerialize like a vampire, Brigit was still in the house.
His search for her ended in the study. She’d moved the plastic cover from the couch and crashed on it, curling into a fetal position on her right side. The rabbit’s foot her assistant had given her lay on the coffee table within reach.
In the deepening shadows of the approaching evening, Michael stood just inside the doorway and watched her sleep. The last people to sit on the couch had been his fellow hostages. Before them, Julia had smiled up at him from it, all the while betraying him with Flynn.
Lots of bad memories. They circled above his head, taunting him and making his stomach clench like he’d drunk Drano.
But then his eyes fell again on Brigit’s sleeping form. Her dark hair lay in a mat of curls on the throw pillow. Her breathing was peaceful, the hovering phantoms invisible to her. Only Michael could see their soulless eyes, hear their demands, feel the cold muzzles of their guns skate across his skin.
He did a one-eighty and left the den, heading back to the kitchen. Leaning on the breakfast bar, he purposely slowed his breathing. Sweat beaded along his hairline and he went to the sink to splash his face with water. Once his pulse was under control again, he snagged a Sam Adams from the refrigerator and considered his options.
While he’d planned to get information out of Brigit before showing her to his guestroom, that plan was out. However, he needed to keep an eye on her. If she was indeed a spy for SIS, all his security couldn’t keep her caged if she wanted to sneak off. She was sleeping like the dead right now, but when the Vicodin wore off and she’d recharged her batteries, who knew what she’d do? She hadn’t been part of the kidnapping, but that didn’t mean he trusted her.
Truth was, he didn’t trust anyone these days.
Which was a sorry state to be in.
He hated sorry.
Taking a swig of beer, he walked back to the den. He had to do something while Brigit slept off her exhaustion and pain-medication cocktail.
He eyed his briefcase. Files and his laptop pushed at the leather to the point of breaking the zipper. He’d fallen behind in the last two days with basic paperwork, and even with everything else distracting him, it was tapping at the back of his mind like a clock alarm, dinging over and over. He didn’t get sick days or vacation. Letting anything slide, even for twenty-four hours, could put the nation at risk. Bracing himself for the return trip to his study, he took another swig of beer and picked up the briefcase.
His desk sat in its temporary spot near the plasma flat screen over the fireplace and was covered with plastic. As Michael cleaned it off, he ignored the way his pulse jumped. Ignored the voices in his head and the echo of gunshots.
It’s been six months. He chanted the words six months under his breath like a mant
ra. A logical mantra. Six months should have been more than enough time to get his head back on straight.
Once settled in his chair, he opened the briefcase, sorted the files into straight stacks and booted up his laptop. While it whirred and took him through several password codes and identification programs, his attention continued to stray to the couch across the room and the rise and fall of Brigit’s upper body.
He envied her total surrender to sleep, yearning for a similar disconnect. When was the last time he’d slept like that? He couldn’t remember, but it seemed like Julia had still been beside him.
Mesmerized by Brigit’s body, he continued to watch, his own breathing slowing to match hers.
Darkness fell. When he could no longer make out her form on the couch, he forced himself to move and turn on his desk lamp. Then he picked up the receiver of his landline phone and dialed a number he never thought he’d use.
“Ace’s Mortuary,” a voice on the other end said. “My two-for-one special on body bags is good all month.”
“Ace, this is Michael Stone.”
The sound of rustling paper and something being knocked over came through the line. “Shit,” Ace said under his breath. In his mind, Michael could see the mortician fumbling to straighten what he’d knocked over. “Big Mike, how’s it going, bro?”
God, he hated being called Big Mike. Hated having to go to Flynn’s local source to get what he needed for Brigit. “I need antibiotics. Strong ones. And I need you to bring them to my house, ASAP.”
“Uh-huh.” The mortician sounded dumbfounded. “I run with the dead, you know. No call for antibiotics.”
“But you have connections, and you owe me. Consider this a collection notice.”
There was a long, awkward pause. A sigh of concession. “I got you, man. How many pills you need?”
“Two week supply. Leave them at the gate.”
“You doping one of your spies or yourself?”
Michael glanced at Brigit. “TMI, Ace. You don’t need to know.”
“Uh-huh. Okay then. Give me a couple hours.”
“One.”