He stood in the doorway until he heard her door close. Confusing female, but weren’t they all?
Fascinating. Bright and competent, witty, confident in her profession, but insecure as a woman.
Maybe having a cover model for a sister was to blame. But they were nothing alike. Vanessa had her own beauty. Anyone with testosterone could see that. He sure as hell didn’t think of her as his buddy.
But damn, he’d better try, or he’d blow his cover story of the engagement.
He stretched out on his rumpled sheets and tried to ignore his thumb and another throbbing need caused by that particular confusing female.
As soon as she’d secured the motion sensor on her door, Vanessa stripped off the black jumpsuit. She’d considered the garment only protective cover until Nick’s ogling had turned it into seduction fashion.
She slipped on her comfortable, dowdy cotton nightgown. The garment was one of the few items of her own clothing she’d brought. No one but her would see it. Although the housekeeper knew she kept her toiletries and clothing in this guest room, Vanessa made the bed carefully every day to keep up the pretense that she spent her nights in Nick’s bed.
Nick’s bed.
She could’ve spent tonight there if she’d yielded to temptation. And his blatant invitation.
He seemed to have no compunction about betraying his fiancée and expected her to have none. That incongruous lack of principle in a man bound to regain his honor worried her.
His final words as she left came to her: You make me forget I’m supposed to be engaged.
Supposed to be engaged? What an odd choice of words for a man in love! Or was he?
She heaved a tired sigh. She was being overly picky and suspicious, the default trait of her profession. A man of the world like Nick, with a glamorous fiancée, didn’t really want plain girl-next-door Vanessa. He simply needed distraction from the demons plaguing him.
Demons, oh yes, she thought as she climbed into the four-poster bed. Demons of guilt for what he believed he’d done or not done years ago. What had happened in that Somali village ate at him like a cancer.
That incomplete confession increased her insight into Nick. His anger at his brother’s crimes stemmed from a strong sense of responsibility—and a need to redeem his own honor as well as his family’s.
Her heart squeezed in sympathy. If she could banish the demons, she’d be tempted to go to him.
But taking him in her arms would be dangerous. It would be wrong. Wrong for him, wrong for his real fiancée. And wrong for her. Sex would compromise her duty and jeopardize the mission. She had to ignore her attraction to him while she acted the fiancée role. And while she spied on him to ensure he didn’t deviate from ATSA’s program. She could be objective and do her job. She had to be.
She punched her pillow and turned over. Chasing sleep was a losing race.
Vanessa saw Nick only briefly the next day. She found him in the study on a conference call with New York and London.
He punched the speaker button off and growled, “My restaurant supply business is going down the tubes. One disaster after another, and all I can do is delegate.”
She made sympathetic comments. When his expression softened, she said, “I’ll be working next door on security arrangements for the Friday reception.” She didn’t mention she’d also search for information about that Somalia mission.
Leaning against the closed door, she thought he seemed grateful for the cooldown after the night’s heated encounter. He was probably regretting coming on to her. Better all around. Better that they could avoid each other in the house. Alone, they didn’t have to pretend an attraction that was all too real for her. All too dangerous for her.
Safer for her to be the pal. And more professional.
Suspicion. Detachment. No intimacy.
Heaving a sigh, she pushed off and headed next door.
Ah, just once, she wanted a man to mean it when he said she looked hot and tried to seduce her. She wanted him to want her, not her undercover persona. She wanted him not to have an ulterior motive, like an introduction to her hotter sister. Or like a detour from his problems in sweaty sex.
She wanted a man who didn’t already have a fiancée.
That night, the ATSA cameras and motion sensors recorded no intruders. No burglars, New Dawn or otherwise, attempted to enter through the severed fence.
On Wednesday morning ATSA officer Grant Snow drove Nick and Vanessa to Markos Imports, where Nick fought another round with the employees about selling the business. Vanessa was beginning to understand that his determination to sell arose from his aversion to anything of Alexei’s.
Later Snow drove them to the suitably gloomy Georgian structure housing Falstone and Drumm Funeral Home. The authorities had only just released Alexei’s body for cremation, so Nick had to schedule the service. When Snow stopped the Mercedes beneath Falstone and Drumm’s portico, Nick hesitated, his hand on the door.
Snow turned around. “All clear, Mr. M. Unknown vehicle parked down the block, but our guys have them boxed in. If it’s New Dawn, they’re ours.”
Vanessa recognized Nick’s taut jaw as tension about arranging a funeral for his disgraced brother, not concern about safety.
Watching him muster strength, Vanessa wanted to hug him or hold him. Both were out of the question. A hand on his forearm offered the only support she dared express.
To her surprise, he covered her hand with his and gave her an answering squeeze. Opening the door, he said, “Thanks, Snow. This won’t take long.”
Mr. Falstone, as plush and dour as his establishment, ushered them through a display of cremation urns and caskets. Without a blink, Nick selected one before the funeral director could begin his spiel. Peering at them over his reading glasses, Falstone then suggested an elaborate memorial ceremony, including a choir, orations and responsive readings.
In spite of Nick’s unusual upbringing—and because of it—family and family honor ranked above almost everything else. He would put his disgraced family member in the ground. He would do it with respect and reserve and hard-won control. To others he’d appear calm and dispassionate. But anger and resentment would churn inside him for a long time.
Vanessa cringed inwardly at the pain Falstone’s over-the-top ideas must be causing. With a sideways glance at Nick’s hard mask, she stepped in and shook her head.
Falstone’s jowls sagged when she said with Danielle-cool disdain, “Your simplest ceremony will do. No choir.”
They agreed on a date and escaped. Nick had been right about brevity. The entire process had taken twenty minutes.
Only when they reentered the car did Vanessa register that during the entire meeting in the funeral home Nick had kept possession of her hand.
Snow announced, “Street’s quiet. Those guys were religious types handing out tracts to the neighborhood.”
She could only stare at her hand, now cold and empty.
Nick hit the basement gym as soon as they returned to the Chevy Chase house. He worked out with weights and the punching bag, then ran five miles on the treadmill. Pent-up frustration sweated out, he showered and dressed for dinner. With Janine here, he and Vanessa would dine together for the first time.
After the other night, she might still be wary of him, but he wanted her even more. He shouldn’t, but he refused to examine the desire any further.
Janine would leave soon. He and Vanessa would be alone.
He approached the dining room to find her and the housekeeper chattering in French. So ATSA’d chosen Vanessa for this skill as well as her glorious hair and people talents.
Janine’s daughter Lise slouched in the kitchen doorway. The bored look on her dusky face was an expression only a teenager could affect. She probably didn’t speak her mother’s native tongue and didn’t know what they were saying.
Nick’s French was rusty, but he understood enough to know the Haitian woman was telling his “fiancée” about the troubles on her native
island. After violent unrest had killed her husband, she and her then infant daughter had come to the United States as political refugees.
Vanessa made sympathetic comments as Janine described her homeland’s lack of jobs and her dirt-floored hut with no electricity.
“Et votre fille?” Vanessa was asking about Janine’s daughter’s plans.
“Ici c’est meilleur. L’éducation lui donne l’espoir.”
Here it was better, she said. Education gave the girl hope. Nick had never seen Janine so animated. Emotion tinged her cocoa-brown face. The linen napkin she clutched rose and fell with the Caribbean lilt of her musical voice.
With him she was always reserved and deferential. He’d praised her cuisine and her efficiency and tried to converse with her, but she’d never shared anything of herself.
The real Danielle would’ve addressed her only as a servant and elicited no more than a nod. Maybe a damn curtsey. Vanessa, with her warmth, had opened up the woman in moments.
He strode into the dining room and wrapped an arm around Vanessa’s shoulders. “Ah, mes belles, about time you met.”
In the doorway, Lise rolled her eyes. Impatience jerked her shoulders and cocked her hip.
Expression once again shuttered, the housekeeper folded the napkin and arranged it at one of the two set places on the cherry-wood banquet table. “Good evening, Monsieur Nick. The dinner, it will be ready in a few moments.”
Eyes downcast, she dashed into the kitchen.
“She’s still skittish of me. And the daughter doesn’t trust me. Fallout from Alexei’s high-handedness. At least I eliminated the silly maid’s uniform he’d insisted on.”
“Trust takes time,” Vanessa said, angling her head to look up at him.
Tucked under the curve of his arm, she was temptingly close. Nick brushed a kiss across her soft lips. Even that light touch kindled a flame. “Miss me?”
“Every minute.” Cheeks pink, she slid from his embrace and fluffed her hair.
He preferred her thick mane up in the tumble of brandy-colored curls that offered access to her creamy neck. Stepping behind her, he absorbed her spring-rain scent.
“Thank you, Nick. You’re so attentive tonight,” Vanessa said, as he held her chair, to the right of his at the head.
“Aren’t I always?”
She merely smiled at him as she spread her napkin on her lap. Dressed for a casual evening, she wore a pair of slim black pants and a sleeveless white turtleneck sweater that invited him to caress the toned flesh of her upper arm.
Why not? Wasn’t she his fiancée?
Yielding to temptation, he also kissed her bare shoulder as he pushed in her chair. Then he forced himself to move away from the enticement of her sensual curves.
He’d no sooner taken his place than Janine and a pouting Lise covered the white linen with platters emitting mouth-watering Caribbean aromas.
“Let me serve you, darling. Janine’s grilled salmon with mango chutney deserves a presentation,” Vanessa said after the other women had vanished into the kitchen. She lifted his plate and slid a serving of fish on it. “We’ve been too busy for me to act the proper hostess for you.”
He stared at her. Sarcasm and aloofness were so unlike Vanessa, but too much like Danielle. And she’d hit on the head the other woman’s role in his life. Too perceptive.
She lowered the serving fork and touched the abstract silver pin clipped to her collar. “Thanks, Snow. Out.”
She pressed the pin and turned to Nick. “Janine and her daughter have left. Their security tail reports they’re headed for the Metro stop.”
Nick stared at the pin. The microphone. ATSA had been listening to every word. Until now.
ATSA was gone. The housekeepers were gone.
They were alone.
Pleased, he plied the corkscrew to the wine.
Did she always keep the mike off when they were alone? Had ATSA heard his damn confession as well as his aborted seduction?
Even if they had not, the honesty and empathy in her clear green eyes weren’t real. None of this was real.
Except for the uncanny way holding her eased the dull ache of grief and anger in his chest.
Except for the threat created by Alexei’s rip-off of the New Dawn Warriors.
Except for his attraction to her sweet sensuality.
After dinner, Vanessa followed Nick into the sunroom at the back of the house. Geared for relaxation, the room had a wall of windows facing the terrace, a breakfast nook at the end near the kitchen and a marble fireplace at the other.
A wicker sofa and love seat created a comfortable semicircle at the fireplace. The cushions coordinated with the Oriental rug’s beige and green pattern. Lacquered cabinets in the wall hid a state-of-the-art entertainment center and a wall safe.
For a change, the night was cool. She watched as Nick knelt to crumple newspaper and lay kindling in the stone hearth. The movements flexed his powerful shoulder muscles. Beneath the pushed-up sleeves of his soft navy pullover, dark hairs glistened on his tanned forearms. Only the white bandage on his thumb hinted at any vulnerability.
He was the most striking man she’d ever seen, with danger and brooding intensity lurking beneath a dark and self-assured surface. And a more than world-class butt.
Dragging her gaze away, Vanessa settled on the sofa.
Detachment, she reminded herself. She needed to get him talking again. She hadn’t made much headway in uncovering details about Somalia. But there were other critical factors. About ten million of them. She couldn’t charge directly into that topic, however.
“Janine said your brother never wanted her to cook her Haitian dishes.”
He kept his back to her as he struck a long match to the crisscrossed kindling and logs. “He preferred European cuisine, mostly French. Janine’s a versatile cook.”
“Saturdays and Sundays, she cooks at a French restaurant on Connecticut Avenue. She’s determined to get Lise through junior college.”
He sat back on his heels. The firelight flickered shadows on his beard-stubbled jaw. For an instant she saw the Special Forces warrior hunkered by a campfire.
His dark brows scissored together as he gazed at her. “How do you do that?”
“Do what?”
“Get people to bare their souls to you like that? You wormed more out of Janine in a few minutes than I have in a month. No wonder Snow called you the Confessor.” He shook his head and rose to his feet in a fluid motion.
She felt heat zing to her cheeks. “I wish he hadn’t told you that. That nickname makes me sound like the head of a convent or something.”
“Honey, I sure as hell don’t think of you as a nun.”
The sexy resonance of his voice started an erotic ache deep inside her. She clutched a throw pillow in front of her, as if any physical barrier could block her reaction to him. She must pretend to herself it could, at least.
He was smiling as he joined her on the sofa. “You do have a knack for getting people to warm up to you.”
Before she could change the topic, the telephone rang.
Vanessa sat up, alert, and clicked on her microphone. “Snow? You on that?”
“Affirmative,” said the voice in her ear.
Nick strode to the phone extension in the living room. “It could be anyone. Falstone. Celia Chin.” But he didn’t sound optimistic.
Biting her lip, Vanessa watched him lift the receiver.
“Hello.” His voice sounded strong and confident, but she guessed his nerves were wound as taut as hers.
Through her earpiece, she could hear the entire conversation. The first words verified that the caller was neither the funeral director nor the import shop manager.
“By now you know that we are close to you,” said the accented voice. “Are you prepared to reimburse what your brother stole from us?”
“I told you before. I know nothing about your money. If my brother had it, he spent it.”
“Ah, no matter to us ho
w you repay the debt. What a shame if harm were to befall the lovely Miss LeBec. An accident or…some mishap. You cannot protect her completely.”
Nick gripped the receiver, his jaw firm and his eyes blazing with fury. “I don’t bargain with crooks. Your threats won’t work. If you come near my fiancée, you’ll have to deal with me.”
With that, the caller disconnected.
“Snow?” Vanessa said.
“Hell. I should’ve kept him on the line longer.” Nick rubbed the back of his neck as he dumped the receiver in its cradle. “But that supercilious tone burned me. I wanted to stuff the damn phone down his slimy throat.”
After a moment, Vanessa clicked the mike off and crossed to the liquor cabinet. “No problem. A trace takes less time than starting that fire in the other room. The bad news is the caller used a cell phone.”
“So he could’ve called from anywhere. And the phone’s probably stolen or a throwaway without the subscriber’s real name and address.”
She grinned. “You sure you’re not a cop or something?”
“I read.” He scowled at her as if she’d maligned his mother’s parentage. “Now what are you doing to this valuable antique cabinet?”
Vanessa stepped back from pushing carved leaves at random. “I thought a sip or two of that lovely Benedictine might be just the thing right now. I hardly had time to taste mine last time.”
“I like the way you think.” The heated gaze gliding over her body showed appreciation for more than her mind.
Tingles fired on her skin as though he’d touched her. He still wanted her.
Correction—he wanted a woman.
If she could hold him off during a little conversation over liqueur, she could avoid him until the museum reception on Friday. Togetherness only in public she could handle.
Nick pressed the requisite series of decorative ivory leaves, and the cabinet’s double doors swung open.
She peered at the intricate inlay pattern. More leaves inside. The cabinet seemed to be deeper than the inside space would indicate. Her pulse danced in anticipation. “This is a puzzle chest, right?”
He nodded, withdrawing the liqueur. “Chinese. Eighteenth-century, I think Alexei said. It’s on the inventory. Why?”
Code Name: Fiancée Page 7