Can You Forget?

by Melissa James

  She frowned, scenting his act—maybe from the way he yelled, but more likely from the extreme lack of blood in the room. If his celiac artery had perforated, there’d be blood all over the floor. If the infrared detectors were still on, Nighthawks would burst into the room any second—and if this guy was scoping them out for Falcone, he had to get him out fast before they blew the mission. Much as it galled him, this guy had to get away safe, or his absence would tell everyone exactly what Verity West and her husband were, unless celebs had resorted to infrareds and cameras in hotel suites for safety and privacy.

  Hell, what did he know? Maybe they did.

  When Mary-Anne left for the other room he took a good look at the guy’s face—surely the fair hair was a dye…but yeah, otherwise he was the image of the journo who’d taken Brooks’s place—and snarled, “Can the act, Longley. What the hell are you after? My wife’s bodyguards will be here any moment and you’ll be arrested for trespass.”

  “Smile, Mr. West!” With a quick laugh, the man pulled out a digital camera from his jacket. He reeled off some shots before Tal, torn between white-hot fury and sick relief that he hadn’t pulled a gun, grabbed the camera and slammed it on the ground. He yanked the guy up by his shirt collar and stagger-walked him to a wall by the window. “I warned you.” He clipped him under the jaw, hard enough to seem like a furious groom, not a pro.

  But to his amazement the guy stared, blinked and crumpled down. Tal released him and let him fall to the floor behind the door, watching, waiting—hoping like hell the guy didn’t wake up and pull a gun this time.

  “Tal! Tal!” Mary-Anne screamed through the door, her panic a clear warning. Damn, the reinforcements had arrived.

  Thank God, within a second the man jumped to his feet, bolted across the room, yanked open the window and vaulted through it—making it out just as the door flung open, knocking Tal off his feet as six armed Nighthawks burst into the room.

  Tal bolted to the window to make it look good, but the guy was gone, slithering down the back of the roof to the alley behind. And he couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Leaping over roofs might suit James Bond, but not the persona of blissfully ignorant honeymooning husband that Falcone, Burstall or any rogue Nighthawk should assume him to be.

  Then a blasting tide of weakness hit his leg, reminding him yet again that he couldn’t have chased the guy far, anyway. That part of his life was over.

  “Tal?”

  Pivoting on his good leg, he turned back to the nine people watching him in silence, and held a finger to his lips. “He only took photos of me. I think he was paid to get close-ups of the man you married, honey.” He pointed to the floor.

  As one, all the Nighthawks fell to their knees. “What do we do?” Mary-Anne cried as she searched the floor for bugs.

  Even if he had to damn well sit, he’d hunt with them…he slid down the wall and began combing through the expensive carpet with thorough fingers, praying only the weakness would stay and not the pain that normally followed—but it was inevitable after diving in front of the car this morning. “What do we do? Sue his sleazy tabloid into nonexistence, that’s what.”

  “But that won’t stop half the world seeing the pictures of us on our honeymoon first!”

  He pointed across the room. “The camera stayed here, honey.”

  “Thank God!” She shook her head, indicating her search had brought up nothing. Every other Nighthawk shook their heads in silence. No bugs—not anywhere the guy had been, anyway.

  Where did they go from here?

  He looked around and noticed what he hadn’t before.

  This room had been searched by a pro. Whoever turned over the place had good stealth work skills—the room looked almost untouched, but they didn’t know their target. Tal had a thing for numbers and angles. Leaving things in precisely arranged mess, with articles sitting on a certain angle when he was on a mission was his way of laying a strategic hair on his things.

  A three-degree difference in the way his pen lay on the desk. Five degrees on the way his shirt was tossed. His shoes, minus the inserts he had to reinsert every time, about five, as well.

  Almost good enough, my friends—but not quite.

  With a quick hand motion, he got everyone’s attention. Nine, he mouthed, letting everyone know the search had to resume.

  Aloud, Anson said, “Miss West, after an invasion of this kind, I hope you realize that we need to search your room for any kind of electronic surveillance? These tabloids will stop at nothing to get an exclusive story.”

  “Of course,” Mary-Anne sighed.

  Anson left the room to turn off the Nighthawks’ equipment.

  A minute later, turning on the electronic detection sweeper, they got confirmation of Tal’s suspicion: there was some type of electronic device hidden somewhere in the room.

  The beep wasn’t strong enough to be anything big. Couldn’t be a hidden camera. Maybe a bug or something he’d never heard of.

  He cocked an eyebrow at Anson, who sighed, shrugged and started searching. “We have to check the room thoroughly for hidden cameras, Miss West,” he said. “Some desperate member of the paparazzi could make a fortune with unauthorized photos of you and your husband in bed.”

  “Nice thought,” Tal said wryly, checking the curtains, the tables and drawers beside him as he spoke.

  She stripped the bed, checking beneath the mattress and under blankets. “Sorry, darling. I did tell you I’d need bodyguards with us and electronic surveillance in the suite.”

  He made his voice sound incredulous. “You mean, some newshounds break into rooms illegally to get shots of stars?”

  “Of course they do. Especially wanna-be journalists desperate to break in.” She sighed to make it sound good to any listener. “Do you think those different shots every week of Julia Roberts or Meg Ryan are authorized releases, or Fergie or Princess Diana wanted those less-than-flattering shots sent around the world? If famous people don’t have protection, they don’t have a private life—the press harasses them wherever they go, shopping, swimming, spending time with family—even at funerals. Fans feel it’s their right to know all about our lives. It comes with the territory, darling. You’ll get used to it.”

  “And the car attack this morning? No wonder you wanted me to be prepared for anything and you insisted that I learn how to defend myself and use a gun. Do you think the driver was the press, a fan, or is it some other part of the downside of fame I don’t know about? Will your more rabid fans try to kill me so they can keep fantasizing you’ll be with them one day?”

  Her head snapped up, her gaze held a deep respect bordering on awe at his cover story for their response to the attack this morning. It must match the story she’d cooked up with Anson. “I’ll tell you as soon as I can, Tal—but not with a possible hidden camera or listening device here. My private life would go straight to Fleet Street.”

  “Found one.” Braveheart lifted up a tiny device from beneath the leg of the desk where the roses stood, and disabled it.

  Tal checked the monitor. Still beeping. He nodded, wishing he could get on his feet to help. Go. The search resumed. He kept checking the drawers, piece by piece.

  Even to a man who’d been a spy the past three years, this still felt surreal—downright weird. What happened to his quiet, boring existence in the Torres Strait, believing he could never lead a full, useful life again?

  Within a week he was married to the only woman he’d ever wanted or loved, yet they’d never have met again, let alone married, if it hadn’t been necessary for international security. And just when he’d got his head around that, she’d changed the game by actually wanting him—wanting him so bad she’d risked her pride to convince him.

  Now operatives were openly searching for bugs and cameras in his damned honeymoon suite in a game of bluff-and-double-bluff, talk-and-double-talk.

  Keeping secrets, telling halftruths. Living with a woman he should know better than he knew himself, yet she was a
stranger. Something weird was going on, like a frightening undercurrent of the mission above.

  Was it the journo, or a member of the hotel staff who planted the bug—or someone else? He had a feeling Falcone and Burstall wouldn’t be as obvious as this, but what the real game was in this crazy circus surrounding them, he had no idea. Yet.

  He found the second bug in his middle drawer, inside a pair of rolled-up socks. Once he disabled it, the monitor stopped beeping, but it resumed in seconds—with a different kind of beep, a long, drooping sound he didn’t know.

  Anson pulled out a little toy Tal had never seen before and scrutinized it. “It’s an outside circuit,” Anson said, his voice loud and aggressive as he read the face of his gadget. “About fifty yards due east, I’d say, heading toward the ‘Beverly Hills’ area of the island, where the rich people live. I’ll call the police now and get in the full regalia. We’ll find who these clowns are, where they’re from, and we’ll take them down.”

  Within seconds the signal slowed, softened and died.

  “Thought they’d run. Now we can talk in peace.” Anson passed the electronic devices to Braveheart. “You like this kind of fun. Find out where these came from and when.”

  Braveheart gave a mocking salute. “Certainly, O fearless leader,” he replied with the same cheeky irreverence he used on everyone. From experience, Tal knew that kind of talk was part of the camaraderie of an emergency service worker—a way of getting through the tragedies they all had to face on a daily basis. Sort of like when the doctors and nurses in the ER ordered beer and pizza after another death.

  So Braveheart’s in the services outside the Nighthawks? Wonder which part of the game he works in?

  He waited for Anson to snap at Braveheart, but Ghost grinned in response, a sort of yeah, yeah, good-natured long-suffering he’d never shown any other operative as far as he knew.

  “Right,” he said briskly. “We have to get out of here. I’ll call the manager now. We can storm out and onto the yachts. That should keep the hounds happy for a day.”

  Braveheart grinned at Mary-Anne. “It’s time to give the world a show, Miss West. I believe the fifty-seven—the royal tantrum, yes?—may be called for at this stage of the game.”

  She grinned back and gave a little salute. “Certainly. I can manage that, O fearless sometime partner.”

  Braveheart burst out laughing. “I shall retaliate in similar kind, in my own way and time for that, Lady Songbird.”

  Anson lifted a hand, silencing the camaraderie. “Now we’re clean, we have a real problem on our hands, folks.” He made sure the outer door was safely locked, then he ushered everyone into the bedroom, shutting that door, too. “Whoever this guy was, he’s seen Irish with smudged makeup, and I’d say he’s seen the limp, too.”

  As one, everyone turned to look at Tal, still sitting on the floor. After feeling his cheek, he felt like crawling into a hole. If he’d been acting like a professional, he’d constantly think about keeping his disguise in place—but by thinking with his heart and gonads, he’d put everyone in danger.

  Anson went on, speaking aloud the dread in Tal’s mind. “We have to face facts. If Longley’s a Falcone plant, Burstall will soon know who Irish is. Even if he’s a legit journo, Burstall will know by tomorrow. Which means our rogue in the organization will know we’re here and after Burstall. We have to get Burstall safely in custody before the rogue can silence him. The rogue knows he—or she—will have to kill him, because if we take Burstall he’s gonna squeal like a stuck pig. He’ll give the names of everyone in on his dirty deals, to deal down a treason charge.”

  The room fell completely silent. Everyone stood totally still, absorbing the ramifications.

  “Those of us going into the Embassy will be targets from the first moment we arrive,” Anson said quietly. “We can’t go in wearing flak jackets and helmets. But we must take down Falcone before that shipment of arms can go out to Dilsemla in Tumah-ra, or to the upper Slovakian or African rebel militia groups. We have to take Burstall and get a positive ID on our rogue, if at all possible. And there’s an innocent kid in there, as well. We can’t leave him to die.” As Tal got to his feet, slowly and painfully, Anson looked around the room at them all, one by one. “There’s too much at stake to walk away, no other team to send in that they won’t immediately find suspicious—but if we go, there’s a strong chance some of us won’t come out alive. So if any of you have doubts, a reason to go home, or someone you need to go home to, say so now. No one will think the worse of you.”

  Silence filled the room once again. Every back was straight, every head held high—every eye met that of their secret boss.

  “Good.” For once Anson’s face held more than acceptance. “I will say here and now that there isn’t a team I’d rather have at my back. I’ve made some preparations to get people inside the Embassy, so we should have a few allies in there.” He waved a hand. “Now let’s pack up, set up the tantrum scene and get out of here. We may as well enjoy the two days enforced R and R we have, compliments of Irish. We’re going to need them.”

  Wildman spoke the thought in all their minds. “Sir? If they suspect us now, wouldn’t it be best to go in tonight?”

  Anson shrugged. “He doesn’t have photographic evidence, thanks to Irish. Burstall was a cop—he’ll want proof. If we go in now, right after this incident, it gives him all the proof he needs. We want him off balance. Irish and Songbird must play the honeymoon to the hilt. And we have to wait until Flipper’s team arrives, anyway. Virginia wants a three-team component to go in.” He snapped his fingers. “Let’s go.”

  As the rest of the team filed out of their bedroom in silence, Mary-Anne’s hand slipped into Tal’s, lacing her fingers through his, squeezing hard.

  “You okay?” He squeezed back gently.

  After a moment she nodded but said nothing, worrying the side of her mouth with her front teeth.

  “You don’t have to do this, Mary-Anne.”

  She turned to him, looking up into his face with fear in her eyes—and resolve. “No. I won’t leave. I can’t say I’m not scared, Tal—but if I have to die, like Ghost said, there’s no other people on earth I’d rather have with me.”

  He released her hand to cradle her face. “I want you to stay safe, but I know it’s useless to ask.”

  “I’m done running.” She smiled at him, with a quirky, misty kind of ruefulness that made her look like a vivid, fiery Mona Lisa. “When I was a girl, I’d dream I was an old lady, dying with you by my side, being your wife. Looks like I just might get my childhood fantasy of being buried as Mary-Anne O’Rierdan—just a few decades earlier than I’d dreamed of.”

  Why the hell did she have to have such a gift with words, making him feel warm and fuzzy and scared to death at the same time? “Imagine that.” The words sounded as flat as he felt. He’d rather she lived another sixty years as Verity West than have to bury her within the next week as Mary-Anne O’Rierdan.

  But neither of them, it seemed, had a choice in that.

  Half an hour later the manager arrived, making sounds of distress about the paparazzi break-in, on top of what already happened this morning in the street. “I cannot believe this. Our guests disturbed, molested and robbed! Their privacy invaded! I do not know what you people have brought upon us—”

  Mary-Anne’s imperious voice halted whatever else he had been about to say. “Mr. Vasquez, do you know who I am?”

  The manager blinked. “¡Madre de Dios!” he suddenly gasped. “Miss West! I am so sorry! Forgive me, I have suffered the flu, and I did not know that you had come to our island, our hotel—”

  She looked at him, head high, hair and eyes aflame. “Frankly, Mr. Vasquez, I find the security arrangements at this hotel appalling. We’d hoped for peace and quiet before I go to London and New York, which is why I registered under my husband’s name. Obviously we won’t find any peace here with journalists lying in wait to take shots of us even if we double lock the doo
r! Darling, you were saying something about a yacht?”

  As a queenly performance, it took the prize. Tal barely recognized the shy, half-stuttering girl he knew in the arrogant woman lording it over the half-groveling man in front of her. He hadn’t seen her act this well since she’d starred as Dorothy in her high-school production of The Wiz sixteen years ago.

  She’d done what she could to save the mission. Few people would doubt her veracity at least, after this prima-donna stunt. Verity West’s royal tantrum would be news around the hotel in minutes and across the world by tomorrow.

  He just prayed it was enough to deflect suspicion from her. He could handle going in as a target, but Mary-Anne—

  The poor man’s face almost touched the floor in humble acceptance of her words. “Of course, Miss West. I am sorry.”

  It looked the right time for him to smooth things over. “Mr. Vasquez, my wife’s naturally upset. This isn’t your fault. We should have told you in advance of our plans, so you could increase security for our visit. I think we’ve caused you enough worries. I’ve booked a yacht for the rest of our stay in Amalza.” He turned to Mary-Anne. “Let’s pack our things, honey. The sooner we get our privacy, the better.”

  Mary-Anne, her tender heart unable to stand the act, added, “I know this isn’t your fault, Mr. Vasquez. I assure you my version of events won’t hit the tabloids.” She turned to the writing table, pulled out a CD, and wrote on the cover insert. “I don’t know if anyone in your family is interested in my music, but here’s a signed copy of my latest album. My agent will send you two front-row tickets to my next show in Paris—with flights, full accommodation and all meals, with my apologies for my temper.” She pulled a little face. “I’m sorry. I don’t have the best reaction to fear,” she confessed.

  “Neither do I,” Mr. Vasquez said, smiling back. “My wife loves your songs, Miss West. She will be most grateful.” He hesitated. “If I may just ask—”