by Lyn Stone
Chapter 7
"Should we run without lights?" Dani asked.
"With this moon, we're visible with or without...but, yeah we should be able to see them better with our own lights off."
"Can't this thing go any faster?" Dani cried, pounding the console with the heel of her hand. "God only knows what they're in!"
"If it's a speedboat, we're screwed," he said. She had to read his lips. Then louder, he demanded, "How're you fixed for ammo?"
"Fifteen rounds," she told him. "Another clip in my bag."
"Go get it!" he ordered, his words sharp with command.
She hustled to retrieve it from the cabin and checked her weapon. When she returned to the deck, he cut the lights and she watched their pursuer closing the distance between them. The smaller boat bounced along the surface like a skipping stone. "Two occupants!" she informed Ben.
He cursed, his staid banker image gone completely. "We can't outrun 'em. So..." With a completely calm face he cut the boat into as sharp a turn as possible, nearly flipping it as he reversed their direction. "They can still see us but might not be able to tell what I'm doing until it was too late."
"What the hell are you doing?" Dani screamed. It took all the strength she had to hold on and not get slung overboard.
"Damn things don't run in reverse.... Get ready!" he shouted. "Lock one arm around the mast and keep it between you and them. When we get close, start firing. I want them ducking bullets, not steering. Got it?"
"You're gonna ram them?"
"Damn straight!" He throttled forward at top speed. The other boat kept coming, obviously planning to fly alongside for a clear shot.
When they were within fifty yards, Ben yelled, "Open fire!"
She braced her right wrist and let them have it. Five rapid rounds. Their windscreen crackled and the two men disappeared. She squeezed the trigger for another volley.
"Hang on!" she heard Ben yell. He jammed the hull of their runabout just off-center. The much lighter, speeding boat glanced off and flipped.
Dani imagined screams rising above the sound of the impact and the sharp whine of engines. She put five rounds in the bottom of their fiberglass hull.
Without pause, Ben veered off to the right at full speed and cut another turn, this one much wider, putting them back on course and well away from the capsized vessel.
Dani grabbed-the binoculars to scan the wreckage. "No heads in the water," she reported, but continued to keep watch until they were out of sight. Then she lowered the glasses and smiled at him. "How's the timing now? You ready to quit?"
Ben laughed, facing the spray that blew over the windscreen. He cut her a smiling look.
The rest of the trip to Cayman Brac went off without a hitch, save Dani getting locked below in the head when the door handle stuck. He tried not to laugh, but seeing her fuming over such a minor mishap after the way she'd performed during the pursuit struck Ben as downright hilarious. She was still pouting when they reached the airport.
"C'mon, getting locked in the head could have happened to anybody," he said, chucking her under the chin. "You'll drink off that story for years."
She moved put of reach and fumbled in her shoulder purse for her hairbrush. She groomed her wind-blown hair quickly and absently handed the brush to him. He ran it over his short cut just to make her happy. "Thanks. Do I pass inspection?"
"Yes. And you have to go home now," she told him, her voice matter-of-fact, yet laced with regret. "Switch your ticket for a flight to Miami or Atlanta."
"Much cheaper to fly through Toronto when you go to Switzerland," he replied easily. "Want some coffee?"
She sighed, her shoulders slumping as she rolled her eyes. Lovely eyes, they were, too. "You. Can. Not. Go."
"Watch me. Have card, will travel." He pointed to the coffee shop and took her arm, guiding her over. "Now it's the 'have gun will travel' part that I'm worried about. Think they'll confiscate it if it's packed with my shaving gear?"
As soon as they got their coffee and sat down, she took out her phone, punched one of the numbers and handed it to him. "Here. You talk to Mercier. He's my boss and he's telling me to unload you, tout de suite. You want me to lose my job?"
"Yeah. Then I'll put you to work at the bank. Obviously we could use an armed guard."
That got an unwilling laugh from her. He took the phone and waited for Mercier to answer. They had spoken before so Ben knew what to expect.
"Yes, Dani? What's up?"
"Agent Mercier, this is Ben Michaels. Dani tells me you're cutting me loose. May I ask why?"
The man at the other end hesitated. "Where's Danielle?"
"Right here drinking coffee." He held the phone over to her. "Say hey so your control won't think I killed you and dumped the body."
"Hey, boss. I'm not dead. He won't quit," she said, granting Ben a smile of challenge.
Ben took back the conversation. "I'm seeing this through, with her or without her," he warned.
"I can have you arrested for obstructing justice. Put your ass in jail," Mercier warned.
Ben sighed. "Well, you'd have to catch me first, sir, and I think I can stay at least one step ahead long enough to finish this. I have all the pertinent information you need to track down these funds and find who's amassing them. You need me and I'm doing this."
"Put Dani back on the phone."
Ben gave it to her with a little flourish and picked up his coffee, exhaling dramatically with pleasure at the taste of it. Better than Starbucks by a country mile.
He didn't even bother to eavesdrop as Dani and her boss hashed out their problem of what to do with him. He knew what the outcome would be. Mercier would have his dossier pulled by now and see that he was qualified. The man had only been giving him a way out of danger that would save face if Ben wanted it. He didn't.
God help him, he had missed the action. He had missed making a difference. Granting a long-time customer an extra tenth of a point interest on a CD just didn't do it for him. He needed to get back in the game, if only this one final time. Then he'd settle down to banking.
His mother would forgive him if he came home in one piece, and if she didn't know what he was up to in the meanwhile. And if he saw he wasn't going to do that, Ben didn't intend to come home broken like before. He knew it was the waiting to see if he'd make it, the worrying that he couldn't handle the changes necessary, the three surgeries and their aftermath. That's what had laid her low and nearly killed her by degrees. She would have handled it far better if he had died instantly. He would never put her through all that again. This time it was all or nothing.
Dani closed her phone and put it away. She stared at him over the rim of her cup, then she set it down. "Looks like you win."
Ben wasn't the least bit surprised. "Okay, off to Canada. Want a souvenir of the islands?" He reached in his pocket and handed her the small seashell he had picked up off the ground at the marina while they'd waited for a taxi. "For luck," he said with a smile.
"Are you superstitious?" she asked as she fingered the tiny shell, feeling the rough fan of striations on one side and the smooth mother-of-pearl surface on the other. Like the two sides of Ben Michaels.
"Having a talisman never hurts," he told her.
"Well, I hope you've got your rabbit's foot handy. I think we're gonna need more than this little keepsake."
He stood, smiled down at her, took their bags and headed for the departure gate.
With a grin, she tucked the shell in her pocket. Like he said, it couldn't hurt.
Dani kept glancing over at the sleeping Ben to see if he had morphed yet again. He had been all but shape-shifting from the moment she first encountered him. House cat to tiger. Back and forth he went. Deferential to commanding. Conservative to take-charge. Who was he really and what would he be when he opened his eyes the next time?
She had a sneaky feeling that the polite, staid-banker image was the false one, but he did it so convincingly. Mama's boy? Maybe. What was the
story there?
The top of his passport peeked out of his jacket pocket. She eased it the rest of the way out for a cursory examination. Middle name Roarke. He was thirty-six. Six feet two. He had lost at least twenty pounds since this was issued, she noted. She glanced at his photo and did a double take. It wasn't him!
She peered closer. Well, it could be him, she realized, but at first glance she'd had to wonder. He had definitely had a nose job. His cheekbones looked less prominent. And all those laugh lines were missing now, as well as the jaunty mustache and mole on his left cheek. She studied his sleeping face and looked back at his photo. The earlobes were different. So was his hairline. What was going on here? She needed to talk to control immediately.
Careful not to wake Ben, she retreated to the toilet at the back of the plane and called Mercier. He picked up right away.
They discussed the robbery and all that had occurred since. For the sake of brevity, they stuck strictly to the facts, not adding any conjecture at this point.
The authorities had identified the dead man at the bank, and she filed away the information about him that Mercier provided.
Ben would find this interesting, Dani thought. She would wake him after the phone call and get his take on it, but first she had a few more questions needing immediate answers.
"Tell me about Ben Michaels. If this gets uglier than it already has, I need to know just how qualified he is," she told Jack. "Also, you need to know his face doesn't match his passport. Not exactly anyway. Something not right here, Jack."
Mercier hesitated, then sighed. "I'll have to give you the abbreviated version. He was Delta Force."
"Was?" Dani interrupted. "Why didn't you tell me before? What's up?"
"He and his team were on an extended mission in Afghanistan. He was trying to save a family targeted by the Taliban. Only, the fifteen-year-old son had been recruited as an SB."
Suicide bomber. Dani winced.
Jack cleared his throat. "They were relocating them when the boy detonated. Michaels and the driver of the truck were the only ones in the vehicle who got out alive. Michaels was given a medical discharge because of his injuries, which I understand were extensive."
"Oh my God, how bad? What was involved?"
"Face, right arm and hip mostly. He's fit for this op now, that's what's important. Totally recovered."
Dani sighed with relief.
Jack continued, "After a number of surgeries, he settled with his folks and took the position at the bank. His father is president of Beresford. Michaels has the education for banking, and experience, too. He had worked there throughout his college years to help his family and also defray fees not covered by his scholarships. He was fortunate to have that as backup when he had to leave the army."
Dani felt a catch in her breath, just imagining what Ben must have endured. "Thank God he made it through," she said, exhaling sharply with relief. "That explains a lot."
"Danielle?" Jack said, catching her before she could ring off. "I sense some personal interest. Not wise here."
She wanted to demand why not, but she knew better. That was tantamount to admitting she already was involved. Jack would not be cautioning her if he didn't have a good reason, something more than just falling for someone she worked with. Jack had done that very thing with Solange, the woman he married, and he had never been into giving orders he couldn't abide by himself.
"Don't worry, boss," she said, trying to sound amused. "He is so not my type."
She glanced at the ceiling, waiting for a lightning bolt to strike her for the lie. For insurance, she mentally listed Ben's major faults as she saw them. Apron strings made from anchor rope, for one thing. Control freak, for another. And, of course, he was too damned good looking....
Yeah, a handsome-as-sin hero who could take over and save the day as easily as he could make nice with his mother. Lots wrong there, girl. Big, scary faults. Fate would probably send her an egg-hatched troll who couldn't punch his way out of a paper sack the next time around.
"We're investigating at this end, all agencies on it. Get what info you can from the banks���faces, names, et cetera. Call if you need backup," Jack told her and rang off without a farewell.
That was his custom. No goodbye, no farewell, no take care. She guessed that was to reassure his people that he knew very well that they had sense enough to watch their backs.
"Okay," she said to herself as she put the phone away.
Dani went forward to take her seat beside Ben. He stirred when she sat and her arm brushed his. A chance touch, one that made her tingle, no matter how innocent.
She inhaled deeply, drawing in the scent of aftershave mixed with his own unique essence. Yep, the sense of smell was arousing, even when slightly blunted by the recycled air of the cabin. Or maybe she was just getting too much or not enough oxygen. At any rate, he filled that one sense to capacity. No premonition of danger accompanied it, either.
She slid his passport back in place. Fascinated and free to explore him unnoticed, Dani examined his long dark eyelashes, the way his hair had been carefully styled to control a natural wave. Her hungry gaze traced the fine, smooth pores of his face and the too perfect line of his nose. Far too good-looking to trust.
Yet she couldn't help noting again the long hairline scar in front of his ear. For the first time she saw a similar one running parallel and just beneath his eyebrow. Unless she looked really closely, both were pretty much invisible. Were those the result of injuries sustained in that bombing? Unable to help herself, Dani rested her hand on his arm, just a light touch.
How long had it been since someone had touched her the way he had earlier? Oh, she got a brief hug, a perfunctory smack on the cheek from her sister and her brother in law about twice a year���once when she arrived to visit, next when she left.
There was the quick pat on the shoulder she had gotten from her boss. Only the one and that proved highly impersonal and almost reluctantly granted. Of course, there were outright grabs on the mat during hand-to-hand with her fellow operatives. Not exactly touches of comfort, of caring, or of anything resembling camaraderie. Not in a scrap for dominance.
Dani flatly refused to resort to massage. Oh, she knew the touted benefits of it, but that kind of impersonal contact left her cold and even more tense than before. Paid-for touches, she could do without.
She could have frequented the singles bars and got all the touching she could stand, but it would have been the wrong kind and she knew it.
No, she wanted touching with a capital T. A sweet slide of fingers over the curve of her neck and shoulder, a palm cupped beneath her breast, a fingertip tracing her lips. Touching.
Ben provided that naturally, God bless him. He knew what she wanted, what she craved more than anything. And he was using it to get under her skin. Or maybe into her pants, she didn't know. Okay, she could make a pretty good guess.
It was too bad she hadn't already found some guy with a little romance in his soul to provide for her, before now, so she wouldn't be so damn needy for the contact. Six years was a long time.
She'd had Kevin back then. His touch wasn't all that great, neither was his lovemaking. But at least she had felt somewhat normal in their relationship. And then Kev got marriage-minded and his mother freaked. The blow to Dani's pride had proved worse than a breaking heart.
She knew what that was like, too. William Cos had broken hers when she discovered he was a double agent, when he had pulled a gun on her and Sean, when he intended to kill them to preserve his cover. She could still see the disbelief on his face when she'd shot him. Like he hadn't thought she could do it?
Then she was alone again, missing the trust along with the touching. She didn't trust herself now, either, with men.
Never would she admit to anyone that she felt the need to be held, stroked, comforted, cared about. Nor would she ever say why. Carol probably understood it, though they could never discuss it.
They had grown up at Lambs of G
od Children's Sanctuary in Landesford, Iowa. The orphanage where their parents had left them had proven a sterile place with no warmth. Not one of the sanctimonious caretakers there had the least inclination to cuddle with a Gypsy child. Romany spawn. The two of them were labeled "devil's get" from the outset. Even at the young ages of five and three they were tainted beyond redemption, as far as those people had been concerned.
The only human touching they got there came from a fist around their upper arms, holding them still for the smack of the flat side of a Ping-Pong paddle. Only rarely were they allowed to be together long enough to hug one another.
Carol had fared a little better, maybe. She had fairer hair, normal brown eyes and lighter skin. Maybe those "favored" characteristics allowed her to develop a sweeter nature.
Dani had grown up belligerent, cocky and aggressive, all attributes that aided her in her occupation. She didn't regret them.
But her softer side had gotten buried deep. It wouldn't do to let it loose now, not on this op and not with Ben Michaels. What if she lost the benefits her hard shell gave her?
God, it was so hard not to respond to him. She could hardly help herself. But she knew in her heart there were differences too great for them to ever overcome if they became too close.
He was no fly-by-night lover. That just wasn't his style. He had family man written all over him. And she could never be one to settle down the way Carol had done, no matter how much she envied her sister.
Carol hadn't even told her husband about their background. She had confessed that she was raised in an orphanage, but not the animosity she had endured or the type of people who had put her there. Not many men would welcome a woman born of a grifter and his common-law wife, parents who couldn't be bothered with kids while they ran their scams across the country and lived out of rusty vans and ragged tents. She barely remembered any of it. Much of her background and abandonment, Dani had imagined, of course, but she had read as much as she could find about the Gypsies and their roving lifestyle.
She didn't need a preternatural premonition to tell her how Ben and his family would react if they discovered her past. Best not to put herself in a position of having to reveal it.