by Rachel Grant
“But it was about you too. You were losing your father.” Hazel couldn’t imagine being shut out of her dad’s life in his final months.
He nodded. “Yeah. But I’d been gone for almost fifteen years in the military, visiting rarely. I’d given up my spot, and they’d learned to live with my absence. I don’t resent either of my parents’ reactions to my sudden return home. I get it. I should have discussed my plans with them instead of just trying to take charge. I know my dad loved me. I know he was proud of me. He and my mom wanted my memories of him to remain intact. To see him as the larger-than-life father I’d worshipped growing up. And the best thing I could offer him as he was dying was to give him that. To only show up announced so he would be clean and dressed and seated on the couch in the living room, not in the rented hospital bed, wearing a gown.
“But for me, I was adrift. I didn’t belong anywhere. About six weeks before Dad died, Rav hired me. It was a lifeline. And Rav, he needed me. He was trying to rescue a company most thought was unsalvageable. The previous owner had been involved in so many dirty deals. The FBI managed to keep Beck’s biological weapons lab in the Virginia compound out of the news, in spite of what happened to Curt and Mara—”
“What?”
Sean looked at her, confusion on his face. “Rav didn’t tell you about that? I was sure you knew.”
She shook her head. “No. My cousin is pretty tight with his secrets.”
His brow furrowed, and she felt a wave of discomfort. But then, Sean probably knew a whole lot more than she did about the threatening letter that had gotten them into this situation.
He cleared his throat. “Sorry. He has his reasons.”
She stared at the platter of food, wondering how much Sean knew that he wasn’t telling her, and if any of it would hurt when she learned the truth. Because she would demand the truth from Alec. After being chased down the road and shot at, she deserved the truth. She might’ve taken the threat seriously if her cousin had been honest with her.
She hadn’t taken it seriously, and that had put Ivy and Matt at risk. She might never forgive herself for that.
Sean placed two fingers under her chin and raised her gaze to his. He leaned down and kissed her, slow and sweet. “I’d tell you if I could. You know that, right?”
She nodded.
He ran a thumb over her lips. “Good.” His hand dropped, and he returned to his story. “My job with Raptor was…everything. The first time I met you was just weeks after my dad died, and I was a mixed bag of emotions. On one level, the attraction I felt was crazy strong that night. When you invited me outside to stargaze, I knew exactly what you wanted, and as I’ve already told you, I wanted it too. But with the loss of my dad, it felt…inappropriate. Wrong. Or maybe even like I was reacting out of grief. Looking for a distraction. You were hot and funny and a flirt…and I just wanted you.
“And then there was the fact that I needed the job with Raptor and no way was I going to fuck it up by getting involved with the boss’s sexy cousin. And both of those mindsets—that the attraction was triggered by a need to escape grief, and getting involved with you would be a bad move careerwise—stayed with me. Every time I saw you, I just wanted you more, but I didn’t know if it was because you were associated with being the thing that had made me feel alive when I was deep in grief, or if it was because you were forbidden fruit in my mind.”
She moved the plate of food aside and straddled him. She ran her hands over his shaved scalp, then cradled his face in her hands. “I’m so sorry about your father.”
“Thank you.”
His arms encircled her, and they held each other. She tucked her forehead against his neck. After a long interval, she broke the silence. “Losing your father to cancer must make your sister’s illness so much scarier.”
He nodded. “At least she’s letting me help her. But crap, I’m terrible at it. I feel so helpless. None of my skills are any good when it comes to cancer.”
“You’ve been taking care of your nieces. That must be a huge relief for her, to know they’re in good hands during her treatments.”
He nodded. “The girls are a light in my world. But even so, I hope I’m what they need right now. What if they’re picking up on how worried I am? What if I’m only making everything harder?”
“You can only do your best and give them the love they need.” She paused. “I can’t wait to meet them.” She smiled, remembering Katrina’s text messages. “And your sister and mother.”
His mouth quirked. “Uh. Yeah. About that—”
She lifted her head and kissed him. “No way. I’m waiting for Katrina to tell me.”
They kissed for a long time. It was sweet and hot, but not the kind of kiss meant to go anywhere. Just a joining. An acknowledgment of their new relationship.
Less than twenty-four hours ago, someone had blown up a car at the inn, then she was chased down the road at high speeds and shot at. In spite of that, she would always rank this as one of the best days of her life.
27
A loud buzzing jolted Alec awake. The meaning of the signal registered slowly—it had been years since he’d slept in a Raptor facility, and the codes were no longer second nature—this one was a call from the front gate.
“Ravissant,” he said, hitting the button on the console next to the bed.
Beside him, Isabel sat up. “What’s going on?” she asked in a sleepy voice.
“Mr. Ravissant,” the security guard said, “Mr. Clark is here, insisting he needs to speak with you.”
Matt.
He’d wonder how he guessed Alec and Isabel were in the compound, but that was likely simple logic. What place was available to Alec that was safer than the estate?
“Is his wife with him?”
“No. He’s alone.”
“Fine. Let him in. Tell the front desk to escort him to an interview room.”
After Matt’s heroics with Hazel yesterday, Alec was ninety percent certain they were on the same team, but he wouldn’t take chances. The interview rooms were little better than a cell.
To Isabel, Alec said, “Go back to sleep. I’m going to talk to Matt.”
Even in the dark room, he could see she was fully alert. “I think I should be there too.”
“No.”
“What aren’t you telling me, Alec?”
He couldn’t lie to her and he couldn’t tell her the truth. “I need to talk to him alone.”
“Alec Ravissant, you made vows to me. One of them was that you’d never lie to me.”
“I’m not lying to you, and I’ve made a lot of vows and oaths. I’m trying to keep all of them right now. Let me talk to Dimitri alone, and then I’ll figure out what I can tell you.”
“His name is Matt, not Dimitri.”
Shit. It wasn’t a good sign that he was thinking of him as Dimitri again. He pulled on a pair of jeans and grabbed a clean T-shirt from his bag, saying nothing to acknowledge his slip.
He leaned down and cupped a hand behind Isabel’s head, kissing her hard and fast. “I love you, Iz. All I want is for you to be safe.”
“And all I want is for you to be honest with me. You know I love you. You know I trust you. I need you to trust me.”
“Oh, Iz. There is no one on the planet I trust more than you. I will tell you everything, once I’m certain of what everything is. Please. Keep trusting me. Have faith that I’m doing all I can to keep every oath and vow I’ve ever made, to you, to my country, to our friends, and to my family.”
“Why do you suspect Matt? He saved Hazel yesterday.”
“He did, and for that, I’m eternally grateful. Now go to sleep. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”
He was thankful when she didn’t argue. He locked their suite behind him and made his way to the room where Matt would be waiting by now. Yesterday morning, he’d agreed with the former spy that they needed to talk, but he’d been more concerned with getting everyone to safety, and there hadn’t been an opportunity f
or a private discussion.
Clearly, Matthew Dimitri Clark had decided it was time. Alec just wondered if he’d be fed Russian lies, or if the man truly played for Team USA.
The Russian spy sat calmly in one of the four chairs in the small room. He slowly stood and said in a heavy Russian accent, “Nice cell. And the body search was most fun. What is your game here, Senator Ravissant? Have you decided I am no longer worthy of your support? Of your family? Do you expect me to start chasing after a damn moose and squirrel like this is some ridiculous cartoon?”
“Cut out the accent. This isn’t a melodrama.”
“Do you not want to be reminded of who I really am?”
“I know damn well who you really are, and I know your accent is effortlessly invisible. I sat in on your hypnosis sessions.”
“You don’t think I can beat ridiculous tests?” The accent faded with each word. “You forget my training and my desperate drive to survive.”
“Whose side are you on, Dimitri?”
His eyes narrowed. “It’s Matt, thank you very much, and I’m on the side that keeps my wife and son safe.”
Alec believed him, but maybe it was only because he wanted to believe him. “Why are you here in the middle of the night?”
Matt stared him down, unflinching. He was nothing like the guy who’d helped flip burgers at the family Labor Day barbecue a few weeks ago. This man was colder. Harder. A formidable enemy.
Or a worthy ally.
After a long silence, Matt dropped back into the chair. “Three years ago, the Hammer was ordered to kill Chase Johnston. I never knew why the young man was targeted, but I suspect now it was because no one knew how well his memory barriers would hold up under CIA scrutiny.”
Alec felt the blood drain from his face. Chase was one of Raptor’s most trusted employees. He wasn’t the most valuable, but he was absolutely above suspicion, given all he’d gone through. “If that’s the case, why is he still alive? I thought the Hammer never failed.”
“The Hammer had a few failures. One in Morocco. Another in Budapest. But failures like that aren’t the sort of thing one likes to advertise in the assassination business. Reputation is everything for a contract killer.”
“I’ll keep that in mind,” Alec said dryly. “So you failed to kill Chase? A defenseless boy who was deep in the throes of a mental breakdown triggered by psychological and physical torture?”
“No. The order to kill him was rescinded. I assumed because it wasn’t the sort of job usually given to the Hammer. Innocent children were a bridge too far.”
Alec noticed that Matt never openly claimed the Hammer’s deeds. But then he’d always maintained that he’d been an unwilling assassin, and polygraph and a dozen other tests bore out that statement. Not that Matt couldn’t beat the tests. He’d just stated as much.
“And why didn’t you tell me this before? Why didn’t the CIA tell me?”
Matt frowned. “The Hammer wasn’t given his name. Just a picture and location, with more details to come.”
“Was that unusual?”
“Yes and no. Information is always limited to a need-to-know basis, and I have a feeling the Hammer’s handlers knew—” Matt paused and then sighed. “They knew I would balk. Chase was such a young kid. It was unlikely he was connected to any Bratva groups, or I’d have seen him before. Chase wasn’t the Hammer’s usual demographic, so to speak. Plus he was in DC at the time, and most of the Hammer’s assignments were out of the US. They wanted to keep my Coast Guard cover intact, and hits within US borders were risky. At the time they sent me the photo, they probably knew the hit was likely to be reassigned. The less I was told, the less I could reveal, should my cover ever be blown. A good choice on their part considering I spent months telling the CIA everything but never mentioned that assignment because, frankly, I forgot all about it. After all, there was nothing I could tell them about a kid whose name I didn’t know and who’d probably been dead for a while.”
He leaned back in his chair. “I assumed the job went to someone else and never thought of it again. Until Saturday.” He crossed his arms. “I have a good memory for faces. It’s part of the training. I only saw his photo for five minutes before I burned it, but I remember the face well. Imagine my surprise when I saw Chase Johnston, still breathing, at Ian and Cressida’s wedding.”
“And why did you show up at my compound at two in the morning to tell me this story now instead of telling me then?”
“I was too stunned in the moment, and I didn’t want to risk Ivy and Julian. Any threat to my cover is a threat to them.”
“So why now?”
“Two reasons. One, I’ve now had a chance to research and know who Chase Johnston is and how he’s connected to what happened in Alaska. Two, Hazel told me about the threat.”
Alec swore, even though he’d suspected. In Matt’s description of the car chase, he’d never questioned who the target was, even though it was more likely to be Matt or even Ivy. As Matt’s wife, she would be the key to controlling Matt as much as threatening Isabel was a way to get at Alec.
Alec remained quiet, waiting.
Finally, Matt sighed. “I think Chase Johnston’s life was spared because the barriers in his mind held up under interrogation. I think those barriers are still there. I believe Chase Johnston is an unwilling sleeper agent. And he blew up his own car under orders.”
“What makes you so certain Chase was behind the explosion?”
“Because I watched him do it.”
Alec stared at the man, stunned into momentary silence. Finally, he said, “Yet you didn’t tell the FBI that.”
“They’d have taken him into custody without understanding the risks. He could be programmed to shut down under pressure. I did some digging last night, and I was right to hold back that information. I found Chase’s hospital records from three years ago. In Fairbanks. He went into cardiac arrest.”
Alec closed his eyes, remembering the young man’s pale, unconscious face as Isabel performed the CPR that saved his life. “He resisted the commands of his programmers. He was supposed to abduct Isabel. When he wouldn’t do it, he collapsed and his heart stopped.”
“And what do you think being arrested for domestic terrorism would do to him, if indeed he’s still under mind control?” Matt asked.
“Point taken. But why not tell me yesterday? Or at any point before now?”
Matt closed his eyes. When he opened them, Alec realized he wasn’t wearing the contact lenses that disguised his intense blue eyes. “I needed to make a decision first. Ivy and Julian are my world. If I’m a danger to them, I will walk away and never come back.”
“I think Ivy would rather go into hiding with you and Julian.”
“I know she would, but I wouldn’t take them from everyone who loves them. Not when staying with me means they’d never be safe.” His eyes were intense, pained. “I’ve spent a lifetime looking over my shoulder. I don’t want that for my wife and son.”
Alec nodded.
“I needed to decide if revealing what I know about Chase could in any way compromise me. If this meant it was time to disappear. But except for an order received by the Hammer, this has nothing to do with me, so I will do everything I can to help you sort this out, but none of what I reveal can get out that it came from me. If the CIA learned I played a role in this, they might try to force me into witness protection. Or simply expel me from the country. I need your promise that the only people who will know of my involvement are the handful of people who already know who I am.”
Alec nodded. It was an easy promise to make. He didn’t want Ivy to lose her husband or Julian to lose his father any more than Matt wanted to be lost.
He leaned in to ask Matt another question, when his phone buzzed. Phone calls at this time of night were never a good thing.
He frowned at Caller ID before answering. “Ravissant,” he said to the head of security at his estate.
“Mr. Ravissant, there’s been an expl
osion.”
28
Sean didn’t know what had woken him. A footstep? A car engine? Whatever it was, it wasn’t natural. Instinct told him their mini-vacation was over. He touched Hazel’s shoulder. “Sweetheart, we gotta go.”
“Hmmmmm?” The sound was soft and drawn-out. Sleepy.
“Sorry, babe. We need to grab our stuff and get out of here. Quietly.”
He slid from the bed and grabbed their bags, dumping the items they’d left on the nightstand and dresser inside, then he pulled on jeans and a shirt as Hazel did the same. She was sleepy and sex tousled, and he wished this wasn’t how their first full night together as lovers had to end, but his instincts were pinging like crazy. They had to get out of here. Fast.
Dressed with bags in hand, he led her to the front door, then came to a dead stop. Something moved past the window. A silhouette that wasn’t deer or coyote. Human.
Instinct took over, and he grabbed Hazel, pushed her to the floor, and covered her body with his. The window crazed, then shattered. As if it had collapsed under a high-pitch frequency.
Shit, were they about to be hit by infrasound? It couldn’t pass through windows, and in Alaska, both Rav’s and Isabel’s windows had shattered before they were hit with the sonic weapon for the first time.
But whoever was outside the cabin had opted for old-school terror tactics. A Molotov cocktail smashed against the hearth to the right of him with a loud crash. There was a flash of flame, but the stone hearth meant there was nothing to catch fire. The flames disappeared as quickly as they’d erupted.
A second Molotov cocktail lit the shrub beneath the front window. The branches, capped with dry autumn leaves, caught instantly. Flames flared outward, licking the window ledge and curtains. In a few minutes, the entire cabin would be ablaze.
He rose to his knees, his body still blocking Hazel’s from the window. “Crawl to the bathroom. We’ll go out that window.”