“Look, I’m not new to
Washington
’s ways. Maybe I’m a bit more idealistic than most, but one of the reasons why I went to work for Hodges was because they had the best reputation in the business. I graduated the top of my class. I could have gone anywhere. Please tell me I didn’t make a mistake.” As soon as the words left her mouth, she knew Liam wouldn’t provide the platitudes and reassurance a part of her had wanted to her.
He glanced at the computer screen, further confirming her suspicions that he had his own agenda. Everyone did, after all.
Washington
had taught her that. She managed a self-depreciating mental smirk. Hell, Walt had been the master of creating agendas. Silence stretched over them. Liam picked up his pencil, rolled it in his long, capable fingers, before setting it back down on the desk. Finally, he leaned forward, resting his arms on his blotter. “I can’t tell you that. Only you know if you made a mistake, Sarah.”
Deep in her gut, she feared she had. She closed her eyes, a momentary pang of loss crushing her. So determined to do right by Natalie, she’d gone where the power was. Perhaps if she found herself working for one of the best firms, she could protect her sister. Instead, her actions may have only created more harm.
Liam reached across the desk. He cupped her hand where she’d unknowingly curled her fingers around the edge of his desk. Warm radiated from his touch. “I’ll tell you what Hodges hired me to do, and that was show you around
Alaska
. Aside from some general instructions to make sure you saw drilling as well as still pristine wilderness, they gave me no orders. I’m not a man who takes orders well.” A smile quirked the corners of his lips. “Some political lobbyist in a stuffed suit isn’t going to be able to tell me what to do. I promise you that.” The smile turned into a full-blown grin.
“No, but for the money I’m sure my firm is paying you they didn’t tell you nothing, either. Right?” Sarah struggled not to fall for his easy grin. She knew her boss. He wouldn’t send her out here to “find out more” without telling Liam exactly what more he wanted her to see.
Liam released her hand. “They told me to keep you safe and answer your questions. I only take orders from men I respect. I guarantee you, I don’t respect your employers.”
His honesty startled her. “What?”
“You heard what I said. I live out here. Do you think your boss could make it this far from a Starbucks? I have no use for men who live solely behind a desk.”
Her back stiffened. “So you have no use for me? Because I guarantee you, that’s where I spend twelve hours out of my day. It might be in the office or it might be at home, but I’m at my desk doing my job.” She yanked her hand from beneath his. For a moment she mourned the contact, but as she crossed her arms under her breasts, she reminded herself of what he’d said.
“I didn’t say that, Sarah. You’re different. You came out here and camped and hiked with me. That’s not sitting behind a desk.” He gestured to the oak monstrosity behind which he sat. “I’m behind a desk right now, just not all the time. I have a feeling you’re not like your boss.”
Sarah remained determined to keep her distance from him. “Well, he’s not a woman,” she said dryly, thinking of their kisses. She’d allowed herself to become attracted to this man. With a small shake of her head, she knew it couldn’t happen again. “I need the truth, Liam. Everyone has an agenda. Even you. Tell me the truth.” She glared at him and knew when she got back to
Washington
she was going to have a long talk with her boss.
~* * *~
Liam distracted himself from the burning need to really tell her the truth by bringing up the email chain he’d exchanged with her boss. Hitting the print button, he waited for the pages to finish, then handed the papers across the desk to Sarah. Whatever news she had received must have spooked her. She was like a little terrier with a bone. “Read these for yourself. These pages constitute the entire conversations I had with your boss. Aside from a few credit card payments, and I’d be happy to show you those as well, that’s it. I won’t lie. I do take orders from someone, but it’s not your employer. They’re nowhere near
Washington
D.C.
, and have nothing to do with your job or your family. I’m sorry you’re getting pressure, Sarah. I assure you I’m not part of that.” He swallowed hard as she picked up the papers. He watched her skim through them, the tightness in her lips easing.
“I see.” Sarah placed the papers back on the desk. “So Ken is really leaving all of this up to you? He doesn’t make it sound as if he has an agenda in mind, though in his position, I suppose I wouldn’t either. But he had to know that you wouldn’t be on his side of things. He had to know that you’d show me things designed to bring me to your side, if I weren’t there already. It doesn’t make sense.” She buried her face in her hands and took several deep breaths.
Liam’s keen hearing discerned his brother wandering around in the kitchen. Hoping that his younger twin remained out there, he rose this feet and circled the desk. Liam knelt beside Sarah. He breathed deeply, drawing the floral scent he’d associated with her into his lungs. Wrapping his arms around her, he tried to offer support. “I swear to you, I have no agenda other than showing you what parts of
Alaska
you want to see.” He cursed himself for the little white lie. “Drilling. Wildlife areas. Even cities, if you want. I know Coldfoot and Deadhorse aren’t much, but we could go to
Anchorage
. Anywhere. I’m paid to show you
Alaska
. How little, or how much of it is up to you.” Just like their relationship.
And that truly scared him. Liam struggled to hide his grin. Look at him, ecotour guide, man of the wilderness, fearful of a relationship with a woman. He’d been in some pretty remote places. . Nothing scared him as bad as the thought that any future he might have lay in Sarah’s hands. He kept his thoughts quiet. Sarah would finish her report and return to
Washington
. She’d return to the human wolves while he’d get paid to show people the wild ones. The irony wasn’t lost on him.
“So whatever is happening has to be at my firm,” she whispered. “It’s never been like this before. I’ve always been given latitude to provide the information I felt was necessary. It doesn’t make sense that they’d suddenly let a bunch of politicians pressure them now.”
“Money?” Liam asked, knowing that in the end, it usually came down to simple greed.
Sarah shook her head. “As far as I know we’re solvent. Quite so, from what I understand. My boss comes from a long line of family money. I doubt he needs more.” She raked her fingers through her hair. They tangled and with a growl she tugged out the elastic confining her hair in a pony tail. The reddish strands swirled around her shoulders like a fiery cloud.
The door burst open.
Liam watched as his brother charged in. Cameron’s normally spiky hair stood up more than usual and his usually jovial appearance was drawn into a mask of worry. Water stains marked his t-shirt and the front of his jeans. Apparently he’d been trying to do dishes again. “Cameron, what’s up?” He moved away from Sarah as if she burned him, not wanting his brother to see the closeness that’d developed between them.
Cameron missed nothing. His gaze darted from her to him and back again. “Johnny called. You need to pick up line one now. Sarah can come with me.”
Liam nodded. “Sarah, would you mind? Apparently this is an important call.” If his brother had broke his cover to make contact, then it was more than important, most likely it was a matter of life and death. “We can pick this up later.” He sat and reached for the phone.
“That’s okay. I think I have all the information I need.” Sarah stood and turned to Cameron. “I’ll just go back to my room. I want to organize my notes.” Before she received an answer, she hurried out the door.
“Be careful, big brother,” Cameron said, then he, too, left.
Liam picked up the phone, all too aware of the warning in his twin’s words.
“Yeah, I’m here,” he said into the phone, careful to keep his tone brisk, yet not surly. Avoiding the use of names had become a habit on the rare occasions when he’d spoken with his younger brother. With the Quintursa breathing down his back, the last thing he needed was one of his younger twin brothers to come out of hiding. Johnny worked as a Quintursa agent. Liam feared the organization would use his brother to place undue pressure on him and he didn’t like it.
“You alone?” Johnny sounded too old for his thirty-two years.
Liam glanced at the closed door to his den. “Yeah.” He dared not ask Johnny how he’d been. The young man had become an elite Quintursa operative after a four-year stint in the military. Where Blake, Johnny’s twin, spent his time working on archeological digs all over
Alaska
, Johnny jetted all around the world on Quintursa business. Focused on the past and the future, the twins couldn’t be more different. Kind of like Cameron and him, except at one time, he and Cameron had been more alike than either had wanted to realize.
Questions hovered on the tip of Liam’s tongue. Where was his brother? What was he doing? Their father supported all of his sons’ work, but if Liam could give his dad some peace of mind regarding his third child…Liam stopped the thoughts. It wouldn’t matter. Even if he could ask the questions, Johnny wouldn’t answer them.
“William Hodges has made some interesting enemies. It appears that he owes large amounts of money and certain special interest groups are holding the loans,” Johnny said. How his brother found out the information, Liam didn’t know. “I don’t think Ms. Doyle knows how tenuous her company’s reputation is at the moment.”
“How did you—? Never mind. I know you can’t answer. I think she’s starting to put two and two together.”
“Let’s just say your last contact got tired of your shit, big bro. You’ll be talking to me from now on.” Johnny didn’t sound happy about the situation.
“I see,” Liam replied, though he didn’t. His brother worked in the field, not behind a desk. Was that irritation or something more in his voice? “Her sister’s job has been threatened.”
“We know. Senator Durwell has few friends and even more enemies on Capitol Hill. He’s made his position on the drilling very clear. I’m afraid if Ms. Doyle goes back to
Washington
right now, she’ll be swept away in all of this. There’s been rumors that loans are being called in and if they’re not paid, more than Mr. Hodges’ reputation will be dead.”
Liam sucked in a breath. “You want me to keep Sarah here so she’ll be safe.”
“Affirmative.”
Liam searched his brother’s words for the trace of the carefree young men he’d once been. He found none. Only the Great Mother knew where he had gone. “I don’t like this,” he said. “You’re not telling me everything and I’m getting really tired of the half truths and lies. I know we can’t reveal the truth to Sarah, but she’s not stupid. She’s going to figure it out. There seems to be enough misdirection in her life. I don’t want to be the cause of more.” He curled his fingers into a fist and stared at it.
“You can’t get involved, Liam.” Johnny’s use of his given name shocked him.
“I already am.”
More than you know.
He drew a deep breath and tried to remain calm. Revealing his burgeoning feelings for Sarah wouldn’t do any good at this point. “Her firm hired me to show her around. If there’s information that you have that could keep her safe, I need to know. It’s in the contract she signed with me. Keep her safe from the dangers of the wilderness. Whether that comes from my people or hers it doesn’t matter. A danger is still a danger.”
His body hummed with the need to work off the tension. Fighting with a nameless, faceless Quintursa agent differed from having this discussion with his brother. Liam stood and shoved his desk chair out of the way. It rolled into a bookshelf, rattling a wooden carving of a bear resting on the top.
“Liam, you can’t protect everyone.”
Liam laughed. He’d been hearing those words for years. “That won’t stop me from trying,” he countered.
Johnny laughed, the first sign of the young man that he’d once been. “I know, and that’s why the Quintursa wanted me to talk to you. Perhaps they think I can stop you from doing something foolish.” He laughed again. “You’ve never been the foolish one of us, Liam. This is tough. I know it is, but you’ve got to stick to the mission. If I could make you see the kinds of forces at work here, I would. But I can’t. Because if you knew, then Ms. Doyle would know, and then where would you be?”
“A hell of a lot more informed than I am right now,” Liam snarled. Just seeing the hint of his younger brother made him wish things were different. But they weren’t. They had to keep their secrets. The phone cord kept him from pacing out his frustrations across his den.
“It’s for the best.” Papers rustled in the background. Silence stretched taut over the phone lines. The sounds stopped, and then the creak of a chair. “Look, I know you don’t like the situation. That’s why you don’t work well with the organization. You prefer straight forward action. You always have. Blake would be off researching in his own little world. Cameron and I would be racing through the forest, and you’d be sitting there watching over us trying to keep us safe. You can’t protect everyone all the time. You’re going to have to focus on protecting those you can, and right now, that’s your people. We’re not like Sarah. We can’t be a part of her world.”
“No, our job is to protect them from themselves,” Liam snarled.
“And at one point in history we protected them from the very earth they’re trying to destroy. No one said we had easy lives,” Johnny’s voice softened. “You know what would happen if our secret got out.”
Liam pressed his lips together and struggled to keep the memories of being locked in a three foot by four foot cell at bay. He knew all too intimately what happened when people discovered what he and his brothers were. The scar low on his hip twanged in memory.
“There’s not just us to worry about.”
“I know. We have guards in the sky and on the ground.
Aquila
. Canis. And the bear shall rule them all.” Liam glanced at the closed door and hoped his brother had taken Sarah far away from here. “Sarah isn’t stupid. She’s going to put things together.”
“You’ve got to keep that from happening.”
“I won’t be solely responsible for that. Have you talked to Cameron? I’m not the only one in this lodge, you know.” He strained to hear what might be happening outside the den and couldn’t. Had Cameron taken her outside, gotten her as far away from this conversation as he could? If his younger brother had any sense, he would. The trouble was Cameron usually left his common sense behind.
Murmured conversation just beyond the range of Liam’s hearing interrupted his thoughts. His brother’s lower tones mingled with Sarah’s laughter. Jealousy tightened his gut. He leaned forward, straining to hear what was happening. An image of his playboy brother, his hand protectively on the small of Sarah’s back as he showed her their lodge and the grounds filled his mind. He went to the door. Nothing more came to him. Distantly he registered the slamming of a door. Sarah and Cameron had gone outside.
“Liam, you there?” Johnny’s voice brought Liam back to the present.
“Yeah, I’m here.” He curled his fingers around the doorknob, anxious to be outside and see what had happened. His brother could be a charmer when he wanted. Surely Sarah wouldn’t fall for his brother’s charm. He nearly laughed aloud at his foolish notions. He had no claim on her. She could fall for whoever she wanted to, and the idea made him fear even more about their secret getting out. Before this conversation, he would have sent her back to
Washington
without a thought. Now that his brother felt she was in danger, he wanted to keep her here as long as possible. Damned if he did. Damned if he didn’t.
“Has she seen anything to make her think that you were something other than an ecotour guide?”
Just me fighting a bear and winning.
When he’d seen her staring down the juvenile grizzly, Liam had one instinct. Save Sarah. Knowing that the young bear would back down at the sign of aggression helped. Most of them, especially at that age, responded well to threats they perceived as bigger than they were. Young males didn’t want to fight with the older ones in an already established territory.
“No,” Liam said. Not quite a lie. He didn’t know how many pieces Sarah had put together. Just his encounter with the bear would have given her pause. She probably thought he did things like that all the time in an extreme-hiking sort of way.
“Good, keep it that way. Look, I have to go. Remember the mission, bro. That’s all that counts.” Johnny hung up the phone.
Liam pulled the handset away from his ear and stared at it for a moment longer before walking across the den to replace it in the cradle. From the living room the sounds of Sarah’s laughter intruded. His brother sounded as if he wanted to say more. Undoubtedly, he did. Instead, he’d gone. Breathing deeply, Liam sank back into his desk chair. He had to keep Sarah here at all costs. His gut told him if she went back to DC right now she’d stumble into something that would put her in far greater danger than staying here and learning his secrets.
~* * *~
For some reason Cameron wanted her as far away from Liam and the lodge as possible. She let him take her outside and show her around. A few spots of landscaping such as the flower beds by the front door decorated the lodge, but for the most part it appeared to have been erected in a clearing hewn from the forest itself. Sarah didn’t mind. Cameron kept her entertained with stories about Liam’s and his adventures.
She drank in his words, wanting to learn more about the man her firm had hired to be her guide. In the back of her mind her sister’s words echoed with the promise of dire consequences. A part of her yearned to return to
Washington
and figure out exactly what was happening. The other wanted to get to know the man in the lodge better, and perhaps, experience his kisses once more.
“You still with me?” Cameron asked. He drew her down to a stone bench on the front porch.
“Yeah, sorry. I have a lot on my mind.” She tried to keep her tone light.
“My brother can be a pain in the ass,” Cameron replied with a chuckle. “I hope he hasn’t made your stay here too unpleasant.”
“No, not at all,” she replied in a rush. Camping without modern amenities was rough, but when one shared a tent with a man as sexy as Liam, it could hardly be called a hardship. Though she wished someone could shrink down a flush toilet to fit in a pack. Digging holes wasn’t exactly five-star accommodations.
“Don’t fall for my brother’s good looks. Beneath that handsome exterior lies a glacier. I don’t want to disappoint you, but I doubt you, or anyone for that matter, could thaw him.” Cameron leaned forward and rested his hand on Sarah’s shoulder in a conciliatory gesture.
“Don’t worry about that. I have to go back to
Washington
DC
, maybe sooner than I had planned.” She looked across the surprisingly well-manicured lawn into the trees.
“You don’t sound happy about that. Not that I blame you. I’d want to stay here too. Stuck in the woods with two hunky guys, twins nonetheless.” Cameron gave an exaggerated leer that had her smiling.
“Well it is peaceful out here.” She side-stepped the idea of twins. Liam scrambled her senses enough without her thinking about him and Cameron too. “Not crazy like
Washington
.”
“It’s crazy out here in a different way. We may not have traffic jams, but we have moose herds and bears.”
Sarah nodded. She battled against the urge to ask questions about Liam. Here was her chance. Out here, Cameron obviously had orders to keep her away from Liam and his den. Whatever call he had taken, it had to be important. “Your brother was on the phone?” Sarah asked. “How many of you guys are there?”
“Four. Two sets of twins. Liam and
I.
Johnny and Blake. In that order. Liam takes his big brother duties a little too seriously for only being the big brother by a few minutes. And of course, we never let Blake forget that he’s the baby of the group.”
Sarah tried to imagine a boisterous house full of the four boys. They must have been a handful growing up. She contrasted that to her own upbringing where it was mostly she and Nat. A big family sounded nice, warm. She wondered sometimes if her sister’s marriage and two daughters hadn’t been an attempt to recreate the big family they never had.
“That sounds nice. Bet you guys drove your parents crazy.”
Cameron laughed. “Nah, mom just sent us out into the woods with dad when we got too rowdy. A few days living off the land, making your own shelter and hunting for your food will calm you down. We were glad to get back to mom’s home cooking and warm beds.”
“I bet.” She knew how happy she was to see the lodge and Liam was an excellent woodsman. In spite of the lack of modern conveniences, their camp sites were about the best they could be. Not that she had a lot to compare them with, but she suspected they were as comfortable as he could make them.
“You like my brother, don’t you?” Cameron asked after long moments.
She stared at him, tamping down the embarrassment at being caught so easily. “He’s a nice guy,” she replied, hoping she wouldn’t seem transparent. Sitting here with his twin; she half-expected to have the same pull of attraction between them. She didn’t. Instead, her mind drifted to the man inside the lodge and wondered how he was faring. “Are you trying to play matchmaker, Cameron? Because it’s not going to work. I’m afraid we’re worlds apart.”