Her Secret Agent Man (7 page)

“Okay, Julia. Talk.”

“Before I give you my father’s books, we have to figure out which federal authorities you’re going to hand them over to.”

“I’ll take them to the FBI, of course. And they’ll take it to the IRS, Treasury Department, Justice Department, and the Secret Service, depending on what the records reveal.”

Julia frowned. “That’s what I thought, but here’s the thing.
The FBI’s compromised. My father’s got a man on the inside. He could foul up the legal process. Make an intentional mistake to get the case against my father thrown out or something.”

He lurched. “How in the hell do you know Eduardo’s got a mole in the FBI?”

“I’m my father’s banker, remember? I write the checks.”

“Jeez. Who is it?” he demanded, fury simmering in his gut. He and his teammates busted their asses every day in the name of defending their country, while some schmuck at a desk was selling it out behind their backs? Make that fury
boiling
in his gut.

Julia answered, “I don’t know who it is. I wire the money to an offshore account in the Bahamas. I can give you the account number, I suppose. Your people could track it down and probably get a name.”

“If you’ll get started retrieving your old man’s books, I’ll figure out where to go with them. And you can damn well be sure I won’t hand them over to any traitor. They’ll stay within Charlie Squad completely if they have to. Nobody’s screwing up this case.”

She flinched. Did the idea of Charlie Squad handling the entire case scare her? He
had
announced that he was going to kill her; she had good cause to be scared of the whole squad. He shouldn’t have threatened her. He’d put her on the defensive, dammit. He knew better than to let his personal feelings get in the way of the mission. Now that he needed her trust, she wasn’t about to give it to him. How was he supposed to earn it back?

He asked as gently as he could, “Tell me a little bit about what you do for your father.”

“If it involves his money, I do it or he does it himself. Nobody else touches it. Ever.”

“How does he make his money?”

“I imagine you know about most of his activities. Drugs, arms sales, smuggling, human trafficking. If it’s ugly and illegal, he does it.”

He frowned at her. “Why wait for his financial records? If you turn state’s evidence with what you know about Eduardo, you ought to be able to get full immunity from prosecution right now.”

“I just can’t.”

He cursed under his breath. They were back to that black hole she wouldn’t let him see into. What in the hell was she hiding? If he didn’t have to stay glued to her side, he might be able to investigate it, figure out what she was holding back. Maybe he should call his boss…see what the squad could scare up on her. Right. Like that wouldn’t send up every red flag in the book back at HQ. He’d have some tall explaining to do about why he didn’t tell the squad the moment Julia had called him to set up their meeting.

He tensed when Julia laid her head on his shoulder, but then he set aside his turbulent thoughts to focus on the woman sitting in his lap. Shockingly, he gradually found himself relaxing. He allowed himself to savor the show of trust from her. A soft hand crept up to his opposite shoulder, her fingers toying absently with the neck of his sweater. He swore to himself. This woman’s slightest touch sent his hormones raging completely out of control. He was rapidly becoming dangerously, excruciatingly aroused. Faced with either embarrassing himself or moving, he chose the latter and disengaged himself from beneath her gently.

She curled up on the couch, as graceful as a newborn colt with her long legs folded beneath her. He was careful to sit on the far edge of the bed, well out of arm’s reach of the temp
tation she represented. But he couldn’t help imagining her sprawled on satin sheets beneath him.

As she lost herself in thought, her features relaxed, became more vibrant. Youthful. He blinked. And stared. An absolute certainty came over him.
He’d seen her sit just like that somewhere before.
But where? It tickled just beyond the edges of his consciousness. The way the light was playing across her skin…the dreamy expression in her eyes…damn!
Why couldn’t he remember?

What was it he’d blocked out with the help of all that booze? For surely that night ten years ago he’d drunk himself into a stupor with the intent to forget something.

A chill of foreboding rippled across his skin. Why was he suddenly afraid of the gaping hole in his memory?

A dull headache began to throb at the back of his neck. It beat a painful rhythm in time with the lust still demanding release elsewhere in his body. He felt crazy enough to climb the walls and hang cackling from the ceiling like a madman.

If she weren’t sitting there, he’d be pacing the room like a caged lion. Of course, if she weren’t sitting there, he wouldn’t have reason to pace. He wouldn’t be rock hard with no prospects in sight for some seriously gnarly sex to relieve the discomfort.

He shoved to his feet and growled, “I’m gonna go take a shower. You know the drill. Don’t open the door for anybody.”

When he emerged, blue with cold and only marginally less randy, Julia was curled up on the bed, reading a magazine. He picked up a day-old newspaper, but didn’t see a single word of it as he surreptitiously watched her.

When she finally retired at midnight, the thought of her in bed beside him all but broke him. He headed for the minibar in the refrigerator and tossed back a double shot of vodka. It
burned a modicum of sanity into his brain. For about a minute. And then he did give in and pace. As her breath settled into the steady rhythm of deep sleep, he prowled back and forth restlessly.

She was the one who’d set up this meeting in the first place. Why, almost as soon as she met him, did she change her mind and try to get away from him? Surely it wasn’t his threat to kill her. She had to have known before she ever picked up the phone to contact him that he would blame her for his brother’s death. So what changed after they met? It was damn hard for a guy not to take something like that personally.

He needed to get some rest if he was going to be sharp in the morning and stay one step ahead of both Julia and her pursuers. As much as he ought to stay on the couch, he didn’t want to.

Girding himself to do battle with his baser instincts, he pulled on a pair of gym shorts and a T-shirt and joined Julia. Her slim shape barely disturbed the covers in the bed, and her breathing was soft and steady in the dark. The warmth generated by her body wrapped around him under the covers and the sleepy, sexy scent of her wafted over him.

He tossed and turned for what seemed like hours. But eventually, he fell asleep.

He was the forward sniper, which meant he’d been lying under a gillie net for almost two days, motionless. His nappie, as the undergarment was fondly called, was almost full. The next time he took a leak, his leg was gonna get wet. Despite drenching himself in bug repellent, the effects of the chemical were wearing off, and gnats pestered him incessantly. It was an exercise in sheer torture not to reach up and swat them from his face.

Night had fallen and the relentless heat of the jungle had
begun to ease, but under his mesh blanket woven full of grass and leaves, he still sweltered. Miserable work, but he’d get the first shot at Eduardo Ferrare.

And tonight was the night, here at Ferrare’s plush, South American estate. Security conscious and crafty as hell, he’d been a hard man to find, let alone kill. Without Julia’s help in pinning down his location, they’d still have been back at square one.

Captain Folly’s whispered voice came over Dutch’s headset. “Movement on the road.”

He eased the sight of his sniper rifle to his eye, only a few inches, but it took upward of a minute to complete the motion. A limousine sprang into focus. Four men stepped out. The smug, smiling face of Eduardo Ferrare moved into the crosshairs. Bingo. Dutch began a slow, steady squeeze on the trigger, cold and precise under his index finger.

And then all hell broke loose.

The jungle lit up around Charlie Squad with muzzle flashes from all directions. There must be twenty positions firing at them! A moment of indecision—did he move and reveal his position or hang his life on his gillie net, concealing his location?

If Ferrare’s thugs were using IR equipment—infrared scopes that painted heat—he was toast. Screw it. He rolled and fired behind him at the black-green wall of jungle over his shoulder. Dammit, the whole place was lit up! How the deadly carpet of lead had so far missed him was a mystery.

A cry over his radio. “I’m hit. Gut shot. I’m in trouble here…”

The nightmare spun away from Dutch, lost in the mists of his subconscious. Who in the hell was hit? He struggled to recall the dream, to pull it back into the front of his mind. He had to know! But it slipped away from him like a mysterious
whale, only partially glimpsed, sliding slowly and majestically into the blackness of the abyss, where no man could follow.

Hell, they’d all been hit that night. Not a single man on the team had escaped with less than two gunshot wounds. He’d brought out four lead slugs. He didn’t have to remember that part. He’d seen the scars he and his teammates bore from that ambush.

A hand touched his shoulder. He jumped, ready to take out bare-handed whatever bastard of Ferrare’s had found him.

“Julia.” He sagged back to the mattress and his hands fell away from her neck. He was soaked in sweat and breathing like a marathon runner. The aftermath of the nightmare receded slowly, reluctant to give up its thrall over him. But gradually, awareness of his present surroundings overtook the heat and darkness of that elusive jungle. The violence remained, though. And the unreasoning terror.

Julia lay half across him, her small breasts smashed against his chest and more out of the top of her nightgown than in it. Her hand smoothed his hair, and she murmured a string of soothing nonsense sounds. Her raven hair fell in a dark curtain around them, blocking out the rest of the world, narrowing down his reality to her smoky, dark eyes and the husky murmur of her voice.

He watched her lips move, moist and full, mesmerized by the dark magic she spun around him. He reached up. Pulled her head down to him. Took her mouth more roughly than he should have. But she just moaned deep in her throat and gave way before the raging storm he unleashed upon her. Like a willow, she bent but did not break, beneath his onslaught. He rolled over, pinning her beneath him, expecting fear from her but unable to control the fury ripping through him. Instead, she smiled. And reached up with her slender arms, twined
them around his neck and opened her thighs to cradle him against her.

Earth magic flowed from her, warm and welcoming. It embraced his rage, containing it but not quenching the fire. Like a drowning man, he stared into her eyes, clinging to the thread of hope she’d thrown to him. Fist by excruciating fist, he hauled himself back from the void, up the lifeline she anchored. And when he finally saw light once more, his spirit soared. For a split second, he knew infinity as all of Nature came together in her.

He drew a shuddering breath, and the beast within retreated. Just like that nightmare colossus, it pulled back slowly into the depths of his mind. He gazed down at her in silent awe. Her mouth curved into a smile, without a doubt the most beautiful sight he’d ever seen.

“Welcome back,” she murmured.

He rolled onto his back and flung and arm over his eyes. “Christ, I’m sorry.”

She rolled over, propping herself up on his chest. “Whatever for? You had a nightmare and woke up a little disoriented. There’s nothing to apologize for.”

He pulled his arm down to stare at her. “I damn well do owe you an apology for nearly strangling you, not to mention kissing you.”

“But you didn’t hurt me,” she whispered with aching gentleness. “Maybe you need to lose control more often.”

He snorted. “You have no idea what you’re suggesting.”

She reached up to stroke his cheek, and he felt his whisker stubble abrade her delicate fingertips. “You might be surprised, James Dutcher,” she murmured.

“Trust me, you couldn’t handle it. I’d hurt you.”

Her eyes gleamed with warmth and inner strength. “You didn’t hurt me just now.”

“Yes, I did. You’re lying to be polite.” He carried her palm to his mouth and kissed it. “I’m sorry.”

A dimple winked in her cheek. “I’m telling you, you didn’t hurt me. But, if it’ll make you feel better, apology accepted.”

“Thanks,” he mumbled gruffly. He cleared his throat. “And about kissing you—”

She cut him off. “I’m not accepting any apologies for that. Period. Got it?”

He grinned at her and stroked back her silky hair. “Got it,” he murmured.

Lord, he wanted to make love to her right now. Not slick, slamming, sheet-tangling sex, but something slow and easy. Sensual. A give-and-take. The mere thought of it sent a shiver of anticipation up his spine. This was a woman to savor like a fine wine.

What was he thinking?

Julia spoke into his shocked stillness. “It’s pretty late. We probably ought to get a little sleep. Lord only knows what tomorrow will bring.”

He closed his eyes for a pained moment, forcing back his lecherous thoughts. She was right. And he was a horny bastard. He pulled her down into the crook of his arm and tucked her head on his shoulder.

“Tomorrow will take care of itself,” he growled. “We’ll worry about that in the morning. Sleep now.”

She snuggled against him like a sleek, contented kitten, and promptly went back to sleep. He sighed and settled in for a night of unfulfilled lust, but surprisingly, found himself relaxing into peaceful slumber.

His last thought before he went unconscious was that he and Julia were racing down the fast track to disaster. But who the hell cared? It was going to be one incredible ride.

T
hey slept late, and Dutch awoke to a gorgeous, sunny morning, refreshed from a no-kidding, decent night’s sleep. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d had one of those. Only a faint residue of his nightmare remained, tainting the bright light of morning with its ominous shadow. He’d been trained in how to deal with violent thoughts and memories, and with a little work he was able to put the horror of his nightmare into perspective. However, the exercise left behind a deep restlessness within him.

They got in the SUV and he drove like a man on the run from something that scared the hell out of him. Truth be told, he
was
scared. Scared of what Julia did to his head.

And of what she did to his heart.

He drove until late that night, heading west this time, into New Mexico. The first order of business was to ditch whoever was following them. Then he’d worry about get
ting Julia access to a secure computer and an Internet connection.

What was it about those snippets of memory that had him so freaked out? He knew the high points of what he was starting to recall already. It’s not as if any big shocks awaited him. Too damn many unanswered questions were floating around in his head, and not only about his lost memories. He was ready for some solid answers.

He felt like a runaway train, gathering more and more speed as he rolled toward a terrible calamity. Since this crazy mission had begun, it seemed as though the only glue holding him together was the gentle, frightened woman beside him. Frustration rumbled through him. How could she be the cause of his problem and the cure? It made no sense.

He glanced over at Julia. She’d been silent for much of the day, staring out the car window, her eyes dark and troubled. If he could only get inside her head! But she steadfastly held him at arm’s length.

Which was just as well because he needed to focus all his attention on what he was doing. He wasn’t used to operating inside the United States. Most of his work took place overseas in nasty corners of the world with little or no technology, archaic telecommunications systems, and in some cases, barely any electricity. This country was a whole lot harder to hide in.

It was late, he was getting tired, and the winding mountain roads were treacherous in the dark. He was going to get them killed if he pushed too much harder. He started looking for someplace to stop for the night.

The unrelenting darkness of the mountains began to give way before the lights of civilization, and gift shops and hotels became abundant. They were getting close to Santa Fe and its dense tourist population. Perfect. He randomly picked
one of the many midpriced, medium-size hotels in the area and checked in. Hopefully, he and Julia would get lost in the sheer volume of people in a place like this.

He parked so his vehicle wasn’t visible from the street and led Julia in a side entrance. He took a quick look at the layout of the building as they headed for their room. Standard H. Two long halls of rooms connected by a crossing hallway in the middle. Elevators, ice machines and stairwells in the middle, fire escapes at the end of each leg of the building.

He dumped his jacket on the bed, its pockets stuffed with a toothbrush, toothpaste, and a razor he’d pulled out of his bags. Julia dropped her oversize purse, similarly loaded, and flopped down wearily on the bed beside his coat. They needed to be able to move fast from here on out, so he’d vetoed unloading any cumbersome luggage.

Though he knew he shouldn’t, he sat down beside Julia and reached over to massage her shoulders, rolling the muscles under his hands and working loose the accumulated kinks of stress and fatigue.

She groaned in pleasure as he worked his way down her back and then up each side of her spine with his fingertips.

She mumbled, “Where did you get so good at this?”

He smiled. “It’s part of my first-aid training. We get sore after some of the wilder stuff we do.”

She looked over her shoulder, grinning widely. “You guys give each other massages like this? I can’t say as I pictured that of you big bad Special Forces soldiers.”

An errant image of the guys in his squad all sitting around giving each other back rubs popped into his head. He snorted. “Hardly. But our team has a medic who’s a miracle worker at keeping us in fighting condition. I’ve picked up a few things from him over the years.”

She turned her head, giving him better access to her neck.
“Well, I’m not complaining about it one bit. This is pure heaven.”

He grunted. More like pure hell. The way her skin slid like satin under his palms, the little moans she was making in the back of her throat, the sheer sensual pleasure she allowed herself to feel… Oh yeah. Definitely an inner circle of hell.

He lifted his hands away from her. “A hot shower should take care of the rest,” he managed to grit out.

“Thanks,” she murmured as she headed straight for the bathroom.

Sure. No sweat. He worked himself into unsatisfied sexual frenzies all the time for fun. No problem. He’d just go over and jump out the window now. He fell back on the bed and groaned in utter frustration.

He lay there for several minutes, doing his damnedest to think about anything except hot water sluicing down that delicious body of hers, turning her skin all rosy and forming rivulets between her breasts, heating up the flesh between her thighs… Hell, maybe he
should
go for the window.

After nearly a half hour, the water finally cut off in the shower. He slitted one eye open lazily and glanced toward the bathroom. Both of his eyes popped open. Julia’d cracked the door open, no doubt to let out the clouds of steam billowing forth, and he had a clear view of the bathroom mirror from where he lay. A vague, honey-colored shape moved sinuously in the foggy glass.
Hello.
His senses leaped to full alert. If he were a gentleman, he’d turn away. But he was just a soldier. And he wanted her worse than he wanted to draw his next breath.

A square of white joined the dusky reflection, gliding across the shapely form. The condensation on the mirror evaporated a bit, and he was able to make out slender arms wrapping languorously around her body as she dried herself.

More detail came into view as the fog cleared. God bless the dry, mountain air! As she bent over to towel her legs, her back was long and graceful. Black, wet hair streamed down it. His hand ached to fist itself in that dark mass and pull her down on top of him, trapping her body against his.

She turned around, and he made out the outline of her breasts. They weren’t large, but sweet Mother of God, they were beautifully made. They’d arch up into him so sweetly, with their little hard buds rubbing his skin…

Her face looked foreign, exotic, with her hair slicked back, as her high cheekbones and big, dark eyes came into focus. She fiddled with something on the counter, and then she propped a foot up on the toilet. The mirror cleared a bit more and one long, slender leg came into view. He watched greedily as she smoothed lotion over her thigh, already feeling its sleek smoothness wrapped around his waist. Her hand slid down over the shapely curve of her calf with almost pornographic appeal.

She gave the same maddening treatment to the other leg, and then she reached for another towel. She glanced into the mirror. And froze. Her gaze locked with his in shock. He didn’t look away. Couldn’t. He was a cad, but he was absolutely mesmerized by the sight of her.

She stared at him for a long moment, and then wrapped the towel absently around herself as she continued to hold his gaze. She felt for the doorknob and pulled it the rest of the way open. And then she was looking at him directly, her eyes smoky with passion.

A step toward him. And another. He willed her closer with his gaze, his male flesh pounding with desperate need to have this cat-eyed beauty. Right now. She put one knee on the bed.

And then he lost his formidable control. He surged up, wrapping her in his arms and tumbling her on top of him. Her
skin was hot and damp, and she burned him alive with the fire in her eyes. He tugged at the towel. It slid from between them and he flung it aside.

Her hungry mouth captured his, as incendiary as the rest of her. Ah, good Lord, her breasts felt exactly as he’d imagined against his chest. And then her tongue was inside his mouth, swirling and dancing around his. Somehow, he managed to want her even more ferociously. His lust was downright painful as he dragged her higher against him, devouring her mouth like an addict way overdue for a fix.

Her silken legs straddled his hips and he groaned as her burning flesh rubbed against him. He was dangerously close to exploding. She laughed deep in her throat, a husky, throaty sound that was pure sex. Who’d have guessed that inside sweet Julia lurked such a tigress? She was driving him plumb out of his mind!

But the further he spun out of control, the more fear gripped him. Finally, drenching terror overwhelmed his lust and made him break out in a cold sweat. Control was the one thing he must not let go of. Dared not. The beast within surged, clawing at his sanity. A driving need to do violence roared up like a volcano from deep within him. No! Not to Julia!

He tore his mouth away from hers, panting wildly in his struggle to wrestle down the strange, primitive urge inside him. How long he fought it, he didn’t know. But gradually he became aware of her soft hands cupping his face. Her dark, worried eyes gazing at him.

Dammit! He’d almost lost it completely, and he hadn’t even had a blackout or a nightmare! Dread coiled like a viper lurking in the detritus of his mind. He had to get control of himself. And having sex with Julia sure as hell wasn’t the way to do that.

He rolled out from underneath her and stood up, pushing his hand through his short hair. He swore viciously, reining in his disgust at himself enough to mumble, “Dammit, I’m sorry, Julia. I’m a bastard.”

He stumbled to the shower and turned on the hot water full blast. He braced his hands against the cold tile, his head hanging low. He hardly felt the water’s scalding needles stinging his skin. What in the hell was he going to do? His career, his
life,
was slipping through his fingers like sand, and he couldn’t seem to snatch a single grain of it back.

Julia lay naked on the bed, stunned. What had just happened? To her and to Dutch? One hot look from him, and she’d walked straight into his arms and his bed without a second thought. Was she crazy? She knew better than to let down her guard with him. Every time he looked deep into her eyes, she lost another piece of her heart.

He obviously wanted her so bad he could hardly stand it. She was sure of that. How any guy in his right mind walked away from a woman who was as eager as she was to jump into the sack, she had no idea. But the self-discipline he could muster up was nearly beyond her comprehension. Thank goodness for it, or heaven only knew what kind of mess she’d be in now. She had no business even contemplating sleeping with a man, much less one who planned to kill her.

Abruptly aware of her nudity, she hastily pulled on her clothes. She fished around in Dutch’s coat pocket and found his keys. She needed his Internet-capable computer. It was time to end this game.

She slipped out of the hotel room and hurried down to the parking lot. She found his laptop in the back seat, next to a plastic grocery bag of food. She grabbed both and headed back to the room. She slipped the key card into its slot and
pushed the door open. And only managed to gasp before a hand slapped over her mouth, cutting off all her air. Panic slammed into her almost as hard as the big, hot body behind her did.
Dutch.

He must have recognized her in almost the same instant she recognized him, because the iron hand fell away from her mouth and she stumbled as she was abruptly released from his powerful grasp.

He demanded, “What the hell were you thinking, going out by yourself? You could’ve been jumped and snatched before I had any idea there was a problem.”

His jaw rippled with tension. She sighed. He was right. She hadn’t stopped to think about her safety before she’d raced out to get the computer.

“And for God’s sake,” he lectured, “if you do get separated from me, announce yourself before you come barging back into the room. I could’ve broken your neck!”

She looked up into his eyes and asked gently, “Do you honestly think you could ever hurt me?”

His anguished blue gaze met hers. His answer sounded torn from his throat. “I don’t know what I’m doing half the time anymore, dammit.”

“I went out to the car to get the laptop so I can get to work on downloading Eduardo’s records.”

He nodded grimly. “I’m gonna go shave and finish getting dressed. Have at it.”

She noticed for the first time since he’d nearly scared the life out of her that he was shirtless. His stomach and chest were a breathtaking mass of muscle. He was so beautiful to look at it practically made her ache.

Somehow, she tore her gaze away from him and sat down at the room’s desk. She plugged the computer into the phone jack the hotel provided. Finally. Access to his computer.
Maybe she could find the Charlie Squad bank account number while she was at it. Bypassing the minimal security on his machine was a piece of cake. It was designed to keep out a casual hacker—not a banker and security expert like her. She scrolled down through the directory of files on the machine, looking quickly for one that might have the bank account number in it.

“So tell me something, Dutch,” she called through the open door of the bathroom. “How come a good-looking guy like you is still single?”

A snort over the sound of water running in the sink. “No time.”

No sign of the information she was looking for, although there was a cluster of encrypted files. Probably not a good idea to break into them right now when he could stroll out of the bathroom anytime and see what she was doing.

She asked aloud, “Meaning you don’t have the time or you don’t make the time?” Her fingers raced over the keyboard, signing the system on to the Internet. No answer from Dutch. She glanced up and saw him staring at her in the mirror.