Compromised (4 page)

S
imon was in his hotel room speaking with his boss on his secure iPhone, trying to keep his mind off Sadie and on the matter at hand. It should have been easier than it was.

“I'm sorry, sir. You're breaking up,” he faked.

“The director of the local office said one of his less-experienced associates had been passed intel—or a rumor, the director assures me—that there is some kind of plot to snatch the Russian finance minister from the conference. As far as I can tell, it's not us…” Even to Simon's ears, he sounded skeptical. “But the intel seems to only come from Russian assets, so read into that what you may.”

What he read into it was that it could be a Russian plan to blame the US and galvanize their people to support a war in Ukraine, Chechnya, or even America. Nothing would incense the Russians more than the abduction of a member of the government, especially if they were told that the US was responsible. “Roger that.”

“Just watch him, Tennant. That's all you're authorized to do at this point. Your team will be en route in a couple of days. Then we can talk about counterplanning. Just remember, we've got no allies in Athens right now.”

He remembered all right. Until his team arrived, Simon was on his own. “Understood. I'm low-pro, just going by the numbers until the guys get here.”

“Barnum out,” his boss said, before his screen went black.

Yes, they joked that Barnum ran the circus, and sometimes his job felt like that, but they always got the mission tucked away.

He put his phone on the alarm clock / iPhone dock to charge. This was the nicest hotel room he'd been in on the job since Nigeria. His mouth twitched as he remembered his infamous escape, on a donkey, in a fetching purple dress and hijab. Let it never be said he didn't do what it took to get the job done.

He pulled back the drapes in the main room of his suite and looked out across Syntagma Square to the government buildings. He distracted himself from thoughts of Sadie by planning a hypothetical attack on the Greek government building. It was a habit that exercised the parts of his brain he hadn't used a whole lot since his CAG training. It was one that lulled him into his comfort zone.

He split the square into grids and mentally blew up a trash can halfway down the pattern. He imagined the police guarding the government building would come running, because they would feel like they could get to injured people easily. If he blew the trash can at the back of the square, they would probably wait for other responders.

When they left their posts, he would use stick-and-set explosives in the guard hut and throw some low-grade smoke bombs in through the courtyard.

Just as he pictured ancillary staff running out of the courtyard away from the smoke, his mind settled on one person running. Sadie. Her body had seemed different to him. Harder? More defined maybe. She'd always been a runner—and Jesus, did she look hot when she was running: sweaty, flushed, and out of breath—but this wasn't just a runner's body. Maybe she'd taken up Pilates since their breakup. Women did that kind of thing, he was sure.

Almost sure.

He turned away from the window, his concentration shot.

He headed for the shower and put the new Sadie—with her Pilates body and shorter, lighter hair—into an old scene. A long weekend vacation in Mexico. For him it had been work, but she'd had no idea the rest of his team had been there. And that he hadn't just sat on the beach while she was in the spa for three hours. But he remembered the feel of her when he returned. Soft and slightly oily, flushed with relaxation, and half-closed eyes. He'd slowly undone her terry spa robe and let it fall. She'd stood there fighting the impulse to cover herself as she usually did. Her skin was cool and damp under his fingertips. She'd bitten her lip when he'd stroked those nipples into hard tips. Moaned lightly when he gently bit them. And when he'd laid her back and penetrated her still with his pants on, fresh from the mission, she'd closed her eyes and rocked her pelvis just enough for him to reach for his climax. Her breasts bobbed with every thrust, mouth slightly open, totally responsive to his every move.

Now, he swallowed hard with the memory as he stroked himself in the shower, one arm supporting himself against the tiled wall as his body reacted to the image of her on her back, taking him inside her, as he stood between her soft thighs.

He bit back a groan as he came, heat threading through his legs, making them shake. Sighing, he finished washing himself, then pushed the control toward cold and stood beneath the cool water, trying to realign his thoughts to the mission at hand. He had one last check to do on the Russian finance minister before he could call it a night.

Sadie stood beneath a tree outside the address Platon had given her. She'd started out by standing under a lamppost, but after a couple of catcalls from kids, she'd realized her error. The street was like any other Athenian residential street, the house like all the others. For a brief second she doubted herself and wondered if this was just where his parents lived. But no. She'd done meticulous research into his family. No one in the Asker family lived here.

Her phone clock said that she was on time, even though she'd spent a little time avoiding what the teachers at The Farm called the “Angelina Jolie effect”—looking too perfect and therefore standing out. To negate that, the female officers were trained to choose two or three things that would subconsciously persuade people that they were of no threat. One of her colleagues always had toothpaste on the front of her shirt—at least now, come to think of it, she
guessed
that was her anti–Angelina Jolie method. Maybe she just always dribbled. Sadie smiled to herself. But it had worked. People took one look at her and dismissed her as a harried young mother.

Sadie had chosen abject clumsiness. That manifested itself with slightly smudged lipstick, and when she thought someone was looking, she'd stumble or walk into something or someone. The latter made her pretty adept at the shoulder swipe, where you brushed past someone with enough force to allow a colleague to take something from their jacket or bag. She'd always figured that if the CIA didn't work out for her, she'd do pretty well as a pickpocket.

She looked at the time again. A field officer would wait patiently. But a girlfriend wouldn't. She texted him:

You forgot about me???

A minute later his head popped around a door that he held closed against his body. Excitement trickled through her. What was he hiding inside? She waved and pointed at her bare wrist, to indicate the time. She pouted, which made him grin and beckon to her.

He didn't open the door for her but instead held up a finger. “We do very important work here, so don't talk to anyone unless they talk to you. These things we discuss are not for women—do you understand? I don't want you to get into any trouble.” He looked so uncertain and unsure of what he was doing that she gave him a pass on the whole “men's work” thing.

She widened her eyes as if she were impressed. “Of course not. I'll be a mouse; I promise.” She pursed her lips together, closed her eyes, and leaned in for a peck. “Can we go dancing after?” she asked, again designed to make him think that her concern was dancing and not the meeting he was attending here.

He grinned—a sweet smile she was beginning to like—and nodded. “Of course. I know just the place.”

She made her eyes widen in glee. “Where? Where are we going?” she asked as she made a step inside, forcing him to open the door for her.

“I'll tell you later. We should be done here in about twenty minutes. Go sit over there.” He pointed at a row of meeting room–style chairs, placed back against the wall. In fact, the whole small reception room of the house looked more like a meeting room than someone's residence. There were no decorations—just a table at the front and these chairs in rows. Almost like a schoolroom. The Spartan atmosphere made it even more likely that this was an organizational hub for the group of anarchists that Platon was somehow involved in. God, she hoped she was right and that he wasn't just taking evening classes in something.

She counted seven other men in addition to Platon. An eighth man came in from what she could see was a very old kitchen. He was sipping coffee from a tiny cup. Deep lines creased his face and thick white hair was cut short—almost marine short. He was definitely the boss. His steely gaze rested on her immediately. A chill seeped through her toes through her legs. He was not a good man; she instinctively understood this. And if nothing else, she'd been taught to rely on her gut. In practice sessions she had scored an 87 percent success rate when she made decisions based on her instinctive reaction to a training scenario. Most others hovered around 60 percent. She'd figured it was in her genes.

As much as she wanted to run away from his glance, she smiled instantly, wide-eyed and guileless. She really didn't want to be on the wrong side of him without a weapon. He nodded slightly and she went to work on a cuticle, feigning boredom.

While she picked at her nail, she mentally filed what she had already seen. The men were all big guys. If she didn't know any better, she would have thought they were New Jersey dockworkers or something similar. The docks. Of course. That would explain how the anarchists got their weapons and explosives.

Pride spiked through her as she tried to pick up what they were saying, but they were talking too fast for her to get a good sense of the conversation. She cursed her postponement of her immersive language course. It didn't help when practically 80 percent of Greeks spoke better English than she did Greek. She should have known better. Why would criminals plot in a foreign language? This wasn't an effing movie.

“What is the matter, young lady?” He-Man growled from the front of the room.

Her head popped up at the sudden English. And the rumble of his words.

“I'm…I'm sorry?” she replied, flashing a quick look at Platon. His grimace did not comfort her.

“You were frowning quite determinedly. What were you thinking?” He moved around the men, who were now craning their heads in their chairs, and grabbed one, sitting astride it less than a foot away from her.

She affected a tiny pout. “Platon promised to take me dancing, and I was wondering when you'd be finished.”

The men laughed. But not the leader.

“Where are you from?” As he asked the question, he slowly turned his head back to Platon as if to make it clear that he was double-checking his answers.

Sadie had never so much wished for her baton. She had this nasty thought that if she said the wrong thing she would never be found again. “Manitoba?” she squeaked out.

Manitoba?
Fuck. She didn't know anything about Manitoba. Rookie, rookie,
rookie
mistake.

“Canada.” He nodded to himself as if he was formulating a plan. “Yet Platon tells me you work for an American company. Is that right?”

She frowned as if she had no idea what he was getting at. “Yes. For now I do.”
Now we are back to solid ground.
“I'm…I'm just an inventory clerk, though.”

She saw it in his eyes. A spark that told her she'd said exactly the right thing. And that told her that she'd been right in her suspicions of Platon. Her eyes flickered to him. So young in this group of older men. She wondered for an instant if he really understood what he was up to his neck into.

“You do important work,” the old man crooned.

“No, not really. My boss is the only important one in the office. Just ask him!” she said, aiming for some kind of common ground, making it easy for him to think he was creating a rapport with her.

He laughed, and then the others laughed too. “I like her.” He turned his head, acknowledging Platon again.

He stood, turning the chair the right way again. “You must tell us if your boss disrespects you. We will be proud to show him…the error of his ways.” He held his hand out, palm up.

She placed her hand in his and he kissed her knuckles. “Thank you…?”
Tell me your name. Tell me your name.

“You can call me Stratigos.” He nodded and turned away.

Dammit. Stratigos was Greek for “general.”

Platon seemed to hold eye contact with Stratigos as he walked by, nodding slightly as he did so. What message had they passed between them?

He beckoned her with his index finger and smiled, nodding toward the door. She wanted to stay, try to record some of what they were saying, but she knew she'd made enough progress there already. She needed to play it carefully. Get pushy or too involved and they would be suspicious. Far better to keep Platon happy and stay safe.

As soon as the door closed behind them, Sadie had to work hard to rein in her exuberance. Screw the director…she'd been right! This had been her first time actually working as a field agent, and it had been a success. She was so psyched that when Platon spun her around to kiss her, she kissed him back. Properly. Passionately. They kissed and she tried to feel something. Anything, really, that would tell her that there were other guys whose kiss could make her feel like Simon's did. She tried to channel the euphoria of the successful contact with Stratigos into the kiss.

Nada.

He picked her up and pressed against her, which brought her crashing back to her senses. What the hell was she doing? He was a mark, nothing more. She wrenched herself away from his lips, painfully aware that she had crossed a line. She smiled at him, surreptitiously pressing the volume button on her phone, making it chirp.

“Sorry—I should get that,” she said breathlessly, holding up her phone. “Hello?” she said to no one. “Of course, sir. Yes, sir. I'll be there…yes, I'll be there as soon as I can.” She glanced ruefully at him and shrugged. “I've got to go. I'm so sorry. My boss…”