Dungeon Royale (Masters and Mercenaries) (3 page)

He was thirty-nine years old and he had absolutely no idea what to do with the rest of his bloody life.

“Damon, please sit down. I might have a solution.”

“What? I grow a new lung? Has tech managed to do that yet?” He could hear the bitterness dripping from his voice. Maybe he’d end up being one of those old men in a pub, barking at the world around him.

“We’ve had a situation come up, and you might be the only one who can take over.”

He stopped, pulling his hand back off the door handle. “Is it an operation?”

Nigel gestured to the seat in front of him. “Yes, though it’s not as dangerous as you’re used to. It’s fairly simple. We have intelligence that a known terrorist will be attempting to come into England using a cruise ship.”

He snorted a little, settling back in his seat. “Even cruise ships require passports.”

“Not in every port they don’t.”

He hadn’t thought about it like that. A cruise ship required proper documentation to get on the boat. It depended on the port of call from there. Damon wasn’t knowledgeable about their security protocols. He’d never been a holiday-type chap. If he went to a country, he wasn’t sight-seeing. He was hunting. If Damon had been running a cruise ship, he would have required proper identification, including thumbprint scans, facial recognition, and routine pat downs for everyone getting on board.

There was a reason he didn’t get invited to a lot of parties.

“What exactly do you mean? You think he’s going to wander up from the beach on some island and make his way to London?”

“We believe he’s targeted a very specific cruise. Cruises are usually full of children. This particular cruise is going to be all adult. It gives the target more of a chance to find someone he can change places with. We believe he intends to target someone with a legitimate passport, wait until he gets off the boat, and then kill the man and take his place. All he needs in most ports is a card the ship requires to get back on the boat.”

It could work. “He would have to have someone on the inside.”

“Yes. We believe he’s got an English woman working for him, but we haven’t figured out a name yet. Our source isn’t particularly close to the heart of this group.”

“What’s the group?”

“It’s a bit odd. We think this agent is working with Nature’s Core.”

He groaned. Nature’s Core was an all-encompassing lefty group who thought the world would be a better place if the banking system was shut down. They fought against everything from new technology to CEO pay scales. They were normally quite peaceful, just obnoxious. “Then it’s not a terrorist group. What are they going to do? Protest us to death? I will admit the smell they get after a month camping out in Hyde Park can be rather noxious.”

“They’re using Nature’s Core as a screen to throw us off. Our source is absolutely certain that this operative is going to attempt to enter England with biological weapons.”

Nigel was trying to send him on a wild goose chase. “How is he going to do that? Surely they have some security.”

“They do, but if he got small amounts in every port, he might be able to either sneak them on board or claim that they’re medicinal. Security won’t know the difference between a biological agent and a vial of insulin if it is done properly. And no one will check his bags as he gets off the ship in Dover.”

“If you know which ship it would come in on, why don’t we just lock it down and search the place?”

“It’s a two thousand passenger ship, Knight. And all he has to do is toss the package overboard. We need to catch him in the act. I want you to go on board, identify the target and his assistant, get control of the package, and bring everyone in for questioning.”

It didn’t sound too difficult. “Fine. Why does it have to be me?”

“Because the cruise ship is the Royale. It’s the top of the line ship in the VIP Cruise Line. They’re known for their specialty cruises.”

“Like a GLBT cruise?” He’d heard of the company. They were a party line, very adult-experience oriented.

“Yes. Or their new alternate lifestyle cruise.”

Damon sat forward, arching his brow. Seriously? “Are you telling me there’s a bloody BDSM cruise running out of Dover?”

“Yes. I know you keep your lifestyle private, but I think you can see why you’re perfect for this job. We have very little time to prepare. No more than a week and a half before you need to have a team on board.” Nigel glanced out his window and then refocused on Damon. “If you can prove yourself here, perhaps I can convince the higher-ups to disregard the medical reports. The truth is you wouldn’t be considered for this job except the two agents we had working it were involved in an auto accident. Harris broke both legs and Keller’s face looks like one big bloody bruise. I obviously can’t send her in as a submissive.”

Nigel knew about his lifestyle, but they hadn’t talked much about it besides Damon being forced to prove it didn’t impact his security clearance. Other than that, Nigel hadn’t wanted to know much.

“Why wasn’t I brought in on this operation? I can’t imagine you have anyone who understands the lifestyle better than I do.” He reached for the folder Nigel was pushing across the desk. He ran through the particulars including the fact that the cruise was a twelve-day Baltic tour that went across Northern Europe.

He spoke Russian, but he would need a partner who spoke German at the very least, Danish and Finnish preferably.

“We began the operation before you were cleared for duty,” Nigel explained.

It seemed a simple enough operation, but he would need more than one set of eyes. And he only had a week to prepare, so he would need his own people. He wasn’t close to anyone here. Well, anyone who hadn’t turned out to be a traitorous bastard. “Do you already have support in place?”

“This was Harris’s operation. He wanted to do it quietly.” The tightness of Nigel’s voice told Damon he didn’t agree.

Which was good because Harris was a bloody idiot. How did he expect to watch over an entire ship without backup? But then Harris had always been an arrogant prick who couldn’t find his head because it was usually shoved up his arse.

“I’d like to bring in my own team. I’ll want to put a couple on staff. Have we made contact with the cruise line?” It was a piece of shit assignment, but if it got him back in the field, he would work it with everything he had.

“We’re stretched a bit thin, Knight. With Harris and Keller out of the picture for a bit, I was thinking about sending in a couple of analysts.”

Good god. That would be perfectly dreadful. He needed operatives. He needed people who would take the shot when they needed to. Analysts would sit down and go through all the reasons why they shouldn’t fire the gun before maybe taking the shot.

“I believe I have a friend who owes me, and he won’t need to be brought up to speed about the lifestyle.” He’d done Ian Taggart a favor by not hauling his information broker wife back to England. Ian and Charlotte would be perfect as long as he could keep them from having sex all over the ship.

And Taggart came with a whole crew he wouldn’t have to train.

“Does he have a woman you can take in as your sub?”

Damn, it was weird to hear Nigel say the word “sub” and not mean something nautical by it. Damon ran through the women of McKay-Taggart. If he had to spend any amount of time playing in public with a sub, there was the chance of sex, the possibility that they would look odd if they weren’t sexual in some fashion. He rather thought Ian would protest if he used his wife, and Alex would just shoot him first and ask questions later once Eve’s name left his mouth. The rest all recently had babies.

Chelsea? She was smart and a bit ruthless and so uncomfortable with her own body that she would never work.

And it would be so much better to have someone who spoke a couple of languages.

“What about the blonde?” He tossed it out casually, not wanting Nigel to know how anxious he was. Penelope worked in translations. She was an analyst. Pretty, petite, perfectly round with nice-sized breasts and an ass that he could squeeze. Sweet. Submissive. His groin, dead since the accident, gave a good flare of life.

A quizzical look crossed Nigel’s face. “Blonde? We have a few.”

How did he not give himself away here? “She’s a translator. Not sure what she translates. German, maybe. Curly blonde hair. She’s complete shit at dressing herself. Pretty girl, but she doesn’t know it.”

“Are you talking about Penelope Cash?” Nigel’s mouth practically hung open.

Penny Cash. God, her parents must have hated her. “I believe so. She would work.”

“You want to take Penelope Cash on a fetish cruise? Well, uhm, she actually speaks German, Danish, and Finnish and her Russian is fairly good.”

“She sounds perfect.” She was a mouse, a cute little mouse who obviously needed a very good fuck. She was kind and sweet and a bit of a doormat. He might be able to teach her a thing or two. And he might be able to break out of his rut. Seven months and not a single erection. He was a bit worried that it didn’t work anymore.

“All right. I suppose it’s your team, but she’s very quiet. I don’t know that she’ll suit you at all.”

She was quiet, submissive. She wouldn’t give him hell in the field. He should be able to control her. He didn’t need a woman he had to worry would disobey him. He needed a sub, and from what he’d seen, Penelope fit the bill better than anyone else in the office. Coupled with the fact that she spoke the languages and he could halfway see himself fucking her—she was practically perfect.

It wasn’t that he was really attracted to her. It was just that she was his type. That was all. He would have to keep an emotional distance from her. No, the fact that he’d thought about her when he’d almost died had been random. She’d simply been kind to him and he liked to reward kindness. In this particular case, he might reward her kindness with multiple orgasms.

“She’s not married, is she?” He hadn’t seen her in seven months. A lot could happen. He’d heard she’d been engaged at one point. That wouldn’t suit. He really would likely have to screw her and possibly in a public setting. It didn’t bother him at all. He could fuck with an audience all day, but some husbands might object.

He didn’t like the thought of her having a husband.

“Penelope? No. I don’t believe she even dates.”

Excellent, then no one would get in the way. “Perfect.”

“Well, you have to convince her first.”

Damon huffed, allowing a bit of his arrogance to show. He might have lost a step or two physically, but the bullet hadn’t taken his charm. “I think I can handle one small female.”

She wouldn’t turn down the chance to serve Queen and country. Of course, in serving Queen and country, she would find herself serving him. His cock stirred for the first time in forever.

Yes, going back to the field would be good for him.

* * * *

“I’m sorry. What did you say, sir?” Penny asked because she couldn’t possibly have heard him right. No. He hadn’t said what she’d thought he’d said.

Nigel Crowe hadn’t just told her he was partnering her with Damon Knight and putting them in the field together where they would pose as lovers. He hadn’t said that because that would be utterly ridiculous.

And she really wished Damon Knight wasn’t standing behind him, looming over the proceedings like a gloriously dark angel. The man was far too big, too grim, too gorgeous for her to be able to breathe in the same room with him.

The head of the double
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program shook his head. “I seem to be having an enormous amount of difficulty making myself plain today.”

She was screwing up. She was a bloody translator. She understood words and their nuances in many different languages, but nothing was computing today.

“He meant what he said.” Knight’s voice was like rich dark chocolate. It seemed to flow from those gorgeous lips of his to caress her skin as though he was talking only to her, and no one else in the world mattered. She’d never had that deep voice turned specifically on her. Oh, he’d said the occasional hello before and once he’d thanked her for baking him a cake—though he hadn’t eaten it—but she’d never held an actual long conversation with him.

Which was good because apparently she struggled with the power of speech around the man. Their whole relationship involved him asking her to translate things and her acting like a drooling idiot.

“Miss Cash, this is an operation of the highest priority, though we believe there is very little risk to your person,” Nigel explained.

“I’ll take care of you.” Knight had his arms crossed over his chest, those stark gray eyes pinning her to the chair.

“I don’t understand. I’m a translator.” She didn’t go into the field. The entire idea was silly.

“You passed your physical.” Knight seemed to have taken over the meeting. Though he didn’t move an inch, there was something active about the way he stood and stared at her. He was like a large predatory cat just waiting for her to make the wrong move so he could attack.

So he could jump on her. His body on hers. Her body under his. He was so big, would she even be able to breathe if he gave her his full weight? He had to be sixteen and a half stone, and every bit of it was pure muscle. She’d seen him without a shirt once. He’d been in a training room, running on a treadmill, sweat glistening off his perfectly formed chest. He looked a bit like she suspected Greek gods would have looked.

She’d heard all the horrible stories about his injury seven months before, but, god, he looked healthy today. Good enough to eat.

“You didn’t pass your physical?” Knight asked, one dark brow rising.

God, how long had she been sitting there staring at him like an idiot? “No, I passed.”

Barely. Though she had been hitting the gym a bit in the last several months. Exercise was supposed to be good for lifting the spirits. It had lifted her rear at least.

“Excellent. And you passed the firearms courses. I don’t expect that you should have to actually use one, but you’ll be issued a sidearm.” He moved suddenly, his big body uncoiling as he reached for a file folder. “This is the basic information about the operation. Obviously, it’s for your eyes only.”