Into the Crossfire (6 page)

the door. Forty men with shaheed jackets stacked on one side and lime green

scarves around their shoulders, just waiting to become shaheed batal--martyr

heroes.

Terrorists. Headed for New York with bombs strapped around their torsos

and access to radioactive material. Simonet's fingers trembled as he fumbled for

the phone, dropping the cordless receiver in his haste. His hands were slick with

sweat, he could barely breathe around the terror in his chest. His fingers punched

in 17, the emergency gendarmerie number, but he hung up almost immediately.

This information was too important to be given to a telephone operator.

His brother-in-law knew the Commissaire de Police. That's it--he'd plead a

headache and leave early. There would be suspicions if the police swarmed his

office building, people would talk, his name would be known. If there was one

thing Simonet knew, it was that these people were vicious. He didn't have much to

live for but by God, he didn't want to die at the hands of these canailles.

No, much better to leave early and go downtown to the Commissariat and

speak with the Commissaire himself.

Having a plan calmed him down a little, until he heard footsteps coming

down the hallway.

No one came to his office in the early afternoon. Were they coming for

him? He stood, terrified, listening as the steps came closer, closer. Two sets, two

men.

The information! He had to get it out!

His eyes fell on the list of files to be sent out for translation. Perfect.

Simonet knew his way around computers and he knew steganography. Inside of

five seconds he managed to hide the necessary information in a file. He pressed

ENTER and turned at the sound of his door opening.

Two men, one small and armed, the other huge and un-armed, burst into the

room. The big one stepped forward and with a contemptuous twist of his big

hands, snapped Simonet's neck.

The big man opened his hands and Simonet's lifeless body collapsed to the

floor. Simonet's last thought had been of the thousands, perhaps millions, of

Americans he had saved from attacks he hoped he had stopped.

28

San Diego

Nicole held up the eight-year-old Dior and the seven-year-old Narciso

Rodriguez, one a flattering periwinkle blue, one a chic black. Blue, black,

blue...she couldn't decide.

It was a very good thing that she hadn't lost or gained weight over the past

few years because there was no way she could now afford a new Dior or a new

Rodriguez. Caring for her father ate up every spare dollar and then some.

That was okay. She didn't miss her heady days in Geneva--young, single

and rich. She'd had those years, enjoyed them, and now they were over.

She was a little less young now, still single and far from rich. Her life had

changed beyond recognition. But she didn't mind. It was worth scrambling to be

able to take care of her father.

Black, blue, black...

It wasn't like her to be so indecisive. And late. When was the last time she'd

been late for anything, let alone a date? No, not a date--an appointment. An

agreement. Dinner-out-as-thank-you-for-unlocking-her-door. Whatever--just not a

date.

And yet here she was, dithering about what she was going to wear, argh!

This was so crazy. What was she doing, going out with a man she didn't

know? Had only exchanged a few words with? Would have crossed the street to

avoid only yesterday?

It had never even occurred to her that the lowlife she'd seen walking into

and out of Reston Security might actually be the owner of the company. Clearly,

security-company executives didn't need to dress for success. Every time she'd

seen the man in the corridor he looked like he was coming off a drunk--incredibly

scruffy, pissed off and none too clean.

As soon as she got off the phone with the hedge fund manager and her

Russian experts, having happily negotiated an excellent contract, she'd checked

out the website for Reston Security and had read the bio for Sam Reston. It was a

long one. He was ex-military, a former SEAL, in fact. She remembered he said

he'd been in the Navy. Well, that was modest of him. Being a SEAL was a little bit

more than having spent some time in the Navy. SEALs were elite soldiers who

underwent a gruelling selection process. As a soldier, Sam Reston had been the

best of the best.

He didn't list his medals but there they were on his chest in the formal

military photograph, for those who knew how to read them. Nicole was familiar

29

with Special Forces. It was quite likely there were other medals in a shadowbox he

would take to the grave with him for missions no one would ever know about,

secret to the end of time.

He didn't have the Marine high-and-tight she was so familiar with from

Embassies around the world, but his hair in the picture was definitely militaryshort and he was clean shaven.

The grim expression was the same, though. She'd been right. Take away the

military trappings and he still looked like one dangerous dude. The kind of man

she ordinarily wouldn't speak to, let alone spend an evening with.

But she'd given her word and that was that.

Still, it looked like there was much more to Sam Reston than met the eye.

The medals, for one.

Nicole's father had always drummed into her enormous respect for the US

Armed Forces. Her father had served in places where often the US military was

the only thing that stood between civilization and the abyss.

The medals on Sam Reston's very broad chest weren't there for showing up

on time or keeping his shoes and brightwork shined. They were medals of valor,

for bravery under fire.

She'd swallowed heavily as she perused his website, letting the facts filter

in, changing perceptions.

He'd been a very successful soldier and he was now a highly successful

businessman.

Not an angry drunk, after all.

So she had to peel a layer of fear off the strong reactions she'd had to him

every time their paths crossed in the Morrison Building's hallway, which had been

often. Sometimes she'd wondered if he had some kind of radar. More often than

not, when she'd turned around from locking up her office door, there he had been,

behind her, just closing the door of the company he worked for. His company, she

now had to remember. He seemed to have been just behind her or just in front of

her every single time she moved from the building. And every single time, her

entire body had gone haywire.

Every cell in her body had stood to attention in his presence. He often

seemed to be going to the office when everyone else in the building was knocking

off for the day. She'd been intensely aware of his presence even when he was

behind her, as if she were made of iron filings and he were the lodestone.

This morning, it was only paralyzing anxiety that had kept her from sensing

him behind her. At all other times, she'd had a sixth sense for his presence.

At the time, she'd thought it was fear. He looked so utterly frightening.

Terrifying, actually.

She'd never seen male power like that up close before. His muscles were

long and lean, not bulging, and looked as if they were used, and used hard instead

of being for show, as most modern men's muscles were nowadays. It was as if

Sam Reston belonged to another race of man.

30

Tougher, stronger, faster, bigger.

A bell rang downstairs and Nicole started. Oh my God! It was seven and

she still wasn't dressed!

Luckily, Manuela would be there to open the door, since her father couldn't.

It saved Nicole from having to run down the stairs in bra and panties with no

makeup on and still-drying fingernails. Wouldn't that be a way to greet Mr. Sam

Reston, former US Navy SEAL?

It wasn't like her at all to run late for a date, but she'd been running late all

day. She'd only made it back home half an hour ago, craving a long, cool shower,

but her father had waylaid her when she got in. He was agitated about an article on

the government's response to the latest bombing in Indonesia.

Her father had spent three years as ambassador to Indonesia and was

infinitely better informed than the hapless State Department mouthpieces or the

hacks who covered the press conference on the bombing.

It was such a pity that his illness prevented him from sharing his experience

and expertise. Nicole's heart ached for him. He had been planning a rewarding

retirement of lecturing, writing newspaper articles, starting up a diplomacy blog.

Finally finishing that book on the diplomacy of the Medici he'd been writing

forever. The sudden onset of cancer had shot those plans down.

To Nicole, her father was the very embodiment of light and reason and

goodness. The very best of humankind. She'd never seen him do or say a

dishonorable thing. The world desperately needed men like him and yet his light

would soon be snuffed out by illness. Even desperately ill, often in pain, he

remained kind and considerate. Never complaining. It was breaking her heart.

Nicholas Pearce had always been her hero. Tall and handsome and smart

and affectionate, the very best. A wonderful husband and father. She'd grown up

feeling her family was blessed. Then they lost her mother in a car crash and now

he had stage-four brain cancer, diagnosed a year ago.

That was when Nicole quit her job with the UN in Geneva to take care of

him. It wasn't easy, taking care of a severely ill man, but there was no question in

her mind. He'd been a wonderful father to her all her life. Taking care of him in his

time of need was a privilege.

However, having a very sick father wreaked havoc on her love life. One

whiff of what she was dealing with, and a lot of men who'd been very interested in

a date suddenly lost interest.

It was her little test. As her philosophy professor in college would have put

it, being able to deal with her father was a necessary but not sufficient condition

for her to think of hooking up with a man.

If the man in question could deal with her life and all its troubles, fine.

They might just take it a step or two further. If not...good-bye. If you wanted her,

she came with her father. They were a package deal.

She'd had a lot of good-byes before the relationships even started, and now

that her father was deteriorating so rapidly, she wasn't open to dating at all.

31

Not that tonight was a date, of course. It was a thank-you.

Blue, black, blue, black...

Blue, she finally decided. The periwinkle blue polished cotton sheath paired

with a black linen jacket. After ten years of Swiss winters, San Diego's mild

climate never failed to delight her.

Makeup! My God, there was no way she could go down with a naked face.

She glanced at her watch and shuddered. Twenty minutes late, unheard of

for her. Nicole dressed and made up in record time and started descending the

stairs when she suddenly stopped, transfixed.

There was her father downstairs, facing her, sitting in the fabulous

wheelchair she'd bought with part of her severance pay from the UN. It did

everything but make coffee and sing. He had a celebratory finger of whiskey in a

crystal glass on the occasional table at his elbow and Sam had his own glass of

twenty-year-old Talisker. Guests were few and far between and her father rejoiced

at visits.

Sam Reston was sitting across from her father--she couldn't see his face but

she could see his shoulders, so broad they over-shot the chair back--clad in an

expensive midnight blue suit.

But what had her blocked at the top of the staircase, one foot up, one foot

down on the first step, was the expression on her father's face. He was...happy. He

looked animated and there was color in his cheeks. His eyes--the color so like her

own--sparkled. No doubt he'd been telling one of his wicked jokes.

She hadn't told Sam Reston that she lived with her father and that her father

was ill. She hadn't told him anything, in fact. So when he came to the door

expecting to find a woman to take out to dinner, he'd been confronted with a

visibly very ill man. An ill man he'd made smile.

Sam Reston just kept on moving up the scale. Lowlife to security company

owner to guy who made her father smile. That last attribute was the best one.

Her father's gaze shifted and his smile broadened. "Hello, darling."

"Hi, Pops." Smiling at her father's expression, she walked down the

staircase. If he was happy, even for a fleeting moment, then so was she.

Sam turned in his seat and their eyes met.

Nicole stopped. Everything in her stopped--head, lungs, legs. It was like

taking a punch to the stomach. All the air left her system. His dark eyes were so

intense, it was as if they were hands, reaching out to touch her. She could hardly

breathe, hardly think.

She'd always seen him looking grim and dirty and dangerous. Now he still

looked deadly serious, two hundred plus pounds of male potency, completely

focused on her. His eyes made a quick trip down to her feet then back up to her

face. With anyone else, she would have bridled at the blatant male once-over.