Keeper's Reach (23 page)

She promised she would and took the stairs up to her room, her legs aching, her mind spinning. She passed Mike’s door. What if she could sneak in there and have a look around? Was that a wise idea?

Why wouldn’t it be?

She unlocked her own door and stepped into her room. It was cool, dark, quiet.

“I miss my Cotswolds chickens,” she said, then backed out into the hall, shut the door behind her and went in search of a passkey.

25

Mike eased onto a bar stool next to Reed at the inn bar. A college basketball game was on the small television up on the wall, the sound on mute. The whiskey glass in front of Reed was almost empty. “I was catching the Vanderbilt score,” he said.

“The Commodores,” Mike said.

“Didn’t take you for a college sports fan, Mike.”

“I’m not. I just know the name of the Vanderbilt team.”

“Because of Naomi,” Reed said, his gaze still on the television screen. “It was you in Afghanistan and it’s you now. It always will be you. Deal with it. For her sake if not your own.”

“You might want to hold off on more whiskey.” Mike tried to make his tone light but didn’t quite pull it off. He noticed Reed was into the Redbreast 21, the bottle on the bar by his glass.

“I’m only saying out loud what we all know. You included, Mike.”

He wasn’t discussing his relationship with Reed. “You and Naomi are both in Nashville these days.”

“There is no Naomi and me,” Reed said. “There never was. There never will be. See that once and for all. If you were out of the picture—married, attached, whatever—that still wouldn’t leave room for me. Forget that line of thinking.”

“I don’t have a line of thinking about Naomi.”

“Now that makes sense,” Reed said. “I knew when I met her in Afghanistan we were never going to be more than friends. It’s not just on her end. It’s on mine, too. She’s like a sister to me. I’m not a monk pining away for a woman I can’t have. I’ve put my romantic life on hold until I get this outfit off the ground.”

“Any of the guys have sisters?”

“I don’t lack for women, Mike, but if I need a matchmaker, you’re the last person I’m calling.”

Mike grinned. “Three brothers limits my matchmaking options.”

“Your future sister-in-law, Emma Sharpe, only has a brother, Lucas, the heir apparent to Sharpe Fine Art Recovery. No sisters. The Sisters of the Joyful Heart don’t count.” Reed lifted his whiskey glass. “Then there’s Julianne Maroney. Your lobsterman brother’s love interest. When does she get back from Ireland?”

“Spring.” Mike opened the Redbreast. “You’ve done your homework on my family.”

“I always do my homework. I figure an objective look at the Donovans makes sense. You’re blind when it comes to your brothers. I get that.” Reed looked up at the television again, his glass still in hand. “Are you going to tell me what happened that brought your FBI brother here?”

“He’s in town.”

Reed gave an incredulous smile as he sipped his whiskey. “Consider, Mike, that what you’re not telling me is a ruse by the FBI to worm their way in here to check out my operation.”

“You’re barking up the wrong tree, Reed.”

“Maybe.”

Mike got a glass from the side of the bar and poured some of the Redbreast. A
táoscan
, Finian Bracken would call it. An imprecise measure. Reed wasn’t distracted by the basketball game. He wasn’t distracted by anything. “Dinner was good,” Mike said. “Low-key. No tough questions from the boss.”

“Boss.” Reed chuckled. “I like that. My family was ecstatic when I left the army earlier than expected. They wanted me to start my own business. I don’t think they had a private security firm in mind. Was your family pleased when you took off to the Bold Coast to be a wilderness guide?”

“I didn’t ask.”

Reed shook his head, his grin broadened. “You’re such a bastard. Always have been. You’re a solid, uncompromising SOB. You’re the guy people want when the bad guys are coming for them. You’re the best, Mike. Naomi isn’t the only reason I got in touch with you. You know that. We need your skills. You’re wasting yourself taking tourists to see moose.”

“That’s not all I do, and moose are cool.”

“I also have a debt to be paid,” Reed said quietly, no grin now. “I owe you. It would have been my career if you hadn’t brought Naomi back in one piece that day.”

“Glad I saved your career, Reed,” Mike said, drinking some of his whiskey.

“That didn’t come out like I meant. Too much whiskey.” He seemed genuinely contrite. “I still get nightmares thinking of what could have happened to her. I should have known she was in danger.”

“You don’t owe me.” Mike didn’t want to think about rescuing Naomi—how close she’d come to torture, abuse and death. She’d been a high-value prisoner. But that was three years ago. Emma’s ordeal had ended only a few hours ago. He set his glass on the bar. “What about Buddy and Kavanagh? Do you have a role for them at Cooper Global Security?”

“I could use Buddy but I hate being around him. It’s not kind of me to say, but it’s the truth. As for our friend Special Agent Kavanagh—I don’t believe for two seconds he’s thinking about leaving the FBI. That doesn’t mean they’re not thinking about kicking him out. I wish I could find out, but he doesn’t work for me.”

“Is he investigating you?”

“Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s investigating your brother and future sister-in-law. I’m being frank with you. We have a lot to do if we’re going to be ready for Naomi’s medical volunteers, but I also want everyone to relax and enjoy this place.”

“You could have driven up to the Bold Coast or picked a place and asked me to meet you. Boston, Nashville. London.”

“Would you have come?”

“Maybe,” Mike said, blunt. “You provoked me into coming here by sending Jamie to Rock Point.”

“It worked.”

“Did you send Naomi there, too?”

Reed shook his head. “No, I didn’t.”

“But you want to make sure my family won’t cause you problems if I come on board.”

“The Donovans are an interesting lot, that’s for sure.”

“Then there’s Naomi. You need her but you want to control her.”

“In my world, Mike,
control
isn’t a bad word. I’d like to know what’s going on with her and this Oliver York character, and what Kavanagh’s interest is—and yours. I don’t want to get caught in the middle of a no-win situation.” Reed turned to Mike. “Do you trust Naomi, Mike?”

Mike didn’t answer. He dipped into his shirt pocket and withdrew the passkey he’d swiped earlier. “If I searched your room, Reed, what kind of trouble would I discover you’re in?”

Reed gave him a thin smile. “The usual. Blackmail, extortion, threats to my life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.”

“You’re serious,” Mike said.

“Yeah.” Reed grabbed the Redbreast, splashing more into his glass and then into Mike’s. He took a sip of the whiskey. “How did you know?”

“You have the same look you did the day Naomi went missing.”

“It’s the usual fare. Par for the course given the work I do and starting a new venture. It could be the competition, former clients whose asses I saved, people I annoyed in the army. Hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if my mother’s behind a couple of the nasty emails. She’d like nothing better than for me to quit this work.”

“She likes having you back in Nashville?”

“She says so. She’d like it better if I didn’t work with men with guns and protect people with targets on their backs. I’m kidding about her threatening me. I don’t have any threats that worry me. I stay on alert. Reputations in my world are fragile. Whispers, innuendo...”

“Someone determined to hurt you can do a lot of damage without any concrete evidence.”

“Yeah.” Reed set his glass on the bar, then grinned suddenly. “But who would want to hurt a nice guy like me?”

“Right.”

“You don’t have enemies, either, do you, Mike?”

He smiled, not into Reed’s game. “There’s a testy red squirrel who would like nothing better than to take over my cabin. We’re sworn enemies.”

“But you let it live,” Reed said, not making it a question.

“We have rules of engagement. Well, I do. I think he’d take me out first chance he got. I don’t give him any openings.”

Reed laughed, but without any real heart in it. “One of the three guys killed in Afghanistan on that screwed-up mission was one of ours. An intelligence asset, as we like to say. I never told you.”

Mike had guessed as much.

“He was one of the two Americans killed,” Reed added. “He wasn’t supposed to be there. It wasn’t just bad guys turning on bad guys.”

“Our guy was caught in the middle.”

“Naomi figured out they knew we were coming—you were coming. She warned you. Exposed herself in doing so and paid for it later, but the bad guys...” Reed exhaled, looking tired. “Could have been a lack of discipline. An argument that had nothing to do with us and turned violent. Their bad timing instead of ours.”

“Why are you focused on this now?”

“We were all there. Stirs it up. And I need to know,” Reed added, shifting his position on the stool so that he was facing Mike. “I need to know this isn’t going to come back and bite me in the ass now that I’m out on my own.”

Mike remembered walking into the carnage that day. Three dead. The FBI had been after the two dead Americans, but Mike had never felt he had the whole story. He and his team were after specific intelligence that would lead to the disruption of a major attack on civilians in Kabul. He’d always suspected the bad guys had been given a heads-up about the operation and had turned on each other, looking to find someone to blame. The remaining bad guys, alert to the mission, had tried ambushing Mike’s Special Forces team. It hadn’t worked, thanks to Naomi. She’d figured out they were walking into a trap.

A relatively straightforward mission had turned into a messy one.

“Was our deceased asset the one who alerted his drug-dealing, arms-trafficking friends that we were coming?” Mike asked.

“Maybe.”

“Is this what this get-together is about, Reed?”

“The past? No. This is what happens when you drink too much whiskey on a dark winter night on the Maine coast.” Reed grinned, looking ragged. “You start telling war stories.”

“Not me. I read a book.”

Reed laughed. “You could tell your red squirrel war stories.”

“My advice, Reed? Ease up on yourself. You can’t be perfect all the time.”

“Neither can Naomi,” he said quietly.

Mike pretended not to hear Reed’s comment. He eased off the stool. “Kill the alcohol. Get some sleep. I’ll see you in the morning.”

“If I get a nasty email in the middle of the night, I’m calling you, Donovan.”

Mike grinned. “Easy solution. Don’t check your email in the middle of the night.”

* * *

Naomi yawned at Mike when he entered his lighthouse room and found her standing by the window. “I found myself a passkey,” she said. “Isn’t that what you did with my room?”

Mike shut the door behind him. “What are you looking for?”

She pointed at the queen-size bed. “I thought you might sleep with a little stuffed baby moose. Packed it in your duffel bag as you left the Bold Coast.”

“Didn’t find one, did you?”

“I didn’t get that far. I unzipped your duffel bag, saw a pair of boxers and almost ran screaming into the hall. Memories, you know? Not that they’re the same boxers you wore in DC. Even you have to go shopping once in a while.”

“Naomi.”

“I pulled your drapes for you.” She pointed at the window, the passkey in her hand. She tucked the key into her pants pocket. “I know I don’t have any right to come in here and search your things. Call it payback for not trusting me if you want.”

“Provocation,” Mike said.

“I’m not law enforcement. I don’t need a warrant.”

“It’s just illegal breaking and entering.”

She angled a look at him. “Going to have me arrested, Mike?”

He sucked in a breath. She’d always driven him crazy. He stepped away from the door, no idea what he was going to do now. He knew what he felt like doing but he kept his eyes on her. If he glanced at the bed, she’d know what he felt like doing, too.

“I didn’t try to have you arrested,” she said. “As if there was any chance that would happen since you’re a Donovan and we’re in Donovan country.”

“That proves you don’t know my family or Maine.”

“No argument from me.” She waved a hand in front of her chest. “My heart’s thumping. I wonder why that is?”

“You didn’t expect to get caught.”

“That’s a good reason. I expected to be in the tub right now. It’s been a long two days. My heart didn’t beat like this when I found that injured Brit yesterday. What do you think of Oliver York? Is he trouble for your brother—for Emma Sharpe? If he is, does that mean he’s trouble for you?”

“More like for you, Naomi.”

“Lucky me.” She moved away from the window, running her fingertips on the top of his duffel bag on a luggage rack at the end of the bed. She’d zipped it back up. “You know York’s an art thief, don’t you?”

“That’s your theory, is it?”

“A private theory. Interesting to think about how he pulls off his heists, where he has the art hidden—why Scotland Yard hasn’t tossed his London apartment and his farm and arrested him. What do you think they have in mind for him?”