The Spy Is Cast (44 page)

He blew out a breath.
“So that’s what you were trying to tell me when you walked away
from me last week. You were warning me to keep my distance. To
protect me.”

“Yeah. And here you
are. Shit.”

“Will you stop trying
to protect everybody else and start looking out for yourself for a
change? I’m a big boy. I can take care of myself.”

I sighed inwardly. He
sure was a big boy. In every sense of the word, from what I’d had
the opportunity to observe. Too bad he had to be permanently
off-limits if I wanted him to stay alive.

“I know you can take
care of yourself,” I agreed. “But Stemp was watching us, and I
wanted to make sure he didn’t see anything that would make him
mistrust you. He’s your boss, after all. You’ll still have to work
with him long after I’m gone.”

His brows drew
together. “What you said last week… About how I’d follow orders no
matter what. Do you really believe that? That I’m nothing more than
a robot following orders?”

I hesitated, trying to
find the right words. “No… But… that’s what Stemp needs you to be.
And that’s the safest thing for you to be right now.”

“You really think I’d
kill you if he gave me the order.” His voice was even, but I could
hear the edge of suppressed hurt and anger.

“John…” I sighed and
tugged my fingers through my long hair, yanking out the night’s
tangles. “You’re one of our government’s top agents. You’ve spent
most of your life in military and law enforcement. That tells me
your top priority is doing the right thing for this country. Am I
right?”

“Of course.” He
frowned at me in the shadows. “Where are you going with this?”

“What if it turns out
that it’s the right thing for you to kill me?”

He jerked back.
“That’s ridiculous.”

“Is it? Think it
through. Right now, I’m both incredibly valuable and incredibly
dangerous. I can crack any data encryption, and I’m working for our
government. Valuable. But I’m a civilian and Stemp doesn’t trust
me. As soon as he finds another way to break the encryption, I’ll
stop being valuable, and then all that’s left is the danger that
our enemies will scoop me up. He can’t afford the risk.”

“You’d never turn
traitor,” he said with certainty. “I’ve seen the sacrifices you’ve
made.”

“Thanks for the vote
of confidence. But I know what groups like Fuzzy Bunny will do to
get what they want. As long as I’m alive, there’s the risk that
I’ll be captured.” I looked him square in the eyes. “I’m no hero. I
don’t have any illusions about how long I’d withstand torture. So
killing me might be the right thing for everybody, including me.
Would you refuse that order?”

He sat silently,
frowning. Finally, he said, “That’s what you meant. When you said
Stemp would be doing you a favour if he killed you.”

“Yeah, something like
that.” I changed the subject. “So is Stemp actually evil, or is he
just an asshole?”

“He’s a ruthless
bastard,” Kane said slowly. “I can’t always agree with his methods,
but nobody can argue with his results. Since he took over as
civilian director two years ago, we’ve had major improvements in
our operations. You shouldn’t have threatened him.”

“That wasn’t a threat.
It was a sincere promise. If he does anything to harm anybody I
care about, I will utterly destroy him. Or die trying.”

He laughed suddenly.
“Aydan, you’re crazy.”

I grinned at him.
“You’re just discovering that now? What made you come to that
conclusion after all this time?”

“Even when you can’t
possibly win, you fight anyway. Stemp has people and resources you
can’t even imagine. And you’re relying on your nose to sniff out
bugs.”

I raised a shoulder
and gave him a half-smile. “I learned long ago that being willing
to fight is sometimes enough to prevent the fight in the first
place. Sometimes you win, just because anybody in their right mind
would know that you can’t possibly win.”

He sobered. “Aydan,
you can’t possibly win this one.”

“Ah. Victory will be
mine, then. So why are you here? You thought it’d be nice to pop by
and get your brains bashed in? You know damn well I keep a crowbar
under my pillow. What the hell were you thinking?”

His lips twisted
wryly. “Yes, I knew about the crowbar. But I thought you were
asleep. No woman would intentionally throw off the sheets and lie
there naked if she thought there was an intruder in the house.”

“It worked, didn’t
it?” I smirked at him. “Someday that ‘most women’ stereotype is
going to jump up and bite you. Or crush your skull with a crowbar.
You knew I was armed and dangerous, and you still turned your back
on me because of your preconceptions.”

“I was trying to be a
gentleman.”

“And it nearly got you
killed.”

“What if I’d been a
murderer or a rapist? What if I hadn’t turned my back? Where’s your
clever strategy then?”

I shrugged. “Tell me
you noticed when I reached under the pillow. You didn’t, did you?
Because you weren’t looking at my hand.”

He shifted
uncomfortably on the bed. “True,” he admitted reluctantly.

“So it didn’t really
matter to me whether you turned away or not,” I told him. “Either
way, I got a weapon into my hand without you noticing. I might not
have won the fight, but at least I had a chance.”

“And you’d fight even
if you couldn’t win.”

I patted him on the
shoulder. “Now you’re getting it. So why are you here? We’re
wasting our hour.”

**End of Reach For The Spy, Chapter 1**