“Don’t you dare give me that look,” J.J. told him, chin thrust out, shoulders squared. “This is none of your business and not open for discussion.”
“The hell it isn’t,” Cody returned with equal force. “I’ve gone out of my way to treat you in the same fashion I’d treat a male protectee.” He paused, rubbing his face. “Jeez, J.J., I’ve been yanking you around, something I would not have done had I known you were pregnant. I saw you on the obstacle course at Quantico. You are—were—more fit than most guys I know.”
“Get over it, Landry. No one is blaming you.”
“I am,” he told her, those chocolate eyes filling with open, raw guilt. “How am I supposed to look you in the face knowing I caused your miscarriage? Didn’t your doctor—”
“You didn’t cause anything, and I never saw a doctor.”
He grew quiet again and she could almost hear his brain zipping through all the possibilities. He must have settled on one, because the guilt she’d seen in his eyes melded into something harsh and unyielding. “Why didn’t you see a doctor, Barnes? You’re smarter than that. You had surgery and follow-ups, so it wasn’t like you didn’t have time or access to prenatal care.”
“What are you, a public service announcement?” she snapped, exasperated and embarrassed. “I’m not discussing my health with you, Landry.”
“Why not?” he insisted.
His voice was deceptively calm and quiet. It was more intimidating than listening to him bluster. She shrugged and turned toward the window, needing to get out from under his probing eyes.
Cody’s fingers hooked her chin, applying pressure until she finally relented and turned her head to look at him.
“Why not? Why didn’t you see a doctor? Why didn’t you tell anyone? Don’t shrug or tell me you don’t know. Those are toddler answers.”
Shoving his hand off her, J.J. said nothing, her stomach churning. She was a bundle of emotion—not something she was accustomed to. She felt splayed open and out of control. Again with the tears? she mutely wondered. Her eyes stung, but she was able to stave off the powerful urge to cry.
Of course Cody wasn’t helping. She felt like a suspect in a film noir, Cody’s unrelenting gaze more disconcerting than a spotlight. “Well, I don’t know.”
Moving back so that he rested half against the door, he regarded her for a long moment. A muscle twitched in his cheek. “I do.”
“Really?” She let sarcasm punctuate the single word. “You can’t know anything, Landry. You don’t know me.”
The smile on his face was completely lacking humor. “I do know you, Barnes—at least I know your type.”
“I don’t have a type.”
“Sure you do. You’re so bent on proving you’re as good as any man on the job that you’ll do whatever it takes to get it done. Including sleeping with the enemy.” He let out a nasty-sounding little laugh. “Here I was impressed as sh-sin that you managed to infiltrate the Visnopovs and it never dawned on me that you slept your way in.”
Her eyes grew wide at the ugly accusation. The sucker punch literally made her heart pause. Her mouth went dry as she stared at his face. He was absolutely serious. “Are you out of your mi—”
“Save it,” he cut in, derision in his tone. “I’m just amazed that you were stupid enough not to use protection.”
Shock and indignation quickly and fiercely evolved into anger. Hot, fiery never-this-pissed-before anger. “You would have used protection, right?”
“Damned right,” he said as he shifted back behind the wheel and gripped the gearshift.
“You hypocritical bastard. You’ve probably slept with someone to further a case or your career—or whatever the reason—but because you probably used a condom, that gives you the right to be all smug and superior with me?”
“Pretty much…yes.”
She spent a few minutes glaring at him before saying, “You’re a bigger ass than I thought.”
“I don’t think you’re in any position to be name-calling, Barnes.”
Sexist jerk. She folded her hands in her lap and focused her eyes straight ahead. Her heart had started beating again after the accusation, but it felt sluggish and heavy in her tight chest. “The only mistake I made on the Visnopov investigation,” she said through her teeth, “was underestimating the danger of the situation.”
“You think? Look, I’m sorry you were hurt. But no wonder Visnopov had his goons beat the crap out of you. He must’ve been pretty ripped when he realized his bed buddy was an FBI plant.”
“I’m only going to say this once,” J.J. said tightly. “I did not sleep with anyone even remotely connected to the Visnopov organization.”
Though he was in her peripheral vision, she chose not to look. It was annoying enough to hear his breathing, sense his overwhelming presence and catch the faint scent of his cologne in the tight confines of the car. Right now she hated Cody Landry more than she’d ever hated anyone in her life. She didn’t care how the situation looked. For reasons she couldn’t quite grasp right now, she was devastated that he’d believe the worst of her. Why that should hurt this badly, she had no idea. It just did. Call it hormones, call it insanity. His erroneous accusation went straight to her heart.
Double jerk. “Drive. It’s broad daylight. We’re sitting here on the side of the road practically begging to be targets.”
“Boyfriend?”
He was like a dog with a bone, and his reasonable tone sent her annoyance up another notch. She didn’t like the fact that when he wasn’t being an ill-informed, confrontational jackass, she found his voice soothing. Go figure. She was losing what was left of her mind. “Haven’t had a lot of time for that of late.” She kept her own tone even, then turned her head to look at him. “Why? Are you going to tell me how pointless it is to try to have a relationship in our line of work? Or how unfair it is to a significant other given the dangerous situations we’re in day in and day out? Tell me something I don’t know.”
“If it wasn’t a boyfriend…then someone raped you? Who? When?”
She dropped her head and stared at her hands. She wasn’t sure which was worse, his original accusation, or his sympathy. “I can answer two out of three.” She struggled to speak over the lump lodged in her throat. “The night I was beaten…the rape kit was positive.”
He cursed and the whole car shook when he smashed his open palms against the steering wheel. “Why in the hell didn’t—”
“Stop yelling at me!” She was horrified to feel tears rolling down her cheeks to drip into her lap. “By the time I regained consciousness, the doctor told me it was too late for a morning after pill. By the time I left the hospital, I had convinced myself that it couldn’t have happened. I mean, who doesn’t remember being raped?”
“But your boss—”
“Doesn’t know,” she said as she impatiently scrubbed away the tears with the back of her hands. “I begged the doctors not to release that part. I knew how it would look.”
“Yeah, like the Visnopovs are rapist pigs.”
“No,” she corrected, slowly turning to look into his eyes. She saw anger and something else she couldn’t define. “If anyone knew, I’d be labeled forever. I sure wouldn’t be sent back out into the field. I’d spend the rest of my career behind a desk.”
“But once you knew you were pregnant—”
“Suspected,” she conceded. “I found lots of creative ways to deny the possibility. I chalked every symptom up to the surgery. It was easier than facing the truth.”
“You could have told me. You should’ve,” he insisted as he wiped away a stray tear with his thumb.
Pulling away from his touch, she offered a weak smile. “Don’t be nice to me right now, Landry. I’m feeling weird and I need to work through that.”
“What you need,” he began, shoving the armrest aside to move closer, “is this.”
He flicked off her seat belt and folded her against him. Tucking the top of her head beneath his chin, Cody laced his fingers through her hair, while, with his other hand, he gently stroked her back. It took a few minutes before he heard the pitiful sounds of her sobs racking her body.
How long—if ever—had it been since she’d let go? How hard had it been to keep all this bottled up inside for what? Almost two months? He couldn’t imagine. Being one of seven, he was never at a loss for a confidant.
However, he wasn’t stubborn J.J. Barnes who thought anything less than absolute competence was a sign of weakness. It was probably killing her to be held and comforted, but he didn’t care. She needed it.
It was some time before he felt her move. Felt her begin to pull out of his embrace. Reluctantly he let her go.
“Better?”
She smiled weakly. “Not really. No.”
“I can hold you some more.”
Her smile broadened. “Using you as a crutch is a great way to solve my problems.”
Shrugging as he slipped back into his seat, he said, “I’m available.”
“This from the guy who just reamed me when he thought I was…involved during a case?”
Cody’s gut tensed as he recalled his harsh words. “I’m really sorry about—”
Raising her hand, she cut him off. “Don’t apologize. Just promise me that you won’t say anything to anyone.”
“It should be part of the investigation, J.J. The U.S. Attorney can charge the—”
Vehemently, she shook her head. “No. I’d like to come out of this with my career intact. The Visnopovs are guilty of enough other crimes to put them out of business forever.” She offered him a pretty smile that reached all the way to her incredible eyes. “The Visnopovs can’t hurt me anymore. How could they? I’ve got you around for protection, so what could possibly happen?”
Guilt surged through him. You can find out I’m supposed to use you as bait.
SEVEN DAYS into her recovery, J.J. was climbing the walls—or at least she planned to. There were no lingering effects from the miscarriage, but the physical inactivity was a problem on two fronts. For a woman used to daily runs of anywhere from five to ten miles, lying around made her muscles feel like mush. More distressing was that she had way too much time to think. Well, that ended right now.
The marshals—along with the local authorities, which pretty much meant brother Seth—had sealed the Simms farm off from the rest of the world. Had it not been for her ability to secretly send text messages, J.J. would have been cut off cold. Strangely the several-times-a-day messages had become informal and frankly, odd. She just couldn’t reconcile the chatty e-mails with her gruff, no-nonsense boss. His writing seemed almost…friendly and he apparently had a sense of humor that occasionally came out in the communiqués.
“Where are you going?” Lara asked, looking up from the newspaper and sizing up J.J.’s outdoor gear as she entered the small, tidy kitchen.
Grabbing a mug from a cup tree on the dated Formica counter, J.J. poured herself a cup of coffee and joined the deputy marshal at the round oak table that was the focal point of the room. “Good morning to you, too,” she greeted.
“Sorry,” Lara grumbled.
J.J. figured the boredom was probably getting to Lara as well. How many crossword puzzles could a person do before she started to get itchy?
“I’m heading to the barn,” J.J. said after sipping the strong coffee. Too strong, which she knew meant Denise had made this pot. From her surveillance she had learned some specifics about her detail. Aside from making tarlike coffee, Denise had the heart unhealthy habit of skipping breakfast, preferring to snack on chocolate bars throughout the day.
Martin was the predictable one. He could usually be found in front of the old television set. J.J. figured he probably had a callus on his thumb from abusing the remote control.
Her current companion was pretty high-strung, with a penchant for minimalist conversation. J.J. hadn’t yet figured out why Lara intentionally distanced herself from the rest of the team. Maybe she just didn’t feel comfortable with the group. After all, she was the newest member.
Or the leak.
“I need some exercise,” J.J. said, running her fingernail along the rim of the mug. “Laziness begets laziness.”
Lara smiled. It seemed a reluctant expression, as if Lara hadn’t done it enough over the course of her lifetime.
“Cody said you were supposed to take it easy.”
“I’m sure Cody says a lot of things,” J.J. returned, offering a conspiratorial look that Lara seemed to enjoy. “I feel fine. It’s a beautiful day.”
Lara scoffed and glanced out the small window above the sink. “If you like the tundra.”
“It’s refreshingly…crisp outside.”
“I’m from Alabama,” Lara countered. “Anything below fifty degrees is flat-out cold.”
“You don’t have much of an accent,” J.J. commented, hoping to sound conversational since this was the first detail she’d actually culled from Lara.
Lara shrugged her shoulders. “I moved away when I was a teenager. I’m not small town material.”
“How small?”
“Less than five hundred nosy, opinionated, self-righteous people. I don’t miss it.”
Serious hostility there. J.J. made a note to have her boss dig into it. Could be nothing more than a genuine dislike of her hometown, but J.J.’s gut was telling her it might just be important.
“Do you have family in Alabama?”
Lara nodded. “I’m related to about a dozen of said self-righteous folks.”
J.J. rose to dump the remnants of the coffee into the sink, then began to stretch out her hamstrings. “The exterior of the barn makes a perfect climbing wall.”
Lara groaned. “The perfect climbing wall is in a gym. Cut me some slack, Barnes. Cody will ream me if I let you leave the house. And even if he never knows about it, I have zero desire to stand out in the cold.”
“You don’t have to. You can see me just fine from here. By the way, where is Landry?” J.J. hoped the question sounded more casual than it felt. She really wanted to know why she’d barely seen him for the better part of a week even though they were staying in the same house. Why is he avoiding me? Something she didn’t dare ask aloud.
“Gone when I got up,” Lara said. “Probably more family stuff. From the bits and pieces I’ve gotten, it sounds like this wedding is the social event of the season.” She folded the paper and placed it on the table. She stood up, scraping the chair legs across the rutted linoleum in the process. “I’ll get my coat.”
“No,” J.J. insisted. “Stay inside. If the Visnopovs knew my location, they’d have made a move before now. I’ll be fifty yards away and your line of sight is unobstructed.” J.J. led Lara to the window and pointed out at the white landscape.
“Look out there. There aren’t any unaccounted-for tracks in the snow, and no way anyone could approach the house or the barn without leaving an obvious trail.” She sensed Lara was vacillating, so she continued. “There’s not enough of a tree line to provide sniper cover, not that the Visnopovs would ever use a sniper. They like public and bloody. Seriously, Lara, hang out here where it’s warm.”
“Nowhere but the barn?”
J.J. crossed her heart. “Promise.”
“Why do I think this will come back to bite me?” Lara said on a sigh. “Go ahead.”
Not wanting to risk Lara suffering a change of heart, J.J. fairly ran out the door. Snow crunched beneath her boots as she first walked, then jogged toward the four-story barn. The air tasted clean and fresh as she sucked in deep breaths.
The sun felt warm against her back as she reached her target. The horizontal wooden boards had just enough space for her to get a decent footing, so she began to climb. Mindful that she didn’t want to overexert herself, J.J. kept her pace slow and easy. Gloves would have been a good idea. The weathered wood was dry and splinters tried to attack her palms each time she hoisted herself higher.
Stale air from inside the barn wafted out between the slats. Since this was her first barn, she hadn’t expected it to be so large. Peeking inside, she counted no fewer than twenty-five empty stalls. It was hard to see much farther inside since the only light source was slashes of sunlight that seemed to create more shadows than anything else.
Then she saw movement. She froze and strained to bring the image into focus. The outline of a man? Definitely. Martin? No. Cody. Definitely Cody. She knew those shoulders. She’d seen them in her dreams enough times to recognize them even in the worst possible lighting conditions.
So what was he doing in a deserted barn?
Talking to himself?
No. Talking on his cell phone. The words were faint and garbled. Damn! Placing her cheek against the space between the boards, she concentrated to hear the fragments of the one-sided conversation.
“…you have to get her here! Time is running out.”
Her heart pounded in her ears as she processed the snippet she’d overheard. Was there a positive way to interpret his comments?
No!
Scurrying down the wall, she dashed back toward the house, trying to figure out her next move.
Get concrete confirmation that Cody was the leak before she said anything to her superiors.
How?
Confront him straight-out and get him to confess.
How?
Winded, J.J. ran into the house, claimed an urgent bathroom need to a clearly startled Lara and Denise, and dashed up the stairs. Her original intent had been to get to her room so she could calmly and carefully consider her options. That intent changed when she saw the door to Cody’s assigned room ajar.
The temptation was just too great.
Normally the door was closed and, normally, she wouldn’t risk violating his space with two of the marshals in the kitchen. But she wasn’t feeling all too normal.
Easing inside, she silently closed the door and took two deep breaths in order to halt her racing heart. Her eyes darted around the room. The bed was neatly made. Nothing on the top of the dresser or night table.
“Did you think he’d leave a To Do list sitting out?” she grumbled.
Seeing no other option, she began a careful search of the room. Especially careful, when she realized that Cody Landry was a certifiable neat freak. Everything was precisely folded and organized.
The top dresser drawer held socks rolled into perfect balls. She squeezed them to see if he might have hidden something inside. Nothing. The next drawer contained a neat row of T-shirts and boxer shorts. Nothing out of the ordinary. Unless she acknowledged that her mental image of him standing in front of her wearing nothing except said boxer shorts was abnormal.
She moved on to the other drawers. And again found nothing of interest. She felt under the sheets, inside the pillowcases and between the mattresses. Still nothing.
Placing her hands on her hips, she surveyed the room for someplace—anyplace—he might use to hide incriminating materials. The house was more than a hundred years old, so instead of a closet, a wardrobe stood in one corner. The interior was as it should be—a precise row of shirts and slacks hanging from a metal rod. A stack of three blankets was at the bottom, as well as two pairs of shoes. Nothing in the shoes or blankets. J.J. even went so far as to separate the clothing to feel along the rear of the wardrobe for a false back. Nada.
Defeated and frustrated, she turned to leave when she caught a reflection in the nearby window. A flash really. Of something white taped to the wardrobe.
Peering around the furniture, she reached for the piece of paper. Three words were printed on the worn business card: Wilkofski and Associates.
Could be Russian. “No phone number?” she whispered aloud.
Flipping it over, she found a notation written in a bold hand. It was a date—October tenth.
The blood stilled in her veins.
The day she was attacked.