Honey bounded out the truck and relieved herself on the strip of lawn fringing the parking lot. Scott unwrapped Skye’s uneaten sandwich, crouched, fed it to Honey.
But his focus was not on the pooch, it was on Skye. He watched her long legs pace the length of the parking lot, her arms wrapped tight around her waist. She reminded him of a wounded and dangerous animal trapped in a cage.
Dangerous enough to lash out and cut.
He was rattled by the way he’d lost control the minute his mouth had met her warm, sweet lips, shaken at the way she’d brazenly sliced so close to the bone.
He studied her as she strode, back and forth, back and forth, boots clicking against asphalt.
“She’s looking to bolt, Honey,” he whispered to the dog. “But she’s scared. We gotta play this cool. Don’t want to push the lady too far into a corner.”
He stood, leaned on his cane as she approached. “So where to now, Doctor?”
She halted. “Those men, how did they find us?” she demanded. “I thought we left them in that field.”
“We did. They must’ve made an educated guess we’d head north. Nowhere else to go from the Saanich Peninsula except by boat. And the only road north through the Malahat is the Island Highway. Perhaps we wasted time using the backroads to get around the inlet.”
Her eyes flickered from one end of the parking lot to the other. The fine mist of rain was leaving diamond drops in her thick dark hair.
“Why aren’t you worried they’ll see us now?”
“I figure they headed on north when they left, and they’ll keep going for a while, until they see no sign of us. My guess is they’ll backtrack.”
She angled her head, her almond eyes narrowed. “You some kind of expert?”
He shrugged. “I’m a writer. I have an imagination.”
She glanced down at his leg. “How did you hurt your knee, McIntyre?”
It was a test.
She was pushing him, trying to decide whether to ditch or to trust him. He’d better give her damn good reason to trust.
He sighed, fingered the smooth, hard wood of his cane, buying time. “I do a lot of traveling to remote places, for research. Some of my work is controversial. I got into trouble with a rebel group in the desert in India. They robbed me, shot me and left me for dead.”
“What desert?” she demanded.
He swallowed. He hadn’t expected this level of inquiry. “The Thar.”
“Where? Near the Kashmir border?”
His gut squeezed into a ball. Most people didn’t have a clue where the Thar lay. “What does it matter?”
Her eyes flicked down to his ankle, where he hid his knife, then back to his eyes. “There’s a lot of political trouble there, near the Kashmir border.”
“Has been for years.”
She took a step toward him. “Why were you there?”
“Like I said, research. I write about stuff like that. The conflict between India and Pakistan is of particular interest to me.”
She moved closer. “And the knife? The one strapped to your ankle?”
Scott met the challenge in her gaze. “You get into a habit, Doctor. You learn to take care of yourself in foreign lands where a government may be of no help to you. Old habits die hard.”
He’d touched something, connected. A link had been forged. He could see it in her eyes.
But her words spoke otherwise. “I find it strange, Mr. McIntyre, that someone with your taste for adventure would find himself in pastoral Haven.”
That’s where people find themselves when put out to pasture. “My leg, Doctor. I needed rest and medical attention for my leg. I’m trying to heal. And that’s the bloody hell truth of it.”
She flinched as the sudden heat in his words, reached out, touched his forearm. “I’m sorry.”
He pulled away, opening the car door for Honey. “In, girl.” He turned back to face Skye. “So, where exactly is this cabin?”
She hesitated. “I—I’m not sure.”
“You mean, you won’t tell me. That’s it, isn’t it? Scott McIntyre has served his purpose. Now you want to go it alone.”
“No.” She ran her hand nervously through her damp hair, crushing the diamond droplets. “It’s… I’m confused. That’s all.”
He decided to take the gamble, roll the dice. He climbed into the cab of the truck. “Well, it’s been fun.” He started to close the door. “Have a nice life, Doctor. Watch out for bad guys.”
She lunged forward, grabbed his door. “Damn you.”
“Hey, I got a book to write, a leg to mend. If you need my help, tell me.” He leaned forward, dropped his voice. “Just don’t treat me like a yo-yo, Doctor. You’ve jerked me around enough.”
Uncertainty wavered in her eyes.
He jerked his chin toward her hand holding his door open. “Do you mind? I’d like to leave now.”
“Zeballos.” She blurted the word out.
His eyes shot to hers. “What?”
“The cabin. It’s near Zeballos.”
“Zeballos? As in totally isolated? As in population around two hundred?”
“You know it?”
“I know it well.”
“Can you take me there?”
His eyes probed hers. “No more bull?”
She made a wry face. “I’ll do my best.”
“Hop in.”
Scott fired the ignition. Bingo. He’d played her right, scored. But again the win came with an ironic twist.
Zeballos, of all places.
Scott hadn’t been there since he was a kid. Since he’d gone fishing up that way with his dad.
This was going to be a trip back in time. And a journey into the heart of the wilderness, into the very core of who he was.
It was a place he didn’t want to go.
But Skye was forcing him back down that road.
* * *
“We have visual. She’s just left a diner in Duncan. There’s a man with her. We’ve got a tail on them.”
Relief surged through him, then bottomed out. “Who is this man?”
“No ID yet.”
He lurched to his feet. A queer, hot sensation sank through to the pit of his stomach. Outwardly, he showed nothing. He paced the room, his mind in turmoil. She had help? An ally? Someone she might trust with sensitive information? This was a new variable. They couldn’t afford to take chances with an unknown.
He’d been prepared to neutralize her at any stage of Operation Vector, but he’d have liked to play her through until the end. Perhaps now was the time.
He halted in the center of the cabin, turned slowly to face his assistant. “When they find her, neutralize her.”
“You sure?”
He turned his back on his assistant, stared through the thick salt-encrusted window, out over the sea. “Very sure.”
* * *
They wound through the streets of Duncan, heading away from the well-traveled Island Highway for the lesser-used coastal road. The rain fell heavier, bringing the heavens growling down with it.
Skye glanced at Scott. The set of his mouth was hard. His eyes kept flicking up to the rearview mirror. She felt a new edginess in him as he shifted gears.
She turned, looked out the back of the truck, eyes picking through cars on the roads, trying to see what he was seeing, what was bothering him.
But the brown sedan was nowhere to be seen.
He swerved suddenly right, veered down a side road, then left. And left again.
“What is it?”
“Our tail.” His words were terse.
She swiveled in her seat again. “I don’t see them.”
He said nothing.
She pulled her hands through her tangle of hair. She felt as though she’d been on the road for days. But it had only been hours. If they drove on through the night, they could still be in Zeballos by dawn.
Scott finally pulled onto the narrow coast road. He put his foot on the gas, drove fast, overtaking cars. The speed didn’t worry her—it was the reason for the haste that concerned her. She stole another look at his rugged profile. Despite the firm set of his jaw, in spite of the speed, his large hands were relaxed on the wheel. He handled the hurtling vehicle with the calm confidence and gentle touch of a familiar lover. It sent an unbidden and quirky thrill through her gut. She could imagine this man crossing the burning hot sands of the wild, unending Thar. She could picture him in the untamed places he’d spoken of.
She laid her hand on Honey’s soft coat, turned to look out the passenger side window. The dark green conifers whizzed by in a monotonous rain-washed blur. Sometimes she missed the sun, the hot, dry hills of her native land. She wondered if Scott McIntyre missed places like the Thar, if they called to his soul in the night the way her home called to hers.
She knew the Thar. Malik had spoken of it often. He’d been there, on business. The Thar desert stood divided between the Sindh region in Pakistan and the Rajasthan in India. Malik had used it as a base to fund rebels in nearby Kashmir in return for their cooperation.
She sucked her breath deep into her chest, exhaled shakily. Way back, when she’d first come to this country, she’d considered going to the authorities, telling them she knew La Sombra, the man behind Anubis, knew where to find him.
But she hadn’t.
Because she knew the depth and reach of the Anubis network. And she knew Malik was smart enough to keep moving, to keep switching identities. Even if the world knew Malik Leandros was La Sombra he’d still remain as elusive as a ghost.
And where would she be? She’d committed identity theft. She’d entered the country illegally. She’d trained in an Anubis camp. She bore the mark of Anubis. She’d be captured, incarcerated, interrogated and jailed.
And if she ever broke her cover, he’d find her, come after her, kill her.
She had little doubt of it.
No. She wanted to keep the past buried. She wanted to be free. But was this freedom?
She shuddered. Honey snuggled closer.
Scott’s eyes flicked over to her. “You okay?”
“Yeah. Fine.”
“We’ll overnight in Chemainus.”
“Why? Why can’t we drive right through?”
His eyes darted once again to the mirror. “We need to make sure we’ve shaken them. If not, we’ll be leading them down a one-way street into Zeballos. We’d be like rats working ourselves into an isolated dead-end trap.”
He was right. There’d be nowhere left to run.
“We’ll pick up the highway again first thing in the morning and make a run for Campbell River. If we haven’t lost them by then, we’re going to have to rethink our strategy.”
Our strategy. He made her feel as though she had an ally. She hadn’t felt like that since Jalil had helped her create a new identity. She reached out, tentatively placed a hand on his injured knee. “Thank you, Scott. Thank you for believing in me.”
His eyes shot to hers.
Words hung unspoken. Then he jerked back, his attention once again fixed on the road ahead.
* * *
Thank you for believing in me. Bloody hell, it made him want to believe.
Scott cruised past several motels, found one that satisfied.
“Why this one?”
“It’s got parking out back. Can’t see vehicles from the road.”
Skye looked at him strangely. “Are you sure you haven’t done this before?”
He forced a grin. “I watched too many detective shows when my leg was mending. Hop out.”
“What?”
“Get us a room. Use my name. Don’t move until I get back.”
Her eyes widened. “Why? Where are you going?” The shaky edge in her voice tugged at his male ego. She wanted to keep him near. It pleased something primal within. He told himself it was only the satisfaction at having won his quarry over. He was a little closer to her secrets. And that was his mission.
This was just a job.
And that kiss at the diner… It was pure male physical reaction. Normal for a man who hadn’t touched a woman in a long, long time. The hunger she’d awakened in him had nothing to do with the permanent void in his chest. The fear she’d stirred in him when she’d looked deep into his eyes and seen the pain of the past meant nothing.
She was a criminal.
“I’m going to get some dog food for Honey. I’ll be back soon.”
“I can come and get the food with you.”
“It’s better you lay low.” He needed to get her out of the way and to let Rex know they’d picked up a new tail in Duncan. A tail he couldn’t be sure was the feds. He needed to switch vehicles. Just in case.
“Fine.” She hauled her backpack out of the truck, swiveled on the heels of her biker boots and strode up to the motel’s reception area.
Scott unhitched his eyes from the sight of her rump moving in her jeans, shifted gears. “That’s one hell of a package, Honey.” He pulled back out onto the road.
Scott found a car dealership not far from the little motel. It had just what he needed in the lot.
An hour later, he and Honey sat in a silver Land Rover. It was the color of Skye’s eyes and worth more than the black thing Rex had sent him off in. Scott chuckled. “He’s not gonna like the tab on this baby,” he told Honey as he punched in Rex’s number.
“Hey, boss.”
“You sound chipper.”
“Chipper? That another one of your pommy tags?”
“Cut to it, Agent. Hannah and I have a birthing class to get to in twenty minutes.”
Scott’s mind went blank. Hannah was pregnant?
“Scott…you there?”
He found his tongue. It was thick when he spoke. “Rex…I—I never knew. I never even asked how she and Danny were—”
“Hey. It’s okay. She’s due any day now. Danny’s doing great. Can’t wait until his uncle Scott comes to visit.”
Scott rubbed his hand brutally over his face. It had been three years since Rex and Hannah had married. Scott had left for the field immediately after the wedding. As happy as he was for the Logan family, their success had only served to sharpen his pain. Guilt welled bitter inside him. “I’m sorry, Rex. I—I’ve been…self-involved.”
“Yeah, I understand.” He paused. “How’s Honey?”
Scott reached out, ruffled the Logan family pet’s smooth fur. The guilt bit deeper. Rex had been looking out for him, giving him their dog. He’d been trying to bring Scott back out of his shell, his self-inflicted prison. And he was keeping tabs on his progress by making him report to him personally.
“She’s good, Rex.” He paused. “Reminds me of the lab I had when I was boy.”
“You were never a boy, Armstrong.”
“Whatever.” He cleared his head. “I have a destination. We’re heading for Zeballos.”
“Where’s Zeballos?”
“The boonies. A two-hundred-year-old village on the northeast coast of the island that once produced millions in gold. It’s a logging community now. Plenty of abandoned gold mines and limestone caves.”
“You know this place then?”
“From another life. My dad took me there for one of our father-son fishing trips. It’s nestled right on the Esperanza Inlet. Nothing behind the town but sheer mountains and forest to nowhere.”
The remorse was suddenly acute at the thought of his father, his parents. It was all coming down on him, as though some kind of floodgate had been opened to feeling. And he was drowning.
Those trips had been real special. A highlight in his young life.
“Where will you be staying?” Rex was talking to him. He yanked his mind back out of the past.
“Not in the town. I’ll send you GPS coordinates when we get there. We’re headed for a cabin somewhere in that region. Let me know as soon as you’ve spoken with our federal contact. I need to know what I’m dealing with here. We picked up a new tail today. Dark green Dodge. Couldn’t catch the plates.”
“Feds?”
“Could be.”
“I’ll check with our man tomorrow. Scott, if it’s not the feds—”
“Yeah, this adds a new dimension.”
“Play it safe.”
Scott heard the concern in Rex’s voice. He tried to laugh it off, tried to tell himself it had zip to do with the fact he was injured, washed up, supposed to be recuperating with a lame-duck surveillance job. “You worried now it’s become a real mission?”
“Chill, hard-ass. Let’s touch base tomorrow.”
“Yeah. Right. Oh, by the way, we’ve got new wheels. Traded the truck in. Tab is headed your way.” Scott hung up before Rex could respond.
He smoothed the fur on Honey’s head. So the Logans were having another baby. He shook the odd onslaught of emotion, fished out the piece of paper on which he’d scribbled the address of the theater store.
He had to stay focused. If that was not the cops back there in Duncan, then someone else was after Skye.
He was damn sure he’d lost them. But until he knew who and what he was up against, he wanted to keep her hidden.
Chemainus was an artsy community famous for murals that depicted the history of the valley. It was also full of antique stores and boutiques offering sculpture, pottery and glass. And it had the theater store. Scott had found the address in the Yellow Pages while he’d waited for the dealer to finalize the papers for his vehicle trade.
Evening was edging out afternoon by the time he and Honey reached the shop. But it was still open. He wasted no time in asking for what he was looking for.
“You want a short, medium or long?” the salesclerk asked him.
He thought of Skye’s lustrous dark hair. She’d never manage to hide it all under a short wig. “I’m going to have to go with one of the longer lengths.”
“Color?” The woman held up a chart.
The image, the sensation of Skye’s exotic, smooth olive-toned skin swam into his senses. Too blond and she would look false. Too much red or orange and it would clash with her olive skin and silver eyes.
“That one.” He pointed to a dark ash-blond mixed with brownish frost.
“The snowy mink?”
He chuckled. “Yeah, the snowy mink. And I like this style here.” He pointed to the head of hair on a mannequin. It would balance well with her height, her stature.
“Anything else?”
“Just these.” He held up a pair of studious looking glasses for himself. Deception, he mused, was an art.
A little voice niggled inside him, Self-deception, however, is folly.
He put his purchase on the Bellona tab.
* * *
“What do you mean, it’s the only room left?”
The motel desk clerk gave an apologetic shrug. “The art festival’s in town this week. Everything’s pretty much booked solid. You’re lucky to find even this. We just had a cancellation”
“Oh, great. That’s just great.”
“Would you like me to make some calls for you?”
Skye checked herself. The poor woman was actually trying to help her. “No, it’ll have to do.” She grabbed the keys off the counter, spun on her heels.
“If there’s anything else I can get for you, Mrs. McIntyre—” the woman called out after her.
Skye whirled, opened her mouth, shut it again, tried to twist it into a congenial smile. “Thank you, no. We’ll be fine. Could you please direct Mr. McIntyre to our room when he finally arrives.”
She unlocked the motel room door, flung it open, tossed her backpack onto the one and only bed.
Just great. She was going to have to sleep with the writer tonight. And the thought of it punched her smack in the gut. She felt winded. Terrified, actually. She didn’t trust herself to be near him.
She sat on the bed, pried her boots off with angry movements. She was way out of her league when it came to Scott McIntyre, dammit. Other men she could kiss without coming totally undone.
Boots off, she threw herself back on the queen-size bed. It was altogether too small. She stared up at the ceiling. She was running all right. And it wasn’t just from Malik’s men.
She was running straight into another kind of trap.
And she was sure of one thing. If she opened up, Scott McIntyre might just steal her heart.
And she’d end up paying the price.
It was more than she could afford.
* * *
“Quiet, now. One sound and you’re back in the car.” Scott let Honey out of the Land Rover. He didn’t know if they allowed pets in the motel but he wasn’t going to chance asking them.
The retriever obedient at his side, Scott unlocked the motel room door and walked in.
She lay on the bed like a sleeping beauty, her dark hair spread over the white of the pillow.
His muscles tightened in a band across his chest.
Then he saw.
There was only one bed.
And she was sprawled out on it. Something dark and hot slipped through his gut. He stepped inside the room, quietly setting his package on the dresser.
But even in her sleep, she caught his movement. Her eyes flashed open. She jerked upright on the bed, hand flying to her chest as if to reassure herself she was fully clothed. He’d awakened her from some deep dream. One that had flushed her cheeks a soft pink.
He swallowed at the intimacy he saw there.
Her eyes darted around the room, as if to confirm the reality of her surroundings.
This was not a relaxed woman.
This was a woman doing one hell of a job hiding some deep-rooted fear.
“Arise, sleeping beauty, I’ve got a present for you,” he said dramatically.
“Where the hell have you two been?” she snapped. “You’ve been gone more than two hours.”
“Relax, sweetheart.” He picked up the package. “This is for you.” He held it out to her.
She took it, uncertain. “What is it?”
“Open it.”
She tore at the wrapping, held up the wig, frowned. “You said you were going to get dog food.”
“We did. But we got this for you, too.” He took the wig out of her hands, lifted it over her head and positioned it carefully over her tresses. He concentrated on ignoring the sensation of her dark silken strands against his fingers as he covered them with the false blond ones.
He stepped back.
The color he’d chosen was perfect. She looked like a siren. He should’ve guessed Skye Van Rijn would only stand out more as a blonde. Still, it was a highly efficient disguise. That’s what he loved about wigs. They were simple. And, in his experience, they worked.
She threw her feet over the side of the bed, padded to the mirror and adjusted the hair around her face. She made a wry face, pouted at her reflection.
Then she laughed. “What the hell is this for?”
He stepped up behind her, caught the silver of her eyes in the mirror. She looked into the reflection, back into his eyes. The frisson was immediate. Heat swelled between their bodies.
“I thought I’d take you out somewhere quiet for supper tonight. Get to know you a little better.”
She turned slowly to face him, her breasts almost touching his chest. His pulse spiked. He swallowed against the tension that gripped at his throat. In the mirror he could see her shapely butt as she faced him. And he saw the unmistakeable stamp of raw desire reflected in his own features.
He knew she could see it, too.
She looked slowly up into his eyes. He could feel the warmth of her breath against his lips as she spoke. “Ah, you think they won’t recognize me in disguise?” Her voice curled through his senses. “Ingenious,” she mocked.
He smiled, lifted his hand to gently move some of the hair from her face. “Maybe I just like blondes. Snowy-mink ones.”
She stilled instantly at his touch, like a rodent frozen by a serpent’s stare. She was afraid. He could sense it in an animal way.
He, too, was afraid, couldn’t move. They teetered silent at the cusp of something. One small move would send them down one road. Another would topple them over, past the point of no return and they’d end up naked, limbs entwined, hot and slick on that single bed.
And Scott was so close to making the wrong move. So very damn close. His hand remained immobile against the skin on her cheek. He couldn’t seem to unhitch it.
She couldn’t pull away.
That’s when he saw it. Light refracting in tiny emeralds, eyes of a gold bug nestled at the hollow of her throat. He hadn’t really noticed it before.
He moved his hand to touch the unusual gold pendant, remotely thankful to have found sudden purpose for movement.
“Where’d you get this?”
She jerked back, bumped into the dresser. Her hand flew to the jewel at her throat, focus returned to her eyes.
“Jozsef…gave it to me just before the wedding.” She took another step back. “I—I don’t really like it.” She sank down into the chair next to the dresser, as if crushed by the sudden weight of an unwanted memory. She clutched the pendant, covering it with her hand.
“But you’re still wearing it.” Scott didn’t know what drove him to say that. It smacked of accusation. He ran his tongue over his teeth. His mouth was dry.
“I…he…Jozsef made me promise to wear this beetle always.”
Scott stepped closer, laid a hand on her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Skye.”
She looked up into his face. Her eyes were wide. He felt like a brutish bull, trampling over her pain. The woman was still hurting. He had no business feeling what he was feeling. No business using her pain to get inside her head.
It’s your job, Agent. Remember that. Just another job.
But it wasn’t. Not anymore. This one had taken hold of him. Deep down, he knew this was different. It was getting to him in ways he never anticipated. And if he didn’t grab control of himself, real soon, he was gonna blow it, seal his fate once and for all with the Bellona Channel.
And that wasn’t a future he was ready to contemplate.
“No, Scott, don’t apologize. I’m the one who’s sorry to have dragged you into the mess of my life.” Her voice was brittle as she struggled for composure. “I’m not usually like this. It’s just that…that…everything’s going to hell in a handbasket.”
He sat on the edge of the bed, faced her. “What do you mean?”
She inhaled a shaky breath. “When Jozsef gave me this pendant, there was something in his eyes. Like an urgency. He said no matter what happened, I must promise to wear this. It was like…like he knew something was going to go wrong. I think he knew when he gave me this beetle that he wouldn’t be at our wedding.”
Scott reached out for her hand.
She pulled away. “Please, don’t touch me.”
Her words burned.
He held back, moved his hand, instead, to pet the silky fur of Honey’s head. The dog could sense the unease, the emotion that pulsed through the room. She nestled her snout into the crook of Scott’s knee, whimpered softly.
“Skye, why do you think Jozsef never showed?”
She was quiet for a while. When she spoke, there was a quaver to her voice. “I don’t think he had a choice. I think something happened to him.”
“Why?”
“You think I’m in denial, don’t you? You think I’m scratching for excuses so that I can cope with rejection. I’m not. Things have been adding up weird. I got this feeling.”
“What, exactly, makes you think something happened to Jozsef?” His tone was more demanding than he’d intended.
She shut down.
She yanked the wig from her hair, tossed it onto the dresser, raked her fingers through her dark tresses. “Just forget it.”
He softened his voice. “Skye, if you talk to me, maybe I can help.”
Her top lip trembled ever so slightly. “I just don’t know who to trust.”
Scott lifted his hand. He needed to touch, to console. But he restrained himself. “You think Jozsef’s disappearance is more than some simple payoff.”
She slumped forward, dropped her face into her hands, her hair curtaining him from her features. She shook her head, as if to discard everything in it. Her body jerked with a sob. Then another. Emotion tore through her, racked her frame. Scott could hold back no longer. He dropped to his knees in front of her, took her into his arms. Held her. Just held as she sobbed.
Honey whimpered, tried to edge her snout into Skye’s lap. And they stayed like that. The three of them. A tiny vignette.
A misbegotten, temporary family built on lies.