A Kiss to Kill (21 page)

He looked away from her. “About this trigger thing.”

“You have an idea?” Quinn asked.

“Maybe. What if it’s
not
a nuclear-triggering device?” Tara’s face paled. “You mean it’s a trigger for some other kind of weapon?”

“What if it’s not a device at all?” he suggested. “What if it’s a person?” He looked over at Kick. So did everyone else.

Gina suddenly realized what he was saying.
Kick was the team’s sniper.

Kick nodded. “Yup, the thought crossed my mind when I read the message, too. Sometimes they called me ‘the trigger’ in my old unit.”

Quinn, Marc, and Alex nodded along with him. They were all spec operators from way back. “So rather than a bomb,” Quinn said thoughtfully, “you’re talking a Day of the Jackal scenario.”

Gina swallowed. The assassination of the president of the United States. A terrible thought.

“You mean the trigger is some kind of hired gun? A political assassin?” Tara asked doubtfully.

“Sweet goodnight!” Rebel said, shooting straight up on the love seat. “The man that got away!”

“I actually think they got Bruce Willis in the end,” Alex drawled.

“No!” Rebel exclaimed. “I mean, on
Allah’s Paradise
. Don’t you remember I told you I may have seen another person onboard? While I was talking on the phone to—” She stopped abruptly. Jerked her attention to Quinn. “Someone may have jumped overboard, just before the yacht exploded. I can’t be certain. It was just a quick flash in my peripheral vision. I put it in my report, thinking he may have taken the trigger with him. But I never thought about him actually
being
the trigger.”

“Merde,”
Marc swore.

“To take a successful shot at POTUS—the President—and survive,” Kick ventured, shaking his head, “this assassin would need mad skills.”

“Maybe he doesn’t intend to survive,” Marc said somberly.

“Or,” Gregg said into the pool of ensuing silence, “maybe POTUS isn’t the target.”

“Who else could it be?” Rebel asked.

He slowly turned to Gina. And pointed. “Her.”

TWENTY

GREGG
sat back as everyone turned to Gina and stared. Mouths dropped open in bewilderment.

“I hope you’re not serious,” Gina choked out.

“Explain,” Quinn ordered.

But how did you explain a feeling? A feeling he’d had ever since listening via the bug he’d planted in her room at Haven Oaks to every debrief she’d been put through by STORM after her rescue? A feeling only intensified by finding that Pentagon file on her this morning—with a source code matching those on Zane’s and Jackson’s level one secure files. It had to have been the traitor responsible for all three attempts on their lives. Nothing else made sense.

Gregg spread his hands. “You think al Sayika is out to kill Gina in revenge for her escaping and sabotaging their Armageddon virus, right?”

“Not like there’s any doubt,” Kick said. “There’s a price on her head,” he reminded him. “Just like there is on mine and Alex’s.”

“And about a thousand other people they consider enemies,” Gregg agreed. “But how many of those revenge targets have they actually killed?”

“Lots,” Alex said, and ticked off on his fingers. “The Saudi princess, the French police commander, the attempt on the Swedish minister of justice . . .” He ran out of steam with a frown.

“You prove my point. None of those were for revenge. They were
primary
targets, high-profile public figures already in the media spotlight, killed to garner attention to al Sayika
’s
twisted cause. Gina is a university research scientist working behind the scenes with kids’ vaccines. Her kidnapping was never even released to the public.”

“But they
did
try to assassinate her,” Tara said. “You were there.”

“What if it wasn’t al Sayika behind the attempt?”

“Who else would it be?” Darcy asked. “The attackers had proven ties to the organization.”

“Yes, but they also had ties elsewhere.”

“You mean D.C.,” Quinn said, getting to his feet. Gregg could see the wheels turning. The commander was actually listening.

Gina blinked. “I don’t understand.” She looked spooked and confused.

But Gregg refused to feel sorry for her. He refused to feel
anything
for her. She’d lied to him. She’d sworn that he could trust her, then deliberately betrayed that trust. He could be sitting behind bars right now, his life over, because of her. He still might—if there was an al Sayika mole hidden among these people.

He reluctantly turned to her. But he couldn’t make himself meet those frightened eyes. He spoke to her lips. “What if there’s someone else with an actual motive to kill you specifically?”

She paled. “Like who?” But he got the distinct feeling she’d really wanted to say, “Like
you
?”

Her lips started to quiver, a trembling so subtle you had to be looking right at them to see it. He knew that quiver. Intimately. When he’d had her tied to the bed, helpless, and was about to do something that both thrilled and terrified her in equal measure, he’d learned to worship that tiny quiver of excitement.

But now it just meant terror.

With good reason.

He suddenly realized everyone was staring at him, waiting for his answer.

“Wade Montana,” Alex Zane suddenly blurted out, pacing away from the fireplace where he’d been leaning with a scowl on his face. “The ex-fiancé lives in D.C., and he can’t stay away from this case.”

“Don’t be absurd,” the redheaded FBI agent countered hotly before Gregg could open his mouth. “It’s not Wade.”

Zane jabbed his finger angrily at her. “
You
suspected him yourself, back in December, before you got so damn friendly with him. The jilted lover is always at the top of your list of murder suspects, your very words.”

At the phrase
jilted lover
, Gina’s eyes widened and slid to Gregg. This time he met her gaze, his mouth pressed thin. A frisson of tense awareness passed between them.

“You can’t possibly think Wade is involved with al Sayika,” she said hoarsely to him.

“His behavior is suspicious,” Gregg said. “But no, that’s not who I meant.”

“Then who?”

“Think, Gina. Back to when you were being held captive. You saw something you shouldn’t have. Some
one
you shouldn’t have.”

She turned inward, thinking, shaking her head slowly back and forth. “But they’re all dead. Or in prison.”

“Not all of them,” he said. Urging her to remember.

And then she did. She sucked in a soft breath. He could see the awful memory of her life’s worst moments swirl through her whole body like a whiff of poison gas. And then came the pain of realizing that the one good, kind part of that memory was in fact the most evil thing of all.

“Oh, God,” she whispered. “The Voice. The man who helped me. Comforted me.
He’s the traitor
.”

DETECTIVE
Jonas Loudon poked his head around the side of Sarah’s cubicle. “Something interesting came up in the Raul Chavez interviews. Thought you might want to hear,” he boomed.

Wincing, Sarah saved the report she was writing, glanced at the time on her computer, and looked up. “Jesus, Jonesy. It’s ten o’clock on a Friday night. Don’t you have a hot date or something?”

“This coming from Detective frickin’ Lonelyheart.”

“I’ll have you know I
had
a date lined up for tonight. Told the guy to stuff it.”
More or less
. Surely, not returning three phone messages and two texts qualified?

“Let me guess. He didn’t ask you for dinner and a movie first.”

“Nah.” She waved her hand in mock disgust. “He
did
. Who’s got time for all that foreplay?”

Jonesy guffawed loudly. “And me, I got the opposite problem. All the dames my age wanna play frickin’ bingo for six hours before lettin’ a man score.”

She tsked. “Getting old sucks the big one.”

“I wish,” Jonesy said in a snickering lament.

“Any
way
,”
she groaned, rolling her eyes. “The Chavez interviews?”

“Oh, yeah. So I went down to the limo service garage this evening. Caught a lot of the drivers waxin’ and lubin’ in anticipation of the big night, bein’ the weekend an’ all. Got ’em talking about Raul. Seems he was pretty well liked by the clients. Easygoin’, knew how to keep his mouth shut about things. Like what? I asks. That’s when they get all twitchy.”

Sarah leaned back in her office chair and swiveled it back and forth. “About?”

“Took me a while to get it out of them, but it seems Chavez drove Asha Mahmood around quite a bit. But she’s not the one who hired him.” He paused for dramatic effect.

She bit. “Okay. So who did?”

“Her sugar daddy.”

Sarah recalled vividly the embarrassing abundance of sex toys they’d found at Mahmood’s trashed apartment. It fit.

“Her
married
sugar daddy,” Jonesy continued before she could comment. “Who’s supposedly some bigwig—wait for it—up on the Hill.”

She stopped swiveling. “The Hill? As in Capitol Hill? A
congressman
?”

He shrugged expansively. “Or a senator, or aide, or hell, the vice president. No one knew for sure. Could be the frickin’ janitor, for all the conjecture. Except—”

Excitement began to buzz through her. “Except janitors don’t have the kind of cash it takes to hire limos for their mistresses.”

“
Cash
being the operative word.”

Her excitement deflated. “Damn. No credit card receipts?”

Jonesy shook his head. “No paper trail at all. The man has obviously done this before. Or—”

“Or . . .” Sarah suddenly recalled the very large campaign contribution from the Mahmood cousins’ joint account to a certain Louisiana congressman.
Oh, yeah. Gotcha
. “Or the bastard has a lot more to hide than just a cheating dick.”

“I
hope you don’t mind sharing a room,” Rebel asked, glancing over at Gina, who was arranging her few things in a dresser drawer in their room at the Watergate.

The other woman looked up and smiled. “Not at all. It’ll be great to catch up. I haven’t seen you since . . . um, you moved down to Norfolk.”

Rebel’s mouth curved. Gina should be a diplomat. “You mean since I grew a pair and finally left Alex, only to sabotage myself by hooking up with Wade?”

Gina had been in bad shape when she was brought to Haven Oaks, but not bad enough that all the love triangle dramas revolving around Rebel had escaped her notice. The miracle was that they’d become friends anyway. Rebel had desperately needed the distraction, and had sat for hours with the rescued hostage, distracting her in turn from her recurring nightmares by talking nonstop about Alex, and Helena, and even Wade—after Gina convinced her she’d left him ages ago and had no interest in reuniting.

“Oh, Wade’s not such a bad guy,” Gina said now, closing the drawer. “You could have done worse.”

“Other than the fact that he was my boss and emotionally unavailable? Do you
see
a pattern here?”

Gina laughed and went to curl up on one of the beds. “Alex isn’t your boss,” she pointed out.

“Technically, he is. Or maybe it’s Quinn now. Whatever. Either way, he
was
my first official assignment as an FBI agent. My Zero Unit liaison.” An embarrassingly appropriate term. Or rather, not . . . “Though to be fair, I suppose I was even more unavailable than Wade was.”

Gina gave her a wry look. “Ain’t love grand. Always there to mess a woman up when she least needs it.”

Rebel flopped onto the other bed like a snow angel. “Amen to that.”

“So what’s going on between you and Alex? Something’s changed. I can tell.”

Pain razored through Rebel’s heart for the hundredth time that day, just as powerful as the first ninety-nine. “I slept with him last night. Finally, after all these years. And this morning, he decided he can’t be with me.” She battled back the urge to roll into a ball and cry.

“Oh, sweetie. I’m so sorry. How did
that
happen?”

The infertility was too personal an issue to discuss without his permission. But she could share his worry about his job and the PTSD. “It was so good,” she said. “I was happy.”
For the most part
. “He seemed happy, too. Then he had that flashback while we were diving, and it all kind of fell apart from there.”

“Ah. I understand.”

Rebel glanced over. Her friend’s focus had turned inward, her expression bleak, raw. Rebel had seen Alex with that same expression on his face. It was the memories rearing up.

“I dealt with it,” Rebel continued. “I tried to be strong for him . . . help him through it.” She sighed. “But I think I remind him too much of . . .”
The memories
. “He told me he dreamed of me, you know. Over there, while he was a prisoner.”

Gina came back from wherever she’d been. “He did?”

Rebel nodded. “All the time, he said.”

Gina smiled. “That proves he loves you.”

Right. “Not enough to deal with the problems keeping us apart. He just wants to run away.”

“Maybe he’s afraid to face them. I’m sure he’s feeling weak and vulnerable right now. He could be afraid you won’t love him anymore, now that you’ve seen his weakness displayed so vividly. Seen him completely helpless. Men like to think they’re strong, invincible. Especially men in Alex’s profession.”

Rebel rolled to her stomach, resting her chin in her hand. It made a lot of sense. Even for the sterility thing. Although Alex had never been the caveman macho type. But the heirs to a man’s name—or lack thereof—could be an explosive issue. Wars had been fought over it.

“You told me once you dreamed of Gregg while you were . . . captive. How did you feel when you saw him again?”

“Not exactly the same situation,” Gina said dryly. “I wanted to kill him. Literally.”

“Maybe you could give me lessons.” They laughed. “Though I take it Gregg didn’t play along. What happened? You two sort of skipped over that part in your stories earlier.”

Gina’s smile gradually faded as she answered. “He convinced me I was wrong about him. He’s actually helped me a lot. Psychologically. I feel better around him. Safe.”

“Hardly surprising,” Rebel observed. “That man’s got to be the scariest human being I’ve ever met in my life. Those eyes. Like he can read every thought in your head.” She shivered.

“He can,” Gina said, almost sadly. She toyed with a silver chain around her ankle. A small heart hung from it. “Every thought.”

“So . . . if you don’t mind me asking . . . why are you sharing a room with
me
?”

Gina pulled a pillow to her middle and curled around it. “He’s angry with me. He wanted to find the traitor on his own and he blames me for being forced to work with STORM.”

Rebel could hear a world of hurt in those words. Obviously her deep feelings for the man had returned with a vengeance now that he’d been absolved of betraying her. “But it’s not your fault we ran into you in the corridor. Not that I’m sorry we did . . . But seriously, what were the odds?”

“That’s the problem. Gregg doesn’t believe in coincidences. I’m sure he thinks I called Alex or Kick. Sold him out.”

“But you didn’t! You should tell him that.”

“I tried. He won’t listen.”

Rebel sat up on the bed. “Then, girl, you need to march yourself over there and
make
him listen. This is ridiculous! You love him. At least
one
of us should have a happy ending.”

Gina hugged her pillow harder. Her brown eyes swam with misery. “Then I guess it’s up to you, girlfriend. Because it doesn’t matter how I feel. The one thing I know about Gregg van Halen is, the man does not believe in love. There’s not going to be any happy ending for Gregg and me.”

If Rebel didn’t already feel completely heartbroken for herself, her heart would have broken all over for her friend.

How did two such intelligent, sensitive, and giving women end up in this lonely, painful position?
Men!
She wanted to send the entire male population to some other galaxy and leave them there forever. See how they’d do without women in their lives.