You Only Love Twice (31 page)

“Do you know what I asked him that night?” Ten’s question
brought her back to the present. “I asked him why he was getting married. I
wasn’t being rude. I just didn’t understand it. He said he wanted to make you
happy. He said if he wanted one thing in the world it was that you would never
be alone again, never be unhappy again. This tragedy goes past him dying. He
would hate the fact that you can’t move on, that you can’t find a way to live.
You think you honor him by being miserable, but it’s not true.”

She was saved by the door to the far suite opening and Erin
walking in. Phoebe turned quickly and tried to shove the unwanted emotion deep
because Ten was starting to get through to her. He was starting to make sense,
and that meant she would have to choose between a life with Jamie’s memory or
one with Jesse. She wasn’t ready.

Except maybe she was. It had been right to hold Jesse. It
had been right and good and she couldn’t work up the will to fight it.
Something deep inside wondered why she would even try.

What if she got a second chance? Should she turn it away
because she didn’t trust it? Would she take back loving Jamie so she didn’t
have to lose him?

Was she that much of a coward?

“Back off, minor Taggart,” Erin said as she strode into the
room. She wore slacks, a white button down, and a smart-looking blazer this
morning. Her hair was in a neat bun. She was ready to play the role of the
hard-nosed businesswoman with the singular exception of her shoes. She had
fuzzy bunny slippers on, but they were ruined by the nasty edge to her voice.
“I don’t need your advice.”

Theo was right behind her. He looked like he’d gotten as
much sleep as Ten. “I’m just saying you have to watch out around that guy. He’s
a playboy.”

Erin’s eyes rolled. “Funny, you sound just like that
douchebag who told me I was dressed like a slut.”

“I never said that.” Theo looked over at Ten like Ten could
help him out. “When did I say that? What does that even mean?”

Ten held up his hands. “I got nothing except to tell you
that hookers don’t give a shit what you say. And I know a couple of very
flexible ones.”

Her brother was a giver.

“Hey, did you blow Murdoch? Because he looked like he could
use it.” And Erin was pure lady. She grabbed a plate and started filling it up.

“Oooo, someone got a little something?” Hutch asked as he
walked out and immediately grabbed a Danish. “I thought we weren’t supposed to
get laid here. I got a very strict ‘no touching the locals’ lecture and Erin
threatened my balls if I looked at her the wrong way. What’s your problem with a
man’s balls, woman? They’re sacred.”

“They’re delicate so that’s where I strike. Are you made of
sugar, dude? How do you stay so thin?” She didn’t wait for Hutch to reply,
simply shook her head and turned back to Phoebe. “So did you fuck Murdoch so
hard he forgot all about his troubled past?”

Phoebe couldn’t help but laugh, but Theo frowned.

“Don’t make fun of her. Just because Phoebe’s got a
compassionate heart doesn’t mean you should tease her.”

Simon stepped up to the buffet, pouring himself a cup of coffee.
“You weren’t angry with him? I was a little worried that you rushed him off for
a private dressing down. I stayed up in case he needed me.”

“Why would I be mad at Jesse? Now the rest of you are idiots
and we should talk about that.” She warmed to her subject because it was so
much easier than the last one. “You treated him like he was the bad guy. Yes,
he shouldn’t have taken off like that, but he was trying to do his job. He was
supposed to identify the Caliph. He couldn’t see his face on the tape. Why
didn’t anyone try to follow him on camera? He had to have walked past a
camera.”

“I totally tried after I stopped watching Murdoch take the
stairs three at a time,” Hutch said around his third Danish. The boy really
could eat and he seemed to prefer sweets.

“Hutch did try, but al Fareed kept his face down until he
got back to his room,” Ten admitted.

“So he knew we were watching. Did anyone think to follow him
on foot? Hutch could have given you directions.” She didn’t wait because she
knew the answer. “No. You didn’t because you were all too busy making Jesse
feel like shit.”

“Baby, it’s all right.” Jesse stepped from their suite, his
hair still wet from a shower. He was in jeans and a T-shirt and no shoes, and
she wanted nothing more than to jump all over him and forget everything that
was happening. When he kissed her, she couldn’t think about anything except
him. “I knew why they were doing it. Now they know I’m here. He knows I’m here.
Even if he didn’t see me himself, he heard about the crazy American who seemed
to be looking for someone. He’ll have brought up the tapes and despite the hair
color, he’ll remember me. A master doesn’t forget his unfinished work.”

The thought chilled her. She couldn’t stand the fact that
the Caliph very likely knew Jesse was here. She got up and poured him a cup of
coffee, one cream and two sugars. The least she could do was help him get ready
for the day. He needed her support. “Come and sit down.”

“I think that’s my line.” He walked to the seat anyway.

“Not today. It’s mine today.” He could Dom her all he liked,
but she was going to take care of him today. She handed him the coffee and then
made a major decision on the spur of the moment. If she was in, she was going
to be all in, even if it was only for a few more days. She sat down on his lap,
nestling against his chest and letting her head find the crook of his neck.

She felt him sigh, a long, pleasurable sound, and then he
relaxed around her.

“Ten, what’s my damage?” This time when he spoke, any hint
of timidity was banished. “How can I fix it?”

Ten shook his head and then plowed forward. “It will help if
you don’t show your face today. Stay in here and review the tapes. Phoebe’s
right. He’s got to have screwed up at some point. We’ll catch him and you’ll
identify him and then we’ll go from there.”

 
Phoebe winced a
little as she hadn’t exactly given them all the information she’d acquired
either. “We might have a bigger problem.”

Erin’s eyes widened. “Shitballs. We didn’t mention what we
found. Damn. I’m blaming even littler Tag for that. He distracted me with his
obnoxiousness. I’ve been getting the same lecture for twelve hours.”

“Well, that’s because you won’t listen,” Theo said.

“Erin, what have you found?” Simon asked with a sigh.

Erin exchanged a look and nodded, giving Phoebe the floor.

She sat up as properly as she could while she was still on
Jesse’s lap. It was odd, but it seemed to give him comfort so she was going
with it. “The little prick who’s working for the senator had the newspaper
article from the Sanctum explosion on his desk. He seemed very interested in
Jesse’s death and he had two names written down.” This was the really bad part.
“Ian Taggart was the first one. Ian was listed in the article so I suppose he
might have gotten it from there.”

Ten had gone utterly still, as though he knew there was a
rattlesnake in the room and it was about to bite him. “Who was the other name,
Phoebe?”

“Tennessee G. Smith.”

“Shit.” Ten rose to his feet and immediately got on the
phone. “Damn it. I’m sorry. I know it’s late Charlotte, but I have to talk to
him.”

Her brother walked into his room and the door slammed shut.

“I find it interesting that he called Big Tag and not his
director,” Erin mused.

“He’s worried there’s a mole,” Jesse said. “That’s it,
right?”

“The name Tennessee Smith doesn’t appear in records,” Phoebe
replied. “Only the Agency is supposed to know his name, and even then only men
with the proper security clearance. When he works with anyone outside his
circle, he goes by the tried and true.”

“Mr. Black,” Simon supplied. “Yes, I’ve met a few of those
in my time.”

“After the problems Taggart had, he took to calling himself
Mr. White, but it’s all the same. It’s there so you don’t ever really know the
name of who you’re working with. I know you won’t believe me, but it’s as much
for your protection as his.”

“Sure it is.” Erin set her plate on the table. “So someone
figured out his name. Big whoop.”

“Ace knew his name.” Jesse’s hand smoothed up and down her
back. “We have to assume he gave the Caliph all the intelligence he had on the
team. We know he was in contact with him.”

She let his heat sink in even as she pointed out the
problem. “I can assure you that my brother has never revealed his middle name
to anyone on his team.”

Theo shook his head. “I don’t know it. I’m closer to Ten
than most.”

“Does the G stand for George?” Hutch asked.

Jesse huffed. “Obviously it stands for Grant. He considered
the man his father. Why didn’t he change it legally?”

And they teased him for being dumb. “He didn’t want a big paper
trail connecting him to me and Jamie. He’s paranoid. Until he flipped out when
he thought Tag was going to murder me, none of his team knew he had a sister. I
was just a fellow employee.”

“So we have bigger problems,” Simon mused.

“Yeah, we’ve got another damn mole and one who’s close to a
senator.” Hutch reached for a pastry. “So now we need to figure out why that
drunk boy knows Ten’s super secret middle name. He really looked more like a
George, you know.”

“So you’ll look into Albertson?” She shot Hutch a pointed
look. “Like now?”

Hutch grabbed another plate. “Fine. You know other people on
this team get time off.” When no one replied, he just shook his head. “Fine.
I’ll go wake up Chelsea and she’s going to be irritable.”

“Send her my love,” Simon said with a wave. He looked back
at Phoebe and Jesse. “And you two get ready. Phoebe has a session soon and you
need to look through the footage.”

“Simon?” Jesse started.

“I’ll go with her. I won’t let her out of my sight,” Simon
promised.

“Thank you, brother,” Jesse said with obvious relief.

So Simon was the only one he really trusted. She should have
picked someone from her own team, but that didn’t mean anything now. Jesse was
her team and he would feel better with Simon watching over her. She wasn’t going
to question him.

She turned her head up when Simon left to clean up and Erin
and Theo continued bickering over breakfast. She and Jesse were left to
themselves. “Are you okay?”

His hand came up, smoothing back her hair. “I’m as good as I
can be, thanks to you. Your brother should have fired me.”

“Not if he knows what’s good for him.”

“Phoebe, I screwed up last night. I put us all in harm’s
way.”

“You had a bad moment.”

“And that one moment could get us all killed. I don’t want
you to go out there today. I want you to come with me and we’ll go to the
airport and we won’t even go back to Dallas. We’ll go somewhere no one knows
who we are. We can just hide.”

“Jesse,” she started.

His hand came up and he put a finger to her lips. “I said
that’s what I want to do. What I’m going to do is tell you to be careful
because you’re precious to me.”

How was she supposed to resist him? The universe was cruel
and oh so kind. She leaned forward and kissed him. “I promise.”

He wrapped his arms around her and they sat that way until
it was time to go.

* * * *

Six hours later, Phoebe stood beside Simon as the session on
new ecological laws in First World countries came to a close. It was the third
session she’d sat through and the final one of the first day of the conference.
Frustration threatened to bubble over. “I didn’t see the al Fareed party at
all.”

Simon nodded shortly and leaned over to speak to her in a
quiet tone. “I didn’t either. I think we have to believe they might have left.
There’s a private meeting this evening, but Kamdar isn’t invited to it. It’s
only oil companies.”

She looked around, but found not a single familiar face
beyond Theo standing guard in the background.

They were running out of time and their prey was proving to
be elusive. The conference itself was only four days. If she couldn’t identify
the man by then, she feared they would lose him. He knew what was happening. It
would be easy for him to simply disappear into his country and start his work
all over again.

Business is always war and war is always a matter of
business.
The words had played through her head. What else had al Fareed
said? She reached up and tugged on Simon’s suit coat, stopping his forward
progress. “He was interested in Kamdar.”

Simon turned to her. “That’s not terribly surprising. He’s
rather making himself a massive target. I hear he was talking about putting
them all out of business last night. He’s an interesting fellow, but I’m afraid
these very conservative men are going to find him arrogant and obnoxious.”

“That’s what al Fareed said. Interesting. He said the king
was an interesting man with interesting friends.”

“I don’t think anyone would argue with that.” Simon looked
at his watch. “Tea’s about to be served. We should walk through before we give
up for the evening. We’ll make sure we’ve got surveillance on his suite and
that boardroom, but we can’t simply stand around and hope to catch sight of
him. It’s more important than ever that we keep our cover.”

He didn’t understand. “I think he was talking about Jesse.
It was in the way he said it. I think when he was talking about Kamdar’s
interesting friends, he was talking about Jesse and possibly Ten.”

“But Jesse hadn’t blown up when you met al Fareed.”

“That’s my point exactly. ‘Business is always war.’ He said
that and that I shouldn’t get caught in the middle. He was specifically talking
about the king of Loa Mali at that point. We never figured out who paid Eli
Nelson to blow up Kamdar’s first experiments with green energy. That explosion
should have set him back years.”