Blindsided, page 7
part #1 of Book Two Series
“That’s what I figured.” Pete nodded. “He’s putting together a base of operations and working on logistics.”
“Shit,” Rafe muttered.
“You’re welcome. Now, tell me the plan.”
Ruby gave Rafe a wide-eyed look. “You have a plan?”
He turned a flinty gaze on her, something that was known to silence the most hardened of bastards.
But not her. Never her.
“Ka-boom!” she crowed and made a noisy, mocking sound of explosion.
He just stared at her, seeing the girl and the woman, both making his breath suddenly tight.
What the hell was he doing?
This was dangerous. Christ, they could all fucking die.
“It’s the only way,” he growled.
“If you say so,” she murmured.
“I say so.”
She only batted her lashes at him. Watching them, Pete laughed again.
Rafe ignored it. “Have you looked through the files I sent you?”
“I did.” His friend sobered. “Can’t say as I got any more out of them than you did.”
“Files?” Ruby asked.
“Jack and I had an encrypted cloud account,” Rafe told her. “If we were working on something outside of the Agency, that’s where we parked our files.”
“And he left some?”
Rafe met her gaze. “I found them after he died.”
“Can I see them?”
Challenge glittered in her gaze; she clearly expected him to tell her no. But Rafe had no problem sharing anything with her. Ruby was smart, and another set of eyes couldn’t hurt. There was every possibility she might see something both he and Pete had missed.
He opened his laptop, logged onto the site, and slid it toward her. “There isn’t much. A dossier and several articles on a Russian billionaire named Christos Sarkovski. The CV of a molecular biologist out of Liverpool, who may or may not have been Jack’s contact at the site, and the memo he left about the message. I told the Agency I wanted his phone records, but so far, they aren’t sharing.”
Pete looked at him sharply. “Those assholes are part of this?”
“That’s why Jack didn’t bring me in.”
Ruby looked up. “Because he didn’t trust you?”
“Because he didn’t trust them,” Rafe retorted, annoyed. “He knew if they were attached to the plant, it wasn’t just his job on the line. It was his life.”
“Nice bunch of folks you work for,” she muttered.
Wasn’t that the goddamn truth.
“So it might not even be the bastards behind the weapon who killed him.” Pete shook his head. “It might be your own people.”
“Yes.”
“And they know you’re looking into his death?” Pete demanded.
“They do.”
Ruby looked up at him, her amber eyes glinting.
"Despite being told to back off and toe the company line,” Pete guessed.
“Yes,” Rafe said again, shortly.
“Seriously,” Ruby said.
He arched a brow. He let his gaze drift over the delicate lines of her face, the lush width of her soft mouth. It was dangerous, allowing himself to savor her. But he knew their time was likely limited.
No matter how badly he wished different. So he didn’t deny himself.
Screw it.
She was here, a gift he had no intention of foregoing.
He had no idea how he was going to keep her safe; she was stubborn and willful and would do what she wanted to do, regardless of his opinion. She was going to argue with him, and tell him he was wrong; she was going to go toe-to-toe with him every single time.
A thought that excited the hell out of him.
But keeping her out of danger was going to prove challenging, especially considering he planned on running headlong into the fire. He might have caved and allowed her to accompany him on this doomed mission, but when it came time to act, he was going to make sure she was locked down tight.
Safe. Somehow.
Another bridge he would cross when he came to it.
“I told you not to come,” he reminded her.
“Goddamn kamikaze,” she muttered and looked back at the computer. “You were smarter when you were ten.”
Pete’s brows drew low at that.
“This belongs to me,” Rafe told her sharply. “I will do whatever it takes to put it to bed.”
She glared at him. “Should we just shoot you now?”
Color filled her cheeks; her eyes flashed, and Rafe realized abruptly that she was afraid, but not for herself.
For him.
She was afraid for him.
He stared at her, his chest growing tight. Again.
“You’re an asshole,” she told him. Then she stood up with the laptop and walked out.
Pete watched her. Then he turned to Rafe and smiled faintly. “Never thought I’d see the day.”
Rafe just looked at him.
“You finally met someone with the ability to pull you out of your own damn head.”
“I’ve known her since I was ten,” he said unwillingly, the words harsh. “I can’t let her die.”
Pete’s smile faded. “Then you’d better stick around and keep her alive.”
Eleven
Rafe’s arm was heavy atop her shoulders.
Ruby tried to look casual as they walked through the Oslo Gardermoen Airport, his hip brushing hers, his large form draped possessively around her.
He wore a knitted black hat, an aged camo jacket, a pair of battered Carhartts, and scuffed work boots. A pair of delicate silver eyeglasses perched on his nose, and behind the lenses, his mismatched eyes were hidden behind unremarkable brown contact lenses.
An over-stuffed, battered backpack was lodged over his shoulder, covered in a variety of patches. He looked much younger than he was, nondescript, a millennial out traversing the world in search of meaning.
Nothing like the intense, dangerous man Ruby knew him to be. Not unless you looked into that bland brown gaze.
There were some things you simply couldn’t hide.
She, too, looked the part. She’d taken scissors to her hair, cutting away the thick, curling mass until only a short, tousled cap remained. The green ball cap she wore was pulled down low over her eyes and matched the fitted green hoodie fleece she wore. Worn blue jeans and hiking boots completed the look. Her pack was faded yellow.
“Welcome to Oslo, Mrs. Avery.” Rafe’s mouth touched her ear. “Try to look happy to be here.”
You have a part to play, he’d told her before they’d gone through security. Play it.
But smiling and cuddling up to him had never been part of the plan.
At least, not her plan.
Damn him.
It had been hard enough sitting next to him for the almost ten-hour flight, letting him whisper into her ear; letting him touch her freely, as though it was his right. And even if they were casual touches, they were still…intimate. Possessive. Something she never would have allowed anyone else.
And she didn’t even want to look at the plain gold wedding band she wore. Or the matching one on his hand. It felt…
Too real.
“Wife,” he said, and there was something in the word that made her heart skip a painful beat. “Your husband is speaking.”
She wanted to kick him in the shin.
“Do I have to kiss you?” He nuzzled her temple.
Another skipped beat. She forced her lips to stretch into some semblance of a smile. “It will be the last thing you ever do.”
A low, rasping laugh. “Might be worth it.”
Damn him.
They exited the main terminal and stepped out into the cool, bright sunlit morning. Cars and buses slid past; a variety of people stood holding signs. One was a kid with bright red hair and pale green eyes and a sign that read “AVERY.”
Rafe frowned but steered Ruby toward him.
“Avery,” he said as they halted.
The kid eyed them up and down, then nodded shortly. He turned and walked to a battered white passenger van that was parked in the drop-off zone. Hostel Oslo was painted on its side in chipped blue letters.
He waved a hand, indicating they should climb in.
“Who sent you?” Rafe asked him, unmoving.
“Name’s Mickey.” The boy jerked a thumb at the van. “Saddle up. We ain’t got all day.”
His accent wasn’t Norwegian. Ruby thought it might be…Irish?
Rafe’s gaze narrowed. “McDougal?”
The boy only blinked at him.
“Goddamn it,” Rafe muttered.
He pulled open the van’s sliding door and scowled blackly at the man who sat in the driver’s seat.
“Blackheart,” the man said and grinned like they were long-lost friends. “Top of the mornin’ to you, old man!”
Ruby blinked at the wattage of that smile. Rakish, charming, with charisma to spare, that grin had no doubt broken many a heart. The man’s hair was darker than the boy’s, more auburn than red, and his eyes were a richer green, but there was no doubt they were related. Clad in a black cashmere turtleneck and pleated linen trousers, the man looked wealthy and sleek and civilized…until one focused on the tattoos that curled up his neck to lick his temples and the brutal scar that halved his face, slicing from the tip of his left eyebrow down to the right corner of his mouth.
Hello, Sean McDougal.
“And who’s this?” Winged brows lifted as Sean’s gaze fell on Ruby. “Och, lass, what’re you doin’ with this stick in the mud? He wouldn’t know a good time if it sucked him dry.”
A laugh caught in her throat. Rafe plucked her from her feet and shoved her into the van with an annoyed growl. She slid onto one of the seats as he tossed their packs onto the seat behind them and claimed the spot beside her. His hand landed heavily on her thigh and rested there.
She stared at it for a moment before pushing it away.
“Drive,” Rafe told Sean shortly.
“Good to see you, too, old man,” Sean told him pleasantly and started the van. Mickey climbed in beside him and put his seatbelt on.
“How was your flight?” Sean asked pleasantly.
Rafe pulled off his knit cap and ran a hand over his head. “Where are we going?”
“No niceties, then? Just straight onto the business of killin’?”
Rafe stared at him without speaking.
Sean only laughed. “Still a dank, bitter brew.” He met Ruby’s gaze and winked. “You let me know when you get a hankerin’ for somethin’ sweeter on the tongue, lass.”
The hand returned to Ruby’s thigh. Again, she pushed it away.
Rafe gave her a dark look.
“You weren’t at the funeral,” he said to Sean.
“Nay.” Sean’s smile faded. “I’ll say my farewells once those responsible are food for worms.”
A chill moved through Ruby. Pitiless words, absent the charming smile: here was the real Sean McDougal.
“We’re goin’ to make ‘em pay, ain’t we, Da?” Mickey said.
“That we are, son.” Sean reached out and ruffled Mickey’s hair. “That we are.”
“Jesus,” Rafe muttered.
Ruby looked out the window. Mountains rose around them as they drove out of the city, cloaked in ribbons of green and dusted with snow; the sky above was so blue that for a long moment, she only stared at it.
She’d seen that color in photographs, but never in real life.
The trees that rose along the road formed a dark, emerald green tunnel, and she could smell them, the same sharp evergreen scent that clung to the man beside her. Her head was buzzing with jet lag and the surreal turn her life had abruptly taken. Here she was, on the other side of the world, seated next to a man she thought she’d never see again, off on a mission that might—arguably—save the world.
Or destroy it.
Part of a crew that involved a rogue CIA agent, a grizzled old man who casually claimed to be a criminal, and an Irish bomb maker and his prepubescent son, who were busy bonding over their planned vengeance.
Sometimes she wondered if something horrible she couldn’t remember had happened —an explosion, a car accident—and she was actually in a coma somewhere, and this was all just a crazy dream.
Because at least half the time, it felt like a crazy dream.
Like now…adrenaline and exhaustion were at war within her. Rafe’s hard, warm body was too close, too comforting, but she was too tired to move. When his hand again curved around her thigh, she muttered, “Move it or lose it.”
His hold only tightened. “Get used to it.”
Somewhere deep inside of her, a flutter pulsed to life.
Damn him.
Because the deepest, most secret part of her could admit that she liked his hands on her. That it was even better than in her dreams.
The stupid, foolish, naïve dreams of a child she no longer was.
Stupid, traitorous libido.
“Wife,” he said again into her ear, and the flutter intensified. His thumb stroked the curve of her thigh.
“A role,” she protested. “And it doesn’t give you the right to grope me.”
He only laughed softly. “Honey, when I grope you, you’ll know.”
The flutter turned into a deep, steady pulse.
“Knock it off,” she told him and shoved his hand aside.
His eyes met hers, and Ruby could feel heat flush her cheeks. Awareness licked across her skin; the pulse within her intensified. The tensile strength of him against her was tantalizing.
Too tempting.
“I let you go once,” he said, his gaze no less arresting for being cloaked behind contact lenses. “I won’t do it again.”
Ruby stared at him, her heart beating with painful intensity. But before she could speak, Mickey turned and handed something to him.
A file folder.
“Jackie mailed that to me a week before he died,” Sean said. “Doesn’t make a bloody lick of sense to me, so I hope you understand it, or this is going to be a very abbreviated act of vengeance.”
Rafe took the file and opened it. A handful of newspaper clippings and several emails. A photograph of a smiling, somber blonde woman, and an address written on a brown napkin with a rooster stamped in red ink in its center.
“Trudy Gordon,” Rafe said, staring at the photo.
The molecular biologist from the cloud files, one with an impressive resume and, apparently, a very sad smile.
Ruby studied her. She hadn’t found anything in Jack’s files that Rafe hadn’t already made note of, but looking at the thin pile in the folder from Sean, realization struck and she said, “He gave you each a piece.”
Sean glanced at her. “A piece of what, lass?”
“The puzzle. One without the other is pretty much useless, but with both…” She looked at Rafe. “He wanted you to work together. He counted on it.”
“The eternal optimist,” Sean said. “That was Jackie.”
Rafe closed the file. “Parceling intel is common sense. You never put all your eggs in one basket.”
Ruby snorted. “If you say so.”
He gave her an annoyed look.
Sean only smiled. “You aren’t wrong, lass. The old man just hates me.”
Rafe said nothing, his mouth hard, his eyes like frost.
Like he’d looked last night when she’d lost her patience and her temper.
Should we just shoot you?
His acceptance—and anticipation—of his own death infuriated her. They’d only just found each other, and all he could think about was leaving her again.
The jerk.
I let you go once. I won’t do it again.
How dare he even say such a thing?
“We got us a wall of evidence goin’ back at base camp,” Mickey said then. “When we get all the intel up there, we’ll know what to do next.”
Well, at least the kid has a plan.
Another laugh caught in Ruby’s chest, but she didn’t set it free.
Because it wasn’t funny.
Not even close.
Twelve
The Hostel Oslo was a large, wooden, A-frame building that Rafe estimated had been built in the late 1960s. Hewn out of pine and cedar, the building sat deeply nestled within a thick stand of old-growth evergreen trees, its roof covered in blackened pine needles, its eaves drooping. The aged wooden siding was covered in patches of moss and bright orange lichens.
It looked, he thought, like a movie set for a horror movie.
Pale green shag carpeting stretched like a sea of pea soup across the long, narrow lobby. The walls and ceiling were paneled in spruce that had yellowed with age, and small windows lined the room, covered by the ugliest avocado-green curtains he’d ever seen. A large wooden front desk dominated the space, scarred and dented from use.
The hostel had a total of eleven rooms, five of which were bunkrooms. The remaining six were comprised of three bathrooms, the lobby, a small kitchen, and a common area.
It was empty now, and judging by its state, had been for quite some time. But Rafe had to admit—if only privately—that as a base of operations, it was ideal.
Over three hours from Oslo, just outside the small village of Moss Bo, and close to the location on the map Ruby had drawn—which made him wonder just what the hell Sean knew.
And how he knew it.
But the plumbing worked, power was supplied courtesy of a new diesel generator, and the hot spot Sean had created to give them wireless internet access worked flawlessly. When Rafe had asked how he’d managed to secure the property in such a short time, Sean had just shrugged and said, “I bought it.”
Which told him Sean was still doing very well at whatever the hell kind of shit he was into, and that this operation mattered to him.
Far more than money.
In addition to the old van, there were two motorcycles, a rusted box truck, an old Vespa, and a nondescript blue Buick sedan parked behind the building. There was also a sea kayak and a small inflatable raft.
An ancient barn sat behind the A-frame, in which Sean had assembled an entire armory of weapons, and several steel boxes lined the walls, boxes which presumably held the components required to build a bomb.
