“I’m sorry,” he said. He’d known she was finishing up her studies at the time, and he imagined that discovering the last three years of her life had been nothing short of criminal must have been devastating.
She shrugged. “The State Department debriefed us, and then I basically went on the speech circuit, warning people about the stolen artifacts and the dangers of private archaeology. And how easy it is to proliferate a country’s history across borders. And demanding that the government establish some way to monitor private archaeologists. But, actually, when my speech here is done, I’m not entirely sure what I’m doing next. Harry’s taking a break from the company”—her eyes lit up—“She’s pregnant.”
He smiled. “I know. Matt told me a couple of months ago when I ran into him in Florida. Very good news.” Matt was one of David’s old EOD buddies he’d met up with again in Iraq at the same time he’d met Molly for the first time. “Anytime I get down, I remember what they went through, and figure if they can make it through hell and out the other side, then I can.” Shit. That was a little too much information to share with someone he didn’t know if he could trust. He decided to cut to the chase. “Okay. Enough about history. Let’s talk about last night. What were you trying to slip Doubrov when he got shot?”
She sat up straight. “Dr. Doubrov? I don’t know…”
“Sure you do, sweetheart. And whatever it is nearly got you shot.” He moved in for the kill. “I’ve waited a year to see you, and if you die here, because you didn’t clue me in on what you’re doing, I’m just not sure I could handle it.” True, but also, he hoped, a good enough manipulation to make her talk.
Instead she got quiet. Crap, was she going to cry? Her lower lip trembled, and he wondered what black magic he’d used to make her so emotional. He’d better dial it back down.
“David, I…” Her phone bleeped, and she grabbed it off the table like it was alive. She pressed a button. “Hell…what? I can’t hear you. Say again? What?”
CHAPTER SIX
It was Brandon Peterson at last, but he was breaking up really bad. “Don’t say…I can’t help…my flight lands in three…Trust…one. Stay away from…”
“I can’t hear you. What?” She plugged her finger in her other ear and waited, but there was just silence. She looked at her phone. The phone just showed a photo of the beach near her house. No! He had to call again. Who was she supposed to stay away from? Not one word of his fractured message had been comforting. Whatever he’d meant, she figured she’d better just stay mum until he got there. For David’s sake. She didn’t want to involve him in whatever she’d gotten herself messed up in. She’d just have to wait for Brandon to arrive and dig her out. Which was three hours, or maybe three days. Crap. Well she could maybe hold it together for three hours. If she could distract David. Everything would be better when Brandon got there. He’d always seemed on top of things during her debrief the previous year, someone she could trust. At least he was a US official, and presumably he knew what was going on. He could take over, and she could concentrate on giving her speech to some very important and influential people from governments all around the world. Butterflies danced in her stomach as she remembered the speech she had to give.
But then there was David. David, who set her body on fire, whose intensity made her heart pump pure emotion through her veins. David, who was killing her by asking for details that she couldn’t give him. She couldn’t tell him what she’d agreed to do for the State Department, because she’d been told not to. She didn’t know if she could totally trust him anyway. Sure, the sex was great, and he seemed caring, but she didn’t really know where his head was.
“Damn,” she said under her breath, finally putting her phone on the table.
David paused, and then leaned forward, elbows on the table. He opened his mouth to speak, but someone walked by speaking on a cell phone. He waited for them to pass. “I’m not sure how to tell you this, but you are in danger. The Russian government wants to question you about whatever you were slipping into his hand when he was killed. They are telling everyone that the United States is trying to pick them off one-by-one, and the Greek authorities won’t protect you from them. I’m waiting for a call from my boss to reassign me, so it could be just you and a KGB officer in a few hours.” He shrugged and leaned back.
She did not want to be alone with the Russians. Just the idea made her start breathing faster. A part of her wanted to tell him everything. Leave every part of her open to him as she had done this morning. It might be her only option. She just needed time. Time for Brandon to get there, time to think.
Was it really fair for the State Department to have put her into this position?
David realized that she’d clammed up good and proper about Doubrov, which confirmed that there was more going on than he knew. She was up to her sweet neck in something, and if she didn’t tell him about it, he couldn’t help her. The only thing he could do was to keep her safe.
David knew that he was going to have to come up with an exit strategy sooner or later. Sooner, since his objective was to get Molly out of Greece immediately after she finished her speech. He basically had just under twenty-four hours to keep her safe and away from prying eyes. He hated himself for wishing Mal were still here to help out.
After they got back to the hotel and unpacked the few belongings they had, David excused himself to get supplies for their stay. He wanted to keep her in the room until five minutes before her speech, hunkered down and out of sight. And he needed some things for that. Food, drink, and more condoms. He planned on enjoying every moment he had left with her, whether he got to the bottom of her involvement or not. He could see in her eyes that she didn’t really trust him, and maybe she was right not to. But the truth was that very few people trusted him, and he’d spent the past year trying to prove to the people around him that he could be relied on. He didn’t want to leave Molly with the impression he couldn’t be counted on. And to do that he had to be counted on.
His whole job with Barracks Security was to protect people. He never asked what their motives were, or what they were hiding from him. So why should he worry about that with Molly? He was beginning to think that maybe she was right not to tell him what was going on. If he didn’t know all her secrets, it would make it easier to leave her as she seemed to want. “No tomorrows,” she’d said.
It made for a cleaner getaway.
He hoped.
When he got back to the room, music was playing, faint strains penetrating the closed door. He double checked the door number, and inserted his key card. The lights were dim and the music, some kind of lazy jazz, swelled as the door opened.
Molly stood in front of the window. Dusk was falling, and he blinked a couple of times to make sure he was seeing what he was seeing. She had swept her short wavy hair up into some kind of updo, and was wearing a black, sparkling, floor-length dress and what must be high heels. Rimmed with smoky-gray makeup, her light eyes shone.
“I feel a little underdressed,” he said softly, so as not to disrupt the mood.
“Then we’re even. I was underdressed at the party, where I should have been wearing this.” She smiled and twirled.
The skirt of the dress peeled back into small panels of separate material, all the way up to her thighs and beyond, showing her impossibly high, and impossibly sexy sandals. Jesus. If he’d seen her in that at the cocktail party when he was so sure he’d been hallucinating he probably would have passed out.
She came to a halt, and the dress swung around her just a little, teasing with what he knew was under it. He shut the door and locked it, then swung the metal security bar over its hook.