Conflicted (Undercover #2) (7 page)

I thought about saying
aren’t all Russian women called Natalia or Natasha?
But I was pretty sure that wouldn’t fly.

“You said her name in your sleep.” It was the first thing that popped into my head.

He frowned. “I don’t talk in my sleep.”

I thought I was going to be sick.

Then he frowned more deeply, looking uncertain. “Do I?”

Nancy had once told me that the best way to make a lie believable was to believe it yourself, to convince yourself that you were telling the truth. I imagined Luka spooning me, so close that I could feel his breath on my ear. I could easily imagine that sexy Russian accent, muttering a name. “You did last night,” I said confidently. “You kept muttering about her.”

Luka’s jaw set. I could tell he believed me, but tentatively. He seemed disturbed that I’d supposedly discovered a weakness. “What did I say?” he asked.

My mind flashed back to all those phone calls. When he’d dumped her, she’d angrily reminded him, in her precise, clipped tones, about all the wonderful things she’d done for him. The things she’d let him do to her.

“You were telling her”—I felt myself redden, which hopefully made it seem authentic –“you were telling her you were going to take her up the ass again,” I said.

And for the first time ever, Luka dropped his eyes from mine. Was that a tiny hint of a blush in his cheeks? If it was, it was gone in a second. “Okay,” he said.

Whew.

Then he frowned. “How did you understand what I was saying?”

Shit!
I hadn’t thought of that. I wasn’t supposed to understand Russian, let alone muttered Russian sleep-talking. I decided to go for broke. “You said it in English,” I said nonchalantly, digging my nails into my palms.

He frowned again. Then he seemed to remember something and nodded to himself, as if he now understood. “Ah. I see.”

“What?”

He shook his head. The matter was closed. But, now that the danger was passed, I was intrigued. “No, tell me—what?”

“Is sex thing, is not for you.” His English always got mangled when he was flustered, or excited.

“Because I’m an innocent?” I asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Yes.”

“But it’s okay for you to corrupt me when you want to?” I asked.

Now there was a gleam in his eye. “Yes.”

I kept staring at him and, eventually, he relented. “I must have been dreaming about a sex game I used to play with Natalia,” he said. “I used to speak to her in English, when we played it.”

“Why?”

“I’d be interrogating her.”

“
Interrogating—”

He smirked. “She used to pretend to be an American spy.”

My stomach did a full somersault and then plummeted into my feet. “Oh.”

He patted my shoulder. He’d cheered up, now, amused at how shocked I looked. “We will be sailing, soon. I’ll go and see about some dinner.” He nodded at the torn panties on the floor. “You find some new ones. Or just leave them off.” He kissed the top of my head and strode out the door, his shoulders almost brushing the door frame.

I sat down heavily on the edge of the bed. Now that he’d gone, the adrenaline washed through me, leaving me a trembling mess. I’d come
that close
to blowing my cover. I’d got angry and Natalia’s name had slipped out. All it had taken was for me to lose control.

And around Luka, losing control was inevitable.

It soon became clear that Luka had dispensed with all of the crew who’d normally look after the yacht and its guests on a voyage. I figured there must be a captain, somewhere, to steer the thing, but there were no cleaners, maids or deckhands. Just us, Yuri and all the guys dressed in black. From their muscle and haircuts, I presumed they were ex-army, maybe even ex-
Spetsnaz:
Russian Special Forces. They didn’t smile at me or glare at me. They treated me like luggage Luka had brought aboard.

There were huge refrigerators in the galley stocked with plenty of food, pre-prepared for easy reheating. We loaded up and, back in the stateroom, we sat at the table and feasted. There was pork with marinated apples, gravy and mushrooms and some very good red wine.

As we ate, I felt the throb of the engines. We were underway. Heading off into the night across a freezing, dark ocean, heading who-knew where. My stomach tightened at the thought. And, at the same time, I was getting into some sort of twisted relationship with Luka. I didn’t know where
that
was heading, either, and that was even more dangerous.

“No,” said Luka suddenly. “You’re not another Natalia.”

“What?” I’d zoned out for a second.

“You’re not another Natalia.”

I caught my breath. “What am I, then?”

He looked at me for a long time, then gave a wry little laugh and shook his head, muttering something I couldn’t quite hear.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

I played it back in my mind, over and over. I couldn’t be sure, but it had sounded like he’d muttered
spaseniye
.

I was his salvation.

***

After dinner, Luka said he had to make a phone call. And then there was an awkward silence.

We were too far away from shore, by now, to use a cell phone. And the ship-to-shore phone system aboard the yacht used handsets, built into the walls, so it wasn’t like Luka could go outside to make his call. He needed me to leave. But I wasn’t supposed to have any idea what he did for a living, so I had to play dumb.

“Business?” I asked.

He nodded. “I need to arrange things with my father. He’s meeting us.”

I smiled innocently but my mind was racing. His father, Vasiliy. The one who’d built the family empire before passing over control to his son. For him to emerge from the shadows, something big must be happening. Was the arms deal going down on this trip? I needed to warn Adam...and I had no way to contact him.

I couldn’t say any of this to Luka. I had to play the oblivious girlfriend. “Will
I
meet him?” I asked brightly.

“Yes,” he said. But he sighed as he said it, as if that was a whole other problem. I felt an uneasy chill pass through me, a dense fog that threatened to numb all the parts that Luka was bringing back to life. What did
that
mean? That his father wouldn’t like me? That he wouldn’t...
approve?

Stop thinking of it like a relationship.
I was undercover. I was just pretending.

“I’ll go explore,” I said. “Or maybe go to the galley and find some dessert.” I felt a flash of guilt, at that. I’d just stuffed myself with pork and gravy, but there’d been some pavlova in the refrigerator that looked divine….

He smiled at that. “Yes, get dessert,” he said. “Eat plenty. You’ll need your energy for later.”

I caught my breath again, eyeing the huge bed, and backed out of the door.

“Stay on this level,” he called after me. “Or go up top. Not down.”

I nodded quickly and smiled, then closed the door to give him privacy for his call. I leaned against the wall in the companionway for a moment, thinking. I pushed all thoughts of me and Luka out of my head and focused on the mission. If the deal was going down on this trip, I needed to get my head in the game and do my job. While he was busy making his call, I had the perfect opportunity to scout around and find out what was on board. And he’d just told me exactly where to look.

The yacht was divided quite clearly into two worlds. There were the decks where the guests were supposed to go, all polished wood and soft lighting. Then there were the lower decks, where only the crew would go.

Down there, everything was bare steel and rooms were either lit up by harsh fluorescent lights or were shadowy pits with tangles of ropes and cables to trip over. Walking quietly on metal staircases in high heels was impossible, so I slipped them off and walked in stockinged feet, wincing at the touch of the freezing metal. Luckily, most of the guards seemed to be up top. That made sense, now that we were out at sea. Anyone trying to steal our cargo or harm Luka would have to board first. They didn’t realize that they’d invited the enemy right into their midst.

Something twisted inside me, at that. A pang of guilt.
Stupid.
I wasn’t the enemy; Luka was the enemy.

In the third room I checked, I found what I was looking for. A huge pile of crates, reaching higher than my head.

I leaned closer. Russian lettering. Batch numbers, which I memorized, and the symbols for the Russian Army.

Weapons, originally meant for the military. The deal, whoever it was with, was going down on this very trip...and I had no way to warn Adam, or call for help. We were way out of cell phone range.

I heard footsteps coming from the next room. The rooms were arranged in a chain, one leading to the next, so there was no place to run but onward, into the next room. Another storeroom, this one empty. No place to hide. I could still hear the footsteps behind me, moving through the room I’d just left.
Shit!

I hurried into the next room...and stopped dead.

The walls were lined with lockers. A TV on the wall was blaring and there was an ashtray on the table, smoke still rising from a butt. It must be the break room, where the guards hung out between patrols. And now the ones right on my tail were coming back here.

And it was a dead end.

Time seemed to stretch out. My eyes searched the room for a door I’d missed, a hatch...anything that would let me escape. But there was nothing. The guards would be there in seconds, and they’d catch me. And they’d know that, to get there, I must have gone straight through the room with the weapon crates. There’d be no chance of “
Oh, I was looking for a bathroom!”
They’d take me straight to Luka, and he’d think back to how he’d found me in his room in New York, and he’d realize what I really was.

My eyes fell on the lockers.
That’s ridiculous.
If I hid there, I’d be trapped until they left.