Protector (6 page)

Chuck drummed his fingers against the coffee mug cradled in his hands and wondered how long Hebert would maintain the staring contest across the waiting room. Not that this looked like any waiting room he’d ever seen.

God, he hated hospitals. Even the scent of Italian java steaming upward couldn’t disguise the antiseptic scent.

He’d spent over six months having his body pinned back together again. There hadn’t been enough morphine to kill the pain. And the stark military facilities had been far from “homey” with steel-framed industrial furniture and medical personnel in uniform. They’d patched him up. He’d even had his head shrunk by a Freud wannabe in camo.

After all he’d been through, there wasn’t much Hebert Benoit— parked in some kind of antique throne— could do to intimidate him. The old dude was worse than some father on a front porch with a shotgun. Of course, knowing that Benoit served as Taylor’s unofficial bodyguard added an
extra level of danger beyond the mundane threat of a Remington double barrel.

Benoit cracked the knuckles of one fist against his other palm. Chuck kept his hands loose on the arms of his chair and counted the many ways he could disable the man, using only his pinky. Benoit reached into a leather bag on the floor by the carved mahogany chair legs.

Chuck tensed.

Okay, he might be willing to use both hands, if need be. Or even his Beretta tucked coolly against his back.

Benoit pulled out a brown paper sack. Chuck scooted to the edge of his seat. Was Jolynn worth the added risk?

An image of her chagrined look after she’d fixed the Maserati flashed through his head.

He caught himself up short. She wasn’t his reason for being here. The investigation, putting his past to rest, and most important of all, stopping a possible terrorist attack— that’s why he was hanging out in a five-star luxury rehab with an overprotective henchman.

Chuck zeroed in on the brown paper bag as Hebert slid his hand inside and withdrew, slowly, deliberately, a container of vanilla bean yogurt and a Chinotto— a local fruity cola.

Touché
. Chuck yielded the point to Mr. Benoit, toasting him with a lift of his coffee mug.

Benoit twisted his bottle open, the hissing of the vacuum seal resounding in the late-night silence. “I’d be mighty upset if anyone hurt that little girl.”

“I don’t doubt it for a minute.” Chuck took a much-needed sip of his coffee, brought to him minutes ago by one of the countless people on staff here who moved about with a silence the CIA would do well to study.

Setting the mug beside the one he’d gotten for Jolynn, he leaned back, crossing his feet at the ankles, watching, assessing, cataloging details to use later if the opportunity came for a peek inside the old mobster’s mind.

The door from Taylor’s suite swung wide, banging hard against the wall. Chuck shot to his feet a second ahead of Benoit. Reflexively, Chuck grabbed for the Beretta tucked in his waistband under his shirt, ditching his mug on the end table with a slosh. The old guy’s yogurt and drink clattered to the floor.

Jolynn blasted into the waiting area. Benoit’s shoulders slumped and he knelt to clean up his snack splattered on the floor. He reached for his napkins, only to stiffen again the minute Jolynn smacked him on the back of the head.

“You lied to me.” Jolynn circled, whacking her hands against Benoit’s barrel chest. “I can’t believe I was such an idiot. I thought you were the one person I could trust, and you lied.”

Standing, Benoit scowled. “Now, watch your mouth, little girl.”

Only moments prior, the muscular mobster had a seasoned dark ops aviator on the edge of his seat. Now Hebert held his hands in front of him, fielding blows like a boxer until he managed to grasp Jolynn’s wrists.

No doubt, she had spunk.

And he wasn’t an aviator anymore.

Without warning, the energy radiating from her evaporated. Jolynn sagged like a limp rag doll hanging from the clutches of a dejected child. “Bear, why did you tell me he asked for me?”

Her voice sounded small in contrast to the dynamic woman who’d blasted through that door. Viewing the
unguarded moment between the two, he felt more voyeuristic than during any surveillance operation in his aircraft.

The older man avoided her eyes. “Because he did ask.”

“Try again.” Her accusing gaze narrowed.

Benoit slid an arm around her shoulders. “I know he wants you here. He just doesn’t know how to say it.”

So Taylor hadn’t asked for his daughter. What had her father said in there to elicit such a strong reaction? Worth checking out once he paid Berg a visit in the computer hub and reviewed the tapes picked up with the chip in Jolynn’s bag.

She slid her wrists free and hitched her purse higher onto her shoulder. “Come on, Tomas. Let’s blow this pop stand.”

With a toss of her auburn hair, she strode down the corridor.

Chuck scooped up his backpack, feeling it rest just over his gun. He nodded once to Benoit and turned away.

“Tomas.”

Chuck glanced back at Taylor’s bodyguard.

“You watch out for her, boy.”

Not what he’d expected from the old guy, but he nodded again, then wondered when the two of them had gone from being adversaries to allies.

Chuck jogged down the corridor, too late to catch the elevator. He took the stairs double time. In the lobby, he spotted her bright yellow shirt outside the glass doors and pinned his eyes on her. He needed to hang tough. Gather information. See her safely to the ship, then get back to work.

Her long legs raced across the parking lot until she stopped by the Maserati. She crossed her arms on top of the
Fortuna
’s car, resting her forehead in the crook of her elbow. A sigh shuddered through her.

That simple sigh kicked him in the gut harder than any implied threat from Hebert Benoit.

Steam radiated off the asphalt with stored heat from the afternoon sun, relieved only by the kick of the ever-present sea breeze. Chuck looked at Jolynn and felt an answering heat inside himself. What the hell was it about this woman?

He swiped a forearm over his brow and waited for her to speak, using the moment to scan the area. Work used to offer him distance, control. Not tonight.

Jolynn lifted her head and extended her arm. The key fob dangled from her fingers. He stared into her glistening green eyes, then flipped his palm up, snagging the controls just as she dropped it. “Where do you want to go, Red?”

“Drive, Tomas. Top down and as fast as she’ll go.”

Without another word between them, he opened the door and secured the convertible top for an open-air ride. Thank God she was pretty much out of it, giving him a chance to check the car for further tampering.

He slid into the driver’s side, and the seat embraced him with a seductive blend of expensive leather and Jolynn. Somebody could market that scent for a mint. Chuck barely suppressed his groan at being behind the wheel of a car any man would give his right arm to drive.

Beside him sat a woman most men would give both arms to spend one night with. But he wasn’t here for sex and nei ther was she.

He snapped his seat belt. The defiant lift of Jolynn’s chin, he expected. The quiver, however, sucker punched him. Chuck reached across to secure her seat belt with a soft click. A quick flash of gratitude tipped at the corners of her mouth, making him feel like a fraud.

Hell, he was a fraud. Was his first instinct right? That he’d lost his edge, that he’d left it somewhere in a dank
torture cell back in Turkey? If so, Berg, the colonel… Jolynn would be the ones to pay the price.

If she was as innocent as he thought, but that brought him right back to thinking his instincts were in serious doubt these days.

Regardless, his best course of action was to spend more time with her, and a drive to blow off steam sounded like a damn good idea.

Checking for tails, Chuck guided the convertible through Genoa on a deliberately convoluted route. Once confident they weren’t being followed, he turned onto a two-lane highway snaking along the Mediterranean shore and edged the superbly engineered car toward the speed limit.

God, but he appreciated a well-tuned engine, whether it powered a car, or military machinery. He’d been a part of testing upgrades of everything from unmanned aerial vehicles to a hypersonic jet.

The power surged through his hands on the wheel, his foot on the gas. He’d been so long out of an airplane, his body soaked up the rush. The car wasn’t quite the same as being airborne, but the rush of power and speed was amazing all the same as he damn near flew past the trees, a crumbled castle ruins, a restored villa. The past and present merged the farther he drove.

Jolynn’s yelp of exultation carried on the wind. She ripped the tie from her ponytail and tossed it into the blurring shoreline. Her hair trailed like a fiery banner in the wind.

For the first time in the two years since he’d been taken captive, he was flying. The howl in his gut echoed with the roaring wind.

He floored it and left Genoa behind.

*  *  *

Cupping a forties-era microphone, Livia Cicero submerged herself into the schmaltziness of “Bewitched, Bothered, Bewildered.” The stars outside the glass ceiling gave the whole night a vintage paper moon feeling she soaked up in her soul so parched for artistic outlet.

Her voice wasn’t what it once was, not since smoke inhalation had wreaked havoc on her vocal cords and ended her rising career. But she was alive and otherwise healthy. These days she sang for herself, something she could live with most of the time.

Although it felt damn good right now to use her voice again for a higher purpose, something beyond just herself.

Over the past months singing on the
Fortuna
, she’d noticed a number of repeat travelers. Again. And again. Suspiciously so until it made her think of how the terrorists that pulled off the 9/ 11 attacks had reportedly made multiple practice runs.

Her government had logged her report, but something in their distracted, overworked eyes didn’t reassure her. Without thinking, she’d run straight to the only man who’d ever broken her heart. Damned ironic she still trusted him more than any human being on earth.

Colonel Rex Scanlon.

He lounged in a velvet chair with silver piping that matched the threads at his temples. He wore a gray suit tonight rather than his uniform, but his military bearing was unmistakable. His long lean body, his intense stare still turned her inside out and he’d never done more than kissed her. He still loved his dead wife. Livia understood that all too well, yet she still wanted him.

But not enough to play second fiddle.

There hadn’t been any real choice for her but to reach out for his help. Much about his career was secret to her, but she’d believed he had connections. Important ones. Apparently she’d been right because the next thing she knew he’d followed up her lead and here they were— the colonel and the team members she knew from the op in Turkey where they’d met, only to spend more time together once she relocated to the States for a while.

She’d agreed to assist the military, her country and the United States working together on something she could not know in detail. She would work with him and two others she’d met during a USO tour. She felt certain other servicemen and women were undercover on this ship, but some things in life were better unknown.

Her heart would certainly hurt less if she’d never known Rex.

The last note melted on her tongue, mellow and with a slight rasp that hadn’t been there before. Applause rippled through the crowd already half-drunk on the excitement of their cruise departure in the morning. After an afternoon of foxtrot lessons on deck five and limbo around the main pool, the partying passengers would have cheered for a karaoke singer.

Standing, Rex clapped steadily, his eyes still on her intently as he walked toward the stage with long lean strides. As she approached the top step off the stage, he was already there to meet her like an attentive boyfriend, extending his hand to help her descend.

Her galloping heart had to remember it was all an act.

“Bravo,” he said simply. “An escort to your room?”

“Grazie.”
She fit her hand into his and he clasped her with strength, stability, all the things she’d never had in her life.

Inching up the hem of her red satin gown, she took the steps slowly, careful not to let her bad leg buckle beneath her. The limp was another souvenir from the explosion that damaged her voice. She’d minimized the limp with rehab, and could make it all but indistinct if she didn’t rush. But still it served as a daily reminder of the attack during her USO tour, when she’d met Rex.

As if she could forget him. And now they had to pretend to be lovers for the next eight days.

Nearby, the couples who’d been slow dancing to her song were only just beginning to break apart, their martini-fueled reaction times slowed by the Mediterranean heat. An Eastern European man in an expensive suit lifted his glass in a private toast to her behind Rex’s back. She’d known better than to date fans, even on the few occasions she’d been interested. With Rex beside her, she scarcely saw anyone else.

Tucking her hand around his elbow, she walked slowly alongside him away from the stage. Since calling him in a panic about her suspicions, she hadn’t been alone with him. Until now.

She stared up at his warm chocolate eyes melting over her until her skin overheated even in a strapless gown, air conditioner blasting. “What happened to your glasses?”

He thumbed the bridge of his nose where the black horn-rimmed glasses usually rested. “I took your advice and got contacts.”

Idle conversation felt strange, drawing too much attention to how they’d left things between them. Rex was willing to pursue an affair. She wasn’t willing to shadow dance with the memory of his dead wife.

Voices swelled in the hall, an aging contessa coming into view holding the arm of her arm candy, a much
younger man who looked like he’d just stepped out of a Versace photo shoot. Rex’s forehead furrowed as he studied the mismatched couple.