You Only Love Twice (38 page)

“See if you can get him to break. I don’t like this calm in
him. He’s different,” the Caliph said in Farsi. “I need the dog back.”

He didn’t fight as they tied him to the wall. There was no
point. He would need his strength.

When the first blow struck, he closed his eyes and thought
of her.

* * * *

Phoebe tried not to panic as she washed her hands, but all
of her training was going right out the door. She was supposed to stay cool and
collected, but she could feel the tears streaming down her face.

He was gone.

She looked at the clock. Morning had broken and now he’d
been missing for an hour and thirty-nine minutes.

She looked into the bathroom mirror and saw the face staring
back. Pale. Haunted. She’d seen it before. After Jamie had gone missing, this
face had stared right back at her. Widow. It didn’t matter that she and Jesse
hadn’t technically been married. She would be his widow.

A sharp knock broke the silence. “Hey, princess. You through
in there?”

Erin. God, she’d hidden in the bathroom to get away from
everyone. The minute they’d realized Jesse was missing, Ten and Simon had
jumped into action. They’d had Hutch, Chelsea, and Adam attempting to track the
helicopter. They’d managed to find a security feed that showed a man being
taken to the rooftop helipad and the chopper flying off.

His face had been down, his head covered in a keffiyeh. The
helicopter was owned by al Fareed Oil. According to all the reports, it had
been cleared to land at the hotel to take a very sick party member to the
hospital.

There was no record of it arriving at any hospital in the
UAE.

How far could they have gotten?

She couldn’t stand listening to them as they discovered
absolutely nothing. Every trail seemed to come up cold.

“Or have you just gone ahead and hanged yourself?” Erin’s
voice once again separated her from her thoughts. “Be sure to use something
sturdy. Too many people try shower curtain rods. They never hold up.”

Erin’s sarcasm was exactly what she needed to make the
morning complete. Phoebe slammed the door open. “What is your problem?”

Erin looked her over. “Good to see you still have a little
fight left.”

Phoebe started to move past her. If Erin wanted the
bathroom, she could have the fucking bathroom. Phoebe could find another place
to wait.

Wait for the news. Wait to find out if Jesse was gone
forever. How long would she wait this time? At least she’d been able to
surround herself with Jamie’s things the last time. She’d been able to sleep in
their bed, find refuge in their home.

She and Jesse had just started out. The first place they’d
made love was smoldering ruins now. How much more was going to be taken from
her?

“Or not. You going to hide in the closet this time?” Erin
followed her into the bedroom.

“Fuck off.”

Erin stopped, shaking her head as she looked Phoebe over.
“You know, I think I will go and do something else. You’re useless. I have a
friend to find. I don’t need to babysit a whiny little bitch.”

“Whiny little bitch?” Shooting Erin would make her feel
better. Infinitely better.

“If the offensively titled shoe fits, I think you should
wear it.”

“My fiancé is out there in the hands of the same man who
nearly killed him and you’re calling me names?”

“Well, you’re running away from the problem and I’m not
known for my sensitivity. I skipped that class in school. All those dudes out
there will pat you on the head and tell you to go cry and try to protect you,
but I’m going to tell you the truth.”

What arrogance. “And what’s your version of the truth,
Erin?”

“Not a version. This part is black and white with no gray.
Your brother is out there putting his job on the line for Jesse. Me and Si,
we’ll put our lives on the line for him. Theo and Hutch, they missed that
plane, too. The Agency isn’t going to give a shit that they did it for a good
reason. They’ll lose a lot because they’re willing to sacrifice for a teammate.
And what are you doing? You’re crying in the bathroom like an eighth grade girl
at a dance.”

Anger started to thrum through her system. She had to admit
that it was better, more invigorating than the utter despair she’d been
feeling. “You think I wouldn’t sacrifice for him? You think I wouldn’t do
anything to take his place?”

“I think you’re fantasizing because that’s not going to
happen. I think if you keep moping around, you’re going to hate yourself a
couple of days from now. You Agency fucks don’t have the balls for the real
game. You spent too much time behind a computer and not enough in the real
world or you would be in there helping.”

There wasn’t anything to do. They didn’t even have
permission from command to still be in this country. They had no real backup.
No resources. “You wouldn’t understand.”

Erin had her hair pulled back, making her look even more
stark than usual. “Oh, I understand. I understand entirely too well. I
understand that in your mind, he’s already dead because it’s easier to just
face it than it is to fight knowing that the outcome will likely be the same. I
understand that you already lost one husband and you feel like you’re cursed. I
totally get that he’s out there and we got nothing. No clues. No leads. We’ve
got no map and not a single direction.”

That summed up the devastating situation they found
themselves in perfectly. “So what do you want me to do?”

Erin got in her face. “I want you to suck it the fuck up,
sister, because it’s go time and there’s no crying in the bathroom until we
have a body on our hands. Until I have visual confirmation that Murdoch is
dead, he’s alive, and that means we have a chance to find him. I do not give up
and I will not allow you to. It makes us look like pussies, and we both know
pussies get a bad rap. So suck it up because I think they’re on the wrong
track.”

Phoebe refused to back down. “And what track is it you think
they should be on?”

Erin groaned and took a step back. “Fuck if I know. I’m the
muscle here. You’re supposed to be the one with all the damn brains. I like to
shoot people, not outthink them. Take two seconds to breathe and then clear
your mind. If this were just a mission, what would you do?”

For the first time since she realized Jesse was gone, she
took a deep breath and tried to banish her fear. Erin was getting to her,
reminding her that there really was a job to do and that job wasn’t to worry.
It was time to take action. “I would take stock of my resources.”

“Okay. What are our resources?”

“A couple of guns no one will resupply, four Agency trained
operatives, two otherwise trained operatives. A little cash.”

“Don’t forget the nerd squad. I assume they can wire us cash
if we need it. And Hutch has like fifteen pounds of candy, so we won’t starve.
That dude is like made of sugar. And I’ve got enough bullets for Bertha to take
out a good portion of this country. I also brought a sniper rifle, some C-4,
and a dozen flashbangs.” Erin shrugged. “A girl likes to be prepared. So we can
totally start a war if we want to.”

If Phoebe was running an Agency team, she would hire Erin in
a heartbeat. “We have to figure out where to look. We can’t just start blind.
What do we know about al Fareed?”

“One brother is still here. He’s at the conference according
to Kamdar’s guys. It’s the older brother, Ibrahim. No sign of Hani.”

“That tells us nothing except they’re trying to keep up
appearances.” Phoebe started to pace, her mind revving up. “Although if they’re
smart, Hani will make an appearance, too.”

“He’s set to give a speech this evening. It would be news if
he missed it.”

This was good. “He won’t. He’s too smart to skip that
meeting. It gives him an alibi. So they’re potentially holding Jesse somewhere
in Dubai. They’re set to go back to Saudi tomorrow afternoon. They need
everything to go according to plan. They won’t take Jesse on that plane. They
have to expect we’ll look for him.”

“I think they expect we’re all going home. At least the
Agency types are going home. Do you think the Agency knows about me and Si?”

“Probably. I don’t know. Ten wouldn’t have told them. So how
did they know?”

“Unless they have an operative here themselves.”

“Ten would have known.”

Erin stared at her, disbelief plain in her eyes. “I don’t
think Tennessee is in the Agency loop anymore. You ask me, they’re going to
take him down.”

“He still has friends there. He would have known if there
was another team working this conference.” But there were other options. “He
might not know if someone inside the Agency is feeding a civilian party
information.”

“Another mole?”

Phoebe didn’t think so. “Al Fareed had to have had a
contact. If he wasn’t Agency, then he’s likely someone connected politically.”

“I hate the spy shit. Give me someone to shoot any day of
the week.” Erin sighed as she looked around the bedroom. “You and Murdoch do it
on the couch?”

“No. Why is that any of your business?”

She sank down and spread out. “Because I do my best thinking
sitting down, but I don’t want to get gross stuff all over me.”

Finally she could get the tiniest bit of revenge. “Oh, in
that case, I totally lied to spare myself the embarrassment of admitting we did
it everywhere. Bed, bathroom, shower, against the window that now has a gaping
hole in it. And definitely on that couch.”

Erin popped back up and flipped her the finger. “You suck, Grant.”

“Yes,” she agreed. “I did that, too.” There wouldn’t be an
inch of that hotel she wouldn’t associate with Jesse.

Not an inch. Or a room. She would remember the ballroom
where she’d had to save him. It was the first time she’d really realized that
she had something to give him past a few nights in bed. He’d needed her. If
only she’d been a little quicker in getting rid of that douchebag…

The douchebag who claimed he was a spy. The best lies always
had a grain of truth.

“Where’s the senator? More importantly, where’s his aide?”

“You talking about the asshat we tagged the other night?”

She’d forgotten about him in her haste to find al Fareed.
“There’s a connection I’m not making here and it runs back further than we
thought. We’ve always known The Collective had politicians in their pockets.”

Erin strode to the bathroom, turning on the water and
scrubbing her hands. “I think I need to change clothes.”

“Are you OCD?”

She shrugged. “A little. I don’t like germs. They’re like
predators waiting to take us down. The flu is like a battle in your own body
and god, I hate mucus.”

 
“Pay attention,
soldier. Eli Nelson worked for The Collective, more specifically, he worked
against anything that might have disrupted big oil interests.” The pattern was
suddenly right there. Oh, it was circumstantial, but she’d learned that the
rules tended to apply to most mysteries, no matter what Hollywood’s
twisty-turny movies would say. The easiest path between two points was a direct
line.

She could draw that line. She just needed one little piece
of information to make it all click.

Without another word to Erin, she walked out of the bedroom.
The living area was a hum of activity. Simon and Hutch were both at laptops.
Theo was moving luggage into the hallway, and Ten was on his cell.

“We have a situation. I explained that to you, you little
piece of shit bureaucrat. Get me to the director. I don’t care what time it
is.” Ten grimaced and brought the phone back down. “They won’t put me through.”

Theo stacked their equipment. “That’s not a good sign.”

Ten turned and his face softened when he saw her. “Hey. Why
don’t you go lie down for a while, sweetheart? I’ll tell you if we find
anything.”

Erin was right. She hated when Erin was right. Ten was going
to treat her like she was made of glass. She wasn’t and she had to pull it
together because she was not losing another man she loved. She wasn’t going to
lose Jesse. Not without one hell of a fight.

She’d asked herself how long she would have to wait. She
knew the answer. She wouldn’t wait at all. This time she was stronger. This
time she would be the one searching. If she’d done anything wrong when Jamie
died, it was leaving the fight to Ten. She was stronger than that, strong
enough to search and never stop. If she was an old woman with a fucking cane,
she would still look for her husband because Jesse would endure. He would trust
her and find a way to survive.

Faith. She had to suck it the fuck up, as Erin so lovingly
put it, and have a little faith.

“I’m not going back to bed. I need to see Ace’s file. I
don’t care how the hell we get it. I’ll pay the nastiest hacker in the world to
figure out who wrote his recommendation.”

“I am the nastiest hacker in the world, thank you very
much,” a voice from her left said. “Turn me around, babe. I believe Hermione is
impugning my reputation.”

Simon turned his laptop and Chelsea Weston glared out at her
from the screen.

“You know calling me Hermione isn’t an insult,” Phoebe
explained. “She was kind of badass.”

“Yeah, well, she was also in a kid’s book, so there’s that.”

She wasn’t ever going to win with Chelsea. “What do you have
on Ace?”

Even through the screen, she could see the way Chelsea
flushed. “They’ve purged his records. I need something else. I need somewhere
to look. The Internet’s a big fucking place.”

“Politicians keep records.” She was taking a big step that
would likely blow up in her face, but she had to do it. “I need you to hack
into Senator Hank McDonald’s files.”

“Phoebe!” Ten put his phone down, staring at her in obvious
shock. “You’re talking about a United States senator.”

And why wouldn’t he be shocked? She’d been the perfect
little Agency soldier. She’d done everything she was told, with the singular
exception of ignoring the kill order on Jesse Murdoch. She played everything by
the book because that’s the way her father taught her. But this wasn’t her
father’s Agency anymore and she wasn’t going to let a man she loved die because
she couldn’t take a chance.