Authors: Roxanne St. Claire
F
ROM THE CAB
window, Miranda saw a plane landing, so close she could read the word delta on the side.
Her heart jumped like the turbulence she imagined the passengers endured, jerky and sudden and fast enough to send her stomach on a free fall. Could she do it? Could she get on that machine and fly?
She hadn’t answered that question yet; she was too busy trying to come to terms with all the others.
Adrien Fletcher had used her in the worst imaginable way. He hadn’t been lying all those times he said it wasn’t about sex. It
wasn’t
. And when she told him she wouldn’t meet this woman, this Eileen Stafford, he’d upped the stakes to a life-or-death situation.
From the beginning, he’d tried to get her to stop the tour. When she wouldn’t, he’d stayed with her. Watched her. Scrutinized her body. Saved her from a gunshot…sort of. For all she knew, that whole thing could have been staged by some secret organization just to make her trust him or believe him.
But could she believe him? Only one person knew the truth. Well, two. Mom and Dad had to know.
There had to be another reason.
The Armageddon Movement
.
What if he really was part of them, and this preposterous story was just a way to make her quit? Right now, with her head spinning and her heart reeling, anything seemed possible.
Miranda, Miranda, please don’t hate me
.
She closed her eyes, and when she opened them, her gaze landed on the sign for National Car Rental. Oh, wouldn’t that be the easy way out? She could drive anywhere.
She could get on Highway 10 and head due east to Atlanta. Or she could head out for Phoenix and continue on her tour. What difference would a few more days make? It wasn’t as if she was dying to have this conversation with her mother.
Better yet, she could drive down to Mexico, see ruins, and get lost in the ancient culture that comforted her. Or San Francisco. Or Alaska or Peru or
anywhere
but Terminal 2 at the San Diego International Airport.
But none of those trips could erase the impact of Adrien Fletcher’s words. Or the rotten way she’d left him. Or the fact that now she was contemplating running—no,
flying
—home to Mommy.
How long would she let fear dictate her every move?
“Delta, right?” the driver asked.
Delta flew into Atlanta a million times a day. She could leave here and in a few hours be in the comfort and safety of her family. Home to Dee and Carl Lang of Marietta, Georgia.
Oh, Lord above, were they even her parents?
Adrien Fletcher had planted a seed that might never germinate but would always be there under the surface, torturing her.
“Ma’am? Delta Airlines?”
She dragged herself back to the moment, to this decision. “Yes, I’m flying Delta.” No words could sound more foreign coming from her mouth.
Except maybe
Are you really my mother
?
She toyed with the corner of the bandage Adrien had so lovingly wrapped around her last night. In between hours of sex and kisses and cooing Australian, he’d bandaged her as neatly as a surgeon.
Was that the act of a man out to ruin her?
Then the cab pulled to the curb, and she felt like a spectator, watching someone else wait in line at a counter, talk to an agent, purchase a ticket, show identification, check a bag, use the ladies’ room, and sit in a bustling place where a million trillion zillion
normal
people went every day.
For an hour in the same navy-blue leather seat, she sat motionless. Mothers with babies, businessmen with laptops, teenagers with iPods, families and grandmothers and flight attendants streamed by, rushing to their planes or their luggage, on phones or drinking or eating. Laughing, talking, and normal.
Her heart was remarkably calm, her palms surprisingly dry, her stomach amazingly settled.
Until the announcement that Flight 516 to Atlanta was ready for boarding.
“Now boarding zones one through four,” a friendly, efficient voice said. “If you are seated in zones one through four, please proceed to Gate A-9 for boarding.”
A group of travelers stood, checked paperwork, admonished children. Miranda flipped the worry-worn corner of her boarding pass. Zone seven.
Heat and dread prickled at her neck, down her arms. She sucked in a slow, even breath.
A million people did this every day. No one died. No one fell out of the sky. No one—
“If you are in zone five, please proceed to the gate.”
How many of those millions got on the plane having just found out they might be adopted? Or that the man they’d lusted after and slept with the night before could be a traitor sent to wreck everything? Or that—
“Now boarding zone six. If you are on Flight 516 to Atlanta, Georgia, and seated in zones one through six, you may proceed to the gate.”
Breathe, Miranda. You can do this
.
Well, at least Adrien had forced her to face her worst fear. She could thank him for that. And those five mind-melting orgasms last night. And all that laughter, and tenderness and byu-ee-ful—
“I’ll fly with you.”
She gasped, opening her eyes to see him on one knee in front of her.
“I will, luv. I’ll fly with you and hold your hand and make you feel safe and get rid of every bloody fear you’ve ever had.” He squeezed her hands gently and fluttered a boarding pass.
All she could do was stare into his steady, sincere golden-brown eyes and drink in the sight of wind-blown hair and a heaving chest that had to have been caused by one hell of a run through the airport.
“Miranda, I’ve found the Armageddon people, and I know why they’re doing what they’re doing, and I want you to have the satisfaction of taking them down with me.”
He found them? “How did you find me?”
He tapped her phone, tucked into the corner pocket of her handbag. “That locator system. I dropped a chip into your phone the other day.”
“You
what?
”
“Please,” he said, placing his finger on her lips. “Give me two minutes to tell you this, and then you decide what to do.”
She was vaguely aware of people staring, a few “ahhhs” and some smiles. Obviously, they misunderstood the man on his knee pleading his case before the woman boarding the plane.
He pulled her closer, as though he could physically bend her to his will. “It’s Blake,” he whispered urgently. “You’ve gotten in the way of a money-making scheme.”
She searched his face, waiting for more.
“He—and I’d bet a million quid his shaman wife—are running a cultlike thing to sell 2012 survival kits. They’re probably siphoning credit-card numbers off the Internet, and we’re checking on that now. Miranda,
that’s
who wants want to stop you and your book. It’s too easily understood and accepted by the very people they are trying to fool. You’re educating the gullible people they’re using to bilk millions. You’re in the way of their scam.”
She just stared at him. “After what you told me this morning, you expect me to believe this?”
“Yes.”
The tinny voice on the loudspeaker broke the silence between them. “If you are holding boarding passes for Delta Flight 516 for Atlanta, Georgia, you may now board with any zone number.”
He gripped her tighter. “Miranda, I talked to Jack Culver. He was trying so desperately to call me because he found additional information.” As her eyes narrowed in distrust, he squeezed her legs, willing her to hear him out. “Eileen Stafford’s child is someone else. He was shown a birth document that proves it’s not you.”
“I’m not adopted?”
“You’re not Eileen Stafford’s child—he found that person. But…you are one of the Sapphire Trail babies.”
She dropped back into the chair, staring. “I just don’t know what to believe anymore.”
“Believe this: I really do care about you. I want to help you. I want to nail any and everyone in the Armageddon Movement and help you succeed. I want to be with you like we were last night a thousand more times. I want to take you on your first flight, and teach you the wonders of travel and a long-distance or shortdistance or no-distance relationship.” His eyes were bright with determination, his hands were clenched, and his words were tearing her apart.
Her whole body wanted to reach out to him, to believe him, to hold him. She ached for it but held back, her head spinning.
“Please,” he whispered, closing his hands over her wrists. “Don’t go home yet. When you do, if you do, I want to go with you. I’ve caused the misery, and I want to help you through it. Please, stay with me. I’m going up to Canopy. I’ll have backup support, and we’re going to get to the bottom of the Armageddon Movement and put them out of business. Let’s do this together. Please. When it’s settled, and you’re ready, I’ll take you to Atlanta or wherever you want to go. Oh, bloody hell.” His voice cracked.
Cracked
. “I don’t want to lose you.”
Her heart felt full, and utterly certain. She didn’t want to lose him, either.
“All right, Adrien.” She stood and he did the same, holding her close. “Let’s get the bastards.”
“Ohh. The juice is loose.”
Lucy ignored the sexy voice, refusing to let that familiar low laugh pull her out of alignment of the warrior three pose, her back leg steady and straight, her entire torso perfectly perpendicular to the ground. She held the yoga position an extra thirty seconds before she bent into a downward dog, then folded onto the mat, rolled over, and finally faced the only man who could get away with calling her Juicy Miss Lucy.
Dan Gallagher ambled into her workout studio in the basement of her estate, and lounged on a weight-lifting bench. He grinned that lopsided, careless smile that made women swoon just before he seduced them, and criminals wet their pants just before he shot them. He tossed back a lock of sun-kissed hair, his green eyes twinkling.
“Good morning, Luce. Hope I’m not too late for exercise class.”
She laughed. How could she not? Everything about Dan was light, bright, fun. Sharp and brilliant and alive, he was levity and life. The polar opposite of the man she’d been thinking about for the last half-hour: Jack Culver. And in many ways, the opposite of her.
Which is what made him her perfect right-hand man and the closest thing Lucy had to a best friend.
She crossed her legs and extended her arms to each side. “Exercise class is over.”
He winked. “I’ll just watch you stretch, then.”
Only Dan could flirt with her like that.
She stood, dabbing her face with a towel. “Fletch is waiting for our call.”
“Good. I just got off the phone with some friends at the feds, and I have plenty to tell you both.” He gestured toward the door and let her pass first, holding her gaze until she was in front of him.
Upstairs, they headed into the Bullet Catchers War Room adjacent to Lucy’s library, the one room in the Hudson River Valley manor where English country style was sacrificed for technology and the tools of their trade. Sage Valentine, the head of Bullet Catcher Research and Investigations, greeted them with one raised finger as she faced a monitor and pushed an earpiece to her ear to listen to someone on the other side.
Since Lucy had scheduled a phone meeting, the flat-panel conferencing screen was black, but the bank of computers and the half-dozen plasma display panels were blinking and alive. As she took her seat at the head of the table, Lucy scanned the Bullet Catcher locator screen, giving her an instant, worldwide snapshot of the whereabouts of every person on her staff.
Alex Romero was in Colombia, undercover with Jazz Adams. Chase Ryker was in Colorado Springs on a government assignment. Four more were detailed in Europe, two others in Asia.
Sage ended her call and spun around to face the table. “Hey, Dan.”
“Hello, Sage.” He nodded toward the locator screen. “How’s Johnny liking that stint with the ambassador in Salzburg?”
Her brown-green eyes sparkled at the mention of her live-in boyfriend. “He says the food’s good, but he’s ready to come back.”
Lucy shared a look with the niece she’d once lost but now spent every day with. “He wants to make us all Wiener schnitzel.”
Before he took a seat, Dan playfully nudged Sage. “He wants to make this one pregnant.”
“So he threatens.” Sage tugged at her long blond ponytail and stood, winking at Lucy. “We’re negotiating a nursery on-site here at Chez Sharpe, right, Luce?”
“Whatever it takes to keep you from taking maternity leave,” Lucy said, still scanning the locator board. “Oh, there’s Fletch,” she said, spotting his code on the screen. “On his way to Santa Barbara. Who’s with him?”
“Unidentified third party,” Sage responded. “I’ve been tracking that signal since yesterday. I thought it was his principal, but they were separated for some time but back together now.”
How long would it take for Dan to put the clues together and come up with Jack Culver? Knowing Dan, not long.
He studied the screen as well. “I could have sworn you said he wanted to take some time off and head home, Luce.”
“He did,” Lucy replied. “He got distracted.”
“Blonde, brunette, or a rugby tournament?”
“He’s doing a favor for a friend.”
Dan’s green eyes flashed with curiosity. Not unusual, since she routinely kept him in the loop on all the assignments, in an informal backup capacity.
“I’ve got him on the line,” Sage announced.
The communication unit on the table lit red, and Lucy pressed the button to turn on the speakers. “Hello, Fletch.”
“G’day Luce. Sage.”
“Dan is here as well,” Lucy told him. That ought to keep Fletch from mentioning why he was in Southern California. “How far are you from Canopy, Fletch?”
“Can you read my locator?”
She looked at the screen. “We can, but the entire compound doesn’t show up on the map.”
“I’ve found some dark green on satellite,” Sage interjected. “But it’s so densely wooded that it’s really impossible to see the place. I’m setting up an infrared filter, but that’ll take a few minutes.”
“I should be there soon,” Fletch said.