XXVI
It was nine o’clock that night when General Ramsey came banging on the door. Jack, who at this stage of his recuperation was easily exhausted although he didn’t like to admit it, had just fallen asleep. Clara, clad in robe and nightgown charged to the villa at one of the resort’s exclusive boutiques, was in the living room-kitchen combination downstairs brewing a fresh pot of coffee. She was nervous despite the general’s marine guard, and when the knock sounded at the door she jumped.
“Not going to bed so early, were you?” General Ramsey greeted her as he barged on past. “McClain awake? That microfilm contained material that will blow his socks off!”
“He’s sleeping,” Clara said, but with a wave of the manila folder he carried in his hand General Ramsey was up the stairs. Clara, shaking her head, closed and locked the door behind him, then followed him up.
“Thought you’d want to see this right away.” Ramsey had already switched on the bedside lamp and roused Jack when Clara stepped inside the door to the bedroom. Jack looked bewildered for a moment, blinking and shaking his
head to come awake. His black hair was tousled and his chin was covered with black bristles. Looking at him, Clara felt a little ache grow in her heart. How could she ever have thought him less than handsome?
“What is it?” Levering himself up against the pillows, sounding groggy, McClain nevertheless accepted the folder from Ramsey. He couldn’t seem to get himself situated comfortably in the bed. The mobility in his right arm was severely restricted. Clara hurried over to arrange his pillows for him. He leaned forward, permitting her to do so as he opened the file.
Taking her attentions for granted already, was he? she mused with one eye on his bent black head. But then he let out a whistle, and her attention shifted to the folder in his hands.
It contained two xeroxed pages. One was a grainy black-and-white head and shoulders shot of a young man in the high-collared gymnasterka uniform of the Soviet army. He was lean, with strong features and a long, hooked nose. In the picture his hair was slicked close to his head, but it appeared to be jet black. His eyes were surprisingly pale for such dark hair, but their exact color could not be determined. A caption under the picture identified the man as Nikolai Andreivich Bukovsky. The other page was Bukovsky’s biography. Clara skimmed it rapidly.
Nikolai Bukovsky was born on August 17, 1922 in the village of Gorlovka in the eastern Ukraine. His father was a coal miner and a soldier in the Red Army. His mother was of mixed Latvian and Polish descent. He was the oldest of four children, had excellent grades in school and a passion for aviation. In June 1941, when Hitler attacked the Soviet Union by bombarding the port of Sevastopol, Bukovsky joined the Red Army. He was put into training in the
fledgling Air Force. He flew throughout the war, first in antiquated wooden planes and later in modern fighters. In October 1944 he was shot down near Warsaw by German antiaircraft guns. He was first listed as missing in action. His family was later officially notified that he was dead. He was twenty-two years old.
“Who is Nikolai Bukovsky?” Clara asked, frowning. She knew the folder must have major significance from the way General Ramsey was behaving, but she could not quite figure out what it was.
“I think,” Jack said slowly, his eyes dropping to the picture once more, “I rather think we’ve found Bigfoot.”
“My conclusion precisely,” General Ramsey agreed, beaming.
“But how can Nikolai Bukovsky be Bigfoot?” Clara still didn’t understand. “It says in the file that he was killed in 1944.”
“That’s what it says,” General Ramsey confirmed with cheerful good humor.
Jack took pity on her. “Just because someone’s official file says that they died doesn’t really mean that they did. The KGB often changes files on its agents to read the way they want them to. My guess is that Bukovsky didn’t die at all. He was recruited as an agent. He was sent to the United States as a sleeper after the war, and he’s here now. As Bigfoot.”
“But how could he be? How could a man like that have reached the kind of level in our intelligence network that Bigfoot supposedly has? Don’t they do background checks, for goodness sakes?”
“Obviously he’s taken on another identity. But now that we know what we’re looking for, it shouldn’t be too hard to find him. We need to run background checks on our list of
suspects, look for information that doesn’t hold water before 1944. Forged high school and college transcripts, for example. Phony birth certificate. No friends or family who knew him prior to 1944, that sort of thing.”
“Wouldn’t it just be easier to compare this picture with the suspects? Surely he couldn’t have changed that much.”
Both men looked at her pityingly.
“If he’s a sleeper, he’ll almost certainly have had plastic surgery, Clara,” Jack said. He was frowning, seemingly thinking of something else.
“Davey’s running those background checks now. Then we’ll start checking official facts against real life. Shouldn’t take more than a couple of days, would you think, McClain?”
Jack was still frowning. He looked distracted.
“I don’t know, General. Bigfoot is certain to have covered his tracks well. It may take more than a background check to smoke him out. But I agree that that’s the first step.”
“Yes, well, we’ll get him, one way or another. Now that we know he’s there, and where he came from, it’s just a matter of time.”
“Time’s what we don’t have too much of, General. The hit on the secretary of state will take place in less than a week. And he’s compromising security every day.”
“The secretary of state thing is all taken care of,” General Ramsey said, reclaiming the file and tucking it beneath his arm. “Simplest damned thing in the world, when you think about it. The hit will go through all right, only they won’t get the secretary. We’ve got a substitute all lined up. Same general height and build, arriving in the secretary’s limousine with the secretary’s security detail. Nobody will know the difference. If the hit goes down, they’ll be shooting the wrong man.”
“The poor man!” Clara gasped.
General Ramsey grinned at her. “He’ll be wearing bulletproof armor under his clothes. He’ll be fine. And we’ll catch the gunman in the act. If the background check doesn’t turn up anything, maybe he can lead us to Bigfoot.”
“Yeah.” McClain still sounded distracted. Ramsey frowned at him, and said heartily that he must be off. Clara accompanied him down to the door.
“Still feeling pretty rocky, isn’t he?” the general asked. Clara nodded.
“Well, he’s done his share. You keep him in bed now, you hear? No need for him to worry about anything. Between us, Nick and Davey and I have things under control.”
When Clara shut the door behind him and went back upstairs, Jack was still sitting up in bed, frowning.
“What’s the matter?” she asked, crossing to him and pulling a pillow from beneath his head so that he was lying on just one.
“Hey!” he protested her action, then settled back, brow furrowing. “I’ve got a funny feeling about this one. Like there’s something there that I know that I don’t know I know. Know what I mean?”
“Yeah, I know.” Clara was gently mocking him. He gave her a lopsided smile.
“The whole thing’s too damn easy,” he muttered.
“Quit worrying and go to sleep.” Clara leaned over to turn out the bedside lamp.
He reached over and caught her hand, drawing her down so that she was sitting on the edge of the bed beside him. His fingers traced the scalloped edge of her cream colored quilted robe.
“I like that. Where’d you get it?”
“At the Columbella. it’s a very exclusive boutique, and this robe cost a small fortune. General Ramsey told me to buy what I needed there and charge it to the villa, so I did.”
“Nice.” His hand slid beneath the neckline of the robe to stroke the silky skin just below her collarbone. Even that slight touch jolted through Clara like electricity. She caught his hand, pulled it from her skin, and held it firmly.
“Why’d you do that?” He sounded injured. Clara tried to release his hand, but his fingers twined with hers.
“You need to go to sleep.”
“Sleep with me.”
Clara’s eyes widened. “You’ve got to be kidding. With that hole in your chest?”
She could see the gleam of his teeth through the darkness as he grinned.
“My, you do have a dirty mind. I meant just sleep. You know, zzzzz?”
“Sure you did.”
“I did. To tell you the truth, I don’t like to sleep alone anymore.”
Clara looked at him suspiciously. His voice was wistful, plaintive. Not like Jack at all.
“Why not?”
“I have horrible nightmares.” It was a tremulous whisper. She wasn’t falling for
that.
If he was really having nightmares, he’d let himself be tortured on a rack before he would admit it to a soul.
“Every one of which I’m sure is well deserved!” She responded tartly and tried to stand up. He shouted with laughter and kept her beside him. As weak as he was, his grip was surprisingly strong. Clara didn’t want to struggle for fear she might hurt him, so she allowed him to hold her in place.
“I like you, Clara Winston,” he told her when his laughter had quieted to a broad grin. Then he brought her hand to his mouth and pressed his lips against her palm.
“Sleep with me. Please? Nothing else, I promise. It’s foolish to mess up two beds when we can make do with one perfectly well.”
That wasn’t much of a reason, but Clara allowed herself to be persuaded. To tell the truth, she knew she would miss him if she went to bed in the other room. She’d grown accustomed to his presence, solid and warm beside her, when she slept.
“If you’ll give me back my hand, I’ll take off my robe,” she said, capitulating. She didn’t want him to know how much she wanted to join him in that enormous bed.
“I can’t wait.” He watched her slide out of her robe, expressing lecherous approval of the pretty pink nightgown beneath. Falling to mid-calf, edged with creamy lace around the neckline and hem, it was a lovely, feminine confection that, if she were honest, she would admit she’d bought with him in mind. Curling up beside him, careful not to touch his injured side, she thought about telling him so. But she was leery of giving him an idea of the extent of the hold he was getting on her heart.
“Kiss me good night, baby,” he murmured, his good arm pulling her close. Obediently she reached up to kiss his lips. She intended it to be a soft, butterfly kiss, but he caught her mouth with his, parting her lips and kissing her with an intensity that shook her soul. When he let her go she was trembling.
“I want like hell to make love to you.” His hand was sliding over her bare arm, rubbing up and down, creating a delicious friction.
“We can’t,” she whispered weakly. Lying shivering
beside him in the dark, the imprint of his kiss on her lips, she caught herself wondering just how much his wound would hamper his activities. Maybe if she made love to him. …
A soft snore put an end to those musings. Staring at him through the darkness, Clara realized that her sexy spy was fast asleep. For a moment she felt affronted. Then she had to grin.
“I like you too, Jack McClain,” she whispered into the darkness as she curled closer to his side.
XXVII
By Wednesday of the following week the background check had turned up nothing. General Ramsey ordered Captain Spencer to probe deeper; Captain Spencer vowed to do his best. Jack seemed preoccupied, when he wasn’t closeted with General Ramsey, which was most of the time. The gears were already turning to foil the assassination of the secretary of state; they worked instead on identifying Bigfoot. But so far they’d had no luck.
“We’ll have to plant some disinformation, see where it comes out” Jack said finally.
“It could take quite a while,” Captain Spencer objected. “We’d have to feed totally separate bits of false information to every single suspect on our list. Counting the members of the Senate Intelligence Committee and the President’s aides, we’re talking about a lot of time and a lot of trouble. And there’s no guarantee that Bigfoot would even pass on the information we gave him.”
“It would have to be something urgent, something that he would have to pass on immediately.”
“They don’t know that we know that they broke our
VKR
code. We could pass that information along in a top secret memo and include a new code. A different one for each suspect Then all we’d have to do is wait and see which one was used.”
General Ramsey and Captain Spencer stared at him with something approaching awe.
“Brilliant!” Captain Spencer said with an air of congratulation. “That will work perfectly.”
“Do you know the codes?” General Ramsey inquired. “The new ones would have to be legitimate, something we could trace.”
“Oh, yeah,” McClain said grimly. “I know the codes.”
General Ramsey and Captain Spencer were closeted with Jack far into the night. They even ordered in a room service meal, so intent on what they were doing that they barely took a break to eat.
Clara ate a solitary dinner in front of the
TV.
She was lonely, damn it. Her spy was not being much in the way of a companion. She’d be glad when this whole mess was over and she could go home. Suddenly she longed for Jollymead with an intensity that brought tears to her eyes. It was hard to believe that twelve days before she had spent a peaceful day finishing up her book and had never dreamed that any of this was about to happen, in the wildest reaches of her imagination she would never come up with anyone like Jack.
The late news went off. Clara clicked off the
TV
and went upstairs. The door to the master bedroom was still firmly closed. She eyed it with disfavor and decided to take a bath. A long, relaxing soak in a hot tub was just what she needed.
She turned on the taps, added some lilac scented bath salts thoughtfully provided by the hotel, and went into the second bedroom where she kept her new clothes. At the
Columbella she’d bought only what she needed, but for someone who had possessed only a grubby pair of jeans, a torn shirt, a borrowed sweater, and a well worn silk teddy, all but the teddy liberally stained with blood, it came to a considerable number of garments. Besides the quilted robe, she had bought two nightgowns, one pink and one cream, a gorgeous raspberry lace bra and several pairs of panties in the same luscious shade, a vanilla satin teddy with a plunging vee neck and high cut thighs filled in with cascades of café au lait lace that she’d fallen in love with, three pair of pantyhose, a pair of flat sandals and a pair of heeled sandals, a gorgeous yellow halter sundress splashed with white flowers, a broad-brimmed sunhat, and two pairs of shorts and matching tee shirts. Most of the clothes she never would have bought two weeks earlier, they were too flashy, too bright, and too revealing. But she had slimmed down and firmed up wonderfully what with everything that had happened, and even she had to admit that her body looked nice. And something had happened to her inside as well. Before she had been content to hide in the shadows; now she had the confidence to walk boldly in the sunlight. To what she owed the change she wasn’t sure, but she expected it boiled down to one person: Jack.
She pulled the cream nightgown and her robe from the closet, armed herself with the creams and cosmetics she had charged at the drugstore, and went into the bathroom. The water was almost ready. Piling her blonde hair on top of her head and securing it with bobby pins, she creamed her face, rinsed it, then applied a thick layer of moisturizer. With all the abuse her skin had taken lately, it could use a deep moisturizing treatment. She would let the steam from the tub help it penetrate her skin.
Turning off the taps, she peeled off the lime green shorts
and top and the lacey raspberry underwear and stepped into the tub. Washing herself languidly, she thought what a luxury a hot bath was. She had never really appreciated it before she’d gone adventuring with her spy.
The hot water was making her sleepy. Finished washing, she lay back against the rolled porcelain lip and closed her eyes. The lilac scented steam wafted around her nostrils; she breathed it in with pleasure.
“You look like Casper the Friendly Ghost.”
The familiar but unanticipated voice made her sit bolt upright, her eyes flying open. The door had opened without her hearing it. Jack stood leaning against the doorjamb, barechested except for the white bandage, lean hips clad in a pair of pale blue cotton pajama pants. His feet were bare. Her eyes flew back up to his face. Those green eyes gleamed at her. Clara remembered the inch of thick white cream she had slathered on her face and her hands immediately flew to her cheeks. Then she saw where his eyes rested. Her bare breasts, gleaming with bath oil and water, were well above the water line. Not that the rest of her was much better covered. The water made a very inefficient shield for her modesty.
She dropped her hands from her cheeks to cross them over her breasts and glared at him.
“What are you doing in here? You’re not supposed to be out of bed.”
He grinned, his eyes shifting back up to meet hers. He knew how embarrassed she was, the devil; she could tell he did from the mocking smile that curved his lips.
“Wild Bill and Davey finally went home. I got lonesome. Then I got worried. Suppose Wild Bill’s baby green marines had slipped up on security? Suppose Rostov had crept into the villa and spirited you away? Suppose you’d guzzled too
much of the orange liquor the hotel provided and were passed out cold on the kitchen floor? I had to see.” His grin widened. “And I do see.”
“Would you get out of here?” His obvious amusement was annoying her. Embarrassment was quickly being replaced by good, healthy anger. She scowled at him.
He sniffed the air, ignoring her. “Mmm, nice! Flowers?”
“Lilacs. Jack, I’m taking a bath. Please leave!”
He cocked an eyebrow at her, his green eyes sparkling devilishly.
“I haven’t had a real bath in weeks.”
His hands were on the snap fastening of his pajama pants. Clara began to get an inkling of his meaning. Her puritan soul was horrified.
“Jack, don’t you dare! You can’t get in here! What about your bandage?” The last was an almost wailed last ditch effort to stop him. But he paid no attention, stepping out of the pajama pants and into the tub with her. Clara squeaked, drawing up her legs as he sat down.
“Quit splashing. You’ll get my bandage wet. Clara, baby, what is that mess on your face?”
Clara had been so preoccupied with the ramifications of his presence in the bathroom while she was taking a bath that she had completely forgotten the white cream on her face. Mortified, she scooped up water in her hands and splashed it off. When she had finished, blinking her eyes against the stinging combination of perfumed water and face cream, he thoughtfully passed her the small towel that had been sitting on the tiled floor beside the tub for just such a purpose. She dried her face with it, then eyed him over the top of it. The ends of the towel trailed down into the water, effectively shielding her body.
“You’re not shy, are you?” he asked in a teasing tone, tugging on the edge of the towel. Clara clutched it tighter.
“Certainly not!”
He grinned. And tugged on the towel again.
“I bet this is the first time you’ve ever had a man in the bathtub with you.”
Clara glared at him. “If it were, I certainly wouldn’t tell you!”
Jack gave a jerk and the towel flew from Clara’s hands to land in a sodden heap on the floor.
“Oh!” Her eyes were wide as they met his. She stood up abruptly. Water streamed down her body as she stepped from the tub, reaching for the towel. Jack had an excellent view of full white breasts crested with velvety pink nipples, a narrow waist, curvaceous hips and a flat belly with an adorable round navel just above a triangular nest of ash brown hair. Her legs were long and lovely and well-shaped too. And when she turned her back on him, her round little ass nearly gave him palpitations.
“Baby, you turn me on,” he said, meaning it. She had wrapped a towel around herself by that time and turned back to frown at him severely.
“You should be in bed.”
He maneuvered himself so that he was sitting back against the tapless end of the tub. Resting both arms along the side, he smiled at her. The charm of that lopsided smile took her breath.
“I told you. I got lonely. Besides, I need a bath.”
“So take one.” She turned and started to gather up her nightclothes prior to leaving the room. He watched her, his eyes gleaming over the long bare expanse of her legs.
“I could use some help,” he said plaintively. “After all, I
don’t want to get my bandage wet. Think of the complications that could lead to. I could
die.”
She turned to look at him.
“You are so full of buffalo chips, McClain, that I’m surprised you haven’t experienced spontaneous combustion by now.”
That surprised a laugh out of him. She eyed him with disfavor, then turned on her heel and marched out of the bathroom, towel still wrapped around her body and night-clothes in hand.
“Clara, wait!”
There was a tremendous splashing as he clambered out of the tub. Then Clara was horrified to hear a yell, an enormous thud—and silence.
“Jack!” She rushed back into the bathroom to find him sprawled flat on his back on the floor. His eyes were closed, his head resting near the toilet. Had he hit his head as he fell?
“Jack!” She dropped to her knees beside him, touching his shoulder, his face, her fingers slipping gently through the hair on the top and back of his head as she sought for visible signs of an injury. “Jack, say something!”
“Something,” he said, his eyes popping open even as his hands closed over her arms.
“You cheater!” Those green eyes were sparkling with laughter. “You no-good, dirty polecat! You—”
“Keep talking, sweet thing,” he murmured, still grinning as he pulled her closer. “Your words are music to my ears.”
“Filthy pig!” Clara wailed, even as he tugged her close enough so that he could catch her lips with his. He had to lift his bead from the floor to do It; his fingers were tight around her upper arms. She knew she could pull away; a sideways turn of her head would at least free her lips of his mouth.
But his warm, soft lips on hers were so tantalizing, gently seductive, promising better things to come. Clara felt her eyes closing and didn’t even fight it. She could imagine nothing she wanted more than to have him kiss her.
“You smell nice,” he whispered as his mouth left hers to trail a string of fiery kisses along her neck. Clara pressed her lips to his shoulder and had to repress a giggle.
“So do you,” she said unsteadily. The scent of lilac was intoxicating mixed with his musky aroma.
“Mmm, I could eat you up.” His mouth was trailing along her collarbone, moving lower. His hands released her arms at last to slide around her back. With a quick tug the towel parted in front, baring her breasts to him.
Clara looked down at herself, saw the soft white globes with their strawberry nipples suspended over his face, saw too the darkening of his eyes to emerald as he took in her bounty.
“God, you’re beautiful.” His voice was a husky growl. Clara felt the force of it like a tremor along her spine. Then his lips were trailing along the upper slopes of her breasts, his bristly chin moving back and forth over the swelling softness until she was gasping, on fire for him to take her nipples in his mouth. At last he did. He licked and bit and suckled her like a babe, while Clara watched him through a smoky daze. He was so dark and she so fair. …
She was kneeling beside his prone body, leaning over him. His hands slid down to knead her bottom. His hands were so large and warm and strong against her silky curves; his mouth was hot and wet and powerful on her breasts. A clamoring started deep in the pit of her belly, a quickening that grew and grew and demanded more.
Her hands were on his chest, careful not to go near the bandage as they tested his muscles, ran over each hard
sinew, tugged on the forest of curly dark hair. His chest was so wide; his belly with its arrow of black hair was so hard and flat. She loved his belly, she thought, stroking it while his hands explored her bottom and his mouth caressed her breasts.
Then his hand slid lower, slipping between her thighs from the rear, creeping and stroking along the hot womanly flesh of her until they found the opening and his fingers slid inside.
“Oh, Jack!” She was leaning over him, completely open to his mouth and his touch, her eyes closed as her body caught fire for him. Trembling, she lay against his chest, not even thinking about his wound now, or hurting him or anything else except the marvelous way he was making her feel. His fingers moved inside her. She made a little mewling sound and sank her teeth in his shoulder. Blindly her fingers reached for the swollen proof of his desire.
“Hold it!”
Clara blinked as Jack sat up, bringing her up with him.
“Jack!” Her hands clung to him; her body craved him. He couldn’t stop now!
“I’ll be damned if I’m going to make love to you on a hard bathroom floor when there’s a perfectly good bed in the next room,” he gritted, standing up. Clara knelt naked at his feet, looking up at him with dazed eyes. She wanted him. … Naked, towering over her, he was beautiful, all bronzed skin and muscles and black curling hair. Her eyes riveted on the part of him that stood out from the rest of his body. It was huge and hot looking and pulsing for her.