Stolen Vengeance: Slye Temp book 6 (30 page)

“Your hounding doesn’t bother me.”

“Then why won’t you tell me the truth about when you left?”

“I did. I told you I had to go undercover to get Garcia.”

“Now, tell me the rest of the truth you’ve been holding back. I’m talking to you about Smith and I’ll give you all I have
if
you will do the same.”

“Blackmail?” His mouth twisted with a wry quirk.

She shrugged. “Call it what you like. It’s the only currency I’ve got for trade right now. You’re not going to throw me off track like you usually do. It’s just me, you, and the ocean. No distractions.”

He sat there silent for a moment then said, “You were enthusiastic about your research on Giuseppe.”

“I was trying to help,” she said defensively.

His fingers covered hers again, where she’d dropped her hand onto the blanket between them. “I know, babe. You never failed to amaze me, but this time you dug too deep and went for things I hadn’t specifically asked for. By the time I realized what had happened, Garcia had been alerted that someone was tracking down Giuseppe’s family members. That was an open path to Garcia. I realized it as soon as I reviewed the extra information you’d dug up. I connected the dots.”

“The night we had the fight.”

“Yep. I was blind with worry over how to keep you away from Garcia. I knew you’d pitch a fit about going into the WITSEC program and I couldn’t trust that you’d stay in it, so the only other choice was to stop Garcia from coming after you. I had constant surveillance on him. It was a matter of setting up an attack on him and taking a bullet.”

“You risked getting
killed
to get inside his organization? Were you crazy?”

~*~*~*~

Dingo thought on that. Was he crazy? When it came to Valene, yes. He told her, “You have to be a half bubble off to do what I do.”

“What happened with Garcia, that was ... all my fault.”

He turned to her. “No. This is exactly why I didn’t tell you. I knew you’d try to take the blame. This was all my doing. I’m the one in this business, not you. I made that choice.”

She wheeled around on her knees to face him and leaned forward, putting her hands on his shoulders. “I would have done anything to have prevented that. Even going in the WITSEC.”

“Your dad would have had to go in, too, and he might not have fared as well. And you would never be happy in that life. I couldn’t have done it to you.”

“Would you have done the same for another woman?”

No. He’d have put anyone else in WITSEC. “I haven’t had to make that choice.”

“You should be a damn politician the way you avoid giving a straight answer. Why did you do it?”

He felt walls closing in on him, forcing him to admit something he couldn’t. If he told her it was because he couldn’t live knowing she was either in mortal danger or miserably unhappy, she’d ask for more. For things he couldn’t give. “Let it go, Val. Please.”

She dropped her head down close enough for their noses to almost touch. “When are you going to admit there’s more between us than casual friendship? Tell you what. I’ll start. I love you and I’ll do whatever it takes to keep
you
safe. I love you enough for both of us so you don’t have to say anything. But you need to know that I’m not letting you just walk out of my life again.”

What the hell could he say to that?

She loved him.

She wanted to keep him.

She was just as insane as he was.

The words were inside of him, pounding to get out and tell her how much she meant to him, but saying them then abandoning her would be worse than last time. As soon as he got Rikker out of the picture, Dingo had to go to ground and figure out what tomorrow brought.

Whatever it was would not include Valene.

Just admitting that to himself was squeezing the life out of his heart.

He wanted her. More than anything he’d ever wanted.

And he believed her when she said she wouldn’t let him go.

This sucked. He finally had someone who really wanted him and he couldn’t have her.

She kissed his forehead and cheeks. “I don’t know why you think you’re destined to go through life alone, but you’re not. I will fight to keep you. I will never let you go. If you leave this time, I’ll find you.”

His throat was too tight to get a word out so he kissed her back and color came into his dreary world again. Holding Valene was as close to perfect as a man could get.

She reached down and found his erection.

Okay, there might be one more place just as perfect and that was inside Valene.

Clothes came off in a rush and he helped her get her panties down. Then he scooted out of his jeans, the whole time keeping his mouth on her.

“Hurry up,” she ordered.

Pure Valene. Demanding and eager. He loved that about her. Loved
her
.

Those words struck him as hard as lightning. He’d fought to keep that inside, not daring to let the words creep up into his world, because once they did he’d never get them stowed away again.

Her fingers curled around his dick the minute he freed the happy part.

A primal groan crawled up his throat.

He filled his hands with her breasts, brushing both nipples at once and she tensed.

“I need you inside me.”

“Say that again and you’ll miss the best part.”

She laughed and brushed herself across the tip of his penis. “Then hurry the hell up. Screw it...”

She impaled herself and Dingo shouted, locking every muscle to keep from losing control. “Don’t. Move.”

“I keep trying to tell you that it works better if I do.”

“Need a condom.”

“I’m on the pill and ... I trust you. No more argument.”

He growled, chuckling at the end. It was that or grind his teeth over the pain of holding back. “What about foreplay?”

“What about next time?” she countered then lifted up. “Ready or not, here I come.”

And she did... right before he did.

Chapter 37

Loose hair tickled her nose.

Valene blew it away and it came back. She woke up slowly. She was stretched over the top of a warm, muscular chest. Dingo had an arm wrapped protectively around her back. He’d covered them up at some point with half the blanket.

The hair grazed her nose again. She swatted and hit his hand. “Stop it.”

He laughed softly. “Time to get up. We’ve got a little over an hour to daylight. Need to be out of here while it’s still dark.”

“Good, because I need coffee.”  She pushed up and smiled at him.

He said, “Hello, beautiful.”

“You are definitely a keeper.”

His grin faded.

What had she said? She brushed her fingertips over his scruffy cheek. “What?”

“I’ve just never heard that.”

She tried to wrap her head around what he was saying. She asked, “Where’s your family?”

“My mum’s dead.”

That
was it for his family? “I’m sorry.”

He made an attempt at shrugging, which was not easy when lying down. “Long time ago.”

“How old were you?”

“Eight.”

“No dad?”

His chest rose and fell with each deep inhale and exhale. “The man who got my mum pregnant left her in the outback as soon as he realized she was knocked up. She met a man when I was six. He moved us to New York. Mum didn’t adjust well. Didn’t understand the city and started thinking my stepdad was being unfaithful. Don’t know if he was or not, but she thought so and went downhill. Lost weight. Cried all the time. I came home from school one day and my stepdad was the only one there. He said she’d died. Taken pills. Then he told me he wasn’t cut out to be a father and I wasn’t his kid. He had a bag packed for me and dropped me at the children’s home.”

She was too stunned to speak at first, but she got her voice back quickly. “What kind of a son of a bitch does that to a kid?”

He stroked his hand over her hair with a soothing touch. “It was a long time ago, babe.”

“I don’t care. My dad kept me when I was a lot younger than you and he’d lost his arm.”

Dingo frowned. “What about your mum?”

“She fell out of love with my dad when he became damaged goods. Her family’s a bunch of socialites in the Northeast. Big money. She got her divorce, then packed up my brother and moved back.”

Dingo’s fingers stopped on her hair. “Why didn’t she take you?”

“Even though I was only five, my father asked me where I’d rather be and I said with him. I had no idea just how hard it was going to be on him to take care of a little girl alone, but he never let on. When I was older, I looked back and realized what all he did. My mom sends cards and gifts. I don’t really care if I ever see her again, or my older brother, because neither one even called when dad got sick. What he did for me? That was true love. Not words. Not gifts. Someone who showed up every day no matter what.”

His fingers slid over her hair again, back and forth, in a rhythm. “He must be some kind of man to have raised a woman like you.”

“He is.” She couldn’t hide the haunted sound in her voice. “I’m just trying to keep him alive.”

“I know.” 

To keep from thinking about failing her dad if Smith really was the criminal Dingo had described, Valene said, “We never finished talking last night. By the way, thank you for trusting me to share what you did. I won’t betray that trust.”

“I want you to if you run into trouble with the law. I’m going to do my best to keep you off their radar, but if you get in any situation where that information will help you, use it.”

“I hear you.”

“But are you going to do what I said?”

She grinned. “Why should I start now?”

“Va-
lene
.”

“
Ding
-o!” She laughed and asked, “Where’d you get the name Dingo?”

“It’s a nickname. Dingoes are wild dogs in Australia. Some people try to domesticate them. That’s not always a wise idea with an animal that’s been wild for thousands of years. I was a hellion as a child. Like a half-domesticated dingo. My mum used to joke that I’d come from the dingoes. They just dropped me on her doorstep.”  He was quiet then added, “I think it was easier than thinking she was at fault for saddling herself with an unwanted child.”

“Don’t say that. I’m sure she loved you.”

“What makes you so sure?”

“Because I love you and any woman in her right mind has to love you.” 

He studied her a bit. “That’s what I call Valene logic. It’s a brand all your own.”

“It’s true.”  She wanted him to tell her that he cared as much as she did, because she could feel it and see it in everything he did. But she also sensed his hesitation to take that risk. To allow himself to care for someone again after he’d been taught that love didn’t exist.

He said, “You were going to tell me more about Smith.”

She conceded to his change in subject. “I’ve been trying to rebuild my business–”

“What happened to it?”

“I dropped everything to take care of my dad and the next thing I knew I was out of funds and out of circulation. But I’ve managed okay.”  One step from being on welfare at times, but she’d kept going. “Anyhow, I’d lost a lot of contacts, especially when Aram showed up in town.”

“Does he know Smith?”

“I don’t know. I would have said no, but someone clued Aram in about the scroll and Navarro killed Aram. Navarro was talking about some man who he was going to one-up by finding the scroll first.”

“Did they give a name?”

“No. You’re wondering if they were talking about Smith, right?”

“Yes.”

She went on. “Navarro didn’t mention anyone else.” She thought back over his interrogation. “I don’t understand why he killed Aram. Navarro’s so cold blooded. Aram was just a number on a list to him.”

“What’d you say?”  Dingo’s body tensed beneath hers.

“Navarro is cold-blooded.”

“No, about Aram being on a list.”

“Oh. Navarro made a snide remark that Aram was merely number two on his list of bodies to put to rest.”  

Dingo sat up, jostling her, but he stopped to carefully lift her up and place her beside him. “I have to get that information to someone.”

“What’s going on with the assassinations?”

Dingo ran his hand over his head and back again. “I wish I knew.”

“Remember when you were telling me how good I am at what I do?”

He smirked at her. “Yes.”

“Then why don’t you give me what you have and let me see if I can figure anything out?”

“Hell, it couldn’t hurt. My people are running out of time to figure out who to protect.”

“Would that be the same people not willing to help you right now?”

“It’s complicated, babe.”

She let that roll off her list of concerns, but only for now. “Tell me what you’ve got.”

Dingo shared the intel he’d gotten from someone in Atlanta on three hits, and gave her the high points of what happened at the charity event. He concluded by saying, “They have you going back into that hall we exited after I saw you in the bathroom.”

“I went back to get my lipstick. I’d left it on the vanity.”

“They think you had time to meet the assassin who came down the emergency exit stairs on that end of the building.”

She said, “What? They think I
killed
the guy you found in the stairwell?”

“Right.”

“Oh my God. How could they think that?”

He lifted his hand and counted off fingers. “You have weapons training that proves you’re capable of making the kill shot, especially at close range. You’re skilled in Krav Maga. You received fifty thousand dollars from an offshore account and you were seen meeting with ... Smith, whose signature kill shot was used on the assassin at the charity event.”

“Then Smith is the one who killed him.”

“That’s my bet too, but they have no confirmation that Smith was at the event and they believe he had you use that signature shot so others would know he was behind it.”

“He
was
at the event.”

“I thought I saw him, too.”

“No, he was
definitely
there.”  She realized she was wringing her hands and stopped. “Tell me what else you know about the assassinations.”

“We have three sets of initials. F.E.P. O.N.C. P.G.C. We thought F.E.P was Francine Eva Perdido, but they killed Fontana.”

She agreed that the initials didn’t work. “Aram’s last name is Pavlovsky, so he can’t be O.N.C.”

“And there’s been no high profile second hit,” Dingo said. “So we have no idea who O.N.C. is.” 

“Navarro said Aram was the second hit. If his list is the same as yours, then the initials might mean something other than a name.”  Valene turned to get Dingo’s reaction. He was studying on her suggestion so she kept brainstorming. “You say Smith is a criminal. If he’s behind Fontana’s assassin’s death then whose side is he on?”

“I don’t know. And why does he want that scroll?”

She went after that angle. “Could Smith be an Orion Hunter?”

Dingo cocked his head, chewing on that. “It’s not outside the realm of possibility, but it’s more likely that he’s the front man for someone pulling strings in all this. Someone who is connected to the hunters. We won’t know until I get my hands on him.”

“How are you going to do that if you have to get out of town?”

He gave her a sly grin. “I’m not running. I have a job to do and Smith is not getting away again.”

“That sounds like history between you two.”

“It is. He’s the reason my team almost died in another country three years ago. His debt is piling faster than he can outrun it.”

Smith was former CIA. “Are you CIA?”

“No.”

She knew even less about Dingo than she had before, and hadn’t thought that was possible. But putting off the one thing she hadn’t told him yet was wearing a raw spot in her stomach.

Valene admitted, “I heard from Smith last night.”

He didn’t react unless turning still as a stone sculpture counted. “And?”

“He gave me a time and place to meet him.”

“Where is it?”

She gave him the directions for the coffee shop. “I don’t know of any event significant to that location, but he said he was on a schedule and had somewhere to be right after that.”

Dingo’s gaze focused on somewhere distant as he spoke. “Smith has been on site for one kill, but we can’t assume that Fontana was the actual target. If Smith’s on site for the next one, then maybe he’s picking up the scroll before he goes, so that gives us a guesstimate time frame.”

“I have to be there at eleven. Gives me about six hours.”

“That’s tight but I can find someone who looks like you to make that drop.”

“No. Smith has made it clear that if I am not there with the scroll on time he’ll come after me for the deposit he’s paid.”

Dingo squeezed her hand. “He’s not going to pay you the balance.”

She forced the tears back. “I know.”

“And I’m not going to risk losing you. He’s too dangerous.”

“But what if ... what if he really is willing to pay for the scroll?”

“That’s not how he operates for one thing, and the scroll would be used for something bad.”

“Oh, hell, besides it has to go back to the Vatican and from what you’re saying he isn’t working for them.”  She pounded the ground with her free hand. “What does he want with killing these people? I mean Fontana might be part of a political deal that went bad, but Aram is not connected to this.”  

All the information tumbled around in her mind.

Not connected. NC.

One Not Connected. O.N.C.

“Dingo!” she grabbed his arm. “I have an idea. Remember I said the initials might not be people?”

“That’s a tough logic angle because they’re assassination targets.”

She got excited, waving her hands. “Hear me out. What if O.N.C. is One Not Connected? As in someone to throw law enforcement off the trail?” 

His eyes narrowed as he concentrated on that. “What would F.E.P. be then?”

“Francine Eva Perdido. Fontana’s Eva Perdido. Fontana’s End Place. Fontana Eliminated ... Permanently?”  She pushed to her feet and jumped around. “That might be it! If so, my theory is right.”

“That’s another dose of Valene logic,” Dingo quipped.

She grinned at him. “Admit it. Pretty brilliant, eh?”

“I always think you’re brilliant. Okay, based on that logic, what is P.G.C.?”

Hmm. She slumped. “I don’t know. Let me think on it.”

“Think while we head back to LA.” He stood up and stared out at the horizon, which was barely visible.

She hugged his waist, enjoying the peace filling her from the ocean whispering along the shoreline. “Someone might recognize you.”