The Phoenix Encounter (16 page)

Because she needed an outlet for the nerves snapping through her, she rose and walked to where he'd set out a bag of almonds, a smaller bag of dried apricots and a bottle of water. As she opened the bags and twisted off the bottle cap he spoke in very low tones to whomever was on the other end of the line. Not for the first time she wondered about the air of secrecy that had surrounded him since he'd arrived in Rebelia. If he were here on a humanitarian mission, why all the secrecy? Where on earth had the high-tech communication gear come from? What about those eraser-size explosives he'd used to escape the soldiers? Or was there more going on with Dr. Robert Davidson than he was letting on?

Several minutes passed before he snapped the computer closed and returned to where she sat near the fire. He didn't look at her as he stowed the computer in its case.

“Is everything all right with Dr. Orloff?” she asked, passing him the water and a handful of almonds and dried fruit on a napkin.

She knew something was wrong the instant he looked at her. As hard as he might try to hide his emotions, there were some things a man couldn't hide. Some things a woman sensed instinctively. Lily wasn't sure what was going on, but she knew it wasn't good.

“What's wrong?” she asked. “Is there a problem at the hospital?”

Sitting on the tarp with his elbows on his knees, Robert looked down, then his eyes met hers. “Do you want the truth? Or do you want me to pretty it up for you?”

“You know me well enough to know I want the truth.” A terrible thought struck her. “It's not about Jack, is it? Robert, please, if it's—”

“DeBruzkya raised the bounty to five hundred thousand dollars,” he said.

The words struck her with the force of a speeding tank, shocking her with fear and a cold, hard reality she hadn't ever wanted to face. “That's outrageous! And how did he know—”

“The soldiers told him we were together,” he cut in. “They told him we have a child.” He shot her a canny look. “The bounty is for the three of us.”

“Oh, God.” Rising, Lily turned away from him and pressed her hand to her stomach. She felt physically ill. “He knows about Jack.”

“He doesn't know where we are, but I'm sure he's got a vague idea.”

“I've put you in danger.”

“No. DeBruzkya put us in danger,” he growled.

“My God, I've put Jack in danger.” The realization tore through her like sharp claws. She'd done this. It was her fault. She'd put not only a man she cared deeply for in danger, but her precious son, as well.

She jumped when strong hands closed over her shoulders. Lily hadn't heard him rise, hadn't noticed his approach. “Don't do this to yourself, Lily.”

“This is all my fault,” she said.

“This is DeBruzkya's fault.”

“I've been blind.” She looked at him. “I've been lying to myself. I've been in this country not to free her people, not to give the orphans food and medicine and hope, but because I'm afraid to leave.”

“Any sane person would be afraid of DeBruzkya.”

“That makes me a coward.”

“Stop it, damn it. You're one of the bravest people I know.”

For the first time, the reality that she'd failed stared her in the face. She'd failed the Rebelian people. She'd failed herself. But worst of all, she'd failed Jack. Sweet, precious Jack. The taste of that failure was bitter.

Determined not to cry, she blinked back tears. “I wanted to make a difference.”

“You did.”

“I wanted to bring him down. That monster DeBruzkya. I wanted that so badly it blinded me to the harm I was doing to my own child.”

“Honey, you didn't harm Jack. He's fine. You've been a good mother. But you can't do it all by yourself.”

She raised her clenched fist. “I was so close. But I'm not going to get him, am I?”

“No, you're not.” Robert's jaw flexed. “It's time for you to go home, Lily. It's time for you and Jack to go back to the United States.”

“DeBruzkya will never let me leave,” she whispered. “I know him, Robert. He's crazy and cruel and obsessive.”

Using a firm touch, Robert turned her to him. When she refused to look at him he put his fingers under her chin and forced her gaze to his. “I can get you out.”

“He has an entire army looking for us.” She squeezed her eyes close to lock in the tears, but they squeezed through her lashes. “He'll kill you. I know it. He'll kill you just to get at me.”

“DeBruzkya isn't going to do anything.”

A sob escaped her when she thought of who else was vulnerable. “He'll hurt Jack.”

“He's not going to get near my son,” he said, his voice taking on a dangerous edge.

“DeBruzkya doesn't care about you or Jack, Robert. The only reason he wants either of you is to get to me. I'm the one he wants.”

“Damn it, Lily, don't go there.”

But Lily already had. She didn't have a choice. She'd been fooling herself to believe she could outmaneuver a master. To actually believe she could bring down someone as diabolical and cunning as DeBruzkya. All she'd managed to do was put Robert and her son in danger.

“I've got to turn myself in,” she said after a moment.

“No.”

She tried to twist away from him, but his hands tightened on her biceps. “There's no other way.”

“Listen to me.” Grasping her arms, he gave her a little shake. “You don't have to sacrifice yourself to do this.”

“I'm not willing to risk Jack.” She looked into his eyes. “I'm not going to risk your getting hurt, either.”

“DeBruzkya will kill you!” he shouted.

“No, he won't,” she said.

“How can you possibly know that?”

“Because he's in love with me.”

His lips drew back in a snarl. “That doesn't matter.”

“How can you say that? I'm the only person who can get close to him. I'm his weakness. How can you deny that using me isn't the best way to get to him?”

“Because I love you!” he shouted. “And I'll be damned if I'm going to let you get yourself killed because you don't have the good sense to know when you're out of your league.”

R
obert stared at her, breathing as if he'd just run a mile, his heart pounding pure adrenaline. Lily stared back, her eyes wide with shock, her face as pale as death. All the while the words he'd just uttered ricocheted between them like a hollow-point slug.

I love you.

Shocked by what he'd said—deeply disturbed because he'd meant it—he gathered the tattered threads of his dignity and grappled to focus on the issue at hand. “What did he do to you that made you hate him so much?” he asked roughly.

His emotions shifted dangerously when she winced, and Robert realized he'd hit a nerve. A live nerve that jumped when prodded. She tried to twist away, but he held her gently, sensing she needed to talk but knowing the words wouldn't come easily for her.

“Lily, it's me. Come on. Talk to me,” he pressed.

Lily looked at him, her eyes stricken. “He…murdered
someone I cared about very much. Her name was Alina,” she whispered.

“A child?”

“She was seven years old. An orphan in a village not far from Rajalla. Her mother had been killed by a land mine. Her father went to fight in the war, but he never came home. Alina was sent to the orphanage when she was five. I met her a year later when I was tutoring some of the kids.” She smiled, but he saw the pain in her eyes. “She had strawberry-blond hair, like mine.” She choked out a laugh. “As silly as it sounds, I think that's what drew her to me. I started calling her Strawberry. My little Strawberry.”

Robert could feel the tremors moving through her. He loosened his grip, but she didn't pull away. It was as if she needed his support just to stand as she remembered. “Tell me about her,” he said gently.

“She liked dolls. Plastic or porcelain or wooden, it didn't matter. I bought her a Raggedy Ann at a tourist shop in a border town over in Holzberg. It was just a cheap, poorly sewn doll. But Strawberry didn't care. In her eyes, that doll was made of gold. She loved her. Took Raggedy Ann everywhere.”

A breath shuddered out of her. “I tutored her two days a week. She wanted to learn English. So she could be a schoolteacher. She was so sweet. So innocent and smart and so undeserving of all the terrible things that had happened to her.”

The tears flowed freely down Lily's cheeks, and she let them fall. The sight of her pain moved him. He hurt for her. He could feel the pain curling inside him. And even though he didn't yet know what had happened to Strawberry, he hurt for that little girl, too, because he knew the outcome hadn't been good.

“Then one day I went to the orphanage to pick her up. We were going to go to the park. Strawberry and Raggedy Ann and I. But when I got there, the building…it was gone.
Leveled by a bomb. I stood there in the rubble and fell to my knees and I cried like a baby. I looked for her but never found a trace.” She raised ravaged eyes. “But I found Raggedy Ann. That's when I knew.”

“Lily…”

“That's when I knew she was dead.” A sob escaped her.

“Shh. It's okay.”

“No, it's not.”

He could feel the pain coming off her, like heat rising from the desert floor in shimmering waves. He didn't even realize it when his arms went around her. “I'm sorry, honey.”

“Something died inside me that day, Robert.”

“Nothing died inside you,” he said.

“I couldn't believe anyone could harm innocent children. I can't reconcile myself to that.”

He pulled back slightly. “DeBruzkya?” he asked.

She nodded, tears glistening on her cheeks. “He murdered that beautiful child. He murdered all of them. I can't forget about her, about them.”

“No one expects you to.” Feeling helpless and ineffectual, he caressed the back of her head, wishing he could take away her pain, knowing he couldn't. “You never told anyone this?”

“I never spoke of it after that day. It's like I locked it away and pretended it never happened. But inside I was seething.”

“It's not good to hold something like that inside for so long.”

“I know, but…I couldn't accept it. And I couldn't walk away.”

He knew she was referring to the day he'd asked her to leave with him. He'd known her for a couple of months at the time. Odd that he'd never had a clue she'd been hurting so desperately. And for the first time her refusal to leave with him made sense. “Why didn't you tell me?”

“I don't know. The time just never seemed right. What
we had…it was really good. The emotions inside me were ugly. Hate. The need for revenge. I just couldn't bring those into what we had.”

“You lost someone you loved. It's okay to grieve.”

“I hate him,” she said. “That's not grief.”

“Sometimes it's hard to tell one emotion from another when you're hurting.” When she wouldn't look at him, he put his fingers under her chin and forced her gaze to his. “You were very brave.”

“I hurt you. I'm sorry.”

“It's okay.”

“No, it's not. It's not okay.” Pulling away slightly, she shook her head. “Now I've put you at risk. I've put my own son at risk. All because I've been blinded by hatred—”

“Not hatred,” he said firmly.

“It's in my heart, like a black hole in my soul, bottomless and terrible and—”

“Love was part of it, too, Lily. You loved Strawberry.”

“Yes, I did, but—”

“You stayed because you didn't want another child to suffer the same fate. If that's not love, I don't know what is.” Unable to bear to see her hurting like this, he took her face in his hands and stared into her eyes. “Come on, Lily. You did what you could.”

“I failed.”

“No.”

“I've put my own son at risk. I've put you at risk. And it's all been for nothing because DeBruzkya is going to win.”

“No, he's not.”

“How can you know that?”

“Because I'm not going to let him.”

Robert hadn't intended to go there, but he didn't regret the words, because he meant them. Still, the conversation had strayed into territory he couldn't ever discuss with her. Lily didn't know about ARIES. She had no idea he was an
agent. To tell her now—especially now—would put her in grave danger.

“Trust me,” he said gently. “And leave it at that.”

“I do.”

“I wish I could have been there for you.”

“You were,” she whispered. “You were always there. What we had…sustained me when I felt as if I couldn't go on.”

Robert closed his eyes against a hot burst of emotion he didn't want to feel, against words he wasn't sure he was ready to hear.

“When you said you loved me—”

“Don't.” Leaning forward, he set his forehead against hers and tried desperately not to feel what he knew to be true in his heart.

“I have to,” she whispered. “I have to say this.”

He pulled back slightly to meet her gaze and waited.

“After the missile hit the pub,” she began, “when I was lying in the rubble, waiting to die, waiting for the soldiers to take me…” Her voice broke, but she struggled through the words. “I dreamed you came back. You picked me up out of the rubble and carried me away from the horrors of that place. When I came to and I was alone, I realized I'd made a terrible mistake. I thought I was going to die. I waited for you, but you never came. I thought you'd deserted me.”

“Oh, honey, no. If I'd been able, I would have come back for you, even if I had to crawl. I thought you were dead.”

“DeBruzkya did that to us,” she whispered. “I can't let him get away with that. I'm sorry if that's not what you want to hear, but I'm not going to let him walk away.”

“I'm not going to let you sacrifice yourself.” But even as he said the words, Robert could see she'd made up her mind. She had every intention of using her connection to DeBruzkya to take him down. He could feel his control over the situation slipping through his fingers, like sand
through the inept fingers of a child. He was a doctor and scientist, a highly trained ARIES agent; he'd accomplished some amazing things. And yet something as simple—and as complex—as keeping this woman safe eluded him.

They were standing face-to-face with scant inches separating them. But Robert knew those inches were fraught with a chasm of pain. A chasm he had every intention of traversing no matter what the cost.

Need twisted brutally inside him, as painful as any wound, as dangerous as any bullet. He didn't intend to kiss her. But one moment he was holding her lovely face in his hands, wanting—needing—to ease her suffering. And in the next instant his mouth was on hers. He tasted tears and grief, but both those things were laced with the heady spice of desire. And in an instant the moment transformed, from one human being comforting another to a man kissing a woman he cared deeply for.

The earth moved beneath his feet when she made a sound at the back of her throat and opened to him. He hadn't expected her to kiss him back, and for an instant he was stunned. The rush of pleasure made him dizzy. He'd known kissing her would be good, but he hadn't expected it to burn. He hadn't expected it to shake his world. Turn him inside out. Make him forget all the reasons he couldn't get involved with her.

He marveled at the silky feel of her tongue against his, the taste of almond and apricot mingling with the sweet taste of her mouth. Gentle was forgotten as desperation and the need to protect what was precious, the need to possess what was his, took over. She matched him strength for strength, returning everything he gave her and adding something more that was uniquely hers. The combination took his breath.

Robert wasn't a fast lover. He preferred to take his time with a woman. But when she moved against him, when she sighed in his ear and made a mewling sound in her throat, his control broke. He ravaged her mouth. His teeth clicked
against hers. He knew better than to rush this moment. But the urgency pushing through him was more powerful than any need for restraint. When she threw her head back, he kissed the delicate line of her jaw, her throat, the point of her chin. He ran his tongue along the ridge of her collarbone until she went liquid in his arms.

Aware that he was breathing hard, that his pulse was raging out of control, he took her hands in his and backed her toward the support beam a few feet away. All the while he kissed her deeply, never giving her respite or time to change her mind.

The support column stopped her backward progression, and he pressed against her. Her body was as soft and warm as a breath. His senses drank in the essence of her like a man dying of thirst. A few feet away, the fire seemed to swell and spark, filling the room with heat. Aware of the pump of blood through his veins, the hot burn of lust in his groin, he loosened the blanket she'd anchored just above her breasts. A violent shiver ran the length of her when it slipped down and dropped at her feet.

Her beauty impacted him solidly, humbling him, and for an instant he felt like an inexperienced teenager. “I'd forgotten how beautiful you are,” he said.

“You always make me feel like the most beautiful woman in the world.”

“You are.”

“Meaningless flattery.” She smiled, but he could see the zing of nerves in her eyes.

“Meaningful,” he corrected. “Very meaningful.”

Her body was familiar and yet it wasn't. Her pregnancy had produced subtle changes that intrigued him so that he wanted to explore every exquisite inch of her. He touched the tiny mole just above her left breast and remembered touching it a hundred times before. He ran his fingers over the thin white scar on her right hip. The scar hadn't been there before, and he wondered if the injury had been one of the horrors she'd suffered the night of the explosion.
Wanting to take away all the old pain—the new pain, too—he touched it gently, lovingly, and tried to erase the injury it had left upon her heart.

Her breasts were fuller, her nipples larger and fully erect. He thought of her breast-feeding their baby and he marveled at the miracle of it, and found himself wishing he'd been there to share that moment with her.

She gasped when he gently cupped her breasts. A cry escaped her when he molded her with his hands. So soft and warm and perfect. She moved restlessly when he brushed his thumbs across the sensitized tips. Dipping his head, he kissed the darkened peak, laving it with his tongue. She cried out when he took her into his mouth and began to suckle. Something primal broke free inside him when she arched. He ran his tongue along the valley between her breasts and flicked the tip of her other breast. His vision dimmed when she reached for him. A hot rush of blood burned him when her fingers closed around his shaft through his jeans.

“I want you,” he heard himself say. “I've never stopped wanting you.”

“I'll hurt you again.”

Pulling away slightly, he took her by the shoulders and eased her back. Her eyes were dark and luminous in the firelight. Her pupils were dilated. Her mouth kiss-bruised and wet. Her breath shallow and fast.

“Why?” he asked.

“I can't leave with you.”

“I'm not going to let you stay.”

“DeBruzkya will kill you if he knows we're…together.”

A quick rise of anger had him pulling away. But Lily stopped him. “Please, don't stop,” she whispered. “We have this moment. I don't want to lose it. Robert, I need you.”

She kissed him, and Robert knew he was going to do exactly what he shouldn't. She slipped her tongue into his mouth, and he felt the contact all the way to his soul. The
soft pressure of her mouth against his. The brush of her breath against his cheek. Arousal burning low and hot in his groin. Twenty-one months of grief and frustration and anger cut loose inside him. Love and fear and the terrible realization that the situation had spiraled out of his control gripped him.