Rules of Re-engagement

“I’m going to show you something.”

Confusion touched her eyes. The clock in the hall ticked loudly.

Olivia glanced at the clock. It was almost two in the morning. She’d be expected in the office by nine for a routine start. But there was nothing routine about this day. She fingered the smooth metal cuff he’d locked over her wrist, feeling as though she’d slid into some kind of twilight zone. She was unable to fully adjust to his presence, and she simply couldn’t believe what he was telling her—especially about her father.

Jack had said the president had been ordered to stand down by October 13. Why did that date feel so familiar? She realized with mild shock that that was the day her father expected her to be on his yacht in the Caribbean for some big Venturion Corporation announcement. The whole board would be there. Her chest tightened. It was a coincidence. It had to be.

The familiar tone of her cell phone broke the silence. Olivia jumped, confused for a moment.

The chime sounded again.

Jack reached down, scooped her phone up from where he’d put it on the table, handed it to her. “Answer it.” His eyes narrowed. “But remember, if anyone finds out I am in town, the bombs blow. People die.”

She took the phone, flipped it open, checked the incoming number in the display. Her father! Tension whipped through her.

“Answer it.”

She glanced at the clock again. Why on earth would her father be calling her at this hour?

She put the phone to her ear, her eyes fixed on Jack. “Dad?”

“Olivia, are you all right?”

No, I am not. Emotion choked her, stealing her voice.

“Olivia? You still there?”

“I…I’m fine, Dad.”

Silence. “You don’t sound fine.”

She cleared her throat, shoved her hair back from her face as if it would help clear her mind. “I…I was sleeping.”

Silence. Longer this time. He didn’t believe her.

“Dad, do you know what time it is? Why are you calling me at this hour?”

“I was really worried about you, Olivia. I know Grayson was in town, and…and I hadn’t heard from you. Did everything go okay? Did he propose?”

“What makes you think that?”

“It was on the news, the speculation.”

She closed her eyes. It was not supposed to be like this.

“Did you accept, Olivia?”

“Dad, I…I can’t talk now—”

“You’re not alone…are you?”

Her eyes flared open. He knew. Somehow he knew.

Her eyes shot to Jack standing brazenly in front of the open curtains. She thought of the men in the street below watching.

That’s how he knew!

Her heart bottomed out. They were her father’s men outside. They were watching her window. He knew she had a man in her apartment tonight because they had called him. It was not a father’s business. He had no right to spy on her like that. But why was he doing it? Why was he having her tailed? How long had she been followed?

A dark and sinister thread curled through her thoughts and nausea filled her stomach.

“Olivia?”

She swallowed against the growing thickness in her throat. “Dad…it’s really late. I have to be up early. Can I call you back at a better time?”

“What happened with Grayson, Olivia?” His tone became insistent.

“I…” She watched Jack’s eyes. “I’ve been meaning to break it off with him for some time, Dad. I was going to do it after he left office, when the pressure was off. But—”

“Grayson is good for you, Olivia. You’re good together.” He hesitated. “Is…is there someone else? Is that the problem?”

Olivia felt ill. She knew what he was doing. He was pressing her for information—about the man in her window. And he was so desperate to know who that man was that he’d called her at this ungodly hour. Jack was right. Her father really was having her followed. Something was going on. Her world was crumbling out from under her feet and she couldn’t even begin to think straight. Just seeing Jack, touching him, was more than she could handle right now.

Her voice began to choke up. “I…I have to go, Dad. I’ll call you later.” Olivia hung up quickly before he could speak again, and she stared numbly at the phone in her hand. She’d cut him off—her own father. She’d lied to him. He’d lied to her.

“I’m sorry, Olivia,” Jack said softly. “I know this can’t be easy.”

Her eyes flashed to his. Well, if that wasn’t the understatement of the night. Olivia sank back on to the sofa as she stared at Jack. He was the key in all this.

If what he said about the president was even vaguely true, why was he here, and not some other FDS operative?

It was because he knew her intimately. He understood the depth of her connection to her father. And he knew how to exploit that.

He also knew Grayson. They were all connected by the past.

A darkness whispered through her mind, an elusive sensation she couldn’t quite pin down. Somehow…this tied back to Elizabeth’s death, to that fateful night on the beach. She could sense it.

Whether she was right or not, it didn’t matter. She needed to know. She needed to know this one thing before she could accept anything else that Jack said.

“Tell me, Jack,” she said quietly. “Tell me what happened on the beach that night. I need to know why you killed Elizabeth.”

“I didn’t.”

The brutal honesty in his voice slammed her square in the chest. She caught her breath, stared at him. His eyes were clear, unblinking. And with a sinking sensation, Olivia wondered if he might be telling the truth.

A dark question whispered, almost elusively, through her mind.

She tried to shake the thought away. And with a shock, she realized she’d been shaking that strange black whispering sensation away for longer than she cared to remember.