Wild Ways

Rafe was half tempted to call her bluff but then had the distinct feeling that all he would accomplish was making himself look like twelve kinds of a fool. This day had gone badly enough already without winding up standing there with his jeans around his ankles and a gun pointed at the part of his anatomy nearest and dearest to him.

He contemplated a half-dozen options, discarding all of them as too risky. Which was pretty ridiculous, considering he wasn’t up against a handful of Navy Seals or a squad of Green Berets but one small, very inexperienced government agent. He remembered what she’d felt like in his hands out by the car, all soft curves and satin skin and lithe muscle. Easy prey. He should have taken her out by now. Should be halfway back to Las Vegas with Reggie Dawes. Money in the bank. He eased his weight onto his left foot, trying to make it look casual.

Reggie moaned just then and she looked at him with concern. “Reg, are you all right?”

And, in the end, it was just that easy. Distracted, she let her attention waver for just that critical instant, and that was all it took. Rafe pivoted on his left foot and brought his right up high and fast, knocking the gun cleanly out of her hand, then swung around to grab her by the wrist before she could go after it. She responded faster than he’d anticipated and he nearly got a karate chop across the face for his trouble, but he blocked the blow awkwardly.

“Damn you!”

She sounded more astonished than dangerous, and Rafe had to grin. “That’s lesson number two, Irish. When you’ve got your gun on a man, never take your eyes off him.”

“A mistake I won’t make twice,” she said through gritted teeth.

Rafe’s eyes narrowed as he watched her trying to decide what to do next. Oddly, he found himself hoping she wouldn’t try anything, because if they kept this up long enough he was going to hurt her without even meaning to, and that seemed like a shame. “If I was serious about taking you out, sweetheart, you wouldn’t get a second chance. Just what agency are you working for, anyway?”

“Does it matter?” She gave her head a toss to get a tangle of hair out of her eyes, scanning the room, looking for the advantage he had no intention of letting her have.

“Whoever it is, they have no damn business sending you out solo before you’re ready. Or are they trying to get you killed? Is that it? You tick someone off who wants a little payback?”

“Miss Kavanagh?” Reggie sat up just then, blinking blearily and rubbing the back of his head. “Miss Kavanagh, did you hit me?”

“Reggie, are you okay?” Kavanagh hurried across and knelt beside him. “Do you know where you are, Reg? Do you know who you are?”

“Of course I know who I am,” he replied indignantly.

“You’re not bleeding or anything.”

“It hurts,” he muttered petulantly, giving Rafe an affronted look as he rubbed the back of his skull. “I could have brain damage.”

“Somehow,” Rafe drawled, “I find that hard to believe.” He walked across to the bed, still keeping an eye on Kavanagh.

“Come on, Reg, sit over here. I’ll get you a glass of water.” She helped him up and into one of the chairs. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“He’s fine,” Rafe put in impatiently. The pile of things he’d dumped out of her purse still lay in a mound on the bed, and he rifled through it until he found what he was looking for.

“Hey!” Kavanagh turned just in time to see what he was doing and took an indignant step toward him. “You have no right—”

“Lady, not five minutes ago you were threatening to shoot off body parts I’ve become very fond of. I think I have a right to know just who the hell you are.” Rafe flipped open the slim leather identification wallet. The picture was hers, and he had to smile. Typical first-year operative photo ID. They all had the same overly serious expression, trying to look blasé and tough as nails at the same time and winding up looking like kids playing cops and robbers.

Then he saw the agency name on the plasticized card and felt his heart stop for one long, disbelieving moment.

He blinked, not quite trusting his eyes, and moved closer to the reading lamp on the table by the bed, turning the gold shield to catch the light. But there was no mistake.

He remembered to start breathing after a moment or two, too many emotions racing through him to make sense, mind spinning. Remembered the last time he’d seen this same gold shield. Remembered lying in the dust, blinded by the sun, knuckles bruised, jaw half-broken where—

“I’ll be damned,” he finally breathed, straightening to his full height and looking across the room at her. “And just how the hell is old Spence O’Dell, anyway?”

She blinked. “You know O’Dell?”

Rafe’s laugh was tight. “Oh, yeah, I know O’Dell.” He took a deep breath, the tangle of emotions surging through him separating out into strands now, each as bright as hot gold. Rage so strong it burned. Disappointment. Betrayal. And, brightest, hottest, of all, the hurt of memories he didn’t want to remember. He saw Stephanie’s face then, just a flicker really, a searing ghost image of laughing eyes and dark swirling hair, the remembered scent of her perfume. He shut his eyes tight and fought it down and away, back into the vault beneath his heart where he kept her memory stored, safe from prying.

When he opened his eyes again, Kavanagh was still standing there, an odd expression on her face. “I know you.” She was looking at him intently, her eyes scanning his face. “You were an agent once. You used to be one of O’Dell’s men.”

“Once.” Rafe bit the word off, almost daring her to say the rest.

“They…” She paused, as though trying to remember. “They talk about you. At the Agency. I thought…I thought you were dead. That’s why I never made the connection. Your name was familiar, but…” She gazed at him curiously. “I thought you were dead.”

“Not yet, no thanks to that bastard O’Dell.” Rafe took another deep breath, annoyed at how shaken he was. It made him feel vulnerable, as though he’d been caught out in the open with no cover.

O’Dell. He let his mind toy with the name deliberately. Was he behind this? The Feds would be watching Ruffio, that went without saying. He’d known that when he’d taken the job but had decided it was worth the risk. If he really admitted it, in fact, he’d counted on his history with the Agency to protect him from any real suspicion. But maybe he’d underestimated O’Dell. Maybe the man wanted revenge. There were stories about O’Dell. About how he didn’t like it when one of his trained agents ran amok. Maybe he’d been sitting back in the shadows all this time. Watching. Waiting for a chance to slip the noose around ex-Special Agent Rafe Blackhorse’s neck and tighten it….

Shrugging his shoulders to loosen them, he prowled across to the window and tugged aside the lime-green curtain. The parking lot was still, bathed in moonlight. The scattering of cars and pickup trucks glittered with dew, and nothing moved until a high-legged dog trotted into view, slat-sided and wary. It moved toward the garbage bin at the back of the lot, pausing now and again to lift its ugly muzzle and sniff the night. Then, apparently feeling safe, it started rummaging through the garbage scattered on the ground.

Not that the stray’s behavior meant O’Dell wasn’t out there. No one worked at the Agency for long without hearing the stories. They still wove epic tales about O’Dell’s three tours in Vietnam. Of how he could stay stone-still for hours at a time without so much as blinking, of how the Vietcong had called him The White Tiger because of the way he could slip ghostlike through jungle so thick you couldn’t see a foot in front of you and never disturb a leaf. The man was a legend. Staking out the Dewdrop Inn in the wilds of South Dakota—or North Dakota, or wherever the hell they were—wouldn’t be much of a challenge.

But, in spite of his suspicions, Rafe found himself relaxing slightly. Odds were that Kavanagh’s involvement in this was just coincidence. There was no reason he could think of for O’Dell to be stalking him. They’d pretty much written each other off two years ago. Had put Paid to any debt between them. Any friendship.

It gave him a cold, empty feeling, for some reason. More loss than anger. It was strange how feelings changed with time. Once, he couldn’t even think of O’Dell without being half blinded by rage. Now…hell, now he didn’t even give a damn. O’Dell’s memory had joined all the others, just one more in the collection of things he rarely thought of anymore. Part of a life he’d survived, barely, and had walked away from, as alien to the man he was now as kindness would be to that stray dog out there.

He shook off the thoughts impatiently, not liking the morose turn they were taking, and turned around to find Kavanagh standing not six feet from him, the Beretta in her hand pointed at his belly.

Chapter 3

“This game of musical guns is getting tiresome, Mr. Blackhorse. Can we just agree that neither one of us is going to shoot the other and enter into a dialogue that doesn’t include bullets and threats?”

Blackhorse seemed to consider it for a moment. Then to Meg’s relief he gave a snort of laughter and nodded, tipping his head back and rotating both shoulders to loosen them. “Hell, why not, Irish. I’m kind of interested in seeing where you’re going with this, anyway.”

She lowered the gun and shoved it into its holster. “The only place I’m going is Washington. With Reggie Dawes.”

Blackhorse gave another of those harsh, abrupt laughs. “And this is your idea of a ‘dialogue,’ Special Agent Kavanagh?”

Meg shrugged. The race of adrenaline had eased and she was feeling the aftermath now, her heartbeat a little unsteady as she walked across to the bed and picked up her purse. She started shoving her things back into it, trying not to think of what might have happened here tonight had Blackhorse been just about anyone else.

O’Dell was right: she wasn’t agent material. She would have been dead two or three times over had he been one of Ruffio’s men. Tomorrow, after she’d handed Dawes over to the Agency rep in Washington, she was putting in her resignation. Then she was going back to Boston and marrying Royce Packard and raising babies and busying herself with social luncheons and charity functions and being the perfect society wife, her brief foray into the dark world of secret agentry well behind her.

And Bobby? Well, Bobby’s death would stay the mystery it was. She should just be glad she hadn’t added her own to it, because her parents couldn’t go through that again. Burying one child was more than any family should suffer. Burying two—the second death as futile and meaningless as the first—was a cruelty she hadn’t even thought of when she’d started this stupid escapade. She’d done it because, of all her much-loved siblings, Bobby had been the closest. Had been her champion and her mentor and her best friend, and he was dead and she wanted to know why and now—

“Damn!” Meg clenched her teeth as her eyes filled with unexpected tears. “Damn, damn, damn!” She scythed her arm out and swept everything from the night table—water glass, clock radio, lamp and all—taking some small satisfaction as the lamp shade went flying across the room and the glass bounced off the wall, spraying cold water.

“Miss Kavanagh?” Reggie sounded tentative. “Are you all right?”

“Yes!” Meg drew a deep, calming breath, keeping her back to both men. She wiped her cheek surreptitiously with her fingers. “I’m fine, Reg.”

She turned around to find them both staring at her with matching expressions of astonishment.

It was Blackhorse who broke the tension first. He laughed—a real laugh this time, not his usual cynical bark—and then walked across to the table and started putting his weapons away. “You’re a real break in routine, Special Agent Mary Margaret Kavanagh, I’ll say that much for you. Either O’Dell’s mellowed since I last saw him, or you’re one of a kind.” He shoved the Smith & Wesson into the holster in the small of his back and gazed across the room at her, mouth tipped aside slightly in a bemused smile. “I wish I had time to hear your story, Irish.”

“No story, Mr. Blackhorse,” Meg replied wearily. “It’s been a long day, and I’m tired. And we still have a situation to resolve. I’m not giving you Reggie, and you say you aren’t leaving without him, so we obviously have a problem.”