The DEA wanted him alive. DHS wanted him alive. Everyone wanted him alive and Ian had sworn to kill him. He would kill him. God as his witness; no matter how despicable the action would be, there was no other way. He couldn't allow another SEAL, another friend, to suffer because he had betrayed Diego as well.
"When do you expect this meeting to take place?" Diego's voice was oddly weary, resigned.
"I'm hoping soon." Ian crossed his arms over his chest and stared back at him. "We have something he wants, badly."
"And that is?" He seemed uninterested, more concerned with the amount of liquor he could consume now than he was about the imminent end of his worst enemy.
"We have his daughter."
He stared back at Ian in shock, then in glee.
"I thought she was mere wishful thinking." He blinked back at Ian in disbelief. "You have her? She is here? In the villa?" His eyes widened as satisfaction began to gleam in them. "Is she in the basement?"
Ian felt his teeth snap together in fury.
The son of a bitch, even now, nothing could touch him but the scent of death or the dirty little games he played in that fucking basement. Or the death of a friend who played those games with him as Muriel had done.
"She's not in the basement," he snapped, the anger leaking into his voice. "I have her and she's safe, that's all you need to be concerned with."
Diego grimaced. "You have never understood the value of the little games I play, have you, Ian?"
"No I don't and we're not going to discuss them now." Sometimes he felt as though he were dealing with a particularly willful child when it came to Diego.
He missed Diego's subtle smile, but Kira caught the shift of the other man's lips and the playful curl of fondness in Diego's black eyes.
* * *
Twenty-six
HE WAS PUSHING IAN'S BUTTONS. He wasn't serious about taking Tehya to the playroom forcefully, from what she understood, Diego liked his playmates willing. But he was serious gauging Ian's temper or his mood. Like a teenager poking at his father's authority. Kira imagined Diego saw it as a game, a prick against Ian for the autocratic way he had taken over the cartel rather than sharing the business as Diego had dreamed.
Diego had wanted a son to share the finer things in life with, and Ian wasn't sharing. They didn't kill together, because Ian became angry whenever Diego shed blood. They didn't plot together and they didn't plan together, so Diego poked at him, prodded, and found what amusement he could. A small amount of gratitude, a measure of confidence that his son felt some small emotion for him, because Ian didn't slice into him. Because he didn't blow up and he didn't threaten to kill or leave. Diego believed there was hope.
Guilt sliced at Kira once again. How hard would it be to watch him die if she couldn't stop Ian from killing him? To know that, monster though he was, he was a monster who craved his son's attention, and even more, his love.
Kira felt a wave of pity so sharp, so intense, she had to turn her head away from Diego; unfortunately, she found herself staring straight into Ian's eyes instead. Eyes that saw too much, that arrowed in on that pity and narrowed warningly.
Back off.
He didn't have to say the words, she could feel the demand. He didn't want to see it, he didn't want to hear it. And he didn't want to regret it. But she could see the regret in his eyes, regret and determination.
"Games are the spice of life, Ian." Diego's comment dragged Ian's attention from her and back to him. Where he wanted it. His attention was better off there, off her and the guilt raging through her.
"Games are a pain in the ass." Ian shrugged. "I want you to get your men in place, have them converge on and assume protective parameters around the warehouse we have outside Oranjestad. Sorrell will assume we're hiding her there. We'll see if he intends to attack or negotiate."
"But the girl is not there," Diego murmured as he moved to his desk and the open laptop on it.
As he took his chair, a frown flitted over his brow. His fingers began to move on the keypad quickly.
"The warehouse wasn't purchased under a known cartel enterprise," he informed Ian. "We've actually been using it for a few legal purposes rather than illegal." There was a measure of surprise in his tone as he reached for the phone and pulled the receiver toward him.
Ian caught Diego's hand as he began to dial the numbers. Kira watched, as surprised as Diego was when Ian hung the phone up carefully.
He pulled the small electronic device from a holder on the waistband of his jeans. It had Kira sighing; she still hadn't been allowed to play with the jamming device. Ian flipped it on, set it close to the phone then indicated that Diego could make the call.
Diego sniffed as he punched in the number. "Technology isn't always a good thing."
"It's going end up saving your ass though," Ian grunted as he turned away from him, his gaze once again meeting Kira's.
She pushed her hands into the pockets of her lightweight blazer, and forced back the need to hunch her shoulders defensively.
She listened with half an ear as Diego ordered the men into place. He didn't give them a reason why, of course, he wouldn't have to. He had ruled with blood and death for over thirty years, and his reputation as a killer ensured that his men would follow his word to the letter and beyond.
"That is done." Diego returned the phone to its base before going back to the laptop. "I do still have my fingers in a few little pies." He seemed to roll his eyes from behind the cover of the laptop. "Let's see if I can't get a report should we have any unscheduled flights landing in the near future. He wouldn't come by boat, it would be too slow."
"He's already in Aruba." Ian folded his arms across his chest and glared back at Diego.
Diego cast his son a look of disbelief. "I would know if he were, trust me. Sorrell may be rather good at keeping his identity hidden, but he's not that good at keeping his presence hidden. Where he goes, death and the disappearance of lovely young women follow. We haven't had a disappearance in Aruba in over a year. Trust me, he isn't here yet."
Kira turned her back on the two men, her gaze colliding with Deke's, as Diego and Ian began to argue the points for or against Sorrell being on the island. It seemed a useless, pointless argument, until you paid attention to what wasn't being said and let the undercurrents of the conversation ebb and flow instead.
"You're a drug lord, not a terrorist, Diego," Ian reminded him coolly. "I don't think you're as knowledgeable about that particular species of evil as you believe you are."
"Terrorists are not so different." Diego shrugged as Kira turned back to him.
He leaned back in his chair and stared at his son, a quirk tugging at his lips. "We both have a vision and we fight for that vision. I say we have the right to choose to enjoy the stimulation of the drugs, the same as we have the right to bear arms or to the freedom of speech that Americans seem to be enjoy with such enthusiasm. Personally, I've always a found a drug addict to be much more literate, easier to get along with, and easier to control than your irate, political mismatch of lawmakers that America seems to find such great pleasure in electing to office."
Ian shook his head quickly as though attempting to shake reality back into his mind.
"Don't fuck with me today, Diego," he bit out. "I'm not in the mood."
"He could have a point, Ian," Kira drawled then. "Just think, if all our politicians were happily running out to the nearest convenience store to buy their next fix, they wouldn't be giving the rest of the nation a headache debating laws and freedoms. Anarchy could reign peacefully then."
Diego's burst of laughter was filled with merriment.
"That is a sharp female you have on your hands, my son, I hope you intend to keep her around for a while."
Ian gaze locked with hers again. It was a brooding, dark look, one that sent a shiver down her spine because she could see the warning in it.
"I need to question, Muriel," Ian stated rather than answering Diego's statement.
&nb
sp; It was deliberate. Immediately all humor fled from Diego's gaze and his gaze flickered with pain. But even that seemed to bring Ian no satisfaction. Kira could see the tension gathering in him though, the need to have this finished, to have it over.
"Kira, we need to talk first." She was surprised when Ian walked to her, gripped her upper hand, and led her to the door. "I'll be back in a bit," he tossed over his shoulder. "Deke, stay in contact with the guards outside and let me know if you need me."
"Gotcha, boss."
The door closed behind them as Ian headed quickly for the stairs.
"What the hell is your problem?" she hissed.
He was silent, tense, until they reached the bedroom and he slammed the door behind him. Stalking to the bureau, he checked the security on the room, slammed that drawer closed then turned back to her.
She could see the storm in his eyes then, the anger that bit at the edges of his control.
"Don't you dare feel sorry for him," Ian snarled, his voice low, intent. "I saw your eyes, I saw it in your face. Don't think for a minute that you can save him."
She licked her lips nervously. She didn't have a choice but to save him.
"He's a monster," she began, then inhaled roughly as satisfaction glittered in his eyes. "But he's a monster who loves his son."
"Fuck! I knew it." He swiped his fingers through his hair, pushing back the dark blond strands and revealing the savagely honed perfection of his face. "I knew it the minute I saw you on this damned island. You're letting your emotions cloud this now. How the hell can you say something like that?"
"My emotions aren't clouding anything, Ian," she assured him, her voice low as she watched him compassionately, aching for him. "I see the truth you refuse to see."
His brows lowered over his eyes, brooding anger shaping his face and thinning his lips.
"Don't start the psychobabble," he snapped. "I don't want to hear it. If you can't keep your emotions under control then you can stay with the rest of the group and get the hell out of my way."
Whoa, that one hurt.
"Your way or the highway then?" she asked him with a sharp breath. "Wow, Ian, took you a while, but you just reminded me why the hell I've always steered clear of SEALs for lovers. Your attitude sucks."
"If it took you this long to be reminded then you should be locked up for your own protection," he growled as he turned his back on her and paced the large sitting room before throwing himself on the thickly cushioned sofa and staring at her with blistering anger. "What do you think you can do, save him? Why? It's like trying to save a rabid animal."
He glowered up at her, his brows pulled low over his eyes, his expression a mask of offended male pride and anger.
She pushed her hands back into her jacket and sighed wearily. She couldn't tell him the truth and not because she had been ordered not to. He would lose the tenuous hold on the control that had gotten him this far and she knew it. He had lived within this dirty, corrupt world with only one goal in mind, working methodically toward it. Learning that it could be snatched from him would push him from that edge of being a loyal American agent, and possibly into rogue.
"I agree with you." And she did.
His jaw tightened. "Then what the hell are you doing hurting for that son of a bitch? For God's sake, Kira, don't try to deny it. I saw it in your face, in your eyes down there."
He pushed himself from the sofa and stalked to the balcony doors.
"Do you remember Nathan?" he asked her then. "Do you remember what you saw in that hospital?" He turned back to her, his body thrumming with fury. "I saw him when we took him out of that hellhole in California. Wasted to skin and bones, his eyes crazed, his mind nearly as destroyed as his body was. You didn't see that, I did."
"And he's your friend, so you have to avenge it," she said.
"I want to avenge it. But even more importantly I want to make certain it never fucking happens again. Don't stand in my way on this, don't try to convince me differently. It won't work."
She wanted to touch him, wanted to ease the tortured fury from his face, his eyes, but she knew better. Touching him would mean giving in, and she couldn't give in. Not just because of her orders, but because of Ian. He would never forgive himself. He would never be able to forget that he had been the one to kill his father, no matter the monster he was.
"Will killing him make the pain go away, Ian? Will it make the memories stop festering inside you? Or will it only make them worse?"
"I don't know," he snarled. "You answer that question first, Kira. Will seeing Sorrell die bring your parents back? Or Jason's lover and his child? What satisfaction will you gain from it?"
She didn't flinch. It hurt. Oh yeah, that hurt, because she knew Sorrell's death would afford her a measure of security. But she had made peace with the fact that she might fail years ago.
"Good strike," she said softly. "Sorrell's death will bring closure to the past, Ian. Not to my hatred. Nothing will ever change that. But he isn't my father either."
"Diego isn't my father. He was a sperm donor," he sneered.
"Your mother loved him once." She was broaching dangerous territory and she knew it. Territory that even Diego Fuentes refused to broach.
Ian almost flinched at the memory, his rugged face tightening once again at the mental slap. She didn't say it to hurt him, she said it to remind him. To make him think.
"She was young," he finally said. "She didn't know what he was."
"And once she learned she didn't hate you. You didn't pay for Diego's crimes," Kira pointed out. "I'm not excusing him, Ian, I don't even blame you. But is this something you really want to remember in the dead of night? The fact that you took his life?"
"I'll remember it with pleasure." His voice was strong, certain, but she saw the flicker in his gaze, the uncertainty. Unfortunately she knew that uncertainty wasn't strong enough to sway the course he had set for himself.
Men were stubborn, SEALs especially so. They had the supreme confidence that they were right, their decisions logical and without flaws. They were determined, arrogant, and essentially a pain in the ass to deal with. It was just her luck to fall in love with one.
She stared back at him, aching for him, and in some ways aching for Diego as well. They were both strong men, but Ian's strength was based on his honor, and Diego's was based within a world that his son could only see as evil.
"Did you drag me up here to argue over Diego?" Kira asked him when she couldn't come up with a single damned argument to save Diego's life. Not one. The man had built his entire life on watching others suffer, watching and using the suffering for his own ends.
"I dragged you up here to ask you exactly where your loyalties lie. Diego and Sorrell are going to die, Kira. If you have a problem with that, then you better speak up now. You don't want to stand in my way later."
Tension pulled at them both. Kira could feel it, she could almost see it pulsing in the air between them.
"My loyalty is with you, Ian," she told him simply. And it was true.
His gaze locked with hers, his intent, burning with an inner rage as his gaze probed hers, searching for a weakness, or a lie. She wasn't certain which at this point.
Finally, he nodded quickly. "I need to make contact with the team, make certain everything's ready to go."
Kira clenched her hands inside her pockets as she turned away from him and paced into the bedroom while he made his phone call. She needed a few moments to repair her control, to center herself and to grieve.
Ian was never going to forgive her when she was forced to stand between him and Diego. She was going to lose him, and the thought of that was destroying her from the inside out.
IAN COULDN'T DISPEL THE TENSION growing in his gut as Kira moved from the sitting room and into the bedroom. He pulled the secured cell phone from the clip on his belt and hit the speed dial to Macey's phone while he watched her. Watched her and wondered how the hell she could feel any compassion, any pity, for the bast
ard that had destroyed so many lives.
"Gotcha," Macey answered, his voice low. "Everything's secured. You?"
"Awaiting contact. Any additional info?" Reno and Clint had still been questioning Tehya when Ian and Kira left just before dawn.
"We have a few suspects based on the deaths of her guardians, locations, and sites where they first disappeared. I've managed to put together some profiles from the information she's given us. She really knew more than she thought she did after we started piecing everything together. I've narrowed it down to about half a dozen men and I'm running some profiles based on lineage, physical characteristics that she might share with him, and various other parameters. I gotta tell you though, if one of these dudes is our guy, then we were right all along. Social and political connections, old money, royal blood, and plenty to protect. He's not going to come in easy."
The battle to identify the terrorist had been ongoing for years. Quantico had come up with a profile two years before, but no suspects. It wasn't a relief to hear that the profilers had been right.
"Have you been able to trace the cell phone hers is programmed to?"
"Nada. Secured. No trace, no how. Maybe we'll get luckier once we put the call through this afternoon but I doubt he'll stay on long enough to get a trace," Macey answered.
"Who are our suspects?" Ian asked then.
His brows lifted at the three names Macey gave him. He hadn't been joking when he said this could turn into a mess. All three men could trace their roots back to French and English aristocracy. All three came from old money that totaled in the millions, perhaps more, and enjoyed worldwide respect. If one of them was Sorrell, then it was no damned wonder he had managed to evade them for so long.
"We've almost managed to tie all three men, in one way or the other, to Ascarti. There's even a bit of rumor that I managed to uncover that Ascarti is one of the men's bastard son. I'd almost bet my money on that," Macey finished.
Hell, it sounded like a good bet to him.
Ian checked his watch for the time. He sure as hell didn't want to give anyone time to trace his own call.