Derek blew a smoke ring and studied it critically. In the same mild tone, he asked, “Don’t you think it’s time you told me who you really are, Shannon?”
She opened her mouth to answer that he knew who she was, that she’d told him, but a sudden thought made her go cold all over. What was it Alexi had said? Derek obviously had been bothered by the fact that they had been found so quickly at the loft, and Alexi had said something about eliminating the impossible … and then they’d both looked at her so oddly.
“I didn’t,” she whispered.
He looked at her, frowning. “You didn’t what?”
“Tell them. I didn’t tell them where we were. You were with me all the time, you know I didn’t use the phone, or—”
He was suddenly beside her on the couch, the cigarette stubbed out in an ashtray on the coffee table. Suddenly beside her and his expression was grave. “I know you didn’t, sweetheart.” One of his arms lay along the back of the couch behind her; his free hand covered both of hers where they twisted together in her lap.
She stared down at his hand, and a laugh emerged shakily. “That would have been devious, wouldn’t it? If I had come to you pretending to ask for your help, but really just trying to lead someone else to you—”
“Stop it, Shannon.” His hand tightened around hers. “Stop expecting to be blamed for what happens. None of this has been your fault.” After a moment, he added softly, “Now, why don’t you tell me who you are so it won’t worry you anymore?”
She sent him a quick glance. “It doesn’t worry you?”
He smiled. “No. Based on what Alexi said, I can guess. He didn’t know about Governor Franklin’s influence, but he knew somebody had pulled strings to get you into Civatech. He also knew that Brown was an assumed name, and yet you had security clearance at the company. And he believed that, because of who you really are, it wouldn’t have been likely that you could be turned traitor. So, when he looked into your background, he found a great deal of political power and/or wealth.”
Shannon was gazing at him in fascination. “Um … both,” she murmured.
Derek nodded, unsurprised. “And I can also guess that you broke completely with your family, to the point of taking a different name and struggling to make it on your own without any help from them.”
She took a deep breath. “My mother and stepfather live in a very high-powered world. I didn’t fit. And my mother just couldn’t understand that. It seemed to her I wasn’t trying hard enough. But I did,” she added softly.
He waited quietly, watching her delicate face, thinking how wrong and dangerous it was to force a fragile spirit into an unyielding mold.
In the same soft voice, she went on. “My father—my real father—was a diplomat. He died when … he died in the crash. My mother wasn’t in the car. A few years later, my mother married Marshall Burke. You’ve probably heard of him.”
Derek had. The Burkes had been political and financial powers in the world for a long time. Marshall Burke, Derek remembered, was now the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations. And no wonder Alexi had come to the conclusion that Shannon would hardly turn traitor; her background was filled with the kind of wealth that made treason highly unlikely and political realities that made it virtually impossible.
“Did Burke adopt you?” he asked.
She nodded. “So my real name is Burke. I … I’m sorry I lied to you, Derek. I just didn’t want—”
“I know.” He smiled at her. “And now that it’s out in the open, you don’t have to worry about it anymore. I suppose William knows who you really are?”
Shannon bit her lip. “No. When he got me the job at Civatech, he vouched for me; there wasn’t a security check. He thought I didn’t want them to find out about—about being arrested that time.”
“I see.” Derek’s smile went a bit crooked.
“Now will you please relax and believe that I never, for one moment, suspected you of being on the other side?”
She managed a smile. “If you say so.”
“I do.” He leaned over suddenly and kissed her.
The movement was so quick, the kiss so brief, that Shannon didn’t have time to stiffen. She just looked at him, uneasy at this reminder of what else lay between them.
But Derek was still casual, his calm voice belying the heat in his dark eyes. “Definitely those big eyes. It doesn’t seem to matter what you’re wearing.”
She blinked, remembering. And as color rose in her cheeks, she tried to change the subject. “Um … how do you think they’ll get Cyrano out of the country?”
“On the tanker,” he murmured, smiling a little.
Shannon was trying to think clearly. “But he—Alexi—said the tanker had been turned back.”
Derek nodded, but not as if his mind were completely on the subject of tankers. “Sure. But it won’t go far. Outside U.S. waters, it’ll wait.”
“Wait for what?”
“For Civatech’s ship.”
Shannon felt bewildered, and knew it was largely because of those warm eyes fixed on her so intently. She was finding it almost impossible to think clearly. “Civatech’s ship … oh, I remember now. They do have a ship to transport up and down the East Coast. But if that’s the case, why do they need the tanker at all?”
“To transport Cyrano to the Middle East. Civatech’s ship won’t go near the place—it would look too suspicious to our military ships out there. No, they’ll transfer the device at sea, far from watching eyes.”
She cleared her throat. Why did he keep looking at her like that? She felt hot. “So their backup plan in case the tanker couldn’t reach port was to use their own ship innocently? You said it would only be days—”
“You’re still on the loose,” Derek reminded her. “I’m betting they were pretty confident that the tanker could reach port. Since it couldn’t, they’ll make use of one of their regular shipments out of—Norfolk, I believe. I don’t know the schedule, but Civatech ships their stuff out pretty regularly. They can’t afford to look suspicious by shipping out early, so they’ll stick to their schedule.”
“How can we find out when the ship will leave?”
“That’s the easy part,” Derek said dryly.
Shannon thought about it. Tried to think about it. “Um … then the hard part is getting Cyrano?”
His gaze was moving over her face slowly, as if he were memorizing her features, and the look alone was a caress. “They can’t afford to use unusual security,” he murmured. “It has to be a regular shipment, overland, to Norfolk. Probably in a semi, or a big van of some kind.”
Shannon pulled air into her lungs slowly, wondering when she’d last breathed. A minute? An hour? “You said—there would have to be a trick of some kind to get Cyrano out?”
Derek shook his head, still obviously somewhat detached from the subject. “To get Cyrano in our hands. I thought about it on the way back here. If they were transporting the device secretly and surrounding it with security, they wouldn’t have panicked and moved against you so fast—there wouldn’t have been a need for that. They feel vulnerable. That means their plan is wide open to possible interference.”
“So what do we do?” Such a small room, really, filled with his presence. She looked down at the hand covering hers and fought a sudden wild urge to throw herself into his arms.
“First, we find out when the next shipment leaves Civatech. It’ll have to be the next; that tanker can’t hang around outside U.S. waters for long without being challenged.” He drew a deep breath. “Shannon—”
The doorbell rang.
Shannon jumped, startled, only dimly aware that the bell rang with an odd rhythm, as if the visitor was deliberately using the bell as a signal. And obviously she was correct about the signal, because after a fleeting moment of tension, Derek relaxed and rose from the couch with a frown.
“Now, what the hell—” he muttered, going to the front door with the confidence of a man who knows only too well what’
s on the other side.
Shannon couldn’t see the door, but gazed toward the foyer, half relieved and half annoyed by the interruption. What had he been about to say to her?
“I just put two and two together, that’s all,” Raven Long said as she strolled into the living room, looking, just like last time, as if she could have fit into any situation. “Hello, Shannon. It wasn’t that I knew where to look, Derek, it was just that I knew how to look. Shannon, this is my husband, Josh. And a friend of ours, Zach Steele.”
Shannon looked at the two men. One was dark, lean, and curiously both elegant and tough in his casual clothes; the other was equally dark, massive and dangerous and graceful. Josh Long possessed a handsomeness that was a bit hawklike, his blue eyes penetrating and intelligent. He was, Shannon thought, a man who would make a very good friend and a dangerous enemy. And Zach Steele was a large man of obvious physical strength who, like Derek, handled both his size and undoubted power with a casual grace that was riveting.
She gazed at them as the three visitors settled casually into chairs, and she felt distinctly unnerved until Derek returned to her side and took her hand.
“Out with it,” he said, directing the command to Raven. “I want to know how you found us.”
“You forget.” She smiled merrily. “Unlike your enemies, I know all about your lurid past. It wasn’t very hard to track down your attorney in New York and—um—persuade him to tell us what properties you owned here in Richmond, whether your name was on the deeds or not.”
Derek stared at her for a moment, and then eyed Josh Long somewhat severely. “You leaned on him, dammit.”
Josh, lighting a cigarette, sent Derek a bland look over the flame of his lighter. “Nice to have clout,” he murmured.
Wincing slightly, Derek said, “I knew that comment would come back to haunt me.” He gave Raven a painful look.
Unrepentant, she shrugged. “Josh had already figured out that you weren’t a garden-variety agent, pal. I just filled in a few of the blanks for him.”
“Fill them in for me,” Shannon said suddenly, her earlier unrest disappearing.
Raven looked at Derek with lifted brows, and he sighed as he turned his gaze to Shannon. “It isn’t important. They just mean that I inherited, through an accident of birth, a company that makes me—financially independent.”
In a polite tone, Josh said, “One might put it that way.”
Shannon understood the burrows now, and the cars and elaborate security systems. It didn’t really surprise her to learn that Derek was a wealthy man, but she didn’t know how she felt about it. It didn’t seem to matter.
Derek looked back at the visitors and changed the subject in a firm voice. “Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, and now that we know how you found us—what are you doing here?”
Injured, Raven said, “Helping, of course.”
“I told you—”
“I hate being told what to do,” Josh said conversationally, glancing at Zach. “Don’t you?”
“Always.” The big man’s voice was soft, his serene gray eyes amused.
“All right, all right,” Derek said. “You’re here.”
“Graceful acceptance,” Josh said, again to Zach.
Derek grinned suddenly. “I’d love to go head-to-head with you in a boardroom.”
“I’d love to watch,” Raven murmured. “From a concrete bunker.”
“Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way,” Zach said.
Shannon understood what was going on, which surprised her somewhat. There was, she thought, something interesting between Derek and Josh Long. Two powerful and wealthy men, both accustomed to command, both tough. She had the odd feeling that, although neither wished for a confrontation, a test of strength, both wondered how the contest would turn out. Like Raven, Shannon would have been a fascinated observer should it ever come to pass and, like Raven, she’d opt for the safety of a bunker.
“I gather you people have been investigating?” Derek said now, briskly, to the visitors.
“We’ve been doing our poor best,” Josh replied.
Zach cleared his throat and spoke rather quickly. “We have Civatech’s transport schedule to Norfolk, and their ship leaves port day after tomorrow for a regular shipment.”
Derek used his free hand to fumble for a cigarette and light it, his expression thoughtful. “When is the next transport to Norfolk?”
“Tomorrow afternoon. The scheduled route is just over a hundred and twenty-five miles long. They usually use two trucks, vans rather than semis. The stuff will be inspected by customs before they load it on the ship.”
“Does that help?” Raven asked.
Nodding slowly, Derek said, “Definitely. It’s what I needed to know.” He looked at Zach. “I had it in mind to destroy this device, but it’s supposed to be practically indestructible. Tell me—how long would it take you to disarm this thing and wipe the programming?”
Zach considered for a moment. “Well, without knowing exactly what I’d be dealing with, it’s hard to say. Any idea how it’s armed?”
“From what I’ve been able to find out, lasers. It also has the capability to launch small armor-piercing missiles. God knows what else it’s capable of.”
Shrugging, Zach said, “The lasers will be simple. As to the programming, the more complicated they make it, the easier it is to throw a spanner in the works. Say two or three hours. Less if it’s partially disassembled.”
“It’s a prototype?” Josh asked.
Derek nodded. “No blueprints or diagrams exist. If we gum up the works badly enough, it’ll be useless to them. And useless is the name of the game.”
“Lot easier to break something than fix it,” Zach noted.
Shannon listened intently to the ensuing discussion. Clearly, Derek had accepted the help of Raven and the two men. Just as clearly, these three people were as accustomed to deceptions and tactics as Derek.
Diagrams were carefully drawn, maps pored over, and a route marked. Shannon was asked to describe the trucks Civatech used, and was able to remember them clearly. She became interested in spite of herself, fascinated by the intricacies of the plan that gradually evolved.
Zach went out to get something for lunch when they realized it was midafternoon, and it wasn’t until they were eating in the kitchen that Raven dryly asked the questions lurking in Shannon’s mind.
“So how are you going to know which truck the device is in?” she asked Derek. “And who stops the other one?”
Derek was silent for a moment. “The other truck will be diverted by some friends of mine,” he said slowly. “I think they’d rather none of you saw them, or knew any more than necessary about them.”
Alexi, Shannon thought. And Gina.
Raven nodded, as unquestioning and incurious as her husband and their friend, accepting matter-of-factly Derek’s implied trust in these “friends” of his. “Okay. What about the decision of which truck we stop?”
Derek hesitated again. He was frowning slightly, his gaze distracted for a moment, and then he returned Raven’s steady look with a faint smile. “I’ll know.”
She nodded, accepting that as well without question.
Shannon put it together in her mind. Alexi and his partner would divert the other truck, delaying it long enough so that both would arrive in Norfolk at about the same time. While that diversion was taking place, the truck they were interested in would be stopped so that Zach could “defang” Cyrano. With that done, Zach would assume the place of the driver and deliver the shipment to Norfolk, where, according to what Josh had discovered, Adam Moreton waited on Civatech’s ship.
Zach had more or less commandeered the job of delivering the truck to Norfolk, saying merely that Derek would want to remain in Richmond. And, after a steady look at the other man and a thoughtful silence, Derek had agreed.
So he can take care of me, Shannon thought. And she didn’t know how she felt about that. She couldn’t seem to feel at
all, except for surface emotions.
“It’s a tight timetable,” Zach noted.
Derek nodded. “Tighter than you know. There’s another player in the game, Moreton’s silent partner. Or partners. This shell game may bring him out into the open, but I’m gambling he won’t show up in time.”
Raven tilted her head questioningly. “He’s the danger to Shannon, then?”
“I think so. Until Cyrano is safely aboard Yaltan’s ship. After that, the whole thing’ll probably break wide open. Civatech’s ship will sail with the morning tide on Friday, and Moreton will want best speed to meet Yaltan’s tanker as soon as possible.”
“What will happen to Moreton?” Shannon asked suddenly.
Derek met her gaze steadily. “Yaltan won’t be happy. He’ll be getting a harmless, useless device instead of the killing machine he expects.”
She took a deep breath. Yaltan, the Middle Eastern fanatic Alexi had described who wanted to conquer the world. “He’ll kill Moreton?”
“Probably,” Raven answered. Her voice was flat. “But he was willing to sell his soul and upset the balance of power, Shannon. He was willing to kill millions.”
Shannon pushed her salad away. Choices. Derek’s plan would send Adam Moreton to a probable death. She thought of the brisk, somewhat impatient, middle-aged Moreton; he didn’t look like an evil man.
“They tried to kill you,” Derek reminded her.
She looked at him, at that hard, handsome face with its ancient dark eyes. She thought she understood, now, why his eyes were old and tolerant. How many impossible choices had he made?
“You said something about an appointment this afternoon.” Raven’s voice was easy and casual.
Derek looked away from Shannon with obvious reluctance. “Yes. I have to meet that friend of mine. And there’s something else I need to do before our game plan will work.”
Raven glanced at her husband, then said, “Why don’t Josh and I stay with Shannon while you’re gone?”
“And I,” Zach said placidly, “will wait in the car while you meet your friend.”
Derek looked at each of the visitors in turn, an expression of faint amusement on his face. “You had this all planned, huh?”