Merrick's Eleventh Hour
Wendy Rosnau
Seductive memories of his beautiful wife Johanna haunted Adolf Merrick's every waking moment.Until the Onyxx operative came to Greece and discovered that the woman he'd loved, still loved–the woman who'd supposedly perished in an explosion–was very much alive. For twenty years, Johanna had buried memories of her life with Merrick.She'd become someone else–the only way she could survive. And now he'd found her. But how could she trust the former government assassin who'd so cruelly betrayed her? Yet once desire reignited, sweeping her back into harm's way, Johanna realized how much she'd risk for the man she'd never stopped loving….
“It’s been twenty years,” Merrick said. “The irony is you don’t look a helluva lot different.”
Johanna looked away, then turned back and raised her chin. “Perhaps it’s the fugitive lifestyle that agrees with me. Or being pampered by lies, and deceived by rogue agents out for revenge on my husb—” She cut herself off.
“Husband?”
“Not for long.”
She had a right to be angry, but dammit, so did he. He tried not to notice how short her towel was. Tried unsuccessfully. He knew every inch of her body. He’d dreamed of her so often he could envision every curve beneath that damn towel.
In that moment all he wanted to do was pick her up and claim his wife.
Dear Reader,
I’d like to say I’ve saved the best for last in this seventh and final book in my SPY GAMES miniseries. And yet each book in this series has been special to me in so many ways. As I began to delve into Adolf Merrick’s character with all his trials and all his grief, I realized what a treasure he was. Once a government assassin, now the commander of the NSA Onyxx Agency, he’s a man who has truly survived hell.
They say survival is everything. That justice will come to those both good and evil. That the journey makes you or breaks you. I admit that the inception of this story was based on survival and justice, but as I joined Merrick in his eleventh hour, it became evident that his journey was a resurrection of heart and soul. For a man’s valor and redemption are weighed by his undying loyalty, honor, trust and his humanity to forgive.
Come with me on this final leg of SPY GAMES. My hope is that you fall in love with Merrick as I did. His broken heart has been waiting a long time to be set free. For even the deepest wounds can be healed by a miracle. So yes, perhaps I have saved the best for last. If you missed one of the previous SPY GAMES books, log on to www.wendyrosnau.com.
Until next time,
Wendy Rosnau
Merrick’s Eleventh Hour
Wendy Rosnau
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
WENDY ROSNAU
resides on sixty secluded acres in Minnesota with her husband and their two children. She divides her time between her family-owned bookstore and writing romantic suspense. Her first book, The Long Hot Summer, was a Romantic Times BOOKreviews nominee for Best First Series Romance of 2000. Her third book, The Right Side of the Law, was a Romantic Times BOOKreviews Top Pick. She received the Midwest Fiction Writers 2001 Rising Star Award. Wendy loves to hear from her readers. Visit her Web site at www.wendyrosnau.com.
For Tyler and Jen. No mother could
be more blessed. You are my
greatest fortune and priority.
A special thank-you to Joyce Alt
for her expertise on asthma.
Any inaccuracies are mine alone.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Epilogue
Chapter 1
An amputee for twenty-two years, Peter Briggs had a certain routine—work at eight, supper at seven, in bed by nine. But the flu had disrupted his staid life for the past week. At 10:30 p.m. he rolled his wheelchair out of the bathroom and into the bedroom for the third time that night.
Weak and nauseated, he reached for the bar that hung above his bed and hoisted himself onto the mattress. Snuggled beneath the blankets, conscious of his old routine, he slid his hand beneath the pillow, his fingers brushing the cool steel of a 9mm SIG. A grunt of assurance, a moan, then exhaustion sent Peter into a restless sleep.
An hour later he woke up shivering, his body racked with chills. He pulled the blanket up around his neck, and that was when he noticed how cold the air was. If he hadn’t known better he’d have thought the heat had been shut off in his D.C. apartment.
Peter reached for the bar overhead and pulled himself up. He turned on the lamp, and found the source of his discomfort. The window was open, a stiff breeze whipping the lacy beige curtain into a ghostly dance, driving in the cold April rain all over the floor.
He was staring at the open window in a confused daze when he heard a noise in the living room. Instinct sent his hand under his pillow to retrieve the SIG, at the same time he reached out to his wheelchair.
No SIG.
No wheelchair.
As if his rising panic summoned his lifeline, the bedroom door opened and his wheelchair rolled slowly inside.
The smell of vomit and diarrhea was caustic. It had turned the small apartment into a war zone. Cyrus Krizova leaned back in the wheelchair and studied his old comrade on the narrow bed. The SIG in his lap, he said, “You look like hell, Briggs. Rough week?”
“The worst of my life.”
Cyrus’s dark eyes shifted to the lower half of the bed where Peter’s legs should have been. “I doubt that. I imagine you’ve had plenty of dark days.”
Peter rubbed his eyes, rheumy from lack of sleep. “You haven’t left Greece in years. What brings you to Washington?”
“Merrick has uncovered our little secret.”
“That’s impossible. There’s no data to prove it. I’ve been careful.”
“That’s good to hear. But he’s looking for that nonexistent data. I suppose I’m going to have to take credit for that. Still, I believe I only confirmed what he suspected. Onyxx has been looking for a mole inside the Agency for some time.”
“You told him it’s me?”
“He’s been leaving you out of the loop for months. That’s why you weren’t able to warn me when he arrived in Greece and stole my prisoners from Vouno weeks ago. Not to mention his untimely arrival at Lesvago days later.”
“I had nothing to do with that.”
“My point. You’ve been isolated. Merrick’s unscheduled raid cost me billions, as well as my daughter. Melita has defected to the enemy’s camp.”
Beads of perspiration popped out on Peter’s forehead. “I had no idea Merrick had left Washington until he’d returned. If you need someone to blame, blame that bastard Sully Paxton. You should have killed him a long time ago.”
“What I should have done is irrelevant now. You really don’t understand this little parody you’ve been living this past week, do you?”
“I contracted the flu. I—”
“The flu is it?” Cyrus smiled. “The infection running through your body is no flu strain. It’s a manufactured virus. Think, Briggs. Where were you the night you took ill?”
“I was at Chadwick’s. Merrick took me to dinner.”
“Go to dinner with him often?”
“No.”
“You’re a fool, Briggs.” Cyrus sighed. “And Chadwick’s of all places. Where Ames sold out the CIA and gave up the names of twenty agents to the Russians. Where moles and traitors hand off government secrets and stab their comrades in the back.”
The look on Peter’s face was priceless. “Merrick poisoned me at Chadwick’s?”
“Must I remind you that, before Onyxx, Merrick was a class-A government assassin? His bag of tricks far exceeds a simple bullet between the eyes. As much as it pains me to admit, Icis is still the best in the business. I would have died at Lesvago if I hadn’t been wearing a bulletproof vest.”
“I’m going to die?”
“If he wanted you dead, you would be. No, Merrick believes you’ll join him in the hunt for me to save your own skin once he’s found proof you’ve been filching information.”
“He won’t find anything, and I’d never give you up. Haven’t I proven my loyalty?”
“Loyalty that served your own revenge. You begged Merrick for your life in Prague and he gave it to you. Had he chosen to save me instead, I would never have betrayed him.”
“Why do you care why I agreed to be your mole? My reasons still served your purpose.”
“Treason is a tricky business.” Cyrus stood and checked the SIG’s ammunition clip. The weapon showed a full eight rounds.
“What are you doing?”
“I considered making this look like a suicide. A man chained to a wheelchair must have contemplated it over the years, but you know how much I enjoy tormenting Merrick.”
“I can still be of use to you.”
“Come now, Briggs, you had to know your days were numbered.”
“Not like this, Cyrus. At least let me get dressed and give me my chair. Let me die with some dignity.”
“A traitor has no dignity. Good-bye, Briggs.”
Cyrus raised the SIG and fired. The first two bullets plowed through Peter’s skull, out the back of his head and into the wall. The third went into his heart and stayed there.
Traitor, mole, comrade…None of it mattered now. Peter Briggs was dead before his head hit the pillow.
Hours later, Cyrus Krizova, aka the Chameleon, boarded a plane back to Greece. Like a soldier heading home from the war, a little victory celebration was definitely in order.
Da, the spoils of war.
For two decades Adolf Merrick had coveted the dream.
Johanna’s image came first. Long raven-black hair surrounding a delicate oval face. Perfectly arched eyebrows framing hazel-green eyes. The body of a temptress that moved with the regal grace of a cat.
Merrick flattened out his hand and stroked the white satin sheet, remembering the way she liked to curl up next to him. The exotic scent of Medallion roses had steeped the air, their peach petals exploiting the memories. The crackle and pop of wood burning slow and luminous in the brick fireplace fueling another timeless image.
Eyes closed, drunk on recall, he beckoned for her to come to him. And like a whisper riding a gentle breeze, Johanna came for a visit.
The bed moved against her fragile weight. Her moist breath teasing his neck, she whispered, However you want me, I’m here.
Merrick moaned deep into the vortex of the dream—a dream he would live in 24/7 if that were possible. He arched his hips in silent solicitation. Rewarded with a naked thigh sliding over his hips.
Then she leaned forward and kissed him.
The kiss of life.
The kiss of death.
Stay focused.
Don’t wake up.
However you want me, I’m here.
He wanted her hot and mind-blowing. He wanted her all night. Every night. He wanted time to stand still. No, he wanted to rewind time and go back to the beginning.
Take me back, my love. My wife. My life.
Stay focused.
Don’t wake up.
Another kiss.
Another moan.
Another night wrapped in ghostly arms.
No more thinking. No more sorrow. No more tears.
Nothing but the dream. Nothing but the memories. Nothing but Johanna swallowing him up body and soul and taking him on a wicked midnight ride.
The incessant rain tapping at the window like an unwelcome voyeur roused Merrick. It was dawn, another dreary, rainy day in April. He tossed back the white satin sheet, soiled now from making love to his ghostly wife. He dropped his feet to the floor and rubbed the gray stubble along his rugged jaw.
The fire had died sometime in the middle of the night, but not the memories. He realized now that he should have hired someone to box up Johanna’s things. Her clothes still hung in the closet. Her jewelry box on the vanity. The quilt she’d made for their bed was still folded over the rocker—all of it wrapped in cobwebs, surrounded by yellowed curtains, peeling wallpaper and wood floors stained from a leaky roof.
The tattered remains of heaven on earth.
He should have sold the house years ago, before it became an eyesore. He’d planned to, but he had always come up with some lame-ass excuse.
He shoved himself up from the bed and walked naked into the bathroom with a powerful grace that, at age fifty-two, still garnered him a second look from a beautiful woman. By society’s standards Adolf Merrick was one of the lucky ones. Like a renowned bottle of port years in the making, he seemed to get better with age.
The only evidence that he was past his prime was his silver hair—a phenomenon that had happened virtually overnight following Johanna’s death.
He turned on the shower and stepped inside. He kept the water cold—a strategic maneuver to quash the residual effects of making love to Johanna’s ghost. Five minutes later, back on track, with a towel wrapped low around his hips, he headed for the kitchen.
The windows faced Johanna’s rose garden in the backyard, and when she hadn’t been sharing his bed at night, or cooking something fabulous for dinner, he would find her in the garden with her roses. He’d left the windows open last night, and he could smell the heavy sweet fragrance—the scent as caustic as the memories.
His cell phone rang while he was cooking the hell out of a cup of instant coffee in the microwave—after all this time he still couldn’t brew a decent pot of coffee. He backtracked to the bedroom and picked up his phone from the nightstand, checked the number and saw it was Sly McEwen.
“What’s up?”
“I’ve got bad news.”
Merrick heard the distress in Sly’s voice. “Let’s hear it.”
“Peter Briggs is dead and so is the operative we had staked out in front of his apartment. That’s all I know. No details. The Agency called me after they couldn’t reach you.”
“I must have been in the shower.”
“I’m on my way to Briggs’s apartment now. My guess is Krizova sent Holic Reznik to clean up a loose end. Maybe we should have locked Briggs up.”
Merrick hadn’t wanted to do that. As of yet they hadn’t been able to prove that Briggs was guilty of treason. They needed concrete evidence, and that had been damn hard to come by.
“When should I expect you?” Sly asked.
“One hour. I’m at my country house.”
“I thought you sold that old monster years ago.”
Merrick set his jaw, sidestepped the issue, as well as his personal obsession with the old monster, saying, “Damn good thing I didn’t or I’d be homeless, thanks to Krizova blowing up my apartment. I don’t want Briggs’s body touched until I get there. One hour.”
The country house was north of D.C. As Merrick drove through the rain, he called Jacy Madox and got him out of bed in Montana. Since he’d slipped the flu virus into Briggs’s wine a week ago, Jacy had been going through the data on Peter’s computer while he was housebound. Although Jacy’s field agent days were over, he continued to work for Onyxx from his mountain home miles from nowhere. A cybergenius, he was considered one of the best hackers in the intelligence world.
“Sorry about Briggs,” Jacy said. “The news is I didn’t find anything on his computer. If he was Krizova’s mole, he left no evidence behind.”
“All right. I’ll be in touch.”
Merrick hung up, his mood sinking past sour. It was starting to look like finding Cyrus’s latest hideout was going to take an act of God. Not that he wasn’t thankful for the surprise resurrection of Sully Paxton two months ago. After believing his agent was dead, Merrick had learned that Sully had given new meaning to the word survival. It had been the salt the Agency needed to step up their commitment to ending Cyrus’s fanaticism with Onyxx, as well as his global terrorism.
With Sully’s help they’d found two of Krizova’s compounds in Greece, rescued more than a dozen government agents imprisoned in the bowels of one of his monastery hideouts and recovered a cache of weapons bound for rebel hands. They had also rescued Melita Krizova from Cyrus’s warped sense of fatherly love.
But at the end of the day—once again—Cyrus had managed to elude capture.
Sully Paxton was still in Greece, on the island of Amorgós with Melita. He’d been tirelessly combing the islands trying to pinpoint Cyrus’s latest hideout. He would need to fill Sully in on the recent turn of events, but he’d wait until he had all the facts.
Merrick swung his black Jag to the curb of the ten-story apartment building where Peter Briggs had lived for the past twenty-two years, since the Prague incident. Out front Pierce Fourtier and Ash Kelly, two of his elite Rat Fighters, were standing under the awning smoking.
Pulling up the collar on his black leather jacket to combat the rain, he joined them. “Got a name on our stakeout agent?”
“New guy. Nathan Connor. Shot three times, just like Briggs,” Ash said.
“Sly’s inside,” Pierce offered.
Merrick nodded and headed in. Peter’s apartment was on the ground floor, halfway down the hall. He walked through the open door. Sly McEwen was standing at the window, his stance in sync with his serious attitude. Over six feet, rock-solid, Sly had proven himself to be a man you could count on. He didn’t know what the word quit meant, and Merrick liked that about him. It’s why he’d made him his second in command.
Sly turned from the window and motioned to the bedroom. “Nothing’s been touched. I called Harry Pendleton and gave him the news. Nathan Connor was his nephew. The kid was twenty-three. Onyxx activated him six months ago.”
“I thought I recognized the name.” Merrick walked through the living room and headed for the bedroom. Briggs’s body should have been his primary focus, but instead his eyes locked on the peach-colored roses in a crystal vase on the nightstand.
There was only one flower shop in D.C. where you could buy Medallion roses without placing a special order. Merrick knew that because they had been Johanna’s favorite and he regularly purchased the rare hybrid to place on her grave.
Merrick left Sly with the task of seeing to Peter’s body and, twenty minutes after his arrival, he was on his way to Finny Floral. Sarah Finny lived in the apartment above the flower shop, and when he pulled up he noticed that the Open sign was on in the window. He leapt from the car and crossed the street. As he passed the window he saw her standing behind the counter waiting on a plump bald man in a gray suit. The little bell rang above the door as he swung it open.
She glanced up, saw him, then turned back to the elderly gentleman. There was no surprise in her soft brown eyes when she’d seen him, which told Merrick she’d been expecting him.
The bald gentleman left with his purchase, and Merrick stepped up to the counter. Before he could say anything, Sarah spoke.
“You’ve come about the Medallions. The ones he bought yesterday.”
“What did he look like, Sarah?”
“Very tall, with dark gray hair. Not silver like yours. And shorter.” She glanced at the overnight shadow on Merrick’s jaw. “Clean shaven. He had a nasty scar,” she touched her neck, “here.”
Merrick had been expecting her to describe the scrawny build of Holic Reznik, a hired assassin who had become involved in Cyrus’s nefarious activities years ago. Instead she’d given him a description of Krizova himself.
“I wanted to call you yesterday, but he said if I did he would be back for more than roses. I was afraid, Adolf. Did I make a mistake?”
“No, you did the right thing. Tell me exactly what he said.”
“He asked for three dozen Medallions, one dozen in a crystal vase.”
“Three dozen?”
“Yes.”
“What time was he here?”
“Yesterday around two o’clock. I remember because I was getting a large order together for a wedding that had to be delivered by four.” She opened a drawer and pulled out a small, three-inch-square brown envelope. “He told me when you came by to give you this.”
Merrick took the envelope and peeled open the seal. He pinched the envelope and looked inside. He was careful not to react to the contents, resealed the envelope and slid it into his jacket pocket.
“So he bought the roses, gave you the envelope and told you I’d be by today? That’s it?”
She pointed to a small gift-card display on the counter. “He bought a card.”
Merrick glanced at the card rack. There had been no card with the vase of flowers at Peter’s apartment.
“Adolf, what’s going on?”
If Cyrus intended to kill Sarah, he would. Merrick wasn’t going to cause her more distress by telling her that, but within the hour she’d have an invisible bodyguard. “You’re not in any danger,” he said. “I’ve got to go.” He started to leave.
“Adolf?”
He turned back.
“If you need me to deliver Johanna’s roses to the cemetery the next time you’re out of town, you know you can ask. Just because we’re not seeing each other anymore doesn’t mean we can’t remain friends.”
Over the past three years their friendship had slowly resolved into casual dinners. Sarah wanted more, and he’d been on the verge of giving it to her until Cyrus had blown up his apartment. Once that had happened, he realized that putting Sarah in his life meant he would be putting her in Krizova’s iron sights, as well.
He hadn’t explained it that way to her. Government spies and espionage weren’t exactly dinner table conversation. Fifteen years her senior, he’d taken a different approach the day he’d stopped seeing her.
She stepped around the counter. She was wearing a pale-blue blouse and black skirt, her blond hair twisted up off her neck. She was the exact opposite of Johanna. It was the first thing he always thought about when he looked at Sarah—his lovely ghost wasn’t just content to haunt him at night—and perhaps that was the real reason he’d ended it.
“No strings, Adolf. You know how I feel about you, but I respect your decision.”
“You’re a good friend, Sarah. I’ll be leaving town soon. Maybe you could see to the roses for the next couple of Saturdays.”
She nodded. “I’ll see to it that Johanna gets them.”
He leaned forward and kissed her cheek. “Thank you.”
He left the flower shop with the envelope burning a hole in his pocket. It was still raining, the day surrendering to a bleak sky of gray clouds and a bitter chill in the air. Inside the car, Merrick slipped his hand into his pocket and pulled out the envelope. He dropped the ring into his hand—Johanna’s wedding ring—and closed his eyes. He remembered the day he’d bought it, and with that memory came the memory of her death. The anniversary of that fateful day was looming. It had been twenty years and it still felt like yesterday.
Because he knew Cyrus didn’t do anything without a reason, he had to ask himself, why had he kept the ring, and why was he giving it back to him now?
Merrick swore, returned the ring to the envelope, then to his pocket. He started the car, glanced across the street. Sarah was standing in the window.
He drove the Jag out into the traffic and the rain. Cyrus had bought three dozen roses. He’d left one dozen at Peter’s apartment. There was no doubt in his mind where he would find the other two.
Forty minutes later, Merrick parked at the Oak Hill Cemetery and walked through the rain down the path to Johanna’s grave. Before he reached it, he saw the roses in the cone-shaped brass vase.
The stark white card was pierced on a rose thorn like a dagger. He bent down and pulled the card free. The rain had smeared the ink, but it was still legible.
Four words scribbled in red ink. Four words that would send Merrick back to Greece.
Game on. Your move.
Chapter 2
“Kipler has just sent word that the Starina has been spotted, Callia. Your husband is home.”
Cyrus’s long-standing housekeeper, Zeta Poulos, stood in the bedroom doorway, her pretty island features accented by her smile.
The sun was setting. Callia had just showered and slipped on a white caftan. With no time to dress, she tucked her asthma inhaler in the nightstand drawer along with her nebulizer, then stepped out onto the veranda.
The view from the second-story bedroom was picture-perfect. A vision of paradise that would easily sell a dream vacation to Corfu.
Three months ago Cyrus had moved her and Erik into a villa on the island. She was used to being uprooted. Survival came with a price, and that price had required a new address every couple of years.
The cove was normally quiet, but now six guards scrambled toward the dock as the Starina glided into the harbor. Cyrus came ashore quickly. He spoke to Timon Kipler, the man in charge when her husband was away, and the exchange sent Kipler hurrying back to the yacht.
The warm island breeze blew Callia’s black hair into her eyes and she reached up. Holding her hair in place, she watched Cyrus begin the long climb up the stone steps that wrapped the sharp, rocky face where the villa was perched like an eagle’s nest high above the Ionian Sea.
Her movement must have caught his attention, and he stopped and looked up. He was still a hundred yards away, but she knew he was smiling. He gave her a thumbs-up—the signal that all was well, and she waved in relief.
He never spoke about business. It was an old rule that had come into play long ago. A rule she never challenged. As long as he came back, she was content. And he always came back. It was the one constant in her life. That, and Erik.
In the beginning she’d felt only gratitude, indebted to him for saving her life. But over the years her gratitude had slowly turned into love. Not the kind born out of burning passion. This was a safe and secure love bred out of loyalty and trust.
When he disappeared from sight, she remained on the veranda. She heard him speaking to Zeta. The fifty-year-old housekeeper spoke softly in return. Cyrus never let the smallest detail of their lives go unchecked. Whether it had to do with his business affairs or mundane household trivia, he required an accounting from everyone he employed.
She heard his footsteps on the stone tiles that were polished like a mirror. Caught the scent of sweet tobacco, but she didn’t turn around. Then a pair of strong arms captured her around the waist.
He lowered his head, said softly, “Although I have no sympathy for the weaknesses of men, I confess you are mine.”
Callia smiled. “Have you taken to reciting poetry after all these years?”
“Poetry? I know nothing about poetry,” he muttered close to her ears. “Greek mythology, perhaps. Inspired by your goddesslike beauty.”
He hugged her tighter, drew her back against his hard body, and she knew his eyes had drifted shut. Knew that she held some odd power over him, that she was his weakness. And although he had no sympathy for men with such flaws, she had become her husband’s debility.
“It’s hard to believe that you could have grown more beautiful. Have you and Zeta cooked up some fountain of youth potion you’ve neglected to tell me about? Something we could bottle and sell to the islanders?”
Still smiling, Callia turned in his arms. “If you’re trying to get me in bed, you don’t need to use flattery.”
“Is that what I’m doing, trying to get you in bed?”
“That’s usually where you want me when you first come home. A new routine tonight?”
“No. I like the old routine.”
“That’s why you’re staring at my mouth?”
“You always kiss me right about now. Da, I like the old routine. So where is my welcome-home kiss, wife?”
Callia went up on her tiptoes, one hand curling around his neck as she offered him a warm kiss. When she would have pulled away, he slid his hands over her backside and pulled her into him, lengthening the kiss.
She was naked beneath the flimsy caftan. He released a primal moan, then let her go.
“Give me a quick update on Erik so I can concentrate on my wife.”
“He’s still opposing college,” she said, giving way to her disappointment and frustration over her most recent argument with her son. “He wants to work with you.”
“And that frightens you?”
“Shouldn’t it?”
“You know I would never let anything happen to our son.”
“Can you please talk to him.”
“You mean change his mind?”
“Please?”
“I’ll speak to him. I see you’ve already started working your magic on decorating the villa. Not overdoing it are you?”
“No. I’m fine.”
“Fine isn’t wonderful. Zeta told me you had an asthma attack a few days ago.”
“Spring pollen,” she said to dismiss the incident that had put her on her back for two days. She still wasn’t feeling a hundred percent—it would take days—but she would deal with it as she always had, without complaint. “So you like what I’m doing with the house?”
“I like whatever you like. The villa is adequate. Soon to be beautiful. Whatever you want.”
“You spoil me.”
“I have an ulterior motive. A spoilt wife is happy and content.” He cupped her face and kissed her again. “A man would have to be crazy not to give you whatever you wanted, just to be in the company of that smile. Now then, what were you saying about our routine?”
He liked it when she made the first move. Dutifully, she reached up and began unbuttoning his shirt. Three buttons open and she spotted an angry red scar that hadn’t yet healed completely. “What happened?”
“A minor accident. A careless mistake.”
“You’re never careless.” She stepped away from him, reluctant to ask him what had happened, but needing some kind of assurance that nothing had changed. That they were still safe. “Who did that to you?”
She saw his eyebrows furrow. “You know the rules, and you know by now that I’m indestructible.”
He left her standing on the veranda and walked back into the bedroom. He removed his shirt, and she saw more scars overlapping the old ones that had ravaged his body years ago. Some horrible injustice—a betrayal before they had met—is how he’d explained what had to have been a near death experience.
Callia understood betrayal. Her own had left her scarred, and although the wounds weren’t visible, she’d been cut deeply and forever changed.
She stepped into the bedroom, still watching him. Naked, he tossed the gold coverlet off the bed and stretched out on the blue satin sheets.
“Show me, Callia. Show your husband how beautiful you are. I want to feast my eyes on every inch of you. I’ve thought of nothing else the entire time I’ve been away.”
She slid the caftan off her slender shoulders and let it fall to the floor. For a woman in her forties, she was still trim, her breasts high and firm, her curvy body and slender legs toned like an athlete from years of long walks on the guarded beaches of Greece.
His eyes moved slowly over her as she came to him and curled up beside him. She knew he liked to be touched, and again she made the first move, gliding her fingers gently over his bare chest. Then lower.
A moan of pleasure made his eyes drift shut. “That’s it, work your magic.”
“You’re tired. You should sleep.”
When his eyes remained closed and he didn’t answer, she attempted to leave the bed, but his hand snaked out and gripped her wrist. Eyes open, he said, “Straddle me, Callia. I’ll sleep later.”
With Merrick’s duties at Onyxx left in Sly McEwen’s capable hands, and Harry Pendleton’s blessing, he prepared to leave for Greece. He made a quick trip back to the country house to pack, then arrived at the airport early in the afternoon. Before he boarded the plane he called Sully Paxton to apprise him of the recent turn of events.
“I’m flying to Rome. I don’t want to give Cyrus a heads-up, so I intend to avoid the airport in Athens. He’s probably got it staked out. We both know why he wants me back in Greece. He’s expecting me to lead him to you and Melita.”
“You know he’s left someone behind in Washington to follow you.”
“They won’t be on my ass for long. I want to talk to Melita when I get there.”
“The report I sent you was complete. She answered every one of your questions about Cyrus to the best of her knowledge. Remember, Melita grew up in a bubble. One that Cyrus built around her. He kept her in the dark on his business affairs, and virtually a prisoner at Lesvago until he moved her to Despotiko. We know more about the bastard than his own daughter does.”
“I’d still like to talk to her. Maybe a few new questions might spark a memory that could help us find him. It’s all we have right now.” Merrick gave Sully some last-minute instructions. “Send your man Hector to Crete with a boat. Tell him to leave it in Iráklion for me.”
“It’ll be there. Have a safe trip.”
The flight left on schedule. Merrick forced himself to sleep on the plane knowing that when he arrived in Greece his days and nights would be rolled into one. He reached Rome after a rough trip over the ocean. Three people on the plane from Washington took the same flight to Iráklion on the island of Crete. Two businessmen and one woman.
Merrick rented a room at a resort hotel, changed clothes and waited for the cover of night. Leaning on a cane, dressed as if he were years older, he shuffled his feet toward a taxi and instructed the driver to take him to the harbor.
As Sully Paxton had promised, Hector had left a sixty-foot sport cruiser christened Aldora—winged gift—for him. Hector had been a guard at Despotiko during Melita and Sully’s incarceration. More loyal to Melita than Cyrus, Hector had been an integral part in her escape with Sully months ago. Since then he had remained with them on Amorgós.
Sure no one had followed him, Merrick boarded the Aldora and sped away into the night in the gutsy twelve-hundred-horsepower yacht. She had a lean underbelly, an enclosed cockpit, one stateroom, a bathroom and galley—everything a man would need to survive months at sea.
An hour before dawn, Merrick reached Amorgós. He spotted the villa on the southeast coast. When he reached the hidden cove, he saw Sully’s wicked speed-demon cruiser moored in the harbor. He studied the villa on the top of a rugged hillside. Sully had chosen the spot with strategy in mind. No one could enter the cove without being seen. Already Sully Paxton was heading down the hillside, that silly little goat of Melita’s trailing him in the moonlight.
Merrick leaned into the dock railing as Sully came toward him.
“Were you followed from D.C.?” Sully asked.
“All the way to Crete. No problem after that. They weren’t looking for an old man with arthritis.”
They shared a grin.
“Did you tell Melita I wanted to talk to her?”
“I did. But like I said, I don’t think you’re going to learn much that we don’t already know. She lived at Lesvago with Simon when she was growing up. They were raised by maids and housekeepers. Cyrus popped in now and then. She says she spent one week once every other year with Cyrus and his wife and her half brother, but the visits were always on a different island.”
The look on Sully’s face made his dark Irish expression even more foreboding than usual. Melita’s life as Cyrus’s daughter had been no life at all. A virtual prisoner since he had killed her mother and taken her and Simon to Lesvago on the island of Mykonos. She’d been eight at the time.
Sully said, “I’ve been combing the islands for weeks, and I don’t have one damn lead on Cyrus’s current hideout.”
Cyrus’s corrupt activities had made him a wealthy man and allowed him to set up a maze of compounds throughout Greece. From a strategist’s standpoint, the islands were the perfect mecca for a criminal to hide and never be found.
“When can I talk to Melita?”
“She’s sleeping. Why don’t you catch a few hours yourself? You look beat. I’ll bring her to you when she wakes up.”
Merrick returned to the Aldora, but he never slept. He unpacked his duffel bag, tossed his shaving kit in the bathroom and his clothes in the drawers beneath the double-wide berth. All the comforts of home, he thought. Sully had even stocked the galley.
He never went anywhere without the picture of Johanna in the garden at the country house, and he pulled it from his duffel and laid it on the table as he entered the galley. He’d snapped the picture in the backyard a few months before her death. Johanna was standing among the roses wearing jeans on her narrow hips and a lavender silk blouse. She was smelling the roses, her hand holding back her long hair from her face.
Feeling like a caged animal, he headed up the companionway and left the Aldora to stroll the beach. He’d been traveling nonstop and was dog-ass tired, but his adrenalin was pumping. For some unexplained reason he felt he was about to learn something crucial that would put him back on the scent of his enemy.
Maybe it was just wishful thinking, but he’d always felt as though Melita was the key to finding Cyrus. She knew something, even if she wasn’t aware of it.
With the scent of his wife lingering on his body, Cyrus rose early. He grabbed his black robe off the chair and pulled it on. Callia was stilled curled up on the bed after he’d had her every way imaginable. The smile he wore as he left the room was that of a prevailing conqueror. The sex had been carnal, fueled by a rapturous hunger that would never be quenched.
Sated temporarily, he focused on his game of cat-and-mouse with Merrick. Soon his old buddy would return to Greece and lead him to Sully and Melita.
Melita’s latest escapade of rebellion had damn near cost him his life. His daughter had to know that he wouldn’t rest until he’d been compensated for that.
Downstairs he phoned Holic Reznik. “Give me an update. Is Merrick on his way yet?”
“He flew to Rome.”
“Why Rome and not Athens?”
“I don’t know. From Rome he took a flight to Crete.”
“And?”
There was a long pause.
“Don’t tell me you lost him. Did he make you on the plane?”
“I don’t know how he got out of that hotel in Iráklion without us seeing him.”
“Idiots. He’s a damn master of disguises, that’s how. I warned you to expect anything, and overlook nothing.”
“He never made me on the plane. I look damn good as a woman, better than I expected. I did find out that a boat was waiting for him in the harbor.”
“How do you know that?”
“I always find a way to make people talk, you know that. Before the fisherman choked on his own blood he told me a man left the harbor around midnight in an expensive little speed-demon cruiser.”
“How do you know it was him?”
“The fisherman said the old man was wobbling on a cane with two left feet, but that he had no need for the cane or the limp when he leapt on board and sent the cruiser out of the harbor at full throttle.”
“That doesn’t help me now.”
“I have the name of the cruiser.”
“Did the fisherman say if someone picked him up? Paxton?”
“No. The Aldora was empty when Merrick sailed her out of port.”
“Find the cruiser, and find Merrick. I didn’t fly to Washington for nothing. Do it, Holic. I hold you responsible for my daughter’s escape from Despotiko. Redeem yourself, or I’ll have no reason to keep you around. You’ve been a disappointment lately, and you know what I do to men who disappoint me.”
“Father?”
Cyrus slid his phone into his pocket, then turned around to see his son wearing sweat-soaked fatigues and a muscle shirt. “Where have you been, Erik?”
“I took a morning run.”
“Your mother asked me to talk to you. She’s still asleep. Perhaps this would be a good time.”
“She’s on the college kick again?”
“If she asks, tell her we’ve talked and you’re considering it. Now come and fill me in on your progress.”
His son followed him onto the veranda. Once they were seated, Cyrus studied Erik. The workouts over the past year were paying off. It was even more than he’d hoped for. It appeared Erik was putting his heart and soul into his work.
“I looked over the file Kipler’s been keeping on you. It’s impressive.”
“Kip says I’m a natural. I can nail my target eighteen out of twenty now.”
Erik flexed his muscles, and Cyrus could see that Kipler had made good on his promise to turn his son into a fighting machine.
Erik was staring at the fresh scars on his father’s chest. “What happened?”
“An encounter with Merrick.”
“Did you kill him?”
Cyrus had shared certain secrets with Erik. One of those secrets had been his life as a betrayed Onyxx agent left for dead in Prague. “No. He’s as good as I am at cheating death. But the opportunity will come again. That’s why you need to continue to keep up with your training. I don’t want you vulnerable should he show up someday unannounced.”
That would never happen. He’d made sure of that, but Erik needed to stay focused.
He didn’t intend to tell Erik about Melita’s defection. He would eventually have to if he didn’t get her back in a timely manner, but for now Callia and his son would believe Melita was safe at Lesvago with Simon.
Simon…He’d shared his eldest son’s death with Erik some time ago—a little fuel to ignite his hatred of Merrick, but there was no reason for Callia to know. Erik had proven his loyalty by keeping the secret. His son was a pleasant surprise, and Cyrus was rarely surprised by anything.
Simon had been weak, a burden from the moment he’d been born. His headstrong daughter and albino son with a frail immune system had been blessed curses from the beginning.
Weak, ungrateful children were a father’s worst nightmare. But Erik was loyal to the bone, and when the time came Erik would follow his father into hell without even blinking an eye. If only he had another just like him. Several. Still, one loyal son was better than none.
He reached over and squeezed Erik’s shoulder. “I’d like to see for myself how well you’re honing your survival skills. We leave for the island day after tomorrow.”
Erik’s eyes lit up. “What will we tell Mother?”
“That we’re going fishing.”
They shared a grin.
The sun was up when Merrick returned to the Aldora. He went below deck, and to his surprise he found Melita waiting for him. She looked up on hearing him come down the companionway. Johanna’s picture was in her hand, and the question she asked a second later was as confusing as the look on her face.
“Sully never mentioned that you knew Callia. How do you know my stepmother?”
Merrick frowned. “Stepmother?”
“You knew my father remarried after he killed my real mother. I don’t see Callia often, but I do think of her as my stepmother. She’s very—”
“You’re mistaken. That’s a picture of Johanna.”
“Your wife, Johanna?”
“That’s the only Johanna I know. Yes, my wife.”
“Sully told me that she died.”
“Cyrus killed her,” Merrick clarified. “She was twenty-six in that picture. It was taken a month before her death. Are you telling me there’s a strong resemblance between Callia and my wife?”
Melita looked at the picture again. “No. This is my stepmother.”
Merrick tried to make sense out of what she was saying. “You know your father had extensive plastic surgery on his face. If there’s a close resemblance, then Callia must have had reconstructive surgery.”
It was too bizarre to believe, but then he knew what Cyrus was capable of. After all, he’d had plastic surgery to clone Paavo Creon, their comrade. He’d gone so far as to have one of his fingers amputated to match Paavo’s hand. Nothing was beyond Cyrus’s twisted mind. It was an extreme concept, but Cyrus was an extremist in every facet of his life.
“I never considered that.” Melita laid the photo on the table. “I can’t imagine why anyone would agree to that, but knowing my father, she probably didn’t have a choice. The likeness is uncanny. Sorry, if I—” She stopped in midsentence, then spun the picture toward Merrick and pointed to Johanna’s raised hand, holding her hair back from her face. “See this scar. Callia has one just like it. She told me how she got it. She was rescuing her cat.”
Melita’s claim hit Merrick in the solar plexus like a sledgehammer.
“His name was something like Jasper or…”
“Jinx?”
“That’s it.”
Merrick sat down at the table before his knees buckled. “Tell me the story, Melita.”
She relayed the tale while Merrick’s memory followed along. Johanna had needed eighteen stitches to close the wound. He’d wanted to kill that damn cat, but the silver Siamese wasn’t just Johanna’s pet. She had loved Jinx like a mother loves a child.
A glass of water materialized in front of him. The sound of his name and a hand on his arm jerked Merrick back.
“Should I get Sully?”
“No. Sit down.”
She sat across from him, and they stared at each other for several seconds. Finally, she said, “Callia and Johanna are the same person, aren’t they?”
“I saw her die.”
“You were there?”
“No. I watched it on my computer in my office at Onyxx headquarters.”
“Could it have been someone else?”
“No. It was Johanna.” It wasn’t possible that she could have survived the explosion, but as that thought came to him, so did another. “Cyrus is an explosives expert. The warehouse was leveled.” He thought a minute. “Time delay. He rigged the explosion on a timer. She wasn’t in the warehouse when it blew.”
“Did you find a body?”
“No. The explosion was double-charged. After searching through the rubble, we found nothing.”
“Then why did you think she was inside?”
“She was in that warehouse. I saw her strapped to a bed with C4. The warehouse was one of ours. I’d been there many times. I found her car abandoned at the shopping mall where she told me she was going that day. She was gone.” Merrick pointed to the picture. “That photo is almost twenty years old. You said Callia looks like this now?”
“Pretty close. A little older, but not much.”
“Johanna would be forty-six now. How’s that possible?”
“I don’t know.”
Merrick knew that Cyrus had remarried, but they had never been able to uncover any data on the woman. It was obvious now why that was. He said, “You’ve spent time with her. How is she?”
“Not much time. Every other year I was allowed a visit with Simon.”
“And how did she seem?”
“I’m not sure what you’re asking?”
“You know Cyrus, Melita. If he has my wife, then she’s living with him against her will.”
“I don’t think so. He treats her like a queen. Like he…”
“Like he what?”
“Loves her.”
Merrick snorted. “You of all people know he’s incapable of that.”
“I know, but he’s different with her and Erik.”
“Erik. Their son.”
“Yes. My half brother.”
Merrick also knew that Cyrus had another child. A boy. He could not wrap his mind around the idea that Johanna had given Cyrus a son. Not willingly, anyway. Not his Johanna.
“How does she treat him? Is she afraid of him.”
“No. She seems…happy.”
“Happy?” The words tasted like poison in his mouth.
“She told me once that my father gave her a reason to live again. That he was the center of her and Erik’s world.”
“And you never told her that your life as his daughter was a living hell?”
“No, and she never knew anything about my situation at Despotiko, either. Or any of the other horrible things. I knew the rules, and I played the game. We both know what happens when my father is crossed.”
Melita had seen far more tragedy than anyone should at age twenty-four. Her brother Simon was dead because of Cyrus, and she had witnessed the man she once loved beaten to death on her father’s orders. The guilt over Nemo’s death had caused Melita to slit her wrists. Luckily, she hadn’t died.
“What are you going to do?” she asked.
He wanted to say, Get my wife back, but that was ego and wounded pride talking. It sounded as if Johanna was exactly where she wanted to be. Which meant she’d been in on Cyrus’s scheme to stage her death. There was no other explanation that made any sense.
“What else can you tell me about my wi—her? When did you see her last?”
“In Naxos about three months ago. She wasn’t feeling well the day I arrived. She’d had another asthma attack and—”
“Asthma? She’s ill?”
“She has acute asthma.”
“Can you take me to the house in Naxos?”
“Yes. But they’re not there anymore. The week I visited, Zeta was packing up the house.”
“Who’s Zeta?”
“The housekeeper. That’s her title, but she’s a nurse by trade. She looks after Callia when my father is away. Zeta and her daughter, Sonya, have lived with them for as long as I can remember. Although I didn’t see Sonya when I visited last.”
“What’s Zeta’s last name?”
“Poulos.”
There was a noise overhead, then Sully came down the companionway. He glanced at Melita, then Merrick. “What’s wrong?”
“What’s wrong,” Merrick said, “is that I’ve been a blind fool. Johanna’s alive.” He pointed to the picture on the table, then stood. “Melita tells me that’s Callia. That my wife is Mrs. Cyrus Krizova. I’ll let her explain. I need some air.”
Merrick didn’t know how long he stood staring out to sea on the Aldora’s deck. Time…He’d spent years living in a time warp. That place where Johanna had kept him sane. He didn’t feel sane right now.
He pulled his phone from his pocket to call Sly McEwen.
“Are you in Amorgos with Sully?” Sly asked.
“I’m here. Listen, I just…” Merrick still couldn’t believe what he was about to say. “I just…”
“Merrick?”
“I’ve learned something.”
“Have you located Cyrus?”
“No. But…Johanna is alive, Sly.”
There was dead air on the line, then Sly said, “Are you sure? Do you have proof? You know how Krizova likes to torment you. Maybe—”
“It didn’t come from Cyrus. It came from Melita. I’m checking in, like I told you I would once I got here. I’ll tell Sully to give you a call later.”
“If Johanna’s alive, I should rally the men and—”
“If I need you, I know where to find you.”
“You all right?”
“I can’t talk right now, Sly. Sully will call.”
Merrick slipped the phone in his pocket. Johanna was alive. Alive all this time, living in Greece as Cyrus’s wife. Happily, Melita had said, with her husband and son. Cyrus’s son.
Merrick closed his eyes as that fateful day surfaced in his mind. They had made love that morning in the shower, and then he’d gone to work. She’d told him she was going shopping, and hours later in his office at headquarters, he’d gotten the e-mail. I have a picture you’ll want to see.
It was an odd e-mail, but he’d been curious. When he retrieved the picture, he saw Johanna on a bed of steel with a charge of C4 strapped around her body. He’d had no idea that the minute the picture materialized on the screen by his own hand he had automatically started the timed explosives.
For three minutes he had stared at Johanna’s terrified face before the screen went black. Then came the report that an explosion had leveled one of their warehouses in Crystal City, ten miles south of Onyxx headquarters.
“Merrick?”
He felt Sully’s hand on his shoulder. “I can’t imagine what you’re feeling right now. I don’t know what to say.”
“Cyrus faked her death.”
“It looks that way.”
“Twenty years of believing she was dead, and now…” Merrick cleared his throat. “I called Sly. I told him you’d call him later and fill him in.”
“Whatever you want. Ask it and it’s yours. The men can be here in—”
“No. That would be a waste of manpower right now. We don’t have any leads on where Cyrus is.”
Minutes of silence dragged by. Finally, Sully said, “There could be a reasonable explanation for why she’s with Cyrus.”
“Reasonable?” Merrick expelled a cold laugh. “What would that be, Sully?”
“She could be a victim. One more in a long list.”
“A happy victim? A victim who gives her abductor a son? No. She went with him willingly, and there’s only one reason why she’d do that.”
“You think she was having an affair with Krizova in Washington?”
“After he survived Prague, he resurfaced with a new face. He wanted revenge on me because I was the one who had left him for dead. What better way than to take my wife. Yes, I think he set his sights on Johanna. We used to talk about our wives. He knew how I felt about her.”
“You think he approached her and they started seeing each other.”
“Johanna was acting secretive about something for weeks before she died. Make that disappeared. Now I know why.” Merrick pulled the envelope from his pocket and shook out the ring and the small white card. “Cyrus left these with Sarah Finny to give to me. Sarah is—”
“The woman from the flower shop.”
“Cyrus put roses on Johanna’s grave before he left Washington, along with this note.” He handed it to Sully.
“Game on. Your move.” Sully looked up. “He really is a sick bastard.”
“That note was meant to bring me back to Greece so I would lead him to Melita. He never expected me to learn the truth about Johanna. But now I know something he doesn’t.”
“So, now what? Where do we go from here?”
“There’s no we. You’re staying here with Melita. Don’t let her out of your sight.”
“Where are you going?”
“To clear my head. I’ll be in touch.”
Merrick left the cove with no destination in mind. Every beautiful memory of Johanna was now tainted by lies. As soon as he faced that ugly truth, he decided, he’d be thinking more clearly.
Chapter 3
Cyrus had been home two days when he sailed with Erik on a short fishing trip. Callia was on her way downstairs when she met Zeta on her way up, her dark eyes red from crying.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’ve gotten some bad news.”
Cyrus and Erik hadn’t been gone two hours. Had something happened to them on the Starina?
“What news?”
Zeta glanced over her shoulder as Kipler walked past. “It’s personal. Can I speak to you privately?”
“Of course. Come with me.” Callia led the way back upstairs. Inside her bedroom with the door closed, she said, “What’s happened?”
“The hospital in Naxos called. My daughter’s been in an accident. The doctor says it’s serious, and I need to come right away.”
“I’m sorry.” Callia hugged Zeta. “I’ll tell Kipler and—”
Zeta pulled away. “No. He won’t let me go. I’m never to leave you.”
“This is an emergency.”
Zeta shook her head. “I need to go without anyone knowing I’ve left.”
“That’s impossible. Kipler has his orders. We’ll need his approval.”
“He’ll say no.”
Callia thought a moment. “I’ll tell him we’re going into Kerkyra to do some shopping. One of the guards can drive us. You can slip away once we’re in town and fly to Athens, then to Naxos. Once you’re gone, there won’t be much he can do about.”
“It might work.”
“Go get ready.”
Callia changed clothes, then went to the small safe in the study where Cyrus left money for her to use as she wished. She was standing at the window when a knock came on the door. “Come in,” she said.
“You wanted to see me Kiria Krizova?”
“I’m going into town with Zeta, Kipler. Could you have one of the guards drive us?”
“How soon do you want to leave?”
“Right away.”
Kipler nodded, and within the hour Callia and Zeta arrived in Kerkyra. Callia told Endre, the seasoned guard that often drove her to town, that she wanted to go to the market square. As he waited near the car, she and Zeta strolled the market. It was busy and that was a good thing. They quickly got lost in the crowd, and slipped into a cab. Halfway to the airport, Callia noticed that Zeta’s anxiety had escalated.
“I don’t think I can do this alone, Callia. I didn’t mention it before, but I’m afraid to fly.”
“You’ll do fine. Don’t worry.”
At the airport Zeta had a panic attack. She was shaking so badly Callia was afraid she would never be able to board the plane. “You have to do this, Zeta. For Sonya.”
“Come with me?”
“You know I can’t do that.”
Zeta collapsed in a chair. “I’m sorry. I know you can’t, but I don’t think I can do this alone.”
Callia glanced at her watch. The plane would leave the runway in a matter of minutes. She hurried to the counter. “I’d like to purchase another ticket to Athens, then one to Naxos, please.” When she returned to Zeta, she said, “Come on. I’ll take you to Naxos, then fly back once I get you to the hospital. Kipler is going to be furious, but I’ll call him once I’m on my way back from Naxos.”
“You will? You’ll come with me?” Tears streaming down her cheeks, Zeta jumped up and threw her arms around Callia and hugged her. “Efkharisto.”
“You don’t need to thank me. Not after all the years you’ve been so good to me. Come on.”
Zeta gripped Callia’s hand, and together they left Kerkyra. They changed planes in Athens at 1:00 p.m. and thirty minutes later they landed in Hora, the largest coastal city in Naxos.
“There’s a taxi.” Zeta pointed.
Callia led the way. The cabdriver opened the back door for them, and once they were inside and he was behind the wheel, Johanna said, “The hospital, please.”
“No aposkeves?” the driver asked.
“No luggage.”
He pulled away from the curb, and the car quickly slipped through the airport congestion. Callia said, “I wish I had time to see Sonya, but my plane leaves in a half hour to return to Corfu.” She squeezed Zeta’s hand. “You have my phone number and the extra money I gave you?”
“Ne.”
“Call me later and tell me how Sonya is. Tell her I’m praying for her recovery.”
Zeta hugged Callia as the car pulled to a stop in front of the hospital. She got out of the cab, stood in the open door. “I’m sorry, Callia.”
“There’s nothing to be sorry about. Call me in a few hours. I’ll be home by then.”
Zeta nodded, then with tears streaming down her cheeks, she closed the door and walked away.
“Back to the aerothromio,” Callia told the driver.
“The airport,” he repeated. “Amésos. Right away. No problem.”
On the ride back Callia noticed that they were taking a different route and the cabdriver was pushing the speed limit. “Piyene pio sigha.”
The driver didn’t slow down. She saw him pull his dark sunglasses off and toss them onto the seat. He ran his hand through his silver hair, and this time when he spoke his island accent was gone. The deep baritone voice sent a cold chill up her spine—the voice as recognizable as the piercing gray eyes that now stared at her in the mirror.
“Hello, Johanna. Or would you prefer I call you…Callia?”
She was two feet from him, and he could reach out and touch her. Merrick quelled the urge—the urge to turned around and wrap his hands around her neck.
From the moment Melita had told him Johanna was alive he hadn’t allowed himself to believe it entirely. Not until now.
“I’ll say one thing for your housekeeper, she knows how to follow instructions. Of course, I did give her incentive.”
“Zeta knew? Where’s Sonya?”
“The girl is waiting for her mother in the hospital lobby. I suppose you could say her accident was running into me. When I spoke to your housekeeper a few hours ago on the phone, I suggested that she take her daughter and disappear as quickly as possible once she’d delivered you to me. If she’s smart she’ll do it. Otherwise Cyrus will kill them both for betraying him.”
“He would never hurt Zeta and Sonya.”
Merrick glanced into the rearview mirror. Her delicate features were strained, her voice full of fear. A fear that was directed at him, not the threat of violence from Cyrus against the hired help.
He swung the taxi into a crowded parking lot at Hora’s busiest seaport and killed the engine. When he looked into the mirror again, he found Johanna’s fear still glaringly evident. Her anxiety had altered her breathing, and it reminded him that she was asthmatic.
“I always knew one day you would come,” she said. “Cyrus said you never give up on a mission.”
“What mission would that be?”
“I know it was you who tried to kill me in Washington. Cyrus told me everything.”
Those beautiful hazel-green eyes were as accusing as the tone in her voice. Sharp and on the attack. Whatever game she was playing, he was about to change the rules.
“I’m going to get out while you stay put. Move your ass into the center of the seat.” When she didn’t move, he said, “Rule number one. Never piss off the man who holds your life in his hands.”
She slid left a few inches, and he opened the car door, slipped his sunglasses back on, then climbed out. He was dressed in jeans and a white shirt, the sleeves rolled up in the island heat. He tossed the keys onto the front seat, then opened the back left door and climbed in next to her.
He remembered everything about her, even the way she smelled. He found it ironic that she hadn’t changed even her perfume.
“Did you kill the taxi driver?”
“He’s taking a nap in a hotel room.” He took her purse from her, opened it and dumped it out in her lap—cell phone, wallet, one lipstick, asthma inhaler. The inhaler made him aware of the shortness of her breath. He glanced at her chest, her sunbaked cleavage as smooth as satin.
Another memory came blasting through his controlled anger and he looked away, pocketed her cell phone and opened her wallet. Money, a passport that claimed she was Callia Krizova, one picture—a group photo of her and Cyrus with a young boy, maybe sixteen. They looked very happy.
He handed her purse to her, kept her wallet. “Take the inhaler, that’s all you’ll need.” Then he reached up and jerked the clip from her hair releasing the thick knot. When she reached up in protest, he noticed the marble-size diamond ring on her finger.
She dropped the lipstick into her purse, set it in the seat next to her and kept the inhaler.
“Did you file for a divorce?”
She looked up. “What?”
“You heard me. Did you divorce me?”
She shook her head.
“Then that ring on your finger doesn’t belong there.” Merrick pulled the small envelope from his pocket. “Give it to me.”
She looked down at her hand, but she made no effort to take off Cyrus’s rock.
“I could cut off your finger. Should I?”
She took off the ring. He opened his hand and she dropped it into his palm. He shook his ring out of the envelope—a two-karat emerald-cut diamond set on a white gold wedding band wrapped with more diamonds.
“Put it on.”
“Where did you get that?”
“Put it on.”
She took the ring and slid it onto her finger.
Merrick pulled the white card Cyrus had left at the cemetery from the envelope, then dropped his garish four-karat diamond inside and slid it into his pocket. He reached down inside his boot and came up with his Nightshade. When she saw the knife, she clutched her hands together as if anticipating losing her finger.
He had never once laid a hand on her, never hurt her in any way, and yet her fear of him was indisputable. He had more than one good reason to inflict pain on her, but that was Cyrus’s MO, not his. Not that he wasn’t angry enough to let his rage fly.
He did it now, raised his hand and drove the knife blade into the back of the driver’s seat. She cried out and tried to scoot away from him.
“Keep your ass nailed down.”
He saw her glance at the white card, silently mouth the words. Game on. Your move.
“What’s that?” Her voice hollow and full of trepidation.
“A gift from Cyrus. He left this and your ring in Washington for me a few days ago.”
“Washington?”
“Did he forget to mention it?”
She looked dumbfounded. Didn’t answer.
Merrick took her wallet, slid the white card inside and tucked the wallet into the hole he had sliced in the leather seat. Then he opened the door and climbed out. “Get out.”
“If you kill me, Cyrus will come after you. He’ll—”
“I didn’t come here to kill you, Johanna. I only learned that you were alive a couple of days ago.”
“I don’t understand.”
“That makes two of us. I never expected you, of all people, would betray me. I’m usually a better judge of character. Now get your ass out of the car.”
She slid out and leaned against the back quarter panel of the cab. “You’re the one who tried to kill me, remember?”
“No more lies, Johanna. You helped Cyrus fake your death, then ran off with him.”
“I didn’t fake anything, and I ran to save my life from the men you sent to kill me.”
“That’s bull.”
She jerked away from the car. “I was there. I heard every word. Those men were acting on your orders.”
“I never sent anyone to kill you, Johanna. If I had wanted you dead, I would have done it myself. I could have blown your head off any day of the week. We shared a house for five years, remember? A house miles from the closest neighbor. I could have buried you in the backyard under a rosebush in broad daylight and no one would have been the wiser.”
That comment rendered her speechless for a moment. “If you’re not going to kill me, where are you taking me?”
“On a little boat trip.”
Her eyes shifted to the blue water and the harbor crowded with boats riding the tide.
Her hesitation made him say, “Rule number two. Never forget rule number one.”
He had no idea how close Cyrus was, and as much as he wanted to face the bastard, he wanted it on his terms. He motioned for her to start walking, and he followed three steps behind her down the pier where the Aldora waited. When they reached it, he said, “Get in and go below.”
He followed her down the companionway, swung the door open to the stateroom and, when she walked inside, he didn’t say another word, just pulled the door shut and locked her in.
As he headed back up the companionway he noticed his hands were shaking. For the first time in months he wanted a drink. If he had a bottle on board he would have broken rule number three: Never let your emotions navigate a mission. Getting stink-ass drunk wasn’t on his agenda, and he didn’t trust the man he might find at the bottom of a bottle. He’d never been an angry drunk, but there was always a first time for everything.
The morning he’d woke up at sea after leaving Amorgos, he’d gone over everything Melita had told him, and within an hour he’d arrived in Naxos on the hunt for Zeta Poulos’s daughter. Melita had said that Sonya wasn’t living in the house the last time she’d visited.
He’d used every resource available to track her down believing there was no reason why she would have changed her name. In the end he’d resorted to his old government assassin tricks to find her. It had taken him thirty-six hours.
Sonya was eighteen and enrolled in a private school in Hora. Dressed as a priest bringing bad news he had met with the girl. His roll as kidnapper came late that evening once he’d gotten her away from the school. She had been more than willing to go with him after he’d told her that her mother was on her deathbed.
The glitch came after he had Sonya on board the Aldora. He’d revealed to her that her mother was very much alive and well, and what he wanted from her was the location of Krizova’s most recent hideout. But the girl didn’t know where Cyrus had moved his family after leaving Naxos—it was part of her agreement to be allowed to stay in Hora and go to school.
He’d told her that was unfortunate for her and, afraid for her life, she’d offered him a phone number where she could reach her mother in case of an emergency.
This was definitely an emergency, he had told her—a life-sustaining emergency, and she wouldn’t want to end up at the bottom of the sea.
Moments later Sonya called her mother. On speakerphone Merrick had waited for the concerned mother to take a breath, then he’d taken over the conversation, giving Zeta Poulos explicit instructions—her daughter would die by three o’clock if she didn’t follow them to the letter.
It was two o’clock when the plane from Athens had landed at Hora’s airport. Merrick had watched the passengers exit the plane. It was the first time in almost twenty years that he had seen Johanna, but he spotted her easily. She wore white pants and a green satin blouse, her hair, still as long as he remembered, twisted in a sexy knot.
He’d stood numb beside the taxi, his dark sunglasses shielding his eyes as she guided her housekeeper toward him. Melita was right. Johanna’s years in Greece had been kind to her. She looked far younger than forty-six.
Merrick climbed into the cockpit, and with a clear sky overhead and a million miles of azure sea to get lost in, the Aldora sped away from Hora recklessly.
It was his silver hair that signified the passing of time, but it was the handsome face and amazingly fit body, his voice and those penetrating gray eyes that had turned back the clock.
She should hate him. Most days she had convinced herself that she did. But that was a lie. What she hated most was that she didn’t hate him, and seeing him again only confirmed what a fool she still was.
She’d spent years in exile, hiding out like a criminal because of him. She had chosen a new life, or perhaps it had chosen her, but the memories of the old days with Adolf Merrick had continued to haunt her. They had spent five years together and she still couldn’t forget how happy she had been.
Curled up on the berth in the stateroom, Johanna forced herself to relive that day so long ago. In the beginning all she had wanted was for it to have been some kind of horrible mistake. For days she had rejected the idea that Adolf wanted her dead. Night after night she had prayed he would come for her. That he would explain it all away, but it had never happened.
Forced to accept Cyrus’s truth, her prayer had changed. She had prayed she would never see Adolf again and that the memories would die, as he had wanted her to die.
Please, God, kill the memories, and let me wake up hating him.
But God hadn’t been merciful. The memories were branded in her mind with visions of what might have been. And now he was here, reminding her of all the pain she’d lived through. He was here tearing her heart apart for the second time.
Unwilling to surrender to emotional suicide, Johanna wondered what the significance was behind the white card. Adolf said Cyrus had been in Washington a few days ago. She wanted to refute that, but she had recognized Cyrus’s handwriting on the card. At least it had looked like his.
Game on. Your move.
What did that mean?
She glanced down at the ring on her finger. The only person Adolf could have gotten the ring from was Cyrus. She’d worn it for weeks after her flight from Washington. The night she’d decided to take it off she was sitting on a veranda in Athens. Cyrus had come to sit with her, and after a long drought of silence, he’d said, “That ring on your finger belittles your intelligence. Why suffer the sight of Merrick’s betrayal any longer? Give me the ring and I’ll get rid of it.”
Had he sent the ring back to Adolf long ago, or was Adolf telling her the truth? Had Cyrus been in Washington days ago?
It made no sense for him to bait Merrick. They had been living in hiding for years to keep from being discovered. It would be like calling up the devil and inviting him to tea.
So who did she believe? The husband who had betrayed her years ago, or the husband who had kept her safe for twenty years?
Johanna heard the cruiser’s engine back off. She climbed off the berth and looked out the window. What she saw sent a cold chill up her spine—a crescent-shaped cove caged in by jagged rocks.
She had the answer to her question. Adolf was lying. This was where he was going to kill her.
A storm at sea hadn’t been part of Merrick’s plan, but as he skirted the southern tip of Rhodes it was evident that one was brewing. Buffeted against the wind, he dropped anchor in the cove and went below deck. For the next two hours he worked at the table on the second stage of his plan and, when he was finished, he held the ring up to the light and smiled.
“Game on, Cyrus. I made my move, and now it’ll be your turn very soon.”
The ring back in his pocket, he debated calling Sully but quickly dismissed the idea. He sat at the table and stared at the door to the stateroom for another hour, then stood and unlocked it.
He found Johanna curled up on the berth, her long hair shielding her face, her inhaler next to her. He glanced around the room. She had rifled through his belongings. He’d slipped the picture of her into one of the drawers beneath the berth. It was now on the floor, and he bent down, picked it up and slipped it into his back pocket like a kid guarding his favorite baseball card.
“Wake up,” he said.
She stirred from sleep and sat up, sweeping her hair out of those beautiful eyes. She scooted back into the berth.
No, he needed her alive to make his plan work.
“Are you going to kill me now?”
“If that was the goal I would have popped you in the taxi, along with your housekeeper. Instead I bought her two tickets out of Greece.”
“So you say.”
“Where’s Cyrus?”
“I’m not going to play your game, Adolf.”
“Why not? You’ve been playing his for years. How long were you screwing him before the two of you decided to run off together?”
She looked confused. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I met Cyrus the day you gave the order to have me kidnapped from my car and killed in that warehouse. Your men drugged me, and when I woke up I was bound with explosives strapped to some kind of steel slab. Cyrus found me before the explosives were set to go off.”
“He just happened by at the right moment?” Merrick laughed. “They say timing is everything, but that’s a bit hard to swallow, honey.”
“I don’t care what you think. I know what happened. Cyrus saved my life.”
“So he’s your hero.”
“I’m alive because of him.”
“What reason did he give you that I wanted you dead?”
“Onyxx business. A conspiracy you believed I was involved in?”
“What conspiracy?”
“He told me that my boss at the art gallery was a Russian spy. That you’d been onto him for years. That’s why you married me. That you’d found evidence that I was working with him.”
“Were you ever working as a spy?”
“No.”
“Then how could I have found evidence that you were? There was no conspiracy, Johanna. If you were abducted, it was Cyrus who ordered it, not me.”
“You’re lying.”
She seemed so damn sure about what had happened. Adamant that he had tried to kill her. Had she met Cyrus for the first time in the warehouse? Suddenly he knew it was true. She was speaking the truth. At least her version of what she believed happened.
“I overheard those men talking when I came to in the warehouse. They were talking about how you wanted me to die.”
“They were Cyrus’s men, not mine. He’s an international criminal, Johanna. A rogue agent from Onyxx. He had you kidnapped and put in that warehouse.”
“No! It was you,” she screamed at him. “You wanted me dead. Go to hell, Adolf, and take your lies with you!”
“I’ve spent years in hell, Johanna. It’s familiar territory.” He reached out and pulled her off the berth and roughly hauled her to her feet. She cried out, and he let go of her before he could do something he would regret. “That you would think I could kill you is—”
“You’re no saint…Icis. That’s right. I know all about your days as an assassin. That part of your life you neglected to mention when you married me.” She had climbed back on the berth and wrapped her arms around herself. “I saw your file. Before Onyxx you were a hired killer.”
“It’s true, I was a government assassin. A mercenary for hire before that. Cyrus used that information to cast doubt so you would believe him, Johanna. He used you.”
“No.”
“Yes, and you doubled his reward by climbing into bed with him and giving him a son. That must have made him laugh all the harder.”
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
Merrick pulled his phone from his pocket. He’d downloaded the e-mail he’d received years ago from Cyrus. He hit the keypad then grabbed her hand and placed the phone in it. “Take a look, Johanna. That’s what Cyrus sent me the day you disappeared…shopping. The day he let me believe he had killed you. That and four little words. Game on. Your move. I watched my wife die on a computer screen, and for twenty years until two days ago, I believed it was true. He did that. Your hero did that!”
Chapter 4
Cyrus got the call on the island. He’d just finished running Erik through a tactical course that would have killed him a year ago. He pulled his phone from his fatigues and saw that it was Kipler.
“What is it? I told you I didn’t want to be interrupted. It better be a life-altering problem or—”
“They’re gone.”
“Who’s gone?”
“Callia and Zeta. One of the guards took them to Kerkyra and they never returned to the car.”
Cyrus glanced at Erik, then walked far enough away to keep from being overheard. “What the hell do you mean they never returned to the car?”
“They were shopping at the market square. When they didn’t come back to the car after two hours, Endre went searching for them. He called me after he couldn’t find them. I’ve sent the men out to search the town, but they’re not having any luck.”
“What time did they leave the house?”
“Midmorning.”
Конец ознакомительного фрагмента.
Текст предоставлен ООО «ЛитРес».
Прочитайте эту книгу целиком, купив полную легальную версию (https://www.litres.ru/wendy-rosnau/merrick-s-eleventh-hour/) на ЛитРес.
Безопасно оплатить книгу можно банковской картой Visa, MasterCard, Maestro, со счета мобильного телефона, с платежного терминала, в салоне МТС или Связной, через PayPal, WebMoney, Яндекс.Деньги, QIWI Кошелек, бонусными картами или другим удобным Вам способом.