you in bed?” Mintz said in a surprisingly gentle voice.
“I’m waiting for my daddy.”
“Where’s Miss Charlene?” Mintz inclined his head toward Natasha. “Ben’s physical therapist.”
Ben’s face began to crumple. “Not Charlene. Daddy. He can take me outside to see the moon.” Tears shimmered on his long lashes.
As Natasha watched in astonishment, the grizzled security chief lifted Ben. The boy wrapped his arms around Mintz’s neck and tucked his face into his collar.
“Your daddy’s working tonight. I want you to meet someone.”
Ben turned his head so that one dark blue eye was visible. “No.” He hid his face again. “I want my daddy.”
“This is Natasha. Can you say Natasha?”
Ben shook his head, but curiosity got the better of him and he peeked sideways at her. “Tasha?”
His little voice saying the nickname she hadn’t heard since childhood caused her to smile, even as it cut into her heart.
“Hi, Ben.” She’d never been around kids, so the ache in her chest and the tightness in her throat surprised her. He was so sweet and so vulnerable and brave. And he’d transformed Stryker’s gruff, rigid security chief into a doting grandfather.
“Come on, Ben. Let’s get you tucked in.”
Ben still peered at her sidelong, from the folds of Mintz’s shirt. “Tasha come, too?”
“Oh, no. I don’t—”
“Sure Natasha can come, too,” Mintz said. “And later, your daddy’ll come in to say good-night.”
Ben shifted and sat up straight, confident in Mintz’s protective embrace.
“Go this way, Tasha.” He pointed as Mintz headed for the west hall. He watched her over Mintz’s shoulder.
What should she say? She had no clue how to talk to a kid. “How old are you, Ben?”
He held up three pudgy fingers. “Three and a half.”
Of course. A pang of sadness hit her square in the chest. The car crash had occurred this time of year—September—three years ago. Ben had been six months old, too young to remember the crash or the pain or the sound of his mother dying. Thank God.
They entered Ben’s room to find a young woman with shiny brown hair folding back the covers on his bed.
“This is Charlene Dufrayne,” Mintz said. “Charlene, Special Agent Natasha Rudolph.”
“Oh, the computer expert.” Charlene gave Natasha a wary nod as she took Ben from Mintz. “We’ve all heard about you.”
Natasha rapidly cataloged the other woman’s appearance. Medium height, late twenties, pretty. In good shape. She’d be good for Ben.
She glanced around the child’s room. It was painted a bright blue, and filled with every toy a little boy could want. But something about it sent an eerie shiver through her.
“Okay, cowboy, let’s get you ready for bed,” Charlene said, setting him on his bed.
“I stay awake ’til Daddy comes.”
“Daddy may not come tonight. He’s very busy.”
As Ben’s eager face fell, Natasha’s heart ached. Charlene began to unlock the braces.
Mintz opened a connecting door and gestured for Natasha to precede him into the next room.
She stepped through the door, her gaze still lingering on Ben’s room. As Mintz turned on the lights and she looked around the starkly decorated room, it hit her what was bothering her.
“These rooms don’t have any windows,” she croaked. Her throat constricted.
“This is the only level of the house aboveground. That makes it vulnerable. Windows would greatly increase that vulnerability.”
Her pulse jumped as she pushed away the panic and forced herself to nod. “Vulnerability. Of course. That…makes sense.”
As an FBI agent, she understood, but no amount of rational thinking stilled her knee-jerk response to the vaultlike rooms. This was why she’d scrimped and saved until she could afford a top-floor condo in Washington, D.C., where all her walls were glass, and the sun streamed in every day.
She couldn’t get Ben’s sweet little face out of her mind. It horrified her to think he’d lived his whole life locked inside these walls.
“Is there a problem, Agent Rudolph?” Mintz’s voice was edged with ice.
She quoted her mantra for dealing with panic. Quiet and safe. Plenty of fresh air. Breathe. Breathe. Breathe.
“No, sir. I realize safety is your primary concern. It’s just that Ben is—” She swallowed. “He’s a growing boy. He needs sunshine and—” she faltered when Mintz glowered at her “—fresh air.”
“Ben’s needs are not your purview.”
She lifted her chin. “So far, apparently nothing is my purview. You’ve vetoed every suggestion I’ve made. I must say, your trust in me is underwhelming.”
“Not just you,” he muttered, his face grim. “Anyone.” He faced her. “Understand this, Agent Rudolph. As far as the public knows, Ben died in the car crash that killed his mother. Dylan has gone to superhuman lengths to keep the boy here with him.”
She searched his face. “You don’t approve.”
The lines in his face deepened. “I built this place to withstand an explosion the magnitude of Oklahoma City. But nobody can guard against human ingenuity. All it’ll take is one person breaching the walls, or hacking into the computers. NSA wants Dylan and his interface safe. They’ve offered to place him and Ben in a secure government location.”
“And you want that, too.” No matter how protected the estate was, the child could still be in danger. Still, now that she’d met Ben, she understood why his father refused to let him out of his sight. After only a few minutes, his innocent, angelic face had already made a dent in her heart.
“What I want is not relevant. Ben is Dylan’s son. He would give up everything for him, even his own life.”
“I get the feeling you’d do the same for either of them.”
Mintz averted his gaze as he dug in his pocket and handed her a small digital device. He cleared his throat. “Your fingerprints are already in the security system. This is your pass code generator. You’ll want to keep it on your person at all times. The code changes every forty-five seconds. Your print on the keypad plus the entry of this code will unlock any door on the estate. There will not be any security issues, understood?”
Natasha stiffened. “Understood, sir.” She took the device.
“I’ll
