job. He was asking the impossible of Kulani. And she had every right to hate him for what he was going to ask of her.
“Hello?”
Morgan’s fingers tightened around the phone. “Kulani? This is Morgan. How are you?”
He heard the gasp of surprise and then the pleasure in her low, soft voice. “Morgan! It’s so nice to hear from you. I’m fine.”
“Am I catching you at a bad time?” He wiped the sweat off his upper lip.
With a slight chuckle, Kulani said, “I’m having my morning Kauai coffee. I’ve got to leave for the airport in about ten minutes. To what do I owe the pleasure of hearing from you? Are the twins okay?”
How like Kulani to inquire about his children. She loved all children, which made her loss even more devastating. With the man she’d hoped to marry gone, Morgan didn’t know if she’d ever have children of her own. His heart pounding, he continued, “The twins are fine. And so are Laura, Jason and Katy. My call is business, Kulani.”
“Oh.” Her voice fell flat. “I got you the information you asked for on that professor.”
“Yes, the information you got us was vital. And I’m grateful.” He hesitated, thought to hell with it and dove in. “I need your help again, Kulani.”
“Morgan…” she pleaded softly, “I don’t want—”
“Please, Kulani, hear me out. You’re the only one who can help us. And if there was anyone else I could ask to take this mission, believe me, I would.”
“A mission? I don’t work for Perseus anymore, Morgan. I’m done with that part of my life.”
The raw desperation in her voice gutted him. “Just hear me out, Kulani. That’s all I ask,” he pleaded, clenching the phone.
The silence was serrating. Finally, Kulani whispered, “I’ll listen, Morgan, but I won’t change my mind. I can’t….”
Heartened, Morgan began what he hoped was a story that would make her change her mind. Sweat beaded on his wrinkled brow. He didn’t have much time, so he made his description of the planned mission succinct. When he was finished, he halted abruptly. Wiping his upper lip again with the back of his hand, he said in a rasping voice, “Now you see why I need you, Kulani. You’ve done the preliminary work on the professor, anyway. You’re familiar with the territory. Only you can do this.” He held his breath.
Over the phone line he heard Kulani sob once. “Damn you, Morgan! I can’t. How could you even think of asking me? It’s just too much.” Her voice cracked. “Too much!”
The phone line went dead. Morgan hissed a curse and gently placed the receiver back in the cradle. Kulani’s cry squeezed his heart. Only the sound of Laura’s tears could make him feel worse. And now he’d wounded Kulani—again. On purpose, though his motives had been pure. Patriotic. So many lives were at stake. And he needed her. So why did he feel like the worst kind of turncoat son of a bitch?
Looking angrily around the office, Morgan picked up the phone. “Get me Dev Hunter,” he ordered his assistant heavily. “Now, please.”
“Morgan, I hope you’ve called me in for an assignment. I’m bored as hell.” Devlin Hunter stretched his hand toward the big man who sat behind the wooden desk in the secluded office. Perseus, the covert branch of the CIA that Dev worked for and Morgan headed, had gone underground since Morgan, his wife and son had been kidnapped years ago. Instead of being in Washington, D.C., its original “home,” Perseus was now located in a tiny, sleepy community of Philipsburg, Montana.
Morgan grinned sourly and gripped the younger man’s hand. “Oh, I think I have something that will unglue you from your boredom, Dev.” He pointed to a large leather wing chair to the left. “Have a seat.” Morgan noticed that Dev, although casually dressed, still wore designer clothing, as was his penchant. Of the four Hunter brothers, all of whom worked for Perseus, Dev was the clotheshorse among them. Plus, in Morgan’s opinion, Dev was the only one of them with the kind of model-handsome looks that seemed to attract women like bees to honey.
Dev sat down on the edge of the chair, relaxed but alert. Folding his large square hands between his opened thighs, he waited expectantly as Morgan took his seat and opened the file that sat in front of him. Maybe it was Dev’s imagination, but Morgan looked more tired than usual. His black hair, cropped short and always military neat, had more silver at the temples. Despite that, however, Morgan looked just as fit as ever. Dev knew his boss worked out at the gym daily as if he were still in the Marine Corps, which he’d left a long time ago. When Dev was between assignments, he ran five miles with Morgan most mornings along dirt roads in the area, among huge, fragrant Douglas fir.
“I hope it’s a good assignment,” Dev said. “To tell you the truth, I’m getting flabby.” He patted his hard gut with a grin. Dev, too, worked out conscientiously at the underground gym that was available for Perseus employees. Morgan had had a condominium built in Philipsburg to house incoming and outgoing Perseus employees. To the outsider, it looked like a time-share facility for vacationers coming to the magnificent Rocky Mountain area of Montana. Morgan was very good at camouflaging things to protect his people and to protect his own family from global enemies who wanted to see Perseus and everyone associated with it destroyed.
He thumbed through a number of e-mail messages lying near the file, his thick, black-and-silver brows dipped in concentration. His mouth tightened momentarily and then he raised his craggy head and met Dev’s intelligent gaze. On the surface, Dev Hunter looked less the mercenary and more like a Wall Street broker. And he always wore a lopsided grin, the left corner of his mouth slightly hitched upward, as if he knew a joke that no one else did. It wasn’t a sarcastic smile, more one of a playful imp from Ireland. Dev Hunter’s easygoing nature was one of the things Morgan liked about him. And in this forthcoming assignment, Dev’s charm and laid-back personality were going to be tested to the limits—and then some. Morgan wasn’t even sure Hunter would take the assignment, but he was prepared to apply a lot of pressure on him to do so. Inhaling deeply, Morgan considered his words carefully. He knew that, in order to get Hunter lured into the assignment, presentation was everything. Morgan prided himself on knowing his people—what snagged their attention, what connected with their passion in life, what made them want to undertake a mission.
“Take a look at this,” he told Dev in a casual tone as he picked up a color photograph and handed to him.
Frowning, Dev took the large photo. “Hey, this is some looker,” he rasped as he sat back, his gaze riveted on the picture. It showed a woman in a Hawaiian grass skirt and a bright red halter top, her wrists and ankles surrounded by garlands of pale pink plumeria, her arms raised skyward as she swayed gracefully on a golden beach, the deep blue of the Pacific Ocean behind her. Her black hair, shining with blue highlights, was encircled with a wreath of white plumeria and greenery, which set off her dusky gold complexion and warm black eyes. Her gaze, too, was turned heavenward, her full lips, a ripe pink color, parted, as if she were caught up in some sacred dance with the spirits of nature and the mighty, placid blue ocean that lovingly framed her.
Dev’s gaze moved in appreciation over her tall, lithe body. One of her knees peeked out from the grass skirt, parting the yellowish strands and displaying her long calf and delicate bare foot. Her exquisitely long fingers curved upward in honor of the sky she danced beneath. Her arms, firm and slender, arced gracefully above her head, as if in tribute to the golden sun that embraced her. She was small breasted, her torso long and her hips slender beneath the flowing grass skirt.
As
