anyway. Lucas had no training and belonged nowhere near the danger surrounding Tremaine. “What about Vanessa?” she whispered to Lucas’s back.
Predictably, he spun to face her. He didn’t look so confident anymore.
This is what you do, girl. Find a weakness. Exploit it. Get the mission done.
“What about her?” he asked, his gaze hard and furious. And anxious.
“Your wife isn’t part of this.”
“Of course not.”
“But she will be if you persist.”
Lucas’s hands fisted at his sides. “Are you threatening me?”
“No.” She walked around his desk and stopped just inches from him. She looked up into his handsome, trusted, beloved face. “But they will.”
“Who?”
Whatever scum from her old life that seemed determined to follow her into this one. Why had Tremaine contacted her? If he’d been shot on the job, why hadn’t he gone to the NSA? Had his cover been blown? Had he lost faith in the agency?
Or was this shooting personal? Was that why he’d involved Lucas? To scare or intimidate her into taking his case?
Once upon a time she’d been an NSA agent, as well, so she could understand the disastrous implications of any of those scenarios. But she’d retired—and not on the best of terms. Even though she now owned a security and investigations company, and could protect the average John Q. Citizen, she didn’t have the power or contacts of the agency.
So why did Tremaine want her?
“Who would threaten me?” Lucas asked, bringing her thoughts back to him.
In disgust, she knew the vow of secrecy to her government only expired on her death, and no matter how bitterly she and the agency had parted, she owed them her silence about their ways and their world. She trusted Lucas, but she couldn’t share this with him.
“Whomever shot Tremaine.” She laid her hands on his shoulders. “This is outside your realm, Lucas. Admit it and let me deal with it.”
He shrugged off her touch.
She fought against the hurt of his rejection. “Where is he?”
“Gone.”
Whatever she’d expected, it wasn’t that. She goggled at him. “Gone?”
“No one knows he left. They think he’s holed up in his hotel room.”
“They?”
“Everybody but me—including the police.”
Resisting the urge to pull her hair out by the roots—she’d save that bit of torture for Tremaine—she paced the room.
Damn the arrogant man. He should have let the NSA take him underground until the whole mess could be sorted out. Yet she knew, and not just because he’d called Lucas, that he’d abandoned protocol and forged his own plan. He’d no doubt continue to do so.
Lucas blocked her path. “Dammit, Jade, I want to help.”
She stepped back. “You can’t.” She wouldn’t let him. Risking the highly trained people in her own agency was going to be hard enough. “Where is he, Lucas?”
His eyes cold, he bit out his response. “He has a room at the Marriott Marquis. He said he’d meet you there later.”
As he turned away, she resisted slugging him and knocking some sense into his hard head. She loved him like a brother, and surely he’d get over his snit fit eventually.
He was her one connection to family. And yet, for her job, she’d hurt him.
Just another day in paradise.
USING THE KEY to Tremaine’s posh, two-bedroom hotel suite Lucas had given her, Jade took advantage of the solitude to snoop and make phone calls.
She noted the neutral black, bone and tan colors, as well as the glass, leather and steel that made up the contemporary decor and wondered if it suited Tremaine. The sumptuous living and dining area was as large as most people’s apartments, and there was a fully stocked bar. She could certainly understand why he preferred the suite to whatever holding room the NSA would stuff him in until they were ready to launch the complicated investigation into an undercover agent’s shooting.
But why had he gone against protocol to hire her?
She was good, and her team was great, but even with her and her partner’s network of contacts, they couldn’t get inside current NSA files. She and Tremaine had never met and knew each other only by reputation. Why was he hiring—and essentially trusting—her instead of moving under the NSA’s protective umbrella?
The answer seemed too simple to be correct—he didn’t trust the NSA.
Smart man.
Whatever his reasoning, he’d cleverly hooked her. She didn’t like violence coming anywhere near Lucas, and if protecting Tremaine meant protecting her cousin, she’d bite her tongue and do it. Plus, despite her urge to scoff at the pretty boy’s troubles, she was reluctantly intrigued about the legendary thief.
So, it seemed she and Tremaine were stuck with each other. She doubted they would get along—she’d heard too much about his tendency to follow only the rules that were convenient for him. In her mind, rules existed for a good reason—convenient or not.
His light-fingered past didn’t win him any points with her, either. Even if he’d been a very good thief.
Could you use good and light-fingered in the same sentence without sounding ridiculous?
Not in her book.
She used her cell phone to call her partner, Frank, and her best guards to her side. They’d all be on planes in the morning. She didn’t see any point in their coming sooner, since their client was MIA, and she preferred facing him alone at the moment.
If she decided to kill him, she could always bury his body and not involve her business in the crime.
Snooping-wise, she got very little that she didn’t already know. He’d left his luggage—purposefully, she was sure—so she found shaving cream, shampoo, condoms and a spicy, exotic cologne that would no doubt suit him. His wardrobe consisted of custom-made suits in charcoal and black and Italian loafers with tassels.
Art magazines and a highbrow novel encompassed his printed collection. And though she took great delight in gliding a razor blade down all the seams of his expensive leather bags to check for hidden compartments, she found nothing of interest.
If he was arrogant, at least he wasn’t stupid.
At dinnertime, she sampled from the fruit basket on the coffee table. Late into the night, she flipped around the TV channels and found nothing that could hold her interest for more than a moment or two.
Nearly all
