he’d lost this chance. She’d done only exactly as she should have. She saw in his eyes that he knew it, too—but he didn’t have the wherewithal to stammer an apology in character. She spit a few more Russian words at him and turned her back to stalk away.
No one in the room was stupid. They’d all know he’d acted deliberately, even the students who had no real clue about her days with the Kemenis. She’d be lucky if there wasn’t speculation…if someone didn’t sort through rumor to find truth so they’d all know.
It’s what they were training these young men and women to do.
As Selena huffed toward the exit of the grand ball-room—stairs that led to a richly appointed hallway and then out the door to the very ordinary eastern Virginia countryside—a dashing figure cut her off. Deliberately dashing, with that very charming, that so irresistible look on his face. Extreme self-confidence—cockiness, even— and a lick of bashful charm. He offered his elbow and said, “May I find you conveyance?”
She said, “That would be most kind.”
“And may I kick yon gentleman’s balls up into his throat on your behalf?”
Selena pretended to consider. “Why, yes,” she said. “Yes, you may.” And then she glanced at Cole and said, “Just don’t get me fired.”
Cole cast a regretful look back into the theater of the evening, finding Dobry in discussion with someone by a side exit. “Maybe not, then,” he said, and led her up the short, wide tier of steps. “Maybe another time, when my perfectly justified response might be less easily traced to my perfectly reasonable self. I do like that dress, by the way.”
“I wore it for the poor young man who received most of my flying champagne. Easily distracted, I’m afraid.” But as they turned into the hallway, Selena hesitated, her hand still on Cole’s arm. Hmm, a nice welcoming committee, the Director of T&E himself. And coming out a more discreet exit into that same hallway, Dobry and the supervising instructor. A third man, unknown to Selena, seemed to mean something to Cole. Tension hardened the muscle of Cole’s arm under her fingers, and she gave a little squeeze.
The director looked at Dobry and said, “Are you done with this?”
“For the record—” Dobry started.
“No,” said the director. “I mean, are you done with this? Because I am. These scenarios are to train our incoming employees. They are not springboards for your own clumsy whistleblowing. If I have a concern, I’ll handle it. If you have a concern, then you tell me and I’ll handle it.”
Selena listened with remote respect, showing no sign of the surprise she felt; Cole’s arm relaxed under her touch. “Sir,” she said, when the director turned to her after receiving immediate assent from Dobry.
“And you? Are you done with this?”
“I was never part of it.” Simple words, sincerely said.
The director considered them a moment, then nodded. “Good. Now, I’m expected inside. I believe we’re just about to reveal one of our evening’s operatives. Always a dramatic moment. In the meantime, I believe you two—” and he indicated Cole and the unknown man “—have something to talk about.” He nodded at them all and walked briskly down the hall. After a hesitation, Dobry followed.
“Walk with me,” the remaining man said, the only one of them not dressed for an evening of high entertainment. Not even in a suit, but khaki pants and a thick sweater and warm ankle-high hikers. He cut his gaze toward Selena, and Cole laughed as he ran his hand along the neatly hung coats on the hall rack, stopping at Selena’s.
“Nope,” he said. “She comes with me. We’ll walk together.”
And that’s how Selena learned the CIA was pulling him back into the fold, back to black ops and back to the intense risks they’d both so recently left behind.
Away from everything they’d been trying to build.
Chapter 3
Thousands of miles and several weeks away from that CIA training exercise, Selena hit the three-mile marker of Goat Camp Trail and stopped to tip her head back and slug a generous amount of water. With the late October dry heat and three thousand feet of altitude in the stark, majestic White Tank Mountains of the Arizona desert, she knew better than to short herself on water.
One of her first lessons at Athena Academy, as it happened.
If she turned south to Black Canyon, she could close her eyes and imagine the terrain beyond, all the way to the five-hundred-acre tract of private land where the academy tucked in against the base of the White Tanks. The stables snugged up closest to the stark, scrubby wilderness, a place of majestic saguaro cactus and startlingly beautiful flowers, with stunted, scattered paloverde and ironwood the closest things to trees that the area could offer. The saddle of land held more than its share of them, giving shade to students who habitually pushed themselves hard both physically and mentally. Science labs, survival hikes, group bonding exercises, rock climbing, endurance swimming… Athena knew how to turn out a well-rounded young woman. Young women such as Selena, who had started her prelaw work long before she actually hit college, or such as her fellow Pandora group member Kim Valenti, code-breaker extraordinaire before she found her niche with the National Security Agency.
Yep, she could just about see it from here, even if only in her mind’s eye. In fact, if she really wanted, she could easily cut through the rugged terrain and approach Athena from behind.
But today she stayed to the public trail, honoring park rules and moving fast and light for her morning workout—a quick jog along Goat Camp where the terrain allowed, confident climbing where it didn’t. On to Mesquite Canyon, where the steep ground offered up plenty of loose rock to send the unwary tumbling down…no thank you. She’d gotten her quota of cholla spines within her first year at Athena. Not to mention prickly pear, creosote bush and that close call with a bark scorpion. Everything living in this alienesque landscape seemed to sting or stab or prickle.
And yet she loved it here.
Not so surprising she’d heard the call of it even from across the country at the Farm.
Especially not surprising with the conflict now constantly roiling through her head and through her heart. She’d hoped to calm her mind, to let her strong early foundation reemerge, eliminating the self-doubt that had grown since she’d accidentally pulled a man’s arm out of joint.
Accidentally.
“Who does that?” she asked herself out loud, muttering through a nearly closed mouth to keep the sandy grit out of her teeth when a sudden gust of wind hit her hard enough to flap her shirt.
It hadn’t been too bad until Cole had been whisked off to do whatever it was the agency thought only he could do, even after they’d washed their hands of him in Berzhaan. Then she’d had more time to think—more time than she could fill with workouts in the gym and on the running path. More time to worry about what this separation would do to them, and why Cole had agreed to go in the first place. They hadn’t had time to talk before they snatched him away; nothing but a quick good bye kiss and separation right there at the Farm training exercise, the Russian princess left on her own. But she’d made it through the end of the training session and then she’d known just what to do. She’d come here.
She
