night. Now I found it all vaguely soothing.
We hadn’t had a chance to talk since our encounter in Parker’s office earlier that day. We’d spent the afternoon, and most of the evening, entertaining a group of high-ranking executives from a major banking corporation. The bank was trying to forge development links with certain South American countries, where its personnel would be prime targets for kidnap and extortion.
Parker had spent several months—not to mention a considerable amount of money—quietly trying to convince the bank the dangers were sufficient to subcontract all its safety precautions out to us. If tonight was anything to go by, it looked like he’d finally succeeded.
He’d taken a few of the top guys out on the town and had called in every spare operative on his books to provide a maximum force, minimum fuss, security detail for them. We’d gone to extraordinary lengths to be visible in the most unobtrusive manner possible.
Parker had put me working the inner ring, closest to the principals. Mostly, he’d done it because he was aware that women blended in much better in low-profile social situations than hulking great blokes. I’d certainly learned to dress like a young city exec since I’d been working for him. But it was also a good opportunity to show faith in me—admittedly without much risk. Either way, I was profoundly grateful.
Parker had kept Sean at the forefront, too, and he knew how to play the game when it came to sweet-talking potential clients. We’d taken them to watch the sun go down over cocktails in a rooftop bar on Fifth Avenue that had a great view of the Empire State Building, then gone on to eat in one of the best restaurants in trendy TriBeCa.
It could have been romantic, had we not been working, and had we not been in a group whose main characteristic was an ego to match the size of the investment portfolios they handled, and the cocky self-assurance that went with it.
So, Sean and I had hardly exchanged a word all evening, and nothing in private. We hadn’t even traveled home together. I’d changed at the office and taken the Buell, and Sean had stayed for the debrief with Parker and arrived by cab two hours later.
He’d got back to find me sitting curled up on the sofa in the airy living room, making a poor attempt to read a survival equipment catalog. I’d glanced up as he’d walked in stripping off his jacket and tie, unclipping the Kramer paddle-rig holster containing the .45-caliber Glock 21 he habitually carried. He was tall, deceptively wide across the shoulder without having the overdeveloped neck of a gorilla, and devastatingly but unself-consciously good-looking. My mouth had gone instantly dry at the sheer intensity of his face.
So it was only afterwards, as the cool air dusted the sweat from our bodies, that I finally had the chance to ask the question uppermost in my mind.
He shifted slightly and let his fingers drift along my spine, circling outwards to delicately trace the fading scar of the bullet wound in the back of my right shoulder.
“It’s not that I don’t have faith in you, Charlie, you know that,” he said gently. “But what you’ve been through changes you. Christ Jesus, you nearly died. It can’t not.”
“It was probably worse from the outside, looking in,” I said, knowing that was only partly true. “And anyway, I didn’t die.”
But as I said it I tried not to think about the Vicodin I’d taken before the start of the evening. I was too scared of getting hooked to take the painkillers regularly, but they’d successfully taken the edge off the ache that had plagued me all day.
I blocked out my father’s stinging comments.
Had Parker seen that? Is that why he’d made that comment about me being good at organization—because he wanted me to keep me reduced to nothing more?
Sean’s fingers stilled a moment and I realized I’d braced myself against the memory. I took a quiet breath and let my limbs float heavy.
“Depends on what you classify as normal, I suppose,” he said. “I’ve been there, too, don’t forget. I know how it changes your perception of things—of how far you can go—because you know what the ultimate consequences are for failing.”
“I know you’ve been hurt—shot, beaten, threatened with execution—but trust me, Sean, you have no idea,” I said, hearing the rough note in my voice.
His hands stilled again, then tightened around me, cradling my head. I felt his lips brush my hair, then one of his fingers trailed delicately down the side of my neck and across the base of my throat, following the faint line of an old scar that was another constant reminder never to drop my guard. Shame it hadn’t always worked.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “That was crass.”
“Yes it was. I can still function, you know,” I said, unwilling to let him off lightly. “I’m not completely socially stunted. Didn’t I prove that tonight?”
“You did,” he said. “In fact, you were so successful in
I stiffened for a moment, then a giggle escaped me and before I knew it we were both laughing.
“My God,” I said. “What did you say to that?”
“I told him, only if he was likely to find it
“I bet you didn’t.”
“You’re right, I didn’t,” he admitted. “I smiled as though he’d said something witty and informed him with excruciating politeness that you were one of our top operatives and that, if he valued certain parts of his anatomy, perhaps he shouldn’t repeat that kind of speculation within Parker’s earshot—or yours, for that matter.”
The amusement subsided and, just when I thought I’d got away with it, Sean asked quietly, “So, are you going to tell me what happened between you and Nick today?”
My turn to sigh. I rolled onto my back and stared up into the gloom while I recounted the news report I’d seen on TV, and the subsequent encounter with my father. I debated on editing the content slightly, but in the end it all came spilling out practically verbatim, until finally I talked myself to silence.
Somewhere in the grid of streets below us, a car cranked up and accelerated away. I listened to its blowing exhaust through two gear-changes before the noise was swallowed up by the background chatter of the city.
Sean still hadn’t spoken. I listened to the tenor of his breathing and smiled at the ceiling
“Stop it,” I said.
“What?”
“Gloating.”
“I never said a word.” He did injured innocence rather well. “Did I say a word?”
I rolled partway back so I could prop onto an elbow and look down at him. “You didn’t have to. I can hear you cackling from here. It’s very juvenile.”
He grinned outright then, wholly unrepentant. “Well come on, Charlie,” he said, not trying to hide the amusement that glistened in his voice. “Even you have to admit—after all that rampant disapproval—it’s bloody funny to find out your old man’s finally fallen off his high horse.”
“No,” I said slowly. “That’s the trouble—it isn’t funny. Even if I discounted half the things he said afterwards—”
“Which you can’t.”
I let my breath out fast, an annoyed gush. “Yeah, right, that’s easy for you to say. You haven’t spent half your life trying to get his attention and the other half wishing you hadn’t succeeded.”
“That’s just it,” he said, and he’d matched my tone. “I can view him as an outsider—God knows, he’s always done his damnedest to make me feel that way. He’s a coldhearted bastard at times, but he doesn’t have the emotional capacity to be vindictive. And he’s not a drunk.”
He tilted his head so I knew he was looking directly at me. I felt the prickle of it across my skin even though I couldn’t see his eyes.
“Reasons?”
He crooked one arm behind his neck to support it. “You’re physically fit. We both know that and, hell, he probably knew before we did. Calling you a cripple is gross exaggeration and he’s not a man prone to flights of
