finally murmured, “I had nothing else. No one else. Hidoshi-san loved me when no one else did. Becoming like him was the least I could do to show my gratitude.”
“No one else loved you? The absentee father, I understand. But what about siblings? Aunts and uncles?”
“Nada.”
He shifted the weight off one elbow and reached out to touch her cheek. Just the slightest graze of his fingertips against her skin. “Are you still completely alone?”
The loneliness aching within her radiated outward in a terrible tension that froze her facial muscles beneath his brief touch. Her entire being felt stiff as she answered, “I have the Medusas now. They’re my family.”
He nodded as if he knew the feeling well. And, given that he had a team of his own that he ran with, he probably did know the feeling. “But what about you? Isn’t there anyone in your life just for you?”
“Is all this psychoanalysis really necessary?” she asked lightly.
“You’re avoiding the question. Your grandfather has passed away, and you have no one else, do you?”
He was prodding painful places in her soul that she’d just as soon have him leave alone. She retreated into the emotionless cool she always did when people tried to get too close to her. Except this time, she felt like a coward for running away. Damn him! She’d been happy the way she was before she met him…or at least at peace with herself. Why did he have to go and tear away the veil of her lonely existence like that and show it to her for what it really was?
She answered in a tone that sounded stilted, even to her. “I don’t need anyone else, so your question is moot.”
He nodded sagely. “The lady has built her very own fortress of solitude. And here you were, doing so well at starting to crawl out of it. I’m a pushy jerk, aren’t I?”
Secretly relieved that he’d poked at her-given her an excuse to come out of her emotional cave, really-she rolled her eyes. “You got one part right. You are a jerk.” But she said it without any real heat.
He grinned over at her. “And you love me anyway.”
Stunned, she jerked her gaze back to the estate in front of her while she turned the concept over in her mind. Did she feel love for him? Was it possible? She’d loved Hidoshi. But that was different. She’d loved him as a child loves a parent or grandparent.
But Jeff? Could she love a man like him? As an equal? A mate? She stared fixedly through her spotter’s scope, seeing a blurry morass of green and peach, vividly aware that he was studying her in the meantime.
“Dare I hope?” he breathed. “Are there really feelings for me lurking behind that inscrutable exterior of yours?”
She started to lower the fist-size telescope to glare over at him, but something caught her attention at the farthest edge of her vision, and she jerked the scope back up to her eye. “I’ve got movement,” she announced. “I do believe our Ghost is putting in an appearance.”
Jeff lurched, his attention swinging back to the mansion. “Say position,” he responded tersely, abruptly back in full mission mode.
“Eleven o’clock. North end of the upper terrace. Moving in low and fast toward the shed housing the main electrical boxes.”
They’d been right, then. The Ghost was simply going to knock out the alarm and make a speed run for the painting. Earlier, they’d discussed trying to nab the guy as soon as they spotted him or waiting until he’d stolen the painting and then catching him. Their concern was that if they grabbed him before the theft, the police wouldn’t have enough evidence to hold the guy. He’d slip away from them, this time for good.
“Good eye,” Jeff murmured. “He’s practically invisible.”
“I should think any respectable thief is invisible most of the time,” she murmured back absently, concentrating hard on not losing sight of the elusive figure. Likewise, any half-decent sniper ought to be able to follow a figure like him at this distance. And she was more than half decent.
Jeff breathed, “Let’s move in closer. Full stealth. We don’t want to spook this guy.”
She nodded, rising silently to a crouch and easing off through the imitation Balinese landscaping behind Jeff. She didn’t hear a sound as they slipped through the night. Jeff was every bit as good as she was at this silent sneaking thing-and she’d been trained by the best. Hidoshi had been one of the last great ninja masters.
Jeff hand-signaled her to go around the house and watch the front doors while he took the oceanside doors. She nodded and Jeff hand-signaled. “First one to spot him leaving calls for backup. Then we move in on him.”
She nodded and glided off into the dark, at one with the night. Adrenaline sang through her veins and her body was light and responsive. She was ready for whatever came. Moments like this, where she got to fully turn her skills loose, were rare. But in these moments she was profoundly grateful to Hidoshi, to whatever quirk of fate had led her to him, that she’d been granted the opportunity to do this. To be this.
Jeff found a carved tiki pole casting a deep shadow and had just taken up position behind it when every light in the mansion abruptly came on and a piercing noise split the night.
“Time hack,” he announced. He looked down at his watch. Three-twenty a.m. on the nose. He figured they had about sixty seconds to wait, and then one of them should spot the Ghost leaving with his prize. He scanned the ground-floor doors and windows on this side of the house, watching for the slightest movement anywhere in his field of vision.
Eighty-two seconds had passed since his time hack when two things happened simultaneously. He heard the first police sirens in the far distance, and Kat radioed, “I’ve got him. He’s coming out the front door now.”
“Go get him!” Jeff ordered as he took off sprinting around the house.
And then all hell broke loose.
No less than five heavily armed men burst out of the bushes in front of Jeff, forcing him to screech to a halt and drop to the ground. “Incoming!” he whispered urgently to Kat. “Five armed men heading your way. Might be cops. Hold your fire!”
The men charged forward away from his position-toward Kat and the Ghost. A spurt of panic broadsided him. Those guys were headed straight at Kat! He briefly considered standing up and shouting at the men to draw their attention and their fire away from her. But then his brain kicked back into gear. She was a trained Special Forces operative. She knew what to do when a bunch of guys ran in her general direction.
As the men moved away, Jeff ran lightly behind them, staying well out of their line of sight and possible line of fire. Who
But these guys were sprinting grimly, pistols at the ready, silent, coordinated, and for all the world moving like a team of commandos closing in for a kill.
He careened around the side of the house and spied the front door gaping wide open. One of the men was just leaving the front porch to rejoin his buddies. Jeff ducked behind a lush hibiscus as the guy raced past him. The guy was wearing a black knit cap and black greasepaint on his face. SWAT team maybe, but no regular cop dressed like that.
Jeff risked whispering to Kat, “Where are you?”
“Running,” she grunted.
As a powerful engine gunned nearby, the men dropped any attempt at stealth and took off running, yelling back and forth in what sounded like something Slavic.
“Cobra! Five targets straight at you!” Jeff called urgently. He swore violently as the team of armed men sprinted right at Kat. He was too far away to fling himself in front of her but, had he been beside her, he’d have done it in a heartbeat.
She veered off to the right, smartly separating herself from the Ghost as a target. The bad guys lurched and slowed momentarily in their surprise at spotting her. But now they had her in their sights and seemed determined to bag her, too. Three men peeled off after the Ghost; the other two went after her.
It was a no-brainer which group he was going after. No way was he leaving her alone to face down these guys on her own.
Neither he nor Kat was heavily armed. Without knowing how skilled-or unskilled-these guys were, he dared not take them on directly in any kind of a fight. Besides, for all he knew, these guys were law enforcement types.
“Take cover when you can,” he ordered Kat tersely as he darted out from behind a palm tree to follow the black-clad men chasing her.
