was paid off and is living the high life in Costa Rica.”
Mack ran his finger down the side of her breast, but his eyes stayed on the screen.
“But you think he’s in a mental hospital as Phillip Thornton.”
“Absolutely I do.” Her fingers flew over the keyboard. “There are tons of documents with Bartlett’s signature, Mack. There’s no picture of him, but his signature is everywhere.” She brought up a document and enlarged the signature at the bottom. “Earl Thomas Bartlett” had been signed with a flourish. “Now look at Thornton’s signature. Our brain-dead Phillip Thornton.” She placed a second signature beside the first.
Mack walked right up to the large screen and studied the two signatures. “You ran them both I take it and there’s no mistake?”
“Numerous times, Mack. The signature was really the only consistent thing I had to ID him with, so I ran it against every single person that had a past with Whitney. Thornton worked for him, with him, for years. They went to the same school together. He was implicated in Whitney’s supposed murder.”
“You think he helped Whitney disappear and that he’s assumed a new identity and is now providing Whitney with everything he needs to stay gone?” He turned away from the screen, his gaze moving possessively over her body.
Jaimie faced him, very conscious of the fact that he was fully clothed and she was half naked. There was something very sexy and exciting about having a man look at her the way he was, his gaze hot as it moved over her. “Yes, I absolutely believe he’s the man covering Whitney’s butt. I think he tipped off Whitney that there was a conspiracy to kill the GhostWalkers. General Ronald McEntire was assigned to the National Reconnaissance Office, building spy satellites. He was a major influence in the Donovan Labs getting government contracts. He went to school with Thornton and Whitney. They were all thick as thieves for a while.”
Mack sank into a chair, rubbing his shadowed jaw as he looked at her. “Are you wearing panties, Jaimie?”
“Is that relevant? What exactly are you doing?” Now he was making her nervous.
“Looking at what’s mine.” He crooked his finger at her. “You’ve really dug deep, haven’t you?”
She took two steps toward him. “I had to. Thornton has been Bartlett for years. Some of the documents have been around for years. He’s got a lot of clout, Mack.”
Mack pointed to the spot in front of his chair. “How in the world did you find his new identity?”
“He’s been in the shadows for so long, getting away with his Bartlett act, simply because the agency covers his ass. He switched identities with his aide. Someone had to have been paid off at the prison to make the switch in the first place, and he had to create a third identity. Which isn’t all that hard when you work for the CIA.” She took the last few steps until she stood in front of the chair. Her knees felt weak.
“His signature,” Mack guessed. “You nailed him through his signature.”
“I have Thornton’s prints from his records, but even that could have been tampered with. Yeah, I found him through his signature. I assumed he’d be very low profile this time, change his appearance, but Thornton had amassed a fortune. He wasn’t going to let that go.”
He was just looking at her, his gaze moving hungrily over her face and breasts.
“How did he keep his fortune when he was convicted of espionage?”
“Mack, I can’t think straight.” He was killing her with need.
“Yes, you can.” His hands reached out and caught the string at her waist. He tugged her a step closer.
She took a calming breath. “There’s a lawyer, a man named Mark Scott. He seems to do a lot of business with these companies. He brokered the deal for three different private jets for three of the corporations. Strange thing is, he works for only a handful of clients, including a Shelton Barstow Reams who also has no driver’s license or anything else I can find, but does have two post office boxes and a company in Virginia.”
“Are Reams and Thornton the same man?” He played with the string at her waistband.
She shook her head. “No, Reams is another ghost living in the shadows, coming out only to sign documents and put companies in his name. He’s like Bartlett. And Mark Scott just happens to be the attorney for both men.”
“So this attorney, Mark Scott, really works for the CIA as well.”
She shrugged. “I think it’s a good bet. That’s why I began looking into his client list. Believe me, Mack, it wasn’t very long. I found this man.” She tried to take a step away from him back to the computer but he held on to the string. “Mack, I need to…”
He pulled the string so that the bow slipped open. His hands caught the waistband and widened it so that the pants dropped around her ankles, leaving her standing in a tiny thong. It barely covered the front of her. His hand slid up her bare inner thigh, higher, until he found the junction and the damp material of her thong. “You don’t need this, baby. Get rid of it.”
She opened her mouth to protest, glancing once more toward the stairs. He pushed the material aside. “Look at me, Jaimie, not the stairs. This is about me. I had to lie in that bed all night, inhaling you, my hands on your body, and I couldn’t do a thing. It was torture, so if I torture you a little, you can put up with it.”
She hesitated and then hooked her thumbs in the narrow band and pushed the thong from her hips, stepping out of it. “Am I supposed to conduct the briefing completely naked?”
“Yes.”
“And keep my mind on it?”
“I’ll do my best to occasionally distract you.”
Her body felt feminine and sexy, beautiful even, with him staring at her, drinking her in. She turned and walked to the computer, using a little hip action, knowing he was watching the sway of her butt. She bent over the keyboard, turning slightly to give him a bit of her profile, so he could see the swell of her breasts along with her bottom, accepting his implied dare.
Jaimie’s overhead screen immediately held a photograph of an older, gray-haired gentleman with glasses. “Meet James Bradley Jefferson the third.”
Mack’s gaze reluctantly left her body to study the face on the screen. He waited while Jaimie’s fingers flew over the keyboard again. A second photograph appeared beside the first. “This is Phillip Thornton.”
The two men were the same height and weight, but their faces seemed different-their noses and jawlines. Thornton wore his hair very short, while Jefferson’s was a bit wilder, giving him a rakish look.
“They both favor Armani suits,” he said. “Are you telling me that’s Phillip Thornton? Or Bartlett? They aren’t the same man.”
“I ran my handy, dandy program, Mack. It finds bone markers; their faces are structurally the same and it doesn’t lie. His nose and chin have been altered, but that’s Phillip Thornton. And Earl Thomas Bartlett. And James Bradley Jefferson the third. They’re all the same man.”
He shook his head. “I don’t see it.”
“I followed the money, Mack. Thornton’s fortune was long gone when they went to find it. He had all his money in offshore accounts. The Feds managed to get his heavily mortgaged home and about thirty thousand dollars. I found fourteen million dollars in one offshore account and a second one holding an additional sixteen, both belonging to Thornton. The money disappeared, just vanished into thin air.”
She straightened slowly and turned to face him, conscious of her body and the way his eyes jumped from the screen to her. “It just so happens that around the same time that Thornton’s money vanished, James Bradley Jefferson the third suddenly came into being and guess what? He just happened to have the exact amount of money that disappeared from Thornton’s account. And one more thing, Mack. Remember those private jets that can land on our military bases? He has one. And his most recent trip was to Oregon, or to be more precise, to a secret training facility.”
Mack tapped the arm of his chair with restless fingers. “You really found the son of a bitch, didn’t you, Jaimie?”
“Absolutely I did.” She sent him a half smile.
“Come here, baby. I think you deserve a reward for all your hard work.”
Her heart jumped, began to beat overtime. His voice was dark and sensuous, Mack at his most persuasive. It was always impossible to ignore that voice when he wanted her. That exact tone was one of the reasons she’d left him. She would never have resisted him. He didn’t move from the chair, just watched her with hooded eyes. She stood in front of him. Naked. Without a stitch. Her body was already betraying her. She could feel the damp nectar moistening her entrance. Every muscle was tight, crying out for him, straining toward him. His gaze drifted over her. Hot. Hungry. Making her mouth water and her body weep.
“You have no idea how beautiful you are, do you?” he asked, and slowly lifted his hand to her breast, stroking a
