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Now she realized the men she’d been sent to spy on were equally dangerous.
And wouldn’t take kindly to being spied upon, judging by the numerous security measures she’d seen thus far.
They’d been the only vehicle on the boat, and once it had docked, several armed men had materialized out of the tall, reedy grass on the banks to secure the ferry and tie camouflage tarps across the deck and wheelhouse. Clearly, there wasn’t going to be a return trip to the mainland anytime soon.
The wind off the ocean had whipped her long skirt and coat about her legs. And though the sun was shining and the temperature was several degrees warmer than the frozen home she’d left behind, she’d shivered.
She’d been shaking by the time her short, skinny escort had wrapped his hard fingers around her upper arm to lead her into some trodden grass along what she now realized was an unmarked path. He paused at a tall, wire mesh fence, hidden in a line of scrubby trees at the top of the sandy incline.
The man pulled a walkie-talkie from his pocket and pressed a button. Another man’s voice answered, demanding identification. Even with her limited English, she could tell they were speaking some type of code. Once approved, Tasiya heard a staticky hum from the fence that seemed to charge the air around it and stand the hairs on her arms on end. She started when the hum ended in an abrupt silence. With an “All clear,” the man pulled her beside him through a gate. Then there was another call, and the hum resumed behind her. Tasiya realized they’d passed through some sort of electric security barrier.
Such extreme measures to keep people out. Not that she’d expected a friendly welcome. Not that she’d trust anyone who did make a friendly overture.
No one had welcomed her to America or Devil’s Fork Island or Boone Fowler’s office. No one had asked about her trip or whether she was tired or hungry. No one had said anything beyond, “Show me your passport,” or “Get in,” or “This way.”
She had a feeling Boone Fowler was more used to barking orders than striking up conversations. Tasiya longed for a kind word, a bit of reassurance, a smile, to make her think she could pull this off. Because she had an equally strong feeling that—like Dimitri Mostek—Boone Fowler would have no qualms about taking retribution on anyone who crossed him.
“So we’re not supposed to touch you?”
He tossed the letter onto the gray metal desk and looked up, raking his dismissive eyes up and down her figure. Tasiya kept her own gaze trained to the floor. “No, sir.”
“That’s not a problem for me. I don’t do foreign trash.” He stood and circled around the desk, stopping just in front of her. “But I do like having a woman at my beck and call.”
Tasiya stared at the buttons on his black-and-red flannel shirt. “Minister Mostek said I should help you in any way I can.”
“You a decent cook?”
She nodded, not out of ego, but of honesty. “That is how I make my living.”
“Good. Anything would be better than that slop Bristoe’s been serving us.” Tasiya held her breath as his hand moved toward her chin, but he caught himself before making contact. He snapped his fingers instead. Her breath rushed out in a startled gasp and he snickered in his throat. Understanding the command to submit to his will, she steadied her nerves and tilted her eyes up to look into his. “I don’t want any of that spicy foreign crud where you can’t tell what it is you’re eating. Plain cooking. Nothing fancy. Use the supplies we have on hand. Can you manage that?”
Just like Mostek. “Yes, sir.”
“Marcus!”
She turned away as he shouted the order over the top of her head. An even bigger man opened the thick wooden door from the outside hallway. He had to stand six and a half feet tall, nearly a foot taller than she. He was built like an ox and seemed to share the same personal habits of a beast of burden. His slick, curly black hair and stained hands needed to meet a bar of soap. And the pool of yellowish-brown tobacco juice that swirled in front of his leering smile before he turned and spat his cud into a corner of the hallway nearly made her gag.
Quickly Tasiya closed her eyes and pictured an image of her father’s kind, smiling face. The face of the gentle man who’d read her bedtime stories as a child, and talked about her mother so she wouldn’t be afraid of the imaginary creature she’d thought lived beneath her bed.
She was calmer when she opened her eyes, but the big ox with the suggestive grin and large pistol strapped to his belt was still staring at her.
“I heard we had company,” he drawled, strolling into the room. “I’m Marcus Smith, Mr. Fowler’s newly promoted chief of security. ’Cause I’m so good at what I do. And your name, little lady?”
Little lady? She was five feet, seven inches tall. Of course, everyone must seem little compared to this brute. She fixed her gaze squarely in the center of his chest. “Anastasiya Belov.”
“She’s a gift from our benefactor for a job well-done,” Fowler explained. “He’s impressed that we were able to neutralize the strike force.”
“I’m the one who’s impressed.” The man called Marcus Smith reached out and twined his thick, grubby fingers into the long curls of hair that fell across her left breast. “Nice. Prettiest damn thing I’ve seen in weeks.”
Tasiya curled her toes inside her boots to keep from bolting.
But, surprisingly, Boone Fowler saved her the trouble.
“Hands off, Marcus.” He shoved the big man back a step. “She’s not that kind of gift.”
Tasiya winced at the pinpricks of pain that danced across her scalp before Marcus let go of her hair, but she refused to cry out. This was nothing. Her father might be suffering much worse than this. She could endure a few unwanted gropes for his sake.
But apparently Boone Fowler intended to follow his instructions to the letter. “The note says we’re not to touch her. Our contact wants her in pristine condition for himself. And since his people are funding our operation, I don’t want to jeopardize that relationship. Yet. We have business to attend to, anyway. Or have you forgotten our purpose?”
Marcus bowed his gaze like a chastized child. “I haven’t forgotten. I just thought maybe, since you seemed so pleased with my performance lately, that—”
“Keep it in your pants for a few days, okay? We’ll use her to free up some manpower to increase security patrols and interrogations.”
Keep it in your pants? Another strange Americanism. She might not understand the words, but she had no problem recognizing the lechery in Marcus Smith’s eyes, or the blame she read there for being reprimanded by the boss.
“I’m sure you can find other ways to entertain yourself. After all, I intend to break every one of Cameron Murphy’s team. I want them begging to do my bidding when we make that videotape and broadcast it.”
Breaking someone seemed to have a reviving effect on Marcus Smith’s mood. He was smiling as he looked up again. “Murphy’s men have been pretty stubborn so far. But I like a challenge.” He glanced down at Tasiya, giving his statement a double meaning. “I’ve got a few tricks up my sleeve to try, if need be. This old pirate hideout is proving to be a very resourceful place.”
Fowler nodded, pleased with the answer that Tasiya couldn’t quite understand. “I don’t care how you get the job done. I just want results.”
“You’ll have them before we shoot the video next week.”
Tricks? Video? Were these the sort of things she was supposed to report to Mostek?
She hadn’t yet come up with an answer when Boone Fowler stepped beside her and demanded her attention. “I’ve got thirty men here who all need to be fed three square meals a day. When you’re done with that, in the evening, we’ve got seventeen prisoners. You’re to take them bread and water. Marcus will show you your room, the kitchen and larder, and the route you’re to take when you feed the prisoners.”
Three square meals versus bread and water? Compassion had her looking up into those cold, dark eyes. “Only one meal for the prisoners?”
Those dark eyes sneered. “Rule number one around here, Ms. Belov. Never question my orders.”
“No, sir.” Tasiya covered the unexpected flare of sympathy for someone besides her father by quickly lowering her gaze. “I just wanted to be clear on my duties.”
“You’re not stupid, are you?”
She had no trouble comprehending the insult. But she ignored it and made an excuse. “English is not my first language, sir. I only asked because I wanted to make sure I understood correctly. Three meals for your men. One meal for the prisoners.”
“In between, you can clean my office and the latrine. But I don’t want you in here without myself or a guard present. As a matter of fact, I don’t want to see you anywhere but your room, the kitchen or making your rounds to the prisoners unless you have a guard and my permission.” He bent his knees and brought his face level with hers. “Do you understand that?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Then you’re dismissed.” He straightened and returned to his seat behind the desk.
Tasiya swallowed her anger and the urge to blurt out that he wasn’t a god. And that if he was as smart as he seemed to think he was, he’d realize he had a traitor in his midst. Standing in his office. A black-haired sheep in wolf’s clothing, to put a twist on one of those childhood stories her father had read to her.
Fowler was a lot like Dimitri Mostek. Full of himself and high on power. No qualms about being cruel and manipulative. The only thing lacking were the lusty overtures, and she had a sick feeling that Marcus Smith would be adding that dimension to this living hell.
“This way, sugar,” said Marcus, turning sideways in the doorway instead of stepping aside, so that her shoulder had to brush against his chest as she exited into the hallway.
Crinkling her nose at the whiff of stale tobacco and sweat, Tasiya clutched her bag tight against her stomach and hurried past him. She fixed an image of her father’s loving face firmly in her mind as she followed Marcus Smith down a spiral staircase of worn, warped stone to the doorless closet off the kitchen that would serve as her home for the next few weeks.
Chapter Two
“Please, Minister,” Tasiya whispered into the phone, glancing over her shoulder to make sure no one was eavesdropping on her call. She trimmed the wick on the kerosene lantern on her two-drawer dresser, dimming the light so as not to draw attention to her presence in the room.
By the end of the night, she vowed to at least find a blanket to hang across the arched opening so she could change her clothes without the curious eyes of Marcus Smith or anyone else ogling her. “I want to talk to my father. If he’s not safe, I have no reason to do this for you.”
“Anastasiya. Darling.” Mostek’s cultured voice tried to seduce her even across the ocean that separated them. “I like it so much better when you call me Dimitri.”
Tasiya swallowed her gag reflex and her pride. “Please… Dimitri. Let me speak to my father.”
“Very well.” Tasiya drifted toward the corner of the twin-size bed that took up half the room. She sank onto the hard mattress, hugging her arm around her waist while he spoke to someone on his end of the line. But Dimitri still had a few more words for her. “That wasn’t so difficult, was it, Anastasiya? I’m pleased you made it to your destination and are getting acquainted with the men you are working for.”
She had no desire to get acquainted with anyone she’d met thus far, but didn’t think it wise to share that information with Mostek. “No one complained about the dinner I prepared. In fact, I believe Mr. Fowler has ordered his men not to address me unless it is about my work.”
“Good. Your father’s well-being depends upon you doing your job there and then returning to be my mistress. I don’t want you sullied by American hands.”
“How can you—” Tasiya bit her tongue to keep the question to herself. It wasn’t her place to understand how men like Mostek and Fowler could do business when they didn’t like each other and trusted each other even less.
“How can I want you?” She let Dimitri run with the topic so she wouldn’t have to explain her impetuous question. “Because you’re a beautiful woman and I’m bored with my wife. I told you I could set you up in style in an apartment here in the city if you’ll let me.”
“What about my father?” She glanced at the clock beside the lantern, knowing she needed to cut the phone call short and get to her rounds delivering the prisoners’ rations before anyone questioned her absence from the kitchen. “What will happen to him when I return?”
“I’ll give you enough money that you can support him as well. But I don’t want him living with you.” She could visualize Mostek’s vulgar sneer. “I’ll require privacy for my visits.”
Not exactly the motivation she needed to successfully pull off this charade.
“Here’s Anton. Keep it short.”
Tasiya shot to her feet and trained every aural cell in her ear to the precious sound of her father’s voice.
“Tasiya?” He sounded tired.
“Papa?” This was what she needed to hear. “Are you all right? How is the cut on your head? Are you eating? Have they hurt you anymore?”
“I’m fine, daughter. They cleaned the wound and put a bandage on it. But I’m worried about you. So far away. So—”
“I’m fine, Papa.” He was being held by terrorists who wanted to use him as an example of how they dealt with anyone who dared oppose them. She wouldn’t be a burden to him on top of that. “The work here is no different from at home. I cook and clean.”
“But these men…” She could hear the fear in his tone. “Are you safe?”
She hurried to the open doorway and looked around the empty kitchen. For now, she could give him an honest answer. “I’m safe.” But Marcus Smith had warned her to start her rounds by eight o’clock or he’d show up to escort her himself. It was nearly eight now. She had to go, even though she wanted nothing more than to cling to the sound of her father’s voice. “I love you, Papa. We’ll be together again soon, I promise.”
“I love you.”
Those three words would have to sustain her courage. Dimitri Mostek snatched the phone from her father’s hand, ordered his men to take Anton back to his room and lock him in, and added a final threat.
“Your loyalty to your father is touching. I hope you will prove as loyal to me.”
Tasiya felt as if Mostek had ripped her father from her arms again. But she squelched her fear with a deep breath and kept her voice calm. “I’ve done everything you’ve asked of me thus far. I won’t disappoint you.”
“It’s imperative for your father’s health that you don’t. I’ll expect a call from you tomorrow. I want to know everything the militia is doing, the status of their prisoners, anything you can tell me. I also want you to find an American television—”
“A television?” In this drafty old place whose only modern amenities seemed to be its security systems? She’d had to hand-pump the stove to make it work, while a small generator produced electricity for the refrigerator and freezer. He wanted too much. “Where will I—”
“Do not interrupt me again.” Tasiya bit her tongue, lest he take his displeasure with her out on her father. “A radio or newspaper will do as well. I want to know what propaganda they are saying about Lukinburg, and what news they have of Prince Nikolai and Princess Veronika.”
“I’m to spy on them, too?”
The two royal heirs had remained in the United States after speaking out against their father’s inhumane policies in their homeland. Though branded a traitor by King Aleksandr and the Lukinburg press, Nikolai had apparently become the heroic darling of American women and politicians alike.
Providing news of the prince and princess to the king would no doubt bring some favorable reward to Dimitri. “I will try my best.”
“You will do these things,” he corrected. “Is that clear?”
“Yes.”
“Such a good girl. Such a good, beautiful girl.” The false charm bled back into his voice. “I’ll be thinking of you tonight. In my dreams.”
Tasiya cringed at the implication, but checked her response. “Goodbye.”
She risked a rare, perverse pleasure in ending the call before he could answer. Hiding the phone inside her pillowcase, she glanced at the clock. Two minutes past eight. Marcus would come looking for her soon.
Her father’s life depended on her carrying out Mostek’s orders.
Her own life depended on her doing it without getting caught.
Ponderosa, Montana
“WHAT DO YOU MEAN they shot another one? Where the hell are my men?” The tall, black-haired man wheezed, trying to rouse himself from his bed.
“Easy, Colonel.” Trevor Blackhaw braced his hand against the shoulder that wasn’t bandaged and eased his boss at Big Sky Bounty Hunters back against the propped-up pillows. “You’ve been home from the hospital all of two hours. If Mia finds out we’re in here talking business, she’ll have my hide.”
Mention of Cameron Murphy’s wife, who had just stepped out of the bedroom to put Olivia, their four-year-old daughter to bed, seemed to ease his agitation. “I guess this means you had to cut your engagement celebration short?”
Trevor sank into the chair beside the bed. “Sierra understands. She might be free of the militia’s influence now, but none of us will rest easy until Boone Fowler and his men are back in prison where they belong.”
Cameron rubbed at the scruff of beard that had sprouted along his jaw in the days since barely surviving a chemical bomb attack by the Montana Militia for a Free America at a nearby mall. Though he’d suffered critical burns and some temporary damage to his lungs, there wasn’t a damn thing wrong with his intellectual capabilities or leadership skills. “Tell me what we know.”
Trevor picked up the grainy black-and-white photographs he’d brought in to show his boss. “An army search-and-rescue team found one deceased soldier down in Swamp Lejeune at the ambush site. Michael Clark,” a fellow bounty hunter whose background in army intelligence made him an expert detective, “dates the second photo about a week after the initial capture. The army ID’d the victim as one of theirs, but it’s too dark to get any kind of fix on the location.”
“What about where the photos were processed?”
Trevor shook his head. “Clark’s still trying to trace the source. It passed through a lot of hands before reaching us.”
“And there’s no way to track them from the ambush site?”
“Lombardi and Cook are in North Carolina now. But Lejeune training base covers thousands of acres over a variety of terrain. They found some heavy-vehicle tracks, but the trail went cold at the New River. Fowler’s men could have choppered out, taken a boat, landed a seaplane. They could be camped out next door or halfway around the world.”
