Donna Young - Black Ops Bodyguard

“Then don’t get me killed,” Julia reasoned, crossing her arms to mask her shaking limbs.

“Bloody hell.”

CAL SETTLED BACK INTO HIS SEAT, shifting slightly to accommodate the limited space of the airplane’s coach section.

He insisted that he and Julia board separately, both under aliases. He’d chosen a seat toward the back. One that gave him a full view of the passengers, but far enough away from the engines so his hearing wouldn’t be impaired.

The fact that he owned a Learjet—a benefit from solid family investments—didn’t improve his mood. But flying privately posed more problems then he was willing to deal with.

The passenger beside him—a solid man in his fifties with a beard and smelling of garlic—snored through an open mouth, making Cal rethink what he could deal with.

His gaze scanned the section. Many families, a few couples, even one or two single mothers traveling with babies. The rest seemed to be a spattering of solo men and women. Most of the men dressed in cotton slacks and sport shirts, the women in trousers and simple tops. Business casual.

He’d worn an oxford-white shirt tucked into tailored black slacks. And because of his fake identification, an Air Marshal-approved pistol tucked into its holster at his ankle.

Business ready, he thought coldly.

Julia sat a few rows ahead. An empty seat divided her and an older woman with a fluff of white cotton for hair.

Her head rested against the window of the plane, still. Most likely asleep.

The sunlight spilled through the small, square porthole, setting dark strands of hair into a golden fire.

It had been like that the first time he’d seen her in Jon Mercer’s office. Cool. Efficient. The lights catching her just right, dazzling him. Then she smiled. A full-on mischievous smile that revealed a sexy little dimple at the side of her mouth.

He rubbed his chest, trying to ease the tightness. It had been the first time in his life Cal had been sucker punched.

Uncomfortable with the memory, he shifted the gun to his pocket and unfolded himself from his seat. Within moments, a female flight attendant approached.

“Can I get you something, Marshal?” She was an attractive woman in her late twenties, with a short bob of blond curly hair, and an invitation in her baby blues.

“The lavatory?”

She gestured to the back of the plane, used the opportunity to take a lingering look. “If you need anything else, let me know.”

“I will,” he promised easily.

Cal reached the bathroom, closed the door, then turned the lock. He pulled out his satellite cell phone.

Quickly, he punched in the number.

“MacAlister.”

“It’s West.”

“It’s about damn time. What the hell is going on, West?” Cain nearly shouted the words. “You had specific orders. Bringing Julia Cutting on this operation wasn’t part of them.”

So Cain had been keeping Julia under surveillance, then. It was the only way the Labyrinth director would have known about their pairing up. “I have the situation under control. We’re still a go on locating your missing equipment.”

“You were supposed to notify me if Julia made contact. Why didn’t you?”

“She didn’t find me to work out a deal. She needed a bodyguard for her trip to Caracas.”

“Don’t trust her, Cal.”

“Julia isn’t a traitor, damn it. She’s a pawn and you know it. She’d never roll over on Jon Mercer, Cain.”

“All I know is that I’m missing a state-of-the-art technical component.”

The DEA’s new Drug Enforcement Retriever. Nickname: MONGREL.

The United States government had developed a drug detector that could find a smuggled shipment of narcotics by simply analyzing compound structure found in the air or in the residue from fingerprints and most other surfaces. The prototype could read a millionth of a gram. A particle so small that up until now could only be seen under a microscope.

It was a breakthrough in high technology that could disrupt drug shipping for months, even years until the drug cartels could counter its effectiveness.

Unless they had the prototype.

“Julia Cutting is my primary suspect,” Cain insisted. “I’ve seen women betray their husbands, their own children for power. The President of the United States is nothing.”

“She admitted to taking ten million out of the government coffers. Not to heisting the MONGREL.”

“What ten million dollars?” Cain let go with a string of obscenities. “How did she do that?”

A small smile twitched across Cal’s lips. Cain didn’t like being outmaneuvered. Simply because that meant he wasn’t an expert strategist.

“Check the government account books and find out,” Cal advised. “It’s ransom money, Cain. I heard the tape Delgado sent her.”

“Delgado doesn’t need ten million dollars.”

“I agree.” Cal rubbed the back of his neck. “I haven’t figured out what he really wants yet. He might suspect she has the MONGREL, but my fear is he hasn’t laid the past to rest. If that’s the case, she’s walking into a death trap.”

“You both are, so be careful,” Cain warned.

“I left the recorder in the top drawer of my nightstand. Get it and have Kate analyze it. Julia erased most of the instructions. See if Kate’s people can retrieve them for me. I want to know exactly what Delgado wants.”

“He wants the MONGREL. And Jason Marsh supplied the means if he gave it to Julia. Roman is fit to be tied that Jason walked out of his security lab with the prototype.”

Roman D’Amato was Cain’s brother-in-law, and an ex-Labyrinth agent. After marrying Cain’s sister, Kate, Roman created a worldwide security corporation that specialized in state-of-the-art technology.

“Roman can have him, after I’m finished with him.”

“You mean if there’s anything left,” Cain commented wryly. “Once Delgado gets the prototype, it will circumvent any hope we have to contain his activities and bring him down.”

“Whatever Delgado is after, it’s not to use Julia as a hostage,” Cal continued, not willing to argue Cain’s point quite yet. “He obviously needs Julia to arrive in Caracas on her own, otherwise he would have had her snatched from her apartment.”

“Not with the surveillance I had on her.”

“Your surveillance didn’t keep Delgado’s men from leaving the tape recorder, Cain.”

“I’ll find out why,” Cain promised. “Delgado must suspect Julia has the MONGREL.”

“How?” Cal asked.

“Good instincts. Jason. Or tip-off from our ranks,” Cain growled. “I’d bet Kate’s fortune on the last.”

“Not yours?” Cal smiled. Kate and Cain were siblings. Both with raven-black hair, slate-gray eyes and a hell of a Scottish temperament. And both, along with their brother, Ian, were heirs to the MacAlister Whiskey fortune.

“Hell, no,” Cain grunted. “Look, I’ll deal with things here. Your attention needs to be there. Once Julia Cutting finds out I’ve sent you over there to kill her husband, she becomes a major liability for you.”

“Ex-husband,” Cal corrected with a hard edge. “Leave Jason and Julia to me, Cain. That’s what you pay me for.”

“You’re sounding like she’s got you wound up again, Cal,” Cain remarked, then paused for a moment. “Julia Cutting’s sudden involvement doesn’t change our original operation. Don’t make me regret putting you on this. Do your thinking out of bed and get the job done. Find our mole. Find Jason. But most of all, find the MONGREL.”

“I will.”

“You’d better,” Cain ordered, his tone unbending. “Or I’ll find someone who can.”

“Taxi, Miss?”