Anne Stuart - Ice Blue

She was a liability, and he’d learned long ago that you couldn’t get sentimental over individual life when the stakes were so high. There was an old Zen koan—the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few—and if he had to choose between mass destruction and the life of one spoiled California blonde, then he wouldn’t hesitate.

Except she wasn’t what he would have expected. He’d skimmed the intel he’d gotten on her—daughter of a Hollywood trophy wife, product of Eastern boarding schools and college, advanced degree in Asian art, with no scandals attached to her name. She’d lived a quiet enough life—maybe too quiet. It wasn’t her fault she just happened to hold the key to something that could tear the entire world apart.

His old friend Peter would be mocking him, telling him it was his damn Asian inscrutability that kept him so cold-blooded. The thought amused him, because Peter Madsen had been the coldest person Takashi O’Brien had ever known. Until he ran into the wrong woman, the same one who’d almost brought an end to Takashi’s life.

Taka wasn’t going to make that mistake again. If Summer Hawthorne had to die, he’d do it as quickly and as painlessly as he could manage, and with luck she’d never know what happened. It wasn’t her fault that hidden somewhere in her memory was the location of an ancient Japanese shrine. Nor was it her fault that people would kill to discover it. And that he would kill to keep her from revealing it.

He could pull over to the side of the road, put a comforting hand on the back of her neck, and snap it. Her death would be instantaneous, and he could take her body and dump her into the white limo’s trunk. The scandal attached to the Shirosama’s deluded cult would be an added bonus.

Taka should never have taken her away from there in the first place—he should have just ended it then. If he hesitated much longer someone might discover the crashed vehicle with the two bodies in the front seat. As far as he could tell, Summer Hawthorne had no more value. Now that he knew where the urn was, retrieving it would be simple enough for anyone with his talents.

Keeping her alive would only make things more dangerous. She knew where the site of the temple ruins were. One valley girl who’d never traveled farther west than Hawaii held the key to a location so valuable that hundreds of thousands of lives could depend on it. Better she die and the secret with her, than risk Armageddon.

It was all made more complicated by the fact that she didn’t know what she knew. Hana Hayashi had left the secret with her, but so well hidden that no one might find it, Summer included.

The Committee couldn’t take that risk. Better to terminate her and all possibility of finding the hidden shrine, than let the Shirosama move ahead with his lethal, dangerous visions.

Taka didn’t even need to pull off the freeway to do it, or even slow his speed from the seventy-five miles per hour he was traveling. The technique was simple and he’d done it too many times already. He needed to stop thinking about it and just do it.

But then, his reflexes were still off from his accident. His fuck-up, which had landed him in the hands of a sadist. There was no need to take chances, just to prove to himself he was still at the top of his game. Taka took the next exit off the freeway, heading west, while his passenger sat quietly in her seat, asking no questions, oblivious to the fact that she was about to die.

He drove onto a less crowded street, pulled over to the side of the road and turned to face her. She had blue eyes, and she was prettier than he’d realized. She didn’t wear makeup, and she had a sprinkling of freckles across her nose. He’d never killed anyone with freckles before.

“So what happens next?” she said, looking at him, and he wondered if she knew.

He put his hand on the back of her neck, under the single thick braid that was starting to come undone from her active night. He could feel the nerves jumping through her skin, feel her pulses racing, though he didn’t know whether it was in fear of him or remembered panic. There was something there, in her eyes, that he didn’t understand, couldn’t afford to think about. Her skin was soft and warm, and his large hand could span her neck quite easily.

“Are you going to kiss me?” she asked, sounding as if that would be a fate worse than death. “Because I know you saved my life and probably figure that, as a knight in shining armor, you’re owed something. But I’d really rather you didn’t. I’d like you to tell me why you were watching me, why you were following those men and what you intend to do about it.”

“I wasn’t planning on kissing you.”

“That’s a relief,” she said, despite the faint stain of color beneath the freckles. “So who are you, and what do you want from me?”

It wouldn’t take much pressure. He could even kiss her, if that’s what she wanted, and by the time he lifted his mouth she’d be gone. So easy, all of it. So logical, sensible.

He didn’t need her help in retrieving the Hayashi Urn from the museum—he was one of the Committee’s acknowledged experts at breaking and entering. When she died she’d take her secrets with her, the safest option all around. As long as she lived there was a good chance the Shirosama would get his hands on her and the secrets she didn’t know she carried. Once she was dead that danger was gone.

Taka tightened his grip on her neck, exerting just a tiny bit of pressure, and he saw the sudden doubt in her eyes. He needed to move fast, because he didn’t want that doubt to increase, to turn into terror before it went blank, and hesitation would only hurt her.

“I’m guessing you’re some kind of private security guard hired by my mother,” she continued, when he didn’t answer her questions. “She must have had second thoughts. She knows how determined her precious guru can be when he wants something, and maybe she thought I was in danger. Too bad. They just didn’t realize how easy it would be to steal the bowl from the museum.”

He loosened the pressure an infinitesimal amount. Nothing that she would notice. “What do you mean? The Sansone has state-of-the-art security.”

“Well, you’d think they’d at least try to get it,” she said. “Most of the security is focused on the more valuable pieces. It would have been a lot easier than they thought—I was counting on them going for it sooner or later.”

“Counting on them to steal the urn?” He was totally confused by this point. “Why?”

“Because it’s a fake,” she said in that maddeningly calm voice. “The real one is hidden. Sorry, but I don’t trust my mother not to sell me out. I’m really quite touched that she hired you—”

“I don’t know your mother.”

Her smile faded. “Then why were you watching me? Why did you come after me? Who are you?”

Your worst nightmare , he wanted to tell her. But the game wasn’t played yet, and he still had a job to do.

He’d have to kill her later.

“Where is the Hayashi Urn?”

Summer glanced over at his cool, exquisite profile in the darkened car. Now that she was beginning to calm down from the adrenaline rush of her abduction, she was starting to see things a little more clearly. And she was beginning to have the extremely unhappy suspicion that her dangerous night was far from over. Why the hell had she told him the bowl in the museum was a fake?

“Someplace safe,” she said. “I think you ought to take me home now.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said, starting the car. “Unless the urn is hidden there, which means it’s probably gone by now.”

“I’m not an idiot. Someone already ransacked my place looking for it. It’s hidden where no one can find it.”