Mallory Kane - The Colonel's Widow?

“I didn’t have a choice.”

She lifted her chin. “Just so I know, how long had you been planning all this?”

“Rina, it wasn’t like that—”

“How…long?”

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Deke squeeze his eyes closed.

Rook looked away and shrugged. “Six months. Maybe eight.”

A short, sharp laugh burst from her throat. “Eight months. You lived with me, you made love to me, and all the time you were planning to—? Dear God, who are you?”

She stood and caught the arm of the sofa to steady herself. Then she glared at the man she’d married in a fever six years ago. “I do not know you at all.”

Rook spread his hands. “Trust me, it’ll all make more sense once you’ve had some rest. It’s a lot for you to take in right now—”

“A lot to take in? You think?” She heard her voice rising in pitch. “But, yes, of course. I am sure I’ll feel much better once I take a nap.”

Deke reached out a hand, as if to soothe her, but she jerked away. “No. Don’t touch me.”

She wrapped her arms around her middle and turned back to Rook. “Where have you been? Who have you been in touch with?”

“Nobody. Irina, you need to calm down.”

“You have no right to tell me what I need to do. You gave that up when you let me think you were dead.” She held up her hands, palms out. “I can’t—I cannot take any more. I’m going to make tea.”

“Stay there. I’ll make it for you,” Deke said.

“No,” she snapped. She couldn’t be alone with Rook. She didn’t know what she would do—or say. “I think I’ll let you two talk. It’s pretty obvious you need to.”

She glared at Deke. “Maybe you can get some real answers out of him.”

She took a cautious step, making sure her legs weren’t going to collapse, then headed to the kitchen, with Rook’s voice following her.

“Use the light over the stove. Don’t turn on the overheads.”

“Fine. Fine. No problem,” she muttered. “Like I have no sense to figure that out.”

She twisted her hair up and anchored it with a rubber band from a kitchen drawer, then pulled the tea canister toward her, hoping there was at least one tea bag. She opened the lid.

“Jasmine,” she whispered. Her favorite. She dug the little package out and opened it.

She put the kettle on the stove eye and held the tea bag to her nose. The scent hurtled her back in time.

She and Rook had come up here a couple of weeks before the fateful trip to the Mediterranean. Just the two of them.

She’d brought up the idea of having a baby—again. And again, like always, he’d sidetracked her with jasmine tea and hot, passionate lovemaking. He’d never talked about having children. At least now she understood why.

She had to blink away tears before she could pour the hot water into her mug. Then she turned out the light over the stove and stood at the kitchen window in the dark, waiting for the tea to steep. In the distance, thunder rolled lazily and a pale flash of lightning lit the sky.

Before Rook, she’d always been afraid of thunder-storms. They reminded her of the guns and bombs from her childhood in the former Soviet Union. Thunderstorms had frightened her. But ever since she’d married Rook, she’d learned to love them.

He liked to lie in bed with the windows open, summer or winter, spring shower or gale-force winds, and watch the lightning and listen to the sounds of rain and thunder.

For her, lying in his arms, safe and secure in the knowledge that he would never let anything happen to her, was the ultimate definition of safety.

But he’d left her alone—alone with the storms and the memories and the unrelenting grief.

She swiped her fingers under her eyes and set the tea bag aside. Then she wrapped her hands around the warm mug and sipped, sighing as the hot liquid slid down her throat to soothe her insides.

She closed her eyes. She’d spent the past two years living in a nightmare. Every night, she’d prayed she would wake up and find Rook beside her, safe and sound. Every morning, she’d woken with her prayer unanswered.

Now he was here, but she still didn’t feel like her prayers had been answered.

This felt like the nightmare. The months of sleepless nights, of the recurring dream of loving him and then losing him, had become her reality.

Thunder rumbled again, closer this time. Irina’s eyes flew open. A lightning flash illuminated the dense woods on the east side of the cabin and a deafening clap of thunder made her nearly spill her tea.

Then something moved—a shadow darker than the trees.

She froze, holding her breath as the thunder continued to roar. She waited for the next flash of lightning. It didn’t take long.

The flare spotlighted a creature slinking along the edge of the woods. No. Not a creature. Not some thing.

Someone. And he was carrying a gun.

Irina’s breath caught. There was someone outside the cabin, and he was carrying a weapon—maybe a rifle.

Setting down her mug, she moved swiftly toward the living room.

Rook and Deke were still arguing.

“—surprised he hasn’t tried to get to Rina before now,” Rook was saying.

“Son of a—That’s what I’m trying to tell you. He has.” Deke’s voice rose. “You don’t get it. The level of security I’ve got around her—she might as well be the First Lady. I told you I’d take care of her!”

“Of course I get it. That’s not what I’m saying.”

“It’s only been two weeks since she called off the search. Fifteen days! And he’s already managed to send a man after Matt and put a plan into place to kidnap Mindy. That’s why I knew I had to call you. He was obviously watching Matt. He knew the instant Irina called him. Hell, he knew before she got in touch with Matt. I’m thinking Novus knew she was calling off the search as soon as we did.”

“That’s not possible,” Rook snapped.

“It is if he’s got a mole on the inside. Look how he got to Mindy and used her to get to me. The SOB was watching her. He knew she was pregnant, something neither Irina nor I knew.”