Dangerous to Know (29 page)

“If you don't need me any more tonight, I'll get the team settled. Dunliff will stand the first shift.”

“All right. It's been a long day. Get some rest, Denise.”

“You too,” the agent responded.

Although Denise kept her face carefully neutral when she wished Adam a courteous good-night, Maggie caught the quick speculative look the other woman gave him.

A few moments later, Lillian came downstairs. “You're all unpacked, Mrs. Grant.”

“Thank you.”

“I think I'll turn in, too. It takes me a while to reacclimate to the altitude.”

“Don't you want some stew? It's delicious.”

Surprisingly, it was. Maggie might have awarded the rich stew her own personal blue ribbon, if it had contained just a chunk or two of beef or lamb or even chicken.

“No, thank you.”

When Lillian retired to her room, the agent on duty discreetly left Maggie and Adam alone. More or less. Hidden cameras
swept the downstairs continuously, allowing the occupants only the illusion of privacy.

Upstairs, Maggie knew, was a different matter. Upstairs there were only two small rooms, each with its own bath. Upstairs, Mrs. Grant had insisted on privacy for herself and her guests. Which meant Maggie and Adam didn't have to take their assigned roles as lovers any farther than the first stair. At this moment, Maggie wasn't sure whether she was more relieved or disappointed.

This complex role they were playing had become so confused, so blurred, she'd stopped trying to sort out what was real and what wasn't. Since last night, when she'd felt Adam's arms locked around her and his naked chest beneath her splayed hands, she'd hungered for a repeat performance.

Not that she'd either experience it or allow it. The rational part of her mind told her they wouldn't, couldn't, complicate their mission further by setting a spark to the fire building between them. But when she thought of that small, private nest upstairs, her fingers itched for a match.

Not an hour later, she tiptoed across the darkened hall and ignited a flame that almost consumed them both.

 

The soft scratching on the wooden door to his room brought Adam instantly awake. He didn't move, didn't alter the rhythm of his breathing, but his every sense went on full alert.

The door creaked open.

“Adam? It's me. Taylor. Are you awake?”

Maggie's use of her assumed identity in this supposedly secure part of the house tripped warning alarms in every part of Adam's nervous system. He rolled over, the sheets rustling beneath him, and followed her lead.

“I'm awake.”

She stepped out of the shadows and moved toward the wide double bed that took up most of the floor space. Bright moonlight streamed through the windows, illuminating the fluid lines of her body. She wore only a silky gown, and without the con
straining Kevlar her breasts were lush and full. Nipples peaked from the cold pushed at the thin gown.

Adam felt his stomach muscles go washboard-stiff. Forcing himself to focus on the reason behind her unexpected visit, he rose up on one elbow. The old-fashioned hickory-rail bedstead bit into his bare back as he propped a shoulder against it.

“I couldn't sleep,” she whispered, her feet gliding across the oak plank floor.

She stopped beside the bed, so near that Adam could see the tiny beads of moisture pearled on her shoulders. Her hair was spiked with water, as though she'd hurriedly passed a towel over it once or twice.

As if in answer to his unspoken question, she ran a hand through her damp waves. “I took a hot bath. To help me relax. It didn't work.”

His mouth curved. “I tried a cold shower. It didn't work for me, either.” He raised an arm, lifting the covers, not sure where this was going, but following her lead. “Maybe we can help each other relax.”

She hesitated, shifting from one bare foot to the other. “I know we promised to take this slow and easy, to use these two weeks to get to know each other, but…”

“Come to bed, Taylor.”

“I need you to hold me, Adam. Please, just hold me for a little while.”

She slid in beside him, her gown a slither of damp silk against his skin. He dragged the covers over them both.

Her body felt clammy through the gown where it touched his, which was just about everywhere. Wrapping an arm around her waist, Adam brought her closer into his heat. She burrowed against him and tucked her icy feet between his. Her head rested on his shoulder. Her mouth was only an inch from his.

They fit together as if cast from molds. Male and female. Man and woman. Adam and Maggie. Thunder and Chameleon, he amended immediately.

“I was thinking about what happened last night,” she said softly, “and I started to shake.”

That didn't help him much. A lot had happened last night. He didn't know if she was referring to Stoney's unexpected appearance, her near-fall, or the sharp difference of opinion they'd had over procedures. A difference that had yet to be resolved.

“I guess I experienced a delayed reaction to the fall,” she murmured, her breath feathering his cheek. “It happened so fast, I didn't have time to be frightened last night. But now…now I shake every time I remember how…how…”

She shivered and pressed closer. Adam pulled the downy covers up higher around her shoulders, almost burying her head in their warmth.

“There's a bug in my room.”
The words were hardly more than a flutter of air against his ear. “I was so terrified, so helpless,” she continued, a shade more loudly. “And then you reached for me and pulled me to safety.”

The covers shook as she shuddered again.

“It's okay, Taylor. It's okay.” His lips moved against her cheek.
“I thought you swept the room yourself.”

“I did. Either I missed this one, or someone planted it while I was downstairs scarfing up vegetable stew.”
She gave a tremulous sigh. “Oh, Adam, I could have pulled you over that railing with me. I could have killed us both.”

“No way. I wasn't about to let go of either you or that stone rail.
Where did you find it?
”

“Above the bathtub.”
Her hand inched up to rest lightly on the bandage on his chest. “I'm so sorry you were hurt. You should have had a doctor take a look at this.”

“It's only a scrape.
Where above the tub?
”

“
Behind the wallpaper. When I ran hot water into the tub, steam dampened the paper. All but this one small patch.
Are you sure you're all right?”

“I'm fine, darling.
Did you neutralize it?”

“No. I didn't want to tip off whoever was listening. There's probably one in here, too.”
She nuzzled his neck. “I'm glad you're here, Adam. I'm glad you came with me.”

“I'm glad, too. We both have too many pressures on us in Washington.
I'm sure there is.
”

The knowledge that someone had planted devices in these supposedly secure rooms churned in Adam's mind, vying for precedence with the signals his skin was telegraphing to his brain at each touch of Maggie's body against his.

No one could have gotten into the cabin undetected. Despite its isolated location, the ranch bristled with the latest in security systems. Which meant that whoever had planted the bug had ready access to the grounds.

The caretaker, Hank McGowan? He certainly had access, although his loyalty and devotion to Taylor Grant supposedly went soul-deep.

Lillian Roth?

A member of the Secret Service advance team?

Denise Kowalski herself, when she'd done her walk-through of the cabin?

Which one of them, if any, was in league with the man who'd made that chilling call to Taylor? And why?

Suddenly the threat to Maggie became staggeringly immediate. Instead of narrowing, their short list of suspects had exploded. The sense of danger closing in rushed through Adam, and his arms tightened reflexively around her waist.

She took the gesture as a continuation of their roles, and snuggled into him. “Just think,” she murmured. “Two weeks to learn about each other. Two weeks for each of us to discover what pleasures the other.”

Her movement ground her hip against his groin. In spite of himself, Adam hardened. The dappled moonlight and soft shadows in the room blurred, merged into a swirling, red-tinted mist.

“I don't think it's going to take two weeks for us to get to know each other,” he said, his voice low.

She tilted her head back to glance up at him from her nest of covers, a question in her shadowed eyes. “Why not?”

“Now that I have you in my arms, I don't think I can let you go.”

He angled his body, allowing it to press hers deeper into the
sheets. His hands tunneled into her still-damp hair. The muscles in his upper arms corded as he angled her face up to his.

He shouldn't do this. His mind posted a last, desperate caution. Deliberately Adam ignored the warning. Lowering his head, he covered her mouth with his. It was warm and full and made for his kiss.

After a moment of startled surprise, Maggie pushed her arms out of the enfolding covers and wrapped them around his neck, returning his kiss with a sensual explosion of passion. Her mouth opened under his, inviting, welcoming, discovering.

With an inarticulate sound, Adam plunged inside, tasting her, claiming her. Teeth and tongues and chins met. Exploration became exploitation.

Maggie couldn't be a passive player, in this or in any part of life. Her arms tightened around his neck, and she arched under him, lifting her body to his in a glory of need. She felt his rock hardness against her stomach, and a shaft of heat shot from her belly to her loins. Without conscious thought, she wiggled, rubbing her breasts against his chest. The tips stiffened to aching points. She shifted again, wanting friction. Wanting his touch.

As though he'd read her mind, Adam dragged a hand down and shaped her breast. His fingers kneaded her flesh. His thumb brushed over the taut nipple. Maggie gave a small, involuntary gasp.

“Adam!”

The breathless passion in her voice drew him back from the precipice. The very real possibility that someone else had heard her gasp his name acted on Adam like a sluice of cold water. He dragged his mouth from hers, his breath harsh and ragged. Resolve coiled like cold steel in his gut.

When he made love to Maggie, which he now intended to do as soon as he got her away from this cabin, it sure as hell wouldn't be with anyone listening or watching. There would be just the two of them, their bodies as tight with desire as they were now. But he'd be the only one to hear her groans of pleasure. No one else would see the splendor of her body. Would observe her responses to his kiss and his touch and his posses
sion. Would watch while he drowned in the river of passion flowing in this vital woman.

He eased his lower body away from hers. “I'm sorry, Taylor.”

The sound of another woman's name on Adam's lips slowly penetrated the haze of desire that heated Maggie's mind and body. Like a cold mist seeping under the door, reality crept back. It swirled around her feet and, inch by inch, worked its way along her raw, burning nerves, dousing their fires.

His body was heavy on hers. Hard and heavy. Yet when he looked down at her, she wondered who he saw—her, or Taylor Grant.

“I shouldn't have done that,” he said softly. “I'm sorry. We both agreed to take this slow and easy.”

Adam's withdrawal stunned Maggie…and shamed her. For the first time since joining OMEGA, she'd lost sight of her mission. In his arms, she'd forgotten her role. When it came to cool detachment in the performance of duty, she wasn't anywhere near Adam's league.

It took everything she had to slip back into Taylor's skin. “You don't have to take all the blame,” she murmured throatily. “Or the credit. I was the one who asked to be held, remember?”

She pushed herself out of his arms. One bare foot hit the icy floor, and then the other.

“We've got time. Time to savor each other. Time to get to know each other.” She struggled to pull herself together and grasped at the straw Lillian had offered earlier. “Why don't you come with me in the morning? We'll walk down to the lake, see the sunrise together.”

“Taylor…”

“I want whatever it is that's between us to be right, Adam.”

His eyes met hers. His seeming detachment was gone, and in its place was a blazing certainty that went a long way toward soothing Maggie's confused emotions.

“It's right,” he growled. “Whatever it is, it's right.”

A
distinctive aroma jerked Maggie out of a restless doze. She lifted her head, sniffing the cold air like a curious raccoon.

Bacon! Someone was cooking bacon!

She squinted at the dim light filtering through the closed shutters. Not even dawn yet, and someone was cooking bacon!

A crazy hope surged through her. Maybe Adam hadn't been able to sleep, any more than she had. Maybe he'd decided to take her up on her offer to see the sunrise, and was cooking himself breakfast while he waited for her. Maybe she could snatch a bite before the tantalizing scent lured everyone else out of bed, as well.

The thought of food, real food, galvanized Maggie into action. Throwing off the covers, she dashed into the bathroom and ran water into the old-fashioned porcelain sink. She washed quickly and, remembering Taylor's comment that she'd didn't bother with makeup in the mountains, slathered on only enough foundation needed to cover the artificial bone.

Returning to the bedroom, she tugged on a pair of thin thermal long johns. The lightweight silky fabric molded to her body like
a second skin. Maggie wished she'd been issued subzero-tested undergarments like these for the hellish winter survival course OMEGA had put her through. They would have been far more comfortable for a trek over the Rockies than the bulky garments she'd had to wear.

Twisting and bending, she managed to strap the Kevlar bodysuit in place, then pulled on a white turtleneck and pleated brown flannel slacks. The palm-size derringer and spare ammunition clip Maggie had found in the bedside table fit nicely in the roomy pants pocket. Relieved to be armed again, if only with this small .22, she rummaged in the chest of drawers for an extra pair of wool socks. The thick socks warmed her toes and made the boots she found in the closet fit more comfortably.

The vice president might wear a smaller dress size, Maggie thought with a dart of satisfaction, but her feet were bigger. As ridiculous as it was, the realization that Taylor wasn't quite perfect helped restore Maggie's balance—a balance that had been badly shaken by those few moments in Adam's arms last night.

Grinning, she paused with her hand on the cut-glass doorknob. Okay, so she'd almost lost it for those breathless, endless, glorious moments. So she'd come within a hair of jumping the man's bones. So he'd been the one to pull back, not her.

It was right. He'd said it. She felt it. Whatever this was between them, it was right.

His parting words had lessened the shock of her loss of control, but they'd also kept her tossing all night. His words, and the utter conviction that she and Adam would make love. Soon. Maggie felt it in every bone in her body.

But they wouldn't do it in another woman's bed. What was more, she darn well wasn't going to be wearing another woman's skin. She wanted to hear Adam murmur
her
name in his deep, husky voice. She wanted to feel his hands in her hair. Dammit, she wanted him. Fiercely. Urgently. With a hunger that defied all logic, all caution, all concerns over their respective positions in OMEGA.

All she had to do was stay alive long enough to discover who among the various people at the cabin had planted that bug.
Learn if that person was in league with a possible assassin. And track said assassin down. Then she could satisfy her hunger.

Another succulent aroma wafted through the thin wood, and Maggie twisted the doorknob. If she couldn't satisfy one hunger for a while longer, maybe, just maybe, she could satisfy another. Chasing the mouth-watering scent, she went downstairs.

A tired-eyed agent pushed himself out of an armchair beside the fire in the living room. In her rush to get to the kitchen, Maggie had forgotten all about the post-stander. No doubt the agent had heard her tiptoe across the hall to Adam's room last night. In spite of herself, heat crept up her neck. Good grief, she felt like a coed who'd been caught sneaking out of a boy's dorm room. No wonder Taylor's list of romantic liaisons had been so brief! The woman had no privacy at all. Bugs in her bathroom. Agents standing guard in her living room. Armed escorts on all her evenings out.

Summoning a smile, Maggie nodded to the man. “Good morning.”

“Good morning, Mrs. Grant. You're up early.”

“Yes, I wanted to catch the sunrise.”

“Should be a gorgeous one.” He lifted an arm to work at a kink in his neck. “The snow stopped around midnight, just after I came on shift.”

“Mmm…”

Maggie was trying to think of some excuse to keep him from accompanying her into the kitchen when he supplied it himself.

“If you're going out, I'd better get suited up and let Agent Kowalski know.”

“Fine.”

He moved toward the front door, snagging a ski jacket from the convenient moose-antler rack. “Just buzz when you're ready to go.”

Maggie hurried toward the kitchen, praying fervently that the person rattling pans on the top of the stove was Adam.

It wasn't.

Years of field experience enabled her to mask her intense disappointment when the figure at the stove turned. Resolutely
Maggie ignored the thick slabs of bacon sizzling in a sea of grease and smiled a greeting.

“Good morning, Hank.”

“Mornin', Taylor.”

She barely kept herself from lifting a brow at his casual use of the vice president's first name. Either Mrs. Grant didn't bother any more with protocol than with makeup while in the mountains, or this was a test.

Maggie had nothing to fall back on in this moment but her instincts. And the memory of the charismatic smile Taylor had given her when she invited Maggie to call her by her first name. She guessed that the vice president didn't stand on ceremony with the man she'd rescued from death row. Nor was he likely to be intimidated by a position or a title.

In the well-lit kitchen, his rugged features appeared even more startling than they had when Maggie first glimpsed them last night. The drunk who'd wielded that tire jack had done so with a vengeance.

McGowan jerked his head toward a carafe sitting on the oak plank table that took up most of the small kitchen. “Coffee's on the warmer. Hotcakes are just about done.”

He turned back to the stove, and Maggie pulled out one of the ridgepole chairs. Pouring the rich black brew into an enameled mug, she propped her elbows on the table and studied McGowan. He looked almost as formidable from the rear as he did from the front.

Brown hair, long and shaggy and obviously cut by his own hand, brushed the collar of his blue work shirt. The well-washed fabric stretched tight across wiry shoulders. Rolled-up sleeves revealed thick hair matting his forearms, one of which bore a tattoo of a snarling, upright bear. His scuffed boots had been scraped clean of all dirt, but looking at their stained surface, Maggie didn't doubt he wore them for every chore, including cleaning out the stables.

He walked over to the table and placed a heaping platter in front of her.

“Buckwheat hotcakes. Like you like them. No butter. No syrup.”

“Thank you.” She managed to infuse a creditable touch of enthusiasm into her tone. “They look wonderful.”

“Figured your…friend might want something more substantial. Biscuits and bacon do for him?”

The hesitation was so slight, most people might have missed it, but Maggie's training as a linguist had sensitized her to the slightest nuances of speech.

“Biscuits and bacon will be fine,” she replied casually.

McGowan nodded and returned to the stove. Her eyes thoughtful, Maggie forked a bite of the heavy pancake.

Did the caretaker resent Adam Ridgeway's presence in Taylor's cabin, not to mention her life? Had his supposed devotion ripened into something deeper? And darker? Had he been corrupted into planting that bug in her room, or had he done it for his own purposes? His closed face gave her no clue.

After a moment, he tossed the spatula into the sink and leaned his hips against it. Folding his arms, he raised a brow in query.

“You want the snowmobiles?”

Maggie chewed slowly to cover her sudden uncertainty. Did she want the snowmobiles? Would Taylor want them?

“You don't need them,” he added on a gruff note, watching her. “I cleared the path down to the lake with the snowblower before I started breakfast. Knew you'd want to go down there first thing.”

The lake. Evidently everyone was aware of Taylor's little ritual of walking down to the lake to find her tree, whatever and wherever that was.

Before Maggie could reply, the kitchen door opened. The lump of buckwheat lodged halfway down her throat.

After last night, she should have anticipated Adam's impact on her traitorous body. She should have expected her empty stomach to do a close approximation of a triple flip. Her thighs to clench under the table. Her palms to dampen. But she darn well hadn't expected her throat to close around a clump of dough
and almost choke her to death. She took a hasty swallow of coffee to ease its passage.

Damn! Adam Ridgeway in black tie and tails was enough to make any woman whip around for a second, or even third, look. But Adam in well-worn jeans and a green plaid shirt that hugged his broad shoulders was something else again.

He wore the clothes with a casual familiarity that said they were old friends and not just trotted out for a weekend in the woods. He hadn't shaved, and a dark stubble shadowed his chin and cheeks. Seeing him like this, Maggie felt her mental image of this man alter subtly, like a house shifting on its foundations—until she caught the expression in his blue eyes as he returned the caretaker's look. That was vintage Thunder. Cool. Assessing. In control.

“We didn't get a chance to meet last night,” he said, crossing the small kitchen. “I'm Adam Ridgeway.”

A scarred hand took his. “Hank McGowan.”

Their hands dropped, and the two men measured each other.

“I understand from Taylor you run the place.”

A wiry shoulder lifted. “She runs it. I keep it together while she's away.”

“It's a big place for one man to handle.”

“A crew comes up in the spring. To help with lambing, then later with the shearing. The rest of the time, we manage.” He flicked Maggie a sideways glance. “Me and the hound.”

“You met him last night,” Maggie interjected, although she knew Adam wouldn't need a reminder. Even if they hadn't been briefed on what to expect at the cabin, the first encounter with that strange-looking creature would have stayed in anyone's mind.

“So I did. Radizwell, isn't it?”

“Actually,” she replied, dredging through her memory for details, “his registered name is Radizwell, Marioffski's Silver Stand.”

McGowan's lips twisted. “Damnedest name for a sheepdog I ever heard. You going to take him down to the lake with you?”

“Of course. You know very well that I couldn't get away without him, even if I wanted to.”

His battered features relaxed into what was probably meant as a smile. “True. Biscuits and bacon are on the stove, Ridgeway.”

Politeness demanded that Taylor share the table with her guest while he ate. Adam, bless him, took pity on Maggie.

“I'm not hungry right now. I'll just have a cup of coffee and tuck a couple of those biscuits in my pocket for later. A walk down to the lake should help me work up an appetite.”

“Suit yourself.”

“You'd better take more than a couple,” Maggie suggested blandly. “It's a long walk.”

 

When the huge, shaggy sheepdog bounded through the snow toward her, Maggie saw at once that he was still suspicious of her. Her hands froze on the zipper of her hot-pink ski jacket as he circled her a few times, sniffing warily.

Before he issued any of the rumbling growls that had raised the hairs on the back of her neck last night, however, Adam dug into the pocket of his blue ski jacket and offered the dog a bacon-stuffed biscuit.

“Here, boy.”

Maggie bit back her instinctive protest as she watched, and the delicacy disappeared in a single gulp. The animal, now Adam's friend for life, cavorted like an animated overgrown dust mop, then took off for the trees.

Muttering under her breath, Maggie zipped up her jacket, tugged a matching knit band over her ears and trudged after him. Adam followed her, and the ever-present Secret Service agent trailed behind.

The path to the lake was steep, snow-covered in spots, and treacherous. It pitched downward from the side of the cabin, wound around tall oaks and silver-barked poplars, then twisted through a stand of Douglas fir. On her own, Maggie would have been lost within minutes. Luckily, the komondor knew exactly where they were headed. Every so often he stopped and looked
back, his massive head tilted. At least Maggie assumed it was his head. With that impenetrable, shaggy coat, he could very well have been treating her to a calculated display of doggy disdain. Or waiting for Adam to offer another biscuit as an incentive. Ha! There was no way the creature was getting any more of those biscuits, Maggie vowed.

Although cold, the air was dry and incredibly sharp. The snow, a foot or more deep along the slopes, thinned as they descended to the tiny lake set in its nest of trees. Maggie was huffing from the strenuous walk by the time they left the path to circle the shoreline. Her silky thermal undershirt stuck to her shoulder blades, and the Kevlar shield trapped a nasty little trickle of perspiration in the small of her back.

Well aware that wet clothes led to hypothermia, which could kill far more swiftly than exposure or starvation, she slowed her pace and strolled along the shore beside Adam as though they were, in fact, just out to enjoy the spectacular sight of the sun burnishing the surrounding peaks. In the process, she searched the trees ringing the lake.

Maggie had no idea which was Taylor's special tree—until a lone twisted oak on a narrow spit of land snared her gaze. Lightning had split its trunk nearly in half, but the tree had defied the elements. Alone and proud, it lifted its bare branches to the golden light now spilling over the snowcapped peaks. Sure enough, Radizwell raced out onto the narrow strip and bounded around the twisted oak. His earsplitting barks echoed in the early-morning stillness like booming cannon fire.