Edge of Danger (2 page)

 
Don’t think about her,
he told himself, feeling feral and slightly out of control at the memory of Dr. Cahill’s glossy dark curls and her big brown eyes—

 
Jesus. He had to put a stop to his thoughts. He’d give anything right now to have a tango opposite him rather than a trusted friend and fellow operative. He’d trained Tremayne well enough to know that his friend could most certainly block a full force blow from him if he lost control enough to deliver it. But this was supposed to be merely an exercise, not a fight to the death.

 
“Why not—”

 
“I’m not discussing my sex life with you, Tremayne,” he said coolly when inside he was anything but. He felt—annoyed. Hot. Twisted. And, if he didn’t know better, scared as hell.

 
His friend raised a brow at his vehemence. “But it doesn’t have to be sex
per se.
Does it?”

 
“At the risk of repeating myself: I will categorically
not
have sex with that woman. I made that crystal clear at the onset. When will Stone be back from Prague?” This wasn’t the first time that Gabriel wished to hell he lived in the fifteenth century, when lopping off a man’s head with the sharp blade of his broadsword wouldn’t have the local cops inconveniently pounding on his door.

 
“After the Terrorism Summit.” Sebastian parried another blow, grinning as he made a lunge of his own. “Another three weeks. I don’t believe his presence would make this situation any less onerous for you, Edge.”

 
Gabriel swept the claymore in a wide arc that had Sebastian dancing back a step or two. “Perhaps not. But having you breathing down my neck isn’t improving my disposition any.”

 
“Easily resolved. Extract the necessary data from Dr. Cahill’s memory banks, and you may paint me gone.” He advanced again, clearly determined to impress Gabriel with his prowess with the blade. “Until such time as you’ve accomplished your mission, I shall remain a guest in your…home.”

 
“Guest my ass. You needed another lesson. You’ve gotten lazy.”

 
“You could always do what other operatives do—use the damned telephone.” Sebastian ignored the sweat running into his eyes, his concentration just as fierce as Gabriel’s. “A castle, appropriated from the Highlands of Scotland and incongruously placed in the middle of Montana, isn’t my idea of a vacation hot spot. The halls are drafty, it’s two miles to my room, and the electricity is iffy.”

 
“Edridge Castle isn’t a hotel, Tremayne.” Gabriel circled him, holding his gaze as intently as a cobra did a mongoose. Right now it was a toss-up as to which of them was which. “You’re at liberty to fuck off any time you like. Now would be a good time.”

 
“It’s big enough to be a hotel.” Sebastian’s incoming attack was lethally fast. Gabriel moved faster. “Let’s expedite this situation as rapidly as possible,” he said, breathing heavily. They both were. Unfortunately, they were each ferociously competitive. Neither would back down until Gabriel’s majordomo, MacBain, stepped in and had their half-dead bodies hauled upstairs.

 
“Get over your aversion,” Sebastian rasped. “Have sex with the doctor. Close your eyes and think of Scotland if it’ll help you stomach it. Just get it done.”

 
If only it were an aversion,
Gabriel thought furiously, slicing down his opponent’s diagonal sweep with a descending cut, knocking his friend’s sword away. “I’m going to say this for the last time.” To control the other man’s weapon Gabriel needed a lever. He stepped in closer. Tighter. Met his friend’s predatory eyes.

 
“I. Will. Not. Have. Sex. With. Dr. Cahill. I’ll get what we need from her in my own way. Is that clear?”

 
“Abundantly.” The point of contact between the two shiny blades was halfway. There were no knucklebows on their broadswords and there was a very real possibility of cutting off a finger or two.

 
Steel clashed against steel, and the whisper of the men’s feet moving across the stone floor echoed in the vast room.

 
They parted and Sebastian recovered quickly as Gabriel forced him to sidestep inside the cut, meeting his blade with a solid blow. “Good one.”

 
His friend paused to draw in a ragged breath. “I’m just saying. We need that intel. It’s the means to an end. Could save the lives of millions of people.”

 
Gabriel knew that, God help him. The Edridge family Curse hung over his head like the sword of Damocles and he felt the swish of that heavy blade nearly parting his hair.

 
“It hasn’t come to that.” He aimed his cut at the midpoint of the incoming blade. “Yet. If and when it does, I’ll take action.”

 
“See that you do. When will you attempt it again? She doesn’t need to be asleep for you to bring her to orgasm, does she?”

 
Gabriel allowed Sebastian’s blade to travel to his crossguard, then struck with the edge of his own blade so their faces were inches apart. “Listen to yourself, for Christ’s sake!”

 
Lightning fast, Gabriel attacked, swinging his sword into
posta frontal
as he sidestepped, meeting the other man’s blade in a clash of metal and flying sparks. “Does anything about this conversation strike you as off limits?”

 
Sebastian, quick as always, met him with
mezza spada.
Gabriel’s blade slid down to his friend’s crossguard again.

 
Hilts and eyes locked.

 
“I’ll tell you how it strikes me. It strikes me that Dr. Cahill has all the information about the robot in her freaking
head.
It strikes me that the only way to get said information is to read her mind, and that you can’t read this particular mind because of some ancient and ridiculous curse. It bites, that’s how all of this strikes me.”

 
“You don’t think I know that?”

 
“You are first and foremost a T-FLAC operative, Edge. A wizard in the psi division
second.
If you can’t extract the information we need from Dr. Cahill in the usual manner, then you’ll use whatever mumbo-jumbo re—”

 
Gabriel gave a savage thrust and disarmed his opponent.

 
“Ow! Shit! That stings like a son of a bitch!” Sebastian’s sword skittered across the stone floor as he nursed his hand.

 
“Want MacBain to kiss it better?” Gabriel knew everything Sebastian was saying was only the truth. But hell, it didn’t make it any easier to take, did it? “Jesus. I miss Stone.”

 
Sebastian dropped his hands to his knees, hanging his head as he tried to catch his breath. “Don’t we all.”

 
Gabriel had tried
again
to probe Dr. Cahill’s mind for the vital information he needed. He’d failed. Goddamn it. He
hated
to fail.

 
He’d cloaked himself, gone to her computer lab in Tempe, Arizona, three days ago. All he needed was a few seconds to retrieve the data and then get the hell out. Easy. She’d never even know he’d trespassed.

 
She’d been alone. Perfect timing. But much to his surprise, he hadn’t been able to penetrate the hot, soft darkness of her mind. Something he could usually do with ease when he wanted to. And damn it to frigging hell. He
wanted
to.

 
He’d also wanted to shake her and demand how the hell this could happen. But he knew instinctively why he couldn’t extract the secrets he needed from her mind. Somehow, God only knew how, she had him blocked. He’d tried to get her to lower her defenses—even a few seconds would have done it—but he’d found his every attempt unsuccessful.

 
He had to get her to lower her guard. One of the quickest, easiest ways was if she had a climax. Her mind would be unprotected by her usual defenses. One quick climax and he’d be in and gone before she knew it. A few seconds with her emotional shields down, and he’d have everything he needed.

 
Now he was going to have to go back to damned Arizona, and try again. He knew if it didn’t work this time, he was going to have to bring her back here to a more controlled environment. As much as he didn’t want her anywhere near him, or the castle, he was running out of viable options.

 
He’d skip the preliminaries, and take her to a fast, unexpected climax. Surprise was going to be his weapon against Dr. Cahill’s strong will.

 
Sebastian straightened to look at his friend. “She’s not safe in Tempe.” He accepted a bottle of water and a fresh white towel from Gabriel’s butler, MacBain, who gave every appearance of being a deaf-mute. The wily bastard was anything but. The man had ears like a bat, eyes like a hawk—despite his glasses—and the organizational skills of Attila the Hun.

 
Gabriel knew without it having been said that Sebastian was giving him an inch more wiggle room on this because of their long-standing friendship. As his temporary control, Tremayne had every right to demand Gabriel extract the information from Dr. Cahill in the most expedient way possible.

 
“I know. Do you think I’d leave her there unprotected?” Gabriel had dispatched two T-FLAC operatives to watch her 24/7. They could not, however, get into the lab. And that was a problem that deeply concerned him. Concerned him enough that he’d placed a protective spell on her.

 
“You’d trust someone else to keep her safe?”

 
“I’d trust myself to keep her alive.”

 
“Really? And how do you propose doing that if you won’t even touch the woman?” Tremayne took a long pull from the bottle, then upended it over his head, sluicing water over his sweat-soaked hair and face. “The good doctor scares the shit out of you. Doesn’t she?”

 
Towel up to his face, Gabriel stopped what he was doing to stare at his friend. “Are you
insane
?”

 
“You’ve seen her once. Yet just thinking about the woman makes you screw up your face like a monkey’s ass, Edge. Admit it. And the reason you’re whining for Alex Stone is because he buys into this whole Edridge Curse bullshit. What happens if you touch her? Your dick turns black and falls off?”

 
MacBain cleared his throat. “ ‘When a Lifemate is chosen by the heart of a son, no protection can be given, again I have won. His pain will be deep, her death will be swift, Inside his heart a terrible rift.’ It’s Nairne’s Curse, sir. The witch made no mention of anything turning black or falling off.”

 
As a close friend, Sebastian was aware of the content of the Curse, and Gabriel knew the other man thought it was so much bullshit. Frankly, Gabriel wished like hell
he
was as certain. But it was damned hard to refute five hundred years of history to the contrary.

 
“Since Dr. Cahill isn’t my Lifemate, if such a thing existed, which I seriously doubt, I can protect her just fine, thank you very much.” Gabriel shot a cool glance at MacBain. “Don’t you have butling duties to perform?”

 
Small and wiry, snow white hair immaculate, the butler drew himself up to his full five feet four and a quarter inches and peered at Gabriel through the thick, black-rimmed glasses perched on his beak of a nose. As always he was immaculately dressed in a natty black suit, crisp white shirt, and a tie in the Edridge plaid. “It is my
great
fortune to attend ye at every opportunity, sir,” he said, the burr of Scotland in his voice, his expression as innocent as a babe.

 
“If only,” Gabriel muttered. MacBain pretty much did as he pleased.

 
“Why do you bother working for this Philistine?” Sebastian asked with a grin. “My offer is still open, MacBain.”

 
MacBain’s bushy white brows dipped in a frown behind his glasses. “Ye live in a
condominium,
sir.”