Fatal Wild Child (6 page)

Tony waved him off. "From the sound of it, I'm glad I could help." He pushed at the device. "You spoke of family, Seth. This woman. Is she important...to you?"

There was no easy answer. Seth licked his lips. "I think...yeah." The heavy mass was back in his chest.

"Then you need to be real careful, Captain. Watch your back. When it's family stuff, you don't know who you can trust. Enemies look like friends and friends stab you in the back just when you think they're reaching around for a hug. A battlefield is nice and clean. Family stuff is ugly in comparison." Tony's expression was bleak.

Seth's phone buzzed, making him jump. He fumbled for it, his heart thudding. The number in the ID display was unknown to him, but it was an Ottawa area code. He answered it cautiously.

"This is Lieutenant-Colonel Mercer, Captain. You know who I am."

"Yes, sir." Seth could feel himself sitting up straighter, even though the man was across the other side of the country.

"Where did you find this device? Use what euphemisms you feel are needed. I can fill in many blanks later."

Seth explained carefully, aware of the insecure qualities of the cell phone.

There was a fifteen second silence. Mercer's ability to come to snap decisions was legendary. "You're back on active duty as of now, Captain O'Connor. I need to you reinsert yourself inside the Sherborne family and take up active watch. Your priority will be to stay with the target and protect her."

"That...could be difficult, sir."

"Difficult, or impossible?"

Seth grimaced. "Not impossible," he admitted. Mercer wouldn't want to know about difficulties. "Do I need to know why, sir?"

Again, the minute hesitation. "The device originates from outside the country, O'Connor. We'll be moving on that end of things. That is all."

"Yes, sir." He closed his phoned and put it away, a sour taste in his mouth.

"That wasn't good news, was it?" Tony said softly.

"No, and I can't explain further, Tony. You're no longer active."

"I don't need details. Your face says it all. I can figure out the rest. Those photos goosed them in Ottawa." Tony grimaced. "Just watch your back, okay?"

Seth nodded. "Thanks."

* * * * *

He was woken by the burr of his cell phone vibrating against the bedside cabinet, barely five hours later and slapped his hand on it. The thing continued to buzz under his palm. He rolled onto his back, bringing it with him. He knew he had to answer it, but reluctance dogged him.

Then he remembered. He was back on active duty. Damn.

He brought the phone to his ear. "O'Connor."

"I figured you for an early riser, Captain. I'm surprised to find I'm wrong." It was Cameron Sherborne's precise diction, filtering clearly into his ear.

Seth sat up. "How the hell did you get this number?"

"The same way I got your records. They've been burned, by the way. I thought I'd assure you on that point."

It
was
reassuring, although just the fact that Cameron had read his military record at all was uncomfortable. Seth rubbed his temple. "That was why you woke me?" he asked.

"I called to apologize, Mr. O'Connor."

Seth didn't miss the change of title. Sherborne was retreating. A little, anyway.

"Why?" Seth demanded.

"Gabrielle said something last night I've never heard her say before," Sherborne said.

Seth's grip on the cell phone tightened. He closed his eyes. Gabrielle. How on earth was he supposed to work this job with Gabrielle in the mix?

"It made me reconsider my position," Sherborne continued. "I was hasty last night, and inconsiderate of my daughter's feelings."

"You were," Seth agreed.

"Come to lunch, Mr. O'Connor. Let me make up for my lack of finesse."

Seth pulled the cell phone away from his ear for a second to look at it, his heart racing.

Just like that, he was back in. He'd spent two hours last night trying to think up ways he could reinsert himself into the family as ordered. The only methods he could come up with involved contacting Gabrielle and lying his head off. The sour taste those options had given him had sent him to the bathroom for the ancient bottle of Pepto Bismal at the back of the cabinet.

And now this.

"This is quite genuine, I assure you, Mr. O'Connor," Cameron Sherborne added. "There is no hidden agenda. The worst you will have to face is running the gauntlet of my daughters and their spouses."

"I can't honestly find a reason to say no," Seth told him, "but every bone in my body says I should. I don't trust you, Mr. Sherborne."

"You probably shouldn't, Mr. O'Connor. I didn't get where I am by being polite and honest. The number I'm using to call you now is unlisted. It's my personal cell phone and I am the only person who answers it. Only thirty people in the world have this number. Now there are thirty-one. If you ever have a need to reach me urgently and can't via normal channels, use this number. You will get my undivided attention."

There was an inflection in Sherborne's voice, a note like a soft-blown trumpet call that made the hairs on the back of Seth's neck stand on end. Sherborne had not made any declarations about iron-clad promises, but Seth knew that the statement was as good as a death-bed promise.

"Why me?" he asked.

"You saved Gabrielle's life yesterday, Seth O'Connor. I'm also aware of what you've been doing all night." Sherborne paused. "Lunch is at noon, but be here by eleven. Have you got a jacket, O'Connor?" And he was gone.

Seth pushed the red button to disconnect and called back the number. Cameron Sherborne's private cell phone number. Unasked.

An invitation to a family lunch. Just like that.

Cameron Sherborne was right. Seth didn't trust him an inch and wasn't going to start any time soon. But, damn, the man certainly had a way of getting what he wanted.

He glanced up at the wardrobe door. A jacket, hmm? To run the gauntlet of his daughters and their spouses. That would include Gabrielle, of course.

He'd been thinking of her all along—who had he been fooling?—but now an image of her as he'd last seen her leapt to the forefront of his mind. He could remember the feel of her hand clenched in his shirt, the small weight of it against his chest.

How on earth was he supposed to deal with Gabrielle now? He was on active duty, and supposed to be ready to react to anything.

But last night her eyes had followed him down into sleep, creating that heavy mass in his chest.

And now even her memory was rousing him to a state that was almost painful. He eased himself off the bed. Time for a shower.

Chapter Five

The beaded ivory lace dress had been a last-minute packing decision. Gabrielle had literally balled it up and shoved it in the corner of the suitcase. She was glad she had packed it, now, but even so, she donned the garment with a complete lack of enthusiasm. Her taste for grunge clothing had fled, but hadn't been replaced by anything else. The big family get-together today would ensure that her sisters would have their fashionista knives out, so Gabrielle went through the motions, knowing they would pick her wardrobe apart if they could. Why give them more ammunition than necessary?

The dress stopped at mid-thigh, and she wore opaque tights to accentuate her legs, and dark stilettos. The dress was backless, scooping down to her waist, while the long sleeves flared out over her wrists and extended to her knuckles.

She remembered buying the dress and feeling sexy in it, but now it was just a shield against her sisters' spiteful comments. She straightened her hair and backcombed the crown to make it lift and applied makeup to accentuate her eyes. Lots of black, blended-in, to make them smolder, like the movie make-up artists had shown her.

Today was the nineteenth of December. In two week's time, exactly, she was flying out of here. Free to leave. She just had to survive the family hysterics until then.

Gabrielle picked up her old digital camera, wrapped herself in her coat and headed for her father's cabin. It was another beautiful day. The sun was out, sitting high overhead and spilling light on the perfectly smooth, untouched snow blanket lying between the cabins. It was so white it looked blue at the edges, where the sun didn't touch it. It seemed liked no one at Jasper Park Lodge wanted to mar the perfection of the snow between the paths. Everyone walked only on the carefully shoveled pathways, leaving a fat white pillowy field between the paths, to dazzle in the brief hours of daylight.

The cabins were located around the edges of the lake and the main building sat a good three hundred yards across from them all. The paths radiated out from the main building to all the cabins, and there was a wide path that ran from cabin to cabin, too, connecting them all. There were secondary, narrower paths that ran between the cabins that the individual cabin users could use to get to the lake itself, or around to the back of their own cabins. Every path, both primary and secondary, was well shoveled and perfectly dry and clear of snow.

The silence here always astonished her. When she stopped and listened, she could hear her own heartbeat. The snow muffled everything, and she could hear for miles.

As she passed the smaller chalets and cabins, she could hear movement and conversations inside. Her extended family tended to take over the lakeside corner of the private cabins at Jasper Park Lodge at this time of year and her father paid well to ensure they were given the privacy and defenses against the media they needed. Jasper Park Lodge had been catering to such clientele for nearly a century and was very good at fending off incursions. Christmas at Jasper was a Sherborne tradition.

Gabrielle stepped into the big chalet her parents used and slid off her coat. A waiter was already hovering. He offered to take her coat, his eyes brightening at her entrance. She had been recognized, even though he remained silent. The staff at the lodge was the most discreet and polite in the world. She smiled at him and gave him her coat, put her camera bag on the side table and peered around the big palm in the entrance toward the sitting room. "Is everyone already here?"

"I believe you are the last to arrive, Ms. Sherborne," the waiter said. He handed her coat to a more junior staffer, who hurried away with it.

She stepped into the sitting room proper, bracing herself for the fun and games ahead, and stopped dead.

Seth O'Connor stood with her father, a whiskey glass in his hand.

He wore a suit that wouldn't look out of place at a party in L.A., but what he did to it, with his shoulders and chest, and his tight hips, made her heart thud and her stomach do a little roll. It was in a dark color. Blue, of course, which made his eyes look that much bluer. But instead of the standard issue white shirt, he wore black.

The tie was the same color as his eyes, which just drew attention to them. Did he do it deliberately? It was like drawing a neon sign above his head, saying "pay attention to me, damn it!"

Without looking at them, Gabrielle knew that each of her three sisters were aware of Seth in a female come-hither way. They were sitting on the edge of their seats, their legs crossed and twined, aware of their bodies in a way they hadn't been in a long while. Seth had done that by walking into the room.

But he was watching her, his eyes narrowed, measuring her reaction to the fact that he was here. Now. And standing next to her father.

Gabrielle's heart hurt as it rammed against her chest. She didn't understand why he was here, or what her father was up to, but for the moment the overriding pleasure of seeing Seth again all but swamped her concern.

Seth moved around the facing sofas, heading her way. Every feminine head tracked him. He dropped the glass on the sideboard and stepped in front of her.

"Hello again," he said softly.

"You came back," she gasped.

His gaze slipped sideways, taking in their rabid audience, before settling back on her face. Her sisters were frankly listening. "I'll explain later," he said simply.

She took a breath. And another. There would be a later.

Seth lifted a finger. "I have something for you," he said. "Wait right there." He moved away, back into the front entrance. A few second later, he returned with a brown paper carry bag. It looked heavy and he carried it carefully and held it out to her. "Call it an early Christmas present. I didn't have time to wrap it, sorry."

She took the bag, held open the handles and looked inside curiously.

Her heart really did stop for second or two. She felt it. She sank down to the floor, the strength draining from her legs. She lowered the bag and reached inside. "My camera!" She pulled the camera out, astonishment warring with overwhelming joy and ripped open the bag to stare at the silver case of the laptop she had thought was gone forever. She looked up at Seth. "You went and got them out. My god!"

He sat on the floor next to her, one knee cocked, careless of the suit. Over his shoulder, she could see the round eyes of her family staring at the astonishing sight of people sprawling on the floor when there were perfectly good chairs right next to them.