Her Spy to Hold (Spy Games Book 2) (19 page)

He brought his seat upright and turned the key in the ignition. “We’ll talk over lunch.”

Chapter Eleven

The fifty minute drive to the Annapolis Valley region of the province was nerve-wracking, at least from Kale’s perspective.

Irina was silent which meant she was thinking. No good ever came of that. It would help if he knew how bad that video was, but he wasn’t about to incriminate himself further by asking the wrong questions. There was the possibility that he might be wrong—that the pop-up wasn’t of them in her living room at a really bad time and in a few eyebrow-raising positions. He’d let her do the talking so he could get a sense of how best to proceed.

But so far she wasn’t talking.

He took Exit 10 off the highway onto a main road that meandered through quaint towns and field after rolling field of apple trees and grape vines. After another ten minutes of silence he turned into the drive of the winery he’d chosen for a late lunch. Acres of vineyard stretched uphill toward the base of the North Mountain, which formed a natural barricade against the high tides of the Bay of Fundy on the far side.

The mid-August heat body-slammed them as they got out of the air-conditioned car. The air was humid and heavy, filled with the smells of irrigated earth and the flowers scattered in beds around the winery buildings and paths. They walked a shrouded, rock-walled lane to the restaurant positioned behind the outlet wine store.

It was shortly after two o’clock and the main part of the restaurant was empty. The hostess led them to a cozy table near a rustic stone hearth. While they looked at the menus Kale ordered a coffee for him and tea for Irina. Once they were alone he broke the silence. She’d had more than enough time to think. He wanted to know what was going on inside her head.

“If I’ve done something wrong, then tell me straight up. The silent treatment is a little junior high, don’t you think?”

She looked up from her menu, blinking those lovely green eyes. “I wouldn’t know.”

Because she’d skipped junior high. She could be so deadpan sometimes. He fought back a smile of relief. She didn’t sound as if she were still angry but it was difficult to tell. She didn’t always react the way he’d expect.

“Why don’t you tell me about the new pop-up?” he prompted her.

“Why don’t you tell me why you didn’t see fit to mention the surveillance camera aimed at my living room window?” she countered. “I’m going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you didn’t know about it before we had sex on my sofa with the curtains wide open.”

There went any hope he’d harbored, slight as it was, that he’d been mistaken about the pop-up’s subject matter. She was most definitely still angry about it too. At least she hadn’t mentioned that he’d been the one to encourage her to leave those curtains drawn back. That was a positive sign.

“I didn’t know. I swear. Once I found the camera I reported it. We decided to leave it in place so whoever put it there wouldn’t be scared off. We hoped they might come back for it. So far they haven’t.” He played with his knife, weighing the risks of trying to lighten the mood. What the hell. He might as well go all in. “Out of curiosity. Did the video make me look fat?”

She cast him a look only diminished in its death ray effect by a stream of sunlight that captured the light dusting of freckles across the bridge of her nose. “And to think I’m the one being too junior high.”

Oh yeah. She was mad.

“Look on the bright side. That computer degree came in handy. You got rid of the pop-up before anyone else saw it,” he said.

“The degree works best when you’re causing the chaos, not doing damage control. I only got rid of one instance of it. Once things go online they’re out there forever. Don’t forget someone still has the original too.” She crumpled her cloth napkin between her fingers, then smoothed it out flat. “The quality is poor and our faces aren’t clear. While our mothers might recognize us it would never stand up in court. That’s the one positive in all this.”

He should have known she’d be practical once she got over the shock. Letting her have that time in the car to think had been the right thing to do after all. “I guess that explains why I’m still alive.”

“This isn’t funny.”

“No it isn’t,” he admitted.

He sat back in his chair. He’d gotten his personal and professional lives intertwined and while he felt guilty as hell about digging her deeper into a situation already disturbing to her, he had a problem now too. Thanks to her fancy degrees and an impressive list of peers her professional reputation would likely survive a poor quality sex tape. His employer might not be as willing to overlook it and being forced to take a desk job would kill him. He was a field agent.

“You aren’t alone in that video, Irina. This might come as a surprise, all things considered, but I’m not into exhibitionism. Or voyeurism for that matter. What goes on between two consenting adults is nobody else’s business. I don’t need the whole world sizing my junk or judging my performance. And yeah. This impacts my career so I’m angry too.” He might not be an exhibitionist or into voyeurism, but he seized opportunities when they arose. If he was ever going to get her to hack into the RBN this was his chance. He had to push the right buttons. “I want them stopped as badly as you do.”

The waitress returned with their coffee and tea. They placed their meal orders and she gathered the menus before once again leaving them alone.

Irina lifted the small silver pot the waitress had left beside her napkin and poured a stream of steaming orange pekoe into a white porcelain cup. A frown marred her brow. “We don’t know what whoever’s behind this is after. We don’t know who they are. Why hasn’t CSIS used their resources to go online after them by now?”

“About that,” Kale began, uneasy again. She still believed he was here in an official capacity. He was and he wasn’t. He didn’t know if she’d fully appreciate the subtleties of that distinction. “I met with my team leader this morning. He claims CSIS doesn’t want anyone on the other side of the RBN to track their activity back to the Canadian government. The Russian government is known to use the RBN too. It could be viewed as an act of hostility.”

“Posting porn videos of unsuspecting participants isn’t hostile? Doesn’t the fact that the RBN is being used to harass a Canadian citizen mean anything? Especially one who does the work I do?” Her frown deepened into suspicion. “CSIS could have been monitoring activity from this end, but it’s obvious they’re not. What’s going on? What aren’t you telling me?”

He dodged the question. “CSIS wants you to hack into the RBN for them. You have the right security clearances already in place.”

She laughed without mirth. “I get the importance of international relations. I understand why they don’t want to do it themselves. The difference, however, is that the person doing the hacking at CSIS would be faceless. I’m not. It’s my life and reputation on the line.”

“You’re being dramatic.” Guilt pinched his conscience as he pushed another button. She was the least dramatic person he knew.

Her gaze sharpened. “I disagree.”

She was trying to decide what game he was playing. Or more likely what team he was on. He withdrew the thumb drive from his pocket and set it on the table between them. “You’d be anonymous. They gave you a ghost VPN.”

She didn’t pick it up. Hurt filled her eyes as she figured out he was Team CSIS, and his gut wrenched. He had no choice. He wasn’t so much Team CSIS as Team Doing-What’s-Right.

“One they could use themselves,” she said, quick to recover. “Or anyone could use. I find it hard to believe a spy agency doesn’t have better-trained cyber security resources than me. So why ask me to do it? What do they hope to accomplish?” She folded her arms on the table and leaned toward him. “It isn’t anything that will benefit me. If they were truly interested in my welfare we wouldn’t be having this discussion.”

While he didn’t like spilling government secrets Kale was going to have to be more upfront with her. She was being asked to do what amounted as a favor to CSIS on faith. She was too smart to accept one-sided terms without a reasonable explanation, and yet he couldn’t tell her about the possible connection between the RBN and another, higher priority case.

He returned the thumb drive to his pocket. “There’s been a security breach at CSIS. Any new cases are being vetted by the department’s director before information can be passed on. We can’t ask CSEC—the Communications Security Establishment of Canada—to assist, which is what we’d normally do. They’re the ones with the cyber security talent. And that right there is more than I’m authorized to tell you,” he said lightly. “Don’t make me have to kill you.”

She didn’t respond to his feeble attempt at a joke. Of course not. She’d never be deflected by humor. She’d be focused more on the information he gave her and sifting out what was important. He waited for the explosion when she drew her conclusions.

Their lunches arrived. He dug into pan fried halibut and roasted red potatoes. Irina’s garden salad remained untouched in front of her.

She settled her napkin on her lap. “CSIS doesn’t believe I have a real problem,” she said. “This whole time the only action they’ve taken, based on what I’ve told you, has been to get you to go bowling with me.”

He took as long as he could to chew a mouthful of food, choosing his next words with caution. “I’m here aren’t I? They know who you are. Until this security breach at the agency is sorted out though, pop-ups and botnets that don’t have access to sensitive documents simply aren’t high priorities for them.”

“Then why
are
you still here? To convince me to do CSIS’s work for them? What if I won’t do it? How much longer will you stick around if I say no?”

He set his fork on the edge of his plate. The conversation kept teetering on the edge of professional and personal, something he wasn’t used to. This was another good reason to keep those two areas separate in his life from now on. Lesson learned—although far too late in this particular instance. He didn’t know how she felt, but for his part he had no wish to extricate himself from their personal relationship yet. She had layers that he liked exploring. She was smart. Too smart for him really. She made him think. And while hardly a risk taker she was pretty and sweet, adventurous and fun in her own quiet way.

“Whether you agree to do it or not I’m here for two more weeks,” he said.

“I see.”

With those two quiet, accusatory words the conversation teetered over to personal. Somewhere, in another part of the restaurant, a door opened and closed. Other than that small sign of life they were temporarily alone.

“I don’t think you do.” He wasn’t having her think she was nothing but casual sex to him. That ship had sailed the first time she’d used the term
labia minora
to talk dirty. “I don’t give a damn if you do what CSIS wants. I’m here for you and I’m staying as long as I can. But at the end of the day I’ve got a job to do too. One I feel pretty strongly about. I have another assignment that begins in two weeks and it’s out of the country. I’m not sure when I’ll be able to see you again after that.”

Her gaze remained cool. “I’m not asking you to make some sort of commitment to me. We’d agreed this was a temporary arrangement. The only thing difficult about it is living under the same roof. It makes things…complicated.” She lifted her slender shoulders. The bangles on her wrist tinkled together as she picked at her salad. “It doesn’t matter if CSIS doesn’t believe my problem is real. I know it is, and since you’re the only person I trust, in two weeks I’m back on my own.”

The memory of the look in her eyes when he’d first come to her door and sat in her kitchen flooded back to him. She was scared and there was very little he could do about it. His fingers tightened. He felt the same as he had that day on the beach when the investment broker with the sketchy friends had approached her—protective and territorial. And while the fact that her bedroom remained off-limits made it quite clear how she thought things between them should be, no matter how Dr. Babe wished to play things he didn’t believe for a second that he was any more casual to her than she was to him.

He had a responsibility here. If he wanted to walk away in two weeks and still be able to look at himself in a mirror he had to either show her she had nothing to worry about or help make her problems disappear. He could see only one way to do either, even though he hated to keep pushing it on her. Flexing the joints, he forced his fingers to relax. She hadn’t dismissed the ghost VPN, simply stated she had no wish to use it. If he continued to push her he knew she’d say yes. In the end it would be for her own good.

“I was assured the RCMP will place your house on its regular patrols,” he said.

“CSIS will no doubt be tapping my phone too, and watching for my passport at border crossings. None of that will help me sleep better at night.” She stabbed a piece of lettuce with her fork. “On the bright side, imagine how much work I’ll get done with all those extra waking hours.”

Her words cut deep. She already knew the only conclusion she could reach was that she had no real alternative but to do what CSIS asked. The video suggested her situation had already begun to escalate. And while escalation would make CSIS become more actively involved, by the time they stepped up their game it might well be too late.

He wasn’t about to stand back and allow anything to happen to her. He had two weeks to make sure nothing did.