Holding Out For A Hero: SEALs, Soldiers, Spies, Cops, FBI Agents and Rangers (66 page)

“Have you forgotten that your life is in danger?”

A tremor went through her but she fixed him with a steely look. “I’ll take that chance.”

“The choice isn’t yours to make. It’s mine and we’re staying here.”

Eve didn’t respond to Burke’s comment, seeing no point in it. His mind was made up.

Since he made no move to reclaim his laptop, Eve returned to the task of trying to figure out Burke’s password.

* * *

Burke watched Eve bend over his laptop again. Shoulders hunched slightly, she gently tapped the keyboard. Her features were a study in concentration with her brows drawn together and her soft brown eyes fixed on her task.

There was no way she was going to be able to figure out his password. She’d soon grow tired of the task. As for himself, he needed to call Lanski.

Burke left the cabin. A bird chirped from somewhere nearby. It was a warm day. He rubbed the back of his neck that was knotted with tension and damp from perspiration. The lake beckoned. He cast a longing glance at it, then resigned to playing babysitter, pulled out his phone from the back pocket of his jeans.

Lanski did not pick up so Burke left a message, including that it wasn’t urgent. He was seeking an update on Alasdair McHampton. Burke closed the phone with a loud snap. He felt tense, edgy, at loose ends. He wasn’t used to being on the fringes of an investigation and sitting idle. Being at the cabin didn’t help. Usually when he was here, he made the most of the slow pace, so unlike what he was accustomed to on the job. He took time to recharge after being drained from an assignment. Part of the problem was that his haven had been breached on this trip. It was not his haven this visit. This trip it was a safe house. He’d brought his work with him. He frowned. And who was he kidding? His problem wasn’t that he’d brought his work to the cabin, but that his work was Dr. Eve Collins.

He shouldn’t have brought her here. Hell, he shouldn’t be the one to guard her. He should have assigned another agent to that task once he realized how fiercely attracted to her he was.

He’d been a poor guard. While on his watch, there’d been two attempts on her life. Was that because in his attempt to put distance between himself and Eve, he’d been careless, overlooked something? He couldn’t deny the possibility. He was never careless on an assignment. Yet he’d never had an assignment like this one where he’d found his suspect distracting.

Burke recalled again how she’d almost died from the insulin switch. Her corpse-pale face as paramedics had rushed her to an ambulance. He rubbed a hand down his face at the memory. His hand came away wet with fresh perspiration.

And then there’d been the bomb. He went still, recalling it.

Both attempts occurred while in his care. While under his protection. There would not be a third attempt. He gritted his teeth. He’d make sure of that. He would keep her safe. He would keep her safe until he could deliver her to Washington, he added.

The telephone he was still holding remained silent. Willing it to ring wouldn’t make it do so. He rolled his taut shoulders. He needed to do something other than wait for the phone to ring. Other than think about the woman sleeping in his cabin, in his bed.

The grass on his land had grown several inches since he’d last been here and there was a leak in one of the windows that he wanted to fix. Might as well do what he could to spend the frustration and use this time on his hands to do some routine maintenance on the cabin. He headed for the shed.

Two hours later, satisfied with his progress, Burke returned to the cabin. He was parched and he needed a shower. His shirt was matted to his back with perspiration. He rubbed the back of his neck. By now Eve would have given up trying to determine his password and moved onto something else. He had to hand it to her though, she was putting on quite a show of innocence. But then, faced with the prison terms she was looking at, she would grasp at any straw to try to get herself out of the charges she faced.

Prison term . . . the thought of Eve in prison for her crime should have brought on the usual satisfaction he felt when apprehending a criminal. It didn’t.

Burke opened the door to the cabin with more force than was necessary. He wanted a gallon of water and headed to the fridge. He stopped short. Eve was in the same position she’d been in when he went outside, hunched over his computer.

She didn’t glance up from the screen at his entrance.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

She looked up then, gave him a brief but steady look before returning her gaze to the screen without uttering a word.

She was still trying to break his password. Despite his efforts, Burke felt a grudging admiration for her tenacity.

“There isn’t anything on my hard drive about your case,” he said. “Gaining access to my files won’t do you any good. Remember my laptop was here at the cabin when we arrived. I didn’t bring it with me. I haven’t used it to work your case.”

She gave him that steady look again, her beautiful eyes unflinching.

“Maybe not,” she said. “But you could use it to connect to your agency’s data base. From there we could get the list of chemists who attended Abernathy’s lecture and do background checks on them. One of them is the buyer or an assassin working for the buyer.”

“All of that is being done.”

“By your people, I know,” Eve muttered.

Her gaze lowered, but before it had, he’d seen dejection in her eyes. Seeing her dejected bothered him. He didn’t like that it did. She needed something to sustain her, something to occupy her time so she didn’t feel useless and out of control. It was not his responsibility to entertain her or to boost her morale, but seeing her dejected when she’d shown such courage so far bothered him. He supposed it wouldn’t hurt to indulge her in this.

Burke took two bottles of water from the fridge then joined her on the couch. His blanket and pillow were neatly folded on one of the faded arms of the old sofa. She had positioned herself on the middle cushion, leaving him just enough room to fit between her and the arm that held the bedding. When he sat, his legs brushed hers. She wore jeans so her legs were covered, but the contact sparked the memory of the long, lithe legs he’d glimpsed following the bombing, when she’d been wearing nothing but a towel and then after that only his suit jacket.

With a monumental effort, he banished that memory and typed in his access code. He felt her gaze on him, trying to decipher his quick key strokes. He decided to give it to her. He’d just change the code later.

“Magdalena,” he said.

“What?”

“My password is Magdalena.”

Her brow furrowed. “Oh. That’s unusual. An old girlfriend or,” she hesitated, “your wife’s name?”

He narrowed his gaze on the computer screen as he went on entering codes that would link him to the agency’s computers. “Nothing so dramatic. And I’m not married. Magdalena was the name of a stray dog my family took in when I was a kid.”

“Oh.”

The surprise in her voice had him glancing up at her. “What? You figured I don’t like dogs or that I was hatched?”

She met his gaze. Humor glinted in her eyes now as she shrugged. “Maybe both.”

Burke laughed. She laughed too. For an instant he was captivated by her mouth. He looked away from it and returned his attention to his computer.

“We looked at all the chemists.”

Eve slid forward on the cushion. “And?”

“Nada.”

“There has to be someone.” Eve’s expression reflected her disappointment but she straightened her posture. “Who is on the list?”

He was now linked to the agency files on her case. He brought up the list of chemists who’d registered for Abernathy’s lecture.

“One-hundred-nine, including Richard Patterson and you,” Burke said.

“That many.” Eve nodded. “Then I’d better get started.”

* * *

Three hours later, they had researched all of the registrants. Eve hadn’t expected Burke to help her, but he remained with her. Nothing leaped off the screen screaming terrorist. Eve’s shoulders slumped slightly in disappointment. Really, though, what had she expected?

She now knew more about Allie and the other chemists than she wanted to and didn’t know how she would face them again now that she’d invaded their privacy and learned personal things about them she had no business knowing. And all for nothing. She was no closer to finding out who’d switched her insulin than when she’d started.

“Ugh!” She flung herself back against the cushions of the sofa.

Burke eyed her. “You’d be hell on a stake out.”

“I never went on stake outs. My work was confined to the forensics lab, which I’m sure you know. I was hoping that my personal acquaintance with some of the chemists might give me an edge your people don’t have. That something about one of them might strike me as out of place.”

“You gave it a shot. We need a break.”

“No. No. We need to continue. We need—”

“A break.” Burke insisted. “It’s dinner time. I’m starving and you must be too.” He got to his feet, stretched then yawned. “Come on let’s see what we can put together.”

The wary look Eve gave him provoked a laugh out of him. “Don’t look so skeptical. I’m not the greatest cook, but I proved earlier that I can put a meal together. If you aren’t too fussy,” he added.

Eve got to her feet as well. The dishes from their breakfast, the breakfast he prepared, still sat on the kitchen table. She felt petty about not having cleaned up earlier and now began stacking plates then carrying them to the sink. While she washed, Burke went to a pantry cupboard beside the fridge. He withdrew a can of tomato sauce and a wrapped package of spaghetti.

He held up his fare. “It’s plain but you won’t starve.”

Eve finished washing the last plate then placed it in the dish drainer on the counter. “Doesn’t have to be plain.”

“‘Fraid so. I keep only canned and dry goods here. No fresh spices and since we’re laying low, I’d rather not leave here to get any.”

Eve dried her hands on a checkered dish towel. “No need to go anywhere. Not a grocery store anyway. We have more than we’ll need right outside.”

At Burke’s frown, Eve smiled. “Come with me.”

“Said the spider to the fly,” Burke murmured.

Eve laughed. “Where do you keep your bowls?”

“Bottom right cupboard.”

Eve withdrew a large stainless steel mixing bowl then led the way to the door. Outside, Burke fell into step beside her. She breathed deeply of the fresh air. If not for her situation, she would have enjoyed being at the cabin. She liked the earthy and animal smells. She liked being surrounded by the beauty of trees and wildlife that far outshone anything man could make in the city.

Eve followed a path into the trees. Sunlight poked through the branches and dappled the ground on which they walked. She set a slow pace, meandering around various patches of plant growth, bending over glorious outcroppings of lush green leaves and stems. She came to a mushroom patch and stopped.

“Those are great in sauces.” She pointed to the patch.

Burke shook his head slowly. “Not a good idea. Haven’t you heard? Mushrooms can be lethal.”

“Certainly, but not those. I often blend herbs and spices to make the scents I use in cosmetics, so I know which are poisonous and which aren’t. Those,” she pointed again, “aren’t.”

He still looked doubtful and she laughed. “Don’t worry. I know what I’m doing.”

She stooped before the mushroom patch that covered several feet of ground and examined the crop. She plucked several plump specimens and placed them in the bowl. She shot to her feet. “Next.”

“Next?”

“Let’s see what else we can find.” She walked on, leaving Burke to follow. When he fell into step beside her again she looked up at him. “How long have you been coming here?”

“I bought the place about ten years ago.”

“Are you from West Virginia?”

“Chicago.”

“So tell me, since you weren’t hatched and like dogs, do you have family?”

He smiled. “Parents. Younger sister. Older brother. My brother has a big, noisy family.”

Big, noisy family. She felt a pang. Once she’d hoped to have a big, noisy family of her own.

“You okay?” Burke asked.

She’d come to a stop. Eve put the wistful thought from her mind. “I’m fine.”

She dropped the subject of family and focused on her reason for being in these woods. She spotted a circle of wild chives and bent over them. Perfect. She added several to the bowl. A few steps away, dandelions sprouted. She picked a handful of them as well.

At Burke’s arched eyebrow, Eve grinned. “Boil dandelion stems and they taste like spinach.”

“Hard to believe.”

“You’ll be eating those words. Literally. We have enough. We can head back.”

Back at Burke’s cabin, Eve filled a pot with water then set it on the stove to boil. She took the skillet she’d washed from the drainer, poured a dollop of oil into the pan, then set it on the stove as well. She dumped the contents of the bowl she’d filled from the forest into the sink and treated her pickings to a thorough cleansing. That done, she chopped the vegetables and plopped them into the skillet.

The aroma of sautéing vegetables and rich tomato sauce filled the air. Eve transferred the contents of the skillet, now gently browned, to the bubbling sauce and lowered the heat. The water reached boiling point and she unwrapped the pasta and placed it in the pot.

Fifteen minutes later, Eve turned to Burke. With a flourish, she said, “Dinner is served.”

She drained the dandelions she’d boiled, added salt and pepper and offered the bowl to Burke. From her place across the table from him, Eve watched him taste a stem.

His brows arched and his wary expression became one of surprise. “I’ll never look at dandelions in the same way again.”

Eve smiled. “Told ‘ya.”

Burke forked up a portion of sauce and vegetable coated pasta. “Where did you learn to cook like this?”

The smile left Eve’s face. She lowered her gaze to her plate. “My daughter Emily had several food allergies. I consulted an herbalist on how to make her meals more palatable using spices and herbs that she didn’t react to. We didn’t live near a wooded area and some things were unavailable in grocery or health food stores, so Em and I started a garden in our yard and grew only the things that she could eat. She loved to discover new things we could plant there.”