Love & Deception (Agents in Love - Book 1) (20 page)

Despite his thorough education so far today,
Nick still had little interest in the cupcake business. However, it
was impossible not to become excited about her plans. Her
enthusiasm was contagious.

When her torrent of words finally ran out,
Nick finished the last of his coffee before taking her hand in his.
He stared deep in her eyes, losing his heart to her even more.
Though he didn’t want to bring her happy mood down, one question
kept running through his mind.

“Carlie, what if you have to leave Sayle
because of your enemies?”

Her hand contracted against his. “I’m going
to do my best to stay here. I’m so tired of running.” She shrugged.
“Besides, I finally found someone I’d like to spend time with for a
while.”

“Just a while?”

She shrugged. “We haven’t talked about you
much. I didn’t want to make any assumptions. You’re living in a
hotel, so I’m guessing you didn’t plan to stay here long. What
happens once your restaurant is going strong and you move on to the
next opportunity?”

He had no answer for that. How could he tell
her that if she wanted to be with him, their problems were much
larger than startup restaurants? The leaders of their country could
very well be against them finding happiness together.

Picking his words carefully, Nick tried to
be as honest as he could. “If I found my soul mate, I’d give up
everything to be with her.”

Though he’d hoped to see her smile again,
Carlie eyebrows furrowed and she pressed her lips together, chewing
on the bottom one for a few moments. “You can’t be certain about
finding your soul mate, no matter how strong the connection. I
won’t give up my dreams again. I don’t expect you to give up yours
either.”

Not the response he hoped to hear.
Convincing Carlie to leave the country with him looked like a bleak
prospect.

I need to quit over thinking everything.
Enjoy the time I have right now with her. Maybe Paul will come
through and everything will work out fine.

Yeah, right.

He wished he still believed in
fairytales.

Carlie smiled as she set her newest batch of
gourmet cupcakes in front of Henry and Edith the following Friday
afternoon. “Sorry again for being closed earlier in the week,” she
told them. “Hopefully these are worth the wait.”

“Were you in a car accident, dear?” Edith
asked, though across the table Henry glared at his wife, likely
anxious to dig into his dessert. “Your face is bruised pretty
badly.”

Grimacing, Carlie shrugged. “Yeah. I was
pretty beat up.” The beating up part was entirely true. If people
wanted to assume the beating came from a car accident, she’d let
them. “I’m feeling much better now, though, so don’t worry. Enjoy
your food.”

She walked to the next table, smiling,
refilling drinks, making sure everyone had what they needed. No one
else commented on her bruises, and Carlie thought she had done a
passable job covering them with makeup, just the way Shelley
instructed.

Truthfully, she felt one hundred percent
back in good health, but Nick hadn’t wanted to return to the karate
dojo yet. Not that it mattered. All Carlie needed was training so
she could defend herself, and Nick drilled her every night,
teaching her new techniques and helping her perfect them.

And after training... Heat rose in Carlie’s
cheeks, and she glanced across the room. Nick sat at the booth in
the corner, watching her. He winked when their eyes met. All the
customers were satisfied and Shelley occupied a table of men, as
usual, so Carlie made her way over to Nick.

“What brings you around here, handsome?” she
asked, inhaling deeply in an effort to inflate her chest to full
capacity. “Looking for something tasty?”

“Mmmm hmmmm.” He licked his lips. “I found
what I was looking for, too.”

“I was just thinking the same thing.” Carlie
winked, wishing they were alone so she could kiss him. Her
confidence had risen so much since meeting Nick. She never used to
flirt and was never forward in stating what she wanted. However,
everything felt natural with him. The past week was one of the
happiest she’d had since being a child and spending time with her
parents.

It was nice to experience joy again. She
tried not to worry about whether her enemies would take it all
away. Nick kept hinting he’d be willing to run with her, if it came
down to that. While she didn’t want him to give up his dreams for
her, it was reassuring to know he wanted to be with her. Optimism
was such an exhilarating emotion after spending so many years in
fear.

Nick finally stopped undressing her with his
eyes and glanced around the shop. “Is Muhammad coming in today to
get your leftovers?”

“Yep. He should be here any time. Friday
nights are one of the busier times at Compassion For All, and I
have quite a bit of food for him today.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Did you purposefully
make extra?”

Carlie widened her eyes. She wanted to lie
and say she hadn’t, but figured Nick would see right through that.
“How is it that you already know me so well?”

Nick reached out and grabbed her hand,
pulling her closer to him and kissing the tips of her fingers,
despite the customers who might be watching. “Because our hearts
speak to each other.”

She wrapped her arms around his head and
hugged him to her stomach, no longer caring who watched. Happiness
this great couldn’t be contained. “What would I do without
you?”

“You’ll never have to find out.” Nick’s arms
circled her upper legs and Carlie ran her hands through his dark
hair, loving the way it felt. He raised his face and she bent to
kiss him softly.

The front door opened and they broke apart.
Although Carlie fought against more blushing since she’d let
herself get carried away, she turned and watched a frazzled woman
enter the shop. Her brown hair was windblown and her jacket
buttoned incorrectly, hanging down on one side. It took Carlie a
moment to realize it was the same woman who’d ordered cupcakes last
weekend for her daughter’s fifteenth birthday party.

Once she spotted Carlie, she rushed across
the room. “Please tell me the cupcakes are ready.” The woman
clearly held back tears. “Something has to have gone right.”

“They’re ready. I have them boxed up in the
kitchen.” Carlie tried to remember the name written on the order
slip. “Are you okay, Mrs. Flair?”

Mrs. Flair wrung her hands together and
shook her head. “The helium tank to fill the balloons is on back
order, the party hall was double booked, and now—” She shook her
head, a small sob coming from her throat.

Before Carlie could respond, the front door
opened again and Muhammad walked into the restaurant.

He spotted them in the corner and smiled
broadly. “Good afternoon, you guys.”

Though Nick hadn’t liked Muhammad at first,
the past week the pair had gotten to know each other. They chatted
each day when Muhammad came to get Carlie’s donations, and Carlie
hoped they could become friends. Nick had even talked about
donating money to the charity again, but said he wanted to check
things out over there first. It made her trust him even more than
she already did. While growing up, her parents always told her to
find a man with a generous heart.

She waved and then turned to Nick. “Could
you help Muhammad? Have him pull his truck around back since
there’s so much. Load up both pots of soup and the loaves of bread
sitting to the left of the sink.”

He nodded, though a grin twitched at the
corners of his mouth. “Two pots of soup?”

“Yes, two.” She put her hands on her hips,
daring him to argue, but his smile only grew larger. “There’s also
some lettuce and tomatoes in the walk-in cooler that he can take.
The stuff in the front bin that expires soonest.”

Nick stood, squeezing her shoulder as he
walked past. “Good afternoon, Muhammad. Looks like I’m helping you
today.”

Satisfied Nick had that under control,
Carlie turned back to Mrs. Flair. “Won’t you please sit down? Let’s
figure out what to do about your party.”

The woman did as asked, and Carlie slid into
the bench across from her. Luckily, Shelley checked on the tables,
keeping the customers happy.

“I don’t think we can fix this party.” Tears
spilled down Mrs. Flair’s cheeks. “My husband left me last Sunday
for another woman. Julie’s birthday is ruined. No balloons, no
place to hold it...no dad. He said he’d be there and pretend things
were fine for Julie’s sake, and he’s certainly good at pretending.”
She shook her head. “At least we have cupcakes.”

Carlie reached across the table to pat her
hand. Sympathy filled her heart as she looked at the older woman.
To be married all that time and then find out your husband didn’t
love you, had only pretended to love you for some unknown amount of
time—Carlie knew what that felt like. “Men can be such dogs.”

That startled a laugh out of the
stressed-out mother. “That’s the truth.”

Then again, Nick had begged her not to judge
all men by the bad apples. She’d certainly found a good one in him.
The Ryans and Stephens of the world didn’t seem as important
anymore. “They’re not all horrible though, Mrs. Flair. I’m sorry to
hear about your trouble. Let’s see what we can do about making a
great party for Julie, shall we?”

“You want to help me?” The shock was clear
on her face. “Why? We’re total strangers. You don’t owe me anything
except the cupcakes you promised.”

“I’ve recently been gifted with a great deal
of happiness, and I want to pay that forward.”

“If you’ll forgive me for saying so, you
don’t look like your luck’s been all that great. Your face looks
like someone beat the crap out of you.”

Carlie nodded. “Someone did, but that opened
the door for something great. Sometimes life knocks us down flat,
but things can only go up once you’ve hit rock bottom.”

“I’m not so sure about that.” Mrs. Flair
wiped some tears away. “Things have been down for a long time. I
don’t know if they’ll ever get better.”

Carlie offered a smile, hoping to reassure
her. “Good things happen when we least expect them. We’ll make this
right.”

***

Nick left Carlie at the shop working on her
books. She assured him she’d be fine. The store had closed for the
night, so no one could get in to hurt her. He told her he needed to
check things at his restaurant. In truth, Nick wasn’t really hands
on in the projects he invested in, but it did give him a good cover
story to take care of his real job’s responsibilities.

Paul finally text messaged today, asking
Nick to call when he was somewhere alone and at his laptop. Nick
had waited all week for the phone call, wondering what S.A.T.O.
decided. He was anxious to talk to the boss.

He sat in the hotel room, laptop open, and
called Paul.

“About time,” his boss barked.

Like Nick hadn’t been waiting on him all
week. “Sorry. I’ve been staying at the shop with Car—uh, the target
during the days like you suggested. She’s there doing paperwork
now, so I was finally able to get away.”

“What have you seen?” Paul sounded slightly
less angry. “She’s in tight with Muhammad Khan like I suspected,
isn’t she?”

Damn. Paul still thought Carlie was guilty.
“Sir, I’ve been present for any interactions between them all week.
There’s no secrecy about what they’re doing. Carlie gives him food,
and he takes it to his kitchen. If he’s running a terrorist
organization, he’s also truly running a soup kitchen.”

“Well
Carlie
has been lying to you,
agent. Make no mistake about that.”

He had to stop slipping up and using her
name. Paul picked up on it every time, and Nick never had that
problem with any other target. Not even the other females he’d
investigated. Then again, Carlie was more than just another target
now. “What do you mean she’s been lying?”

Paul cleared his throat and Nick heard him
tapping on a keyboard. “I sent files to your e-mail. You’re not
going to like them.”

The message beeped through on Nick’s screen
and he opened it. There was no subject or message, just four
attachments. He clicked the first one and saw a copy of a newspaper
clipping. ‘Prince Rayhan Kollek to marry local girl, Stephanie
Swanson.’ Nick read the details, which told the date and time of
their pending nuptials. It also talked about Stephanie going from
peasant to princess in what the article called a true-life
Cinderella story.

“President Sharp and the S.A.T.O. board dug
these up for me,” Paul said. “Whoever your target is, she was never
Stephanie Swanson-Kollek.”

A picture at the bottom of the paper showed
the happy couple in grainy black and white. The woman looked
nothing like Carlie. For one thing, she was quite a bit larger,
though Carlie could have lost weight after starting karate.
However, the woman’s face didn’t resemble hers at all.

Frantic to find an explanation, Nick opened
the next file. This contained wedding pictures in full color. The
happy couple stood before a priest in a packed church. They cut
their wedding cake and fed each other. Two other pictures showed
the plump bride looking radiant in her dress with her bridal party
surrounding her. And she was definitely not Carlie.

The last two files were reports of Rayhan’s
death—and they reported it as a car accident, not the explosion
Carlie claimed it was. Although it didn’t say so outright, the last
report hinted another person was in the car with Rayhan when the
accident occurred, taken from information gathered during an
interview with the prince’s mother. Could that have been what
happened to the real Stephanie Swanson? It seemed to say that she
died too, but wasn’t spelled out on the page.

“What does all this mean?” Nick finally
asked, uncertainty eating away at him. If Carlie lied about who she
was, then she lied about everything. Was she, in fact, a
terrorist?