Match Play (13 page)

“Casual doesn't always stay that way. Take tonight, for example. This dinner.”

She waved a hand, encompassing the linen-covered tables, the flickering votives, the river flowing with the swift, rippling pull of the tide.

“You don't have to romance me.”

“Yeah, you made that clear.”

He kept his tone light, but Dayna was sure she detected an edge.

“This isn't just for you, Pud. I thought Gillian might enjoy a little local atmosphere. What's the story with her and Callahan, by the way? Does she know she's got the man tied up in knots?”

Dayna snatched at the change of topic. “Did Hawk tell you that?”

“Nope. In fact, he went out of his way to deny it. But he wants her. Almost as much as I want you.”

Her breath left on an audible whoosh, but the waiter appeared with their wine before she could respond to the deliberate provocation.

“Are you ready to order?” he asked after decanting the Bordeaux and presenting it to Luke to sniff and swish.

“I am. How about you?” His bland smile told Dayna he knew
exactly
how far he'd thrown her off-kilter. “Want to try the filet of beef? Trust me, you won't regret it.”

“The filet it is.”

She passed her menu to the waiter along with an order for a house salad and tender white asparagus as a side dish.

“About Hawk and Gillian,” she said firmly when he'd departed. “There's nothing going on between them.”

“Not yet,” Luke agreed, raising his wine goblet. “What shall we drink to?”

He was doing it on purpose, Dayna realized. Deliberately changing directions with every other sentence to keep her off balance. And doing a damned fine job of it, she conceded as she tipped her glass to his.

“Let's drink to the men and women you fly with,” she said, thinking of Alan Parks and Gabe and Dweeb.

And Luke, in all his incarnations. The cocky young student pilot who'd had to choose between Dayna and serving his country. The older, more experienced aviator who put his life on the line every time he flew his unarmed bomber into a hot zone. The lover who'd stormed back into her life and stirred up needs and wants she'd thought long dead.

“May you come home safe after every mission.”

His eyes grave, he nodded. “Back at you, Pud.”

 

The toast precipitated a dramatic change in mood.

The sexual combativeness and uncertainty that had dogged Dayna since bumping into Luke on the street outside her hotel finally dissipated. He, too, seemed to lose his edge. For the first time, they relaxed and enjoyed each other's company.

Over succulent beef and asparagus so tender it fell off the fork, Dayna learned more about his life and the missions he flew. She opened up about her job at the Outdoor Wilderness Center and shared expurgated details of various ops she'd worked for OMEGA.

The mellow mood stayed with her through the scrumptious dinner, two glasses of wine and a dessert of bread pudding swimming in raisins and brandy sauce. It dissipated fast, however, when they walked out into the starry night and Luke gave her the choice of spending the rest of it at his flat or having him camp out on the sofa in her hotel suite.

“There's a third choice,” she countered with a sudden catch to her breath. “I could sleep in my bed, and you in yours.”

“Not an option.” Cupping her elbow, he steered her toward his car. “I told you, I'm not letting you out of my sight until this is over.”

“And then?” she asked as he opened the passenger door for her.

“We reopen negotiations.”

The door thudded shut. Luke rounded the rear of the car, slid behind the wheel, keyed the ignition.

“Which is it, Pud? Your place or mine?”

“Yours.”

No strings, she lectured herself sternly as she keyed his cell phone and left a message for Jilly that she'd made other arrangements for the night. No complications.

Unless they reopened negotiations.

She knew before she shimmied out of her clothes and straddled Luke's hips there was no “unless” anywhere in the equation.

T
he subconscious kindling of nerves and energy Dayna always experienced before a major competitive event woke her just before dawn.

She lay still for a moment, adjusting to the strange bed, the unfamiliar surroundings and the heavy arm draped over her waist. Then the realization that the crucial focus of her mission—getting the Wus aboard a plane to the States—was fast approaching pumped a spurt of adrenaline into her veins. When she tried to wiggle out from under the deadweight, however, the arm tightened and drew her into a solid wall of warm flesh.

“Luke.”

She waited a beat and tried again.

“Luke, I need to get it in gear.”

A sandpapery cheek rubbed against hers. He mumbled something inarticulate but didn't budge.

“Harper.” She added an elbow. “I have a ten-ten tee time.”

This time she got a grunt and an irritated grumble. “Plenty of time.”

“Not if I want to loosen up on the driving range and spend a little time on the putting green. I need to get back to the hotel, change and collect my gear. Unhand me, sir.”

Still grumbling, he eased his hold. Dayna abandoned the comfy cocoon of covers and made for the bathroom. When she emerged some time later, the bed was empty.

Luke's absence gave her a chance to look around. Since they'd had more urgent matters on their minds last night, this was Dayna's first real look at his private world.

The bedroom was typically male—no frills, no fuss: a king-size bed covered with a russet-colored duvet; a leather easy chair; a large-screen TV on a corner stand; functional miniblinds screening the window. A wardrobe stood against the far wall, the mirrored doors ajar. One half of the wardrobe contained civilian clothes. Luke's uniforms took up the other.

Chewing on her lower lip, Dayna surveyed the green Nomex flight suits hanging alongside sets of camouflage BDUs. Next to them was a row of short-and long-sleeved blue shirts, a formal mess dress in a zippered bag and Luke's service dress uniform. The blue jacket displayed rows of colorful ribbons, shiny captain's bars and silver wings. The shelf above held his garrison and flight caps. Highly polished boots and shoes marched in precise order below the uniforms.

But it was the flyaway bag on the floor of the wardrobe, next to the boots, that riveted Dayna's attention. She had only a vague idea of its contents. Aeronautical charts, no doubt. Emergency supplies of cash and medicines in case the crew got stranded at some forward location. Luke's sidearm. Whatever he needed to take off at a moment's notice and remain deployed for long periods.

The discussion with Jilly replayed forcefully in Dayna's mind. Could Luke harness his career so it fitted with hers? Could she do the same?

Did she want to?

She suspected she already knew the answer to that but didn't have time to separate thought from emotion right now. Her tight, controlled energy was mounting by the moment in anticipation of the sporting event to come.

She left the bedroom and glanced into the other two upstairs rooms on her way to the stairs. One doubled as a guest room and office. The other housed a universal gym with an impressive collection of weights and bars and pulleys.

Downstairs, she followed the tantalizing scent of fresh-brewed coffee through a living and dining room. She found Luke in a starkly utilitarian kitchen. He'd pulled on a set of gray sweats and was wielding a spatula like someone who knew how to use it.

“Help yourself,” he said, indicating the coffeemaker with a jerk of his chin. “You still restrict yourself to a high-carb meal before competitive events?”

Surprised he remembered after so many years, she nodded and poured life-giving caffeine into a mug. Although golf didn't require the same vigorous energy as steering a kayak through a roaring white-water, Dayna's training regimen went bone-deep.

“We have buckwheat pancakes,” Luke informed her. “We have toasted bagels. We have cereal and whole milk. I think there's some instant oatmeal in the cupboard if you'd prefer that.”

“Pancakes and a bagel are more than enough.”

“Here you go, then.”

Filling plates for her and for himself, he claimed the stool beside hers.

Luke didn't press her for conversation as they ate. He'd shared preevent hours with her before and knew Dayna always narrowed her focus before a major competition. The woman possessed an uncanny ability to tune out everything but the challenge ahead. Most of the time, he'd been okay with that. Looking back, he could chalk up to basic immaturity those few occasions when he'd felt excluded or left behind.

Or was it a reluctance to share center stage in Dayna's life?

Her Olympic dreams had consumed her then, just as his pilot training had demanded all his time and energy. After her coach had called to warn him that Dayna was putting her spot on the Olympic team in jeopardy with her cross-country commuting, Luke believed he'd done right by suggesting they cool things for a while.

Now, he had to wonder whether the suggestion stemmed from a noble desire to see her achieve her goals. Or had there been something less gallant at work? Something small and self-centered, like the realization that he didn't constitute the center of her universe?

If
that was part of it—and Luke wasn't ready to admit it was—he'd sure as hell learned his lesson. All he had to do was look at the woman next to him, see her lost in contemplation as she licked a drop of syrup from the corner of her mouth, and know he'd take whatever part of her she wanted to share with him.

This wasn't the time to tell her so, however. She was already in her zone, already centering on the task ahead with the same single-minded concentration he brought to his preflight mission prep.

“Ready?” he asked when she'd forked down the last of her pancakes.

Blinking, she exited her private space. “I am. Let's do it.”

 

The companionable silence at breakfast proved the last calm before the storm.

As they drove across the stone bridge linking Leuchars and St. Andrews, Dayna could feel her pulse picking up speed and her muscles coiling. The tournament wouldn't win her a title or trophy or a big purse, but cameras would pick up every nuance of her mood, as well as her swing. So would Wu Kim Li. If Dayna and her team were going to pull off the Wus' defection, she had to remain cool and in control.

She managed both through the bustle of a quick shower and change at the hotel followed by a hurried meeting with Hawk and Jilly. After that, she joined her foursome at the clubhouse for a pregame media conference.

Because of their low scores on the initial rounds, Dayna and her partner had the honor of teeing off last, in the same group as Kim Li. The Korean was paired with Joan Ryson-Smith, a tall, lanky South-African amateur who'd inherited millions and played a wicked game of golf. Dayna's partner was the top female money winner on the British women's circuit, Allison Kendall. Short, wiry-haired and intense, Kendall made quick work of the media conference and disappeared to warm up on the driving range. Ryson-Smith watched with amusement as Kim Li hogged the cameras.

That was fine with Dayna. She needed to hit a few buckets, too. Excusing herself, she left the Korean and South African to the limelight and took a short cut through the women's locker room to the club storage facility.

The cavernous, carpeted-and-paneled facility normally buzzed with activity as attendants cleaned clubs, polished shoes and tagged bags before tucking them in their assigned stalls. The caddies, too, usually hung out there while waiting for their players to show and call for their equipment.

With all but the last few foursomes already on the links, most of the stalls were empty. Strange, though, that no attendant manned the front counter. Nor, Dayna saw with a sudden skip of her pulse, were any caddies milling around inside.

That thought had barely registered when a bulky, unmistakable figure emerged from the stall containing Dayna's bag and froze.

The plastic water bottle gripped in sumo-mama's fist carried the Royal and Ancient Clubhouse's distinctive logo…as did the towels, extra sleeves of balls and two additional water bottles sitting next to Dayna's bag. One of those bottles, she noted with a swift narrowing of her eyes, was still filmed with moisture from the cooler. The dew on the other showcased a very distinctive set of fingerprints.

The evidence was unmistakable. Sumo-Mama had dipped into her bag of tricks again.

Enough was enough, Dayna thought with a spear of cold, lethal fury. The woman was going down. Quietly. Unobtrusively. With no one, including Wu Kim Li and her other watchdogs, any the wiser.

“What did you do?” Dayna asked softly, rounding the counter. “Exchange that bottle for one spiked with essence of orchid?”

Recovering from her frozen surprise, the masseuse tried to bluff it out. She shook her head, as if to indicate she didn't understand, and waddled toward the exit. Dayna sidestepped into her path.

“You're not going anywhere, lady.”

A gleam of pure malice lit the other woman's eyes. “You stop me?”

“So you do understand English?”

“I understand.” Her lip curled. “You move now.”

“I don't think so.”

Rolling her massive shoulders, the masseuse flexed her arms. She had to weigh a good three-ten or twenty.

“You move, or I crush you.”

“Maybe.” Smiling coldly, Dayna went up on her toes and balled her fists. “Maybe not.”

The ruse worked. Thinking her opponent really intended to duke it out, the other woman smiled in vicious delight, lowered her head and charged.

As nimble as a matador, Dayna danced away and whipped up her arms. She slammed her locked fists down on the back of the woman's neck. The shock reverberated all the way from her wrists to her shoulders.

The karate chop should have brought sumo-mama to her knees. It barely checked her stride. When she turned to charge again, Dayna experienced a decided uh-oh moment.

“You gnat,” the masseuse taunted, breathing heavily through her mouth. “I squash you.”

Dayna had nowhere to go but into the stall behind her. Her gaze never left the other woman's face as she backed up the few steps. The Korean sneered, lowered her head and charged.

In a swift economy of movement, Dayna plucked the supercharged eight-iron from her golf bag and swung. The clubhead cracked against the Korean's skull. Staggering, the woman grunted once and went down like a felled ox.

“You're lucky I didn't use my driver,” Dayna huffed as she tucked the eight-iron under her arm and signaled Hawk. “I'm in the club-storage facility. I need you to dispose of something for me. Better bring Luke,” she advised, eyeing sumo-mama's massive bulk.

Keeping a careful eye on the Korean, Dayna searched the other stalls. She wasn't surprised when she found an attendant lying in a crumpled heap. A quick check of his pulse indicated he was alive, but out cold.

Returning to the stall containing her golf bag, Dayna eyed the water bottles thoughtfully. They were capped with plastic tips, the kind you had to pull up before you could squeeze out a squirt of water.

“Perfect.”

Planting her butt on the floor, she braced her back against the wall and used both feet to roll sumo-mama over. Groaning, the woman flopped onto her back. Dayna had the water bottle inserted between the Korean's jaws before her lids fluttered up. When the woman saw her opponent poised over her, she jerked convulsively.

“I wouldn't jump around too much,” Dayna advised. “Unless you want me to give this bottle a little squeeze.”

“Wha…?” Gasping, the masseuse struggled to get her tongue around the spout protruding into her mouth. “Wha' 'ou want?”

“Some answers.”

“I know nos-sing!”

“I'm guessing you know how that orchid extract got into the champagne delivered to my room.”

“No! No! I…Ay, ah!”

Her brows raised in polite disbelief, Dayna rattled the tip of the bottle against the woman's teeth. When she had her complete attention, she smiled.

“Let's start again, shall we? Why did you try to poison me?”

“Kim Li. She…She…”

“Kim Li what?”

Almost cross-eyed, the masseuse kept her desperate gaze on the bottle wedged between her gaping jaws.

“She—She tell us you say bad things to her.”

“What things?”

“You tell her to leave…Korea. Tell her to…be traitor to her country.”

Dayna gave no indication that the impetus to leave their native land had originated with the Wus, not the other way around. Instead, she played the heavy.

“Kim Li would make millions in America. Break into the movies if she wanted to. We can make her the international superstar she should be.”

“Money no matter. Kim Li never leave Korea. Never leave mother.”