Seek and Destroy (39 page)

    A knock on the door broke her of her mental breakdown. Her tears had long been spent. Now she just felt numb. "Come in," she stated evenly, her back still planted firmly on the bed.

    Thank God it was Chris and not David. She didn't have the strength to deal with him right now. Her brother stepped in with a plate full of pizza slices. "Figured you'd be hungry."

    "Bless you," she almost sang and rose off the bed. Food. She accepted the pizza and dug in. Chicken and garlic. Her and Chris' favorite. "Mmm."

    "Good thing I got two of those. Apparently it's Snyder's fav, too. He and I finished one pizza before digging into the second."

    "Thank God one of you had enough sense to save me a few pieces."

    "That would be your boyfriend out there," he answered cynically. "He's got three more pieces for you after you finish these three. Won't let me touch them."

    Six pieces? She wouldn't even be able to finish two. But the thought of him saving pizza for her made her feel-nothing. She had to quit him completely, and that included thinking about him. "He's not my boyfriend."

    "Want to tell me about it?"

    She looked at him, stared into eyes the same blue as hers. Even though they were fraternal twins, they still looked alike. But, then again, all the McKoy's shared the same blue eyes, the same dark chocolate brown hair.

    Although she and Chris had shared just about everything happening in their lives with each other, she somehow doubted he'd understand what she was going through, let alone sympathize. But she desperately needed someone to talk to, someone other than the problem.

    Still, this was her brother. And, judging by his reaction to David last time sex had anything to do with his need to protect her, along with the look in his hard eyes now, he wouldn't be the person she'd be sharing her love life with. Some things were best left up to the best friend, not the twin.

    But David
was
her best friend. She wanted to tell him anything and everything. He'd been her best friend since she'd nursed him back to health at the hospital, he just didn't know it. It was when she'd fallen in love with him.

    "I'd rather have something to drink."

    "Unleaded or diesel?"

    "Unleaded, please." They'd referred to alcoholic drinks as diesel since forever. Unleaded meant alcohol-free. Diesel was fully loaded.

    "You got it." He smiled and left the room.

    She thought about her decision. If she had a drink, it would take the edge off. She just might be able to focus on something other than David Snyder. No, she could really go for a beer. Jumping to her feet, she threw open the door. "On second thought-"

    She choked on her words. David stood there, two beers in hand, his free hand bunched into a fist to knock on the door. As he rested his gaze on her face, he gave her that debilitating grin. "I found two of these in the fridge. Never had," he stopped and glanced at the bottles, "
Moose Drool
before."

    "It's from a local brewery in Missoula." She thanked him for the beer and thought about inviting him in. Knowing the bed there would be far too great a temptation, she closed the door behind her and started down her hall. She took a quick glance in her office as she passed. Her system was quiet, her monitors dark.

    Still no word from Surreal.

    Sighing, she shuffled out into the living room and sank onto her couch, tucking her feet under her. She picked at the toppings of her second piece, not sure if she wanted to dig into another one or not.

    "Time to come clean," David said after taking a seat in one of the chairs. Chris sat on the arm of the couch next to his sister, no doubt to protect her from the big bad man sitting on the other side of the room.

    She rolled her eyes. Inwardly. Nothing could protect her from him. Chris would have a better chance at roping the wind than saving her from a man she didn't want to be saved from.

    "Tell me everything you know about this asshole. And I mean everything."

    "Read the file."

    "No," he countered, his voice even. "You may have background info on him that isn't in any file."

    "Listen, I'm not in the mood-"

    "Too bad," he snapped back. His eyes centered on her, serious and clear. Dare she say
cool
. This wasn't David, her lover. This was David Snyder, Super Spy and the SAC on the op. She didn't know if she liked having him look at her like another agent on an op. It was exactly how they needed to be right now, and yet it bruised her.

    "Sorry, Baby-" he caught himself and forced a smile through clenched teeth. "Sorry,
Charis
. We can't wait any longer. Spill."

    Her heart skipped when he'd corrected himself, actually called her by her name. What happened to love? Sweetheart? Baby? Closing her eyes, she refocused. It had to be this way. They weren't lovers. They were agents together on an op.

    The time had come. With a preparatory breath, she began. "I met him at a job fair in Bozeman. As a recent grad from Montana State University with a degree in computer science, he was there looking for a job. I already knew who he was, having done my research on him before the job fair."

    "You were there to recruit him?"

    She nodded. "Him and three others. ICE has recruiters in all the major universities. When they told me about him, about what a brilliant programmer he was, I knew he'd be great ICE material. The others wouldn't make it past the first screening, but Thomas Macy had talent. I saw amazing potential in him and couldn't wait to bring him onboard, to train him personally."

    "Why you?" David's hands clenched into fists. He didn't seem pleased with the details. Too damn bad. He wanted them, now he got to sit there and hear them.

    "Charis is the best there is," Chris chimed in. "Not many can do what she does. Macy could."

    "Wonderful," David muttered.

    "I've never met a code I couldn't crack," she explained. "Or a system I couldn't hack. I knew Thomas had what it would take to be another top of the list e-tracker, and if he was going to be one of the best, then he needed to be trained by one of the best."

    David nodded.

    "Aren't you going to write any of this down?" Chris asked him.

    "No need," he answered. "Go on."

    "After he came on board, we immediately started his training. He was like a robot. I only had to show him things once and he had it."

    "How long was he there?" He watched her intently as she spoke, studying her. She knew what he was doing. The man didn't need to write anything down. He had instant and total recall, and a photographic memory. A genius in his own right, he'd still be perfect ICE material. She could teach him-Stop it! He would not be transferring to ICE, and even if he ever had a change of heart, she wouldn't be assigned to train him. Not if she wanted to walk away with her heart intact.

    "Standard probationary period is six months before a new recruit can hit the keyboard on his own. Their handler must remain in the shadows monitoring their movement for the first year. Of course we don't tell them that."

    He looked at her. "You were his handler?"

    She nodded. "He did a great job the first couple of times. But then he started to purposely sabotage his retrievals. When I caught on to what he was doing, I locked him out and had him arrested."

    "And did he vow his revenge against you?"

    "Doubtful," Chris jumped in. She punched him in the leg. "What? The punk worshiped you. When you weren't around, all he did was ask when you were going to be back."

    "So what?" she defended.

    Chris turned back to David. "Back then dad had Charis pulling recruits left and right. She wasn't in the office much. Drove that little shit crazy when she spent time with another recruit. He'd make up reasons for her to pay attention to him."

    David raised his eyebrows. "Looks like he's trying to get your attention again."

    "It worked," she said and shuddered.

    "Did you ever give him reason to think there was more to your relationship than on a professional level?" His voice seemed strained. She knew he tried to hide the fact he seemed entirely too interested in the answer.

    The way her heart fluttered gave her pause. It took her several seconds to regroup. "You mean like dating?" She shook her head. "It wasn't like that. We had a lot in common, so we became friends. It was never more than that."

    Chris nudged her. "Tell him."

    She looked up at him. Then back at David. Her heart thudded.

    "Tell me what?"

    With a sigh, she continued. "Not that it matters, but he kissed me once."

    "Hah!" Chris shook his head. "He did more than that."

    David tensed. "How much more?"

    "Nothing...happened."

    "Charis, the son-of-a-bitch attacked you," Chris snapped.

    "What?" The tone in David's voice scared her. She'd never heard him sound so dangerously lethal. "Did you have him arrested?"

    "No. It was harmless. After my knee found his crotch, he backed down."

    He winced. "What about you?" He turned his attention to Chris. "Why didn't you kill the bastard?"

    "Believe me," Chris said, his hands up as it warding off the attack. "It wasn't for lack of wanting to. But she wouldn't let me."

    "I would have still killed him," he growled, his dark eyes glowering.

    "Looking back, I wish I would have."

    They exchanged looks. She flipped her gaze back and forth between them. "What?"

    "This guy was obviously in love with you," David explained. "The question is, is he still in love with you? Is that why he's doing all of this? Some sort of declaration?"

    "I don't believe that." She grabbed her beer and took several long drinks. Her eyes watered, her throat raw from the carbonation by the time she came up for air. She set the beer back on the table. Holy mama. That was exactly what she believed and had believed all along. And he picked up on that even though she'd done everything to hide the fact.

    Thomas Macy was, again, causing a commotion in order to get her attention. This time in catastrophic measures.

    Then again, maybe he did it as some sort of punishment for her turning him in. And maybe they were all reading more into it.

    Maybe he was just a psycho who planted bombs at random server rooms across the nation. No, not across the nation, she realized at that very moment. He'd kept them all on the west side of the states, at least he did with the original three bombings.

    She jumped up, her brain processing the new information. What if he did the same again? If she applied that reasoning to her algorithm, she'd seriously narrow down the probable targets.

    "Where are you going?" David stood.

    She practically sprinted back into her office and stopped in front of the board. Scanning, she searched for the locations of each building that had been attacked. "Where are they?"

    "What?" David ran into the room, stopped next to her.

    "The locations!" Damn, she knew that had to be it. If they'd only written them down as well, they might have picked up the pattern days ago.

    He grabbed a pen to write on the whiteboard. He didn't even question her as he wrote. "Cascade Technological Advances is in Tucson, Arizona. History of Arts is in Houston, Texas. All City Technology is in Olympia, Washington. That one really pissed me off since I have friends there. Uh, Riverside Consulting is in Modesto, California. That's it."

    Tucson.

    Houston.

    Olympia.

    Modesto.

    T.H.O.M. THOM.
Thomas.

    She hurried to her system and added the new criteria. "He's going to go after a building that starts with the letter 'I'."

    "Tell me something I don't know."

    She spiked her brow, knowing her next statement would definitely fall under that criterion. "The city will start with the letter 'A'."

    He seemed less than impressed. "There are still a lot of possibilities, Charis."

    When would he learn to not doubt her? "Not on this side of the country. And now that I've applied my new layer to the existing algorithm, I'll be able to narrow it down to a number we can work with."

    His lip twitched. "You have one hell of a brain, Charis McKoy."

    "Hmm," she responded. "I bet you say that to all the girls."

    "Actually," he countered and set the pen back on the board holder. "I've never fallen in love with a woman's brain before any of her other," he paused and gave her a slow, sexy once over, "assets. Not that those were far behind."

    Her mouth went dry. Her heart refused to beat. He
loved
her? As she looked up at him, the debilitating smile he gave followed a wink that made her insides turn to putty. "What did you just say?"

    "You heard me."

    She did hear him, but wanted to hear it again. "I-"

    "Ah." He brought up his finger to silence her. "Let's just leave it at that for now. This is a conversation we can finish later. And believe me, we will finish it later. For now, we have a terrorist to catch."

    

    

    
They were back in that Montana field. This time Charis wasn't covered head to toe in KevSpa. She had on that damned shirt/suit combo he'd spotted her wearing in Hawaii. She strolled slowly, swaying her hips like blades of grass in the easy breeze.

    
Her glasses were propped high on her nose. She adjusted them as she spiked her brow at him. As she gave him a sly grin, his heart seized in his chest. She made a motion for him to follow her. Of course he did. How could he not? He'd follow her anywhere. Through anything.