Page 135

“Yeah, well.” I clear my throat again and carefully untangle my hand, slowly edging out from her side. “Roman is Roman, you know that as well as I do. And right now, he doesn’t matter, anyway. We need to get on with this, Abs.”

I swing my legs over the side of the bed and stand up. My stomach rumbles. I turn back and grin at her. “You weren’t wrong, by the way. I’m starving. Let’s get fed and get on with planning.”

“Wait.” She props herself up on one elbow, the sheet slipping, and my eyes drift down to the candy-pink nipples I’ve just had my mouth around. My cock leaps.

“You need to pull that sheet up, Skip, or we’re never getting out of this bedroom.”

I’m only half joking.

Abby doesn’t smile. “We do need to plan, you’re right. And I need to tell you about the man we’re going after.”

We?

I appreciate the support, but there’s something about the way she says the word that makes me think she’s talking about more than fucking cheering me on.

That said, I’m not about to stop her from telling me the one part of this little tale she’s been holding back.

I’m also fucking relieved. We’ve been skirting around this issue from the moment I walked into that hotel room. Irespect Abby’s choices, but it’s also a tough call to try to kill a man when you don’t have either a name or a face.

So I touch her leg lightly and smile. “I appreciate that, Skip. For a while there I was worried I’d just have to kill everyone in the place and hope I hit the right target.”

Abby gives a silent huff of humorless laughter. “You’d have fucking done it, too, wouldn’t you?”

My smile fades at her tense expression. “Yeah, Skip.” My hand tightens briefly on her leg, and I don’t look away. “Yeah, that’s exactly what I would have done.”

She takes a deep breath. Then her hand covers mine, and she nods slowly.

“Then it’s definitely time we talked.”

29

Abby

“Okay.” Dimitry throws himself down on the daybed next to me, drink in hand, and gives me the crooked smile I love. “Talk, Skip.”

Dao has cleared away the remains of another delicious meal. Leon, Dimitry, and I are sitting on opposite sides of a carved wooden coffee table. Leon, with his customary elegance, sits with one leg neatly folded over the other in a low cushioned wood chair. Dimitry stretches his legs out and crosses his ankles, propping his feet on a round cushioned footrest built for the purpose. His arm lies possessively along the back of the daybed, his thumb and fingers lightly caressing the nape of my neck.

Even that touch makes me shiver.

If I thought sex with Dimitry was mind-blowing before I left Spain, since our reunion, it’s been something else entirely. He’s like a magnet I move around, an energy field I just want to be close to. His every touch is electrifying, his closeness intoxicating.

Which makes what I’m about to do even more terrifying.

“I need to tell you about the man we’re going after.” I turnto meet Dimitry’s eyes. “Because that will help you understand why I’m going into that compound with you.”

His hand on my neck stills, and his eyes narrow.

“You’re not going anywhere near that compound, Skip.” His voice is low, controlled—and extremely final.

“Yes, Dimitry, I am.” I match his tone evenly. Our eyes meet in a hard standoff that I am the first to break, because until he understands my reasons, he’ll never understand my determination. “Let me explain.”

I lean forward. “The only name I have for this man is Jacey. No last name, no details. And although I can describe him to you, I can’t show you a photograph—because I don’t have one.”

He frowns. “I thought you told Rodrigo that you would give him a photo—”

“I told him that, yes.” I lift a shoulder. “I lied. It was the only way I could think of to get out of that compound. The only photograph of Jacey I ever had was on the tablet Juan Cardeñas gave me, and I destroyed that as soon as I sent him the information I promised to. Believe me, I didn’t want to carry that picture around one second longer than I had to. My only goal was to get out of Colombia, to relative safety. Once I was certain I wasn’t being followed, I sent Juan the photo and the name, then broke the tablet and the SIM card inside it to a thousand pieces.”

I shudder, trying not to think of how terrified I was back then.