Page 68 of Poison Evidence

He grimaced. “I suppose I should admit they taught us to use all our assets in spy school.”

She winced. To be taught to use sex as a tool from a young age—if she remembered correctly, he’d been barely more than a child when he started spy school—horrified her. “All?”

“If I’d wanted sex training, it would have been provided. But the idea of that left me cold.”

“How old were you? When you started?”

“Sex or spy school?”

“Well, I meant spy school, but now I’m curious about sex too.”

He stood and crossed the small stretch of beach between them. He slipped an arm around her waist and kissed her. Deep, but not a precursor to anything more. Just a kiss. Sweet and soft. “I was seventeen the first time I had sex—on my own terms, consensual on both sides.” He released her and stepped back. “And I was fourteen when I was selected for the embed program. My sister was eleven.”

“Your sister?”

“Yes. She’s the reason I need to find the AUUV. If I don’t, she and her son will both be killed.”

Chapter Twenty-Three

It was Dimitri’s turn to share, but before he launched into his story, he checked the fishing line—coming up empty. “Would you believe I caught a fish this”—he held his hands three feet apart—“big just last week?”

Ivy laughed. “Never.”

He tightened his lips as if in deep introspection, moving his hands an inch closer together. “Well, maybe this big?”

There was something so…north-northeast of normal about the moment. Stranded on a tropical island with a Russian spy. His earnest, silly joke.

For a moment, she felt…light. Like everything would be okay. Or at least not like Spontaneous Combustion Man lurked around every corner, holding lighter fluid in one hand and a blowtorch in the other.

Worst. Superhero. Ever.

And then there was Dimitri. Who, come to think of it, also resembled the actor Ryan Reynolds, just a tiny bit. More Green Lantern in looks than Deadpool. But if she had to choose, she’d go for the darker hero. More Dimitri-ish.

Deadpool with Captain Kirk’s eyes. Now there was a superhero she could root for.

She noted that his fishhook was clean of bait. “I suppose it’s my turn to collect grubs.”

“Not today,” he said. “We should head inside and not push our luck being exposed like this.” His voice had turned serious. Break time was over.

“Canned tuna for dinner again, then,” she said with an exaggerated sigh.

“We can dress it up with ramen noodles.”

“What, you’re not willing to splurge on macaroni and cheese?”

He smiled and kissed her. “Do I know how to wine and dine a woman or what?”

“Well, at least we have wine.”

Dimitri hid the kayak in the jungle, leaving it inflated and ready so they could use it later to row to the other island, then he grabbed his fishing gear and followed her up the path, wiping away their footprints in the sand as he went. The coming evening rain would take care of the rest.

Inside the cave, she witnessed a subtle shift in Dimitri’s demeanor and recognized it as the return of his darker self as he braced himself for the coming tale.

“I think this calls for something stronger than wine,” he said, making a beeline for the provisions. He grabbed the lone bottle of scotch. “Drink?”

She shook her head and settled in a camping chair in front of the folding table. He sat across from her. “So. Your sister and nephew,” she prompted.

“As I said, Sophia was eleven when we were recruited. We’d been orphaned—drunk driver in the other car—and had no extended family. Wards of the state. We were sent to an orphanage. If you know anything about Russian orphanages, I can promise, they’re even worse.” He cleared his throat. “Officials came looking for kids with high aptitude who could speak English and found us.” He paused, then added, “Our mother was American.”