All The Queen's Men cs-2 Read online

  Ronsard paced quietly. He didn't like leaving everything to his men. He understood Temple, he thought, at least he didn't underestimate him. His guests were gone; there was no reason for him to remain here.

  The phone rang with another update. The Renault had been found in Valence, but there was no report of Temple or Madame Jamieson. The plates on the Renault had been switched with those from a Volvo, but the Volvo hadn't been stolen.

  "What other cars have been reported stolen within the past twenty-four hours?"

  "A Peugeot was taken from behind a house a kilometer from the Renault. A Fiat was also stolen, but that was some distance away. And a Mercedes was reported stolen, but the owner has been out of town and does not know how long the car has been gone."

  The Peugeot was the most likely, Ronsard thought. It was the closest. And yet. . . perhaps that was what Temple wished him to think. "Concentrate on the

  Mercedes and Fiat," he said. "I will be joining you by helicopter in two hours. Find those two cars." "Yes, sir," came the brisk answer.

  It was noon when they reached Nice. Niema was so tired she could barely think, but somehow her body kept moving. They were met at the dock by a man in a small outboard, to take them out to the yacht that was moored in the harbor. He had to be Company, Niema thought. He was American, and he didn't ask any questions, just competently steered the boat across the harbor and brought it alongside a gleaming white sixty-footer.

  She wasn't too tired to be amazed. She stared up at the yacht, with an impressive array of antennas bristling from its top. When John had said "yacht," she had expected something about twenty-five or thirty feet, with a tiny galley, a tinier head, and bunk beds in a cramped cabin. This thing was in an entirely different category.

  John spoke quietly with the other man, giving him instructions on the disposition of the stolen Fiat. It was to disappear, immediately. There were other instructions as well. "Keep us under surveillance. Don't let anyone approach us without warning."

  "Got it."

  He turned to look at Niema. "Can you make it up the ladder?"

  "Do I get to take a shower and go to bed if I do?"

  "Absolutely."

  "Then I can make it up the ladder." She suited action to words, setting her bare feet on the rungs and using the last of her energy to climb to the deck. John made it as easily as if he had just woke from a good night's sleep and started fresh. He looked terrible, but she couldn't see any sign of fatigue in him.

  He opened the hatch door and led her inside. The interior was surprisingly spacious, with everything built in that could be built in, the design both sophisticated and luxurious. They were in the middle of the boat, in a large salon outfitted with pale golden wood and dark blue trim; a full galley lay beyond. John ushered her past the galley, into a narrow hallway, or whatever it was called on board a ship. If a kitchen was a galley, a bathroom was a head, and a bedroom was a cabin, then a hallway had to be something else too.

  "Here's the head," he said, opening a door. "Everything you'll need is there. When you're finished, take either of these cabins." He indicated two doors in the hallway past the head.

  "Where will you be?"

  "In the office, up-linking to a satellite for a burst transmission. There are two other heads on board, so don't feel you have to hurry."

  Hurry? He had to be joking.

  The head was as luxuriously appointed as the rest of the boat. All of the cabinetry was built in, to save space. The glass-enclosed shower was spacious by anyone's standards, with gold-plated fixtures. A thick white terry cloth bathrobe hung on a hook behind the door, and a bath mat with a pile so thick her feet sank into it covered the glazed bronze tiles on the floor.

  She investigated the contents of the vanity and found everything she could possibly need, as John had said: soap, shampoo, conditioner, toothpaste, a new toothbrush, moisturizer. In another drawer was a blow dryer and an assortment of brushes and combs.

  She was so tired all she wanted to do was fall in bed and sleep for the rest of the day. They were safe, the job completed. She had done what she signed on to do.

  She should feel satisfied, or at least relieved. All she felt was a great hollow pain that had started in her chest and now seemed to fill her entire body. It was finished. Over. John. The job. Everything.

  "I can't let him go," she whispered, leaning her head on her hands. She loved him too much. She had tried to fight it for weeks now; loving a man like him was a tough thing to do. She had already loved one damn hero, and losing Dallas had nearly destroyed her. What she was risking now was too devastating to even contemplate, but there was no turning back.

  Nor could she see any future for them. John was, essentially, a lobo. They had worked as a team on this job, but that wasn't likely to happen again. By necessity he had to limit the number of people who knew his real identity, and carefully control any contact with them. She still didn't understand why she was one of those few people, despite what he said about being taken by surprise and blurting out his real name. John Medina didn't blurt out anything: Everything he said, everything he did, was toward some aim.

  So why had he told her? She was nobody, a low-level tech with a talent for electronic surveillance. He could have kept quiet and let her go on believing his name was Tucker, or he could have come up with some other name; God knows he had a list of them tucked away somewhere in that convoluted brain of his. She had no way of knowing the difference.

  She would drive herself crazy wondering about him, what he was doing and why he was doing it. No sane woman could possibly love him, but if this job had taught her one thing, it was that she wasn't sane. She was an adrenaline junkie, a risk-taker, and though she had spent the past five years fighting her own nature, punishing herself for Dallas's death and trying to shape her life, her personality, into a more conventional pattern, she could no longer maintain the illusion. All John had to do was walk through a door and beckon her, and she would go with him- anywhere, any time.

  It angered her that she could be so defenseless against him. If he had shown any corresponding weakness, she wouldn't feel so hopeless. He liked her, she knew; physically he had responded when they kissed, and he had certainly risen to the occasion in Ronsard's office, but a physical response from a man was so automatic she couldn't let herself read any importance into it. Men were, as he himself had pointed out, simple creatures. All they required was a warm body. She had filled that requirement.

  She could stand there all day running the details around and around in her mind, like a rat trying to escape from a maze, but she always came back to the same end: She couldn't see a future with John. He was what he was. He lived in the shadows and risked his life on a daily basis, and kept his personal life to a minimum. She even loved that part of him, because how many people in the world could do what he did, make the sacrifices he had made?

  All she could do was hope she saw him now and again. Even every five years would be enough, if she could just know he was alive.

  Shuddering, she pushed away that last thought and at last moved into action, stripping off her filthy clothes and stepping under the warm shower. She put her mind in neutral, soaping and scrubbing and shampooing, scrubbing away at a stubborn dark stain on her thigh until she realized it was a bruise.

  Getting clean made her feel marginally better, though the face she saw in the mirror was still pale and strained, her eyes shadowed with exhaustion. She took full advantage of the amenities provided, brushing her teeth, smoothing moisturizer into her skin, blow-drying her hair. There was even a tube of medicated cream, and she dabbed that on the raw places on her feet.

  The grooming rituals had a sedative effect, easing the tightness of her nerves. She could sleep now, she thought, and even managed a smile to herself. As if sleeping had ever been in any doubt! She planned to spend at least ten hours horizontal, more if she could manage it.

  She would deal with her dirty clothes later, she decided, and wrapped herself in the thick, soft