Off the Grid Read online

  She rolled her eyes. “Like you don’t already?” She pushed him off her. “I knew I shouldn’t have said anything. Now you’ll be impossible—more impossible,” she corrected herself.

  There wasn’t much room in the twin bed, so he got out to push the two beds together and tossed the condom in the wastebasket while he was at it. She didn’t object when he slid down beside her and tucked her in against his chest.

  Might as well save time. He was pretty sure she’d end up wrapped in his arms anyway.

  Seventeen

  Kate missed Percy’s big party.

  After Colt’s proclamation about Rear Admiral Morrison’s suicide, she’d been too upset. Had their meeting with the rear admiral sent him over the edge? Was his suicide an admission of guilt? Who else knew? Did this mean Scott and the others were in the clear and could come out of hiding?

  She voiced all but the last question to Colt. He didn’t know, but they spent the next few hours trying to find out, using both her connections and his.

  They hadn’t come up with much more than they’d already had. Colt learned that the investigation was being kept quiet so far—the circumstances seemed cut-and-dried. She found out that the rear admiral had cleared out the last of his bank accounts a few days earlier, but she still hadn’t been able to locate any accounts that were in the green. By her calculations he was more than two hundred grand in the hole. That gorgeous home they’d visited on the golf course? Mortgaged to the hilt and purchased at the height of the market about five years ago. If he’d tried to sell the property, they’d have been underwater.

  Colt left before Percy got home from the party, which was a good thing, as Percy was furious enough. Seeing Colt would have made that stiff-upper-lip facade crack even more.

  She’d embarrassed Percy by not showing up and more so by not calling with an explanation. Did she realize how that looked?

  Kate could explain the first but not the latter. She could have called; she just hadn’t thought of it.

  Which in a way was worse.

  He’d been worried. Although not worried enough, she realized, to call her.

  They’d argued. Did she understand his position and the duties that she was agreeing to as his wife?

  Of course she did. But that didn’t mean those duties would take precedence over her own work.

  When Percy hadn’t agreed, she’d been floored. Apparently, he thought they did take precedence.

  When he decided to sleep on the couch downstairs, Kate didn’t object.

  Things had been better in the morning—he’d apologized for losing his temper—but when he left for work, he told her that if she was having second thoughts about their marriage she needed to be honest with him—and herself.

  She knew he was right. She’d fought long and hard to get over her heartbreak with Colt, and she desperately wanted to make her relationship with Percy work. Maybe a little too desperately. Had she worked too hard? Percy was a good man. In so many ways he was everything Colt wasn’t—kind, loving, respectful of her job and life. She cared about him deeply, but . . .

  There shouldn’t be a “but.”

  Kate pushed the errant thought away. She couldn’t think about it right now—not with Hurricane Colt confusing her. She was meeting him first thing the next morning to plan out their course of action. If Mrs. Morrison alerted the police to their visit, it wouldn’t be long before the investigators came knocking and wanted to know why they’d met with the rear admiral hours before he’d killed himself. They needed to come up with a plausible explanation and get their story straight.

  Fortunately, he’d agreed to put off his trip to Russia until everything was sorted out.

  But today she had to clear her tracks. She’d gotten rid of all the surveillance programs she’d had on the rear admiral’s electronics last night, but she wanted to make sure she got rid of any trail at work, too. She was well aware of the fact that what she was doing might be construed as illegal—destroying evidence—but as her surveillance had been unsanctioned, that ship had probably already sailed. Besides, protecting Scott came first.

  To that end, she spent most of the afternoon and into the night looking into the reporter and her source at the DoD. Kate needed only half that time, and a glance at the pool car logbook, to connect the dots.

  She saw the name of the woman who’d requested the car and driver on the date in question and couldn’t believe her eyes. Nor did she believe in coincidences.

  When she walked into the coffee shop the next morning after only a few hours of sleep, Colt must have realized she was upset. He stood and reached for her as if he still had a right to touch her without realizing what he was doing. As soon as he did, he dropped his hand.

  The tightening in her chest wasn’t as easily disposed of. That protective look, the concern, the I’ll-make-all-your-troubles-go-away certainty had always taken the edge off what was bothering her. It had made her feel as if they were a team. She’d counted on him in a way she’d never allowed herself to count on anyone before.

  She’d forgotten how much she missed that. But she couldn’t let herself get confused. He’d shown her who he was; she had to believe him.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. “What did you find out?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said. “But we need to go see my godfather.”

  * * *

  • • •

  The last place Colt wanted to go was Castle Murray—or whatever the hell the general’s “estate” was called. But he understood Kate’s insistence when she explained what she’d found: the general’s longtime assistant had requested a car on the same night Brittany Blake had met with her “source.”

  What he hadn’t understood was Kate’s reaction to his question about how she’d learned of the reporter’s source at all. It had clearly jellied her. She’d claimed that she and Brittany had crossed paths when she and Colt were married and become friends. But to Colt’s knowledge, Blake and his sister had been estranged for a long time.

  He was almost certain Kate was lying to him.

  But the question of why would have to wait. Jeeves, or whatever the hell the butler’s name was, welcomed Kate at the door with a smile and a fond kiss on the cheek. He acknowledged Colt with a pursed mouth and a slight inhaling of his nostrils, as if something unpleasant had just been stuck under his oversized nose. Unlike the last time Colt was here, they were admitted to the inner sanctum of the general’s private office immediately.

  “My dear!” Murray said, rising from his seat behind the desk. He came around to give Kate a big hug. “What a pleasant surprise.”

  The last was said with a sharp glance toward Colt. Clearly it was a surprise to see him as well, but not a pleasant one. Colt was supposed to be in Russia. And the general probably wasn’t happy to see him with Kate, either.

  But the old guy needn’t have any worries on that account. Colt and Kate were working together because they had to. Nothing more. If Colt had any regrets about his “karma” dig from the other day, he wasn’t going to admit it—even to himself. All he’d done was establish the lines of the playing field.

  Whatever unwanted feelings and attraction had been resurrected by being around his ex didn’t matter. That grave was buried under six feet of ice. It would take a hell of a lot more than a raging hard-on to chip through it.

  Although it was an impressive hard-on.

  It was that damned dress. His eyes had nearly popped out of his head when she’d answered the door the night of Percy’s party. Kate had never dressed sexy when they’d been married. He probably wouldn’t have let her walk out of the house in a dress like that—it would have been ripped off her well before she left the bedroom. The slinky red silk had clung to every slender curve. Her hips. Her ass. Her tits. She might as well have been poured into it. He’d had to move to the opposite side of the room after he’d caught a few too many