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They’d spent the night further looking into the backgrounds of the suspects they’d both come up with. Ford Grace, Samuel Waterstone, Ronald Claymore, and Stephen Menton-Squire. Added to that list were Raymond Greer and Jerric Abbas.
She knew that was bullshit, she already had it out in the open. Micah’s portrayal of Jerric was excellent, though, she’d give him that. Few agents would have known the difference. But she had.
She had, and something inside him that warned him that Bailey was slowly figuring him out as well, even as he watched her.
The temperature was still fairly moderate, just cold enough for a thick, heavy wet snow. The flakes caught in her dark hair and glistened among the strands as she trailed her fingers over a winter-dead climbing rosebush as it hung tenaciously to its trellis.
She was thinking, and he’d learned in Australia that this was never a good thing, unless it involved a mission.
In his case, John knew it was a very, very bad thing. She was already suspicious. He’d slipped into her laptop enough times to know she was already aware that Micah Sloane was her cousin, David. She was too fucking intuitive. She’d pieced that one together with such accuracy that it was frightening. And she was piecing together the truth about him with the same accuracy.
He hated hiding it. Every time she stared up at him with those inquisitive green eyes, every time he saw the questions in them, the pain and the loss she felt.
She was getting closer to piecing it together. Not through investigation or proof, but through her own intuitive strength. It was one of the reasons she had made such an excellent agent. Bailey could see beyond most disguises. She studied body movements, expressions, and characteristics. Things that were much harder to change. She looked beyond the skin and that made her incredibly dangerous to the Elite Ops.
If Jordan weren’t being so fucking stubborn, she would have made just as strong an agent for the Elite Ops.
Shaking his head at the thought, he flipped open his cell phone and hit the secure line into headquarters.
“Morgan’s Meats,” Jordan answered on the first ring as John activated the added scrambler on his phone.
“Activate Black Jack,” John stated. “We’re moving.”
He cut the line before it could be traced or descrambled. To this point, he hadn’t needed backup, or hadn’t considered it important. If Warbucks was getting ready to move, then he wanted Travis in place. As his bodyguard, Travis wouldn’t be considered a threat or unknown. And if this was getting to move, then John would feel more comfortable with the knowledge that there was someone else watching Bailey’s back as well.
She might not be certain that he was Trent yet, but she wasn’t far from it. And the problem with that was, he knew he was slipping in front of her. Slipping in ways she couldn’t miss. It was almost instinctive, as if a part of him needed her to know, even though realistically he knew she would only end up hurt in the end. God knew, he didn’t want to see her hurt more.
Breathing out wearily at the problems he was facing, he turned and headed out to meet her. She looked like a fairy princess with the snow falling around her and hair lying about her shoulders like a cape.
He needed to be with her. Denying himself the pleasure of her warmth was more than he was capable of. He needed the memories when this was over. If he had to walk away from her or, God forbid, he didn’t survive this mission, then he wanted her to know he’d given her every part of himself while he could.
Moving down the stairs, he snagged his long leather jacket from the foyer closet and headed to the back of the house. Wide French doors led to the gardens and the snowy wonderland that awaited there.
He loved the snow, even the cold sometimes. Shrugging on the heavy leather coat, he moved through the massing snow, following the dim prints of her footsteps, moving deeper into the gardens toward the gazebo where she had been heading. The shelter was as large as some rooms, surrounded by latticework.
Stepping up to the doorway, he watched as she sat on the cushioned bench and stared at the open fireplace that sat in the middle of the structure.
A blaze leapt hungrily at the logs she had laid fuel to, illuminating her thoughtful face as she curled into the corner of the wide seat.
She wore a long, heavy sweater over her jeans and cashmere top. Heat radiated from the fireplace, painting a golden hue over her as her head lifted and her gaze met his.
They hadn’t discussed much other than the mission at hand since the morning before. She’d almost avoided him otherwise and she’d definitely avoided any references whatsoever to anything more personal than how to conduct themselves once they were back in the public eye.
“We have a party tomorrow night,” she told him as he stepped into the shelter. “Stephen Menton-Squire had invitations issued this morning. I received one by text. It’s formal—most of them are. His Winter Ball. His wife, Josephine, was one of my mother’s best friends. Her and Janice Waterstone.”
“Your mother enjoyed throwing parties as well,” he stated. “Your file is filled with references to her charities and the newsworthy balls she hosted.”
A small smile tugged at her lips. “Mother always grasped the opportunity to squeeze out donations to her favorite charities. Her parties were mere excuses to draw the most moneyed of her acquaintances into one place and ply them with good liquor or champagne. Then, while their defenses were down, she would sweet-talk them like the southern belle she was.”
He grinned at the thought. Her mother had been known as a kind, gracious lady who didn’t mind getting her hands in the dirt if she had to. She had planted the gardens here herself, working with a few landscapers for the heavier projects, but her hands had helped shape it.
“Mother was an angel,” she said softly. “Everyone loved her.”
Especially her daughter.
“I often wonder if the man who hired Orion to kill them gave any thought to what they were doing to someone who had most likely cared for him,” she said softly. “My mother knew the men we’re looking at, she was friends with their wives, their children called her Auntie Angie. She would have had him at her dinner table. She would have kissed his cheek and smiled at him the night she was killed.”
Benjamin and Angelina Serborne had died in a crash after leaving a party Ford Grace had hosted.
