Cloud Invasion: R-D 2 (R-D #2)(66)

"With a water view?"

"The best they have to offer."

"Sounds fine," I shrugged. "When?"

"Tonight?"

"Is it big enough for all of us?"

"With room left over."

Opal has a nice smile, when she chooses to offer one.

"One place is just as good as another," I agreed. We were coming to the part where we'd be in danger, no matter where we were. If moving made them feel more comfortable, then we'd move.

"You tell Rafe, we'll tell the others," Nick grinned.

"Leave me with the hard job, huh?"

"Goes without saying."

"What goes without saying?" Ilya walked in. He hadn't bothered to sound like Rafe around the others in days. He felt comfortable being himself, I think.

"That you're the hard sell," I said. "We're moving. To the Gulf Coast. It'll make them feel better," I nodded to Nick and Opal.

"What about you?" He sat down beside me, his dark eyes wandering my face, attempting to read my preferences.

"It doesn't matter where we are," I said. "Plus, we've probably been here long enough."

"Then we'll move," Ilya slapped his knee as if that were the last word on the matter.

"You don't have to pack anything-I can take it with us. How's the kitchen where we're going?" I asked Opal.

"Everything you'd want and more."

"Outstanding."

*

"You have rich friends," I said the moment we landed in the huge beach house. With three levels and more than six thousand square feet, it had to cost in the millions.

"I call dibs on the first-floor bedroom," Nick said. I wasn't surprised; it was next to the state-of-the-art workout room.

Richard, Maye and Nathan took the suites on the second floor, leaving the top floor master suite to Ilya and me.

A half-moon hung low over the water as I walked onto the large deck behind the house. Darkness had fallen earlier, but moonlight glittered on the waters of the gulf behind the massive house.

"This is nice," Ilya breathed against my neck as he leaned in to place a warm kiss. "I haven't seen you use the sunlamps much lately. Are you all right?" He pulled away, concern in his eyes.

"I've developed a way around that," I said. "I can't explain it-it's sort of complicated."

"As long as you are all right," he said and tilted my chin. His mouth met mine in a demanding kiss.

"I'm fine," I said, after he broke the lingering connection.

"If we were alone, I'd make a bed here in the moonlight and we would make love," he said.

"That sounds nice," I breathed. "Really nice."

"Will you take us to bed?" he breathed against my mouth.

He didn't have to ask twice.

*

French and German airliners were shot down the following day. Somehow, I felt the enemy was rushing his plans after he learned I was still alive. That's why I took Ilya with me when I paid Merle Askins a visit in D.C.

He was cleaning out his desk to make room for whomever took his place. His assistant almost screamed when Ilya and I appeared inside the office and blew the door shut with power. Evidence of the creature's temporary occupation of the space was everywhere-the new Director would be forced to redecorate.

"Don't scream again," Ilya cautioned Merle's assistant, holding up a hand. "You won't like my reaction if you do."

"Are you threatening us?" Merle snapped.

"Seriously? I wouldn't bother to threaten you-I'd just make you dead, Merle," I deadpanned.

He backed up against the window, hoping, I'm sure, that the cavalry would gallop in to rescue his sorry ass.

"I came to make an offer," I said. "Come clean about your real boss, and I'll cure your cancer."

"My real boss was the President," he began.

"Which one?" I asked sweetly.

"What?" he sputtered.

"You know what I'm talking about, so stop pretending. Tell me what he looks like now and I'll fix your lungs. No worries."

I saw the fear come over him, then. He wanted to live, but the horror of what his boss might do to him was greater. Fortunately, I was able to read that in him-there was no fog on his brain. At least not yet. He knew Hal Prentice was posing as the former President. He knew the real former President was behind Hal Prentice's masquerade. He didn't know much past that, but a confession would call out the enemy, at least. Askins wasn't willing to cooperate because he was terrified.

"Fine," I tossed up a hand. "Just remember that I offered." Ilya and I disappeared.

*

We heard from Auggie and Matt Michaels later the same day. Hours earlier, a technician in Matt's employ had found a tiny chip in one of the rockets I'd deactivated in Colombia.

It had a code on it.

I had to pick both of them up at Auggie's office, but that wasn't a problem. "We think we've found where these things are manufactured, or at least some of their components," Auggie said as Ilya set glasses of iced tea in front of him and Matt. "We traced the chip back to a factory in Russia, but that's not where they're making the rockets. We had to do some careful maneuvering, but the chips were delivered to a building on the Russian-Ukrainian border. We believe they're transporting the chips underground to manufacture the rockets elsewhere."