Love and Let Die (Masters and Mercenaries #5)(102)

So he was finally going to get into it. A little shiver went through her. This was the conversation they should have had five years ago. “I didn’t. He contacted me.”

“So you weren’t looking for an assassin?”

She felt pinned by him, unable to do much more than answer his questions. “I was, but I was doing it quietly. I had reached out to another syndicate, one in the US. They had problems with my father. They were both fighting over some territory. My father wanted to expand out of Russia.”

“What kind of territory?” His tone was flat, the same as he probably used on everyone he interviewed.

“Drugs. They were just trying to get into the pharmaceutical business, and the States was the best place to do it.”

Ian nodded. “They were bilking Medicare and Medicaid?”

It was a common practice for the syndicate. They took money from government programs. “Yes. They would buy doctors who would write prescriptions for patients. OxyContin mostly. He didn’t care if the patients took the drugs or went and sold them. The patients worked for the syndicate.”

Ian held up a hand. “I understand how it works. So let me get this straight, you reach out to a rival syndicate, but Nelson replies. You reach out to a syndicate that is making money off pharmaceuticals. Nelson was supposed to be working in Europe at the time, but he wasn’t in Russia according to what I could find out. He sees a way to get the ten million in bearer bonds that I’m going to use in my operation, but he has to get rid of me to do it. So he sends you in. An exchange of services, so to speak.”

God, he could make her feel like a prostitute, but then again, she’d put herself here. “Yes.”

“And he used your father as a scapegoat. He convinced the Agency that your father was the likely suspect for claiming to have the uranium we were attempting to buy. Once he was dead and there was no further evidence, the case was closed. He couldn’t use the bonds for years so everything quieted down. The Agency was too busy dealing with me. I suppose I should be happy they bothered with me at all. They could have burned me and let me rot in a London jail.”

He wouldn’t have lasted long. When she looked at the evidence from Ian’s perspective, there was no way to find her innocent. “I didn’t understand what was going on at the time. I only knew I had to get out or my father was going to eventually kill my sister. Nelson offered me a way to run. He offered me money and a chance to be free of my father.”

“What else did he offer you? Did he offer you comfort?”

She shivered at the thought. “No. He offered me a job.”

“Now that I find interesting. What did it involve?”

She had to shrug. “He just gave me money and told me to get to the States and he would contact me.”

“What do you know about his finances?”

She hated the cold, flat tone he was using on her. “Chelsea knows more than I do.”

“I don’t want to talk to Chelsea. I want to talk to you.”

He wanted to torture her, but she owed him answers. “Fine. I know he’s got accounts all over the place, but I was surprised to find out he doesn’t have a ton of liquid. In the last year, I’ve connected him to several mafia jobs and a couple of terrorist groups.”

“Why would he be working with terrorists…Charlie, baby, what did the terrorism involve?”

Fuck, how could she have not seen it? “Oil fields. They were destroying equipment in oil fields. The groups do it to protest American involvement in the Middle East.”

Ian stood up, stretching. “Yeah, well, I don’t think Nelson gives a crap about the Middle East. But he does seem to care deeply about oil.”

A few pieces to the puzzle fell into place. “He’s working for an oil company.”

“That would be my guess at this point. If we take everything we know, we can probably figure out what company it is. He’s freelancing, but it isn’t for other governments. He’s freelancing for corporations. A terrorist for hire, so to speak. It makes a man wonder. I heard a rumor a couple of months back about some ex-Special Forces aiding in the civil wars in certain African countries that have a high level of diamond mines. They were getting paid by diamond merchants to keep the war going because the minute the war ends, the market will be glutted with diamonds and the price will go down. What if Nelson is trying to manipulate the price of crude?”

She thought about everything she knew about the king of Loa Mali. “The rumor is Kamdar is working on an energy project.”

He walked up to her, his expression softening a little. He reached down, touching the pad of his index finger to her nose. “Smart girl. Keep quiet. The other rumor was that the man brokering the deal with the mercenaries was an intelligence operative.”

She didn’t like the suspicion in his voice. “You don’t think it’s Ten, do you?"

He was suddenly invading her space, pressing his body to hers. It seemed the interrogation was over. “Don’t let Ten’s idiot bongo beach boy attitude fool you. He’s deadly, Charlie. He’s been with the Agency since he was a kid. They recruited him straight out of college. He’s smart, fast, and he has no ties to anyone. He grew up in foster care. Do you know why he’s named Tennessee?”

She could only guess. “His mom loved Tennessee Williams?”