The Espionage Effect(18)
“Is there another?”
His black silhouette moved in a slow headshake. “Only the one. Meant to signify cohesiveness below all, above everything, holding the world as we know it together.”
“Not for a single government?”
He leaned forward. I’d already edged from my slouched position in the far corner of the couch to perch on the last inches of cushion nearest him without consciously realizing my movement. Warm breath fogged over my lips. I closed my eyes and inhaled deeply, trying to calm my racing heart.
“Not for any one. For everyone.” He paused, another smooth exhalation brushing over my skin, past my defenses. “We are the last, the most important protection humanity has.”
“To balance the ego of man.” I’d often thought it. Those in power believed they were above it all. Made decisions based on greed and misguided motivations.
The warmth of his steady breath fanned over my chin, my mouth. I inhaled his enticing male scent, salt and earthy spice. So close, his lips were one slight shift away from touching mine.
Instead, I rocked backward a few inches. Coolness rushed between us from the air conditioning current overhead. The long, narrow unit’s fins moved in lazy oscillation upward as I settled against the cushions of the couch. Even with the adjustment, he remained so near he took up all the air space, crowded out every other thing that I vaguely sensed I needed to focus on.
The minor distance cleared my head enough to realize that he’d straightened too. He watched me. Waiting for some move I’d yet to make. I dropped my head back onto the pillow and stared up into the darkness that clung to the ceiling. The air conditioning fins paused when it hit their maximum radius in the upward position, then began their gradual descent.
A puzzled piece clicked in my brain. “The limestone passages.”
“What?”
I snapped my fingers and pointed behind him, toward his blueprints. “Hydroelectric energy. There’s a generator, transformer…turbines.”
He spun back around, facing the desk. “Where? Show me.”
I leaned back further into the couch and stared up at the black void of the ceiling canvas, visualizing the mechanical schematics of the house blueprint. Imaginary phosphorescent lines glowed into existence, weaving a detailed tapestry in my mind’s eye.
“Bottom right quadrant. It’s disguised as an enormous wine cellar. Part of it probably is. But the mechanical room on the blueprints is too large for electrical purposes only. And the width in your schematic spans that entire side of the house. Underground rivers exist in this area, carved through the limestone. Anna was prattling off about one earlier today, the one at Xcaret.”
“How did…you stood over my shoulder for only a couple of seconds.”
“Eidetic memory. Mine delivers key pieces of data once my brain relaxes enough to see the bigger picture through the information gridlock.”
The light in front of him adjusted, and my imagined diagram disappeared as I turned to watch him. He’d unclipped his tiny penlight from the laptop screen and swept it over the blueprints from the bottom right corner toward the top. “You’re right. It goes straight through the house toward the inlet side.”
“There’s your delivery method.” I pushed up from the couch.
He let out a drawn-out sigh. “Do you know how long we’ve been trying to figure that out?”
When I stood beside him, I crossed my arms and gave a one-shoulder shrug. “You’ve been focused on standard communications. Typical transportation.” Although I would’ve thought a cloak-and-dagger spy organization would’ve had better intel. “You just obtained these blueprints?”
He leaned back in his chair, resting the penlight onto the center of the blueprints before glancing up at me. The diffused light from below illuminated his face, making his features appear almost menacing. He arched a thick eyebrow. “I did. Was shot ‘obtaining’ them.”
My gaze drifted down his uncovered back toward his side, although his position obscured the bullet graze from my view. He’d risked his life, put himself in peril, all for the greater good, against a man who wanted to harm innocents.
“Take me with you.” The quiet words were uttered before I could stop them.
“No.” With swift efficiency, he gripped the pages at the corners, aligned and folded them in half on a preexisting seam, then rolled them. “What makes you think I’m going inside?”
“You were studying the layout. Your attention was focused on the lower portion of the blueprints, the subterranean floors. And your gaze swept from left to right, repeatedly. Like you were memorizing the layout.”
His jaw tightened. “No.”
“Admit it. You need me. No need for blueprints or the risk of a wrong turn.”
He stood from the desk, scraping the chair legs back across the tiled floor. “I’ve worked for years without you. No way in hell am I risking you, or this operation, on some vacationing girl’s whim for adventure.”
“It’s not a whim.” I didn’t know what my motivation was. The urge hadn’t been there until I’d met this mysterious man who’d stumbled into my world. But now I became acutely aware that what he did, who he was, was something I’d yearned to do…to be…for a very long time. “And I’m not a girl.” No idea why I felt the need to emphasize that point. But the woman he’d touched, the pent-up desires he’d freed, could no longer be denied.