Thrill Ride (Black Knights Inc. #4)(92)
Adrenaline instantly surged, but before she could fight back, an entire mob of people in eveningwear were rushing her back into the bathroom…
“Move her toward the back of the room,” a deep, smooth voice instructed, a voice she’d recognize anywhere.
Her heart began racing out of control as her eyes searched the group of people in front of her. It appeared as if an entire wall of humanity was pushing her past the row of stalls. She lost her shoe on the travertine tile floor and dropped her handbag as she struggled against the crowd, but there was no breaking away from the flesh and blood vice wrapped around her arms.
And, then…
There he was. Rock Babineaux. Dressed in a slim-cut tuxedo, altogether too much alive.
Goddamn CIA! They screw up everything! was her first thought.
They’d screwed up when they stopped funding for The Project. They’d screwed up when they let her go as a result. And now they’d gone and screwed up by not killing Rock.
Of course her second thought obliterated everything before it. Because her second thought had ice water rushing through her veins.
Oh, God, how did he find me?
“Take your hand off her mouth, Boss,” he said, coming to stand in front of her, the people with him fanning out behind him.
Boss…The Black Knights. He was here with the Black Knights…
The ice water in her veins froze solid, and goose bumps pebbled her skin.
The hand that was over her mouth lifted away, but the big arm wrapped around her, holding her in place, remained iron tight.
“You,” she breathed then realized her mistake before she took it too far. Shaking her head, she donned a baffled expression. “Who are all you people?”
“Cut the crap, Rwanda Don,” Rock hissed, leaning forward until their noses were barely an inch apart, until she could see the forest green striations in his pretty hazel eyes.
Rwanda Don…How in the world had he pieced it together? Her stomach climbed up her throat to sit at the back of her mouth.
“Who…” She swallowed loudly, shaking her head, knowing her eyes were big and round. If she could just play dumb until help arrived, she could take some time to regroup, time to figure out how they’d made her, and time to decide the best way to destroy whatever evidence they’d found and discredit the entire lot of them. She had friends in very high places, after all. “Who’s Rwanda…Rwanda Don?”
A look of disgust passed over Rock’s face, and he sighed heavily before settling back onto his heals.
“I guess we’re gonna do this the hard way, non?” he said, shaking his head.
“I…I don’t know what you’re t-talking about,” she murmured, feeling a frightened tear slip from the corner of her eye to trail down her cheek.
What was the hard way? She didn’t dare contemplate it…
***
Rock looked at the woman who’d ruined his reputation and tried to have him killed and had a hard time seeing the shadowy Rwanda Don in her. The coiffed, ash-blond hair, the Botox-ed forehead, the demure string of pearls laying against her slightly aging neck all screamed staid politician’s wife. But the look in her eye…?
It was frantic and scared and altogether knowing.
She was Rwanda Don all right. Now he just needed to make her admit it.
And he knew just how to go about doing it.
Taking a deep breath, dragging in the scents of industrial cleaner, high-class perfume, and fresh cigarette smoke, he began with, “We’ve read your thesis.”
“Wh-what?” she asked, pulling off the whole timid, middle-aged woman shtick with aplomb. Which was probably because, despite the psychology degree, the famous husband, and the super-secret spy life, the fact remained she was just a timid, middle-aged woman.
A timid, middle-aged woman who suffered from a God complex and more than a little bit of crazy. And she was no match for a man with his training and ability.
“The one outlinin’ the jobs of Investigator, Interrogator, and…” he snapped his fingers, the signal for Dunn to step from the back of the group. This was the first part of his strategy. “…Cleaner.”
Her gaze flickered when Dunn came to stand beside him, her nostrils flaring slightly.
Oui, you know exactly who he is.
“That’s supposed to be classified information,” she whispered, cornflower-blue eyes big and watery. “I don’t know who you are, or how you came about—”
“You know exactly who we are, Rwanda Don,” Rock interrupted. “Rwanda Don…Hmm, you weren’t very smart about choosin’ that code name were you? Donna Ward, Rwanda Don…a boring, unintelligent little anagram.”
At this her nostrils really flared. And, ah, the second part of his strategy seemed to be working. Her God complex didn’t suffer well under attacks on her mental acumen.
“We also know Fred Billingsworth was killed because, ostensibly, he’d discovered somethin’ unsavory about you, or maybe your husband, or maybe your involvement with a highly illegal operation known as The Project.”
She was working hard to control it, but her breathing was accelerated. To anyone without a trained eye, she still just looked scared and confused. But to him? Pay dirt. He was pushing the right buttons.
The Knights, bless them, were silent and still as apparitions behind him. Creating a wall of support for him and a wall of opposition for Donna Ward.