Blacklisted: Blacklist Operations Book #1 Read online

  When Veronica pushed back her drink and crossed to the elevators, he finished his Coke and waited until the doors had slid silently closed in front of her face. He dropped a few bills on the table and left as quickly as he’d entered.

  The opulence of the hotel made no impression on him, nor had it at the moment he first entered. The thick, colorful carpets, sparkling fountains and curved balconies that lined the interior of the place were just the trappings of wealth, which he’d had long enough that it no longer mattered. It was just another place where Aidan had been dispatched to do work that needed to be done.

  Reaching the bank of elevators, he pressed a button and stepped in. Aidan reached out and hit 26, then stood with his arms crossed while the box rose.

  He’d never killed a woman before and he wasn’t looking forward to it now. But no matter his personal preferences, Veronica would die and he would be the one to kill her.

  Chapter Two

  Two drinks after a year of alcoholic abstinence had taken their toll on Sophie’s ability to balance perfectly. She stood in front of her hotel door, unsteady on her nude kitten heels, and dug her fingers through her purse, searching for the key to get into the room. She giggled when her fingers finally closed on the cold metal, then tried to jam it into the lock.

  With a shout of triumph, she pushed open the heavy door. It was nothing like the hotel doors she’d grown up with in America. It was thick, solid wood with a steel core. No one was getting in without permission.

  Before she could step into the room, a man strode out of the elevator and stopped, staring at her. After a beat, he pulled out his smartphone and started playing with the screen. Probably sending a text message.

  Sophie watched him for a moment. He looked gray. Older than her father would have been if he was still alive. He reminded her, too, of the oldest tenured faculty at every university. His coat was tweed and his shoes were slip-ons. The man must not be planning to leave the hotel, because he’d wilt immediately in the heat.

  He looked at her again, then back at his phone. Slowly, he moved down the hall. Sophie smiled, but he didn’t see it. Then the elevator beeped and they both jerked, turning to see a hotel employee walk out with a rolling cart of covered dishes.

  Sophie stepped through the door, away from the old man’s deliberate non-perusal. She’d learned to notice when a man was pretending not to look at her, and the old guy was a pro. “Such a perv,” she muttered, unsteadily kicking off her shoes in the direction of the closet.

  Walking into the bathroom, she stripped off her dress and turned on the shower. Soon steam was rolling through the bathroom, thick and fragrant like roses.

  Sophie didn’t want to sober up, but she knew the effects of the alcohol wouldn’t last long. She’d have to deal with the night. But for the moment things were easy and free in her brain. Until they weren’t, she’d enjoy the time she had.

  She slid off her panties and pulled the elastic band from her hair. Running her fingers through it, she stepped into the shower. The water hitting her skin felt like Heaven as the heat worked its way into her sore muscles. She slumped boneless against the tiled wall and let the water roll over her.

  Aidan stood on the roof of the hotel, looking down to the beach far below.

  God, he hated heights. But he’d tried to take the damn cart into Veronica’s room posing as room service after he’d failed to pick her lock and she was either too drunk or too savvy to answer the door. It had to be done. He’d already waited too long.

  He’d learned the importance of timing in Delta Force, but Aidan had been out for four years and he was slipping. Time to talk to his boss about a little retraining if he was going to make elementary fuckups like this. His body was in prime physical condition to fight in underground matches—but he needed to work out before he took on anymore death-defying crawls more than 25 stories above the ground.

  He had to be his best.

  The stolen hotel jacket strained across his shoulders. It was uncomfortable enough that he used one hand to rip it off and let it fall from his fingertips, fluttering down into the dark night. Then he attached the hook to the edge of the roof, circled himself with the harness and stepped off into nothing, rappelling down as his stomach sank.

  Slowly—so slowly—Aidan moved from the roof down to the room where he knew Veronica was staying. Heights sucked. No matter how often he found himself up in the air without a net, he’d never be used to it. The way the night wind brushed over his heated skin gave him chills, but he didn’t falter.

  Not even when the ground seemed to sway under him did he give in to his nausea. When he’d started training for Delta Force, he’d scaled ropes, then walls. Aidan’s instructor had told him that you don’t look down. Don’t ever take your eyes off what you’re moving toward. So he forced his eyes to focus on the light from Veronica’s window.

  If she was standing at her window, gazing dreamily at the sea, he was fucked. He had no doubt she’d punch through the glass and send him spiraling to the ground far below. He didn’t have time to die. Three days behind schedule meant that Oliver didn’t have time to send another operative. They needed her put down and to get the location of the documents she’d taken now.

  Not to mention that his body ending up on a beach in Dubai could cause some political problems. Hell, Oliver would probably posthumously fire him.

  This is the life. The steam had billowed into wet, white clouds around her and, though she’d been in the shower for more than half an hour, she wasn’t sure she’d ever get out. The concierge had pointed her toward a selection of herbed soaps and shampoos in the spa a few days before. Both she and Adele had spent lavishly, coming back to the suite with armfuls of caked soap and small bottles.

  For two years, they’d planned for the vacation. Sophie had family money that she refused to use; Adele didn’t have anything other than her salary and some decent investments. The trip wasn’t going to hurt anything, but they’d definitely feel the pinch if anything big came up in the next few months.

  Sophie hoped Adele was out dancing in one of the nearby nightclubs, or maybe drinking wine on a patio overlooking the ocean. They’d both been on edge during the weeks leading up to the trip, and the luxury had helped it melt away like ice cream on a hot summer day. They finally felt like themselves again.

  Humming the theme from Gilligan’s Island, Sophie finally shut off the shower, shivering when she pushed back the glass door and the air parted the clouds, kissing her skin with a chill. The bathroom was still cloudy, though, the steam thick enough so she could barely see.

  In an attempt to clear the room, she moved toward the door with her feet slipping a little on the tile. She cracked it open and fresh air rolled in, filling the room with the salt scent of the ocean. Turning back to the counter, she pawed through the cosmetics they’d stashed there. First, the face cream, which she slicked over her skin and rubbed in while eyeing the various lotions. Choosing one that smelled just a bit like roses, she rubbed it into her arms.

  A sound made her turn her head to the door, but no one was there. It made sense. Adele had no reason to be back so early.

  She set down the lotion and picked up a hair treatment. It was designed to keep the frizz down, which was incredibly important in such a hot place. She smoothed it through her hair, enjoying the clean scent. It reminded her of her mother’s dressing room when she was growing up, the smell of the cosmetics sweet in her nose when Sophie gripped the edge of the wooden vanity to peer at her own face in the mirror. Sometimes she and her sister would even get away with a pot of blush or bottle of perfume.

  Thinking about the smell of the hair treatment made her stop. They’d been there for almost a week and she’d never once smelled the sea air in her room. How would the scent of the ocean make it inside through the closed glass windows?

  She reached out with one hand and dragged it over the fogged mirror. Pressing hard, she moved her palm back and forth quickly, then stopped.

  There was a
man standing behind her.

  Terror gathered in her stomach. He didn’t move, and she didn’t respond, just kept moving her hand back and forth long after the glass was clear. With a sudden motion, she jammed her elbow back and slammed it into his ribs.

  He grunted and she pushed back, hoping she’d cracked him hard enough to slow him down. But the man absorbed the blow and, breathing hard, tangled his hand in her long, wet hair. When he yanked it, red pain flashed in front of her eyes.

  Sophie tried to turn and hit him again, but her feet couldn’t find purchase on the wet floor. The room spin crazily as she slid into the counter when he let go of her hair. Pain sung up her back and she turned in midair, hitting her face on the toilet.

  When he moved in to grab her, she kicked him and he fell back with a curse. Scrambling up, she ran for the door—but she was too slow. He wrapped a large hand around her mouth.

  Her teeth sunk into his skin.

  He didn’t pull back. Instead he wrapped his other arm around her neck and pressed in hard. She couldn’t breathe. Spots swam in front of her eyes. She watched the purple colors of the opulent bedroom beyond the door blur and fade, and then everything was just gone.

  Veronica’s naked body collapsed against him and he gathered her into his arms, a light burden. Part of him wished that she’d wrapped a towel around herself; he wasn’t made of stone. Though one part of him had grown hard when he took in her long, pale limbs.

  It was surprising that he’d subdued her so quickly. The last time they tangled—two years before in Beijing—she’d almost cut his throat. Maybe like him, she’d gone soft in the interim.

  He carried her into the bedroom and laid her on the bed, averting his eyes from her enticing curves. She wasn’t a woman. Not really. She was a vicious killer. A terrorist. She was the one link they had to stop what was going to happen.

  Aidan used zip ties from the pack around his waist to restrain her, locking them securely against the bedposts. Her head lolled to the side, her hair twisted down her shoulders in thick ropes of gold. Dressed in the bar, she’d seemed sophisticated.

  Naked and free of makeup, she looked impossibly young and tired.

  Turning from his perusal of her face, Aidan began to dig systematically through her room. Her passport, international driver’s license, American social security card, checks and credit cards were all in the same name. He couldn’t find anything hidden. Clever girl, he thought. In his early 20s, when he traveled on black ops missions with Delta Force, he’d carried several aliases at all times. Having only one meant having only one way out.

  A search of her luggage yielded what he would expect from a young woman traveling with a friend. There was casual clothing, a swimsuit, some dresses that would have peaked his interest if they belonged to a woman he didn’t despise, and silky underthings that made him curse and drop them as if they burned his skin. Nothing was in the pockets except a dry cleaning receipt in a light jacket. It was marked from Paris. There was minimal cash in her purse or the bedside table.

  A novel with a dog-eared page lay on the dresser. There was also lip gloss and a half-empty bottle of ibuprofen. He knocked on walls and furniture until his knuckles split again, but there was no trace of anything hidden in the room. If he’d checked it before knowing who was staying there, he’d have thought that the occupant was just a person visiting Dubai with a friend.

  But she wasn’t just some pretty girl in an exotic locale. She wasn’t here to browse the souks, walk on the beach or sip fruity, frozen drinks while laughing with fraternity boys. For all that she’d put on a good show the entire time he’d been watching her, there was no question that she was the woman he’d come to find.

  He’d met her before, but never in her natural state like this. Somehow Veronica had managed to disguise her lush curves and intriguing hollows when they’d clashed on assignment. Her eyes were the same bright blue he remembered, but they seemed larger in her porcelain face.

  She was beautiful, young…and a viper. A snake who would as soon look at him as blow him a kiss. Even if he couldn’t turn up anything of the ordinary in her room, he knew her for what she was. A murderer.

  Dima had been a good man. He didn’t deserve to end up with her knife in his chest, his body dumped alone by the water.

  A good agent knew how to cover her actions, and Veronica had been one of the best since he first became aware of her when he left Delta Force to fight his way to Bartek. Aidan couldn’t believe how young she was, even now that he was looking at her with his own eyes. But she couldn’t fool him.

  She could take all the day trips to the Palm Islands she wanted. The bitch could swim with dolphins, eat falafel and buy silk shoes while laughing her oblivious friend. All of it was a lie and Aidan didn’t have time to fuck around with her—he had two weeks to find the package. Veronica had three hours to tell him where it was, if she wanted a quick death.

  Chapter Three

  Sophie came to slowly. The silk wallpaper seemed off, like it was grayer than it had been before, fuzzy around the edges. She stared at the wallpaper, trying to see it as the expensive wrapping it was, instead of something alien in the room. She groaned, bit back the sound, then groaned again. Her head hurt. Her wrists burned. She jerked them forward, but couldn’t make them come in front of her.

  She was tied to the bed.

  Seeing the bonds snapped her to alertness. The muscles in her arms were screaming, and she wondered how long she’d been unconscious. The memory of the man in the mirror flooded her brain and she looked around, whipping her head wildly from one side to the other.

  He came around the corner.

  “Good morning, sleepyhead,” he said. Naked pain flashed across her face, but she didn’t try to restrain it. Her father had said that to her as a child.

  “Don’t rape me.” Sophie was shaking and wished she was sober. She could feel the plastic ties abrading her wrists where they’d slipped down. They cut hard into her flesh, making it numb.

  “Don’t flatter yourself. I wouldn’t rape you if you were the last woman on Earth and I had a hard-on that wouldn’t go down.”

  She cringed at his harsh words and, despite the predicament she was in, part of her was insulted. He looked at her naked body like she was pizza that had been left on the counter for three days. Like she was something indelicate or disgusting that he was forced to exist in the same space with.

  “Sorry if I jumped to conclusions,” she said, biting back her terror at the flatness of his eyes. They would have been beautiful if they hadn’t been so cold. “It’s just that you tied me naked to a bed.” To her horror, tears flooded her eyes. She didn’t like to be restrained in anyway.

  “Don’t misunderstand me, Veronica.” He put his hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “I don’t want your body. Or your money. I just need you to answer one question for me, and then I’ll kill you easy.”

  Ice flooded her body when she heard the word and she met his eyes with a snap. “No.” Sophie was grateful for the chill that swept her body, because it helped her stop tears from rolling down her cheeks. Looking to the left, she saw the window cut open and realized that the sea air sweeping in was making the temperature of the room lower than she could bear without clothing.

  “No?”

  “You can’t kill me. Please.” Sophie didn’t want to beg the man for anything, but she wouldn’t let him kill her. Not here. Not now.

  “Where did you put the package, Veronica?”

  “My name is Sophie. I don’t know what package you mean. I got a package at my new apartment in Rome with a table from IKEA. Is that what you want?”

  The man shook his head and sighed, then slipped off his jacket. She could see the end of a tattoo near his elbow. “I hate liars,” he muttered, looking away from her as if Sophie disgusted him. “Where’s the package?”

  “There is no package. Search everything. I don’t care.”

  The man dropped heavily on the bed, making her body slip to the side. He
twisted around to look at her and she noticed the strong flex of muscles in his torso. “I don’t want to torture you. Sure, you killed a friend of mine in cold blood. You almost killed me a few years ago. And I really fucking hate you and everything you stand for. But I don’t want to torture a woman.”

  “That’s good,” Sophie said, meeting his eyes. “I really don’t want to be tortured.”

  “I don’t relish the idea of you screaming in pain. Even the thought of you breaking and telling me the truth isn’t that appealing.” He didn’t break their gaze. “I don’t want to torture you, Veronica. But I will.”

  He was terrifying. His strength, his flat expression, the stage makeup she realized he was wearing now that he was close enough for her to study him. The lines on his face were mostly fake, painted on. His eyebrows and lips were changed, too. She didn’t recognize him, except as the man she’d thought elderly in the hall.

  “What’s your name?”

  “You know my name.”

  “Humor me,” she snapped, twisting her wrist in the restraints.

  “I’m Aidan. You’re Veronica. Where’s the package?” Sophie didn’t respond, just looked at him and tried to quell her shaking limbs.

  “I’m not Veronica,” she finally said, the words bursting out of her. “I swear to God, I’m not Veronica. I don’t know what package you want. Oh, god. I don’t know. I don’t know. Please don’t do this.”

  She wouldn’t have thought it possible, but his face shut down even more. This wasn’t a bluff. Instead of responding, he reached into his pocket, cut the ties holding one of her hands and moved to pull it onto his lap. Aidan pressed down hard enough that she felt the delicate bones of her hand shift.

  “Where is the package? I don’t believe in false starts. If you don’t want to answer this time, I’m going to dislocate two of your fingers. Then I’ll ask again.” He paused, waiting for an answer that wasn’t coming.