Spectre of Intention Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Tonya Macalino Reader Group

  Acknowledgements

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Seven Months Later...

  Afterword

  Sneak Preview TItle Page

  Sneak Preview of Faces in the Water

  Tonya Macalino Reader Group

  Other Books by Tonya Macalino

  About the Author

  Copyright

  For my parents,

  for whom no dream

  was ever too big.

  Sign up on the website: www.tonyamacalino.com.

  I would like to thank my husband Ray for slugging through oh so many manuscripts during his very precious spare time. And my kids for listening to Mommy go on and on about the latest developments in space elevator technology—as though that were the most fascinating subject in the world.

  To my brother, Jack, for snickering at all my technical mistakes and my sister, Trixy, for tactfully pointing out the psychological and physiological inconsistencies.

  I would also like to give a nod to my critique group: Rob Richards, Margaret Hammitt-McDonald, Tom Cutts, and Teri Watanabe. Thanks for taking me in and challenging my brain!

  For their generosity, kindness, and support through the publication process, I would acknowledge John Vincent and Lisa Holmes. Thanks again.

  And last, but absolutely not least, my own personal cheerleader, Teri Watanabe, for endless encouragement when a certain someone got discouraged, for retrieving untold numbers of errant prepositions and pronouns, and for helping decode the back end of publishing.

  My love to you all,

  Tonya

  Who was it who ran away like this?

  Lady Liberty never said, “Give me your social outcasts, your criminals, your bored, your adrenaline junkies.” But that was because she was scripted with poetry, colored with hope.

  So, who was it really who ran away like this?

  I had been all those things Lady Liberty never said she collected, but would I have ever considered this?

  The gray ribbon dangled from the center of a perfect blue sky; its slender length held up by nothing, having no beginning, only an ending here on the gleaming white platform where I stood. I tilted my head back, the infinitesimal sway of the great cruise ship leaving me floating, feeling as though I could reach up into that sky and grasp hold of that ribbon, as though I could give in to its seductive song: Come away, come away with me. Leave this all behind and begin again. This time it will be right. This time it will be real. No more lies, just a pure, new beginning.

  My hand floated up, but I lowered it back to the textured blue-gray silk of my skirt, dried the sweat from my palm. I had tried that before, the running. As desperate as I had been, as terrified as I was now, I didn’t think that would have driven me here.

  Pioneer’s Port.

  No, I definitely didn’t have the stuff of a pioneer. To be frozen, canned, raised up this elevator ribbon to the glittering emptiness of space, packaged neatly in a voyager, and shot off toward a promising-looking speck of light whose only name was a meaningless jumble of numbers and letters.

  I felt the familiar pull, warm and gentle behind me, long before his large hand settled on my shoulder.

  “Kaitlin.” My boss and mentor, Jessie Broadbent, squeezed my shoulder.

  I sighed and smiled, comforted despite myself.

  He kept his deep, rich voice low. “We’ve gotten this far. Everything’s going to be fine.”

  “Five years isn’t so long ago, and this isn’t some playboy’s mansion or a corporate fortress with a little hole that needs patching.” I turned to face him, and his hand slid away across the back of my suit jacket. “This is international security, a long-term, high-profile contract. They’re going to look. They’re going to find out.”

  A smile creased Jessie’s tanned, outdoorsman face, framing his bright green eyes with the beginnings of crow’s feet. “If they were going to say something, they would have done it by now. We won this contract thanks to your sales expertise. No more cold feet. Kaitlin Osgood doesn’t get cold feet.”

  No, but Ashley Porter sure as hell did. Especially when my signature at the bottom of that contract could be the last nail they needed for my coffin…if they knew. I took a deep breath, slid Ashley Porter back into her windowed closet where she was allowed to look out at the life we lived, but where her commentary would remain—after all these years—largely silenced. As my spine straightened and the worry slid from my face, Kaitlin settled back into place. I saw the satisfaction in Jessie’s eyes.

  I inclined my head. “Shall we go sign the contracts, Mr. Broadbent?”

  Jessie gestured for me to lead the way. Always the gentleman.

  The operations side of the ship gave the impression of a neatly labeled rat maze, winding in on itself and tricking you from reaching your goal by means of endless sameness. Little cash had been put into softening the laboratory look of the halls and offices with their sharp right angles, shiny institutional flooring, and blinding white walls. More than abovedeck I itched for the sunglasses I’d left in my cabin.

  By the time we reached conference room 5-F, I knew that if gremlins came along and removed all the small block-lettered signs along the hallway, Jessie and I would never find our way out again. Well, Jessie might, but by this point I was thoroughly turned around. The narrow meeting room we had been assigned even had laboratory-style mirrored observation windows down either side. Creepy. I glanced back at Jessie, but his hero mode had already been replaced with hardened security professional. I jerked Kaitlin over me a little tighter as he reached past me and opened the door.

  White laminate conference table; cushionless, velcro-to-your-nylons blue upholstery on the chairs. Better than stainless steel with floor drains, I guessed.

  A chair scraped as we entered the room: the don of the Pioneer Port Authority, William Nye. His perfectly tailored suit and elegantly sculpted white hair matched the steady, focused push I felt radiating off him. Not a cold or fiery push of negative intent, but that relentless forward energy that said he was already half way through this meeting and onto his next billion-dollar decision.

  Seated to his right, J.C. Brands, Port Operations Manager, looked up at William. He seemed to consider rising as well, then sent us a vague smile and returned to reading whatever was on his workpad. No negative intent there either, just the swirl of warm thrill and frustrated fire of a man focused on untangling the kind of problems he loved. I smiled at J.C.’s thinning pate and strode across the room to shake William’s hand.

  “Mr. Nye, I would like to introduce my boss and CEO of Countermeasures International, Jessie Broadbent. Jessie, Mr. William Nye.”

  “Will, please,” Mr. Nye corrected as I stepped aside so the two men could shake hands. “Please have a seat. Mr. Glaswell, our Director of Port Security, will join us in a moment.”

  Jessie looked to
me. I smiled and gave a small shake of my head, got an I-told-you-so look in return. No, if the calling out was going to come, it was going to come from the man who belonged in the empty chair next to J.C. So that’s where I sat, directly in front of that empty chair.

  And hoped. Hoped that it wouldn’t be him. Anybody but him.

  The silence stretched. Logistically, it should have been my role to start up the conversation. My mind stayed stubbornly blank.

  So, Will, with his impeccable manners, set up the play.

  “I’m counting on you and your team to test my staff during your stay. We expect to take our first prospective clients aboard in six months. Any of the restaurants, fitness facilities, hotel staff, spa, recreation—it’s all free while you’re here, if you fill out the comment screen at the end of each day.”

  Spa. If I survived this meeting, I was headed straight over.

  “Thank you, Will. I’ll be sure to inform the rest of my team of your generous offer,” Jessie replied.

  “I’m serious about this. I expect four-star service out of my people and there’s only one way to find out if they are going to give it.”

  “Understood, sir.”

  Nope. Jessie was not going to pick up that ball for me. I was definitely going to have to run with it myself.

  “So, Will—”

  The door popped behind me. I nearly popped out of my seat. I did end up coming up out of my chair, just to see, just to finally know what was coming at me. As I turned, it grabbed me—a jerk of intention directed so forcefully at me personally that it had me hanging onto the back of my chair for balance. Bright blue eyes, shimmering with vitality. That sharp pull tightened, our first meeting in the flesh, the recognition in his fresh, vivid face, reflecting back the curiosity I knew he saw in mine. For a year we had worked together only as voices—a fast, well-matched rhythm, a pair of clever minds. For a year, I had known him without knowing him. Now here he was with the power to destroy my life.

  He shifted the stack of workpads onto one arm to push back a short sweep of sandy, sun-bleached hair.

  The movement broke the moment.

  His intention shifted abruptly into a snarl of hot and cold, push and pull. Completely unreadable. Oh, shit.

  Inside my brain, Ashley slammed open the closet door, “The perfect hair, the perfect blue dress shirt with the perfect tie. Don’t trust this guy. Get away! Get the fucking hell away!” Kaitlin grabbed that ragged old me and shoved her back inside, held the door closed against her hysteria. Kaitlin thought the man in that perfect blue shirt was the most beautiful, the most dangerous thing she had ever seen.

  I watched Camden Glaswell circle the sharp corners of the table followed by his two lieutenants. In my business, in my past, I had known a myriad of different types of law enforcement professionals. Protect and serve. Some embraced different faces of the protector: the tough guy; the righteous soldier…or the unfortunate bureaucrat with a badge. For others it was the chance to play war games. Camden Glaswell came to it to help. Pure and simple. That much was in his face. That much made me want to let Ashley take the helm and run. But more important was what made Kaitlin nervous: the way his easy smile—as it crept up to fill those all too intelligent eyes—bore no trace of his disjointed emotional focus.

  None of that stopped me from reaching out to take his offered hand, from letting that tingle of contact creep slowly up my arm.

  “Nice to finally meet you, Cam.”

  “How was the trip, Kaitlin? Any problems getting your sea legs?”

  He looked so concerned; I smiled just to reassure him. “Barely noticeable.”

  God, what were those eyes trying to see? I forced myself to relax under his scrutiny.

  Finally, Cam released me to shake Jessie’s hand. “And the trip, Mr. Broadbent?”

  “It was a smooth ride. Thank you, Mr. Glaswell.”

  On that, I had to shoot Jessie a wry grin. A four-hour flight from Miami to Ecuador, a quick three-hour hop over to the Enchanted Islands, followed by a twelve-hour boat ride from the Galapagos to this unknown point in the Pacific. It would probably be exactly that many days more until my brain realigned with my body. Jessie was, of course, fine.

  As Cam passed out the workpads with the contracts, I settled back into my chair. So, I couldn’t read him. Then time to try the lieutenants. I introduced myself to each of them to give me the excuse to focus on them directly. The first woman was dark, maybe part African, part Hispanic. Ms. Davina Soto, Operations Security. Everything coming off of her said we were not her pick to receive the contract. Her negativity focused more on Cam and Will with a little left over for Jessie and me. And then came the grinning redhead: Mr. Arlen McEnnis, Hospitality Security. Who was pretty much exclusively thinking about nailing me against the wall.

  Okay, next!

  I pulled the contract verification cards from my shoulder bag and handed one to Jessie. He looked at me for confirmation, but I could only shrug my eyebrows. I wanted to be reassured. Davina and Arlen seemed to have no knowledge. Will and J.C. didn’t seem to know. I couldn’t believe that Cam would have kept that kind of information from his boss or the managers he’d brought with him to the face-off. I should have been reassured…but alone, in my self-imposed exile, I just couldn’t read intentions like I used to. I couldn’t see what people wanted to do. I could only guess by feel—and that would always leave so much room for misunderstanding.

  Time to take the leap.

  Jessie and I passed the cards our lawyer had prepared for us over the workpad’s reader. After a moment, the card flashed green with confirmation that no unapproved changes had been detected. I navigated through the signature screens, then laid my hand over the screen just as Will, Jessie, and Cam did.

  Bio-signature one confirmed.

  Raise pad for bio-signature two.

  I aligned the marks on the screen with my eyes.

  Bio-signature two confirmed.

  Signed contract being transmitted.

  Transmission complete.

  Receipt of contract confirmed by:

  Miller, Kohlson, and Associates.

  3:00 p.m. EDT

  May 13, 2048

  It was done.

  Nobody was pulling out badges. Or guns. Or handcuffs.

  I probed out across the table. Cam’s frenetic, unintelligible emotional state remained unchanged.

  Could I really have gotten away with it?

  Ashley wasn’t buying it. In any other moment, the force of her distrust could have cracked that closet door, set her free. In any other moment. In this moment, Kaitlin struggled to keep a very unprofessional foolish grin off my face.

  I glanced over at Jessie, the adrenaline of relief pounding through me so hard, I had to tuck my hands beneath the table. Jessie rose and Mr. Nye got to his feet as well. The two men shook hands vigorously. I dried my cold palms as Cam pushed up from his chair. Our turn. As his hand caught mine, he gave a little pull, drawing me forward over the table.

  Beneath the congratulations of the other men, he murmured, “Are you alright, Kaitlin?”

  Even Kaitlin couldn’t suppress a slight blush at that. Was it that obvious? With my hidden little ability, I’d long ago become damn good at hiding my reactions to the things I shouldn’t know. Cam gave my hand a little rub. I looked down.

  Ah, the cold hands, I realized.

  “I’m fine. Just tired.” I looked up into all that concern. “Thank you for all your help through this. Now I guess we’ll find out how well you hold up during deployment. If we are both still alive, I’ll buy you a beer on November 1st.”

  He laughed at that. “So, you’re trying to get out of the one you said you’d buy me at the end of the contracts.”

  I shot him a sly grin and pulled my hand free.

  I exchanged nods with J.C. and the lieutenants, handshakes with Mr. Nye. I turned to pack our legal confirmation cards away when Mr. Nye cleared his throat.

  “Camden here feels that your company has th
e best mastery of the kind of security technology this port requires. And I trust him.”

  I heard a “but” coming and straightened, turning. Ashley tensed.

  Mr. Nye gave Jessie, then me a pointed stare.

  Then it came.

  “But, I believe in learning from history’s mistakes. As my people know, I see this port as the launching point for pioneers, pilgrims looking for better lives and new beginnings. Those original Pilgrims, the ones that first sailed for America, they trusted, too.”

  Will settled his briefcase on the table top like a podium. Ashley had a death grip on my bag’s handle that I couldn’t release. Trust, he kept saying. Where was he going with this?

  “The Pilgrims put their lives and their fortunes in the hands of Captain Reynolds and the crew of the Speedwell. Have you heard of the Speedwell?”

  I shook my head, saw Jessie nod. Ashley had one eye on the door. As if there were somewhere to run, out here in the middle of the Pacific. Kaitlin double-checked the expression of polite interest on my face, made sure it matched the rest of the room’s occupants. I tried to feed from the press of their boredom and suspended impatience, but an underlying frisson of discomfort skittered across my arm from the other side of the table…Arlen, maybe Davina. Not the time to look. Not when Will had decided to focus his speech directly on me now.

  “Two ships were to have sailed to the New World, Miss Osgood. The Mayflower and the Speedwell. But you rarely hear of the Speedwell. That’s because this Captain Reynolds used their trust to commit sabotage. He had the boat refitted with masts that were too tall, putting too much torque on the hull. The pressure caused gaps between the planks and the ship began to take on water. Our clever Captain Reynolds purposely put the Pilgrims out one ship, a quarter of their people, and likely a good bit of critical cargo as well. All to save himself a long, treacherous voyage and to placate the officials of a treacherous Dutch government.”

  Trust. Treacherous. Betrayal. Is that what he thought? I never hid Ashley to betray anyone. Far, far from it. Will smiled as he lifted his briefcase from the table and nudged his chair back out of the way.