Spectre of Intention Read online

  Paula and I had a giant box of monitoring equipment balanced between us.

  “Left. Left. Keep going. Fingers. Fingers! Up higher!”

  I heard the door open.

  “Whoa!”

  I heard the thump of boots and Paula’s end of the box shot up, leaving me bearing more of the load than I could handle.

  “Oh, shit.”

  Cam’s body slammed me from behind, catching both me and the box before we went down. The scent of him, the press of him erased what little there was left of my mind. I let him guide the box the rest of the way to the table. We both carefully eased our fingers free.

  Then Cam stole a nuzzle in my hair, gave my arms a quick squeeze and the tension drained like melted ice from my body. I twisted, looked up at the sweet need in his eyes. For a second, he cupped my cheek. Then it was time to step away.

  “We set a couple wands to charge.” I gestured toward the wall where we had set up the rack. “We were trying to dig out the portable freight scanner. Thought maybe that might be helpful. The blast suit is in that case under the table.”

  Jessie and Paula came around from the other side of the box.

  “Cam and I have been talking,” Jessie said. “We have a question for the two of you: Would you be able to conduct a modified employee screening interview specifically regarding this incident?”

  I looked at Paula; she looked at me. My gut clenched. That would certainly speed things up. But on a scale I hadn’t really anticipated. I blew out a breath. All to save my little secret, save my little neck from a serrated spider claw knife. I looked at Paula, really looked at tiny, beautiful, reserved little Paula and realized that if I didn’t do this, her Brian would be walking onto a ship where Mak still roamed free.

  “Absolutely.”

  Paula tilted her head ever so slightly.

  “It’s going to mess up the regular interviews.”

  “I can help with that,” I promised her. I knew from her slow nod that she understood what I meant. She wouldn’t be relying solely on software for those interviews. I would be mental and emotional jelly by the end of these six months, but if it meant my life and my freedom—and little Brian’s safety—then I would do it.

  “Today?”

  Now my head was spinning.

  “Today?” Paula and I both stared at Cam.

  “The attempt was made sometime in the last 16 hours. They failed. The more on edge they are, the more likely it is they’ll blow the interview, right?”

  Never mind that they didn’t know they’d just botched breaking into the canister. What they didn’t know would pit them at each other’s throats. This might actually work. I used my wrist to sweep the sweat from my forehead.

  “Guess it’s going to be another late night.”

  I didn’t have to look at Paula to know that she wore a poorly concealed look of terror. I gave her arm a squeeze.

  “I’ll handle it.”

  I started running it like a play through my head.

  “My workpad, where’s my workpad?”

  Jessie retrieved it from my bag, tossed it at me.

  “Alright, we’re going to need a room large enough to house all 2,000 people currently onboard, preferably an empty dining hall where myself and a few others can easily wander the crowd. We’ll need a podium where we can make announcements. Gerard will need time to mount a few cameras to cover the room.”

  “Wait! I need to make notes.” Cam grabbed his pad from the other side of the table, gave me a nod when he was ready.

  “Alright, cameras. We’ll need a small connecting room for the actual interviews. You’ll need to make arrangements to hold the people we finger separate from one another. I’ll need a button camera. Where are those? Paula, Box 2.

  “We’ll need to pull all your staff first, Cam, and interview them, so that we can use them when we move on to the larger staff. We’ll need a database we can proof against, so we know if anyone jumped ship during the round up, make sure we don’t have any stolen badges, that sort of thing. Your staff can take care of that part. First department we’ll want to hit after we get critical ship’s crew taken care of is the banquet’s kitchen staff. We’re going to have to make arrangements for feeding these people. And make sure they have access to restrooms.

  “We’ll need to get the booth and these two monitoring stations hauled over. Am I forgetting anything?”

  I saw Jessie running my vision over in his mind. He nodded slowly.

  “Monitoring stations will either need to be in a separate room or partitioned off. Maybe partitioned. Don’t want that interrupting the interviews. Already figured about the video cameras. Gerard went with J.C. to borrow some of theirs.”

  “How long does it take those wands to charge?” Cam asked.

  “’Bout an hour,” Jessie said.

  “Then let’s break for lunch. Be back in an hour.”

  The others headed for the door through the maze of boxes Paula and I had created. I stayed where I was.

  “I’m just going to stay here, catch a nap. I’ll buzz you when the wands are ready.”

  Cam looked at the grey industrial carpeting on the floor. He looked at me.

  “My apartment is right upstairs. You can sleep there. I’ll let you in.”

  I got a flutter in my stomach as the mere mention of his apartment brought memories of his lips and hands to vivid life across my skin. Everywhere.

  Even completely alone, I wouldn’t be able to sleep there for a second.

  “Thanks.”

  After the security check point, Jessie and Paula broke off and headed for the hospitality side of the ship. I followed Cam to the elevator.

  He worked as we rode. Instructions to Davina, J.C., other people I didn’t know. I leaned my head back against the elevator wall and closed my eyes. Davina. How cool would she try to play it? How had she gotten this angry? What was her connection to Mak and Stephan? Was her connection even to them or was it to someone/something else entirely? I would need to see if a picture of Mak would set her off. He was the only one stupid enough to show his face. The food court had a camera. I’d already checked.

  “Who would have the video surveillance files for the hospitality side of the ship, Arlen or you guys?”

  “Arlen has his own set up over there.”

  “Alright.”

  Cam looked up as the sunlight poured in through the open elevator door. This short hall was lined with windows that overlooked the lower decks of the ship. I glimpsed the white expanse of the elevator launch pad as Cam led me out and down the hallway to his apartment door.

  His eyes and hands focused on getting us through the door, but his awareness focused solely on me. It didn’t coalesce into an intended action, just pervasive, penetrating awareness.

  I followed him in and he closed the door behind us.

  “So, the kitchen’s there.”

  The living room, dining room, and kitchen had an open floor plan.

  “Yeah, kinda hard to miss,” Kaitlin replied. A pang of guilt flashed through my chest for throwing her in his face. I didn’t know how to deal with his oscillating bouts of need and rejection.

  “Right.” Cam stood there awkwardly for a moment, swinging his workpad from his fingertips.

  “Thanks, but I can eat while I work. Right now, I just need some rest.”

  I stepped out of my black pumps and scooted them under the dining room chair. I pulled my scarf from my neck, tucked it in my pocket. Then I dropped my bag against the wall, so I could slip free of my suit jacket. The jacket I hung over the back of the chair, carefully smoothing the shoulders, waiting.

  That’s your cue, mister.

  Silence.

  I felt a brush against my arm, soft as the beginnings of an intention. I got a jolt of surprise when I saw his hand rise from my arm to my face as I turned around. He reached past me and set down his workpad. He’d brought us face to face, a breath away from touching.

  “You okay?”

  �
��Just exhausted.” I saw my breath push into his shirt. I turned my face up to him. The difference without my heels startled me. It took me a split second to adjust to it.

  And a split second after that, I was off balance again. Cam searched my face with those eyes, searched in that way that said he saw something even I didn’t know was there.

  “You’re not just exhausted, Kaitlin.”

  Adjusting the truth was part of the game whether it was a con or a sales job. With him looking at me that way, I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t lie. I looked away. The pain in him, the sadness, it made me sick. I tried so hard to look back.

  “Hey, if this is making you uncomfortable, if this isn’t going to work for you…” His intentions wrenched at my chest as he simultaneously reached for me and withdrew inside himself. Quickly, I reached up, laid my palm on his cheek.

  “No. I’m sorry if you got that impression.”

  His relief made my knees weak.

  “Then what is it?”

  I shook my head. He wouldn’t really understand what I meant, but he would have the truth.

  “You are so painfully hard for me to read. You require such terrifying naked honesty out of me. But I can’t see where it’s going once you have it. I can’t see…I can’t see what you want…what you intend…there’s just this big tangle of heat and chill and confusion mixed in with a powerful desire to rip my clothes off.”

  He barked out a startled laugh at that.

  “I can see I’m going to have to be more careful about the questions I ask. I wasn’t expecting my own psychological profile in return. I guess I forgot who I was talking to.”

  I smiled and let my hand fall away. In the midst of his humor, his tension vanished and the warmth that always lay at the core of him unfurled, enveloping me. I eased into it, into him, raised up on my toes and brushed his lips open with my own. His hands slid up my back, pulled me in tighter. I wound my arms around his neck.

  “I really do need some sleep.”

  His answer was to reach between us and unbuckle my slacks. A quick tug at the zipper and the weight of the belt had them slithering to the floor. As I stepped out of them, he tugged my camisole over my head.

  I worked the buttons of his shirt free, letting my fingertips brush over him until I felt the muscles of his abdomen ripple. When I reached for his belt, he toed off his shoes. His pants fell away.

  “How much sleep?”

  “They say twenty minutes is optimal.”

  “You’re only leaving me ten minutes to work with here.”

  I smiled against his lips.

  “Plenty of time.”

  I awoke pulled so tight against him. It should have been awkward, uncomfortable. Instead it felt safe. Cam inhaled deeply.

  “Whatever it is you use in your hair, promise me you’ll never change it. Just keep your head away from me while we’re working. I don’t need to embarrass myself with a hard-on in front of my people. Might ruin my image.”

  I laughed and abruptly he shifted his hands from my waist and shoulder to my loose breasts. And began to knead. I groaned and arched back into him. I felt him twitch against my ass. He dropped the hands.

  “Whoa, remember the security crisis. Remember the security crisis. Remember the security crisis.”

  Laughing stupidly, we both climbed off the bed and rushed to put ourselves back together. We had five minutes to get back downstairs and back down to reality.

  In the elevator, I tried to realign my brain. Davina was going to get picked out during the security staff interviews. I had to be ready for that. I had to be ready to either tie her to Mak and Stephan or to something else entirely. I had to be ready to deflect anything she threw at me. I needed more information.

  I turned my head toward Cam where he scrolled through his messages.

  “Why does Davina hate you?”

  Cam looked up.

  “You keep saying that. She’s just mad.”

  “No, she hates you. Why?”

  I had his attention now. He watched me with a puzzled expression.

  “Okay, well, her brother bid for the same job. She accused me of giving you the job just because you were blonde. I showed her her brother’s bid laid up against yours. His was completely amateur. He had no idea what he was doing. I said that considering he had her to coach him; there was simply no excuse for it, either. She took it as a personal slap in the face.” He shrugged. “She’ll get over it. Or she’ll be finding a new place of employment.”

  “Hmm.” I turned back away, needing a minute to process the information, but Cam lowered his workpad and leaned up against the back of the elevator to face me.

  “So, does this have anything to do with why you were staring her down like the Wrath of God this morning in the loading facility?”

  I laughed. At my own clumsy foolishness. Fortunately, Kaitlin’s breezy confidence settled comfortably over me.

  “Maybe. I suspect we’ll know by the end of the night tonight.”

  “Davina?”

  “I don’t know yet. That’s not how this works.” Oh, he wasn’t going to let this slide. I used the time it took for me to turn toward him to think fast. “Look, you used to be in law enforcement, right?”

  He nodded.

  “You remember the stories about the old lie detectors? How they could be tricked so easily? How a strong reaction to a question didn’t necessarily really mean the person was guilty? Well, this isn’t that unreliable, but you still have to eliminate a lot of variables before you can start making accusations.”

  “You didn’t have her in the booth out there in the middle of the loading dock.”

  No, I didn’t. Get your head out of your ass, Kaitlin.

  “No, but I’ve been doing this for a lot of years.”

  There it came again. This time I’d been so open to him, so attuned to him, that it hurt bad enough to catch my breath. That coiling, driving mass of mistrust speared me in the chest, right through the heart, shooting pain through my entire body. I deserved it. But it didn’t make it any less excruciating.

  Cam’s dancing eyes narrowed.

  “So have I, Kaitlin. So have I.”

  By the time we got back to the office, no one would have mistaken us for a pair who’d just taken a tumble between the sheets. Wariness colored our every interaction.

  As soon as we arrived, Cam and Jessie disappeared with the explosives wands. All too relieved, I welcomed the chaos of the move.

  Paula, however, was frantic.

  “What the hell kind of interview is this going to be? I have no background on any of these people!”

  Krissi from Hospitality had bequeathed us a two-room suite. I dragged the desk away from the wall and positioned it in front of the booth.

  “It won’t be that kind of interview, Paula. You will just be sorting wheat from chaff. And you’ll already have a pretty good idea which is which by the time I send them up here. Cam’s staff will handle the actual interrogations once we’re finished. We’re just going to record reactions to this specific incident. Alright?”

  “I’m not a spontaneous sort of person, Kaitlin. I don’t like this.”

  “It’ll be over before you know it.”

  I positioned the chair behind the desk and double-checked the visibility from the desk to the booth. Paula started setting up her workpad and easel while I trotted over to the bedroom.

  The bed had been shoved out of the way and the two monitoring stations with their stools had been set up in its stead. The monitor for the queue remained blank. I walked back out.

  “The cameras still aren’t syncing up. I’m going to check with Gerard.”

  Paula nodded, absorbed with syncing up her own system with the booth.

  The banquet hall four doors down from our borrowed suite would have done a castle proud with its heavy draperies and gleaming wood floor. The mirrored paneling would make discreet signals to Paula tricky. Gerard hung from the top of a ladder, two hands in the guts of a camera.
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  “Nothing’s coming up yet,” I told him.

  “Loose transmitter. Jus’ sec.” This soliloquy done with a screwdriver between his teeth.

  The door behind me opened. Jessie burst in.

  “Kaitlin, I need to talk to you.”

  He turned right back around again. I had to jog to catch up. He led me back to the suite.

  “Paula, could you excuse us for a moment?”

  Paula’s eyes got really wide, but she hurried from the room without a word. As soon as the door closed behind her, Jessie turned on me.

  “The wands didn’t pick up any trace of explosives—of any kind.”

  Jessie was holding onto all of his emotions very tightly. Carefully, I nodded.

  “Good.”

  “The job on the keypad looked more like vandalism than safecracking to me.” He took a step closer. I had to tip my head back to keep my eyes on that stone blank face. One eyebrow rose. “Would you know anything about that?”

  “Yes.”

  “You can visually ID these people?”

  I nodded.

  “You know they are going to try to implicate you, discredit you. Are you ready for that?”

  I didn’t answer. Yes, I’d known that, but it had sounded totally different in the confines of my head.

  Jessie gripped my upper arms.

  “I’ll do what I can to protect you, but if they hit too close to home, you are going to have to come clean with Cam. Are you prepared to do that?”

  A little tremor answered that question for me. Ashley, asleep so long now, ran her nails down every nerve in my body. But Ashley, whose life had been so long ago now, couldn’t matter at this moment. Because there was Mak…and his knife. Because there was Stephan who didn’t seem to understand the difference between stealing jewelry and stealing lives.

  And Cam would hate me forever.

  My gaze had sunk to Jessie’s chest. I raised it back up again.

  “I guess I’ll have to be.”

  “Hey,” Jessie murmured. He pulled me in tight and I hugged him back, needing his strength and his goodness. “It’s going to be alright. You’re not alone. We’ll be right here with you.”