Ace in the Hole (13 page)

Christian drafted the press release quickly and sent it out, and then he headed for the shower. By the time he emerged, he’d developed a long to-do list for himself.

Stone observed him with hawklike intensity but seemed content to leave him alone this morning to work. Or at least pretend to work. It was impossible to concentrate with those golden hazel eyes registering his every tiny movement. He felt like an antelope squarely in the sights of a hunting lion.

He managed to scroll down through Jack’s e-mail, answered the easy requests, scheduled a few meetings for when they got back to Washington and added them to Jack’s calendar, and stored the other messages in a file for the junior staffers back in DC to deal with later this week.

And then he opened an innocuous-looking message titled simply, “For Senator Jack Lacey—Urgent.”

Your time is coming very soon, you worthless piece of shit. Settle your affairs and say good-bye, because I’m coming to send you to hell where you belong.

It wasn’t signed. The sender’s e-mail said simply “unnamed sender.” Not helpful.

He snatched up the phone and dialed Tucker. “Where are you, Travis?”

“At the venue for tonight’s gala. This place is a nightmare—”

“I need you to get back here right now,” he interrupted.

“What’s wrong?” Tucker’s voice already was jumping as if the man was running while talking.

“Stone’s safe. But Jack just got another death threat. And this one said specifically that he’s going to be attacked soon.”

“Keep Stone in the room, and I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”

“Got it.” He hung up the phone anxiously.

From the sofa across the suite, Stone said grimly, “And you didn’t think to tell me first that there’s another death threat?”

“You heard at the same time I told Tucker.”

“That’s not my point. You see something alarming, something that has to cause you significant stress, and you don’t tell me first?”

“I followed protocol,” he said defensively. “Secure the principal and tell the bodyguard immediately.” Christian braced himself for an explosion out of Stone but instead got only a terse “Give me everything you’ve got on tonight’s benefit.”

Christian handed over the hard-copy file and went to work downloading and printing out the rest. Stone turned his attention to the paperwork, but anger rolled off his muscular shoulders in palpable waves. What the hell did Stone want him to say?

His mind was blown by what had transpired between them yesterday, and he needed some time to process it. And now was not the moment to have a huge fight with Stone over the fact that he’d meant it when he said they were over last night.

The silent standoff grew more and more uncomfortable as Stone grew steadily more angry, and Christian was by turns defensive and irritable himself. The first priority was Stone’s safety, and that meant telling his chief of security immediately about any incoming threats. He’d done the right thing by calling Tucker first, dammit. At least they’d established that the two of them could have a knock-down-drag-out fight without ever uttering a single word aloud to each other. It was actually a rather impressive feat.

Gradually Stone’s focus shifted to the papers he had spread out all over a table. He was poring over some sort of tourist map of downtown Miami when Tucker burst into the suite. Christian had never been so relieved to see the man.

“What have you got, Tucker?”

“Lemme see the e-mail.”

While Christian pulled it up and turned his laptop for Tucker to see the short message, Stone reported tersely, “The tech experts at Wild Cards had no success tracing the sender of the e-mail. It was likely sent from an Internet café or a library and bounced off a bunch of servers to anonymize it. As for the message’s content, there’s nothing new except the addition of the attack coming soon. The Wild Cards’ profiler said only that now there’s a timetable in play. And you and I could have figured that out for ourselves. Talk to me about the venue.”

“You’re not going to go through with the appearance, are you?” Tucker demanded.

“We might as well catch ourselves a psychopath while we wait for Jack to get tired of Chesty.”

Christian’s mouth opened and a protest danced on the tip of his tongue. Why in the name of God didn’t Stone value his life more than this? Why was he so damned willing to throw himself in front of a madman and roll the dice with death?

Stone muttered, “Talk to me, Tucker.”

The security chief moved over to the map and started jabbing at intersections and buildings, giving a rapid-fire description of the area around the large plaza where an evening charity auction and ball would be held under the stars.

“The whole plaza will be blocked off for the night with police barricades here, here, here, and here. They’ll be manned by cops but should be considered porous.”

Stone made a noise of disgust.

Tucker continued, “At least ten high-rises are close, with a half dozen well within a thousand yards.”

Stone grimaced and Christian asked, “What’s significant about a thousand yards?”

“Any half-decent sniper with a semidecent weapon can kill a man at a thousand yards,” Stone replied.

“Are we worried that the stalker is going to make a hit tonight? I thought you guys decided the casino night was the event the guy would target because of how high profile it will be.”

“Given the latest communication, I think we have to consider every appearance that I—Jack—makes to be at high risk.”

“And yet you’re going through with it. Look. Jack bailed on all of us. If he misses out on all the campaign donations and blows his chances for reelection, it’s no skin off my nose at this point. Although you may be prepared to sacrifice your life at the drop of hat, Stone, I am not willing to throw you to the wolves. I’m calling this thing right now. I’ll write up a press release that Jack has had to leave town unexpectedly and is bowing out—”

“And what happens when this would-be killer shows up at your DC office and shoots the entire staff, including you? Or he shows up at Jack’s home and murders his wife and the dog too, just to make his point?” Stone asked grimly. “Hiding from nut jobs gives them a sense of control. They’re successfully manipulating their target. If we can draw this guy out into the open without Jack around to screw up our plans as only he can, it’s a win for everyone.”

Christian reluctantly saw the logic. But he didn’t like it. Not one bit. And furthermore, his dislike of this plan to proceed on schedule had
nothing
to do with his feelings for Stone Jackson.

God. Damn. It.

STONE
wasn’t fond of bulletproof vests. In the first place, they weren’t actually proof against a high-caliber round, and there was always a head shot to consider. Even if the Wild Cards’ guys didn’t believe this attacker was a pro, a shooter could still get lucky and nail the target in an unprotected part of the body. Bullet-resistant vests tended to give their wearers a dangerous and potentially life-threatening sense of invincibility. Furthermore, they were hot and bulky, and they made his suits lie funny, no matter how good a tailor might be. But Tucker was having no part of him going out in public without one.

Christian had opted to sit in the front seat of the SUV with Tucker en route to the gala tonight, and Stone didn’t know whether to be insulted, hurt, or amused. He settled on being a little of all three. He’d really shaken up Christian yesterday. He didn’t for a minute think Christian was serious about the two of them never making love again. He’d just overwhelmed the guy a little. Good. Christian had been badly in need of a shock. He was stuck in the mother of all ruts and was too awesome a human being to languish in the bottom of it forever.

His mind drifted to the insane pleasure they’d shared, and his fly started to bulge alarmingly. Swearing, he pulled out the dry-as-dust speech and determinedly practiced saying it in Jake’s Texas accent. Thankfully it did the trick, and he would be able to walk upright when they arrived at the venue.

The SUV pulled to a stop, and the privacy panel slid down. “All right, then, sir. Good luck,” Tucker announced.

Stone responded, “Christian, I want you to stay away from me at the gala tonight.”

“Hey, you don’t have to throw yourself at women in the name of impersonating Jack—” Christian started.

“No, that’s not it. In the first place, Jack has a history of making his guys stay away from him. But more importantly, I don’t want you hit by a stray bullet in case our stalker chooses tonight to find out how lousy a shot he is.”

“Oh.” The syllable thudded like lead between them. Christian swore quietly and got out of the SUV without waiting for Jack. Grimly, Stone watched him walk away.

Jesus, his job sucked sometimes.

And then he got to climb out of the SUV, get mobbed by sycophants, and play United States senator for the next hour. Suddenly being a plain old bodyguard who only risked death for a living didn’t seem quite so bad.

Maybe he was just feeling antisocial tonight, but the aggressive interest of a huge crowd of people all eager to steal a minute of his time went against every minute of training he’d ever had at covert operations, avoiding detection, and above all, not being recognized.

And the women. Apparently this event had been declared some sort of open season on politicians within their ranks. At least every two minutes, some beautiful woman came sashaying his way, inviting him silently to look down her dress or feel up her thigh.

Truth be told, it was more than a little creepy. There was something desperate and needy in the false sex appeal these women presented. He didn’t for a minute think any of them were genuinely attracted to him personally. How in the hell did Jack Lacey mistake any of this for real desire? Or maybe the guy was so desperate and needy himself that he couldn’t see the calculation lurking in these women’s cold eyes.

Stone painted on a fake smile and politely rebuffed them all, doing his damnedest not to show his faint revulsion at the lot of them.

A number of people asked about the previous day’s attack, but he refused to talk about it, in concert with Christian’s press release to that effect. People seemed taken aback that he would decline to make political hay from the incident. Was the real Jack that morally bankrupt, then?

A man approached, greeting him loudly. “Jack, old buddy. How the hell are you? I can see that Florida agrees with you. You look great. How’ve you been since the hunting trip?”

Fuck. Someone who knew Jack. This wasn’t supposed to happen. He had no idea who the dude was, and worse, he’d sent Christian away. He leaned over to murmur to Tucker, “Get Christian ASAP.”

“Right, sir.”

Stone turned to face the backslapper. “I’m great. How the hell are you?” He resorted to asking about the guy’s latest hunting exploits, and when that topic petered out, he shifted to asking about how the job was going. Apparently the guy was the CEO of some sort of paper manufacturing company. Unbelievably, the man didn’t seem to realize he wasn’t the real Jack Lacey. Obviously the loudmouth knew Jack a great deal less well than he was pretending to. Thank God.

Christian strolled up, a smile on his face but his eyes grim. He said smoothly, “Henry Spencer! What a nice surprise.”

God bless him. He’d diagnosed correctly that Stone had no idea who this man was and that there was a grave risk of their ruse being exposed.

Christian continued pleasantly, “I didn’t realize you were on the guest list. How’s Millie? I haven’t seen her tonight.”

Lord, the guy was smooth at this social stuff. Stone was mesmerized by Christian’s effortless charm. Apparently Jack had it to some degree, as well. But Stone was completely at sea with all this small talk and name-dropping. Spencer spied someone in the crowd and declared that Jack had to meet him.

The man moved off to fetch the “must-meet,” and Stone muttered to Christian, “I retract my previous order to stay away. I can’t do this without you.”

Christian’s eyes registered surprise. And then a slow smile spread across his face. “Stick with me, kid. You’re on my turf now.”

“And for the love of God, please run interference with some of the female sharks cruising this event.”

“Not a chance. You’re on your own in that department.”

However, a fair share of the women did veer toward Christian, particularly after Stone politely ignored their come-hither antics. It was gratifying not being the only man in the joint uncomfortably pasting on a fake smile and pretending to be complimented by the come-ons.

The chicken was, indeed, rubber, and the emotional prostitution real as people vied for a piece of him in return for cold, hard cash. Thankfully Christian handled most of the delicate negotiation of pimping out Jack’s soul.

During a momentary break from the sleeve tugging, Stone murmured to Christian, “How do you stand doing this for a living? Don’t you feel like a flesh peddler?”

“I keep my eyes on the prize. Someday I’ll be free of this rat race. And in the meantime, I’ll know this world as an insider. It can’t help but give me a better perspective on how to nail these bastards.”

Stone’s jaw tightened. There had to be a way to break Christian loose from the prison he’d locked himself in.

“Excuse me, Senator Lacey. The charity auction is about to begin, and we’ve had a wonderful idea. We’d like to auction off drinks and a dance with you.”

Alarm sluiced through him, and he glanced over at Christian in panic. But the big jerk smiled broadly and replied for him, “The senator would love to auction off his body for the cause.”

The woman moved off, chirping happily as Stone glared at Christian. “What the fuck?”

“You’re here to play nice and make them money for their hospital.” He added under his breath, “And girls don’t actually have cooties.”

He told Christian what he thought of that in no uncertain terms, and Christian merely laughed. The auction ensued, and the bidding commenced for a “date” with Senator Lacey. He was hauled up on stage and paraded across it like a piece of meat. Of course, the real Jack would have eaten this up, so he was forced to flash a come-hither smile and flirt outrageously with the crowd in general. It was horrifying.