Seduced by the Operative. Merline Lovelace

the politicos attended to business, Señora Diaz gave Stacy a tour of the capital. They were accompanied by the fourteen-year-old girl who recently won our national spelling bee. And, of course, a full contingent of both U.S. and Cartozan security forces. I vetted every one of our people myself.”

      Claire didn’t doubt it. As former chief of Cartoza’s security forces, Luis would not take the challenges associated with a visiting head of state lightly.

      “The first nightmare came well after midnight, close to four a.m. I didn’t learn of it until several hours later. I also learned the physician accompanying Andrews’s party had administered a sedative and Stacy had slept for the rest of the night.”

      Frowning, he rolled the thin cigar in his fingers.

      “She appeared happy and quite normal the next morning, although you could see the fatigue in her eyes. We altered her schedule so it included only the events we thought she would most enjoy. Stacy and Rosa—the spelling bee champion—splashed in the Dolphin Cove with a group of other youngsters. That afternoon they attended a village fiesta. It was very colorful, crowded and noisy, but I swear to you, Claire, my people tested everything before she ate or drank it. I’m ninety-nine-point-nine percent certain no one slipped her any kind of drug or hallucinogen.”

      “It certainly seems unlikely, but you and I have been in this business long enough to know anything is possible. So the second nightmare occurred that night, after the fiesta?”

      “It did.”

      His mouth grim, Luis stubbed out his cigarillo in the ashtray Claire kept out on the deck for his use. He never lit up inside and always took care to stand or sit downwind, so as not to expose her to secondhand smoke.

      She would have liked him to give the habit up completely, but the casual nature of their relationship didn’t give her the right to request that kind of behavioral modification. Unless or until that relationship changed, she actually enjoyed an occasional whiff of the rum-and-cherry smoke.

      “Did the White House fax you the results of the blood test they administered after the second nightmare?” he wanted to know.

      “I had to sign and send back a confidentiality agreement first. The results may have come in in the past few hours…while I was otherwise engaged.”

      “Will you inform me if the actual results are different from what I was told?”

      “No.”

      Her calm reply produced only a small shrug. Luis had learned enough about Claire’s profession—and about her—during their months together to have expected no other answer. He also knew she would do her best to keep him in the loop, however. Especially with his prickly macho pride and national honor at stake.

      “If they are different,” she assured him, “I’ll ask Stacy or her father if I can discuss them with you.”

      She tapped a nail against her cappuccino cup. A item from the notes she’d dictated tugged at her thoughts.

      “Do you know what the women at the fiesta were wearing? The village women?”

      The question surprised him. “Their best garments, I would guess. As you know well, the women of my county love bright colors. They would have worn ruffled skirts in red and turquoise and green. Embroidered blouses trimmed with colorful ribbons. That sort of thing.”

      “What about on their heads?”

      “The girls usually wear garlands of flowers, the older women lace mantillas.”

      “Flowers and lace, not kerchiefs?”

      “Some may have covered their hair with cloth mantles. Why do you ask this?”

      “It was just something Stacy said. A fragment of the dream she remembered.”

      Luis’s gaze sharpened. “You think a woman wearing a head covering may have frightened her and caused her to have these nightmares?”

      “I haven’t formulated any viable theories as to their root cause yet. I had just dictated my notes and begun my research when you arrived.”

      “Nevertheless, I’ll query the captain who commanded her escort and have him review the footage from the festival. If Stacy spoke to or came in contact with a woman wearing a mantle, it should be on the surveillance videos.”

      Being able to take some action, any action, seemed to reenergize him.

      “Are you done with your cappuccino, my heart? If so, I’ll carry the dishes into the kitchen.”

      “I’m finished.”

      When she rose to help gather the plates, he nudged her aside.

      “You cooked, I’ll clean. Go, finish this research I interrupted. Then we will finish what we began earlier.”

      

      Luis made sure their second session was as slow and sweet as the first was fierce. He would have made it last until dawn, if Claire hadn’t finally driven him over the edge.

      His chest heaving, he sprawled bonelessly amid the tangled sheets until the world stopped spinning. She lay with her head nested on his shoulder, her hair spilling across his chest and the musky scent of their lovemaking teasing his nostrils. Idly, he played with strands of her hair as the thoughts that had tugged at him when she’d opened the door to him earlier once again played through his mind.

      Why couldn’t he seem to get enough of this slender, maddeningly independent woman? How was it that she satisfied his every carnal desire, yet left him wanting more?

      God knows he was a self-professed connoisseur of women. Some he’d admired for their beauty, some for their intelligence or talent or sparkling personalities. But this one…This one stirred urges that edged dangerously close to that vague, ill-defined emotion the poets labeled love.

      Luis had teetered on the brink of that emotion only once before. The affair had flamed hot and ended in a murderous cross fire. Since then, he’d limited himself to mutually satisfying liaisons with no commitments on either side. Yet lying here, stroking Claire’s hair, breathing in her scent…

      “Shall I stay the night, querida?”

      “What time is it?” she murmured sleepily.

      He flicked a look at the bedside clock. His glance lingered on the crystal frame for a second before he replied.

      “Almost two.”

      “Mmm.” She buried her nose in the warm skin of his neck. “Too late for you to drive back into the city and rouse the embassy staff. Stay the night.”

      “What if I stay longer?” He gave her hair another slow stroke. “Or don’t leave at all?”

      The question bought her blinking awake, as he’d known it would. Pushing upright, she propped herself on an elbow. Her hair fell across her forehead. When she hooked the loose strand behind her ear, he saw her face clearly in the moonlight streaming through the top half of the plantation shutters. Saw, too, the question in her eyes.

      “We agreed up front that we both need our space, Luis. We discussed boundaries.”

      “Perhaps it’s time to renegotiate those boundaries.”

      “Why?”

      “I want more of you, Claire.”

      “You have all I’m prepared to give right now,” she said quietly. “All I can give.”

      He was formulating his response to that when the phone beside the bed shrilled. Rolling over, she lifted the receiver.

      “Dr. Cantwell.”

      A few clicks sounded, then a disembodied voice announced that the line was secure. That was followed by a terse request that came through clearly enough for Luis to overhear.

      “This is Tom Fogerty, Dr. Cantwell. Can you come to the Executive Residence right