White lies (Page 56)

As soon as he’d turned that mental corner, all the memories came rushing at him in a confusing flood, filling his mind with so much clatter that he could barely drive. He didn’t dare stop, didn’t dare let Jay know what he was feeling. He felt… God, he didn’t know how he felt. Battered. His head hurt, but at the same time he was aware of an enormous sense of relief. He had his identity back, his sense of self. Finally he knew himself.

He was Lucas Stone. He had a family and friends, a past.

But he wasn’t Jay’s ex-husband. He wasn’t Steve Crossfield. He wasn’t the man she thought she was in love with.

So that was why she’d been brought in. There had been only one agent at the explosion, and he was that man. Steve Crossfield must have been there for some reason, and he had died there. Lucas tried to form his memories of the meeting, but they were blurred, fragmented. They would probably never come back. But he did remember seeing a tall, lean man walking up the street, his outline reflected on the wet pavement under the streetlight. That could have been Steve Cross- field. He didn’t remember anything after that, though now he was remembering making contact, setting up the meeting with Minyard, going to the meeting site. He’d looked up, seen the man…then nothing. Everything after that was a blank, until Jay’s voice had pulled him out of the darkness.

His cover had been blown, obviously. Piggot was after him; that was the reason for the charade. Pulling Jay in, duping her into thinking he was her ex- husband, having him positively identified as Steve Crossfield, was the best cover the Man could concoct for him until they could neutralize Piggot. The Man never underestimated his enemies, and Piggot was, as Frank had said, very good. The extent of the Man’s deception also told Lucas that the Man suspected there was a mole in his ranks and hadn’t trusted regular channels.

So they’d "buried" him, and he’d awakened to another name, another face, another life, even another man’s wife.

No, damn it! Savagery filled him, and his knuckles turned white as he automatically negotiated the icy patches on the road. Maybe he wasn’t Steve Crossfield, but Jay was his. His. Lucas Stone’s woman.

Silently and at length, he cursed the Man and Frank for everything he could think of, ranging back over several generations of their ancestors. Not Frank so much, because he could see the Man’s fine hand in this. Nobody had a mind as intricate as Kell Sabin’s; that was how he’d gotten to be the Man. They had probably–no, almost certainly–saved his life, assuming there was a mole passing information to Pig-got, but they weren’t the ones who had to tell Jay he wasn’t her ex-husband. They didn’t have to tell her that the man she loved was dead and she’d been sleeping with a stranger.

What would she say? More important, what would she do?

He couldn’t lose her. He could stand anything except that. He expected, and could handle, shock, anger, even fear, but he couldn’t stand it if she looked at him with hate in those deep blue eyes. He couldn’t let her walk away from him.

Immediately he began examining the situation from all angles, looking for a solution, but even as he looked, he knew there wasn’t one. He couldn’t marry her using Crossfield’s name, because such a marriage wouldn’t be legal, and besides, he’d be damned if he’d let her carry another man’s name. He would have to tell her.

His family probably thought he was dead, and there was no way he could let them know he wasn’t without jeopardizing them. If his cover was blown, his family would be at risk if Piggot ever found out he hadn’t died as planned. The way things stood now, he’d have a hard time convincing his family of his identity anyway; he neither looked nor sounded the same. His hands were tied until Piggot was caught; then he supposed Sabin would arrange for his family to be notified that a "mistake" had been made in identification, and due to extenuating and unusual circumstances, et cetera, the error had only now been corrected. The Man probably already had the telegram composed in his mind, letter-perfect.

His family would be taken care of; they would be glad to get him back despite the way he looked, or the fact that his voice was ruined.

Jay was the victim. They’d used her as the ultimate cover. How in hell could she ever forgive that?

Jay dozed, finally awakening as they turned onto the track to the meadow. "We’re home," she murmured, pushing her hair back. She turned her head to smile at him. "At last."

He was tense again, surveying every detail of the track. There was new snow on the ground, filling the tire tracks they had made the day before and also obliterating any other trail that could have been made after they’d left. All his training was coming into play, and Lucas Stone didn’t take chances. Unnecessary chances, that was. There had been more times than one when he’d laid his life on the line, but only because he’d had no other choice. Taking chances with Jay’s life, however, was something else.

As usual, Jay picked up on his tension and fell silent, a worried frown puckering her brow.

The snow surrounding the cabin was pristine, but when Lucas parked the Jeep he put a detaining hand on Jay’s arm. "Stay here until I check the cabin," he said tersely, drawing a pistol from beneath his jacket and getting out without looking at her. His eyes were never still, darting from window to window, examining every inch of ground, looking for the betraying flutter of a curtain.

Jay was frozen in place. This man, moving like a cat toward the back door, was the man she loved, and he was a predator, a hunter. He was innately cautious, as graceful as the wind as he flattened his back against the wall and eased his left hand toward the doorknob, while the pistol was held ready in his right. Sound- lessly he opened the door and disappeared within. Two minutes later he stood in the back door again, relaxed. "Come on in," he said, and walked back to the Jeep to get their bags.