The Cinderella Mission (Family Secrets #1)(53)
Author: Catherine Mann

Relief threatened to swamp her. Too much. More emotion than she wanted right now when she didn’t know how Ethan felt.

Kelly stared at the computer screen, taking in the two heads bowed close together, deep in conversation. She might not be jealous. But she was mad as hell. Anger felt good. Tangible and a lot less painful than what she’d experienced when he announced he’d be sleeping on the sofa.

How dare he pull a stunt like this? Kelly considered racing down there and simply entering the meeting as if she’d been called to participate. Except he might leave before she arrived.

Her eyes slid to the telephone. Ethan’s first lesson in field craft drifted through her mind.

Sometimes the simplest answers worked the best.

He always carried a cell phone in his pocket.

Kelly reached for the receiver, never taking her eyes off the computer screen. If she and Ethan stood even an infinitesimal chance of working out, he needed to come to grips with accepting her as a fellow operative and equal.

Starting now.

Ethan took the computer disk from Samantha and wished he could come up with some words of comfort to offer a friend with too much pain in her eyes.

Others might be fooled by her calm exterior, but he’d lived in that same hell for too many years and for the first time wanted to find a way out of it other than getting himself killed on the job.

The cell phone in Ethan’s shirt pocket hummed, vibrating against him. Samantha jumped back, elegance in place again, if a bit brittle.

Ethan slapped a hand over the pocket. “I’d better take this.” He pulled the phone out and glanced at the LCD screen to find his apartment number. Kelly. Panic punched him. He shouldn’t have left her alone. He flipped the phone open. “Kelly? Everything okay?”

“Just peachy, partner.”

Her over-bright tone set off alarms in his head. “Did you need something?”

“Yeah,” the cheer in her voice faded, “I need my partner to be straight with me and not hold out on meetings with sources.”

Ethan’s eyes shot straight up to the security camera in the corner wet bar. Busted.

“That’s right, ace. I’m watching you this time.” Kelly’s voice shimmered through the phone waves with an extra electric kick of anger.

Samantha patted his arm. “I should go.”

“No,” Ethan said. “Hold on—”

“It’s okay.” Samantha stood. “You have what you need. Work’s the best thing for me and I have a pile of it waiting back in my hotel room.”

“Kelly, be with you in a second.” He flipped the phone closed on the distraction he did not need right now. He would deal with Kelly’s jealousy in a minute. “You’ll be at the summit ball tomorrow?”

“Of course.”

He couldn’t come right out and tell Samantha about the potential threat at the gala, and damned if the need to do so didn’t tear him up. Alerting the public would send the perps deeper into hiding and only make it tougher to catch them, leaving others open to the threat without the blanket of protection Ethan and Kelly had orchestrated.

Ethan settled for a simple, “Watch your back.”

“Of course.” She jabbed a finger at his chest. “And you remember to treasure what you have.” Whipping her coat off a chair, she stopped him with a raised hand. “I’ll see myself out.”

Spine straight, she glided toward the door.

See herself out? Training wasn’t easily ignored. He stood at the door and watched until she pulled safely away from the house.

Prideful woman. He recognized the resistance to accepting help well. Now Samantha would just have to find the right person to help her through it. As he had. A person he damned well did intend to treasure and protect.

As soon as they got past a serious head-butting in their future.

Ethan pivoted on his heel and shot through the hall to the back entrance in the garage. Taking the steps three at a time, he framed his words to reassure Kelly. Christ, he would never, never cheat on her. Couldn’t fathom ever wanting another woman. Damned well looked forward to exploring a thousand ways to make Kelly sigh with pleasure.

However, while he wasn’t used to accounting for his actions—to anyone—he recognized she carried a lifetime of insecurities, thanks to her parents.

He paused outside the door to give himself a second to gather his thoughts. Then remembered she was likely watching him anyway.

She made a hell of a student. He punched in the code and swung the door open. “Kelly?”

The low squeak of his office chair spinning above offered the only answer. Kelly lounged at his wall of computers in the loft, her arms draped over the rests with negligent ease. Her legs stretched for endless miles in front of her.

The fire in her eyes sparked a shower of ire upon his head.

“Kelly, it’s not what you think.” Was that cliché the best he could come up with? This woman stole his ability to think, reason and apparently his ability to talk rationally, as well.

“Then what was it, Ethan?” She stood, her voice picking up speed and anger with every word. “Explain to this junior operative what I misunderstood about my partner meeting with an embassy source without telling me.”

Busted. Truly busted.

Well, hell. He’d underestimated her. She wasn’t jealous at all. Not even a slice insecure.

She was professionally pissed.

Kelly started down the stairs, slowly, every word punctuated with a step. “Tell me why half the team keeps from the other half what’s going on.”

Somehow he suspected his “keeping her safe” answer wouldn’t gain him any ground.

She cruised toward him. “Make me understand why it’s smart ops to hamstring your partner by insisting she sit in a freaking apartment all the time rather than utilize the skills you taught her.”

He opted for a shot at a bluff. “Samantha lost her husband, Kelly. She’s going through a rough time. She needed someone to talk to.”

Her arms folded over her chest. “Good try, Williams. I’m not buying it.”

Kelly waited, her face smooth and expressionless.

When had he lost control? The first time Kelly spoke to him. “Damn it, Kelly, I taught you that poker face, so you can just cut it out.” Still she didn’t budge. “Fine. Yeah, I was meeting with her to discuss business. She had some intel to pass along about an intercepted message. She wanted it off the record and untraceable back to her.”

“And you didn’t see fit to tell me?” Her voice rose with the color in her cheeks. “I could have had something to offer, and instead I’m sitting up here with nothing but a stack of crossword puzzles.”