A noise came from the other room.
A squeak.
Then another.
Somebody was there.
He approached the doorway, staying to one side. Only an idiot rushed into the dark, so he reached around the jamb and flicked the wall switch. The room lit with the soft amber glow from two lamps on the nightstands. In the bed, her back propped on a pillow, lay Sonia Draga.
Back when he was still with the Magellan Billet, during the years he lived apart from his wife, Sonia had been quite a temptation, one he’d succumbed to on more than one occasion. Those encounters had not been without passion, though more a uniting of kindred seekers, two drifting souls who took comfort in each other since they both seemed to understand loneliness.
But that was all in the old days. BC. Before Cassiopeia.
Things were different now.
“Ivan asked for a favor and I obliged,” she said. “He promised he’d behave. Did he?”
He walked over and sat on the bed, noticing that she’d removed her shoes, her toenails painted blood red. “He Tasered me.”
She touched his arm. “Would you like me to make it better? My way of apologizing.”
He needed to say something to bridge that clumsy gap between offer and caress. Years ago, as a young navy lawyer, he’d made the mistake of cheating on his wife. Why? Looking back, he had no idea. It just happened. A stupid act, a vain attempt at thinking someone else cared, finding pleasure in them, if only for a moment, regardless of the consequences. He hurt Pam more than he ever thought possible, and she repaid him with a child that he only learned years later was not biologically his. It took more than a decade to end that civil war. He and Pam now got along just fine. Gary, their son, knew the truth, and had come to terms with the fact that though he may not be a Malone by blood he was in every other meaningful way.
More important, his own feelings had finally come into focus.
Cassiopeia was important to him.
She meant something. She laughed at his jokes, admired his intelligence, sympathized with his hurts, and shared his passions. As he did with hers. She was his best friend, and that realization came with a warmth and fullness, a sense of belonging, of a purpose intertwined. He loved Cassiopeia and she loved him. How did that happen? Hell, if love could be predicted it would lose all of its power. All he knew was that he did.
“Sorry, Sonia. I’m not available.”
She tossed him a puzzled look. “Has Cotton Malone found someone?”
“You sound surprised.”
“I never thought you the domesticated type.”
She was gorgeous, with a petite, rounded face, a buttoned chin, and a small, upturned nose that made her far more pretty than glamorous. Centered between high cheeks was a small but expressive mouth. Her body had not a drop of fat or excess. Her eyes, blue to green, changing with her mood, reflected a lot about her, everything casting an air that was quintessentially feminine. One he knew was somewhat of an illusion, since this woman could definitely hurt you.
“I found someone myself,” she said.
“Yet here you are in my bed.”
“Fully clothed. This is business.” And she smiled, her puckered mouth dimpled at the corners.
“What do you want, Sonia?”
“The United States needs to avoid the auction. Walk away. With America’s departure, the value of that information diminishes greatly for Jonty Olivier.”
Interesting. She knew the seller. But he understood. “Olivier needs the haves and the have-nots. Both affect the price. And American is the biggest have. Did Poland get an invite?”
She shook her head. “Hence my alliance with Ivan. We needed a little help from someone who thinks like we do on this issue.”
“No missiles?”
She nodded.
“What did your president do that’s so bad?”
She tossed him a quizzical look. “Tom Bunch didn’t tell you?”
He decided to be honest. “Not a word.”
She smiled, her teeth white as pearls. “Is it tough being out of the loop?”
“Not at all. The tough part comes when someone wants you in the loop but tells you nothing.”
“Are you in this?”
He knew the rules. No information to outsiders. No need. They’re not in the game. But players? They were different, and sometimes you had to cast your net wider than usual to see what could be reeled in. “I haven’t decided.”
“Ivan said you weren’t all that receptive.”
He smiled. “You and he have quite the relationship.”
“Those missiles are a dead issue that your president has resurrected. Russia doesn’t want them in Poland. Nor do they want to spend the tens of millions it will take to deploy their own missiles across Central Asia in retaliation. Poland doesn’t want the missiles. Europe either. The whole thing is an unnecessary escalation so President Warner Fox can show the world that he’s a big man.”
He couldn’t argue with her assessment. “Bunch is intent on being a part of that auction.”
“But first he has to acquire a relic. Which one?”
The lies had to be consistent. “The Nail in Bamberg.”
“That will be an easy take. It’s just sitting there in a side chapel.”
“What do you know about the other relics?”
She shifted in the bed. “Ten days ago a team broke into the Monastery of Santo Toribio de Liébana in Spain and took their True Cross. I traced them back to Iran. Two days after that another team burglarized St. Anthony’s Chapel in Pennsylvania and stole their thorn from the crown. The segment of the Pillar of the Flogging, in Rome, was taken last week. The Holy Sponge inside Notre-Dame just two days ago. I’ve not been able to identify any of those thieves. The Russians took the Holy Blood today. Only the Nail and lance remain.”
She cocked her head and leaned forward, her soft lips approaching dangerously close to his. He raised a finger to stop her advance. Once he would have surrendered. When lust took control of good judgment and emotions ran on autopilot, all of it fueled by risk and anxiety.
But he would not make that mistake again.
He stood from the bed. “Time for you to go.”
Her restless blue eyes bore testimony to a hit-and-run existence. She’d always been a hive of nerves. What she was doing right now seemed typical Sonia. Playing both ends against the middle. Using every weapon she had at her disposal. But he felt the tense atmosphere that had sprung up between them, as if neither believed a word the other said. They were definitely fencing, each tossing around a measured blend of fact and fiction.
“She’s a lucky woman.”
“More the other way around.”
She rose from the bed, her body just as impressive as he remembered. She slipped on her shoes and headed for the outer room and the door. He stood propped against the dresser, arms folded across his chest.
She stopped and said, “Take Ivan’s warning seriously. Stay out of this one. It could get rough.”
“As I recall, you liked it that way.”
She smiled.
“I do.”
And she left.
CHAPTER TWENTY
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 5
KRAKÓW, POLAND
11:50 A.M.
Cotton admired Rynek Główny. At over six hundred feet on each side, the open expanse claimed the title of the largest medieval square in Europe. Its colorful perimeter buildings were all neoclassical, filled with every kind of shop, store, and eatery imaginable.