The Phoenix Encounter

Lily lifted the child, then pressed a kiss to his forehead. “The symptoms haven’t been consistent, but several times I’ve noticed that his fingers and toes are blue. Sometimes he’s cold to the touch. He had a low-grade fever last week, but it went away after a couple of days.” She looked at the child in her arms, worry creasing her brows. “Sometimes he’s…lethargic. He sleeps a little too much. Some days he doesn’t eat enough.”

Robert glanced at the child and for the first time got a good look at him. Jack was a beautiful baby with vivid blue eyes that were alert and intelligent. He had thick brown hair with a cowlick at his crown and the face of an angel come down from the heavens. Robert had never been partial to babies. But the sight of Lily’s baby awed and amazed him nonetheless.

“Nice looking kid,” he said.

“Thanks.” Robert saw the quick flash of pride in her eyes and the smile she couldn’t quite hide. “He’s everything to me.”

“Do you mind if I examine him?”

She cast him a startled look but made no move to hand over the baby.

“Lily, for God’s sake, what do you think I’m going to do? Throw him out the window? Come on. I’m a doctor. Let me examine him and see if I find anything out of the ordinary.”

“All right.” She glanced toward the rear of the cottage. “I can put him down on the bed in the bedroom,” she said and turned to carry Jack down the hall.

Snagging his medical bag off the floor, Robert followed, entering the bedroom just in time to see Lily lay Jack on the bed. He knew he should be paying attention to the child and not the bed, but he couldn’t help but notice it was little more than a twin-size mattress set up on a homemade wooden pedestal. Hardly big enough for Lily, let alone Jack’s father. The thought of her sharing that bed with another man disturbed him a hell of a lot more than he wanted to admit, and another wave of jealousy seared him.

As if realizing his thoughts, Lily said, “I thought you’d have more room if I laid him on the bed.”

“This is fine,” he snapped.

She unwrapped the blanket, and Robert found himself staring at a perfect baby boy wearing pajamas with little blue ducks and tiny booties that had been made to look like traditional Rebelian shoes. And he found himself smiling despite the knot of tension at the back of his neck. “What’s up, doc?” he said in his best Bugs Bunny voice.

Jack kicked out his legs in delight. “Gah!”

“That’s what I thought,” Robert said.

Lily leaned forward. “What is it?”

“A Bugs Bunny fan,” he said deadpan.

She didn’t quite laugh, but he heard her release the breath she’d been holding and figured the level of tension wasn’t going to get any lower.

“Let’s have a look at you.” Struggling hard to keep his mind on the business at hand, Robert dug into his medical bag for his stethoscope and thermometer and quickly examined the baby. All the while Jack cooed and kicked his feet in quiet protest.

“Temperature is slightly elevated,” Robert said.

Lily pressed her hand to her breast and looked worriedly at her son. “He’s got a fever? What does that mean?”

Robert held up his hand to silence her. “Heartbeat is regular and strong. Pulse is good.” Using his penlight, he checked the baby’s eyes and ears, then moved on to do a quick check of his extremities. The blue tone of his fingers and toes worried him. Taking one of Jack’s fingers between his thumb and forefinger, Robert pressed and watched the tiny pad turn white. When he released it, the blood returned slowly. A little too slowly in Robert’s opinion.

“Okay, big guy. I think that’ll do it.”

Leaning forward, Lily pulled on his pajamas then carried him to the crib. “Why is his temperature elevated?” she asked over her shoulder as she laid him in the crib.

Robert walked to the crib and looked at Jack in time to hear him giggle and was surprised to find himself smiling. He didn’t have much to smile about at the moment, but there was something contagious about the sound of a baby’s laughter. “I don’t know. The fever isn’t high, certainly not anything to worry about at this point. I can give him a dose of acetaminophen to take it down.”

“All right.”

“He appears to be just fine at the moment, but I’d like to run a couple of blood tests.”

Lily turned on him, her eyes huge and concerned. “Blood tests? Why? What did you find?”

“I didn’t find anything definitive, but just to be safe I’d like to rule out a few things.”

Never taking her eyes from his, she came around the crib, a mother lion facing off with a big male who’d just threatened her cub. “Don’t give me some vague doctorlike answer, damn it. What are you looking for?”

Robert didn’t want to worry her needlessly, but he had to tell her what he thought, regardless of how difficult the truth might be.

“I’m not looking for anything specific at this point,” he said. “But from the cursory exam I performed, I can see that his circulation isn’t quite normal. I don’t think it’s anything serious at this point, but it definitely warrants a few nonobtrusive tests.”

“Circulation? Oh, my God.” She pressed a hand to her breast. “What could it be?”

He shrugged. “It could be something as benign as a slight case of anemia. Any number of things that aren’t too serious—”

“But…it could be serious?”

He hated to be the one to put that sharp-edged worry in her eyes, but he didn’t see any way around it. “I don’t know, Lily. That’s why I’d like to run some blood tests. Just stay calm. This is nothing to get worked up about, okay?”

Biting her lip, she looked over her shoulder at the baby cooing in the crib. “He’s everything to me,” she said. “I could never bear it if something happened to him.”

“Nothing’s going to happen to him,” he said firmly. “These are routine tests. Chances are the pediatrician will prescribe some vitamins with iron, and Jack will be just fine.”

She didn’t look convinced, but at least she no longer looked as if she were going to jump out of her skin. He supposed they’d both learned that fate didn’t always bestow a kind outcome.

The instincts he’d developed in the course of his experience as a doctor told him to reach out and touch her, just to reassure her that her child was going to be fine. But Robert didn’t dare touch her. Deep down inside he knew it wasn’t the physician who wanted to touch her, but the man who’d never gotten her out of his system.

“I’d like to take him to the hospital in Rajalla where there’s a pediatric unit and laboratory facilities,” he said.

Lily visibly paled, but masked it by quickly turning away. Noticing that her hands were shaking, Robert watched her closely and wondered about her level of anxiety at the mention of the hospital in Rajalla. “Is there a problem with Rajalla?”

“No. Of course not.” She looked directly at him and smiled, but Robert saw the shimmer of nerves beneath the surface. “It’s just that the city has…changed since you were last there.”

Rajalla was the capital city of Rebelia. Robert had spent a good bit of time there and remembered it as a pretty, bustling metropolis with several sleek skyscrapers, ancient stone churches, a bazaar where local farmers and artisans sold stone-baked bread and Rebelian stained glass, and some of the most beautiful parks in all of Europe.

Robert had researched Rajalla carefully before leaving the United States. He knew DeBruzkya’s soldiers had invaded the city. He knew those soldiers had destroyed many of the buildings, including several historical cathedrals. He knew the once-healthy economy had slumped, that people had fled to the nearby country of Holzberg to become refugees.

But he was getting some odd vibes from Lily and wanted to hear her view. “How has it changed?”

She moved away from the crib as if what she were about to say was somehow harmful to her son. “DeBruzkya is in control of the entire city now. There are armed soldiers everywhere, including the hospital.”

“The soldiers don’t know who you are, do they?”

The hairs at his nape prickled when she didn’t answer.

“DeBruzkya himself has spent a fair amount of time at the hospital,” she said. “His sister is pregnant. The general is fanatical about his sister’s unborn child because that child will become his only heir.”

“Does DeBruzkya know who you are?” he asked.

Lily turned to look at him, her expression troubled and stubborn at once. And suddenly Robert got a very bad feeling in the pit of his stomach.

“Does he know who you are?” he repeated.

“He knows my face.”

Robert cursed.

“He doesn’t know I’m with the freedom fighters,” she said quickly.

“Does he know what you do?”

She stared at him, a hunted animal trapped in the crosshairs of a high powered rifle. “No.”

He scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “I can’t believe you would do something so incredibly foolhardy.”

“Robert, I can handle this. I know what I’m do—”

“You’re so far over your head you don’t know up from down,” he growled.

“I’m not afraid of him,” she snapped.

He shot her a hard look. “You’re too damn smart not to be afraid.”

She evidently didn’t have anything to say to that, so she turned away. Robert contemplated her in profile, liking what he saw even though he was dangerously furious.

He wanted to believe he was just being paranoid, but his instincts were telling him there was a hell lot more to the situation than what she was letting on.

Lily was lying to him. She was hiding something important. Something dangerous. And for the first time in his life Robert found himself hoping his instincts were wrong.

Chapter 3

Lily’s knees trembled as she walked down the narrow hall toward the main room of the cottage. Robert had only been there an hour, and already she was a wreck. She honestly didn’t know how she was going to get through this. It was bad enough having Robert in the cottage, dredging up all the old emotions. But it was infinitely worse knowing Jack could be seriously ill. She’d suffered so many losses in her life. She didn’t think she could bear it if something happened to her precious child.

In the last hour it seemed as if every nerve in her body had been stripped bare and exposed. Every new bit of information had those nerves jumping like a bad tooth prodded with a sharp instrument. Her entire world had been rocked off its foundation when she’d seen Robert standing on her porch, glaring at her with those cool blue eyes.

Because she couldn’t seem to get herself settled down, Lily took a few minutes to stack some logs on the grate in the hearth. When the fire was blazing and she finally ran out of things to do, she turned to face Robert. He’d taken one of two chairs and was staring at her intently, as if she were a puzzle that had just befuddled him.

“Stop looking at me that way,” she snapped.

“I’m just trying to figure out what you’ve gotten yourself into since I left.”

“I haven’t gotten myself into anything.”

“Yeah, I guess you blindfold all your visitors.”

“That’s just a precaution. In case you haven’t noticed there’s a civil war going on.”

“I’ve noticed,” he shot back. “I’ve noticed a lot of things since I’ve been here, and I’ve yet to get a straight answer out of you about any of them.”

She tried to laugh but didn’t quite manage.

“What the hell are you up to, Lily?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“The bits and pieces I’m getting from you don’t fit,” he said. “Why don’t you tell me the whole story?”

She glared at him. “And what story would that be?”

“The one that explains what you’re still doing in this godforsaken country with an innocent child in tow.”

Because she was much more comfortable with anger than any of the other emotions boiling inside her, she held on to it with the desperation of a drowning woman hanging on to a float. “I got caught up in the movement,” she snapped. “Is that mysterious enough for you?”

“You were involved with the rebels before…I left the first time. Tell me something I don’t already know.”

Letting out a shuddery breath, she sank into the second chair and looked into the fire. “Nothing has changed.”

“Everything has changed, damn it. Don’t lie to me.”

Her eyes met his, and within their depths he saw the memories, felt them in his heart the way he had a thousand times in the months since he’d last seen her. A young doctor and an American journalist in a strange land surrounded by ugliness and danger. Two people longing for their homeland, but bound by their love of freedom and a responsibility to help those unable to help themselves. Robert and Lily had spent their days doing what they could to breathe life into a country dying a slow death of oppression. By day, Robert inoculated children, treating the innocent for disease and malnutrition and neglect. Lily wrote her articles, sending them to newspapers in London, New York and Frankfurt, and visited the orphans, the children whose parents had been killed in the war. The children no one cared about.

By night, Lily and Robert met in a smoky little pub, exchanging stories, decompressing, laughing on the outside because inside they felt like crying. For a few short hours they escaped the war, talking about all the things they wanted to do with their lives, their hopes and dreams and plans for the future. Surrounded by despair and destruction and hopelessness, they found peace and their own tiny slice of paradise. They fell in love in that dank little pub. The most unlikely of places that led them to something extraordinary and breathtaking….

Lily shoved the memories away with brutal precision, the way she’d done a thousand times in the last twenty-one months, but she wasn’t fast enough to keep them from cutting her. Instead of giving in to the hot burn of tears, or memories that had been seared into her brain like a brand, she took a deep breath and looked at Robert.

“Things were looking hopeless for the freedom fighters,” she began. “There had been so many good men killed. Families devastated by grief. All because they wanted to be free. DeBruzkya was putting out a lot of propaganda, telling the world how he was going to turn the country around. He’s a very charismatic man. A politician and dynamic speaker capable of rallying huge numbers of people and making them believe him. Facts were hard to come by. People wanted to believe him. They want to believe in the goodness of people. They wanted desperately to believe that he would rebuild their nation. They didn’t have a clue about his firing squads or that he didn’t have the slightest intention of turning Rebelia into a democracy.”

Realizing her hands had turned suddenly icy, she held them to the fire and continued. “Most people were so involved with just trying to survive, they didn’t know what was going on with the revolution. But having spent time with the freedom fighters, I knew exactly what was happening. I saw what DeBruzkya was doing. And I knew the single most powerful thing I could do was tell the truth to the people.” She shrugged. “I began putting out a monthly newsletter. At first it was just a way for me to get my thoughts down on paper and exchange ideas with others. But over the months that newsletter slowly evolved into a sort of underground newspaper.”

Sitting a few feet away, Robert listened intently. He didn’t look happy about what she was telling him. But Lily wasn’t going to let his disapproval influence her one way or another.

“My newspaper is called the Rebellion,” she said. “I put it out weekly, updating people on where to find medicine for their children, where DeBruzkya’s soldiers have been, where the bombing is expected to take place, where to find food, what the freedom fighters have been doing to save their country, where the secret rallies are being held. People want to be free. They want to know if the soldiers are going to come to their village.”

“How is the newspaper distributed?”

“Mostly through e-mail, but many don’t have access to computers, so several young men who aren’t yet old enough to fight, but still want to be involved, deliver the newspaper.”

Robert cursed mildly. “You know DeBruzkya will kill you if he finds out what you’re doing.”

She withheld the shiver that crept up her spine. Lily knew better than anyone what the general was capable of. “That’s why I’m concerned about taking Jack to the hospital. If DeBruzkya spots me…”

“Jack needs a blood test. If we can’t do it at the hospital in Rajalla, then we’ve got to go elsewhere.”

“The other hospitals have been destroyed.”

Robert swore under his breath.

“I’ll just have to…be careful. Robert, I can do it. I’m good at being careful.”

Robert cut her a hard look. “How well does DeBruzkya know your face?”

Lily stared at him, not wanting to answer because she knew he would overreact.

For several long minutes, the only sounds came from the rain pinging against the tin roof and the crackle of the fire. When the silence became unbearable, she rose and crossed to the kitchen. There, she removed a dusty bottle of French cognac and poured a small portion into two snifters.

In the living room, she handed one to Robert. “I think you’re going to need this.”

He accepted the snifter, swirled the golden liquid within. “That sounds distinctly ominous.”

“It is.” She took the chair and sipped the amber liquid, let it burn away some of the nerves. “Before Jack was born, I…met with General DeBruzkya. Several times. Under false pretenses.”

For an instant she thought Robert was going to come out of his chair. “You what?”

She glanced toward the bedroom. “Quiet, or you’ll wake Jack.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Because I knew you’d react like this.”

“What were you thinking, meeting with DeBruzkya? Lily, are you crazy?”

“You’ve heard the term keep your friends close, keep your enemies closer….”

“I don’t think that means snuggling up with a viper.”

She would have smiled if the situation hadn’t been so dire. God, she missed American sarcasm. Robert’s dry humor had always made her laugh, even when things were bleak. She missed that, too. She didn’t want to admit it, but she missed a lot of things about this man. “I interviewed the general under the pretenses of my writing his autobiography.”

Robert shook his head. “Lily…”

“He has an ego.”

“He’s also a sociopath. I can’t believe you would put yourself at risk like that.”

“I was careful. We always met him in public places. The bistro over on Balboa Avenue near the bazaar. A café near the disco. We had a picnic at the park over on Salazar.”

“You met with him three times?” he asked incredulously. “Lily, what could you possibly have been thinking?”

“Something I should have been thinking about all along.”

“Yeah? What’s that? Suicide?”

“I’m going to expose DeBruzkya to the world for what he is.”

Robert glared at her. “Oh, so you’re going to take him down single-handedly, huh?”

“If I have to.”

“Why don’t you leave that to the trained agents and the freedom fighters? Lily, damn it, this isn’t your war.”

“I’m in the perfect position to do this.”

“Why?”

She changed tactics. “Because DeBruzkya is committing terrible human rights abuses. I’ve seen it, Robert. The mal-nourished children. Entire villages wiped out. Men and women and children.” She thought of the little girl she’d met at one of the orphanages, and to her horror, her voice broke with the last word. “I can’t stand by and do nothing.”

“You haven’t changed a bit, have you?” he growled. “You’re still as hardheaded as ever.”

“I may be hardheaded, but I know when I’m in a position to make a difference.”

“So Lillian Scott can bring down the infamous Bruno DeBruzkya when the people of Rebelia and the American CIA can’t. That’s rich as hell!”

“I know his weak spot.”

“Oh, yeah?” Smiling unpleasantly, he leaned forward and challenged her with a killing look. “So what is it? You got some kind of secret weapon stashed in your kitchen? Military resources we haven’t yet discussed? Soldiers training in the backyard? A knife in your sock? What? What’s your secret weapon, Lily?”

She met his gaze in kind. “Me.”

The single word echoed like a clap of thunder. Robert squashed down temper and tried not to think about how little of this was under his control. “What the bloody hell are you talking about?”

Pulling her legs beneath her in a protective gesture, Lily met his gaze. “General DeBruzkya is…intrigued by the idea of my writing his autobiography.”

“So, he’s an egomaniac.”

“Among other things.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” But Robert had read the general’s profile; Hatch had included it in the file, and it read like a horror novel. The anger burning inside him shifted and tangled with a thin thread of fear and ran straight to his gut. “Jesus, Lily. Don’t tell me you’ve—” Robert struggled for the right words “—let him believe there’s something between you.”

“Not exactly.”

“What the hell does that mean?”

She blew out a breath. “Ever since I interviewed him months ago, he’s been asking people about me, trying to find out where I live. He’s invited me to his palace for dinner several times, but I’ve always found an excuse not to go. He’s asked me several times about the autobiography. He’s obsessed with the idea. He wants to go down in history as being one of the greatest leaders of all time.”

“Lily, for God’s sake…”

“I know what I’m doing.”

“What if he connects you to the Rebellion?”

“I anticipated that, and there’s no way he can connect me to the newspaper.”

“DeBruzkya isn’t stupid. He’s cunning and smart and connected.”

“So am I.”

“Don’t make the mistake of underestimating him.”

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t underestimate me, either.”

Frustration snarled through him that she was being so hardheaded about this. Once upon a time her courage and determination had drawn him, and he’d loved her for it. Now, he figured he’d be lucky if those two things didn’t get her killed.

“I can’t believe you’ve gotten yourself into such a dangerous, impossible situation.” Cursing, he rose and paced to the fireplace to stare into the flames. “You’re playing a dangerous game, Lily.”

“I’m in a position to make a difference.”

“You’re in a position to get yourself killed!”

“I can handle the general.”

Robert knew she was cool under fire. He’d been in some intense situations with her; she didn’t lose her head easily. Still, the fact that she thought fast on her feet didn’t make her a match for DeBruzkya’s brutality. Robert knew all too well what the general was capable of. His file on DeBruzkya contained not only a psychological profile of the general, but photographs of atrocities most people couldn’t fathom. DeBruzkya was a monster who’d fooled hundreds of thousands of people and brought an entire country to its knees. If he found out a woman he trusted—a woman he was interested in romantically—was putting out a black market newspaper there was no doubt he would react swiftly and violently.

Robert’s stomach roiled at the thought. He glanced at Lily and felt nauseous. He’d seen her die twenty-one months ago. Even though there was no longer anything between them save for a few memories and a truckload of bitterness, he didn’t want to see her hurt or killed. By God, not on his watch.

“What about Jack?” he asked, playing his ace. “What’s going to happen to him if you end up getting yourself shot?”

“I don’t plan on getting myself shot any time soon, so you can cut out the scare tactic crap.”

She stuck out her chin, but not before he saw the minute ripple that went through her when he’d mentioned Jack. And Robert knew he’d struck the nerve he’d been aiming for. He hadn’t enjoyed seeing her go pale. But he damn sure wasn’t sorry for making her think twice about what she was doing. And he’d be damned if he was going to keep his mouth shut and play nice while she walked into the sunset with a madman.