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Chapter 2

Tory dialed Ben’s cell number from the cab on her way to her doctor’s appointment. She knew it was a longshot but since she knew that Ben was in the business of rescuing hostages, she hoped he’d be able to help with Andrea.

His phone rang only once before it was answered. “Forsythe.”

Ben had a deep, sexy voice that she never quite got used to. It was hard to imagine the man she once thought of as a fluff-brained society boy turning her on just by saying her name, but it happened.

“Hey, it’s me.”

“Hello, me. Did you get my voice mail?”

She really missed him. But she’d never let him know. Knowing her own independent spirit, she’d fought to keep a distance between them, but lately it was growing harder. She wanted to feel his arms around her in the middle of the night.

“Yes, I did. I thought we talked about you not calling me babe.”

“Must have slipped out. Are you calling to chew me out for that?”

“No, that’s not why I’m calling.”

“Why are you calling?” he asked.

She didn’t know where he was or what he was doing. And at first, that hadn’t bothered her, because her job was demanding and she couldn’t really talk about it, either. But lately her mother had started to notice Ben’s playboy-cover pictures, and she’d told Tory she didn’t understand how the man she’d met last Christmas could be so into her daughter and still be seeing all those other women.

“Andrea Jancey has been taken hostage by some terrorists.”

“I’ve heard.”

“I’m going to Berzhaan to do some investigative reporting.”

“Tory, don’t come—don’t go there. The country isn’t stable.”

“Neither was Puerto Isla, but I came out of there fine.”

“Barely,” he said.

She wasn’t going to argue with him. “I have a job to do.”

“I thought you were an anchor.”

“I am. But Ty thought I was the best person for this story.”

“I don’t. It’s dangerous.”

“Good thing you’re not my boss. Your job is no walk in the park, but you don’t hear me telling you to stay home.”

He sighed. She heard it over the connection and suspected he was running his hands through his thick, dark hair, something he always did when she frustrated him.

“I didn’t call to fight with you,” she said. “I want your help.”

“With what?” She heard the caution in his voice.

“Finding Andrea. I thought maybe you could—”

“No. We don’t get involved with civilians.”

“But she’s a friend, Ben. She was like my little sister at Athena. I mentored her, recommended her as UBC’s Berzhaan correspondent.”

“Babe, it’s not your fault she was taken.”

“I know that. Really I do, but she wouldn’t be there if it weren’t for me. I have to do what I can to help her.”

“You’re going to be stubborn about this, aren’t you?”

“I don’t think of it as stubborn,” she said. It was her job to get to the bottom of situations like Andrea’s. To find out exactly where her friend was.

“Can you please just let this go?”

What exactly was he asking her? Even Ty, who wanted her in the anchor chair, understood why she needed to go after this story. And Ben, who supposedly knew her better than her boss, should understand. “No.”

“Dammit, woman. Sometimes you make me crazy.”

She could tell he was trying to get them back on track. Away from the fight they both were dancing around, but she wasn’t ready to backpedal and say that everything was okay.

“Too bad.”

“Tory…”

“I can’t just let you blow this off like it means nothing. This is what my job is. I can’t refuse assignments because you think they might be dangerous.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“You like my job as long as I stay in New York while you go jetting around the world. I’m not a slippers-and-martini-holding kind of woman.”

“I know that.”

“Then act like you understand what it means.”

He said nothing for a moment and the cab pulled to a stop in front of the doctor’s office. She paid the driver and stepped onto the sidewalk.

“Listen, I’ve got to go.”

“Babe…understanding your job isn’t the problem. I have a hard time thinking of you in danger and me not being there to save you.”

“I don’t need you to save me.” She’d spent her entire life proving that she didn’t need anyone, afraid to let any person glimpse her vulnerabilities and insecurities. But she feared she needed Ben. He was the only man she’d ever really felt comfortable being herself around. The only man she’d let see the real Tory.

“But I need to. It’s part of my makeup.”

She understood that about Ben. She liked the fact that he did want to protect her. But that didn’t mean she’d avoid danger to please him. “Get over it.”

“I’m trying. I really am.”

She knew that. She loved him for it. The way he fought against his own instincts because he knew that she didn’t like it when he acted all macho. “Do you want to know my travel plans?”

“Hell.”

“Is that a yes or no?”

She entered the building and took the elevator up to Dr. Waters’s office. She signed in and found a seat in the corner, still waiting for Ben to respond.

“I guess that’s a no.”

He cursed savagely and she just waited, knowing he was fighting the same battle within himself that she always waged. They were both so strong-willed that their relationship wasn’t smooth sailing for either of them.

“Ben?”

“It’s not a freakin’ no. Yes, tell me when you’re leaving for Berzhaan. I’m going to be out of radio range for the next thirty-six hours. E-mail me your schedule.”

“I will,” she said, hating the feeling in her stomach that came from this new discontentment between them. It had been growing lately and she knew she was to blame. She wanted more from Ben but was afraid to ask for it. She could handle the toughest assignments, ask the hard questions of politicians and world leaders, but she had no idea how to ask Ben for what she wanted.

“Be safe,” she said, quietly.

“You too,” he said, and disconnected the call.

The capital city of Berzhaan wore its Russian influences well. Old and majestic, the architecture harkened back to a more civilized age. Ben rubbed the back of his neck as he ducked out of the busy foot traffic and into a familiar fast-food establishment where he was to meet his contact.

No matter what he might want to believe about a more graceful age, he knew that men like him had always been around and that fighting was something that had come naturally to this land in every age. There was something wild and untamed about the Middle East. Something that made even the most determined atheist sense there was a higher force at play in this land.

Ben ordered a Big Mac and fries from the attendant in perfect Russian. Most of the locals spoke Berzhaani, which was derived from Arabic, and Russian, after the country’s long relationship with the former Communist nation. No matter where he was in the world, he could get a Big Mac, but there was still something a little weird about ordering one in Russian.

Ben found a table in the back of the restaurant and sat down. He opened the bag and prepared to wait for his contact. He’d just reached in to snag a fry when the clerk yelled out to stop him.

“Wait, sir. That is the wrong bag.”

Ben pushed to his feet and handed the clerk the bag he’d been given. The new bag was slightly heavier and Ben glanced inside to see a small yellow capsule nestled in with his super-size fries.

“Thanks,” he said to the clerk, and worked his way back out to the street. The last time he’d had fries had been with Tory in her apartment right before the start of this mission. They’d lain on the floor, watching another one of her favorite Tom Cruise movies and eating junk food.

He wanted to go back to New York, tie her to a chair and lock her in her apartment. He needed to know she was safe. She wouldn’t understand it and he wasn’t ever going to let her know it, but she made what he did worthwhile. Knowing that she was safe while he saved the world, or at least a small portion of it, made it easier for him to sleep at night. And he didn’t want her anywhere near Berzhaan.

The Kemeni rebels had scattered after their defeat and the death of their leader Tafiq Ashurbeyli, during their takeover of Suwan’s capitol building last February, but they were still out there. The last thing Ben wanted was for Tory to come here and start poking around.

The woman had a real talent for finding the truth and she never stopped once she was on the trail of a story. Should he have told her he’d be going after Andrea? Would she have listened to him and stayed in Manhattan? He doubted it.

He pocketed the capsule and blended into the throng of people on the street. He wanted to examine the information he’d been given, but he knew he couldn’t out here.

A late model car pulled to a stop next to him. Ben identified Salvo and slid into the car. Salvo pulled away from the curb.

“How’d it go?”

“Smooth.”

“Does anything ever not go smoothly for you?”

He thought of Tory and the constant frustration he felt at not being able to get through to her. He thought of his sister and the way she treated him as if he were letting down the family name with his globe-trotting ways. And his mother, who was disappointed that he still hadn’t found himself an heiress and settled down. His personal life was one constantly changing mess.

“Yes. But only temporarily,” Ben said. He had an image to keep up, especially around his men.

He palmed open the capsule and removed a tiny microdisc, passing it to O’Neill, who sat in the backseat. His small laptop computer was up and running, receiving information and dissecting it.

“This should be the coordinates of the rebel camp. Plug those in with Manning’s last known location and the coordinates of the downed chopper.”

“I’ll have a location for you in a minute. I thought that the Kemenis disbanded after their attempt to take over Suwan last year.”

“For the most part they did, but the survivors are still ready to fight.”

“Any idea who the leader of the new movement is?” O’Neill asked.

Ben didn’t take his eyes off the terrain. “That’s not our mission, O’Neill.”

“It’d be nice to have the upper hand a time or two. Remember that FUBAR mission on Puerto Isla?” O’Neill asked.

“Hell, yes. What a fuckup,” Salvo said. “But Slick here got us through with no problems.”

“That’s what they pay me for,” Ben said.

They left Suwan, heading south out of town. The lights of the city dropped away behind them as they rode out into the barren landscape. The military unit they were entrenched with was about thirty miles away in the foothills.

The night closed in around them as they sped along the deserted highway. O’Neill worked on his computer in the backseat while Ben monitored the radio for updates. They’d had an in-briefing earlier in the day and they were still a go on retrieving the marines. The ROEs—rules of engagement—were to stay focused on getting the Marines out, to expect some hostile fire and to engage only if necessary. The CO didn’t expect them to sustain any causalities.

Suddenly a round of gunfire ripped through the night. Salvo cursed and floored the gas pedal and Ben pulled his firearm and returned fire. O’Neill did the same out of the other window.

The Kemeni rebels had been driven out of Suwan, but they still patrolled the roads and sometimes shot at cars to make their presence felt. This time they’d get a little more than they bargained for. Ben prayed they’d back off now that he and his men were returning fire. Last week, a group of missionaries had nearly been taken hostage when they’d stopped to change a tire, and Ben and his men couldn’t afford to talk nice to keep their own freedom. It was kill or be killed.

The car sputtered. Salvo kept his foot on the gas, but they all heard the whine that signaled the radiator had been hit.

“We’ll dump the car and continue on foot,” Ben said.

“Yes, sir.”

Salvo steered them onto the shoulder and all three men got out of the car. The enemy gunfire had ceased, but the vehicle was DOA.

They fell into an easy formation, Salvo and Ben standing guard while O’Neill packed up his computer. They shot the gas tank and let the car burn, careful to stay out of the light cast by the flames. The car was registered to an attaché at the U.S. Military listening station. They didn’t need for it to be identified until the LASER team was out of country. This way the car could be reported as stolen.

“Ready to roll, sir.”

“Let’s move out.”

As they moved across the desert, all that Ben heard was a series of clicks on the radio. He’d been in a hundred situations like this one, but for the first time, as they made their way on foot back to the military base, he felt a churning in his gut that wasn’t excitement.

A churning that said that a man could die out here and his family might never find out what had happened to him. A churning that said maybe his luck was finally running out now that he had someone to live for.

Tory got off the plane in Germany for a short layover, the news from her doctor’s appointment still churning through her head. Her cell phone beeped as soon as she turned it on. She glanced at the caller ID. Her mother seemed to have a built-in radar to know when to call.

Tory had sent her an e-mail saying she was leaving on assignment but not detailing what she was doing. Her parents tended to worry whenever she left New York. And right now she had news she just didn’t want to spill to her parents yet.

“Hi, Mom.”

“Hey, sweetie. Dad and I wanted to invite you to come down to the ranch for the Fourth. Derrick and his family are going to be here.”

“Just me?” she asked.

“Are you still with Ben?”

Tory sighed, not sure she’d ever really make her mother understand the complexities of that relationship. And not knowing how to tell her it had just gotten a lot more complex. “Yes, I am.”

“Of course we’d love it if he came with you,” Charlotte Patton said.

She loved the way her mom covered her own dislike of Ben by making it sound as if he’d be welcome. Tory had a sudden picture of Derrick and her dad taking Ben out to a remote area of the ranch and talking to him about commitment. She smiled to herself. There was something to be said for being the baby of the family and being surrounded by their love. Baby. Oh lord.

“We can’t make it. I’m on my way to Berzhaan to cover a story.”

“I knew it was someplace dangerous. As soon as I read that e-mail I said to Dad, look at the way she didn’t say where she was going.”

“Mom, it’s not dangerous. It’s a foreign assignment. The same as when I’ve been to Ireland or London.”

“It is not the same, Victoria. A news crew was taken hostage there.”

“That’s why I’m going. I’ll e-mail you when I have a chance.”

“Be careful, Tory.”

“I will.” If you only knew…. But this wasn’t the time.

“Tory?”

“Yes?”

“I…I’m sorry I asked about Ben like that.”

“Mom, it’s okay. I understand why you did.”

“Love you, honey.”

“Love you, too.”

She hung up the phone and entered the VIP waiting room. She powered up her laptop and focused on work, doing what research she could before she got to Suwan.

She tried to concentrate but her mind was filled with the news she’d gotten at the doctor’s office.

She was pregnant.

She’d tried to put it from her mind. It wasn’t as if she felt any different today than she had yesterday. She looked the same, had even spent precious minutes in front of her bedroom mirror trying to see some physical evidence of the baby that was inside her, but there wasn’t anything yet.

She’d almost told her mom, but how was she going to explain her pregnancy when she hadn’t had a chance to talk it over with Ben? And given her mom’s concerns about the relationship, about Ben’s picture always appearing in magazines and newspapers with gorgeous women….

She checked her e-mail and saw she had one from Alex.

I can’t get Ben to call me back, are you two going to be around on the weekend of Fourth? We want to see you.

Tory rubbed her head where she felt the beginnings of a bad headache. She and Ben both came from families who were tight and close, she thought. They shared that kind of upbringing and yet there was a part of both them that liked to be alone.

D.C. was closer than Florida and Ben’s family wouldn’t ask uncomfortable questions. Plus, lately, she suspected that Alex had realized there was more to Ben’s job than met the eye.

She swallowed hard. She was never really going to be alone again. She’d have a child with her for the rest of her days. A child.

The words echoed in her head and she felt her entire world spinning out of control. The world that she’d always kept carefully ordered was being filled with chaos.

Get hold of yourself, Patton. You’re an Athena grad, not some average wimp. She took a deep breath and pulled her Blackberry PDA/cellular phone from her pocket to check Ben’s calendar. He was supposed to be back in the country on Monday. The Fourth was on Friday so they might be able to see the Forsythe family.

But Tory wasn’t sure that she’d be back from Berzhaan by then. True, it was seven days away, but the timing might be too close.

Deep inside she knew she was being a coward, afraid to face Alex knowing that she was pregnant with Ben’s child. Afraid to be at a family gathering and know she was carrying the great-grandchild that patriarch Charles Forsythe craved. Afraid that she was going to have to come clean before she was ready to.

She e-mailed Alex a quick note cautioning her that they might not make it. She mentioned Andrea and the kidnapping, which Alex had undoubtedly heard about by now, and the fact that she was on her way to Berzhaan.

She e-mailed the three UBC field producers in Berzhaan with the information she’d pulled together so far and asked them to forward anything they had from Andrea. A producer hadn’t been assigned to Tory yet. She hoped that she’d get Joan Simpson, who’d worked directly with Andrea. At the very least she wanted to talk to the woman.

Tory was booked into the same hotel that Andrea had stayed in and planned to start looking for clues to her friend’s whereabouts there.

Her phone rang again. “Patton.”

“It’s Jay. I’ve spent all day roaming around Suwan looking for any locals who might have seen Andrea or know what story she’s been following.”

“Did you find any?” she asked, pulling out her notepad to take notes.

“One guy, but I’m not positive he didn’t have Andrea and Shannon confused. He said he saw the blond TV woman yesterday. I’m going to see if I can find anyone to corroborate that.”

What if Shannon had been the target? What if Andrea had been taken by mistake? Both women were similar in height and build. Tory made a note to find out what she could about Shannon and her reporting from Suwan.

“That’s something. Can you check out where she was and see what she was asking about? Maybe try to find a more reliable source? I’ll be there shortly and I’m going to want to roll as soon as I hit the ground. I’ve been in touch with the producers and they said Andrea had a hot tip about some sort of rescue mission. Did you get a lead on anything like that?”

“Not a word, but I spoke only to locals. I didn’t think there were any hostages until Andrea and crew got nabbed.”

“Me either. I’ll start digging on this end and see what I can find.”

“Sounds good. I’ll meet you at your hotel later.”

She turned her attention back to her computer and started looking through files, searching the wire and the databases she had access to.

Thirty minutes later she found what she was looking for. A unit of Marines had gone down in the mountains of Berzhaan when their helicopter was hit by enemy fire. Four men were rescued but two were missing.

She had a tingling in her stomach that she couldn’t ignore. Ben was in Berzhaan. Was he close to Suwan? Had he seen Andrea? Damn him for being so cool on the phone when she’d mentioned the incident.

What kind of relationship did they have?

She understood the need for secrecy. She wouldn’t betray him. When was he going to start trusting her?

Chapter 3

Russ Dorn didn’t like the heat in Berzhaan. It hung in the air in oppressive waves, making a man struggle to breathe. Their contact, a young Berzhaani named Momar, had brought robes for all of his team.

Russ shifted in his djellaba, not comfortable with the fabric draping over his camouflage. But he knew the importance of blending in. He stopped at the back of the large open-air market and rubbed some dirt into his graying beard to darken it.

He purchased enough kaffiyeh for all the men. He spoke in Barzhaani, which he’d learned through deep immersion at home, playing only the Suwan national television station and listening to tapes from Berzhaan.

He’d always had a gift for languages and he’d picked up Berzhaani easily, brushing up on his Russian as well. The language was now a part of him and as he stood in the marketplace letting the sounds flow over him, he felt himself becoming more Berzhaani. He felt it seep into his pores and he was ready for action.

Larry waited in a small alleyway with Jake Brittan and Rodney Petri, two other fathers who’d joined the group. This was Russ’s elite inner militia. Men who knew how to act in a combat situation and weren’t afraid of the risks. Frankly, the ROE on this mission meant there’d be casualties and Russ knew each of the men was unafraid to give his life for the cause.

They donned the kaffiyeh headgear and Russ thought they did a good job of looking like men of Islam.

“Do you have the address for us?” Russ asked Rodney.

“It’s on Sovetski—the name has been changed to something Berzhaani, but the locals still call it Sovetski. Its two klicks from the embassy in a small residential neighborhood. I’ve programmed the GPS coordinates into your devices.”

Russ nodded at Rodney. “We’ll meet there at sunset. Larry and I are going to secure local transport back to the plane. You two make sure we have the carpets needed to get our package out of Berzhaan.”

Rodney and Jake departed and Larry fiddled with his backpack for a minute before handing Russ a Stechkin APS Russian automatic handgun. Russ checked the gun and the clip. He took an extra ammo clip from Larry and tucked it into the back of his pants for easy access.

“You sure about this?” Larry asked. “Once we go in there, we can’t turn back.”

Russ looked the man in the eyes. Larry had been his buddy for more than twenty years and he didn’t want him chickening out before the mission barely got started. This was what too many years and too much grief did to a man. There was a time when Larry would have taken all of Berzhaan with an AK-47 and a few grenades.

“Yes. Are you?” Russ asked, holding his gun easily at his side. Casually he removed the kaffiyeh from his head and folded the scarflike garment into the right size and density for a silencer.

Larry turned his back to Russ and Russ lifted the gun and the cloth. Larry glanced over his shoulder at Russ, eyes widening and hands coming up in an “I surrender” gesture.

Larry took a step back. “Yeah, man. I’m sure. I want our kids back home where they belong, not in this godforsaken place.”

Russ continued to stare at Larry until beads of sweat dotted Larry’s forehead. Then he lowered his gun, tucking it into the large pocket in the middle of the djellaba. “Then let’s make sure they go home.”

Larry nodded. Russ retied his kaffiyeh and led the way out of the alley. They both were careful to blend in with the people on the street. He’d have to keep a close eye on Larry in case he decided he wanted out of the mission.