Page 42 of Trapped With the Secret Agent

Chapter Nine

The smell—old, rotten, and musty—it almost knocked her over. Georgia coughed and her eyes watered. She wiped the backs of her hands over them, then swung the flashlight around, unsurprised to discover that the hole was just as small as she feared. Tight quarters filled with dirt, stench, and garbage.

What had she done to deserve this obscene situation? She couldn’t think of anything so vile, so hideous that in punishment she would have to suffer living through her worst fear over and over again.

She stifled the groan rising from her throat.

Something small and furry scurried away from the light in one corner. Oh, lovely. Justlovely. Now there were rats to contend with, too. The groan found its way out. She lifted an armful of the black chador off the ground and held it tightly.

Georgia solemnly vowed that as soon as she got home, she was never going to sleep in anything more confining than an outdoor hammock ever again.

Severalthunksabove her head drew her attention upward. Peter hadn’t finished with his building project yet. She could see him vaguely, a shadow blocking the rays of sunlight filtering through the many holes and gaps in the rotting wooden floor. Lifting, dragging, piling. It was like something out of an action movie. Running and hiding. Avoiding guns and terrorists. A nuclear warhead poised to go off. She should have had Arnold Schwartensomebody to save her. Instead, she had Peter. Strong, smart, protective Peter. Her brows wrinkled in puzzlement. He was the strangest journalist she’d ever met.

His behavior contradicted everything she knew about them. Rather than try to keep his own skin intact or spin the situation into a story he could sell later, he seemed focused on keeping her safe and alive and getting the bomb diffused.

If anything, he reminded her of a policeman.

He was level-headed, had an idea to solve every situation they’d come up against so far, and nothing seemed to faze him. Uncle Theo trusted him. When she’d gotten to the point of being able to take no more and broke down in tears, he offered comfort. When a soldier threatened her with a gun, he expertly and efficiently killed him.

It was that effortless expertise that bothered her the most. How could a person learn to kill someone that quickly and easily? That wasn’t a skill acquired by taking a few martial arts lessons. And he hadn’t reacted emotionally to the fact that he’d violently ended someone’s life with his bare hands. He’d carried on as if it were routine.

What kind of training had he had in the military?

How could he ignore killing a man?

Or had the butter slipped off her noodles? Again.

Georgia swung the flashlight around a second time. There were a couple of rickety wooden crates squeezed along the wall near the stairs. She sat on one and looked up. Light was still visible through the growing pile of wood and trash Peter was arranging around the opening. She supposed that if she had to wait somewhere this would be the best of several unsavory spots. Thinking to save the batteries, she turned off her light. Now she could clearly see through the openings above her head.

Peter bent over to grab a long board, stretching his khaki sacks over his muscled butt. It wasn’t fair that he was so darn good looking. It made it hard to stay suspicious, when all she wanted to do was beg for another kiss.

He poked his head down the stairs. “Almost done,” he reported, stepping down the first couple of steps, pulling his camouflage pile of stuff closer. “There are more military trucks driving around. It’s a good thing we didn’t try to go any farther or we would have gotten caught.”

“What do you think our chances are of reaching the base before a...meltdown?”

He came down another couple of stairs, bringing a broken plank covered in odd pieces of metal and boards over the majority of the opening. He stuck an arm through the remaining small hole, pulling more wood, littered with useless garbage, across the plank, making it look like part of the floor.

“I don’t know.” He came all the way down the stairs and looked up, checking his handiwork. He glanced at her. “I really don’t, but I think we have a decent chance.”

“You’d probably say that whether we did or not.”

“You think?”

“Yeah.”

He finished inspecting his creation and reached for the flashlight she held, switching it on and flashing it around. Aside from the two crates, there wasn’t anything else to sit on. He joined her, taking the corner crate, setting the rifle he’d stolen against the wall and switching off the light, putting himself in the shadows.

Georgia’s eyes were adjusting to the dark and she could see better now. Peter’s face gleamed dully in the weak light.

“You’re probably right. I tend to think in terms of the glass being half full most of the time.” He leaned a shoulder against the dirt wall, crossed his arms, and met her gaze head on.

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