Page 53 of Poison Evidence

“No,” she whispered.

Ivy was so aroused, she wanted to bite his neck. Instead, he stepped back and let her go. She wanted to halt his retreat. To take him deep in her throat and change his mind.

But his words had both seduced and stopped her.

Make love?

That would never happen.

His retreat was logical. He wanted her, she wanted him, but she could never trust him. That equation couldn’t be balanced using any type of known math.

And she had to ask herself, how could she have sex with a man she didn’t trust? This wasn’t stranger sex, like the first time. Now he was a man sheknewshe couldn’t trust.

And what would it mean for her later? It was one thing to have had sex with him before she’d known what he was, but would Curt Dominick offer her absolution and exoneration if she made the same mistake again, fully aware of his crimes against the US?

She paused at that. How did she know he’d committed crimes against the US? They were in Palau. She knew nothing about his actions as a spy. Maybe he’d done his spying elsewhere.

But there was that perfect American accent. Hardly necessary if he did his spying in other countries. She stepped away from the table, crossed her arms, and turned to face him. “Tell me about your life as a spy. Give me a reason to trust you.”

“What do you want to know?”

“Where were you? What did you do? Have you killed people?”

“Spy and assassin aren’t the same thing.”

“But if your cover were to be blown, did you—or would you have—killed someone to protect yourself? And I’m not talking about self-defense, like today.”

He held her gaze for a long moment, then reached for the bottle of wine. “Let’s get comfortable. I’m going to tell you about Parker Reeves.”

It was strange—and yet felt so right—to be tucked against Dimitri’s side as they sat on thick inflatable sleeping pads and leaned against the cave wall and he told her the outrageous story of everything that happened on a cold night less than a week before Thanksgiving.

Parker Reeves. Dimitri had been the second man on the Osprey, the man she’d believed was a Ukrainian neo-Nazi terrorist who the government had allowed to escape.

First she needed to wrap her head around the fact that he’d been in the US Coast Guard for nearly five years. Then that he knew Undine. She could confirm his story. As could Luke Sevick. One phone call, and she’d know if he told the truth.

But the point that made her heart pick up speed and which had her pulling away from his side to pace the cave as she processed the data was that in the course of events last fall, he’d participated in several phone conference calls with Curt Dominick.

Curt had knownexactlywho Dimitri was. He said as much in his text. And he’d ordered her to cooperate with him, knowing that. Surely that meant he trusted Parker/Jack/Dimitri at least a little?

But couldshetrust Dimitri? She felt better knowing this, but still, it raised more questions. Like who was he working for now?

But he would only tell her so much, and his story ended in November.

She frowned at her wineglass. He’d refilled it at the start of the story, but after nearly thirty minutes, it remained half-full. She abandoned it because she needed a clear head.

She turned back to the table with the chart laid across the surface. “I’ve been thinking. I could fly RON out through the large skylight and have him collect data at night. People are less likely to spot it in the dark, especially out here. It will be safer that way.”

“You don’t need daylight?”

“No. The lasers provide their own light.”

“I’ll help you set up the workstation.” He stood and crossed the rock floor to her side. “You won’t be able to upload the data to the military database with the satellite uplink.”

She nodded. “I know. The beacon transmits with every upload. Patrick’s men could find us.” She ran her hand across the surface of the chart on the table. So many beautiful contours and, added to the printed data, markings in Dimitri’s own hand. He’d been at this for months, and he’d been systematic. She could see the pattern in his notation. Insight into his beautiful mind.

“CAM collects a massive amount of data. At some point, I’ll run out of storage on the hard disk.”

“You’ll have to dump it.”

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