LITMIR.BIZ

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man. She couldn’t be anything other than what she was—tough and uncompromising. She couldn’t even pretend...as other women she knew pretended. And that meant the life most Zakharian women took for granted was out of the realm of possibility for her.

      Even if she didn’t get involved romantically, even if this was only sex—only sex? she asked herself, remembering how things had exploded between Alec and her—she wasn’t willing to risk her reputation. Things were difficult enough for a woman in the Zakharian National Forces. When sex reared its ugly head, men tended to look at women differently. As if they didn’t already.

      This was twice now she had surrendered to her body’s insistent demands. Twice she had let Alec inside her defenses. Twice she had let herself forget who and what she was. And that was two times too many.

Chapter 4

      Least said, soonest mended. Alec could hear the words in his head as clearly as if his mother were standing next to him reciting that old maxim. And he knew the wisest course of action was to say nothing to the outgoing RSO. What did you say to a man who was being bounced out of a coveted job to make room for you? Ostensibly because of political favoritism, but really because he was suspected of fraud and corruption?

      No, it was better to say nothing at all, not even to commiserate with the guy over being displaced. So he listened politely as the outgoing RSO—a man he’d crossed paths with before—went through his calendar and case roster with Alec.

      He noted that the guy had a hard time meeting Alec’s eyes, and his laughter seemed forced—signs of a guilty conscience? Alec wondered. Or just that he doesn’t quite know what to say to me, too, especially since we know each other? It wasn’t unheard of to be replaced on short notice. But it couldn’t be easy. Still, it wasn’t as if he was being demoted. Not exactly. And if he was clean, the DSS would soon place him as RSO somewhere else.

      “What’s the ambassador like?” he asked, for something innocuous to say.

      “Okay, I guess, for a political appointee.”

      Which didn’t tell Alec much. He had an appointment with the ambassador this afternoon, and he was keeping an open mind. Even though the ambassador would also be a target in his upcoming investigation, that was just speculation at this point. The ambassador deserved respect from Alec in every way. At least until something was proved against him. As RSO, Alec was the personal adviser to the ambassador on all security issues, and was responsible for all aspects of the embassy’s security. Conversely, Alec had every intention of using the ambassador as his adviser on all things Zakharian. At least until he got his feet wet.

      “Well, I guess that’s about it,” the other man said. “You have the safe’s combination already, but you’ll change it, of course.” He took a set of keys from his pocket and laid them on the desk in front of him. “You’ll need these. Everything there opens a door somewhere in the embassy.” The outgoing RSO smiled briefly, stood and offered his hand.

      Alec didn’t hesitate to shake it. He couldn’t let the outgoing RSO suspect anything more than he might already suspect under the unusual circumstances.

      * * *

      Alec was run ragged over the next few days, but he loved every minute of it. This was work he was born to do, and he did it with style. With a flair all his own. Putting his personal stamp on the job without conscious effort.

      In addition to his meeting with the ambassador, he held a meet-and-greet with the entire embassy staff, memorizing their names and matching faces to them. It was another little knack he had, a trick he’d learned back when he’d first joined the DSS—people loved being remembered. It cost him nothing and gained him willing cooperation when he least expected it.

      He obtained a list of embassy employees from the ambassador on down, going back five years—including their work histories and whatever else was on file— and began going through the data meticulously. Alec had no idea how long the human trafficking might have been going on. He’d go back as far as necessary, but five years was a good start, and he’d work his way backward starting from the present. He put the current ambassador and his predecessor as RSO at the top of the list, because the king had specified the corruption could be occurring at the highest levels.

      Related to the investigation, Alec met privately with Colonel Marianescu and the three policemen the king had specified were working the trafficking case from the Zakharian side of things. Zakhar’s laws were stricter, their punishments more severe than in the United States, but crime existed everywhere, and Zakhar was no exception. The same rules of evidence didn’t apply, though, and Alec couldn’t help but feel a twinge of envy at how much easier it would be to make the case in Zakhar than it would be in the States, once all the evidence was assembled and indictments sought.

      * * *

      On Friday afternoon he met with Trace McKinnon at the palace to ensure complete privacy.

      “The agency brought you up to speed?” Alec asked McKinnon when they were alone in the sitting room of the McKinnons’ suite in the palace.

      “Not really. All I was told was that the State Department asked for me again—something critical and urgent here in Zakhar—and that you would fill me in on everything.”

      Alec told him. It didn’t take long—McKinnon didn’t need all the t’s crossed and the i’s dotted. “I thought of you right off,” Alec said. “Especially since you mentioned in the car from the airport that the princess took a year’s leave of absence from the university after the twins were born. The plan wouldn’t work if she had to rush home to get back to teaching, because it involves her, too.”

      “So you want Mara to stay on here in order to give me an ostensible reason for staying on, do I have that right?”

      “Pretty much. And the job is right up the agency’s alley. I wouldn’t ask otherwise.”

      McKinnon nodded thoughtfully. “It tracks. And Mara did take a year’s sabbatical.” A smile crept across his face. “I’ll have to check with her, but I know what she’ll say.”

      “So, you’re in?”

      “Are you kidding? Making Mara happy by giving her a reason to stay here indefinitely? It’s a no-brainer.”

      * * *

      Angelina sat quietly in one corner of the queen’s sitting room as Queen Juliana and Princess Mara drank tea and shared confidences about their husbands and their children in the way of longtime friends—which they were.

      Angelina hadn’t said anything when the queen had introduced her favorite bodyguard to her best friend a week ago, but she’d been thrilled to have finally met the princess who’d played such a pivotal role in her life. The princess was only a few months older than Angelina, but she’d been held up to Angelina as a role model by her mother since she was a little girl.

      Angelina’s mother hadn’t realized Angelina wasn’t patterning herself after the princess as a lady—she was inspired instead by the princess’s scholastic achievements and steadfast determination to achieve her goals, despite the common Zakharian attitude toward women.

      Angelina had been fired up to follow in the princess’s footsteps. Not in mathematics—she’d known that wasn’t her forte—but she’d pushed herself to excel scholastically just as the princess had done. She’d graduated from college a year early and followed that up immediately with law school and then a budding career as a prosecutor—as budding a career in the law as any woman could find in Zakhar—before joining the military.

      Her original dream of being a prosecutor might have been supplanted by her current dream job as one of the queen’s bodyguards, but that didn’t mean her original dream was gone. Someday she’d go back to it. Just not anytime soon.

      “Trace tells me you and Captain Zale met Alec at the airport,” Princess Mara said, and suddenly Angelina realized

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