Rules of Re-engagement. Лорет Энн Уайт

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СКАЧАТЬ She clicked. “Typical Forbes. Has to do everything with a high sense of drama. No wonder the president is running without this guy.”

      Jacques said nothing. He’d heard of La Bocca. It was a famous high-end Italian restaurant. He also knew Italian had always been Olivia’s favorite. He stood against the barricade, stared down the empty wet street, his heart growing colder by the moment.

      She glanced sideways at him. “Not a fan, are you?”

      “No.”

      She smiled. “He does have fans. He’s one of the most eligible bachelors in the free world.” She pointed her camera at the phalanx of metropolitan police behind the barricade, readjusted the lens. “So much for privacy,” she said as she clicked rapid-fire.

      She repositioned her camera, trying to get a better angle down the empty street. “And so much for secrecy.” She clicked, then glanced sideways at Jacques. “He’s going to propose, I’m sure of it. Want to make a bet?”

      “No, I don’t.” He reached into his coat pocket, found the slim, flat box, fingered the hard casing. He’d been uncomfortable with the idea of using what was in the box. He wasn’t so uncomfortable now.

      A bus came to a stop beside them in a cloud of diesel fumes, the side plastered with Vote Elliot posters. Jacques stared at the smiling image of the man who’d hired him—John Elliot, one of the most beloved presidents in the nation’s recent history. There was no doubt in anyone’s mind that he’d secure a second term in the upcoming election. But that was not going to happen if Killinger got his way before October 13.

      There wouldn’t be an election. Forbes would be president, and there would be no elections in the foreseeable future—the beginning of the end of democracy.

      His job was to stop that from happening. That’s why he was standing here tonight, in the cold streets of Manhattan, a city he thought he’d never set foot in again, preparing to face down a nemesis he’d never wanted to lay eyes on again, about to confront the woman he was once going to marry. A woman he thought he’d only ever touch again in his dreams.

      He closed his fist tightly over the box. This was business. He could not allow it to become personal. The stakes were too high.

      He turned his back on the photographer and the blocked-off street. If he tried to slip through those barricades now, he’d alert the cops and Secret Service. He couldn’t risk that.

      He’d wait at her apartment until she came home…if she came home, if she didn’t sleep with Forbes in that hotel. She wasn’t likely to bring the vice president back to her place. That would require some serious advance security planning, and it would generate the wrong kind of publicity.

      Jacques crossed the street, dodging cars, oblivious to the angry honk of horns. Must be hell dating at that level. Not that he had any sympathy. Olivia was once going to be his wife.

      Now she was positioned to become the First Lady of the United States. He cursed softly. He’d loved Olivia—mind, body and soul. He remembered how her skin felt beneath his. How soft the insides of her thighs, how…he jerked to a sudden stop, clenched his jaw in pain and lifted his face to the cold rain, his scar twisting tightly down the side of his face.

      Her father must be damned pleased with himself. He’d gotten rid of that “poor bastard from the wrong side of the tracks.” He was giving Olivia a president instead—a man of breeding, a man of wealth. A man befitting his little girl.

      Rage mushroomed through his pain. He was going to look right into Samuel Killinger’s eyes when he quashed that dream. He was going to show the megalomaniac bastard just what a guy from the “wrong side of the tracks” was made of. He was going to give Samuel Killinger a taste of real power.

      Jacques swore bitterly as he reeled under the pressure of the emotions surging inside him.

      He could see now there was no way in hell he was going to be able to keep the personal out of this. That genie escaped the bottle the instant he’d caught sight of Olivia again. This was personal. He was a fool for even trying to think otherwise. It was precisely because of his connection to Olivia and Killinger that he had been the unquestionable choice for this phase of the mission.

      The best he could hope for now was to keep a tight leash on his feelings and to maintain his balance—and to remember, above all, that the success of the mission must come first. Above Olivia. Above him. Above this sudden ballooning need for revenge.

      And in a few days it would all be over. He could get the hell out of New York and go back to the way things were.

      He gritted his teeth and stalked with purpose into the city streets. He made for her apartment, his coat flying out behind him, images of her and Forbes searing his brain as the rain beat at his head.

      Garish shades of neon—pink and yellow—slid over his features as he moved between the alleys. People in his path averted their eyes, stepped quickly out if his way as he approached, not because he carried a visible weapon. He didn’t need to. His body was one, and he walked like he knew it.

      He had a mission, and he was going to get it done.

      The heavy wooden doors swung shut behind Olivia as she stepped into her favorite restaurant. The soft sounds of a harp and the gold light of hundreds of candles enveloped her instantly, but there was none of the usual buzz in the room tonight. La Bocca della Verita was empty of patrons.

      Save one. And his entourage.

      Vice President Grayson Forbes pushed back his chair and stood up from the only table set for dinner. “Olivia! I’m so glad you could make it.” He stepped forward, arms held wide, an unusual animation dancing in his eyes.

      An inexplicable sense of foreboding rippled through her. She glanced at the serving staff and bodyguards lined along the wall. “Grayson…what’s this all about?”

      “Surprised?”

      She had a sudden, sickening feeling that things were about to come to a head, that Grayson was going to force her hand, and that she was going to have to tell him it was over between them. She’d been dreading this moment.

      Grayson was not a man to accept rejection easily. He was like her father that way.

      She’d planned on talking to him after the election, after he’d left office. She’d wanted to at least do him that courtesy.

      “You…you’re supposed to be in Washington,” she said nervously. “What are you doing in New York? Why…why all this secrecy?”

      He took her hands, drew her closer. “I wanted to have dinner with my girl tonight. No crime in that, is there?”

      “Dinner?” She tried to smile. “You snarled up half of Manhattan and had me kidnapped by agents just for dinner?”

      His eyes turned serious. He pulled out a chair. “Sit, Olivia, please.”

      She sat slowly, eyeing the bodyguards along the wall. “Do they really have to be in here?”

      He didn’t answer. He didn’t need to. She and Grayson had been through this a hundred times before. He knew she was uncomfortable under their constant scrutiny. He’d learned just how much when he’d officially requested round-the-clock Secret Service detail for СКАЧАТЬ