Previously: Chapter 1: Eu quis amar, mas tive medo [A]

Look! Another chapter! Last chapter was all Ashley, so this time we meet Spencer.

Rating: A. Mild violence and swearing.

* * * * *

Chapter Two: E quis salvar meu coração

Spencer tapped her fingers on the table in front of her. She had no patience at the best of times and, right that moment, she had none whatsoever. She had never been in favour of paying off kidnappers, even though she knew that it was standard operating procedure in this part of the world. After all, she’d lived in South America all her life and she was well used to how things were. You paid them: they returned the target unharmed. For many in the more impoverished favelas of both Brazil and Costa Mesa, it was a career and they had no intention of spoiling things by accidentally hurting a target, especially one as uncontroversial as Ashley Davies.

But, this time more than any other, Spencer had wanted to rush in and go for the balls-to-the-wall rescue plan. Her boss, Brendan, was always warning her about her hotheadedness and, for that reason, he had refused to involve her in the pay-off. So, she was left sitting there, waiting for Glen and Brendan to come back from the drop-off. Assuming things went to the same basic set-up as most kidnappings, the drop-off would be made and Ashley would be returned within twenty-four hours at the latest. It shouldn’t be any different from any of the other four kidnappings she’d previously been involved in.

But this time was different. Ashley Davies was different. How she felt about the young woman was different.

So, she was sitting, drumming her fingers, bouncing her leg with nervous tension: waiting, waiting, waiting…

* * *

Spencer felt Ashley’s hand grasp her forearm. Using her free hand, she removed her sunglasses. They’d been useful in the drive from the airport in allowing her to observe the brunette without the other woman knowing. Ashley had pestered her the entire ride back with question after question, but Spencer had been unable to answer her. Since the moment she had met the young musician outside the airport, her entire body had been thrumming with an incredible need to touch her. Spencer had wanted to shut the brunette up by pulling her into her lap and kissing her until they were both breathless.

But she was a calm, cool professional. She didn’t get this way about her clients. Hell, she didn’t get this way about anyone. Spencer’s MO was to chase a girl until she had them and then, once she’d had her fun, get gone before there was any emotional commitment. She’d been stupid enough to fall in love only once and she had her heart broken and ripped into tiny pieces when the girl had announced that she was getting married. To a guy. And not just any guy, either. Natalia had married Brendan, Spencer’s boss and the man she looked upon as almost a second father. She never wanted to feel pain like that again, so she avoided any chance that she might make herself vulnerable. It was, after all, what she and Glen were trained for: safeguarding themselves and others; being in control; never letting the pain show.

It took all that Spencer had to manage a look of disdain. She looked at the hand on her arm and then up at Ashley.

“I’d like to lick every inch of you,” the brunette purred.

Spencer felt a flash of hot desire shoot through her and she hoped that it hadn’t shown. From the other woman’s grin, however, she suspected that she had betrayed her emotions, if only for a moment. She slipped her sunglasses back on and peeled Ashley’s hand from her skin.

“Someone will come and get you for the security briefing,” she responded. She was actually quite pleased that her voice sounded calm and even. She certainly wasn’t feeling that way. “Good afternoon, Miss Davies.”

Leaving the room, she moved swiftly and purposely down the stairs, through the house towards the kitchen at the rear, where she found Glen flirting shamelessly with Pilar, the beautiful young cook she’d briefly considered making a play for herself. Looking at them now, she realised that, beautiful as Pilar was, she was as nothing compared to Ashley Davies. Slumping against the closed kitchen door, Spencer stifled a small moan as she thought of Ashley’s frankly appraising gaze and her bold statement of intent.

“Hey, sis, what’s the brat like?”

Spencer shook her head clear of her thoughts and grinned at her older brother. “Hot but bratty.” Her tone sounded dismissive, even although she knew it was a lie.

“When’s the other one getting in?” Glen asked, referring to Ashley’s younger sister, Kyla.

“Later tonight, I think. Brendan’s picking her up.”

Glen nodded and went back to his faltering pursuit of Pilar. As Spencer helped herself to a strong cup of coffee from the pot on the stove, she saw that her hand was trembling. Her whole body was trembling with need.

She tried to remember if this was how she’d felt when she met Natalia. But it definitely wasn’t. Falling for Natalia had been a slow, tender process, of taking one step forward and a couple back. Meeting Ashley Davies was like being hit by a thunderbolt. Something told her that this was not a woman to take lightly.

It would make for an interesting couple of weeks.

* * *

“Did it go okay?” Spencer asked immediately, as Glen and Brendan entered the kitchen.

“Sure,” the older Irishman agreed, as Glen pulled out a chair and sat down across from his sister.

“When and where’s the pick-up?” Spencer knew her voice sounded strained. She didn’t care.

“They’ll call here in an hour. I’d better go tell the father.”

Spencer watched Brendan leave and immediately turned on Glen. “Tell me everything.” The blond man wasn’t paying too much attention, as he was looking around for Pilar. “She’s not here,” Spencer snapped. “Just tell me what happened, Glen.”

Her brother looked at her evenly. “It was like the other times. We dropped the money off, called the disposable cell we’ll never trace, hung back for a while to see if anyone showed and then left.” He looked quizically at his sister. “She means something, doesn’t she? She’s not just some hot chick to you, is she, Spencer?” he asked, reaching out his hand to place it over hers.

Spencer pulled her hand away. “I don’t know what you mean.”

“She really likes you, too,” Glen noted.

That made Spencer’s head shoot up. “What did she tell you?”

He shrugged. “Nothing specific. The two of you have been circling around each other since she got here, so I just flat-out asked her what her intentions were towards you. I told her she needed to let you do the chasing cos my big, bad little sister doesn’t like it when the chicks are too eager.” He grinned in response to her eye-roll. “What? It’s true!”

“She’s not some chick,” Spencer admitted through gritted teeth. She didn’t know exactly when it had happened but, somewhere in the previous two weeks, she had fallen hard for Ashley Davies. Possibly it had happened the moment that she first saw her at the airport. It didn’t really matter anyway: no matter how this all played out, Ashley would be heading back to New York and Spencer and Glen would either stay on at the mansion or be moved to another job. Brendan’s security company was never short of work. Whatever she might feel, there was no future in it. It didn’t stop her from feeling almost murderously helpless, however.

“My little sister’s in love?” Glen teased.

“Don’t,” Spencer warned.

“Oh my God, you really are!” Her brother could not have looked more shocked. “Fuck, Spence, I’m so sorry. Don’t worry, we’ll get her back. I promise.”

Spencer nodded and stared at the telephone on the wall, as if watching it could make it ring.

* * *

Standing in the changing rooms of Cidade de Mesa’s finest department store while Ashley tried on clothes was Spencer’s idea of hell on Earth. It wasn’t that she didn’t enjoy the view – quite the contrary, in fact – but it made Spencer feel weak. The two things she prided herself on were her sense of detachment and the fact that she was one of the best at her job. She had neither of those to fall back on at that moment.

The curtain to the changing room didn’t quite meet the wall and Spencer had been staring in through the gap, trying to catch glimpses of the partially-clothed inhabitant. A circus could have passed through and it wouldn’t have distracted Spencer from her covert observations. All her concentration was directed at not letting herself pull the curtain back, let her hands touch the smooth, exposed waist she could see and pull the brunette hard against her.

In the previous two weeks, she had been finding it harder and harder to be professional in the face of Ashley’s relentless flirting. The only way she had been able to cope had been to feign indifference. She spoke as little as possible because she didn’t trust herself not to say something inexcusable. Her brain was screaming at her with the need to return the brunette’s teasing, to give in to what they both so clearly wanted, and that scared her enough to keep her from doing just that.

Although she’d been assigned Ashley, she had managed to get Glen to cover for her on several occasions. She knew her brother suspected something. His self-satisfied grins gave him away. She didn’t really care. She just knew that she sometimes needed space from the brunette to allow herself to maintain her composure.

As Ashley removed another top, partially turned away from Spencer’s gaze, the blonde bit her lip hard. She took in the sight of the tanned skin of Ashley’s back and the curve of her breast, encased in black lace. She shut her eyes for a moment as her mind wandered to what it would feel like to slide her hand over that lace and feel the other woman’s nipple harden against her palm. She shifted uncomfortably as she felt that now-familiar sensation of primal lust. She was glad she’d decided on a loose-fitting pant suit for their shopping excursion, as it helped disguise the more obvious signs of her desire.

Her discomfort increased as Ashley turned to pick up another top which was on a hanger on the wall behind her. Spencer could see that the black lace was almost transparent at the front. As she looked upon Ashley’s breasts, her nipples clearly visible, Spencer heard alarm bells ringing in her brain. And the brunette chose that moment to glance in her direction. Despite the sunglasses that Spencer was wearing, she felt their gazes lock and she knew that they were both thinking and feeling the same thing.

The alarm bells in her head reached fever pitch as Ashley’s own gaze raked over Spencer’s tee. It was then that the blonde realised that the noise in her head was, in fact, external. The fire alarm in the building was sounding. Immediately, her training kicked in. She knew that, in Mesa, that sound often meant a bomb alert, that a suspicious package had been found or a malicious call had been made to the store. With elections coming up, tensions were running high in the capital; there had been several riots strenuously put down by the Costa Mesan Army. She could take no chances.

Without further thought, Spencer barged into the small changing room, picking Ashley’s tank top off the floor and thrusting it at her.

“Put it on!” she commanded as she picked up Ashley’s purse and shopping bags with one hand. With the other hand, she hauled the brunette against her side. She tried desperately to ignore the feeling of the other woman’s body against her, even as her raging hormones kicked in.

“Let’s go,” she barked. Pulling Ashley with her, she made her way towards the stairs, easily weaving in and out of the crowds who were trying to leave the store. Her training, second nature to her, allowed her to anticipate the movements and jostling. Her grip on Ashley’s waist tightened as they left the store and hit the teeming street. The brunette’s feet were barely touching the ground as Spencer moved them in the direction of a quiet alleyway she had spotted as soon as they had exited the building.

As wailing sirens approached, announcing the arrival of either the police or the Army, Spencer pulled them into the alley, marching up it until she found a doorway a few hundred yards from the main road. Pushing Ashley back against the bolted and padlocked door, Spencer stepped into the doorway with her. Looking over her shoulder, she checked to see if they’d been followed, but there was no-one else there. The only sounds were the muffled sirens and the trickling of water in a drain somewhere overhead.

As the adrenaline wore off, Spencer became acutely aware of the fact that her body was pressed up hard against that of the smaller woman. She could feel Ashley’s anxiety in the way her chest heaved against her own. She realised that she had dropped the shopping bags and the purse she had been carrying and that her hands were protectively clutching Ashley’s waist, while the brunette’s hands gripped her shoulders. Not wanting to move from their intimate position immediately, she continued to look up and down the alleyway, even though she suspected that they were no longer in any danger.

Ashley must have sensed the change because her hold on Spencer’s shoulders loosened. Those fingers which had been digging into her skin in panic were now almost a caress. The chest that had been heaving against hers settled into an easier rhythm, but one which unsettled Spencer completely. She wanted nothing more than to thrust her hips harder into the brunette, but she reluctantly let her hands drop from Ashley’s waist and took a half-step back, turning finally to look at the other woman.

Ashley’s eyes were somewhat glazed and she was looking back at Spencer with barely-disguised desire. Spencer cursed the fact that she had lost her sunglasses in the fracas, as she realised that her eyes were probably reflecting back the same emotions. She ducked her head and coughed.

“I, uh, think we’re all clear now,” she commented.

Expecting a flirting comment or a snappy retort, Spencer was surprised when the brunette merely murmured, “Thank you.”

Spencer felt herself blush hard as she bent down to retrieve their bags. “We’d better get back,” she muttered.

“Yeah, we’d better,” Ashley agreed softly.

* * *

“I am not fucking sitting around here doing nothing, Brendan! You must be fucking insane if you think that for one fucking second!”

The older Irishman placed his hands firmly on Spencer’s shoulders and shoved her back into the chair she was trying to get up from. He gave her a stern look.

“Look, Spence, you’re too close to all of this. You’re half-bloody-likely to get yourself killed at the best of times. You need to stay here with Vice-Consul Davies and act point on this.”

Spencer sighed heavily. “No. Fucking. Way.”

“Spencer, we have been through this five ways from Friday and you are not coming with us,” her boss warned.

Things had not gone well. The ransom had been paid and they had received a series of messages giving them the time and location of the pick-up. In ninety-nine percent of such cases, this part was fairly routine and the target was just released back onto a busy public street or somewhere innocuous. But, when Glen and Brendan arrived at the scene of the pick-up – a busy shopping mall on the outskirts of the city – there had been no-one to pick up. They had searched the parking lot and every single store inside. Ashley Davies was nowhere to be seen.

Glen had gone to the mall security guards. He couldn’t tell them the truth, but he got as close to it as he dared, telling them that his employer had gone missing within the mall. He was still there, going over all available surveillance tapes. Brendan had returned, alone, to the Residence and had broken the news to a heart-broken Vice-Consul Davies and an equally distraught Spencer. The Residence had quickly become a flurry of dark-suited activity as Mr Davies called in the State Department and, Spencer suspected, the CIA. While the US authorities began their own investigation through official channels, Brendan informed Spencer that he and Glen would be carrying out a little investigation of their own. He had made it quite clear, however, that Spencer would not be involved and that she would be left behind to look after the Vice-Consul. They had been arguing for a solid half-hour about it.

Spencer wasn’t a fool. She knew that Brendan had been shaking down people since Ashley had disappeared two days previously, trying to find out who had taken her. For all that it was a big city, Mesa was a hard place to keep a secret. Someone always knew something and Brendan made it his business to either know those someones or to have some leverage against those who could point him in the right direction. She had a notion that Brendan probably had a list of potential suspects by now and that he and Glen would be heading out to pursue them.

“All right, all right,” she replied, raising her hands, palms towards Brendan, in acceptance. “You win. I’ll stay here.”

Her boss looked at her with skepticism. “That’s it? You’re giving in?”

Spencer shrugged. “I could fight with you some more, but that’s just stopping you getting out there and getting her back. And I really want her back, Brendan.”

He still seemed uncertain about his most stubborn employee’s sudden change of heart, but nodded his head in acceptance of her explanation. “Right, then, I’d better get going and pick your brother up.”

* * *

Spencer watched from her window as Brendan’s silver SUV pulled out of the Residence’s driveway. She was putting on her best boots – the climbing boots that she’d invested nearly six hundred dollars in but which would withstand anything she put them through – and lacing them up. Trying not to be too obvious, she’d gone for her more casual look: the brown cargo pants and a white tank layered over an olive wifebeater. Completing the look with a straw cowboy hat, she knew she that she would be able to blend in anywhere easily. People would naturally assume that she was either a backpacker or a member of the Peace Corps. There were plenty of both in the city and the surrounding countryside.

Picking up the keys to her own battered Jeep, Spencer sprinted down the back stairs – pausing only to give a surprised Pilar a hug and a kiss on the cheek and to ask her to cover if anyone was looking for her – and out to the courtyard. She drove like a thing possessed until she pulled up in front of a large set of gates off a side road a couple of miles outside of the city. Keying in the entry code and seeing the gates swing open, she continued up along a track until she parked in front of an impressively large stucco house.

She was not surprised to be met at the front door, as she knew that the security system alerted the main house to anyone opening or closing the gates.

“Natalia,” she murmured in greeting. “How’s married life treating you?”

The tall, willowy girl smiled ruefully. “You don’t really care, do you?”

Spencer looked at the girl to whom she had once given her heart and wondered what she had seen in her. Although Natalia was objectively attractive, with a slender body and a pretty face, she was lacking a certain something. There was no light or warmth behind her eyes, only ambition. Spencer wondered how long it would be before the woman traded her current husband in for someone richer and possibly better-looking.

“No, Tash,” she replied, using her old pet name for the half-Russian girl, “I don’t really.”

The girl smiled at that. “You were always so honest, Spencer. It was one of the many reasons I liked you so much.” Spencer tried not to wince inwardly at Tash’s revisionist view of their relationship as being one of friends-with-benefits. “So, what can I do for you?”

“You have no idea?” Spencer knew that Brendan kept nothing from his wife. He was as in love with her as Spencer had once been.

Natalia looked Spencer up and down, and stretched against the doorframe. “You look good, Spence,” she murmured. “There’s never been anyone like you, you know. Where it counts,” she added somewhat unnecessarily.

The blonde laughed mirthlessly and rocked on her heels, stuffing her hands in her pockets to prevent her from lashing out and slapping the smug smile from Natalia’s face. “Tash, I might be great in bed, but I’m still poor. It’s never going to work between us.” She shrugged her shoulders. “I need into Brendan’s office.”

“For?”

Natalia had been the company’s office manager when she had first met Spencer and, since marrying the boss, she continued to be Brendan’s personal assistant. Spencer knew that there was nothing about Brendan’s work that his wife didn’t know. “I need the list they’re working from, Tash. I need to know who Brendan thinks has the Davies girl.”

The other woman nodded in understanding. “Brendan mentioned that he thought there was something going on between you and the Ambassador’s daughter.”

“There isn’t,” Spencer retorted, not bothering to correct Tash’s elevation of Raife Davies from Vice-Consul to Ambassador and not being entirely truthful either, “but would it really matter if there was? You’re married to one of my best friends. We’re in the past.”

Tash shrugged her shoulders and stood aside, letting Spencer inside the house. Spencer followed the other woman to Brendan’s private office and waited while Natalia looked through a stack of papers before pulling out a single sheet and passing it to her. As Spencer reached her had out to take it, the other woman pulled the paper back.

“What’s it worth to you, Spence?”

Trying not to curl her lip with disgust, Spencer responded, “How about you give me the list and I don’t tell your husband that you hit on his employees?”

“What happened to you, Spencer? You used to be fun.”

“You fucked my boss behind my back and then married his money. That shit kinda puts a dent in your sense of humour. Now, give it here, Tash.” Spencer reached out and snatched the sheet of paper away. “Thanks,” she muttered through gritted teeth. “As ever, it’s been an experience.”

Spencer had already eliminated about half the names on the list by the time she’d scanned the paper on her way back to her Jeep. They were known political militants and nothing about this kidnapping said ‘political motive’ and she assumed that Brendan had come to the same conclusion. Some of the others she recognised as petty felons whom the Mesan police would consider the usual suspects. Picking the nearest address of the first name she hadn’t ruled out, she headed out of Brendan’s compound. She had barely made it three miles down the road when her cellphone started ringing.

Pulling it out of her pocket, she nearly crashed the Jeep into the ditch that ran along the roadside as she noticed that the caller ID flashed the name ‘Ashley Davies’.

* * * * *

Next up: Chapter Three – Mas o amor sabe um segredo [A]