Point Of No Return

Except it wasn’t as if Chet had come rushing to Tbilsi, was it? Apparently Chet had really meant it when he said he didn’t want her on his team. He didn’t even want to be associated with her.

It didn’t matter. She was so over Chet Stryker. Over him and his swagger and his overprotective urges and his devastating smile. O-ver.

She’d find Joshy on her own.

She wadded the greasy paper and sandwich into a ball and threw it into a trash can, no longer hungry.

Now that she was here, she’d start by checking in with the powers that be—namely, the American Embassy—and see if they might point her in the right direction.

She’d looked up the address online at a kiosk in Amsterdam and printed a map, and now headed in what she hoped was the right direction.

Funny, she’d expected less foot traffic, given that the residents of Georgia had been through a war not so long ago. Instead, street cafés and vendors selling ice cream and hot dogs festooned the sidewalks. Strollers scattered pigeons, and the occasional artist called out a price.

Normalcy. A country in crisis craved it, perhaps.

She understood. Whenever she’d come home from a mission, especially a rescue, she’d dive into her routine—yoga, health food, Bible study on base and weekly phone calls home.

She hadn’t had a real routine since she’d left the military. Which was why, perhaps, she was always living in crisis mode, pushing herself, never finding her default rhythm.

In a way, the foreign aromas made her feel more at home than anything had in the two years she’d spent in Seattle.

She turned onto George Balanchine Street and spotted the embassy set off from the road, wire fencing cordoning off Little America from the rest of the world. A guard station flanked a gate at the end of the rectangular fencing. A driveway beyond led to an enormous white building—austere in relation to the rich architecture of the Tbilisi streetscape. Of course, Americans had to be different, stand apart, resist blending in.

She hoped, however, just this once, her nephew hadn’t listened to her advice and had done exactly that—not blended in. It would be a thousand times easier to find him if he’d left a conspicuous trail.

And as for this runaway girl…well, Mae hoped she was worth it.

The light changed and she stepped out to cross.

Something grabbed at the canvas bag slung across her body, jerking her back.

On instinct, she whirled around to slam her fist on the hand holding her bag. Didn’t even think when she followed with a side kick to the shins.

She finished with a stiff arm chop to the neck.

The pickpocket didn’t run. Didn’t, in fact, even flinch. He just blocked her chop, his grip iron on her bag, dark eyes on hers, his voice just above a growl. “Calm down and stop hitting me.”

Then he released her bag. Mae tripped back, words stuck in her throat.

Chet?

He looked good, too. Dark curly hair, a little shorter than she remembered. Rumpled in a gray snap-button denim shirt rolled up just above the elbows. And a messenger bag slung across his chest. He stared at her with those piercing blue eyes that seemed to be able, in this moment, to stun her into silence. Chet Stryker. The man who’d told her that she couldn’t ever be on his team. That she couldn’t keep up.

That he didn’t want her in his life.

He had her off balance—that was why she let him drag her back toward the shadowy enclave between two doors. She was still reeling when he pushed her against the wall, bracketed her between his arms, and said tightly, “Can’t you listen to anything I say?”

And then, because it felt right, because he deserved it, because all her adrenaline suddenly peaked, she hit him again.

Square in the chest. “Apparently not.”

THREE

“Why do you always have to make things so difficult?” Chet rubbed his chest where Mae had boxed him. The first two punches he’d taken—after all, he had pounced on her like a bandit, but he’d been trying to keep her from igniting an international incident. The last thing he needed was to alert the local militia to his presence in the country.

The third punch, however, hurt more than it should have. Especially since Mae had looked him square in the face, full recognition in those beautiful green eyes, right before she walloped him.

Although he probably deserved that one, too. Not just for stomping on her hopes of flying for Stryker International, but also for walking out of her life.

Or perhaps for letting her believe that he could make room for her in his heart.

Okay, she still took up way too much room in his heart, but she didn’t have to know that. No, that wouldn’t be safe for anyone.

Mae stalked down the street, ten feet ahead of him, fists tight, as if she might be trying not to hit him again. He’d vote for that. In fact, he should probably be ecstatic that she was heading in the opposite direction of the embassy, that she’d bought his reasoning that the government would only send them packing stateside. Unfortunately, he’d expected—no, hoped was more accurate—that she’d actually be happy to see him. That her eyes would light up, and maybe she’d throw her arms around him.

He’d been jostled around the cargo hold of the C-130 harder than he’d thought.

She looked better than the image his imagination had conjured up. Her auburn hair had grown, and she wore it in a sloppy, curly, tantalizing ponytail. Despite trying to hide her figure inside a pair of baggy cargo pants, a green T-shirt and a canvas jacket, she took his breath away. She still looked like she had the day he’d met her—about ready to bullet a group of disrespectful teenage boys with gooey tortilla wraps.

They’d deserved it. He would have helped her, even. Something about her—the spark in her eye, the pride in her jaw, the way she turned away, hiding her pain—stirred his respect. Of course, he knew the story—thanks to his pal David Curtiss, one of Mae’s college buddies—of how she’d risked her life for her friend Roman and rescued him from a Siberian gulag, and just what it had netted her.

No pension. No job. Stripped of her very identity as a soldier.

Seeing her pain had made him suddenly long to make it all better. To make her smile.

Just another person he’d managed to disappoint.

At least he hadn’t gotten her killed.

Yet.

Unfortunately, it might be easier to reason with a rhinoceros than with Mae when she was in this kind of mood.

He dashed to catch up and was on her heel when she whirled. He plowed right into her and had to grab her to keep them both from going over.

She shook out of his grip. Opened her mouth. Closed it. Glared him into a pile of ash.

“Still not using our words, are we?” Chet stepped back and held up his hands. “Okay, I’ll fill in the blanks. I’m here to help you find your nephew. And the runaway princess.”

For the first time, her expression flickered. He leaped on it.

“Yep, I said princess. From a Caucasian tribe. Did you know she’s pledged to be married in a few days, and guess who ran off with the bride?”

Mae’s expression drained and she rolled her eyes—or perhaps looked heavenward for help. Which he was all for, at the moment.

“The bottom line is, your nephew is in big trouble, and I’m here to find him.” He reached into his jacket and pulled out a plane ticket. “Alone. You’re headed back to the states, Mae.”

Before you get killed.