Dance with the Devil Read Free Page A

to 5:00 p.m. And lonely from 5:05 p.m. to 8:55 a.m. She was just starting to kick the lethal Jack Ryan habit.
    She’d gone cold turkey, and had been doing just fine, thank you very much, without him.
    â€œYeah, I know,” he said, sliding his thumb back and forth on her thigh in an absentminded and annoying caress. “But I— we —need you for this job, Mia. You’re the best. Nobody can—”
    â€œToo bad.” Mia shoved at his marauding hand. It didn’t budge. Fine. Stroke away. It didn’t affect her in the slightest anymore. She relaxed against the plush leather seat. Outside she projected calm, inside mooshy, adrenaline racing. With annoyance, she reminded herself. “My cat-burgling, safecracking days are over,” she told him flatly.
    â€œYou’re back in, darling, whether you like it or not. Orders from the top. We go in, get the disk and leave. You’ll be back home in no time. Tops.”
    â€œWhat disk?” Mia demanded. Hell, she couldn’t even keep herself from asking. She felt the familiar rush of anticipation. Damn it. Damn him. She had to remind herself that it wasn’t Jack who needed her tonight. This was for her country, she had to remind herself. She felt the zing of energy she’d always felt when she was embarking on a gray ops assignment. As partners, she and Jack had been unbeatable.
    â€œYou ready to listen?”
    No. Mia sighed. “Brief me. And make it…brief.”

CHAPTER TWO
    J ACK UNLOCKED THE CUFFS as the limo pulled up in front of the embassy. They’d been to several parties here in the past. Knowing the layout of the house made tonight’s job that much easier. Too easy, Mia thought suspiciously, shooting Jack a glance.
    The disk they were there to retrieve was probably in the safe in the library. First floor, and just beyond the downstairs bathrooms. They’d never heisted anything from here before, but they’d certainly scoped out what was where. Just in case.
    Their job description was— had been —gray ops retrieval. If something needed to be copied, or replaced, Jack and Mia were sent in to do the job. If specific information was required, Jack could set up a program to trap key strokes and send the info back to the agency’s computers without the user being any the wiser.
    While Mia’s nimble fingers could open just about anything locked, Jack’s expertise was anything computer related. He was brilliant. He could ferret around to his heart’s content, change, tweak or copy without leaving a whisper of a fingerprint, not a breath of evidence that he’d tromped all over their hard drive.
    But this job was nothing that intrusive or complicated. In this case they were to retrieve a disk with the names and addresses of the people funding the arms race in one of the ever name changing nations north of South Africa.
    It was suspected that not only were there thousands of wealthy individuals contributing, but also a good number of American corporations. And of course millions of dollars in funding was being funneled to the cause from certain weapons manufacturers who benefited from the continuing war.
    American weapons were killing thousands of American soldiers sent there to protect the nation’s citizens from the bad guys. Anyone possessing the list of contributors was in the position to halt the war. Or escalate it.
    They were there to retrieve the disk.
    Piece of cake, Mia thought as she waited for Jack to round the car to her side and then for the driver to pull away to a predesignated spot in case they had to make a hasty departure.
    And she would be hasty. She’d be in and out in ten minutes or less.
    And this blind date from hell would be over.
    Ten minutes with Jack, using their usual cover, was about all she’d be able to take.
    With any luck at all, tonight wouldn’t even be a blip in her memory this time tomorrow.
    She took a deep breath of cold