WOULD-BE CHRISTMAS WEDDING Read Free

wrong time, Thomas. I realize you didn’t plan this, but you know I have commitments.”
    “The charities and parties can manage without you.”
    “But I don’t want them to. And I won’t let a vague ‘maybe longer’ interfere with my plans.” That was exactly what she was trying to change in her life. The idea everyone else seemed to have that nothing she did mattered enough that it couldn’t be cast aside at the drop of a hat.
    “Cecelia, please cooperate. The man pulling the strings on this won’t hesitate to hurt you. He turned one of my own people against me. He nearly killed me a few times over between the airport and Casey’s wedding.”
    “And yet you made it.” She patted his cheek. He really didn’t need to go so far in his effort to talk her out of this move. “I’ll make it, too—if this threat to me even proves more than a rumor.”
    “I had years of field experience and another trained agent at my side,” Thomas protested.
    “I’m not hiding.”
    “Mom,” Casey hesitated in the kitchen doorway, a big suitcase behind her. “You might put your friends in danger.”
    “That’s hitting below the belt and it won’t work.” Cecelia set her hands on her hips. “Your father didn’t marry a bubble brain, no matter how the two of you believe otherwise.”
    “You’re twisting things up,” Casey said. “This has nothing to do with your career change.”
    “Maybe it should.” The words were out before she’d really thought it through, but she warmed to the idea immediately. “I’m taking leave through the holiday until I report for ops training. Why not use me to trap the traitor on your team?”
    “How can you help if you’re a victim?” her brother demanded.
    “If they make the attempt, you can close in and you’ll have your rogue agent. If—big if—I get kidnapped, you’ll have someone on the inside.”
    Thomas shook his head. “No way. I won’t risk your life that way. Even if we wired you, this guy would either find it or jam the signal, rendering the exercise pointless.”
    Cecelia held her ground, undeterred. “You can get creative and use me as an asset, or stop wasting your breath. Even if you put me in a safe house, I wouldn’t stay there.” Not this year. She had plans, a ticket to the Caymans and maybe even a new friend who might be encouraged to join her on a holiday getaway. But she wasn’t sharing that. As unsettled as these two were about her career change, she didn’t want to see how they would come unglued over her personal secret.
    “If you were asset material, I’d have recruited you already.”
    Casey gasped, but Cecelia gave her brother her most serene smile. “When is this kidnapping supposed to happen?”
    “I don’t have a hard date. The analysts are working on it.”
    “I see.”
    “Who is the mole?” Casey wanted to know.
    “I’ve narrowed it down to two people.”
    Cecelia arched an eyebrow. He’d already avoided this question once.
    “Has to be either my deputy director or his assistant. They’re the only ones who have the access to the information we’ve discovered that has been leaked to my enemy.”
    “And your gut says who?” Cecelia pressed.
    Thomas sighed, rubbed his temples. “My money’s on Deputy Director Holt. He’s the only one who would know where to start looking. I just don’t think his assistant could manage this alone. As much as I hate to admit it, it has to be Holt.”
    Cecelia rode out the jolt of surprise, hoping the two people staring at her didn’t notice. She thought about it for a minute or two as Thomas went on about how he was still having trouble accepting the man would turn like this. Cecelia sipped her coffee, found it had gone cold. She dumped it out and poured a fresh cup.
    Okay, reality check. What were the odds that two men named Holt would come to her attention within weeks of each other, one working for her brother and another through the online dating site?
    Didn’t take a master spy to