Page 66 of Close Pursuit

His gaze flashed for a moment and he glanced down at her breasts. “Talk is not at the top of my agenda when we get out of here.”

Her pulse went crazy and her thong got damp in a matter of seconds. But that other stuff, the who was trying to kill them stuff, was important, darn it. She couldn’t afford to let him distract her.

“What’s the play, here?” she asked. “Chat up everyone until someone reacts wrong?”

“Clever girl.”

“Want me to flirt and throw them off balance?”

“No,” he answered sharply. “You’re mine.”

Well, then. Didn’t that just make her thong a little more damp?

They wandered around the reception for the next hour, making inconsequential small talk with any number of foreign dignitaries and staffers from D.U.

And then Katie spotted a newcomer and lurched in shock against his arm.

“What is it?” Alex asked quickly.

“Uncle Charlie just walked in.”

Alex muttered something under his breath in Russian that she assumed was not an expression of joy.

Her uncle, a gray-haired man in his early sixties, but wearing the decades elegantly, wasted no time coming over to her. “Katie, sweetie, Are you all right? You took ten years off my life with that phone call.”

“Thanks so much for the help, Uncle Charlie. I couldn’t think of who else to call on such short notice. I’m so sorry I bugged you.”

“What’s the point of having influence if I can’t use it for good now and then,” he replied charmingly.

“Uncle Charlie, I’d like to introduce you to my working partner, Dr. Alex Peters.”

“Mui vrestretilise prezhde,” her uncle said to Alex.

Alex answered emotionlessly in English, “Yes, we have met before.”

Uncle Charlie switched to English. “Your father was a worthy adversary.”

“I imagine he still is,” Alex replied dryly.

“Just so. What are you up to these days? ”

“Delivering babies until I was rudely interrupted by a brush war.”

Katie frowned. Uncle Charlie had a predatory glint in his eyes she wasn’t accustomed to. Here was the master spy at work, not her father’s laid-back brother relaxing with family.

“How did you two get out of Zaghastan? I hear it’s pretty dodgy over there.” Charlie asked.

“Several kind souls provided us unexpected rides,” Alex answered smoothly. “Including you, sir.”

“A bit of good luck ever hurts,” Charlie replied.

“Make no mistake. Luck had nothing to do with it,” Alex retorted.

Charlie’s head dipped slightly as if acknowledging some coded message in Alex’s words. “Maybe someday we will met again in the wake of less stressful circumstances.”

“Don’t hold your breath,” Alex bit out.

Somebody called a greeting to her uncle from across the room. “Don’t be a stranger, Katie,” he said smoothly. He gave her a kiss on the cheek and moved away.

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