Page 67 of Tom Clancy Line of Sight
But he didn’t really have a choice. Staying here another couple days or even another couple years wouldn’t change the likely outcome. Aida Curic, his mother’s young patient from so many years ago, simply didn’t exist. And he had important Campus work to do, as well as his work as a financial analyst at Hendley Associates. He was a good worker, and a good soldier.
But he was also his mother’s son.
He was so lost in his thoughts that he actually jumped when he heard a knock at the door. He was expecting his landlords to drop by for an inspection before he flew out tomorrow.
Jack padded over to the door in his stocking feet and opened it.
Oh.
Not his landlords.
34
SARAJEVO, BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA
Jack’s jaw dropped, just like in the cartoons. Standing in front of him was one of the most beautiful women he’d ever seen.
And maybe one of the angriest.
Jack didn’t care. Her thick, chestnut shoulder-length hair and full-figured beach body would have caught his attention any day of the week, but her startling blue eyes absolutely gobsmacked him.
She must have liked what she saw, too, because the harshness in those magnificent eyes softened. She might even have blushed a little.
God knows he felt a jolt racing through him, from the nape of his neck all the way down to his...
Toes.
Standing behind her in the tiled hallway was a slope-shouldered slab of meat, with a shaved head and a closely trimmed beard, staring daggers at him.
The woman gathered her wits. Her softness disappeared. All business now. “You are Jack Ryan?”
If you’re looking for me, yeah. I mean, hell, yeah!
“Yes, I’m Jack Ryan,” he said evenly.
“My name is Aida Curic. I understand you were looking for me.”
“Yes, I was. I mean, I am.”
In a million years, Jack never would’ve connected her grainy driver’s-license photo, which Gavin had sent him, to that perfect face.
“Please come in.”
“No, thank you. What is it that you want from me?”
“Nothing, I promise. I was trying to find you in order to give you something.”
“A letter?”
“Yes.”
“From whom?”
Good English,Jack thought. “My mother.”
“Why would your mother want to give a letter to me, a perfect stranger?”
Mr. Clean shifted his stance, his glowering eyes still fixed on Jack. From where Jack stood he couldn’t see a weapon on the man, unless you counted the two seventeen-inch guns hanging from his wide shoulders.
