Embarrassed by her reaction, she swiped the rest of the moisture from her cheeks.

  His eyes were shadowed, as if he were haunted by some dark tragedy. “It was the thought of coming back to you, Lauren, that helped me survive three years ago. My heart wouldn’t let go.” His finger lightly traced her jaw. “How can I prove to you I’m Jonathan Michaels, your husband?”

  Her mind raced. Did Jon have any distinguishing marks? “When Jon was eight he was caught in a barbed-wire fence. The scar was on…” Her cheeks burned with embarrassment.

  Her tormentor’s lips curved into a broad grin. “Yes. Where’s the scar?”

  “If you’re who you claim you are, you’ll know where the scar is,” she answered indignantly.

  She tried to outstare him, but when his hands went to his belt buckle, her eyes dropped to the floor. As she listened to the rustle of fabric and the sound of his zipper, the color in her face went two shades brighter. Why couldn’t she have thought of another distinguishing mark?

  “Lauren.”

  Her head jerked up, and she glued her eyes to his face.

  “Unless you look lower, you’ll never know if there’s a scar on my thigh or not.”

  Her eyes moved quickly down his body, trying to ignore the wide shoulders and deep chest. Thankfully his shirt covered his briefs. When her eyes settled on his thighs, she went still. His legs were covered with a dozen scars. Some were thin, straight lines. Others were jagged. His right knee was surrounded by angry red lines, sure signs of trauma. The spot where Jon’s scar should have been was covered with a gigantic red scar.

  “What happened?”

  “The car accident. My legs were cut by flying glass and broken in seven places.”

  She continued to gape until he cleared his throat and pulled up his trousers. She flushed again.

  “Why didn’t you just tell me you had all those scars on your legs, instead of dropping your pants?” she demanded indignantly.

  “Would you have believed me if I simply told you?”

  “No.” She hadn’t felt like such a prize fool since she was eight and stepped in a cow patty in front of the entire third grade when they’d gone on a field trip to a local dairy.

  “Is there anything else you want me to remove?”

  She glared at him. “Don’t be smart. I’ve never appreciated that trait in men.”

  “Does your fiancé have traits you appreciate?”

  She caught the slight edge of bitterness in his tone.

  “You need more proof, don’t you, Lauren?” He didn’t wait for an answer but sat at the table. The man hooked his cane over the edge of the table and, with his right hand, picked up the pen she’d used to address invitations. Ah-hah, Lauren thought triumphantly to herself. She’d caught the impostor. At that moment he glanced up, flashed her a devilish grin, then transferred the pen to his left hand.

  Lauren watched in growing horror as he turned over the shower list and wrote his name in the unique style of printed letters and cursive that was her husband’s. When he finished, he pushed the paper toward Lauren.

  “It’s easy to forge a signature.”

  He didn’t say anything but wrote her entire name, Lauren Mary Crocker Michaels, then listed her date and place of birth and the names of her parents.

  “It’s not true,” she mumbled to herself, feeling sick.

  The doorbell rang, startling them.

  “Lauren,” came Cass’s muffled voice from the hall.

  “Don’t tell anyone I’ve been here,” the man claiming to be Jon whispered in Lauren’s ear.

  “Lauren,” Cass called again.

  “Just a minute,” Lauren answered. Standing, she started toward the door, but the stranger’s hand on her arm stopped her.

  “Remember, not a word to anyone. Your life and mine depend on your silence.”

  Before Lauren could take another step, the doorknob turned and Cass hurried into the apartment. Lauren panicked. Cass was the biggest gossip in the building, and within a half hour every one of their friends would know that Lauren Michaels was entertaining a strange man in her flat.

  “I just came back for my glasses,” she said, scurrying toward the dining table. “I don’t want to miss a single moment of the soccer game.”

  Lauren braced herself for Cass’s screech, but nothing happened.

  “Thanks, luv,” Cass said over her shoulder as she rushed by Lauren, holding her glasses high. At the door, she paused. “Are you feeling under the weather? You look pale.”

  Lauren shook her head.

  Cass smiled. “I’ll call tomorrow.”

  Dumbfounded, Lauren turned. The room was empty. She walked slowly through her apartment, looking for the mystery man. He’d vanished. Probably through the open French doors not three feet from the table.

  Lauren reached in her pocket and withdrew the crumpled letter. With shaking fingers she put it on the dining room table and smoothed out the wrinkles. The penned words jumped out at her.

  Her knees weakened and she collapsed into a chair. It couldn’t be true. Jon couldn’t be alive. She covered her face with her hands and took a deep breath. The grief over Jon’s death had nearly killed her. It had only been during the past eighteen months that she felt like a whole person again, and her recent decision to remarry had been a hard-fought battle with her heart.

  And yet this strange man had known about the mystery she wanted to write, the facts of her birth, and his handwriting was a dead ringer for Jon’s. Even the chemistry between them felt right

  “It can’t be,” she whispered. “It just can’t be.” Even as she denied the possibility, her heart leapt at the prospect.

  “Did she believe you? Buy your story?” Diamond asked from the other end of the phone line.

  “I don’t know.”

  “You mean you couldn’t convince her?”

  “The lady’s no fool. And you’ll have to admit my story sounds rather farfetched.” The man readjusted the phone to his ear as he stared out the window. “I don’t think she knows what to think. Only time will tell. I’ll let you know how things progress.”

  But time wasn’t a commodity he had, he thought ruefully. He had the ugly suspicion that the game had begun, even if all the players weren’t in place.

  Moments later Diamond hung up the phone, then leaned back in his chair. He didn’t like what he had to do. It made him feel lower than a slug. He hoped his plan would work, and he prayed Sapphire never discovered how he’d been set up.

  Chapter 2

  Parker James slid his ID card into the lock of the steel door of the embassy basement room. When the mechanism popped open, he pushed open the heavy door and strolled into the secured room. He tried to appear casual as he walked over to the desks where Greg Williams and Anthony Neil were working.

  “How’s it going?” Parker directed his question to Anthony, the more approachable of the two men. “Find any new leads?” He wanted to know how far the team had progressed in their investigation of the ROSES leak.

  Tony Neil glanced up, a welcoming smile on his youthful face. “Maybe.”

  Parker turned to the other man. Greg Williams had none of the gung-ho, youthful excitement that Tony, his partner, possessed. The weariness in Greg’s eyes told Parker this man had been through a lot. But it was his pantherlike attitude—patient and deadly, as if waiting for his victim to get close enough—that unnerved people in the embassy.

  There was something about Greg Williams that seemed familiar to Parker. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but it nagged at him like a sore tooth. But that couldn’t be, he told himself, since Greg had only been assigned to the embassy six months ago with the new rotation of staff. Parker had even gone so far as to check out Greg’s personnel file. All the information matched what he’d been told by his superiors at the CIA.

  “I stopped by to see if you two would like to go to lunch.” Hopefully he could pry a little more information out of Tony and Greg while they ate.

  “Yeah,” Tony answered, putting down the folder he held. “I’m starved. What do you have in mind?”

  “There’s a Mexican restaurant around the block from here. It’s a favorite of the embassy personnel. I thought we might go there.” He rested his hip on the corner of Greg’s desk and glanced at the computer screen. “You haven’t been to Santa Fe Station, have you, Greg?”

  The man’s expression was guarded. “Can’t say that I have.” Immediately he saved what he was looking at and turned off his machine.

  Parker stood. “Well, you’re in for a treat. Mexican food prepared the way it would be if you were in Texas. I think you’ll like it.”

  Greg Williams gave Parker a look that made him want to squirm.

  “You think so?”

  “Yeah.”

  Greg nodded. “Let’s go.”

  * * *

  Lauren checked the ice, making sure she had enough to get through the lunchtime rush. She prided herself in serving ice in her water and tea, a kind of welcomehome to the Americans living abroad. Satisfied there was enough, she picked up the menus and walked to the front of the restaurant.

  “Parker, how nice to see you,” she said, recognizing Jon’s old associate. Parker had been a steadying force in her rocky world after her husband’s death. He had often checked on her, taken her out to eat, listened to her woes.

  “Lauren, I want you to meet two of my fellow workers.” Parker stepped aside, and for the first time Lauren saw the two men standing behind him. Her field of vision narrowed to the face of the man who had appeared in her apartment and claimed to be her husband. When she’d awakened this morning, she had wondered if she had dreamt the entire episode. But here he was in the flesh.

  “This—” Parker pulled the younger man forward “—is Tony Neil. And the guy beside him is Greg Williams.”

  “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance,” Tony said, shaking her hand.

  The other man simply nodded.

  With not so much as a blink of an eye did the man calling himself Greg Williams acknowledge he had met her. His warning of last night to tell no one of their meeting came to mind. So what was he doing here? Was this a test to see if she could keep her mouth shut?

  More of this spy stuff, she thought sourly. Well, she could play that little game.

  “This way, gentlemen.”

  After seating them, she turned to Greg. “Is this your first visit to Santa Fe Station?”

  His brown eyes—not blue—returned the stare. “Yes, it is,” he calmly answered.

  Liar. If he was Jon, as he claimed, he had once been such a fixture at the restaurant that one of the waiters had joked that she should pay him for all the odd jobs he’d done around the place. And if he wasn’t, then he’d lied to her last night, which fired her anger all over again. After the man left her apartment, Lauren had lain awake most of the night wondering why this man would claim to be her husband. She didn’t have an answer but she couldn’t believe he was telling the truth.

  “Can you believe that Greg’s been at the embassy for six months and hasn’t found this place before now?” Parker asked.

  As close as her restaurant was to the Grosvenor Street location, it was darn hard for Lauren to believe Greg hadn’t stumbled across her place unless he had purposely avoided it. “Yes, I find that amazing.”

  A muscle in Greg’s jaw jumped, but his irritation didn’t deter her. She’d give him something to clamp his jaw around. “Let me recommend the chicken enchiladas with green sauce.”

  “I don’t know if Greg wants to plunge in that deep his first time here,” Parker interjected. “That’s one of the hottest items on the menu.”

  “Is that so?” Greg asked.

  She wanted to clobber him. “Yes. But then, if you’re going to live life to the fullest, you have to take a few chances.”

  The impostor didn’t flinch. “Well, for the time being, I’ll take my chances in other areas. For now, I’ll take the chili rellenos with salsa on the side.”

  This man was good, whoever he was. Although Jon had loved chicken enchiladas with green sauce, his passion for chili rellenos smothered in salsa was a close second.

  “I’ll send a waiter over to take your order.” She smiled at Tony. “I hope you enjoy your meal.”

  “What about me?” Greg asked.

  “I’ll make sure the cook gives special attention to your food.”

  “I just bet you will,” he mumbled.

  He heard the key in the front-door lock. Closing her diary, which had proved to be interesting reading, he slipped it back into place under her lingerie and turned off the light on the nightstand.

  The outer door closed, then immediately two thuds sounded against the floor, followed by a moan of relief. He smiled. The lady had just kicked off her shoes.

  He plastered himself against the wall, waiting for her to come into the bedroom. If Lauren was consistent, she’d go into the living room, throw her mail on the chair, retrieve a soda from the icebox and take down her waist-length hair from the bun at the back of her head as she walked to the bedroom to change.

  He was going to impress on her the need for safety, and her performance this afternoon was exactly the opposite of what she needed to do. Her actions had left Parker giving him odd looks the balance of the day.

  The prank she had pulled on him at lunch might have blown up in his face. Lauren had kept her promise and had somehow tampered with the chili relleno. It tasted as though she’d loaded it with extra chili powder and spices. He’d fought the tears that formed in his eyes, not wanting Parker to know something was wrong. If he had caught on to the fact Lauren had purposely loaded the relleno with chili powder, Parker might wonder why she had it in for Greg Williams, whom she supposedly had never seen before in her life.

  The light from the living room flicked on, then he heard her steps in the kitchen. The refrigerator door opened and closed. Her footsteps came closer. His muscles tensed as her shadow appeared in the doorway. The instant she walked into the room, he stepped forward on his good leg. One of his arms snaked around her waist, the other around her neck.

  She shrieked, dropping her can of soda. Instantly his hand covered her mouth. She didn’t meekly surrender, but instead drove her elbow into his belly and rammed her heel into the arch of his foot. He staggered back, knocking his cane, which had been resting against the bureau, into the hall.

  The only thing that saved him from total collapse was that she’d already kicked off her shoes, so the blow to his foot was minimal. Damn, he should’ve remembered she’d taken several self-defense courses.

  “Lauren, it’s me, Jon,” he whispered frantically into her ear. He hoped to reassure and calm her. Unfortunately his words seemed to have the opposite effect. She renewed her struggle.

  He tightened his grip on her waist, hauling her flush against his body. “Lauren, stop it. I won’t hurt you.”

  She bit the hand covering her mouth and kicked him in his bad knee. The blow caused his leg to buckle, and he was unable to keep them from crashing to the floor. He tried to cushion the fall for her by shifting his body under hers. He took the brunt of the impact on his shoulder, but he heard her cry of pain when she bounced off his body, then hit the wooden floor.

  When his breath returned and he could speak again, he cursed, “Dammit, Lauren, why did you do that?”

  She rolled over and faced him. Pushing her hair out of her face, she glared at him. “Me? Me?” She sat up. “You’ve got the gall to ask me why I fought some unseen attacker who grabbed me?”

  “I told you who I was.”

  She rolled her eyes. “And that was supposed to reassure me?”

  “Yes. I would never hurt you.”

  “You have a funny way of showing it.”

  He noticed then that she had unbuttoned her blouse before coming into the bedroom, and it hung open, giving him an unobstructed view of the peach lace that covered her beautiful breasts.

  Noting the direction of his gaze, she glanced down and quickly pulled together the edges of her blouse. “What are you doing here? And how did you get in? I know I locked the French doors.”

  “Indeed you did. Only that lock isn’t worth the cheap metal it’s made of. You need to have it replaced.”

  “You’re right. I need to replace it to keep out riffraff. Now, why are you here?”

  “I came here to talk about our little meeting this afternoon.” He struggled to sit up. Pain shot through his shoulder and down his side. A moan rose from his throat.

  She came to her knees and reached out, touching his arm. “Are you okay?” Her green eyes darkened with concern.

  He gave her a self-deprecating smile. “I’m getting too old for this kind of stuff.”

  She snorted. “Oh, please. If an eighteen-year-old had taken that fall, he would’ve been in pain.” Standing, she held out her hand. “Come on.”

  He wondered if she planned any more karate moves.

  “I’m not going to take you down a second time. You need to be out of here before my fiancé arrives.”

  A streak of jealousy shot through him. “Why’s he showing up here?". He sounded like a covetous teenager.

  She moved to the nightstand and turned on the light. “Not that it’s any of your business, but he’s taking me to our engagement party. His father is giving it.”

  “You’re still planning on committing bigamy after what I told you last night?”

  She placed her hands on her hips. The action made her blouse fly open again. Her hands gathered up the edges. “It will be bigamy only if your story is true.”

  “And you don’t believe me?”

  She opened her mouth, then closed it. “I have my doubts.”

  “How can I erase those doubts?”

  Her gaze locked with his, and he read her desire to believe him, then the confusion that quickly followed. “Why are you here?”