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you’re not interested in the mess Isobel has gotten herself into?” “In the years I’ve known Isobel I’ve never seen her unable to deal with what has to be done.” Peter wasn’t sure just how much Thomason knew about her current assignment, and he wasn’t about to offer any information.
“Josef Serafin isn’t only the most dangerous man in the world,” Thomason said, watching him. “He’s also someone from Isobel’s past.”
    Peter didn’t blink. “Indeed. And you think she didn’t know that, going in?”
“Did she?”
    “It’s always a mistake to underestimate your enemy, sir,” he said with exaggerated politeness.
“And you don’t think Isobel made that mistake with Serafin?”
    “I think you’re making that mistake with her.”
    “She’s hardly my enemy” he said loftily. “She’s my employee.”
    “She’s your replacement,’ Peter corrected him bluntly. “And you’re not the sort of man who takes forced retirement in stride.”
    “No. I’m not. But I don’t expect I’ll have to worry about it. Isobel is in over her head, and when she fails to complete her mission, there will be no one to turn to but me to fix the mess you’ve made.”
    “In the meantime I have work to do,” Peter said, unmoved. “These are new offices since your tenure, but I’m sure you can find your way out.”
    He rose, ever the polite recruit. He was a long ways from the hybrid street rat Thomason had brought in, and he knew manners better than those who were born to it. Harry Thomason’s jibes fell on deaf ears—if it were up to Peter he might have chosen his old life, not the bloody warfare thrust on him, along with the manners. But then he wouldn’t have run afoul of Genevieve Spenser, Esq., and despite everything he had done, she loved him. And sorry excuse that it was, I still made everything all right.
Peter waited until Thomason left, then sank back down in his chair again, rubbing his leg absently. Isobel was smarter and cooler than anyone in the business. If Josef Serafin was indeed someone from her past, she would most certainly have known, and she’d have her own good reasons for not telling him. There was no denying the fact that the job was getting to her. It got to everyone sooner or later, and no matter how adept she was at hiding things, he suspected she was paying a very high price for her cool efficiency.
    But no, he didn’t need to worry—he had enough on his own plate tonight, far more pleasant tasks. Picking up one of Takashi’s cousins, Hiromasa Shinoda, at Heathrow, a new recruit for the Committee. And making a baby with Genevieve Spenser Madsen.
At least he could be certain of one incontrovertible fact. Isobel would be in control no matter what she faced. She was totally incapable of feeling weakness, or emotion.
She was made of ice, the way they all needed to be. Isobel Lambert wasn’t sure whether she wanted to throw up, burst into tears or laugh. Killian had been the epitome of her romantic dreams, tall and gorgeous. Despite her French husband’s inventive talents, despite the intervening years, she still thought of Killian as the one man who’d ever been able to move her. Now he was simply a paunchy, balding mercenary with bad teeth. And the memory of that night in Marseille, the blood on her soul, had been washed clean.
    He was driving through the cold dark night, much too fast for the mountain roads. His mascot was curled up in the rear of the Jeep, sound asleep, still cradling the gun that was almost bigger than he was. She could reach back and get the weapon away from his grubby little hands, but then, she probably could have done that at any point. She just didn’t want to kill him.
    “I wouldn’t try it if I were you,” the man beside her said. She noted again how his accent was different than Killian’s—an amalgam of continents and cultures, since he’d sold his services all over the world, killed in every time zone. It was no wonder there was no tracing