At the Edge of the Sun (Maggie Bennett 3)

“It’s me,” Randall’s whisper broke through her panic, and with more self-possession than she would have credited herself with she managed to gain a semblance of calm. She relaxed her muscles, slowed her breathing beneath his suffocating hand, and waited for him to release her.

He moved his hand away, and she took in deep breaths of the black night air. “You want to get off me?” she inquired tersely.

“Not particularly.” He was still lying on top of her prone body, crushing her into the concave mattress. He rolled partway off, enough to allow her to turn on her side, facing him in the narrow space, but his hands were still keeping her close. Imprisoning hands, rough hands, she told herself. It was only the darkness that made them welcome.

“Why did you do that?”

“Do what, Maggie?”

“You half strangled me …”

“Maggie,” he said wearily, “I didn’t half strangle you. I was just trying to keep you from screaming and waking half of Beirut. I’m sorry if I frightened you. Are you all right?”

“Why shouldn’t I be?” she answered, her whispered voice matching his. “I love being awakened by a man smothering me.”

He ignored her carping tone. “We didn’t mean to be gone so long. Why didn’t you ask Mabib’s wife for a flashlight?”

“I don’t speak Arabic or Lebanese or whatever.”

“I’m sorry. I should have thought of that.” His hand moved up her arm, cupping the back of her neck, and his long fingers massaged the tension away as he carefully pressed her forehead against his shoulder.

“I was fine,” she muttered against his shoulder, not bothering to fight it.

“Sure you were.”

“I can take care of myself.”

“I know you can,” he said, his voice somber. “There are times when I wish you weren’t so self-sufficient, that you needed someone, anyone, just a little bit.”

She closed her eyes, closed her heart, fought against the need to clutch at him with desperate hands. “I need people,” she said, no longer sure it was true. “I just don’t need you.”

The words hung between them in the blackness. Maggie lay in the shelter of his arms, wondering if they were the truth or more lies, and wondered if she was going to betray Mack. Randall was warm and strong and comforting beside her, and she was so very cold, so very alone. And she knew that sooner or later, she would.

“Ian told me who his contact was,” Randall said finally.

“Big of him. He must have finally decided he didn’t like being set up. Who is it?”

“You’re not going to like this,” he warned.

“I never do. Who is it?”

In the darkness she could feel him shrug. “He has a phone number he calls in London. Different people answer, giving him information, but it all comes from one source.”

“Okay, Randall, who’s the source?”

Randall took a deep breath. “He told me it was Bud Willis.”

For a moment Maggie felt her heart contract, contract with hatred, despair, and fear. “It couldn’t be,” she said flatly. “He’s dead. I watched him die. I watched all those machines stop beeping. There’s no way he could still be alive.”

She could hear his sudden sharp intake of breath. “You were with Bud when he died?” he said. “In Washington?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” He sounded no more than casually curious, but Maggie told herself she wasn’t fooled. His hands were still gentle on her tense body, holding her against him, but the tension was running through him, matching hers.

She considered it for a moment. “He had a deathbed confession for me,” she said finally. “You know Bud; he couldn’t resist getting his final licks in.”

“I hope you didn’t believe him.”