Jaimie: Fire and Ice (The Wilde Sisters 2)

CHAPTER ONE

Zach Castelianos reached into the pocket of his faded blue denim shirt, took out his Ray- Bans, and propped them on the bridge of his nose.

He switched the small, nondescript duffel bag from his right hand to his left as he stepped out of the JFK International Arrivals Terminal into the harsh glare of the Indian summer sun.

Jesus, it was hot. Ninety degrees, maybe more, even in late afternoon. Typical crazy New York weather. After ten hours in the chilled air of an aging 737, his reaction to the blast of heat was almost visceral.

So was the sweet pleasure of being home.

The realization still came as a surprise.

Zach was a man who had never really called any one place home. Growing up an army brat, moving a dozen times as a kid, landing wherever his father, a spit-and-polish Marine Corps Sergeant Major had been posted, enlisting in the Corps himself at seventeen, being chosen, two years later, for SOCOM—Special Forces Command which had ultimately become MARSOC—Marine Corps Special Operations Command—and, man, the service could create more acronyms that an advertising agency on steroids—had taken him around the world half a dozen times, almost invariably to countries with names that ended in “stan.” Four years later, he’d been recruited into The Agency. Same story, different agenda, the kind of stuff that made for worn-out punch lines to stupid civilian questions­­—What do I do? Well, I could tell you, but then I’d have to kill you­­—though there was a degree of reality behind the joking responses.

Put all together, it meant that he’d never spent enough time in a single town or city to consider it home.

New York was the closest he’d ever come.

There was something about the city—the sense of anonymity he felt in being just one of eight or nine million people, the soaring skyscrapers and deep concrete canyons juxtaposed with the unlikely sprawl of Central Park—that gave him a sense of belonging, or as much a sense of it as a man without roots could ever imagine.

The proof?

Zach walked briskly to the car pickup area outside the terminal.

He’d gone from leasing an apartment to buying one. A condo perched so high over Manhattan that the view from its endless glass walls and wide wraparound terrace was pretty much what you’d see from a helicopter.

If anybody had told him he’d actually want to own a place of his own when he’d left The Agency four years ago, he’d have laughed.

All he’d known back then was that part of saying goodbye involved more than handing in his resignation. It also meant leaving D.C. and his rented townhouse in Georgetown.

It meant starting fresh.

He wasn’t an introspective guy. The inclination to plumb the depths of your head or your soul or what a Zen master he’d known in Japan had referred to as your inner self was for people with time on their hands.

Still, something had told him that he had to move on. For him, that meant a new location. A city, a big and impersonal city where he could put the past behind him.

He’d considered San Francisco. He liked the hills, the Bay, the moodiness of its rolling fog. He’d given thought to London, too, with all those narrow streets, the taverns that had been serving dark stouts and crisp ales for hundreds of years. Paris was a favorite of his—the Seine winding sinuously through the ancient streets, the wide boulevards, the sense of history around every corner.

In the end, New York had won out.

He liked its take-no-prisoners attitude.

It was the right place for a man like him.

So he’d signed a one-year lease on an apartment in Soho mostly because of its narrow streets and old buildings, but between the gaping out-of-towners and the laughably trendy shops, his fascination with the area had rapidly diminished. Besides, he needed outdoor space. Green space to walk in. Run in. Open space where you could see trees, grass, something wilder than a pigeon.

He’d headed uptown, took a sublet near Riverside Park. It was nice, but the park was too small, too confining. Plus, by then he’d started Shadow Inc., and the time he spent traveling between the sublet and the offices he’d taken in a building just off Madison in the 60’s seemed wasteful.

Shadow took most of his time.

Not that he minded.

He loved what it was becoming, a high-tech security firm where he could utilize the techniques and tools he’d learned in Special Forces and The Agency, and add new techniques without having to wait for some Pentagon desk jockey or congressional committee to approve them.

By the end of his fourth year in Manhattan, he knew it was time to move again. He knew exactly what he wanted—a high-rise with glass walls and an unimpeded view of Central Park, and the comfort of crowded streets far below.

At that point, he also knew one more thing and it was a shocker.

He was rich.

Hell, he was rolling in money, meaning he could have the high rise, the glass walls, the view.

Shadow had taken off like a rocket. No advertising. No gimmicks. Just a few quiet words to a few people and clients were stacked up like planes in the landing pattern over JFK.

Zach made some phone calls to people he’d worked with over the years, people he’d learned to trust not just in theory but in balls-to-the-wall practice, and Shadow was no longer a one-man operation but an elite team.

With an elite clientele.

If you ran down the Fortune 500 list, then checked out the Forbes list of the hundred wealthiest individuals in America, you were looking at an amazing number of names on Shadow’s very hush-hush client roster.

Zach’s baby had grown up fast.

He’d known that he needed legal counsel not just from someone smart but from someone he could trust. Not always easy, based on things he’d seen. Plus, it had to be someone who would take one look at what Shadow was and understand that it had nothing to do with installing nanny cams or trailing cheating husbands.

There was only one lawyer he’d even considered contacting. It was a guy he’d known at The Agency, someone he’d actually worked with a couple of times. They’d left The Agency within months of each other; Zach had headed north, Caleb Wilde had headed west and opened a law practice in Dallas. Zach did some quiet investigating. Caleb’s practice was not only world class, it was also discreet. In fact, Zach and he shared some of the same clients.