Athena Force 12: Checkmate by Doranna Durgin Read Free Book Online Page B

she found the room littered with signs of use and tried the next door down.
    This room looked ready for guests—or at least, ready to be ready. There were no flowers on the table in the suite’s first room, and when she found the bedroom she didn’t see any dents on the pillow. But it was clean and ready for whatever final touches were deemed appropriate for its next occupant.
    She didn’t intend to stay here long. Sooner or later the Kemenis would do a room-to-room search, rounding up anyone they might have missed the first time through. She’d give them enough time to settle down…but not so much they’d entirely have their act together. And even though her inclination to rush down and check out the situation drove at her, she forced herself to brew a cup of tea from the supplies in the kitchenette. Her stomach hadn’t been more than grumbly, but tea might well calm it further.
    And then she sat cross-legged on the floor on the opposite side of a plush chair, giving herself a good view of the double-locked door while remaining discreetly tucked away, her briefcase at her side. She sipped tea and she considered the situation and how little she knew of it so far. Kemenis. They seemed to have based themselves in the public part of the capitol. The ballroom, perhaps, where the students would have been. She still needed to discover their intent. If they were holding hostages, to what purpose? What demands would they make…and how soon would they start killing people to achieve those demands?
    For the Kemenis had never demonstrated a reluctance to kill people.
     
     
     
    Quiet moments later, Selena set aside the tea, pulling her knees up to briefly rest her forehead there. Her stomach felt better…soothed. Her mind still whirled with unanswered questions—was she actually, truly pregnant? So hard to tell with her whimsical cycles…Had Cole actually, truly faked an assignment to have an affair? So hard to tell with his astonishing ability to play the moment…to play people.
    But it shouldn’t have been. She should have just known. And he was sending e-mail from their home computer, returned sooner than expected. Not surprisingly—he obviously hadn’t had far to travel. Selena pulled her phone from the leather pocket on the side of her briefcase and turned it on. Its pale blue LED screen informed her she had voice mail, and that she had less than half the battery life left. She stared at it, tempted.
    No. She’d wait until she had answers to her other questions—the Kemenis’ intentions, their manpower.
    Answers it was just about time to find out.
    In her hand, the phone vibrated. Selena jumped, chided herself for being nervy and checked the incoming number.
    Cole. Of course it was Cole; the message was probably his, too. It’d been forty-five minutes, maybe even an hour since the Kemenis had made their move on the capitol. By now CNN had a live feed going. He’d be expecting to find her at the embassy…and he’d be wrong.
    The phone gave another hopeful vibration, and this time Selena thumbed the on button, resolutely putting the phone to her ear. “Hello, Cole.”
    “Selena!”
    She’d never thought to hear Cole frightened. Of anything. But the fear tinged his voice even through this staticky satellite connection. Cole’s voice. It was a wonderful, smooth low voice that triggered a flush of the very emotions she’d been trying to avoid—along with the usual warmth she felt in his presence.
    The very reason she had to run so far away in order to sort out her feelings.
    She’d always responded to him that way—the first day she met him, the day they’d gotten married, and each and every time he turned that smile on her. With effort, she managed to avoid blurting out her suspicions about being pregnant—because he really didn’t need to know it. Not now, when she was trapped in a building under Kemeni siege. For whatever he’d done, whatever potential affairs he might have conducted, she knew he