The Spy Wore Red by Wendy Rosnau

Author:Wendy Rosnau [Rosnau, Wendy]
Format: mobi
Tags: Suspense
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2005-06-25T05:00:00+00:00

“You were born in Copenhagen?” Nadja asked the next evening.

“I think so, but I’m not sure.”

They were seated in front of the fireplace on the fur rug, wrapped in blankets. Outside the snow continued to fall, and there was no way they were going to be able to leave Nordzum until it let up. Bjorn had been listening to the weather reports, and it sounded like the storm was expected to stall out for another twenty-four hours.

“You’re not sure where you were born?”

“I don’t remember much growing up except that I hated the orphanage I was in. Later, once I was on my own, I was preoccupied with trying to stay warm and fed.”

“I’m sorry.”

Bjorn studied her. They had been breathing each other’s air, cooped up in this room for two days straight. He knew her body inside and out, and she knew his just as well. They were connected now, in a way that he’d never been connected with anyone. And yet it felt too new to be comfortable. In many ways they were still strangers.

“You must have been lonely.”

He didn’t answer her, though it was true, he had been lonely as a boy, and as a man, too. It was a kind of comfort zone for him—what he knew.

“How did you survive it?”

“Eventually someone took me in.”

“How old were you?”

“About twelve. I ran away from the orphanage at seven. With two other kids. They were a little older. We lived on the streets together. Looked out for one another.”

He didn’t like talking about how he’d existed in Copenhagen. It had been hell on the streets, but it hadn’t been much better at Anna’s place. He’d seen more and done more in her whorehouse than any kid ever should. And that’s why he would never judge Nadja and what she’d done to stay on her feet. At least she had a cause behind who and what she’d become. For him it had been totally self-serving.

“Unwanted kids,” he mused. “They would be better off dead. Our mothers should have disposed of us before we were born.”

“That’s horrible. You can’t really believe that. Look at you. Who you are.”

“Who am I?”

“An Onyxx rat fighter. You help people. Fix the world’s problems.”

Bjorn chuckled. “A regular superhero, that’s me. What else do I do…to you?”

She paused, then said, “You feed my soul.”

He reached out and stroked her cheek with the back of his hand. “So tell me how you came to be at Quest.”

The question brought immediate tension to the lines in her lovely face. She pulled back from his hand and drew her blanket more securely around herself. “You know how. Once Kovar realized that I wasn’t going to make a comeback on the slopes, he wanted revenge.”

“On you?”

“Yes. He thought I threw the race that day. That I deliberately lost control.”

“Why would he think that?”

“I had asked him to give me some time off. My life with Kovar was simple and single-minded. He lived to see me ski. It’s all I did from the time I was eight until I had the accident at nineteen.

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