The "honey" sounded good, but the gravity in his voice chilled her. "Tell me you're not part of this."

"I'm not part of Nash's plan. Get in the Jeep, Lucy, we have to go get Finnegan's number from Mary."

"What are you part of?"

He shook his head. "Just trust me-"

"No." She stepped back from the Jeep, the cold feeling settling in her bones. "You know, it's awfully convenient that you showed up right about the time everything went bad on this shoot."

"Lucy," he said, looking at her soberly. "You have to trust me."

"The hell I do." Lucy stepped back again. "I am through being everybody's patsy. You tell me who you're working for, or I walk away and shut down this movie now. I will do it, I will send everybody home and leave Nash alone with his fucking helicopter. I will do it."

He met her eyes for a long moment and then said, "I'm working for the CIA."

"Oh, Christ." Lucy looked away from him. Boy, you sure can pick 'cm, Armstrong. "You are the fucking CIA. Literally the fucking CIA."

"I am not the CIA," J.T. said, looking grim.

"No, you jus: work for them. And I trusted you."

"No, you didn't," J.T. said. "You slept with me. It's not the same thing."

"I thought it was," Lucy said and started back toward base camp.

"Oh, come on, Lucy," J.T. said. "Get in the Jeep."

She turned around. "I was actually thinking about spending the rest of my life with you."

"What?" He looked so startled that she wanted to throw something at him.

"Hey," she said, clamping down on her hurt. "Last night meant something to me, okay?"

He frowned at her. "It meant something to me, too, but I usually don't propose after one night. Slow down a little."

"Really?" Lucy said. "How long does it usually take you to propose?" She read the look on his face and said, "You've been married before?" trying not to sound outraged. So much for saving him from a lifetime of loneliness. God, you're stupid, Lucy.

"See, this is why it's a good idea to know somebody longer than three days before you start planning a future," J.T. said. "It would have given me time to mention them."

"Them?" Lucy said, straightening. "There was more than one?"

"Two," J.T. said. "If you hadn't rushed me, I'd have told you about them."

"I'll keep that in mind with the next guy I sleep with," Lucy said and turned back toward base camp. Yeah, you really rescued him.

"Come on, Lucy," J.T. called after her.

I am an idiot, Lucy thought as she stepped over the ruts.

Somehow, the thought didn't make her feel any better.

Chapter 15

By the time Wilder had the Jeep started and had caught up with Lucy, she was a hundred yards down the road and moving fast. "Come on, Lucy," he said again, as he pulled up beside her with the Jeep in first gear, his foot working the clutch to keep pace with her stride. "Get in here."

She didn't look at him at all, just kept striding along.

Okay, so he worked for the CIA and he'd been married. Technically, the CIA were the good guys here, and hell, he was divorced. She should be happy. Wilder could never figure women out. He guessed that was why he had exes. Thinking of that reminded him of his next move.

"I'm sorry."

Lucy's head swiveled, and he was appalled to see her blinking back tears.

"Lucy!"

She kept walking, her face stony. "Sorry about what?"

Crap. Lying to her? Getting married twice before he met her? Get-ling sucked into this mess by the CIA? Being born?

"Anything I did to hurt you." That should cover it. "Don't cry."

Lucy came to a halt and turned and faced him, so he shifted into neutral and the Jeep rolled to a stop.

"I'm not crying," she said, and her voice was steady. She stood there for a minute, digesting his words, turning them over, probably deep-frying them. Women. There was a reason he was in the Special Forces with other manly men. Then she said, "Okay. I'm upset."

No shit. He nodded, wary.

"I know I'm overreacting but…" She shook her head. "No but. I'm overreacting, period. You're right, last night was just last night, nothing to get upset about."

She looked at him narrowly, like she was waiting for him to say something, and he nodded again, not sure what to say but pretty sure whatever he said would be wrong.

Lucy cast her eyes to the sky in exasperation. "Oh, stop looking like that. I know you don't have a clue what I'm upset about." She looked at him, straight on. "Do not lie to me again."

Wilder's shoulders relaxed. "Never."

"Because in spite of your ex-wives…" She took a deep breath. "I really do trust you, you bastard."

Wilder nodded. "You can."

She swallowed. "This movie. These people. My family. I'm responsible for them. It's like…" She hesitated. "It's my mission."

Wilder nodded again.

"Which is why I'm not going to let the CIA hijack my set and endanger my team. The team is more important than the mission. I'm shutting down the movie, J.T."

Crap. "Get in the Jeep, Lucy," he said, keeping his voice gentle.

"No more lying."

"I didn't lie," he said. "I just didn't tell you the whole truth."

"That counts," she said and got in.

He shot her a glance. "Then you lied to me too."

She snapped to look at him, scowling. "I never-"

"Daisy's not your sister," he said, knowing she couldn't be. They were just too different.

"She's my sister in every way that matters," Lucy said coldly.

"Adopted?"

Lucy swallowed. "Same foster home."

Shit. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be." Lucy faced forward again. "It was a good home. Nobody hurt us. We were fine. And she's my sister. She is absolutely my sister."

Yeah, Wilder thought. Foster kids always have a good time. Boy, does this explain a lot. "Look-"

"Daisy and I have been sisters since she was one year old and I was five. That's twenty-nine years and that's good enough for me."

Okay, then. "Fasten your seat belt," he said gently.

"J.T., we were fine," Lucy said, but she buckled herself in just as a black car came from the direction of base camp and swerved, screeching to a halt in front of them and blocking their way. Wilder recognized Crawford behind the wheel, dressed in a suit and looking older than the kid he'd been in the diner. Crawford stared at him, a cold look, different from any expression he'd shown before.

"Who the hell is he?" Lucy asked.

"I don't-" Wilder caught himself. "My CIA contact. Name is Crawford."

"What's he doing here?"

"I don't know." Okay, this truth thing is working okay so far. Two for two. "Listen, I wasn't lying when I came on the set. Bryce did hire me. Everything was aboveboard as far as I knew. But the CIA set it all up. That guy"-he jerked his head at Crawford, now coming toward them-"called me out of the blue to meet me after the first day. That was the appointment I went to that day, the day I got Pepper the Wonder Woman doll. He told me about Finnegan."

Lucy tensed. "What about Finnegan?"

Hell, where to start with that? Wilder opened his mouth to answer, but then Crawford was there at his door. He flashed an ID, and Wilder squinted at it. It said Crawford was a Special Agent with the FBI. What the fuck?

"Sir, may I speak to you?"

Wilder couldn't resist. "What?"

"Please step out of the vehicle," Crawford said with a straight face. Either he was very good or he didn't get it. Wilder wasn't so sure anymore.

Wilder opened the door and got out. Crawford put a hand on his arm and directed him away from the Jeep.

"What the hell happened?" Crawford demanded once they were out of earshot. "There's a police report on an accident with a van from the movie shoot."

"The assistant to the director of the film, Stephanie-" Wilder realized he didn't even know her last name. "She took the stunt van to stop the picture from shooting tomorrow because she thought the stunts didn't belong in the movie. Nash has the stuff from the van back."

"Good," Crawford said.

" 'Good'?" Wilder echoed.

"The movie goes as scheduled."

"Why?"

Crawford ignored the question and nodded toward the Jeep. "Who's she?"

Wilder looked back at Lucy, watching them with her arms folded and her eyes narrowed. "That's Lucy Armstrong, the director."

Crawford nodded and dismissed her. "So you ran this Stephanie into the bridge?"

Yeah, and then we waited for the EMTs. "No. It happened before we got there. We called 911 and then waited for them to show."

Crawford nodded. "Just checking. The cops say it looks like she lost control."

Wilder didn't say anything.

"There's no sign of foul play," Crawford continued, filling the silence. He stared at Wilder. "Do you have any reason to suspect otherwise?"

"Other than the situation?" Wilder shook his head. "Armstrong's going to cancel the shoot."

"No. I told you. Everything goes as scheduled."

"And I asked you why, and you ignored it, so I'm ignoring you," Wilder said even as his brain supplied the answer: Because you know Finnegan is close, you asshole.

Crawford fixed Wilder with a stare that added ten years to his personality. "That's an order."

"You can order me," Wilder allowed, "but you can't order her."

"I can order you to persuade her."

"How?"

"Use your imagination," Crawford said. "If you haven't already."

Wilder didn't take the bait, and Crawford backed up slightly. "Listen, this is very important." He nodded toward the Jeep. "You get her back to wherever she belongs. Meet me at the diner in two hours. I'll explain it to you. For now, you need to maintain your cover."

Covers blown, kid. Wilder shook his head and walked back to the Jeep.

"What did he want?" Lucy asked when he was sitting beside her again.

"He wants to meet me in two hours." He looked over at her. "That gives us plenty of time to roust Mary Vanity."

"Only if you tell me about Finnegan. I want to know everything."

Wilder put the Jeep in gear and drove north. "Finnegan was IRA-"

"Oh, hell." Lucy took a deep breath. "Sorry. Go on."

"Then he went freelance and now the CIA thinks he's laundering money through the film."

Lucy frowned. "So why don't they arrest him?"

"They don't have any proof, and they don't know where he is."

"Oh, just hell."

"They told me Finnegan wasn't even in the country. So either that's wrong or they lied to me, and right now I'm kind of evenly split on which it is." Wilder shook his head. "But there's something wrong with their theory because Finnegan needs fifty million, which he's not going to get from the movie."

"God, no. Nobody's going to get fifty million from this mess. What does he need it for?"

"He owes it to the Russian mob. Or at least part of it."

"The Russian mob?" Lucy said faintly.

"Finnegan stole fifty million dollars worth of Pre-Columbian jade phallic symbols for a Russian mob boss named Letsky who thinks they cure impotence. Then he lost them. And somehow what Finnegan's doing with this movie is going to help him make amends with Let-sky."

Lucy looked over at him, dumbfounded. "We're going through this hell because some Russian mob guy can't get it up?"

Wilder thought about it. "Yeah."

Lucy still seemed dazed. "Pre-Columbian what again?"

"Jade phallic symbols. Basically, jade penises."

"Oh." Lucy nodded. "This is probably not the time to ask this, but what the fuck is wrong with you map."

"Uh…"

"Nash is screwing everything that moves, Bryce is screwing everything that moves and asks for his autograph, LaFavre is screwing everything whether it moves or not, and now the Russian mob has hired Finnegan to make sure that-" She shook her head. "Even the Pre-Columbians had a dick fixation. What's next? Mother-of-pearl boobs?"

Damn good thing she doesn't know about Ginnie, Wilder thought.

"I just don't understand how you guys got control of the world," Lucy said. "Half the time there's no blood in your brains, and you're still in charge of most of the governments in the world, most of the companies, and all of the military." She blinked. "Which actually explains a lot, now that I think of it."