Chapter 2

He pointed toward an exam room Housekeeping had finished putting back in order after the last of the agents he’d treated had been discharged.

As Ms. DiNois had assured her distracted partner, the contractions were simply signs of false labor.

Granger looked disgruntled. “Don’t tell me you told me so.”

“I won’t,” she agreed, then giggled. “But I did.”

“You make me crazy,” Granger groused.

Max helped Ms. DiNois off the exam table. “If you’re concerned, I’d suggest you see your obstetrician.” He refrained from telling Granger this wasn’t his area of expertise, but he was certain of his diagnosis.

“I have, and she said everything is right on track for this baby to be born on Christmas.”

“Ah, that’s nice.” Max smiled.

“No, it’s not,” Granger snapped, startling Max out of fond memories of the Christmases he’d spent with his grand-mèrein Paris. “The poor kid will get rooked out of presents.”

“Then we’ll just have to make it up to him or her.” Ms. DiNois kissed the corner of Granger’s mouth. “Now, let’s go get Gabriella.” She smiled at Max. “She needs to get home for her nap.”

“Okay.” Granger ran a hand through his hair. “But I’m driving you home.”

“Yes, Gabe.” The smile she gave him was soft and loving, and at one time, Max would have regretted he had no one to smile at him that way, but not any longer.

Now he had Smitty—Avery Schmidt, the WBIS’s medical examiner, and Max’s lover.

Max escorted Granger and Ms. DiNois to the door and waved them on their way.

Max smothered a yawn and went into the doctor’s lounge. Things like that didn’t usually happen at the WBIS. For the most part, the agents would come in with some sort of wound, bullet or knife or—if they were careless while fencing with M. Bélanger—a sword.

Granger, though—he had never come to Max injured, not even for a twisted ankle caused by those ridiculous five-inch heels he wore when he was on the job. The first time Max had seen him, Granger had been dressed in a green silk gown that actually made him look like he had breasts. He did make a very pretty woman.

Max turned on the radio and listened with pleasure as Christmas music filled the lounge—Michael Bublé singing about silver bells ringing in the city. If it were earlier in the season, he’d put on a CD of classical music, simply to avoid the madness that was the holiday season in the United States. Now, with Christmas just a few weeks away, it was more apropos, and he could enjoy it.

He smiled, poured himself a cup of coffee, and made himself comfortable in one of the overstuffed armchairs scattered around the room. On a small table beside it was a medical journal in French. Smitty had subscribed to it for him when he’d overheard Max bemoaning the fact that he missed his native language.

Smitty—Avery—was a kind man.

Max had been working for the WBIS for almost a year and a half and had been Smitty’s lover for most of that time. He’d been there ever since Mark Vincent had brought him to the United States in the late spring of 2002 and somehow managed to see his license to practice medicine was reinstated. It had been revoked because he’d participated in a physician-assisted suicide. How could he have refused when his grand-mèrehad been in such agony and had begged so desperately for his help?

Practicing medicine had been his life. He’d wanted that from the time he was a child and had bandaged the knee of the boy who lived next door, who’d chanced to be Max’s first same-sex crush

Richard, the man who’d run Prinzip, an antiterrorist organization that “recruited” its members—read kidnapped—from other intelligence agencies rather than training up its own, had known Max would fall into his palm like a ripe plum. When Richard inquired as to whether Max might be interested in joining him in his glorious vision, Max agreed, and not simply because he would once again be practicing medicine. His family had thrown him out not only for aiding grand-mère, but also for being gay. With no one to care about him, no job, and no place to live, he’d had nowhere else to go.

He’d realized too late how he’d been manipulated, and had mitigated what he’d been forced to do to the best of his ability without winding up dead.

Max had first come into contact with Charles Browne, Foreign Affairs special agent of the WBIS, when Charles had been taken by Prinzip while vacationing in Paris. In spite of himself, Max had been intrigued by Charles’s looks, and although he’d had to sacrifice Charles’s little finger, Max had kept him alive at the risk of his own life.