Alpha Squad: Prince Joe / Forever Blue

Veronica tightened the belt and clutched the lapels of the robe more closely together. She took in a deep breath, then let it slowly out. It steadied her and kept her voice from shaking. “Who are you?” she asked.

“Who are you?” the voice countered. It was rich, husky, and laced with more than a trace of blue-collar New York. “I was brought here and told to wait, so I waited. I’ve been hustled from one coast to the other like some Federal Express overnight package, only nobody has any explanations as to why or even who I’m waiting to see. I didn’t even know my insertion point was the District of Columbia until the jet landed at Andrews. And as long as I’m complaining I might as well tell you that I’m tired, I’m hungry and my shorts have not managed to dry in the past ten hours, a situation that makes me very, very cranky. I would damn near sell my soul to get into that shower that you just stepped out of. Other than that, I’m sure I’m very pleased to meet you.”

“Lieutenant Catalanotto?” Veronica asked.

“Bingo,” the voice said. “Babe, you just answered your own question.”

But had she? “What’s your first name?” she asked warily.

“Joe. Joseph.”

“Middle name?”

“Paulo,” he said.

Veronica swung open the bathroom door.

The first thing she noticed about the man was his size. He was big—taller than Prince Tedric by about two inches and outweighing him in sheer muscle by a good, solid fifty pounds. His dark hair was cut much shorter than Tedric’s, and he had at least a two-day growth of beard darkening his face.

He didn’t look as exactly like the prince as she’d thought when she saw his photograph, Veronica realized, studying the man’s face. On closer inspection, his nose was slightly different—it had been broken, probably more than once. And, if it was possible, this navy lieutenant’s cheekbones were even more exotic-looking than Tedric’s. His chin was slightly more square, more stubborn than the prince’s. And his eyes…As he returned her inquisitive stare, his lids dropped halfway over his remarkable liquid brown eyes, as if he was trying to hide his innermost secrets from her.

But those differences—even the size differences between the two men—were very subtle. They wouldn’t be noticed by someone who didn’t know Prince Tedric very well. Those differences certainly wouldn’t be noticed by the array of ambassadors and diplomats Tedric was scheduled to meet.

“According to the name tag on your suitcase, you’ve gotta be Veronica St. John, right?” he said, pronouncing her name the American way, as if it were two words, Saint and John.

“Sinjin,” she said distractedly. “You don’t say Saint John, you say ‘Sinjin.’”

He was looking at her, examining her in much the same way that she’d looked at him. The intensity of his gaze made her feel naked. Which of course, underneath her robe, she was.

But he didn’t win any prizes himself for the clothing he was wearing. From the looks of it, his T-shirt had had its sleeves forcibly removed without the aid of scissors, his army fatigues had been cut off into ragged shorts, and on his feet he wore a pair of dirty canvas deck shoes with no socks. He looked as if he hadn’t showered in several days, and, Lord help her, he smelled that way, too.

“Dear God,” Veronica said aloud, taking in all of the little details she’d missed at first. He wasn’t wearing a belt. Instead, a length of fairly thick rope was run through the belt loops in his pants, and tied in some kind of knot at the front. He had a tattoo—a navy anchor—on his left biceps. His fingers were blackened with stains of grease, his fingernails were short and rough—a far cry from Prince Tedric’s carefully manicured hands. Lord, if she had to start by teaching this man the basics of personal hygiene, there was no way she’d have him impersonating a prince within her three-day deadline.

“What?” he said with a scowl. Defensiveness tinged his voice and darkened his eyes. “I’m not what you expected?”

She couldn’t deny it. She’d expected the lieutenant to arrive wearing a dress uniform, stiff and starched and perfectly military—and smelling a little more human and a little less like a real-life marine mammal-type seal. Wordlessly, she shook her head no.

Joe gazed silently at the girl. She watched him, too, her eyes so wide and blue against the porcelain paleness of her skin. It was hard for him to tell the color of her hair—it was wet. It clung, damp and dark, to the sides of her head and neck.

Red, he guessed. It was probably some shade of red, maybe even strawberry blond, probably curly. Yet, if there really was a God and He was truly righteous, she would have nondescript straight hair, maybe the color of mud. It didn’t seem fair that this girl should have wealth, a powerful job, refined manners, a pair of beautiful blue eyes and curly red hair.

Without makeup, her face looked alarmingly young. Her features were delicate, almost fragile. She wasn’t particularly pretty, at least not in the conventional sense. But her cheekbones were high, showcasing enormous crystal blue eyes. And her lips were exquisitely shaped, her nose small and elegant.

No, she wasn’t pretty. But she was incredibly attractive in a way he couldn’t even begin to explain.

The robe she wore was too big for her. It drew attention to her slight frame, accentuating her slender wrists and ankles.

She looked like a kid playing dress up in her mommy’s clothes.

Funny, from the cut and style of the business suits that had been neatly packed in her suitcase, Joe had expected this Veronica St. John—or “Sinjin,” as she’d pronounced it with her slightly British, extremely monied upper-class accent—to be, well…less young. He’d expected someone in their mid-forties at least, maybe even older. But this girl couldn’t be a day over twenty-five. Hell, standing here like this, just out of the shower, still dripping wet, she barely looked sixteen.

“You aren’t what I expected, either,” Joe said, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “So I guess that makes us even.”

He knew he was making her nervous, sitting there like that. He knew she was nervous about him getting the bedspread dirty, nervous about him leaving behind the lingering odor of dead fish—bait from the smelly bucket Blue had knocked over earlier that morning. Hell, he was nervous about it himself.

And damn, but that made him angry. This girl was somehow responsible for dragging him away from his shore leave. She was somehow responsible for the way he’d been rushed across the country without a shower or a change of clothes. Hell, it was probably her fault that he was in this five-star hotel wearing his barnacle-scraping clothes, feeling way out of his league.

He didn’t like feeling this way. He didn’t like the barely concealed distaste he could see in this rich girl’s eyes. He didn’t like being reminded that he didn’t fit into this opulent world of hers—a world filled with money, power and class.

Not that he wanted to fit in. Hell, he wouldn’t last more than a few months in a place like this. He preferred his own world—the world of the Navy SEALs, where a man wasn’t judged by the size of his wallet, or the price of his education, or the cut of his clothes. In his world, a man was judged by his actions, by his perseverance, by his loyalty and stamina. In his world, a man who’d made it into the SEALs was treated with honor and respect—regardless of the way he looked. Or smelled.

He leaned back on the big, fancy, five-star bed, propping himself up on his elbows. “Maybe you could give me some kind of clue as to what I’m doing here, honey,” he said, watching her wince at his term of endearment. “I’m pretty damn curious.”

The rich girl’s eyes widened, and she actually forgot to look disdainful for a few minutes. “Are you trying to tell me that no one’s told you anything?”

Joe sat up. “That’s exactly what I’m telling you.”

She shook her head. Her hair was starting to dry, and it was definitely curly. “But that’s impossible.”

“Impossible it ain’t, sweetheart,” he said. A double wince this time. One for the bad grammar, the other for the “sweetheart.” “I’m here in D.C. without the rest of my team, and I don’t know why.”

Veronica turned abruptly and went into the hotel suite’s living room. Joe followed more slowly, leaning against the frame of the door and watching as she sifted through her briefcase.

“You were supposed to be met by—” she pulled a yellow legal pad from her notebook and flipped to a page in the back “—an Admiral Forrest?” She looked up at him almost hopefully.

The navy lieutenant just shrugged, still watching her. Lord, but he was handsome. Despite the layers of dirt and his dark, scowling expression, he was, like Prince Tedric, almost impossibly good-looking. And this man was nearly dripping with an unconscious virility that Tedric didn’t even begin to possess. He was extremely attractive underneath all that grime—if she were the type who went for that untamed, rough-hewn kind of man.

Which, of course, Veronica wasn’t. Dangerous, bad-boy types had never made her heart beat faster. And if her heart seemed to be pounding now, why, that was surely from the scare he’d given her earlier.

No, she was not the type to be attracted by steel-hard biceps and broad shoulders, a rough-looking five o’clock shadow, a tropical tan, a molten-lava smile, and incredible brown bedroom eyes. No. Definitely, positively not.

And if she gave him a second glance, it was only to verify the fact that Lieutenant Joseph P. Catalanotto was not going to be mistaken for visiting European royalty.

Not today, anyway.

And not tomorrow. But, for Wila’s sake, for her own career, and for little Cindy at Saint Mary’s, Veronica was going to see to it that two days from now, Joe would be a prince.

But first things first. And first things definitely included putting her clothes back on, particularly since Lieutenant Catalanotto wasn’t attempting to hide the very, very male appreciation in his eyes as he looked at her.

“Why don’t you help yourself to something to drink,” Veronica said, and Joe’s gaze flickered across the suite, toward the elaborate bar that was set up on the other side of the room. “Give me a minute to get dressed,” she added. “Then I’ll try to explain why you’re here.”

He nodded.

She walked past him, aware that he was still watching right up to the moment she closed the bedroom door behind her.

The man’s accent was atrocious. It screamed New York City—blue-collar New York City. But okay. With a little ingenuity, with the right scheduling and planning, Joe wouldn’t have to utter a single word.

His posture, though, was an entirely different story. Tedric stood ramrod straight. Lieutenant Catalanotto, on the other hand, slouched continuously. And he walked with a kind of relaxed swagger that was utterly un-princely. How on earth was she going to teach him to stand and sit up straight, let alone walk in that peculiar, stiff, princely gait that Tedric had perfected?

Veronica pulled fresh underwear and another pair of panty hose—number three for the day—from her suitcase. Her dark blue suit was near the top of the case, so she pulled it on, then slipped her tired feet into a matching pair of pumps. A little bit of makeup, a quick brush through her almost-dry hair…

Gloves would cover his hands, she thought, her mind going a mile a minute. Even if that engine grease didn’t wash off, it could be hidden by a pair of gloves. Tedric himself often wore a pair of white gloves. No one would think that was odd.

Joe’s hair was an entirely different matter. He wore his hair short, while Tedric’s flowed down past his shoulders.

They could get a wig for Joe. Or hair extensions. Yes, hair extensions would be even better, and easier to keep on. Provided Joe would sit still long enough to have them attached…

This was going to work. This was going to work.

Taking a deep breath and smoothing down her suit jacket, Veronica opened the door and went back into the living room.

And stopped short.

The living room of her hotel suite was positively crowded.

Senator McKinley, three different Ustanzian ambassadors, an older man wearing a military dress uniform covered with medals, a half-dozen FInCOM security agents, Prince Tedric and his entire entourage all stood frozen and staring at Joe Catalanotto, who had risen to his feet in front of the sofa. The tension in the room could have been cut by a knife.

The man in uniform was the only one who spoke. “Nice to see that you dressed for the occasion, Joe,” he said with a chuckle.

Joe crossed his arms. “The guys who shanghaied me forgot to bring my wardrobe trunk,” he said dryly. Then he smiled. It was a genuine, sincere smile that warmed his face and touched his eyes. “Good to see you, Admiral.”

Joe looked around the room, his gaze landing on Prince Tedric’s face. Tedric was staring at him as if he were a rat that had made its way into the hotel room from the street below.

Joe’s smile faded, and was replaced by another scowl. “Well,” he said. “I’ll be damned. If it isn’t my evil twin.”

Veronica laughed. She couldn’t help it. It just came bubbling out. She bit down on the inside of her cheek, and all but clamped her hand across her mouth. But no one seemed to notice—no one but Joe, who glanced over at her in surprise.

“Don’t you know who you’re talking to, young man? This is the crown prince of Ustanzia,” Senator McKinley said sternly to Joe.

“Damn straight I know who I’m talking to, Pop,” Joe said tightly. “I’m the kind of guy who never forgets a face—particularly when I see it every morning in the mirror. My team of SEALs pulled this bastard’s sorry butt out of Baghdad.” He turned back to Tedric. “Keeping free and clear of war zones these days, Ted, you lousy bastard?”

Everyone in the room, with the exception of Joe and the still-grinning admiral, drew in a shocked breath. Veronica was amazed that her ears didn’t pop from the sudden drop in air pressure.

The crown prince’s face turned an interesting shade of royal purple. “How dare you?” he gasped.

Joe seemed to grow at least three feet taller and two feet broader. He took a step or two toward Tedric, and everyone in the room—with the exception of the admiral—drew back.

“How dare you put yourself into a situation where my men had to risk their lives to pull you back out?” Joe all but snarled. “One of my men spent months in intensive care because of you, dirtwad. I’ll tell you right now, you’re damned lucky—damned lucky—he didn’t die.”

The deadly look in Joe’s eyes was enough to make even the bravest man quiver with fear. They were all lucky that Joe’s friend hadn’t died, Veronica thought with a shiver, or else they’d be witnessing a murder. And unlike the morning’s assassination attempt, she had no doubt that Joe would succeed.

“Mon Dieu,” Tedric said, hiding the fact that his hands were shaking by slipping into his native French and turning haughtily to his aides. “This…this…creature is far more insolent than I remembered. Obviously we cannot risk sending him into public, masquerading as me. He would embarrass my heritage, my entire country. Send him back to whatever rock he crawled out from under. There is no other option. Cancel the tour.”

On the other side of the room, one of the senator’s assistants quickly translated Tedric’s French into English, whispering into McKinley’s ear.

With a humph, the prince stalked toward the door, taking with him Senator McKinley’s hopes for lower-priced oil and Wila’s dreams of economic security for her country.

But McKinley moved quickly, and cut Prince Tedric off before he reached the door.

“Your Highness,” McKinley said soothingly. “If you’re serious about obtaining the funding for the oil wells—”

“He’s a monster,” Tedric proclaimed loudly in French. McKinley’s assistant translated quietly for the senator. “Even Ms. St. John cannot turn such a monster into a prince.”

Across the room, Joe watched as Veronica hurried over to the prince and Senator McKinley and began talking in a lowered voice. Turn a monster into a prince, huh? he thought.

“You always did know how to liven up a party, son.”

Joe turned to see Admiral Michael “Mac” Forrest smiling at him. He gave the older man a crisp salute.

The admiral’s familiar leathery face crinkled into a smile. “Cut the bulldinky, Catalanotto,” he said. “Since when did you start saluting? For criminy’s sake, son, shake my hand instead.”

The admiral’s salt-and-pepper hair had gone another shade whiter, but other than that, the older man looked healthy and fit. Joe knew that Mac Forrest, a former SEAL himself, still spent a solid hour each day in PT—physical training—despite the fact that he needed a cane to walk. Ever since Joe first met him, the Admiral’s left leg had been shorter than his right, courtesy of the enemy during the Vietnam War.

Mac’s handclasp was strong and solid. With his other hand, he clapped Joe on the shoulder.

“It’s been nearly a year and you haven’t changed the least bit,” Admiral Forrest announced after giving Joe a once-over. The older man wrinkled his nose. “Including your clothes. Jumping Jesse, what hole did we drag you out of?”

“I was on leave,” Joe said with a shrug. “I was helping Blue pull in a major tuna and the bait bucket spilled on me. The boys in the Black Hawk didn’t give me a chance to stop at my apartment to take a shower and pick up a change of clothes.”

“Yeah.” The admiral’s blue eyes twinkled. “We were in kind of a hurry to get you out here, in case you didn’t notice.”

“I noticed,” Joe said, crossing his arms. “I take it I’m here to do some kind of favor for him.” With his chin, Joe gestured across the room toward Prince Tedric, who was still deep in discussion with Senator McKinley and Veronica.

“Something tells me you’re not happy about the idea of doing Tedric Cortere any favors,” Mac commented.

“Damn straight,” Joe said, adding, “sir. That bastard nearly got Frisco killed. We were extracting from Baghdad with a squad of Iraqi soldiers on our tail. Frisco took a direct hit. The kid nearly bled to death. What’s maybe even worse, at least in his eyes, is that his knee was damn near destroyed. Kid’s in a wheelchair now, and fighting hard to get out.”

Mac Forrest stood quietly, just letting Joe tell the story.

“We’d reached the Baghdad extraction point when Prince Charming over there refused to board the chopper. We finally had to throw him inside. It only gave us about a thirty-second delay, but it was enough to put us into the Iraqi soldiers’ firing range, and that’s when Frisco was hit. Turns out His Royal Pain-in-the-Butt refused to get into the bird because it wasn’t luxurious enough. He nearly got us all killed because the interior of an attack helicopter wasn’t painted in the colors of the Ustanzian flag.”

Joe looked steadily at the admiral. “So go ahead and reprimand me, Mac,” he added. “But be warned—there’s nothing you can say that’ll make me do any favors for that creep.”

“I’m not so sure about that, son,” Mac said thoughtfully, running his hand across the lower part of his face.

Joe frowned. “What’s going on?”

“Have you seen the news lately?” Mac asked.

Joe looked at him for several long moments. “You’re kidding, right?”

“Just asking.”

“Mac, I’ve been in a chopper, a transport jet and a jeep tonight. None of them had in-flight entertainment in the form of the evening news,” Joe said. “Hell, I haven’t even seen a newspaper in the past eighteen hours.”

“This morning there was an assassination attempt on Tedric.”

Aha. Now it suddenly all made sense. Joe nodded. “Gee, sir,” he said. “And I already smell like bait. How appropriate.”

Mac chuckled. “You always were a smart mouth, Catalanotto.”

“So what’s the deal?” Joe asked. “Where am I inserting? Ustanzia? Or, oh joy, are we going back to Baghdad?”

Inserting. It was a special operations term for entering—either stealthily or by force—an area of operation.

The admiral perched on the arm of the sofa. “You’ve already inserted, son,” he said. “Here in D.C. is where we want you—for right now. That is, if I can convince you to volunteer for this mission.” Briefly, he outlined the plan to have Joe stand in for the crown prince for the remainder of the American tour—at least until the terrorists made another assassination attempt and were apprehended.

“Let me get this straight,” Joe said, sitting down on the couch. “I play dress-up in Cortere’s clothes—which is the equivalent of painting a giant target on my back, right? And I’m doing this so that the United States will have more oil? You’ve got to do better than that, Mac. And don’t start talking about protecting Prince Ted, because I don’t give a flying fig whether or not that bastard stays alive long enough to have his royal coffee and doughnut tomorrow morning.”

Mac looked across the room, and Joe followed the older man’s gaze. Veronica was nodding at Prince Tedric, her face serious. Red. Her hair was dry, and it was definitely red. Of course. It had to be red.

“I don’t suppose working with Veronica St. John would be an incentive?” Mac said. “I had the opportunity to meet her several weeks ago. She’s a real peach of a girl. Rock-solid sense of humor, though you wouldn’t necessarily know it to look at her. Pretty, too.”

Joe shook his head. “Not my type,” he said flatly.

“Mrs. Forrest wasn’t my type when I first met her,” Mac stated.

Joe stood. “Sorry, Mac. If that’s the best you can do, I’m outta here.”

“Please,” Mac said quietly, putting one hand on Joe’s arm. “I’m asking for a personal favor here, Lieutenant. Do this one for me.” The admiral looked down at the floor, and when he looked back at Joe, his blue eyes were steely. “Remember that car bomb that took out a busload of American sailors in London three years ago?”

Silently, Joe nodded. Oh, yeah. He remembered. Mac Forrest’s nineteen-year-old son had been one of the kids killed in that deadly blast, set off by a terrorist organization called the Cloud of Death.

“My sources over at Intelligence have hinted that the assassins who are gunning for Prince Tedric are the same terrorists who set off that bomb,” the admiral said. His voice trembled slightly. “It’s Diosdado and his damned Cloud of Death again. I want them, Lieutenant. With your help, I can get them. Without your help…” He shook his head in despair.

Joe nodded. “Sir, you’ve got your volunteer.”

Chapter Four

It was nearly two-thirty in the morning before Veronica left the planning meeting.

All of the power players had been there—Senator McKinley, whose million-dollar smile had long since faded; Henri Freder, the Ustanzian Ambassador; Admiral Forrest, the salty-looking military man Veronica had met several weeks ago at an embassy function in Paris; stern-faced Kevin Laughton, the Federal Intelligence Commission agent in charge of security; and Prince Tedric’s four chief aides.

It had been decided that Prince Tedric should be spirited away from the hotel to a safe house where he’d be guarded by FInCOM agents and Ustanzian secret service men. The American sailor, Joe Catalanotto, would simply move into Tedric’s suite of rooms on the tenth floor, thus arousing no suspicion among the hotel staff and guests—or even among the prince’s own lesser servants and assistants, who would not be told of the switch.

After convincing the prince to give Veronica St. John a chance to work with the sailor, McKinley had gotten the ball rolling. Prince Tedric was gone, much to everyone’s relief.

Veronica and the prince’s main staff were working to reschedule the beginning of the tour. The idea was to organize a schedule that would require Joe to have the least amount of contact with diplomats who might recognize that he was not the real prince. And the FInCOM agents put in their two cents worth, trying to set up times and places for Joe to appear in public that would provide the assassins with an obvious, clear target without putting Joe in more danger than necessary.