Under Pressure(2)
Her smile wobbled. “Little girl?”
One of his eyebrows rose in a mocking silence, and her smile completely disappeared.
She took a step back, releasing herself from his hold. Her voice lost any hint of friendliness. “Look, I said I was sorry. It’s not like I did it on purpose. Besides, what do you expect when you’re lurking behind someone like that?” She tried to hold back a smirk, sincerely glad now that she had spilled her drink on this jerk.
His jaw clenched and released.
Telling herself to relax and not cause a scene, she tried a different approach. “How ’bout I buy you a drink, and then we can call it even?” Bella suggested, trying to shake off her annoyance.
“The drinks are free,” he replied in that same icy tone, looking at her with that stupid, blank expression again. “Besides, are you even of age to be drinking?”
Bella’s eyes slightly widened as she gasped softly. At twenty-nine sure, people were always assuming she was younger than she looked based on her petite stature but what the hell?
Bella had always dealt with people assuming her height or lack thereof was some sort of indication about her age since Bella was only five three, but she was curvy in all the right places and she knew that in her killer, sexy bronze dress that hugged her curves, no one could mistake her for anything less than a full-grown woman.
She knew was not an average beauty, her exotic features more intriguing with small slanted catlike eyes of amber, small nose, and lips that she thought were too full. Her prized curly mahogany tresses hung loose down to the middle of her back. She pushed her hair behind her ear with her right hand and was at a loss for what to say. No matter her lack of height, she was a small pack of dynamite when pissed. Bella’s Italian temper boiled to the surface, and she saw red at that condescending tone he had taken with her.
She would never, never let anyone talk to her like that again.
Bella yanked her arms out of his grasp, turned to a passing waiter, and deposited her now half-empty glass in exchange for a full one.
“I was trying to be nice, you arrogant ass.”
With that, she spun on her heel and walked away.
Chapter Two
Jason MacBain despised money as only the rich could.
Growing up in Edinburgh, Scotland, Jason had come from a very wealthy family. His father had the Midas touch when it came to financial matters, and he made a fortune doing what he did best as one of the founding partners of a large financial investment firm based in London. Jason had loved his father and mother dearly. His older brother had been his best friend, and he had looked up to him with worshipful adoration.
His world had been perfect.
All of that had changed when his father’s partner had killed his family…for the money. The partner had paid someone to tamper with the brakes of their car and Jason had only survived because he wasn’t with them that day. The investigation into the accident led straight to the business partner and Jason had watched, dry eyed, as the man was taken away in handcuffs.
It was that moment that Jason’s need for justice was born.
At fifteen Jason was not yet a man, but he wasn’t a child either. With no other family left, the family attorney had sent Jason off to boarding school until he came of age. Jason excelled in school but found no joy at the private institutions he had attended. While attending University, he had been approached by MI6 and asked to join the intelligence agency. Needing the freedom they provided, Jason joined, putting his brilliant mind and muscular physique to work in service of his country.
Jason was the perfect agent. A warrior. Mainly because during missions he acted as though he didn’t care whether he lived or died.
Because he didn’t.
No matter what, he completed his mission.
No one was cooler under pressure because Jason no longer felt anything.
After years of service, he had known he needed a change. His life in London had no longer held any appeal to him. He had established a security firm with his knowledge of electronics and surveillance, amongst other skills, and had used his family money to found his company. By reputation alone, Mac Securities was now the one of the most sought after security firms in the world.
Mac Securities installed security systems in many museums and other high-risk facilities around the globe using the latest technology and military precision. Jason had wanted to devote his energy full time to his firm and leave the agency. He had made plans to branch out overseas in the States, had picked out the perfect location, and bought the building.
That was when the offer came.
The International Alliance of Defense was a new branch in the intelligence community, more like a transnational agency. The ultimate warriors of global warfare. The members of NATO had given permission to form IAD to function in every member country, every nation where terrorists existed and to wipe them out. They had a frightening policy of not wanting to know what was going on with the agency, leaving the dirty work to those who knew the game and how to handle the repercussions.