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gown hanging on its stand. As she stared at it, she imagined blood staining the front.
    Hers? Or Zanov’s?
    But that probably wasn’t the solution. If she killed him, she ran the risk of retaliation from his staff. They might not love him, but he was their meal ticket.
    Which left killing herself. A Cold War saying she’d heard from her father leaped into her mind. Better dead than red. Or conversely, better red than dead.
    The latter might be translated—where there’s life there’s hope. And even if she had to let Victor Zanov make love to her, that might be the price she paid for her ultimate freedom.
    She forced Victor out of her mind. This was the night before her wedding—but she wanted to think about another man. Nick Cassidy, to be specific.
    Please, Nick, she silently begged. Please, if you care about me at all, get me out of here.
     

CHAPTER SIX
    “If you don’t sleep, you won’t be any good to Camille or anyone else,” Frank Decorah said. He was speaking privately to Nick on a small monitor he’d taken to his cabin on the luxury yacht, Minerva, that was speeding toward Zanov’s private island. The craft looked much like any one of the luxury vessels that might ply these waters, but inside it was now bristling with special equipment, including the communications setup that Nick and Frank were using.
    It was after midnight, but instead of sleeping, Nick had been going over plans for his assault on Zanov’s stronghold. He’d told the distraught father that they couldn’t go in immediately, but this was pretty damn close, and Nick was absolutely, positively terrified over how many things could go wrong. Six months ago, signing on as a Norland bodyguard had been a routine assignment. Now it weighed on him like an anchor dragging him down below the surface of a rough sea, choking the breath out of him.
    He took a deliberate breath and asked the question that had been gnawing at him. “You’re sure this scheme isn’t too half-asked?”
    “I think your talent for concealment is our best chance,” Frank answered.
    “My talent, yeah,” he acknowledged.
    He’d never known quite what to call it, but he’d been born with the ability to—what? Flicker out of sight? He hadn’t really been good at it—until he’d met Frank. But the Decorah Security chief liked using agents with special talents. And he had recognized that Nick could be one of his best assets. More than that, he’d helped Nick acquire the discipline to employ the skill effectively. After working with Frank, he could usually call on that gift when he needed it. The rub was that the skill tended to crap out on him when his emotions got too involved, which was obviously the case when he was so damn worried about Camille.
    If this was going to work, he had to stay calm and focused, or the two of them would end up dead.
    “You’ve done all the prep you can,” Frank said. “Get some sleep.”
    “Is that possible?”
    “I’d sing you a lullaby if I thought it would do any good,” Frank replied.
    Nick knew it was true. Frank had always gone above and beyond when it came to the men and women who worked for him.
    “The boat will be in position when you wake up,” Frank said.
    “Right.”
    When they signed off then, Nick sprawled on the wide bunk of the master cabin. He couldn’t stop worrying about Camille—and praying that Zanov was going to keep his hands off of her until tomorrow night—when Nick had planned a big surprise for him.
    Somehow, he managed to drift off. The alarm he’d set woke him at five thirty, and he climbed out of bed, hit the bathroom and went up on deck.
    Bobby was waiting for him with coffee and a protein drink.
    “It should be me,” he said as they checked over the equipment.
    He wanted to tell the wet-behind-the-ears bodyguard that if he tried it, it would turn into a suicide mission. Maybe it would be for Nick, too. But he was going to give it his best shot because he simply couldn’t leave Camille