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  RUSTY CHEMISTRY

  By

  J.J. Massa

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  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  RUSTY CHEMISTRY

  Copyright (c) 2005 by JJ Massa

  ISBN: 1-59836-230-5

  Cover art and design (c) 2005 by Nix Winter

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any form without permission, except as provided by the U.S. Copyright Law. Printed and bound in the United States of America.

  For information, you can find us on the web at

  www.VenusPress.com

  Dedication:

  Nix Winter for her inspiration. My editor, Tracey West for her unfailing support.

  Barefoot innocent

  Beautiful flame

  Into danger sent

  Heart not tame

  Love is a dream

  You must Believe

  Partners, team

  And love receive

  By Nix Winter

  Chapter One

  Lancelot Morgan strode angrily through the University’s vast network of corridors, finally stopping someone who looked to be a young college student. “I’m looking for Dr. Ambrozak,” he growled at the pimple-faced girl.

  “Oh,” she squeaked. “His office is on the third floor.” Lance turned to leave when he heard her amend, “He’s not there, though. He’s in his lab at the end of the hall.”

  With an inarticulate snarl, he turned on his heel and marched toward the end of the hall cursing all people and their convoluted thought processes.

  He stopped when he found a doorway with a plaque bearing the embossed name: Vanya Yakovetch Ambrozak, Ph.D. Glancing through the wired glass window, he saw a hunched figure, a boy, Lance guessed, staring intently into a microscope.

  Little of the person was visible save a mop of pale red-rust hair and stooped, white-covered shoulders. He seemed to be scribbling blindly on a nearby pad.

  Lancelot rapped quickly and pushed the door open, not waiting for an invitation. “Is Dr. Ambrozak around?” he demanded.

  “Da?” the boy answered, tearing himself away from his microscope with obvious reluctance.

  “I’m looking for Dr. Vanya Ambrozak,” Lancelot announced, some of the hard edge leaving his voice.

  “Da, I am Dr. Vanya Ambrozak.” The other man’s brow furrowed as he looked fixedly back at Lance.

  Lancelot’s eyes widened as they swept over the young man he’d taken for a visiting high school student or possibly a very young college freshman. The guy didn’t seem old enough to have a Ph.D., he reasoned.

  Well, it didn’t matter, he decided, in fact it just made some things more clear. “I have a complaint,” he gritted, pulling out a small plastic container and slamming it loudly on the counter.

  “What is…” the diminutive doctor reached a fine-boned hand out and snatched the plastic bottle. Uncapping the lid, he began to shake his head sadly.

  “That was alleged to be a sleeping agent,” Lancelot snapped in a clipped voice. “I’m the one who ended up sleeping after I was injected by the man that didn’t work on.”

  “Gospodi pomiluy!” the boy doctor groaned, sliding off his stool. “Is not supposed to be in plastic! Who? Where gave you this?”

  “What?” It took Lance a moment to figure out what the other man was saying. English was obviously not his first language. . “Your office sent it over. How old are you?”

  The younger man’s eyes went wide as he stared at Lance. “Old? My years?” his face turned pink as he dipped his head, ostensibly to regard the bottle Lance had given him. “Am twenty-five age,” the professor mumbled. In a stronger voice he proclaimed, “I am my office and this is not container I sent.”

  “Oh--well--Your container didn’t look right,” Lancelot confessed sheepishly. “And anyway what difference does that make?” he demanded, his tone more aggressive.

  “As you saw, is very big difference it makes. The chemicals of solution are rendered impotent when combined with polymers of plastic bottle,” the small scientist explained.

  “Why didn’t someone tell me that, hmmm?” Lancelot challenged peevishly.

  “Someone was sure you’d call to ask prior to pouring sleeping solution from container to bottle…”

  His first instinct was to sputter and spurt and carry on loudly, but one glance at the mischievous twinkle in those gold-flecked hazel eyes and Lancelot found himself chuckling.

  “Guess that’s why you’re the one with all the Ph.D.’s huh?” he laughed, intrigued by the little professor. “Any chance you can whip me up another batch?” he asked, embarrassed.

  “Am chemist, not cook,” the smaller man shot back, but he still had that twinkle in his eyes that told Lancelot that he was joking and not offended. “When would you need this?”

  “When can you have it for me?” Lancelot shot back. “Oh!” It occurred to him that he hadn’t actually told the professor who he was. “Lancelot Morgan, at your service,” he announced, thrusting out his hand. “Rude of me not to introduce myself.”

  Red-faced, the younger man nervously grasped Lancelot’s much larger hand, giving it a cursory pump. “I know you, Mr. Morgan. I mean to say that I have seen you at meetings. Please call me Vanya.”

  Lancelot studied Vanya’s flaming face intently, a thrill of attraction zipping through him at the touch of that small, elegant hand. “I don’t remember seeing you at any meetings,” he confessed, a bit surprised and embarrassed. He was sure he’d know if he’d ever seen this interesting little man before.

  “You are big spy, I am small chemist,” Vanya answered, clearly uncomfortable. “I will call you to know when solution is finished.”

  With that, the diminutive professor turned away and slid back onto his high stool, focusing all his attention back onto the microscope, as it had been when Lance had first arrived. Lancelot Morgan, secret agent extraordinaire, was dismissed.

  Vanya resisted the urge to look up until the large and charismatic agent had gone. While he wasn’t sure why Lancelot Morgan caused his stomach to flutter and his cheeks to flame, he certainly didn’t want the other man to realize the effect he had.

  Vanya hadn’t been in America very long when The Agency had contacted him. He could keep his research and teaching tenure at the university he was assured, but they’d be grateful for his assistance.

  He had voluntarily transferred from Crimea State Medical University in the Ukraine, pleased when this large university and hospital had accepted him. He knew academically that America was the land of the free, but in reality, he had been certain that The Agency’s request was really a polite demand. That didn’t bother Vanya since The Agency served several countries, his homeland among them, in its fight against organized terrorist cells.

  In short order, Vanya pulled out the necessary chemicals and began to prepare the sleep toxin that the handsome agent had requested. The process of preparing the formula took hours so he was pleased to realize, somewhere along the way, that he didn’t have any scheduled classes that afternoon.

  It wouldn’t have been the first time that he’d gotten involved in research or a task and missed giving a lecture or teaching a class, unfortunately. The Absentminded Professor was an accurate
nomenclature, he realized.

  Chapter Two

  Vanya made his way down the subway steps, turning left innocuously when he came to The Agency’s hidden entrance. He was still distracted and not thinking clearly when he arrived at the reception desk to find only a guard on duty.

  “Offices are closed for the day, sir,” the muscular black man informed him.

  Vanya shook his head slightly. “Is okay, I must leave something only. Is for Mr. Morgan.” What an idiot he was! He hadn’t even stopped to check the time.

  “Your thumbprint here, sir,” the other man instructed, holding a flat device for Vanya to press. “I’m not sure he’s still in,” the man warned him as Vanya passed his desk and headed deeper into the bowels of The Agency’s headquarters, still silently berating himself.

  He hadn’t gone very many steps when he heard his name issue from a nearby wall speaker. “Dr. Ambrozak, please report to Mr. Franklin’s office. Dr. Ambrozak, please report to Mr. Franklin’s office,” the tinny voice intoned.

  He supposed that his entrance had been reported somehow and turned in mid-stride, heading for the boss’s office. As soon as he entered Franklin’s secretary’s domain, she leapt up and opened the office door for him, indicating that he should enter.

  “I’ll take that,” she offered as he moved past her. He looked at her blankly for a moment, embarrassment coloring his cheeks as he realized she meant the small bag he carried.

  “Is sleeping solution for Agent Morgan,” he murmured his limp explanation.

  “Yes, sir,” she smiled kindly at him, taking the bag and stepping aside so that he could enter Mr. Franklin’s private office.

  He hadn’t spoken with Emory Franklin personally since that first interview almost a year prior and he was more than a little apprehensive now. As Vanya nervously crossed the threshold, he wracked his brain trying to guess at what the old man could want.

  “Dr. Ambrozak,” Franklin came around the desk and patted Vanya’s shoulder. The other man was so much taller than he was, Vanya felt like a child before him. “I’m afraid I must speak with you this evening about something rather unpleasant.”

  The sleeping solution that hadn’t worked! Morgan had been compromised and could have been injured.

  “Sir, I am most sorry about…” he began earnestly, only to be cut off in mid-sentence.

  “Please, Dr. Ambrozak, I beg your indulgence. This is such an unpleasant task for me that I pray you’ll allow me to finish.” The melodic British tones flowed over him, soothing, even in spite of the alarming words.

  Vanya nodded mutely, easing onto the edge of a chair.

  “Young man, I know you aren’t an agent, but I have need of some of your--your services. Services that I’m afraid you didn’t agree to when you signed on with our organization.”

  Vanya was really confused now. “All of my abilities are at your disposal, Mr. Franklin,” he answered, tilting his head sharply, trying to understand the older man’s unspoken nuances. Not only was the gentleman’s uneasy demeanor confusing, but also, so far nothing Mr. Franklin said had made sense to Vanya.

  Pulling a chair in front of Vanya’s, the old man sat and leaned forward, placing a palm on his shoulder and looking hard into his eyes. Vanya, so unused to personal contact in his isolated and lonely life, merely shifted uneasily, glancing from Franklin’s riveted gaze to his heavy hand and back again.

  “Dr…Vanya,” Franklin began. Then, speaking more firmly, “Vanya, you understand that everything you do for our organization is completely voluntary. You do understand that, don’t you?”

  Thoroughly bemused, all Vanya could do was nod once again. If it made the old man happy, he’d say he’d volunteered. He would have, too. Only people like him did as they were told when their government spoke. America was now an ally to his government so one voice was the same as its sister to him.

  Releasing a sigh, the Englishman sat back in his chair, reaching back to grab a yellow folder from his desk. Pulling out a glossy square, he handed it to Vanya.

  “This gentleman poses a threat to us. He has aligned himself with The Gray Death, the terrorist group that blew up that cruise ship as it was entering St. John’s Harbor, Newfoundland last year.”

  Vanya studied the man in the photo. He looked normal, dignified even. He had short, light brown and gray hair, an attractive, no doubt expensive smile, and looked to be around fifty or so years old.

  He looked up at Mr. Franklin curiously, just as the office door opened and Lancelot Morgan walked in.

  “He’s a chemist, Dr. Ambrozak. He likes young men. He likes very young, very attractive, very intelligent young men. You are all of those. We need you to seduce him.”

  Chapter Three

  Lancelot froze in the act of opening the folder Franklin proffered. A photo slid out and fluttered to the floor. He leaned down and lifted it, coldly studying the smiling face of the handsome man pictured.

  For a moment he was sure that the old man was telling him to seduce the man in the photograph. It wouldn’t be the first time that he seduced and even bedded a suspect, male or female. Glancing at Vanya he realized that it very well might be the first time for that young man.

  “Sir,” the young scientist spoke up, his voice almost calm, his pale face nearly expressionless. “I have not… That is I never….” he floundered, apparently unable to make himself clear.

  Lance moved to stand behind the young professor, feeling unaccountably uncomfortable with the idea of Vanya seducing the polished man in the picture. Lancelot was bi-sexual. He didn’t know what the little professor’s sexual orientation was.

  “Mr. Franklin,” he began, hoping to alleviate some of the tension pouring from both Mr. Franklin and Vanya. “Perhaps I could do it or even someone….”

  “Sit down, Mr. Morgan!” Franklin snapped. In a calmer voice he continued speaking, “Dr. Ambrozak is the perfect body type for this man and his looks are along the lines of Dr. Havalon’s general preferences. In addition, there is a biochemistry conference at the University of Alberta. Dr. Ambrozak will fit in perfectly. Add to that his familiarity and even his expertise with the chemicals in question–his presence is quite necessary.”

  Lance noticed that Vanya remained silent so he continued to quiz Franklin about the mission. “What is our objective? What information are we after?”

  “We need information on the nerve inhibitors Dr. Paul Havalon has developed and certain anti-toxins he’s cultivated to counteract them.” Franklin turned to look at Vanya, “Frankly, you are the only person suited for this…task that The Agency can trust definitively. If you hadn’t come in today, I would have called for you tomorrow. Every bit of information you can assemble, young man. I shudder to think what The Gray Death would do with such tools of torture.”

  Lancelot nodded, noticing that Vanya nodded at the same time. The connotations of the violent group in question with such horrible nerve agents at their disposal didn’t bear thinking about.

  “You, Agent Morgan, will accompany Dr. Ambrozak,” Franklin’s voice was cold, distant now. It was obvious he’d rather be anywhere else. “Naturally, you will be responsible for taping all conversations between Dr. Ambrozak and Dr. Havalon. We can’t risk trying to videotape any encounters between them. The Gray Death will have trained him to watch for devices that might capture his image on film. It’s more likely that he will say the wrong thing and leave himself open for entrapment.”

  “Yes, sir,” Lancelot nodded, glancing down at his new partner. He didn’t know the young man very well so he couldn’t be sure if he was always this quiet or if he was rattled.

  “Needless to say, Agent Morgan,” Franklin went on, his voice serious and sharp. “You will be responsible for the success of this mission and Dr. Ambrozak’s safety. You will need to work closely with him and supervise his activities. He is, of course, not trained to work in the field.”

  “Of course, sir,” Lancelot agreed.

  * * * *

  Before he
knew it, he was standing in the hall outside of Franklin’s office next to a very shaken looking little professor. “Come on, Vanya,” he said, sliding an arm across the smaller man’s shoulders. “Why don’t you come home with me and let’s talk about this?”

  Wide-eyed, the silent Ukrainian nodded, following Lancelot after he dropped his arm to lead the way out of the building. Once outside, he hailed a cab and the two men climbed in. Not a word was uttered all the way across town and up the elevator to Lance’s penthouse apartment.

  Lancelot glanced covertly at the smaller man, concerned with his silence. He couldn’t blame him for his distress. Lance, too, was distressed, very much so.

  Something about Professor Vanya Ambrozak grabbed him deep inside. It had to be his protective instincts. Certainly, the other man was attractive. In fact, he was cute as hell with that messy mop of wine red hair, full lips and sparkling hazel eyes.

  That couldn’t possibly have anything to do with his reservations about Vanya doing this assignment, however. Lancelot was a professional. He would never allow personal feelings to interfere with an assignment. Of course he wouldn’t do that.

  The problem was that Vanya wasn’t a trained operative. That was what concerned Lancelot the most. This was an important assignment and a very dangerous one as well. He’d need to discuss this at great length with Vanya. Very great length.

  Once inside, Lancelot hung up his coat and moved toward the kitchen, stopping only when he realized that his guest hadn’t followed him. He looked back and saw the younger man standing almost like a statue in the foyer and decided that a glass of medicinal alcohol was called for.

  With a vague idea that Ukrainians probably liked vodka as much as Russians did, he poured them both a large, cold glass full. He snagged a bag of chocolate chip cookies on his way back into the living room.