As if the assumption needed affirmation, Shay twisted back, trying to use his forehead
on the wall. After three attempts, he gave up. The mountains of his shoulders heaved
with his breaths.
Rebel filled in the other end of the composure spectrum. With barely a change to his
stance, he calmly murmured, “Glad we got that covered. Do you want to talk about something
that matters now?”
Shay’s breaths stretched longer. “Left,” he finally grated. “I think they turned left.”
“That means they went south.” Across the room, Rhett flashed a small smile. He’d clearly
been hoping for that answer.
“Out of town, then?” Ryder queried. “To California? Or Arizona?”
“Not necessarily.” El added her knowing gaze to Rhett’s. Brynn looked on, hiding a
bizarre bite of envy for their connection. Or
was
it that strange? El’s mind worked like a hard drive, able to process a thousand pieces
of information and spit out a conclusion in seconds. It was the key behind her impeccable
dancing, why she always got audition callbacks before Brynn, who performed mostly
from her gut. Two different routes to the same result—except when that outcome was
impressing a man as incredible as Rhett Lange.
Focus! This is your best friend’s living room, not a damn cocktail bar. Phone numbers
on napkins are
not
why you’re here.
Getting Zoe back. It was the only thing that mattered—no matter what it took from
all of them to do so.
“The airport.” El’s hazel eyes favored dark green, betraying her anxiety. “Shit. They
could have been headed for the airport, right?”
“Airport
s
,” Rhett corrected. “Not just McCarran. In this case, Henderson Executive fits that
bastard’s MO better.”
“MO?” Brynn looked from him to Rebel, who nodded grimly. “What bastard?”
“Yeah,” Rebel muttered. “It does.”
“
What
bastard?”
El twisted her lips. “Homer Adler. He’s the only one who makes sense. Right?”
Rebel’s jaw hardened while throwing another glance at Shay—for good reason. Even the
mention of Adler’s name stripped the color from Shay’s face. Could he be blamed? Brynn’s
gut wrenched, thinking of what that beyond-mad scientist had put him through as a
“test subject” of the Big Idea, a secret human-animal genetics experiment. As the
only victim who’d been dosed with the serum as a child, Shay had become critical to
Adler as a grown man. After weeks of cutting him open to learn the secrets behind
his animal strength and speed, Adler had Shay drugged into a stupor, preparing him
to be the main stud horse for mutant super babies.
A lot of the guys in this room had prevented that from happening, staging an off-books
rescue worthy of a Hollywood adventure. The team hadn’t failed—thanks to the secret
weapon they’d brought along for the mission.
Zoe.
Who, beyond anyone’s knowledge but her own, had already been carrying the super baby
so important to Adler and his goons.
Important
? As adjectives went, it barely dinged the bell—and was probably the only treat that
could’ve enticed Adler out of whatever slime hole in which he’d been hiding for the
last year. Clearly, the worm had learned of Shay and Zoe’s happy announcement, and
gotten so eager to get his hands on the baby, he’d bounded back into the limelight
with a damn ballsy leap. By grabbing her tonight, Adler had shot to the top of every
government watch list ever conceived, including countries who weren’t even friends
with the US. Finding Adler and his minions meant finding Zoe—and the first baby of
an entirely new race of humans. That meant a new breed of warriors. And, in fifteen
to twenty years, an unstoppable army.
“Fan-fucking-tastic.” Zeke growled it low and tight, exposing the dismal downturn
of his own thoughts. Garrett scowled with similar intent.
On the couch, Kellan leaned forward, chin balanced on his clasped hands. “Those piranhas
could have very well slithered back into the bog they came from, too. Vanished without
a trace.”
“With a gagged pregnant woman?” Brynn countered. They might have forced Zoe to stay
on her feet, but no way would she be quiet about it.
“Valid point.” While his tone remained at mission gravity, Rebel cracked an approving
smile. “That narrows down the search.”
His smiled widened. Brynn’s heart flipped a little, and the reverberations didn’t
stop there.
Great.
She had her dread over Zoe
and
a throb between her legs to contend with now.
Rhett’s nod coincided with his buddy’s, doubling the pressure of her frustration.
The speed at which the two men processed things was as captivating as the packages
their brains came in. “Right,” he agreed. “We focus on Henderson Executive.”
“Let me help.” El scooped up her laptop again, then nodded at Rhett. “Amazing what
a girl in dance tights and heels can get the guys in the Caesar’s security office
to spill during her break. I may know a few new shortcut hacks into the airport’s
security feed.”
Rhett chuckled. “Legally, I’m not supposed to love every word you just said.”
“Me neither.” El shrugged, making the piercings along her right ear wink in the light.
She tucked a strand of her pink pixie cut behind the row of jewelry. “But I hate everything
about the reason I’m here, so it’s a wash.”
Rhett’s full lips thinned into a commiserating line before he led the way back to
the dining room. In their wake, nobody else had much to say. Brynn only had to take
a glance around to know thick silence wasn’t the norm for these guys. If they were
working, conversation was likely all Spec Ops sarcasm between the soldier acronyms
and radio code. If they were off the clock, it was probably more smack-talk, blended
with their chosen off-duty “amusement”—a term Brynn was determined to leave alone
right there. She’d overheard enough conversations between Zoe and her sister, Ava,
as well as their cousin, Rayna, to figure out what those pastimes might be. Ava and
Rayna, now both married to guys on the team, used expressions like
safe word, subspace,
and
aftercare
as if they merely chatted about the new flowers they’d planted or movie they’d seen.
It hadn’t escaped Brynn’s notice that with Shay’s arrival in her life, Zoe had joined
that party.
What the hell? Had submissiveness become a virus?
If that was the case, Brynn vowed to get the vaccine right away.
It wasn’t like she was a puritan. Being kinky, even deeply so, didn’t transform her
friends
or
their husbands into different people. If it made them happy—and she understood at
least the sexual dynamite part of that equation—then why fault them for their consensual
choices? Dan Colton, the boyfriend she’d met in this very room, had actually revealed
himself as a Dominant by the time they went on their third date. By that time, Brynn
had been so nuts about him that she copped out with flirtation, declaring his revelation
“bold” and “sexy” but secretly hoping it was his way of simply stating a need for
intensity between the sheets.
For almost a year, that had been just the case. By day, Dan had been attentive and
sweet, enduring the steps of recovering from the explosion that had disfigured half
of his face. By night, he was everything she’d ever fantasized about in a lover: forceful
and powerful, the only man who’d ever met the mighty needs of her libido and still
had passion to spare. Through it all, he’d never brought out one satin blindfold or
pair of fluffy handcuffs. His “I’m a Dominant” Tourette’s had seemed just that—or
maybe his accident had changed more than his flesh. Whatever the reason, she’d been
damn grateful—and giddily on her way to falling in love.
Until Dan confessed he wanted to take her to a BDSM club.
“Beginning of the end” had never fit a night in her life more aptly.
He’d tried a hundred poetic phrasings. Told her they’d take it slow, that he would
explain things as they went, that she’d discover new parts of her submissiveness that
she’d never known before—
At which point, she’d rocketed off the couch and seethed her reply from across the
room.
I’m not a submissive, Daniel. Nor will I
ever
be.
Why did Dan’s answering stare still burn so brightly in her memory? His assessment,
hard as steel but fathomless as morning sky, had been potent to the point of brutal—and
over six months later, still confused the hell out of her.
Because you may have…
liked…
being stared at like that
?
Because you may have truly knelt for the man, had he commanded it
?
Never.
She was stronger than Enya. She could never be anything less. If she needed a reminder
of the consequences otherwise, she could always take a quick drive to the Sandbells
Psychiatric Facility…in hopes that her sister would say more than ten words in a row
to her this time.
Nope. No kneeling in her future. Not for a man who commanded it, at least.
And wasn’t that irony’s ideal cue to come knocking?
She didn’t care. As Shay slipped back down the wall and hunched back over his knees,
she didn’t think twice about dropping down next to him.
“Shay?” She squeezed his shoulder. “Hey, don’t check out on us now, buddy. Come on.
Stay strong.”
Oh, sheez.
Stay strong
? She was really going with that?
But if she didn’t, who would?
Garrett, Kellan, and Zeke were a dark, darker, and darkest row of uncertainty, shifting
weirdly on their feet. Under other circumstances, Brynn would’ve chuckled. Ask these
guys to lead hostages from a hot zone, extract an emissary from an embassy, or haul
a buddy from a battle trench, and they were aces for the job—but Shay’s torment was
a jungle they didn’t know how to handle. Never mind that all three of them had slogged
similar bogs of despair within the last two years—but as best as Brynn recalled, they’d
also been able to act right away on the crises with their women. Zoe had been snatched
from that alley nearly eight hours ago, and Shay didn’t have even a step one.
No wonder his friends looked like prisoners. They were staring down their worst fear—and
were shackled by it.
Ironically, the guy who “didn’t get it” was the only one who came near. He crouched
next to Brynn, presence still huge as Blackbeard. “The woman has
beaucoup
brains as well as beauty, Bommer. Heed her,
mon ami
.”
Shay raised his head, already glowering. Clearly, Rebel’s unique mix of Creole ’tude
and soldier drawl didn’t impress him in the least. Maybe it was a guy thing, because
all that musical French drawl was so sexy to Brynn, even her neck hairs tingled.
“
Merde
,” Rebel spat. “Look. You’re not doing Zoe a microsecond of good by giving up the
ghost on your shit now.” He bent over farther, meeting his buddy’s glare, warrior-to-warrior.
“I’m not going to insult you by coating this in weasel-speak. You know as well as
I do that the condition we find Zoe in may not be pretty,”—he gripped Shay’s forearm
when the guy grimaced and grabbed at his hair—“and she’s going to need
you
all in one piece.” He shook his friend hard. “I-Man?
Fuckhead
? You hearing me?”
No response came from Shay except an angrier coil of his hand, twisting deeper into
his thick chestnut hair. Brynn’s throat throbbed with emotion, and she wondered how
the man hadn’t fully scalped himself yet. The only thing worse than a loved one in
trouble was being helpless to do anything about it.
“Enya, please let me back in. Let me help you through this!”
“You can’t, bibi. Nobody can help me through this except Peter, and he doesn’t care
anymore. He never will.
”
Of course he hadn’t. And wouldn’t. Someone newer, fresher, and shinier had entered
the submissive program at Club Catacomb, captivating the bastard like an infant with
a new shiny—the same way Enya had charmed him eight months prior to that.
No time for that bitterness now. She had to stay focused on keeping Shay sane.
“Why don’t I make you something to eat?” She curled a little smile at the spark of
interest in Shay’s eyes. “I can’t unscramble security video feeds but I
can
scramble eggs. Are there some in the kitchen?”
Shay’s forehead crunched, giving his face a uniquely boyish light. Brynn half-expected
him to rub the “sleep” from his eyes with a knuckle. “Yeah,” he said softly. “I guess
we do. I mean, we usually do. Zo goes to one of those farmer’s markets on Tuesdays
and Thursdays. She likes to get tomatoes and carrots and onions…and apples.” His face
contorted again. “Yeah. Apples. She loves those. Don’t touch the apples, okay? She’ll
want one when she gets home.”
It was a line worth waiting for.
When she gets home.
If he believed Zoe would survive this, then Brynn would too. If things like psychic
connection really existed, she was certain Shay and Zo shared such a bond. Their love
was palpable when they were in the same room, infusing everyone around with its magic.
Brynn didn’t harbor the illusion of finding such a thing for herself one day; cosmic
connection required an emotional bridge she just didn’t have anymore—but she could
sure as hell jump on Shay’s train and use
his
bridge this once.
She made sure he got the point by tightening her fingers around his.
Damn
.
Beneath her grip, his skin was icy—or maybe her impression was skewed by Rebel’s nearness.
The man was a walking furnace. No wonder his eyes were always intense as blue flames,
and his nearness felt like a rush from the oven on a frosty morning.
And there she was, doing it again. Mooning over her personal fantasy pirate when there
was a crisis to focus on—when the dearest friend she’d ever had was God-knew-where.
Zoe. Oh God, girlfriend. Hang on
!
“Got it.” She forced a small smile along with the reassurance to Shay. “No apples
will be harmed in the making of Brynn’s famous scrapple.”