“Way to kill my appetite, Z—but yeah.” Garrett sidled next to his friend but kept
gazing at Shay. “There has to be another choice.”
Everyone let out a collective breath when Shay not only nodded, but did so with assurance.
“Yeah. There is.”
“And?” Zeke prompted.
“Austin.”
“Austin?” Garrett scowled. As in…Texas?”
Shay nodded again. “At the outskirts of town. The site of the old Verge Pharma building,
or close to it. I learned the whole story last year, when Colton let us hide in the
suite at the Vdara when everyone on the planet was looking for me.”
Brynn couldn’t help one small smile. Oh, how she remembered that week of holing up
at the Vdara. It’d seemed like a luxury staycation, except for the times they were
reminded that every law enforcement agency in the city—plus Stock, Newport, and Adler—were
out to capture Shay any way they could. She didn’t doubt that all the danger fed her
attraction to Dan, the G-man just as commanding as his soldier friends—and mind-bendingly
gorgeous, to boot. The feeling had been heady and heart-stopping…
And temporary.
But, as she’d come to learn over the last few months, not worthless. Despite the heartache
of the relationship’s end, everything about her journey with Dan had brought her to
who she was now. Clearer about why she’d made that mistake. More resolved to never
make it again.
That determination prompted her head up again. “Learned it from who?” she asked Shay.
“You and Dan were pretty picky about the suite’s guest list.” The two of them had
been so bossy about the issue, El and she had nicknamed them “the old ladies”. Zoe,
already deep into the “yes, Sir” and “no, Sir” thing with Shay, hadn’t joined the
fun. While their dynamic wasn’t nearly as intense as the shit Enya had gotten into
with her Dom, it had all still made Brynn giggle—and mightily razz her friend at every
chance she got.
Get back here alive, Zo, and I’ll never tease you again. I’ll be too busy thanking
God for you.
“Ghid Preston,” Shay answered her. “You and Ry were watching a movie in the other
room.”
Zeke grunted. “Ghid. Yeah. Good man.”
“He filled in some blanks for Tait and me,” Shay offered. “About why our mother fell
off the grid after the Big Idea project was discontinued. He told us about a site
outside of Austin, supposedly the home of Verge Pharmaceuticals—but that was only
what the building said on the outside. Inside, it housed Adler’s new lab facilities.
They abandoned the building after Newport got them cleared to move to Area Fifty-One.”
As he spoke, El grabbed the laptop back, snapped it back open, and clacked at the
keys like a teenager in chat mode. “Got it,” she announced ten seconds later. “Right
here.”
She turned the device so everyone could see the screen, consumed by images of a building
that had, at one time, likely been an architectural showpiece. In the pictures El
showed, the giant glass and chrome building was closed off by chain-link fences, and
was rocking the “overgrown decay” look. Rain had streaked the dirt from the roof down
over the walls, and tall weeds rose up from the ground to meet the stains.
El scrolled to some links on the side of the page. “Looks like it’s still registered
to Verge.”
“Only a two-hour plane trip from here,” Kell filled in, “as opposed to the five hours
required for D.C.”
“Good point.” For a second, Shay’s face didn’t look so ravaged.
“Feels like our best bet,” Zeke concurred.
Rhett studied the screen more closely. “Especially because this complex isn’t as helpless
as it looks.”
Rebel stepped in too. “You’re right,” he murmured. “The weeds on the fence have only
grown as high as this break point. They’d have overtaken the top if the wires there
weren’t still charged.”
“And look at this.” Rhett spread his fingers to expand an image. “Around the loading
docks, in the back.”
Rebel shifted closer, practically pressing his cheek to his buddy’s for the better
view. Nobody in the room flinched—Brynn imagined they all operated under close quarters
when on missions—though she wondered if anyone picked up the new strain in Rhett because
of it.
“That dust has been scuffed recently,” Rebel murmured. “A lot of it, too.”
“And there.” Rhett pointed at the screen again. “Fresh tire marks?”
“Or some huge fucking slugs, looking for a little shelter,” Rebel countered.
“It’s Texas,” Zeke inserted. “You never know what Mother Nature’s going to allow.”
“No shit.” The mutter was nearly indiscernible, issued from Rebel’s thinned lips as
he stepped away from Rhett—though Brynn wondered if he’d traversed a lot farther than
that in his mind.
No matter what, the last minute had exposed a couple of truths to her. One, the waters
of both Rebel Stafford and Rhett Lange ran deeper than the world saw—and maybe, as
the team’s notorious rule breakers, that was how they liked it. Two, she shouldn’t
be so curious about grabbing her psychological scuba gear for those waters—especially
not now.
No. Not ever.
What the hell had gotten into her about both of them, anyway?
Stay on the shore, girlfriend. Those waters are laced with your personal arsenic.
Men like them are death sentences to your heart and spirit.
If only Zoe were here to lend her willpower.
If only Zoe were here, period.
Rhett’s comment sliced into her rumination. “There’s some very fancy security hardware
here, too. The picture is fuzzy, so I can’t catalogue it.” He shook his head, making
the red tips of his hair dance beneath the light. “This is going to take recon. Probably
from the inside.”
“Recon?” Rebel folded his arms and growled. “From the
inside
? Right. Because we have that kind of time?”
Rhett grunted. “So you vote for just blowing the lid off the place?”
“Sounds like a plan to me,” Zeke drawled.
“Right.” Garrett snorted. “That’s a fine plan—unless Adler’s fun little fairies have
been hard at work building in some cute booby traps for wandering C-4 enthusiasts.
Just to make things more interesting, yeah?”
Zeke narrowed his eyes. “You’ve been watching too many James Bond movies.”
“And you’ve been to too many CrossFit sessions.” Garrett caught enough of Rhett’s
commiserating glance to go on. “The ability to bench-press a tractor tire doesn’t
do you shit beneath a mountain of rubble or a lungful of sarin gas.”
Rebel glowered back into pirate mode. “Better the guy who tried than the guy who stood
around ‘strategizing’ with his dick in his hand.”
“So you’re all dead,” Rhett snapped, “and Zoe and her baby are still turned into Adler’s
human sushi.”
That
took care of any remaining stomach flips—and turned into Brynn’s bravado for whacking
the man’s shoulder. “There’s a word in the dictionary called ‘tact,’ bozo. Look it
up. And
you
,”—she stabbed two fingers into Rebel’s chest, cutting short his gloating snicker—“aren’t
any better.”
Rebel glowered. “Huh?”
“Are you really licensed to play with explosives? Who do I write a letter to about
that?”
Shay shoved from the wall and barreled toward them. “This bullshit’s getting us nowhere.
If I have to tear down that building brick by brick, I’ll do it.”
Zeke hooked him to a halt. “Negative.” He shrugged in reply to Shay’s snarl. “That’s
exactly what Adler’s anticipating, not to mention your fun friend Nyles. Sorry, I-Man.
If Zoe’s their holy grail, you’re their golden Arthur. On top of that, you’ve barely
slept or eaten, not to mention the emotions that are fucking your game to shit.”
“And
yours
wasn’t, when you went running after Mua when he took Rayna as revenge when you put
away his brother?”
“I was way clearer than you.” Z jerked up his chin and firmed his jaw. “I was also
a lot less valuable to Mua than you are to Adler.”
“And Mua was a moron,” Garrett inserted.
Shay fumed into silence. Brynn winced again in sympathy. The guy had no other option.
Homer Adler and “moron” didn’t belong in the same sentence. The man was brilliant—to
the point of daunting.
But while Brynn had sworn off soldier studs like these as lovers, she knew their fiber
as men. “Daunting” was part of their job description, along with terms like “impossible”,
“risky”, and “what-the-fuck-are-you-thinking”. She could practically see the gears
churning in their heads already, about what they were going to do for Shay.
And Zoe
.
As if the conviction of her conclusion drew him forward, Rebel moved to the middle
of the room. But that was where things got weird. He didn’t stomp forward; he sauntered.
Like a gentleman pirate strolling the decks in the sun, he clasped his hands behind
his back while glancing at Rhett.
“Hey, Double-Oh?”
“Yeah?”
“Weren’t we about to hit up Franz for those two weeks of leave?”
Rhett closed the laptop with a knowing grin. “Do believe we were.”
“Seems a good time to make that happen.”
He grinned wider. Rhett mirrored the look.
“The mavericks haven’t had an adventure in a long, long time.”
“God help us all,” Zeke muttered.
“Sending that the wrong direction, buddy.” Garrett jabbed hands into his pockets.
“With those two, we’ll be posting bail money to hell.” When he pulled a hand back
out, a child’s pacifier dangled from his fingers. His eyes softened, undoubtedly succumbing
to a vision of his nearly two year-old son, Racer.
“As long as they take care of recon on Texas first, I don’t give a shit.”
“Amen, brothah.” Kellan lifted his hand, wiggling a confident Hang Ten. “And while
you guys are checking out shit in the land of longhorns, I can cross the D.C. warehouse
off the list. Wouldn’t hurt to check out LA, too. If Adler formed relationships with
any of Stock’s show biz buddies, he might be going that route, as well.”
Z bumped a fist in his direction. “Good thinking. What better place to hide someone
than the land of ultimate illusion?” His head jerked, a thought clearly piercing it.
“You have any lines on where to find a discreet pilot?”
Kellan curled a wolfish grin. “Sam Mackenna just got into town.”
Z chortled. “Mackenna! They really let that ape leave Scotland?”
“All six-foot-whatever of him.” Kellan chuckled. “He’s here for some cross-training
between the air forces, only they’ve been delayed due to some bullshit red tape. He’s
sitting on his hands over at Nellis, going stir-crazy. Seriously, you’d think he’d
been forced to hole up in a cave for years or something.”
“Call him. Right away.”
“Done.”
Zeke cocked a wry look at Garrett. “I’m pretty sure Franz won’t have a problem with
our request for some leave, either.”
“Under the circumstances?” Garrett returned. “No. But adding in the can of whoop-ass
we unleashed on those drug traffickers last week,
and
the fact that he’s in training now?”
Z snorted ruefully. “Why training gives that guy a nonstop boner, I’ll never understand.”
“Don’t bother to try,” Kell interjected. “Just be grateful.”
“Agreed, Slash-tastic. Agreed.” Zeke’s resilient tone reflected a newly buoyant mood
among the guys—even Shay, who stood without the help of the wall or sofa for the first
time in hours. “We’ll put together the mission command center right in the next room
so you can monitor everything that’s going on, I-Man.”
Shay growled. “If they find Zo, ‘monitoring’ won’t be all I do, asshole.”
“Bridge to cross later.” Garrett clapped a hand over the big man’s shoulder.
El stepped forward again. “I can be here a lot, too. Help out in any way you guys
need with the tech.”
Brynn frowned at her. “You’re in
two
shows right now.”
“One’s dark for two weeks,” El countered. “And they can grab someone to cover for
me at
Papillon
. Thank God the Braneff Brothers believe in huge show casts.”
“Outstanding.” Rebel smacked his palms together. “And I’ve got a guy who can hook
up Double-Oh and me into a place just outside Austin.”
Rhett jogged up a brow. “Of course you do.” He traded a look with his friend that
solidified Brynn’s earlier assessment. Deep waters. Both of them.
A lot
of them traversed together.
Which meant they didn’t need company.
But some moments in life were just dominated by other forces. Maybe divine ones. That
was the excuse she went with, as a string of insane words spilled off her lips.
“And I can help you two with that part.”
Both men looked up. The pirate and the Viking stared at her, scrutinizing with two
distinct shades of deep blue that dared a girl to get lost in them. What an ideal
match for the rabbit hole she’d surely just flung herself into.
Rhett’s ruddy brows were the first to crunch. “With what part, peach?”
Okay, forget being entranced by his eyes.
Peach
? Had he really gone there? It seemed so—and in one syllable, turned a dorky endearment
into an all-hail for the deepest tissues of her sex. She stood there with the wet
panties as proof, desperately praying she effectively hid the sexual cataclysm that
had just struck.
Maybe going to Texas with him wasn’t such a keen plan, after all.
“El, Garrett, and Zeke have things handled here. Kellan’s scoping out D.C. and Hollywood.
So why don’t I help you two in Texas?”
So exactly
why
was she pushing the point again?
“Please. I need to help find her, too.”
There it was.
It sure as hell didn’t come easy. She wasn’t wired to beg for anything in her life.
Only when the moment really called for it did she flip open the circuit box and consciously
decide to rewire her nature. But if any cause was worth it—if any
one
was worth it—Zoe Chestain-Bommer was that person. Brynna had a nonexistent father,
a mother who might as well have been, and a sister who lived in fantasy land most
days. Ryder, El, and Zoe were her only real family now. She’d be damned to stand by
and just watch a monster rip one of them away.