Masked Page 21

  “Pleasure.” He didn’t mean either syllable. A glance to Tess for commiseration was worth the effort. It wasn’t that they absolutely hated teaming with the feds on cases; it just wasn’t their preferred method of tackling issues. Red tape and hoops were bad enough when one group of spies was involved. Doubling the manpower didn’t always equate to doubling effectiveness.

  Franz stomped forward, clearly determined to be Switzerland. “Okay, everyone play nice, boys and girls. This stack of bang sticks is too hot for us to fuck up.”

  Dan glared. “What are you talking about?”

  Menken braced a hand to John’s shoulder. When the huge warrior didn’t bite it off, a chill gripped Dan’s chest.

  This was serious shit.

  “Kirk Newport has been relegated to house arrest,” the fed explained.

  Screw the ice. Fury detonated through Dan in a hundred different ways. Make that a thousand.

  “What. The. Fuck?” He surged toward Menken—only to be stopped cold by his sister, ramming a hand against the center of his chest.

  “Sit the hell down, sparky.”

  He twisted away from her. Hurled a new glower at Franz. “You said a sentence downgrade, John. House arrest isn’t a fucking downgrade!”

  “Sit.” Devyn again. Shoving him this time. “Down.”

  He stumbled back and fell to the couch. At the same time, Tess lowered to a chair on the other side of the coffee table. Her tongue flicked nervously over her lips. “So the president signed the papers.”

  Dan redirected his glare at her. His ire dripped, heavy and hot, right over the fucking cracker flower. “You knew this might happen?”

  She paled—and he wished that didn’t look as gorgeous as any of her blushes. Menken saved her from having to answer by stepping stiffly forward. “Shit’s going down with Moscow. They need Newport on board,” he explained. “Nichols signed everything about forty-eight hours ago. It was discreet. Nobody was supposed to find out.”

  “But somebody did.” The whole right side of Dan’s face was a bath of fire, signaling his psyche’s security alert system was in perfect working order. Rage level high. Evacuate all but necessary instincts for survival. “Didn’t they?” he demanded, digging his fingers into the couch cushion. “And now the shit’s hit the goddamn fan.”

  Menken’s composure was damn near irritating. “Well, thanks to your sister, we’re not dodging as many fecal Frisbees as we first anticipated.”

  Franzen snarled. “No time for walking cocky yet, G-man. This is far from over.”

  “What’s going on?” Tess focused on Devyn. Her evasion was so obvious, he wondered why she didn’t just flash a neon sign. Officially avoiding Dan.

  It hurt. Deeply. How long had she known the full plan for Newport? And why hadn’t she breathed a word of it to him?

  “After they settled Newport in at his house, the vice president went to visit him,” Devyn explained. She lifted her gaze to Dan for a second. It was pointless to hide his conflict from her. The connection they shared was difficult to explain to anyone. They weren’t twins or best buddies or even raised in adversity. They were just…close. Over the miles, through the years, beyond the crazy job demands for them both—nothing changed the fact that she was one of his coolest blessings and biggest curses. Right now, it was tough to decide which, especially after she stated, “Daniel, I know you’re sideways about this—”

  “Sideways.” He barked it on a bitter laugh. “Oh, sister. You have no fucking idea.”

  “But you don’t see the entire picture. Nobody does. The Soviets are pulling some bullshit that could be pretty degrading for US security in Europe and the Middle East. To keep Americans safe, President Nichols had to strike a deal with the devil.”

  “The devil.” Franz folded his arms. “There’s a truth we can all get behind.”

  “No shit.” Devyn’s agreement turned his mood around a little. A little. Her continued tension kept his attention amped.

  He wasn’t the only one. Tess bolted from her seat with both hands balled. “What. Happened?”

  Before Devyn answered, she pulled in a measured breath. “On a sweep during Madame Vice President’s meeting with Newport, I found a cell phone hidden in a lead planter.”

  Tess sat right back down. “Damn.”

  “Yeah,” Devyn snapped. “Damn. That bastard isn’t allowed to have a cell, let alone a secret one. And what we found on it—” She cut herself short as her stare swung over, riveting on Dan.

  It was a sledgehammer of a moment for him too. Never had he seen such a look on his little sister’s face before. He stared over every inch of her, wondering where or how she’d been so violently stabbed. Surely there wasn’t any other reason for the violent pain on her face—and the last-breath kind of love in her eyes.

  “I wanted to kill him,” she whispered after a long moment. “I did, Dan. When I saw what the bastard was capable of ordering, just punching it all into a damn cell phone like a takeout Chinese meal—” She inhaled and exhaled, shoulders shaking from the effort. “I could’ve taken out my SIG and blown his worthless head off. And damn it, I couldn’t. I can’t. I can’t even give that cocksucker a paper cut because of his value to our national security.” She spun and drove a fist into the wall. “Fuck!”

  Tension fell over the room like a funeral knell—until Franz cocked his head in a wry glance at Dan. “Can’t tell you two are related at all.”

  The urge to rise and pace was excruciating. Dan fought it, sensing whatever came next would make him want to turn the wall into a punching bag too. He leaned forward, parking his elbows on his knees before looking back up at his friend.

  Softly, he asked, “What was on the phone?”

  Franz dipped his head to one side and then the next, a cross between a shrug and a scowl. “Want to take a guess?”

  Dan linked his fingers. The comeback was actually perfect. Franzen knew him well enough by now to discern he’d feel more empowered if he could slam together parts of the puzzle himself. “GPS locator pins on everyone involved with the mission that took him down—and their women and kids.”

  Franz straightened his head. “Very nice, Holmes. And what else?”

  Dan swallowed hard. “Links back to other GPS coordinates. Real-time locations of the operatives for each hit. Probably statuses too.”

  Franz dinged an imaginary bell. “Give the man a prize.”

  Devyn swore again.

  Menken turned, bracing both hands to the fireplace mantel.

  Tess went eerily still.

  And yeah…Dan noticed.

  Every damn inch of her.

  His gut gave his gaze no other alternative. His spirit gave his heart no other path. Yeah, even in his wrath at her. Maybe even because of it. Every thought in his head and sensation in his body was revved on high octane right now, even the recognition that, while he was pissed as hell at her, he was awed into paralysis by her.

  How was this possible? How had she turned him into this mess?

  Because she was unlike any woman he’d ever met—especially now. Others, even toughened field agents, would likely be shaking from head to toe after hearing the news Franz, Devyn, and Menken had brought—that as they spoke, Kirk Newport had a different assassin headed for every dot on his secret cell phone. But Tess lifted her face with pride, dedication, and determination. She didn’t stop focusing on Franz. Her lips mingled with her teeth and tongue as she processed thoughts, accessing her amazing laser beam of a mind for any knowledge she could bring to this makeshift war room of theirs, any new angle she could lend to thwarting Newport without killing him.

  She floored him. Enraged him. Mesmerized him.

  Tore him apart.

  “Needless to say, we’re working with Spec Ops in all the cities to take out the assassins before they get to us,” Franz clarified. “But until that happens, we’re arranging for fully supplied safe houses for all the families.”

  “Nichols gave us clearance for that much,” M
enken supplied.

  “I didn’t give the fucker much of a choice,” Franz growled. “We saved his life last year, goddamnit.”

  “That op was one hell of a hat trick.” Menken’s voice was thick with fanboy admiration, referencing the insane mission Franz and his team had pulled off, that had saved the president as well as the entire US West Coast. Franz barely noticed the compliment. His sculpted Samoan features, normally set in the requisite Spec Ops mode of tough-guy arrogance, were much different tonight. They were an open book of fear for his men and their families.

  “Z’s fiancée Rayna, along with Sage and Racer Hawkins, are already tight in the Seattle location,” he stated. “A few more Stateside members of the team, including Rhett Lange and Rebel Stafford, are with them. Can we use the new condo you secured in downtown LA for Ethan Archer’s wife?”

  “Of course,” Dan answered before a scowl took over. “Hold on. Ethan wasn’t even on the mission last year.”

  “You think Newport knows the difference?”

  “Or cares?” Devyn added.

  That flipped open another page of Franz’s book. “We’re already covered in Hawaii,” he rushed on. “Luckily, Shay and Zoe are still there on honeymoon. They’ve been transported to the cottages on the Barking Sands Missile Base. Nobody’s getting on that base without stripping to their skivvies and handing over five official forms of ID.”

  Dan nodded, approving the move. “Is there a chance Newport may still want Shay more alive than dead, though? And would he try to use Tait as bait for that?”

  One more page peeled back across Franz’s face. “That’s why Tait, Kellan, and Lani are staying in the next cottage over. Lani’s little brother, Leo, is with them.”

  He punctuated it by fully locking his gaze with Dan’s—baring the full extent of his dread. The move reeled Dan through his third shock of the night. Fate had gotten in the first smack with Devyn appearing on his front doorstep, followed by her fist in his wall. Now, the exposure to this side of John Franzen he’d never seen. During the entire history of their friendship, the tough soldier had never allowed his composure to unravel so much.

  “These men are my ohana, Colton,” Franz told him. “My family. If even one of them or their loved ones are taken down by Newport’s fucked-up rampage, the man will not live to see another sunrise—and I’ll gladly tell the world in a court of law, including President Craig Nichols, that I was the one who rid it of that sonofabitch.”

  Another long pause weighted the room. This time, Menken didn’t attempt to calm the Samoan. The only person with those kinds of guts was, not surprisingly, Devyn. “Okay, big guy.” She stroked his shoulder, her hand looking tiny on his bicep. “We’re on a good roll here. Stay focused. One more safe house to secure, and then you can go out and track some bad-guy motherfuckers.” She shook her head and pouted. “Damn it.” Added a pitiful whine. “I wanna go too, mauna man.”

  “No.”

  Dan commanded it in unison with Franzen. He was about to embellish it with a rant about how playing roulette with safety got half of one’s face burned off, but that was when all his thoughts of fire were totally doused—

  By the glacier of horror that had taken the place of his chest.

  Shit. Shit.

  The last safe house would be Vegas. Because Devyn would be going in it.

  Sure enough, Menken looked up from a smartpad he’d opened, declaring, “We’ve got a furnished place ready to go not too far from here, tucked into a gated community. Nice view of the lake and everything.”

  “Sounds charming,” Devyn groused. “I can toodle around the water in my cute little paddleboat, getting blitzed on margaritas—or you can just send me to hell. Same diff.”

  Dan jolted to his feet. Paced all the way to the kitchen and back again. Then again. He had no idea what else to do with the terror now gripping his soul—the crazy what-ifs that bombarded him from all angles, shattering the glacier into shards that tumbled through every inch of his body, every drop of his blood.

  You want to talk about hell, baby sister?

  Hell was the certainty that Newport likely knew, with crystal clarity, what Tess had come to mean to him in the last year—and that if he’d been followed by any of the bastard’s minions over the last week, especially to Catacomb, it wouldn’t be an outrageous leap to assume they’d taken their relationship to new levels.

  Hell was the certainty that if Newport even suspected Tess was Dan’s sexual submissive, he’d take her to his own dungeon—where safe, sane, and consensual would be merely fancy words from a dictionary.

  “Hey, king shit.”

  Devyn’s shout jerked him around.

  “What?” he snapped.

  “I think that’s my line,” she rebutted. “Well, our line.” She spread her hands. “What the hell? What’re you doing?”

  He took a second to breathe. To evaluate the accuracy of the shitstorm that had just plummeted over his logic—and still led to the only course of action, disgusting as it was, that he could take because of it.

  Fuck.

  He scraped a hand through his hair. When he lifted his head back up, he arrowed his stare straight at Tess.

  “You have to go with her,” he directed.

  Tess’s gaze widened. “What? Who? Me? Where?”

  “To the safe house.” He didn’t falter any syllable. “With Devyn. You have to go with her, Tess. It’s not negotiable.”

  She gawked like he’d just grown webbed feet and had quacked it at her. “You’re smoking crack, Colton. If you send me, you’ll have to send half the office too. We’re all just your work friends. Trained CIA work friends who work in a damn secure building, at that.”

  “Damn it.”

  “Damn it what?” Her head slid back as if on a rail, spearing him with a full what the hell, as he started crossing the room toward her.

  “You’re going to make me do this the hard way, aren’t you?”

  “The hard way…what?” But when he didn’t deter his gaze from her beautiful face for a second, her demeanor started to crack. She blinked hard, and he knew—knew—that for a moment, she didn’t just see him. She felt him. She felt them. All the connection and perfection and power of what they’d shared in the middle of the desert, in the darkness of that dungeon, was just as real and brilliant here, as he knew it would be—as she shook her head against it, refusing to believe. Dan didn’t blame her. Looking at the sun was hard enough, but being forced to hop in a space shuttle and then land on it?

  Death was death, no matter how good the fire felt getting there.

  When he was finally close enough, he lifted his hands to her shoulders but didn’t grab them. Instead, with hands turned over, he trailed his knuckles along both those sweet curves, hoping she felt his longing, even now, to kiss them, shield them, hold them—

  To protect her with his own damn life, if that was what this all came to.

  “You’re going to the safe house with my sister.”

  “No, I’m not.”

  “Yes…you are. I’m not going to let that asshole or his dipshits near you, Ruby.”

  A tremble ran the length of her body. An answering energy vibrated through him. Just like that, it all returned…the threads, so spectral yet so strong, that bound their very chemistries. Undeniable. Unbreakable.

  Tess jolted her stare up at him, stabbing daggers of jade confusion through dark-ginger lashes, sharpening as he shifted even closer. Help, he pleaded to heaven. Help me to help her understand. If at least her senses acknowledged the truth of who he was, she’d comply. She’d be safe, and so would his secret.

  Not happening.

  The next second, she made her chin follow her gaze. It jutted up as she huffed again at him. “Damn it, Dan. They’re not going to come anywhere near me. Honestly, I don’t think there’s any need to—”

  Desperate times. Desperate measures.

  He flipped his hands over. Dug his fingers into the flesh of her arms and his stare into the deepest
corners of hers. “We don’t have time,” he growled. “And you will not argue with me about this anymore. You’re going to that house, little rose, and that’s a goddamn order.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  “Tess.”

  She ignored him, tugging the blanket tighter around her shoulders. She’d found it in the window seat of the bedroom she’d claimed at the Summerlin safe house and then instantly wrapped herself in it, craving the symbolic refuge as much as the real.

  Even so, she wished the thing would become a full invisibility cloak. That would mean she couldn’t enjoy the view of the lake—Caspar had been right; it was awesome—not that she saw it, anyway. She was numb. Sealed off. Barriers up. Nothing in, nothing out. She couldn’t drool over her luxurious surroundings or even laugh at the family of ducks on the patio below, shaking their backsides after a midnight dip in the water. She certainly couldn’t risk a speck of fear for everyone, even herself, who had targets on their backs courtesy of that bastard, Kirk Newport.

  Letting any of it in meant letting all of it in. That meant remembering the blast from two hours ago that had dropped her to her knees in the middle of Dan’s living room. Warp core breached, Captain. She’d proved that by shivering through the most agonizing minute of her life, before letting Devyn yank her up and help her out the door.

  Between there and here, everything had turned into a blur. It was for the best. Even slivers of memory made her ball up, knees to chest, checking the shields in her soul for full coverage.

  The thing was, she wasn’t sure they all still worked. The gears of her emotional defenses were rusty, too rusty, not having to be activated since the day after her eighteenth birthday, when she’d hauled the last of her moving boxes from home.

  No. Not home. Just Mother and Father’s house. That place had never been home.

  A home was a place for feeling wanted. Accepted. Safe.