Danger Mine: A Base Branch Novel (2 page)

Khani aligned the bangs crowding her brow, stowed her phone, and continued through the armory to the range. The muffled boom of a single gunshot reverberated in the narrow space. A wall of pistols, rifles, earmuffs, and safety glasses decorated one half of the viewing room. On the other side a concrete buttress and ballistics resistant glass split the difference.

Warmth and comfort most people experienced when they stepped inside their homes cloaked her. Gun oil. The clink of brass hitting the ground. Sulfur and charcoal. The almost silent click of the trigger. It relaxed the knots at her shoulder blades. It eased the strain on her lungs.

Shit’s bound to look up soon. Let it go and concentrate on the task at hand.

She snagged ear protection. A grimaced crinkled her nose as she wedged the thing over her hair.

“A beast like you worried about your hair? You think men care about misplaced locks? Not a chance. All we want are our broads bangin’ and as far as possible from psycho.”

Hunter stood in the range entrance. He waved both hands in the air and shook his head, indicating to the crazies to stay back. Each push defined a new plateau of muscle in his arms. Banded traps welled the collar of his graphite tee. “Can’t handle that crazy shit. And that’s the truth.” A full-on purse stretched his thick midnight lips and added a whole new level of sexy to the man’s game. His bulldog physique brushed either side of the frame.

“Your high expectations astound me. I thought tits and a hole to poke it in was all you boys required.” Khani snickered.

“No, ma’am. Standards mean less headache later.”

“He learned from experience.” Oliver slipped his corded forearm around Hunter’s throat, locked his palms together, and dragged him backward. Oli’s blond man-bun flopped atop his head. His matching beard stayed put as though it were an extension of his distinct chin.

“Why don’t you ever learn?” Hunter croaked.

“What can I say? I like an adventure.” Oli huffed and struggled, fighting to keep Hunter from successfully wrapping his leg around Oli’s and taking the fight to the floor.

Khani seized the opportunity and hurried through to the doorway. One mighty fine ass attached to hefty legs protruded from a stall halfway down the line. Scuffed cowboy boots crowned the feet. “At least one of you knows how to be serious…on occasion.”

“Tyler, you kiss-ass,” Oliver yelled.

Another rifle shot split the air, traveling at about twenty-eight-hundred feet per second. This close, the concussion of sound zipped through her veins. Like a plunger of adrenaline to the heart, hers kicked the beat from R & B to Dubstep. She headed for the control panel only a few feet from the door. “Prepare yourselves, children. I’m about to rock your world.”

“Yes!” Hunter and Oli both barked the word.

“Yes!” She fist-pumped the air. “Moving targets at a mile.”

Tyler rolled over and leapt from the ground, joining the other two in an advancing line of naysayers. They hovered a few feet away, having mastered their lesson in her personal space requirements.

Hunter spread his arms wide and hugged Tyler to his right shoulder and Oliver to his left. “Come on, LT. You can’t do that for qualifiers. How could you stand to lose one of your Uh-Oh Oreos?” His wrists rested on the other men’s shoulders and gestured wildly as they always did when he got excited. Which was all the time. “What’s an Uh-Oh Oreo without an end, or the middle? Then it’s just two white guys or a black guy and a white guy. None of those scenarios are as fun as an Uh-Oh Oreo.”

The other two backed his ridiculous speech with nods and at-a-boys.

“Do I have your attention, gentlemen?” Khani asked.

“Yes, ma’am,” Tyler said for the team. The guys snapped to attention, dropping their shenanigans for the moment.

“Good. In less than a minute Carmen Ruez will join us for her qualification test. I expect you to act like you work for the most well-trained covert operations organization in all the world as opposed to coked-out frat boys.”

“We’ll do you proud, LTC,” Tyler announced.

“You always do. That’s the only reason I put up with you wankers.” Khani turned to the panel. “And you are testing at a mile, but it’ll be a static target.” She caught a glimpse of movement in her periphery. Carmen sashayed toward the door. “Also, be nice.”

“Nice. You’re asking us to be nice to the woman you promised to skin alive and wear as a coat?” Oliver’s mouth gaped.

“The very one,” she nodded.

The door swung open. Carmen stepped into the range with sure strides and fancy sound protection buds in her ears. And not one freaking hair out of place.

“Everyone find a stall, set up, and impress me.” Stupid as it was, smug satisfaction curved the points of Khani’s mouth. She liked giving orders, but having Carmen fall-in at her command cherried her sundae in a way very few things did.

She typed in the distances on their chosen lanes and set the timer. When everyone laid flat on their hips with an Accuracy International tucked under their chin she started the clock. The blare of a horn announced the beginning of the test.

As expected, no frenzy of movement erupted. Each shooter moved smoothly through the prescribed three shots, placing the brass cartridge into the barrel, sliding the bolt home, calibrating their sights, steadying their breaths, and then shooting.

In a window of four seconds the first and last shooters to finish stood behind their weapons with their hands behind their back. The concrete structure tunneled so far under the DC city streets that without a scope or binoculars Khani hardly made out the paper targets hanging approximately twenty city blocks away. She switched on the cameras at the end of the second, fourth, sixth, and eighth lanes and studied each set of shots. A sense of pride she had no right to feel since she hadn’t trained these operatives, nor Carmen, to shoot, thumped her chest.

Her perverse brain flashed an altogether inappropriate image of the last operative she had trained to perfect a max of a one-inch spread on the mile shot—the clutch of her hands buried in King Street’s bulging pectorals, nails sinking into skin. Sweat sheened their bodies. The phantom sensation of his heavy cock breaching the barrier of her taut body had her pulsing around a memory. The thrill of her driving thrusts plunging him deep inside her body gathered every drop of desire she’d banished to the corners of her psyche and crashed through her defenses.

The fingers she held over the keys shook. A single drop of sweat coasted across her belly. Her breath came in shallow pants as though she’d run to check the target and back to give her report, a report four people stood at her back to receive.

Fucking hell.

She inhaled a long drag of oxygen and used some of the same techniques the shooters used to calm their heartbeats to check her own. “I told you to impress me. And…” Khani erected the mask she used so often to hide her thoughts it was second nature, and then turned to the group. “You did.”

Tyler bowed his head. Oliver and Hunter swayed their hips in an all too familiar victory dance. Carmen didn’t move a muscle.

“Twelve shots within a two-inch spread. Individually, you sank them within the one-inch spread qualifier. Well done. Carmen, you can leave the gun and go. I need to speak with my team. Gentlemen, collect your gear and meet me in the armory.”

The brunette bowed her head and turned for the door. Her guys hit the deck and tended to their rifles. Khani stepped through the door with Carmen, let it close behind her, pulled off her ear protection, and fixed her hair as best she could. “Tell Sophie I said hello, please, and call me if you need anything?”

Carmen turned with an easy smile. “Thank you. You saved Vail. For that, I owe you everything.”

The near black tips of Khani’s hair tickled her neck as she nodded her understanding. Carmen left and Khani worked on composing herself further before confronted with the equivalent of a team of bloodhounds when it came to sniffing out weakness. Or arousal.

When would enough time pass that she wouldn’t think about her stupid mistake and melt into a puddle of fuckable goo? Maybe never. Which was why she’d put an ocean between her and her biggest cock-up.

In a tidy line the men filed into the room with their rifles slung over their shoulders. Each took a side of the large counter in the center of the room. Khani flattened her palm on the cool black metal. Oliver stood to her left, Hunter across from her, and Tyler to her right.

“Ever heard the name Cara Ann Lee?” she asked.

All three shook their heads.

“She was a fresh CIA operative at the start of the Cold War. Beautiful. Cunning. Deadly. At twenty four, Cara almost single handedly brought down the iron curtain,” Khani explained.

“Wait a minute,” Hunter angled his head to the side and worked his jaw. “Did I read her name on a list of wanted ex-pats?”

“Probably. She’s on there. Wanted for selling US intelligence to the Russians. There have been whispers that she’s back in the States. I want you to find her. When you have, report back. Do not under any circumstances make contact. If she runs we’d have better luck digging for diamonds in my garden than finding her.”

“You keep a garden?” Oliver’s blue eyes plumped.

“Of course not. Across the pond a back yard is called a garden, but I don’t even have one of those. Does that make my point even clearer?” she challenged.

“Yes, ma’am,” Oli said.

“Is the goal apprehension?” Tyler asked.

“No. The goal is to have her join Base Branch command without bloodshed.” Khani stuffed her hands in her pockets and watched the fireworks erupt.
WTF
’s snapped and crackled in the air before finally drifting into silence. “I’ve been called crazy before, but I would never do anything to jeopardize this operation. Its security is more valuable than my life.”

Khani took a second to pin each of them with a quelling glare. “I have evidence that proves Cara was set up as a traitor and I have a good idea why. So, trust me and find her. Start with her daughter, Darinda Lee.”

“Sorry to question you, LT,” Hunter shook his head and gave a lopsided purse of his lips.

“Sorry, ma’am,” Tyler agreed.

“We’re assholes, LTC. Sorry,” Oliver tapped the table with his balled knuckles.

“Clean your metal and get out of my sight.” She turned toward the range.

“Want me to clean Carmen’s gun?” Tyler asked.

Lip smacks and kissy sounds came from the other two.

“Nope. I’m in the field. I have to qualify too,” she reminded.

A stampede of overgrown boys thundered behind her.

Oliver hurried past her and opened the door. “Hey, someone has to keep you honest.”

“Three someones?” She arched a brow.

“Yes, ma’am,” Tyler drawled. “Want a new target?” He headed for the control panel.

“No. This one will do.” Khani walked to the farthest stall and eased onto her belly. She collected the spent casings, set them to the side, and lined up three new bullets.

“No shit!” Tyler whooped. “Carmen Ruez got the tightest spread.”

“Damn.” Hunter’s word came from floor level. Khani tilted her head to the right. That big ass smile flashed at her from the far side of the small stall. Hunter rested his head on his fist. “Have to make sure you can work with distractions, LTC.”

“Get any closer and I’ll give you a distraction,” Khani whispered.

“Understood, ma’am.” Hunter smirked.

Khani blocked everything. The men. The irritation over Carmen. The arousal over a gaffe in her past. The worry for her brother. She snuggled the weapon, warming it with her body heat. The paper and its three close holes came into focus down the scope. She ticked the sight once. Twice. Her hips and the insides of her feet hugged the cold ground.

The buzzer blared.

She placed the cartridge into the barrel, slid the bolt home, checked her calibration, exhaled, and then fired. One. Repeated the sequence. Two. Repeated the sequence. Three shots.

“No fucking way!” Tyler enunciated each syllable.

“What!” Oliver dragged the word into a high-pitched whine of disbelief.

“What?” Hunter begged. “I can’t see shit.”

“Three shots. Three holes in the target,” Tyler explained.

Khani sucked in a breath. She still had it.

A
man
and woman with a brood spilled out the storefront of Sushi Capitol. Khani dodged an oncoming kid with a quick dip. Usually she called in her order, but with the flurry of activity before she left she hadn’t had time. Hopefully, Minoru—the owner and Itamae—would take pity on a nightly customer—a starving one at that—and squeeze in her to-go order. She waited for the family to clear out, and then stepped into the little foyer.

The man she sought stood behind the tall bar at the back corner of the shallow space. Patrons cluttered the counter on high stools like well-mannered gulls awaiting the fisherman’s catch of the day. Khani willed the quiet man to look her way, but his head stayed down. His hands moved efficiently over his workspace. His mouth held a concentrated line.

Every tiny table boasted coltish Hill staffers, save for the recently vacated four top, disgracing the honor of Minoru’s nigiri masterpieces by leaving two yellowtail hunks behind. Bowls of soy sauce tinted green with gobs of wasabi added to the insult. The two-seater window bar around the foyer hosted one man hulking enough to take up both spaces. He wore a light jacket with the collar kicked up. The gold and maroon of a Redskins hat obscured his face further. His concealment and sheer size pinged her radar. Not to mention he didn’t fit the customer mold, but then good sushi enticed all sorts.

Spring air wafted over her neck. Loath to have someone at her back that wasn’t a Base Branch operative, Khani turned her back to the glass partition and the out-of-place man. A lawyer-type in a dark suit and loosened tie tripped on the tip of his dress shoe and stumbled his way inside. The chap’s briefcase connected with her knee. Its impact created a nice
pop
in the narrow entryway.

Horror crinkled his face. “I’m such an idiot. I’m so sorry.” He swiped the sweat off his brow and straightened. “I blame it on too many cups of coffee and too many hours of depositions. Are you okay?”

The impact hardly registered. “It’s fine.”

“You’re not from around here, are you?” He didn’t wait for her to answer. “Why don’t you let me buy you dinner as an apology and you can tell me about what brought you to the States?”

This fella, though cute, didn’t have the clearance or time for that long and twisted story. “I think you’ll have trouble enough finding a spot on your own.”

“Naw,” he pointed over her shoulder. “The window bar is open.”

Khani snapped her head around. Three twenty-dollar bills stuck out from beneath a large nigiri tray and not one spec of food cluttered the thing. She didn’t consider the mound of wasabi to be food. She scanned the interior, but didn’t find the man who knew how to eat sushi.

“There was a big man at the bar. Did you see where he went?”

“Nope. I was distracted by my clumsiness and a pretty Brit. So, what do you say, join me?”

“Thank you for the offer, but I’m just here to pick up my order. You go ahead and snag the window before someone else gets it.” Behind him another staffer eyed the window seats, but waited outside the door for them to move.

“Fair enough. Sorry about your knee.” The bloke bowed his head, and then dipped around the corner to the only two walk-in seats in the place.

The group outside the door swelled from one to three. A lone waitress hustled from table to table. Her cheeks flushed as though she’d been at it for a while. Khani groaned, and then sucked in a lung full of the aroma that kept her coming back here too many nights in a row. Her stomach gurgled. A masochist at heart, she stepped around the jutted corner to the front window bar to get out of the way and inhaled again.

She choked on the distinct scent of citrus, wood, and man. The couple holding hands while simultaneously gnashing bits of sashimi at the table three feet from the tip of her boot swung their gazes on her. But the cologne and the memories it brought with it gridlocked her attention.

Her gaze cut left and right. She’d been drunk on that scent many times, but had only partaken of its host one delicious day. None of the stick figures in suits had the height and bulk of a rugby player. Not one of them had the gaze that cut her through to the soul. But it couldn’t be a coincidence that a chap of the same size and smell as Street haunted the restaurant she called dinner nearly every night of the week.

Oxygen knotted in her lungs. Her palms slicked. Every nerve in her body pulled her toward the back of the building, while her brain screamed for her to run out the front. One by one her sleek ankle boots treaded between the tables, past the crowded bar, and down the hallway.

Khani came face to face with an alarmed emergency only exit. The red handle screamed stop. She halted long enough to make certain the single water closet was empty, and then pushed through the door.

The alarm stayed silent. A thin metal strip covered the sensor on the frame.

No fucking way.

Down the narrow alley few lights illuminated business doorways. Night shrouded the corners. Ever cautious, Khani palmed her pistol and drew. She advanced on the first of two dumpsters. Her feet whispered across the asphalt. The closer she came to the corner the steadier her breathing became. This was what she did. Who she was.

She coiled, aimed, and then dipped into darkness.

An alley cat screeched loudly enough to rupture her eardrums. The thing shot down the backstreet as though she’d fired it out of her Wilson Combat. With her stealth blown to shit in a matter of seconds, she sprinted to the other dumpster, and then crouched behind it for cover.

Stillness enveloped the area. She held her position for several minutes. The longer she did the more doubt clouded her judgment. Perhaps her sanity had snapped and her psyche taunted her with the one thing she shouldn’t want and couldn’t have. She shook the notion away. A man King Street’s size and smell had been in her restaurant tonight and snuck out the back door.

In full-on stealth mode, she eased around the corner, and then lunged into the line of fire—if someone had been crouched there with a gun. But no. The corner didn’t even host a rat. She studied the alley one last time, feeling eyes on her though she couldn’t see them.

Khani holstered her weapon. She kicked the dumpster. The loud
gong
whittled off enough of her agitation she could dial a phone number without smashing the device into the ground.

Why would her former operative be in the States and why would he shadow her? She had no clue, but vowed to find the answers. She dialed Law’s cell and walked to the lit sidewalk while she waited the extra seconds it took to connect an international call.

“There are only a handful of people I’d be happy to hear from at this hour and I’m sleeping with one of them.” Law’s voice held none of the grogginess of one pulled from slumber, but years of round-the-clock training had honed the ability to function at a moment’s notice. “Good thing you’re on the short list.”

“Bloody hell! I know there’s a five-hour time difference between DC and London. I just forget that I’m not in London.”

“You can do that? I mean, I haven’t been there, but I hear Americans are quite unforgettable.”

“Ignoring the obvious is my coping mechanism for homesickness.”

“Come home. Then you won’t be sick. Or surrounded by traitors.”

As he did almost every time, he made reference to the former English colonials. Like he really cared. He just liked giving her a hard time. “Come on, wouldn’t you fight for what you believe in? Don’t you?”

“I’d stay and fight. Fighting with an ocean between your opponent is coward’s work.”

The comment smacked her across the face. Law hadn’t been talking about her, had he? Intended or not, it applied.

“You didn’t wake me to talk history. What’s up?” Law asked.

“Have you heard from Zeke?” It wasn’t the reason she’d called, but it should have been. She squeezed her nape and meandered with the flow of two old ladies back toward Sushi Capitol.

“Nope.”

“He was supposed to be back two days ago and I haven’t heard from him.”

“Back from where?”

“Alaska.”

“I though you two were taking that trip a couple of months ago. March wasn’t it?”

“We were, but the thing with V happened.”

“Oh yeah.”

“Z was supposed to go without me, but he got called away for work and rescheduled. I thought it was going to iron out that we could go together, but then Rhonda got shot and we were put under the microscope. He left last week.”

“How long was the trip?”

“A week.”

“Hey, at least he won’t freeze off his knob,” Law chuckled.

“Frozen knobs?” Magdalena croaked. “Now that’s bad news.”

Law laughed harder. “Go back to sleep, love. All knobs are firmly intact.”

“Oh, good,” Mags said.

“Can we stop talking about knobs? I’ve been around them all day.”

“You hussy.”

“I wish. I’m not worried about Zeke freezing. I’m worried he might have been dinner for a grizzly fresh out of the den.”

“I’d put my money on Zeke and light a barbecue for the bear. Khani, you know how he is. He’ll turn up when he’s good and ready.”

Sure she knew Zeke vanished from time to time, but he always let her know—whether in an email or singing telegram—before he disappeared.

“Maybe he found peace in the great wilderness.”

“Right. I find zen in make-up and shoes. Zeke finds it in big pints and even bigger women. We’re city dwellers, Pierce. All of us.”

“Then why the vacation to the last frontier?”

“Isn’t the last frontier space?”

“That’s the final frontier, if you’re a Trekkie.”

“Oh. Well, I missed him. I moved half the world away to be able to see him more than once a year, but it hasn’t really worked out that way. I figured this trip would bond us or something.”

“And then you didn’t go. Maybe he’s punishing you.”

“It’s possible. That’s the only reason I haven't launched an all-out manhunt. Speaking of man-hunts, or women-hunts, have you heard anything about Cara Lee?”

“Last I heard she was causing a ruckus in your neck of the woods.”

“If you hear anything concrete, let me know. How’s work? Is the rookie holding his own?”

“Finally we get to it,” Law sighed.

“Get to what?” she hedged.

“The real reason you called.”

“Oh, stuff it, would you?” The old-blue-hairs shuffled along probably as fast as their brittle legs could carry them, but the stagnant pace only added to her annoyance. She banked left. A row of parking meters cut her off. The bastards.

“Not a chance,” Law laughed. “And you can’t call him a rookie anymore. The kid has more chops than most lifers. I really don’t think he came to us straight out of college. He’s too seasoned for that shit. You were commander before you left. Did his file say anything about prior training and for whom?”

“You’re the commander now,” she reminded.

“I
was
the interim commander. You know I didn’t want the job. I hate paperwork. There was so damn much of it I hardly had time to eat, sleep, and bang my wife. Forget about snooping in files.”

“Who’s your replacement? When?”

“He wants to tell you himself. So, I can’t say, but you’ll approve. And it’s been in the works for a month now, but you were dealing with some shit and he was getting jumped in, so to speak. Now back to Street’s file.”

“His file was sealed.”

“No fuck?”

That tidbit—the reminder of it—revved Khani’s over-stimulated brain. In her two years as commander of the London Branch office and one as lieutenant commander in DC she’d never come across another closed personnel file. When she’d called the UN director for her region asking questions about Street’s background she’d met with a greased wall. Every attempt to maneuver around it or over it failed and she hadn’t had enough time to devote herself to something so inconsequential. The UN had reasons for everything it did and it was all for the furthering of peace.

“No fuck,” she finally sighed.

The white-haired ladies separated to pass an immovable object planted in the center of the sidewalk. King Street’s hazy green gaze centered on hers, punctuating the futility of her fighting the attraction that had sparked the moment she first laid eyes on him. Her feet sank into the concrete as though it were quicksand.

“I’ve gotta go,” she said into the phone.

“Good luck with it all. And hey, we always have a room or six, if you want to come visit.”

Khani ended the call and shoved the phone into her pocket before her shaking hands dropped it. What the hell? In countless missions, dodging bullets and blades, covered in blood, hers and others, her hands never shook, no matter how steep the adrenaline drop afterward. She fisted them and crossed her arms over her thrashing heart.

Her lips suddenly seemed as dry as the cracked edge of the walkway. No way could she speak. Not that she knew what to say anyway. She dragged them into her mouth and whittled her gaze.

The jacket and hat no longer hid his features. What a shame for her heart health. He stood, relaxed, on his heels, as though he hadn’t just parked a tank in front of an oncoming train. One hand pressed leisurely into his back pocket. The other hung at his side. Veins swollen, probably from his quick escape, contoured a forearm as wide as her thigh. An extra-large white T-shirt—she knew from experience—molded to every bulge and curve of his traps, pecs, and round shoulders.

His casual air, the one with which he interrupted her hard-fought center irritated her out of the momentary stupor. She tightened her fist in preparation to jab him on the square jaw or knock him upside his fat head. “Why are you here?”

The nostrils of his broken-many-times nose flared.

Khani salivated like a fucking dog in heat. She refused to swallow, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of knowing the effect he had on her.

“To buy you dinner,” the Englishmen—who sounded more Irish than Brit—said.

His voice ratcheted her insanity to a whole new level. She hadn’t heard it in months and it had been one of the things she found most appealing. His voice gave sound to his thoughts, which were often insightful. It was as if he’d lived four lives already and took the knowledge gained with him to the next. It had surprised the shit out of her at a time when not much stunned her.