Forged in Smoke (A Red-Hot SEALs Novel Book 3) (8 page)

For several long moments the three clung together and that hot, acidic rush in Mac’s chest climbed his throat. Scowling, he yanked his obsessed gaze from the tender tableau on the ground and scanned the access road again. The dust storm the Expedition had launched was settling. Judging from the lack of new clouds, Amy’s brother hadn’t been followed.

An uneasy feeling wormed through him. Those bastards after them should be making their move—he twisted to scan the hillside behind him, but there was no sign of party crashers.

The driver’s door swung open as the cluster on the ground separated. Amy rose to her feet and shifted, watching her stepbrother approach. Mac settled the scope on her face, or at least what he could see of it, which was mostly her profile. From this angle she looked more neutral than welcoming.

Frowning, Mac studied the fed. Although they were stepsiblings, surprisingly they looked enough alike to be twins. What were the odds of that? The pocket-sized Venus look suited Amy—but her brother? Not so much. His lack of height combined with his slender frame imbued him with an air of ineffectuality.

Great.

Mac lowered the rifle and scowled. In his vast experience of dealing with assholes, size did matter. Far too often guys built like Amy’s stepbrother tried to prove their masculinity in the most inconvenient way possible.

“Thanks for meeting me here,” Amy said, her voice as flat as her face.

“Momma!” Her youngest kid grabbed a handful of Amy’s polo shirt and tugged. “What do you have on your head?” His gaze skated over Amy’s headset before settling on her face. He lowered his voice, but not by much. “Uncle Clay said the really bad words all the way here.”

Apparently the aforementioned bad words were much more interesting than Amy’s headset and mic. Mac grinned. What, exactly, did Amy consider to be “the really bad words”? Probably everything in Mac’s vocabulary. It wouldn’t hurt to watch his language around her and her boys. When he realized the direction his thoughts had taken, he froze in shock. When the hell had she become important enough to him to justify modifying his behavior? He was so busy backpedaling in his own mind, he missed her stepbrother’s initial reply.

“
. . .
I could have done without the theatrics,” Clay continued in the thin nasal tone associated with pretentiousness.

Mac grimaced and shook his head. It was hard to believe these two had been raised in the same household, under the same set of parents. Amy’s voice was matter-of-fact, with a side of cool. Her brother sounded like he’d taken acting lessons to get the diction and delivery just right. Where Mac came from, that was called putting on airs
. . .
or being an ass
. . .
or both.

“Momma,” the youngster said, tugging determinedly on his mother’s shirt. “A deer jumped in front of us and Uncle Clay said—”

“Give me some credit.” Clay raised his voice, drowning out the childish chatter. “I’ve been on the job for twenty years. I know what a damn tail looks like.” Clay shook his head, disgust sharp on his face. “You’re acting paranoid as hell, you know that, right? Nobody is after you or your kids.”

While he spoke, the fed turned his head and locked on to Cosky. Mac groaned beneath his breath. Amy had been right about one thing—the asshole was about to become aggravating.

“Momma,” the little guy said, still yanking on Amy’s shirt.

“Not now, Benji. Let me talk to your uncle.”

But the bastard had already turned his shoulder on her in favor of confronting Cos.

“You’re Lieutenant Simcosky, aren’t you? We’ve got some questions for you. If you’ll accompany me back to Seattle, I can offer you immunity and free you from this mess.”

“Considering the lack of progress the bureau has made on our case, I’ll pass on your
generous
offer,” Cosky said, his voice drier than the dust surrounding them. “I stand a better chance of straightening out this
mess
without your help.”

“But
Momma
—” Benji’s voice lifted determinedly.

The fed scowled. “That wasn’t a request. You will—”

“Don’t push this,” Amy broke in, her gaze locked on her stepbrother. She caught her son’s impatient hand and anchored it against her side. “Cosky’s here as a favor to me.”

Her sigh echoed through Mac’s headset as her son resumed tugging on her shirt with his free hand.

Clay’s head swung in her direction. “What the hell? Tell me you aren’t bunkered down with these clowns. There are warrants out on all of them.”

Mac snorted. While he didn’t doubt there were warrants out on him, Zane, and Rawls, the feds had nothing on Cos. The bastard was lying through his teeth.

“Considering the evidence against them is manufactured, you’d do well to separate yourself from this
mess.
” Amy’s voice skated between cool and dogmatic. “When the truth comes out—and it
will
—someone will have to answer for the bureau’s incompetence. I’d hate for that someone to be you.”

“Let me guess, they told you they were innocent, they weren’t at the lab, and they weren’t the ones who killed those security guards.” Contempt filtered through each word.

“No. That’s not what I’m going to tell you.” Amy’s voice flattened.

Mac broke into an appreciative grin as he peered down the rutted lane leading into the bowl. He was all too familiar with that cool, flat, I’ve-had-enough-of-you tone of voice. It was a novelty to have it directed at someone else for a change.

But the humor soon faded, and that itchy sense of warning prickled again. He scanned the hill behind him. Nothing. And from Zane and Jude’s silence, they weren’t picking up on anything either.

What the fuck? Where are the bastards?

He was rarely wrong in his predictions. And this had been a no-brainer. He scowled, that earlier unease back in full force. Maybe their adversaries had decided to tag the kids instead of crashing the rendezvous. If they had tagged the boys, they could track them back to camp and take out everyone at once. If that was the case, they were in for a hell of a disappointment.

“Momma, I’m telling you something.” Indignation swam in the youngster’s voice.

Another sigh hit his headset, and Amy settled her hand on the boy’s tousled, dark head.

“Let’s move this along,” Mac said quietly into his mic. He grunted softly in satisfaction as Amy turned away from her brother, backtracking to the plastic bags sitting on the ground.

“Mooooomma—”

“You can tell me everything in a minute, Benji. But first, I have a present for you.” She picked up one of the plastic bags, peered inside, and handed it to her eager son. “There’s a complete change of clothing in the bag—everything from shirt to shoes. Take off everything you’re wearing—that includes your underwear—and put the new clothes on.” She handed the second bag to the older boy and glanced toward the SUV. “You can change in Clay’s car.”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake.” Clay’s voice was loud enough for Mac to hear it even though he stood a good ten feet from Amy and her mic. “You think someone bugged them? Who would have gotten close enough to do that? Me? Dad? Your mom?”

Amy’s hand latched on to her youngest son’s shoulder, who was standing with his head bent as he peered into the plastic bag. She steered him toward the SUV. The older child headed over under his own steam.

“I’m not taking chances,” she said without looking back. “I was there, at the lab. I know what happened. The identification of the men who attacked us as unarmed security guards is a complete and utter fabrication. The men in question were well-trained mercenaries armed with AK-47s. They fired on us first. Which means that the entire investigation into the incident is corrupt.”

Dead silence followed that announcement. Mac studied the fed’s face through the scope and frowned. Her brother didn’t look surprised.

“You were there?” Clay repeated, staring at his sister’s back. “You weren’t on the tape.”

Something about the bastard’s expression sent a chill down Mac’s spine—there was a predatory cast to his brow and chin. Plus, he was lying. Mac was certain of it. He knew Amy had been there, so why the fuck was he playing dumb?

“No, I wasn’t on the tape. And Mackenzie and his team did not fire first
or
on unarmed civilians. Which means the footage was doctored and the SEALs are being set up.” Amy opened the back door to the Expedition and lifted her son inside. “There’s something screwy going on.” She stopped talking for a moment, and her shoulders rounded. She stared into the SUV. “John”—her voice stumbled over her murdered husband’s name—“told Mackenzie that the men who kidnapped me and the boys had demanded seven of the first-class passengers in trade if John wanted to see us alive again.”

“I’m
. . .
Mackenzie’s
. . .
no evidence
. . .
support . . .” Clay’s reply was indistinct.

“That’s where you’re wrong.” Amy turned to stare at her brother, which gave Mac a perfect view of her determined face. “Seven of the scientists from the company whose lab exploded were booked into first class on that very flight. And just a few months after the aborted hijacking, their lab is incinerated and armed mercenaries show up on their doorstep? There’s your evidence.”

Clay followed her to the SUV, well within mic range again. “A coincidence, admittedly, but there’s no proof indicating the film footage was doctored or that the men killed were more than security guards.”

“I was there,” Amy reminded him very quietly. “I know exactly what happened.”

“Forgive me, Ames. But you’re not exactly a credible witness these days. The men you’re defending rescued you from hell. This paranoia you’re exhibiting? It’s a classic sign of PTSD brought on by your kidnapping and rape.”

A haunted expression touched Amy’s shadowed face.

Motherfucker.

Mac rubbed his chest, trying to ease the sudden, vicious ache digging into his heart. The ache burned as anger stirred.
The bastard
. There had been no reason besides spite to remind her of what she’d endured during her captivity. He resumed his grip on the rifle and focused on Amy, fighting the urge to swing the rifle in the fed’s direction and let his finger tighten around the trigger. Not that he wanted to kill the bastard, maybe just hurt him a little
. . .

Suddenly the shadow vanished from her face and her chin took on that familiar stubborn tilt. “And this attitude of yours is exactly why Mackenzie and his team are better off pursuing this case on their own. It’s clear you have a traitor in your office, yet you’re too shortsighted and tied to bureaucracy to admit it.”

An explosion of rage touched her stepbrother’s face, but it vanished almost immediately.

“Oh cool. So cool!” A childish voice broke the sudden tense silence. “These are the flashy shoes. The ones I wanted for my birthday, but you said they were too expensive.” The youngster flew out of the backseat of the SUV wearing nothing but his underwear and his new tennis shoes. And sure enough, his shoes were flashing the entire color palette of the rainbow one hue at a time.

Christ. Why the hell would Amy buy something that lit up the entire countryside and gave their pursuers a glowing beacon to follow if they had to make a run for it?

“They come with an off button.”

Her voice came clear and wryly through his mic. Either she’d read his mind, or he’d asked the question out loud without realizing it. He wasn’t sure which possibility was more disconcerting.

“Benji, back in the car. Let’s get the rest of your clothes on.” Turning her back on her brother, she climbed into the SUV after her son.

As a constant stream of childish chatter filled his headset—Christ, that kid could talk up a storm—Mac turned the scope on the fed. The asshole was approaching Cosky, determination in every taut stride. Like he was going to get any answers from that quarter.

Jackass.

With one final sweep down the empty entrance road and the scrubby terrain surrounding him, Mac keyed his mic.

“Time to bug out,” he said quietly, knowing the chopper pilot was monitoring their frequency.

“Copy,” the vaguely familiar voice of Wolf’s pilot said. “ETA five minutes.”

The timing should be perfect. From the constant stream of babble flooding his headset, Benji was more interested in talking than dressing. But by the time the bird had warmed up and took to the air, Amy should have him bundled into his new clothes.

“You have five minutes to get that kid dressed,” Mac said.

The pilot’s ETA would have traveled down her headset as well, but with the kid talking a mile a minute, it was pure guesswork whether she’d heard it.

“Copy.”

“Copy what?” the youngster asked as the thump-thump-thump of the rotor sounded in the distance.

Amy’s stepbrother cocked his head, obviously listening. “A helicopter?” he asked Cosky. “How the hell did you manage that?”

Cosky ignored the question, and the fed stepped closer, his face hardening.

Yep. Mac grimaced. He’d called that one right, the asshole was about to become annoying.

“I’m not fucking with you, Simcosky. You and your buddies need to turn yourselves in. You aren’t doing my sister any favors by dragging her into this mess alongside you.” He reached for Cosky’s arm, but lowered his hand before making contact. “We’re looking into your commander’s claims—”

Mac snorted beneath his breath.
Sure you are.

Cosky stared back, his face as hard as concrete. “The FBI has had months to investigate the attempted hijacking of flight 2077 and the events it spawned. Instead, you appear more interested in pinning everything on us. We’ll clear our names on our own.”

“Then you leave me no choice,” Clay said, reaching beneath his jacket for the weapon holstered at his side.

Instantly the sharp crack of a rifle sounded. A small circle of dust puffed up from the ground several feet in front of the asshole. The report echoed across the hillside and—surprise, surprise—the shot hadn’t come from him, or from Zane’s direction. Instead it had come from the ridge Jude was covering. Maybe the big Arapaho warrior wasn’t quite so unprepared after all.