Kiss the Enemy (Slye Temp) (26 page)

Nitro came up to Logan, who expected his man to lift his chin in acknowledgement on the way to take his shift, not for Nitro to say, “Cuz, your sleeping bag’s gone.”

Logan didn’t have the energy to get pissed. “She
took
my bag.”

“Looks like.”

“Screw it. I’ll sleep in the shack.”  Logan and his men slept outside where they could better hear an approach.

Angel strolled up to them with an M4 carbine cradled in his arm. “Everything set?”

Logan kept his voice low. “I just double checked the perimeter. You both know what to do if we get an intruder tonight.”

“Oh, yes,” Nitro assured him. Built with compact muscle, his easygoing smile had caused more than one enemy to underestimate him. Nitro had gone to school in Boston and college in the UK when his parents divorced. He was former SBS, or Special Boat Service, an arm of the UK Special Forces and considered the UK equivalent of the US Navy SEALs.

“Ten four, Cuz.”  Angel wore a skull cap over his ears and had three days of beard growth. His eyes took on a hard glint that too many missed because of the black, curly lashes.

You only crossed him once.

Logan dismissed them and walked on to the infirmary shack. Moose was already snoring in his bag. The last time Logan had checked on Party Man, his resident Mr. Fix It was neck deep in the truck’s engine compartment. Ty had crashed on the front seat.

A replacement lantern lit the room when Logan stepped into the building. He peeled down to his boxers, turned off the lantern and landed face down on the bed.

That smelled like Margaux. Son-of-a-bitch.

Just that one whiff and his cock stirred.

But not enough to deny him the sleep his body was demanding. He just needed a couple of hours to ...

Margaux danced through the dark mist, smiling and laughing. He was back in Paris with her spread across the soft white sheets of the bed they’d spent hours frolicking in. The setting sun cast a glow over her nude body.

She called to him to bring her some wine.

Everything replayed perfectly. He strolled over to open another bottle of wine, his mind tinkering with the idea of keeping her.

She tossed a pair of silk underwear and hit him in the head, laughing. “You’re too fucking slow.”

“You liked that a little while ago.”

More of her throaty laugh.   

He chuckled and poured her a glass of something special she’d brought home from work, but when he turned to take the wine to her, Margaux wasn’t smiling. Or breathing. Her eyes stared unseeing. Blood poured from the slit across her throat.

He roared, “No!”

Someone touched his arm.

He whipped around and launched himself at the dark shadow, both of them crashing to the floor.

“Stop, you fucking idiot.”

Logan blinked awake. He knew that F bomb. Ten strong fingers clutched at his wrist, pushing his arm toward him as hard as he was forcing his hand to stay where it was.

“Logan, don’t.” 

It wasn’t the order, but the hitch in Margaux’s voice that brought him to full consciousness. He had her pinned to the floor with a knife at her throat. Shit.

He stopped pressing the knife toward her throat, but he didn’t relax a muscle, not when his plan had worked so well to catch her. “You should have kept running, Margaux.”

CHAPTER 32

Sabrina looked up to see the only other agent still in the Slye Temp office besides her at 2:15 in the morning.

White Hawk had an HK 416 slung over her shoulder and was picking up a file she’d been handed in an earlier briefing.

“Heading home?” Sabrina asked.

“Soon.”

The twenty-two-year-old woman had come to her via a friend on the White House Council for Native American Affairs. He’d told Sabrina that White Hawk was an unusual case, but a natural the CIA or FBI would snag if they had a chance.

Sabrina had interviewed her.

White Hawk had some fair requirements. She did not want to leave the continental US and she had to have the freedom to go home if someone needed her.

She’d gained her skills through a family member who was part Cherokee and part Caucasian, and who’d been a Ranger in the US Army. But she had serious trust issues. She’d work with a team, but would not partner with one man or woman.

Sabrina liked to give her encouragement when she could. “I may need you if we go wheels up on short notice.”

“I don’t need much notice.”  White Hawk carried the file she had with her into Sabrina’s office. She wore her dark brown hair in a a chic cut and no makeup. You didn’t need it when the genetics gods smacked you with a beauty wand.

“But you need rest.”  Sabrina sat back in her office chair and her muscles squawked at having been bent over her computer for so long. “Exhaustion is part of our business, but that means we have to take advantage of downtime when we can. You aren’t doing that.”

“I will perform as required.”

“I don’t doubt that for a moment, but I also won’t use anyone on a mission who isn’t taking care of herself. Are you having problems sleeping?” 

“No.”

She didn’t even hesitate with that lie.

Sabrina remembered being twenty-two and so full of herself that she knew better than anyone else. But her agents were adults and she wasn’t their keeper. She would pull someone not ready for action, but she couldn’t tell a woman who was the epitome of robust health that she wasn’t ready.

Instead, Sabrina asked, “Why that HK? Thought you were working on your handgun skills?”  Because White Hawk was one hell of a shot with a rifle.

White Hawk’s eyes twinkled. Her voice was as soft as her movements. “I haven’t shot this one yet and I read that this is what they used when they inserted to get Osama. I want to know it better.”

“Take plenty of ammo.”

“I did.”  White Hawk had made it to the doorway when she turned back.

“Yes?”

“I have personal limitations, but they will never interfere with my job.”

“I understand.”  Sabrina sensed that White Hawk might have doubts about her standing on the team. “You’re a strong addition to my team, White Hawk. You have exceptional skills, especially when it comes to tailing someone alone.”

“But we still lost Margaux.”

“We’ll find her. When we do, I’ll need you again.”

“I’m ready.”  She stood a little taller with that one compliment and walked out.

Sabrina yawned and closed her computer, ready to call it a day since it was almost twenty-four hours since she’d walked in. She should take her own advice.

Her cell phone buzzed with an unknown number. Phone calls didn’t make her heart jump, but Gage’s calls were from unknown numbers. It buzzed again. He was making it tough for her to hang on to her anger, but she didn’t forget when someone betrayed her and he was standing in the way of getting answers.

She picked up the phone. “Yes?”

“Hello, beautiful.”

Her heart flipped at those two words. That used to be the first words Gage would say as soon as he called to tell her he was on his way home after a long mission.

Every time either one of them came home it had been as though they both celebrated being alive. They’d meet somewhere and make the most of every minute.

Until the UK job.

Gage kept chipping away, sure that he’d find a toehold and convince her to let him back in.

But all he had to do was tell her who in the agency had known about the UK op. She wouldn’t climb over the baggage piled between them to make this work.

He had to do his part to clear it out of the way first.

His sigh rumbled. “We have reason to believe the Russian from the Trophy Room is still alive and back in the states.”

She debated on admitting what she knew. She might have called Gage after Nick heard from Margaux if Sabrina could trust Gage not to tell the agency. But he’d made his loyalty clear. “If the Russian is alive that means Margaux—”

“—might or might not be alive,” he finished.

She’d let him think that. “What can you tell me about the Russian?”

Gage growled something under his breath. “I’m already telling you more than I should.”

“And not as much as I deserve,” she countered, sure that he’d get her meaning about the blown op.

“Do we have to do that tonight, Sabrina?”

“No.”

The silence became a living thing, stretching and morphing into a challenge to see who would fold first. Gage finally said, “You can’t go running your own op on this one.”

“How do you know one of the agencies hasn’t contacted me to run one?”

“I know.”

She ignored that. “Are you
involved
in this stateside?”

“No. Even if I could do it without ruffling feathers, I’m tied up on the other side of the pond. I just don’t want you going in dark and no one knowing it’s you. Anything connected to the Banker ends bloody. We’ve never been able to find anyone alive who has contracted for him and I’m starting to wonder if he does repeat business with any merc.”

“I’ll govern myself accordingly.”

“Not going to let this go, are you?”

She smiled at the capitulation in his voice. “No.”

“I better be gaining major points for this.”

“You are. I just can’t guarantee how you’ll get to cash them in,” she joked, enjoying this little moment.

“The Russian surfaces from time to time then disappears. We thought he was dead then he surfaced again eleven months ago and started taking heavy contracts with different factions. He was putting a resume out for the Banker. If you get between him and his goal, Dragan Stoli will mow you down.”

“If he gets between me and one of my people, I’ll mow him down.”

“Just be careful. Okay?”

She gave the empty room a give-me-a-break look. “I have a better team now than I did back when you called me your ace-in-the-hole.”

“You were more than that and you know it.”

She’d thought so at one time. How did he expect her to hang up and sleep alone tonight when he said things like that? He didn’t. He wanted her to miss him as much as he missed her.

She had for so long she didn’t want to think about it. And neither did she want to argue any more tonight so she didn’t remind him yet again that he could fix this. “Thanks for the intel. I’m sure my team can handle anything I take on.”

“There’s never been a question of that, but whoever burned you in the UK is still around. If I knew who it was, I swear I’d bring you his head. Until that happens, stay safe for me.”

Those last four words clutched her heart and squeezed.

The click ending his call echoed in her head with finality.

Was she making a mistake by keeping them apart? Punishing both of them when she no longer believed he had any part in burning her team?

She didn’t know, but once this mess with Margaux was cleaned up, Sabrina had to make a decision to either put their differences aside and be with Gage or end all personal contact until she had answers on the UK.

CHAPTER 33

This might not have been her best plan.

That happened when you only had one play.

Margaux could just make out Logan’s face by the wisp of light coming off a tiny candle across the room, but that was plenty. Enough to see that he was not going to be easy to convert into a Margaux fan. “Let me up and I’ll explain.”

“Really? You think you’re just going to stroll back into camp after popping Moose with a Taser, dismantling my truck and stealing an ATV, give me some bullshit and that’s all it takes?”

“I
am
sorry about Moose, but you left me the hardest one to take down.”  Marguax lost her thought when Logan’s hardon nudged her between her legs. Not to be left out, her breasts perked in response, wanting to rub against the heat coming off his chest.

What had she been saying? Moose. “I tried not to hurt him.”

“Where’d you go?”  Nothing soft in that tone. His body might be happy to see her, but having her beneath him didn’t seem to bother him at all.

“Margaux.”

“What was the question?”  She knew, but his superior attitude was getting on her nerves. She hadn’t had the best day.

“Where. Did. You. Go?”

“For. A. Joy. Ride. Played Goldilocks. Found a house, got a real shower. Ate a meal I nuked and put on some clothes that fit me better.”

“Who’d you talk to?”

“No one. It was a vacation home. I had to break a window to get in.”  She stopped short of telling him she intended to pay for that when she got out of this mess.

Hardass mercs did not leave apology notes.

How could Logan act unaffected by his reaction to her? She could feel his dick getting thicker.

Heat pooled between her legs. She had to be crazy to want a man who looked ready to string her up by her thumbs. But Logan wouldn’t hurt her. She knew that all the way to her bones. And the minute she’d driven away today she’d felt a hollow place open up in her chest at leaving him.

She’d missed him.

No matter how many times she tried to tell her body that he was the wrong man to trigger her hormones, it changed nothing about the way she felt when he was close.

Too close.

Logan wasn’t moving. He had her sandwiched between the hard wood floor and over two hundred pounds of cut muscle. Not a give anywhere she looked, definitely not in his face. This whole intimidation routine was wasted on her.

“Come on, Logan. If I wanted to hurt you, I could have.”

“No, you couldn’t have.”

Her ego had taken enough hits lately. “Think not? I disarmed Hulk Jr, took your truck out of action, found my way out, then made my way back and hiked around until I could sneak in here without anyone knowing. Not bad for Jane.”

“My men knew you were here.”

“Prove it.”

Logan lifted up and spoke in a normal voice. “Angel?”

The door flew open and an automatic weapon was pointed at Margaux’s head. The flirty Angel was nowhere to be seen. If Logan said the word, he’d unload his magazine.

Logan really had been expecting her and opened his security so that she’d just walk right in.