Rogue Alliance (26 page)

             
Hal stood with perfectly straight posture and looked uncomfortable.

             
“Hey, Hal. Is everything okay?”

             
“Can I come in?”

             
She didn’t miss the fact that he hadn’t answered the question. Stepping back she let him in.

             
“Sure. Be my guest.”

             
She shut the door and flicked on the hall light.

             
“Sorry
,
I’m not myself right now,” she said,
“
I must have fallen asleep. Can I get you something; water, soda, tequila?”

             
“No thanks,” Hal said, holding back,
“
I can’t stay long. The wife and I are supposed to have dinner with her parents.”

             
Shyla sensed his agitation. Leaning a shoulder against the wall she crossed a foot over the other.

             
“All right then. What’s up? I can tell something’s eatin’ at you so spit it out.”

             
“
Eli Straton and I had a conversation this afternoon.”

             
“Yeah, and?”

             
“You’re off the case, Shyla.”

             
She’d known it was comin
g. Embarrassment at her failure and
anger at their authority made her
feel queasy, but she squashed the emotions
down and tried her best to remain detached and professional.

             
“This is crap, Hal. And you know it.”

             
He shook his head solemnly.

             
“No, Shyla, I think this is absolutely the right decision. Everything is too tentative right now.
Your safety is the priority.
You need to break it off with Victor before tomorrow night. Eli doesn’t want you anywhere near him.
”

             
“So that’s it?”

             
“For now, it is. Eli wants a conference call with the team next Monday. We’ll regroup and decide what the next step is.”

             
“Fine,”s
he sighed in resignation.

             
Hal narrowed his gaze.

             
“
Fine?”

             
“Yeah, fine. What
else do you want me to say? I told you earlier today that I think the case is still solid, that I have had contact with Victor. I don’t think there’s anything I can say that will make you guys believe that I have this under control. So what’s the point?”

             
Hal nodde
d and looked uncomfortable
.

             
“Okay, well…why don’t you take t
he next few days and rest a bit? You’ll feel better by Monday.”

             
“Yeah, okay. Maybe you’re right. I could use some down time. Now you
’d
better head out and get to your engagement.”

             
He turned and opened the door. Hesitating, he g
lanced back.

             
“You going to be okay?”
he asked.

             
“Psh, who me? Yeah, I’ll be just fine. Thanks, Hal.”

             
He gave a weak smile.

             
“I’ll see you Monday. Goodnight, Shyla.”
He shut the door behind him.

             
Her earlier dream was still fresh in her mind; the anticipation of great things to come followed by disappointment and frustration. She touched her earlobes and though
t of her mother’s declaration: ‘
you will make the world a better place
’.

             
Damn right she would.
So what if Eli had forbidden it?
Rules were meant to be broken
,
weren’t they
?

TWENTY-SEVEN

             
Restless didn’t even begin to describe the way Shyla was feeling as she sat in her car at the top of the knoll
,
a football field away from Victor’s house. The moon was nearly full
and seemed to be staring in through the windshield
,
mocking her.

             
All day, as she fought off her hangover, she simultaneousl
y battled against
the sensation that she was dangerously on the edge of loosing it. Her skin was sensitive. It felt like tiny ants were crawling over her. She felt jittery
and had a hard time sitting still. She knew it was just nerves but the knowing didn’t help ease the pain.

             
When she couldn’t take it anymore, she followed instinct and hopped
into the car, bound for Victor’s. As she neared his drive, she had cut the lights and drift
ed past the gate and up the incline
, parking well off the road at the top of the small hill where she would have good vision of his house in the small valley.

             
Off the case? How could they do that to her? Didn’t they know that they were throwing away the opportunity of a lifetime? She had already made so much progress with Victor, how could they
toss all that aside just because they were paranoid?

             
She figured it had
been at least an hour as she sat crunching on one Dorito after another, licking her fingers nervously as she staked the house. There hadn’t been much movement, until she saw someone
stomp out the
front door of the main house,
cross the drive under the one streetlight which lit up that area of the property and up to Brennan’s apartment. Even at that distance she recognized Victor’s aggressive demeanor.

             
He had only been in the loft above the shop for maybe five mi
nutes before he marched
out to his car. She held her breath as
she watched him pull out of the
lane and drive
in
the opposite direction
,
toward
s
town. Should she follow him? Should she sneak into his house and start digging. Should she just go home and call it night?
She wasn’t in her right mind. She needed sleep.

             
Before she could make a decision, she caught movement on the far side of the house in the back field. Imagining a deer coming down to
the creek that
ran through Victor’s
land, she narrowed her gaze and wished she had binoculars. A premonitory shiver ran up her spine. That was no deer. There was a man running a full sprint across the field. When he came to the fence he hopped it in one fluid motion and
hit the ground running.

             
Her back was straight as she leaned forward and watched the intruder bypass the main house and swoop behind the shop.
Whoever he was, he was on a mission and looked to be in a hurry.

             
She doubted
it was a coincidence that he had waited until Victor had left. Common sense told her that he had been wa
tching the house, too
. She calculated where he must have emerged from the woods and guessed that her spot would have been out of his sights.

             
A million scenarios ran through her mind as she contemplated who in the hell was going to try to kill Brennan, but
none of it mattered. Thankful that she had grabbed her gun before she left the apartment, she snagged it, bolted out of the Range Rover,
and
hopped the perimeter fence and ran as fast as she could.

             
The ground was uneven and had a lot of holes. She nearly fell on her face when her ankle twisted but she caught her balance and kept running despite the pain.
When she reached the main house, she plastered her body against its frame and peeked around the corner. All was still. There was only one lonely light on above the shop. Wherever the intruder was, he hadn’t made his presence known yet. She imagined him
hiding out in the back until Brennan went to bed. Or maybe he was scaling the backside of the building for an alternate entrance point.

             
With that thought, she realized she might not have much time to warn Brennan. Taking her chances
,
she dashe
d across the drive light on her feet
. Without wasting a moment, she took the wood
en
stairs two at time and didn’t bother to knock.

             
Brennan was stepping out of his bathroom with only a towel wrapped around his waist. She held up a finger to her pursed lips as she quietly shut the door behind her.

She watched the myriad of emotions pass over Brennan’s face as he
processed the situation
. Shock,
then
confusion, then something close to understanding settled on his face as he looked at her with her revolver in hand. His jaw clenched.

             
Sh
e nodded her head and whispered.

             
“There is someone outside. I came to see Victor and saw the man jet across the field. He went behind the shop. I don’t know where he’s at now.”

             
Brennan turned, walked
to the bed and grabbed his jeans. He let the towel drop revealing his firm, bare ass then jerked one leg at a time into the denim.

             
As he turned around she heard the faint sound of metal scraping against metal. It was brief but it was unnatural. Brennan had apparently heard it too. He stood stock still, his head tilted to the side and seemed ready to attack. He crooked a finger and beckoned her toward him.

             
She nodded and reached for the light switch
. With a flick of the wrist the room was cloaked in shadows. Only the light of the moon shone in. Knees bent, and her gun held to her chest, she made her way toward Brennan.

             
They stood very close to one another.
She could feel the moist heat rolling of
f
his skin
from the
shower.

             
“He won’t be able to get in anywhere but the front door. I made sure of that,” Brennan whispered.

             
“You knew he was coming.”

             
The realization raised only more questions.

             
Brennan gave her a quick
,
knowing glance then looked away.

             
“
He’ll figure it out soon enough,” he said,
“g
o into the bathroom and wait.”

             
She shook her head.

             
“No.”

             
Brennan
turned and gripped her by the biceps, squeezing hard, seemingly indifferent to the gun held between them.

             
“I’m not messing with you,” he said,
“y
ou shouldn’t be here. Now get into that damn bathroom.”

             
“We don’t have time for this shit. Let me go now, dammit,” she said through clenched teeth.

             
To her surprise he released her.

             
“Suit yourself.”

             
Again, a faint sound that she couldn’
t quite make out drifted in from the far side of the shop. As she turned her body, she caught the lightning quick movement as Brennan’s right fist arced up and toward her.
There was no time to evade the impact. She knew it would land on the right side of her jaw.

*

             
When she woke up, her jaw and gums were throbbi
ng. Her surroundings were pitch
black and her cheek was lying on linoleum. Memory flashed instantly. She sat up and knew she was in the bathroom. She felt around for her gun, but didn’t want to risk turning on the light. For whatever reason, Brennan was determined to keep her out of harm
’
s way.

             
Well
,
t
o
hell with that. Standing slowly, a wave of dizziness caught her off guard and she leaned against the wall until the world felt solid again. Damn
him for punching her in the
face.
What kind of man did that?