Haley leaned her head against his shoulder, and his throat closed. Damn if he didn’t want to give it a try.
It was early days. He didn’t need to leap fully into the void. They could take it slow. See how their feelings for one another stood up to real world challenges like him leaving the toilet seat up or her being messy and disrupting his orderly bachelor existence.
“Did you see Darby?” she asked. “How is she?”
“Doctors were happy with how well she’s physically healing. We’re trying to make sure someone from CNU is with her whenever she’s awake. Eban Winters is there right now. She seems comfortable with him.” He turned her hand over in his and then traced her lifeline down to the tendon beneath the delicate skin of her wrist. “She asked the doctors to sedate her for the exam.” They’d run a rape kit, which had taken a lot longer than he’d hoped for. “She’s on a course of intravenous antibiotics and prophylaxis.” There would be no unwanted pregnancy.
Haley looked sad, and he remembered what she’d said about being infertile. “Does it bother you, not being able to have kids?”
“It’s been a fact of life for me for a lot of years. I don’t let myself think about it much.” She looked pensive. “I’ve always been fine without children in my life. I get to play aunty to Alex’s new baby. What about you? You ever want to be a dad? Are you a dad?”
The words were like bullets that raked his soul. He shook his head, unable to say the words even though he owed Haley an explanation about Abbie. He’d do it later when they were back in the States, and he could maybe explain exactly how much he’d loved his wife without making Haley feel like she had to compete with her memory.
That wasn’t fair and wasn’t necessarily accurate, because his feelings for Haley were intense. But he wasn’t sure how much he could trust these emotions as they’d been borne by circumstances outside the norm.
He’d be lying if he’d said he wasn’t relieved at the idea of Haley not being able to conceive. Losing his partner and their baby in one stroke was not something he ever wanted to risk again. So what if thousands of women went through childbirth every day? He was pretty sure he was jinxed, and even the thought of pregnancy made him sick to his stomach. And he was getting way ahead of himself. They hadn’t even gone on a date yet.
“I heard Cecil Wenck and his bodyguards left before the attack.” Her voice was calm but threaded with anger.
He nodded. He was furious but needed to let go of the emotion if he hoped to stay anywhere near this investigation. “His lawyer is stalling when it comes to letting him be questioned by FBI officials.” Wealth was apparently an effective shield when it came to law enforcement. The question was, why was he stalling?
“Did Chris survive?”
Quentin smiled. “Yeah, he did. As did Tricia Rooks and Grant Gunn who was busy getting drunk in town.”
Haley smiled at him and bumped his shoulder. “I’m glad.”
“Me too.” Although it was a pitifully small number.
He checked the time and realized he was already late for a meeting. “I have to go see how plans are progressing.”
“Can I come?” Haley asked.
He stared at her and frowned. Strictly speaking, it was government personnel only, but this wasn’t classified information per se. She might remember something he didn’t…
Quentin took her hand, kissed her fingertips and then let her go. “You can attend, but they might toss you out if things get sensitive, and you can’t get pissy with them if they do. You and I are both here on sufferance.”
She wiggled her brows and smiled. “Story of my life.”
Wow, those words were a punch in the gut.
“Where are we going?” She slipped her feet into the same stolen boots she’d been wearing since the hotel attack.
“Hostage Rescue Team along with a few Navy SEALs and a few Indonesian Special Forces are going to conduct a dawn raid on the island. We’re sending a drone for a look-see first.”
Haley nodded and pulled her shoulders back like she was getting ready for battle. Revisiting that island wouldn’t be easy, and they’d been relatively well looked after, just threatened and roughened up a bit.
Unlike Darby.
The only explanation Quentin could come up with was the terrorists had simply been too tired after the nighttime attack on the hotel, and he and Haley would have been beaten and tortured more if they’d not slipped away when they did.
It made the risk they’d taken worthwhile, especially as they’d found Darby. But what about the Alexanders? Their fate tormented him.
Haley followed him out of the room and along the narrow metal corridors. Quentin wasn’t blind to the stir she caused amongst the mostly male crew. The white t-shirt she wore was thin and, if you looked hard enough, you could tell she wasn’t wearing a bra.
Quentin narrowed his gaze at one guy who leered a little too obviously. It was one thing to admire beauty, it was something else entirely to ogle until he made someone uncomfortable.
“Relax.” She ran her hand over his shoulder and down his arm in a possessive move meant to soothe him, which made him feel like a fool. “You’re going to break your own jaw from clenching it so tight.”
He forced himself to release the tension and let her go ahead of him up the metal stairway. The fact he couldn’t look away from her ass meant he was just as base as these other men.
Dammit.
She was special. It wasn’t simply her face or her figure. She was brave and smart and had a sense of humor even when things got seriously tough. But she was probably the hottest woman he’d ever been with, and that brought a pang of guilt right along with it. Abbie had been pretty and undeniably sweet but in a cute girl-next-door kind of way, whereas Haley was more international glamor.
He shook his head. It was like trying to compare rare jewels. Both were precious and unique and beautiful. Both had value that didn’t diminish that of the other. He needed to tell Haley about Abbie, but the guilt still flayed him. He needed a little time to figure it out, to try to find not just the right words, but the right headspace.
He led Haley up another level and down a corridor. He knocked on the wooden door. A sailor opened it.
At the ensign’s frown, Quentin stated, “Ms. Cramer is with me.”
He indicated Haley go ahead and nodded to the people inside. Held out a chair for her to sit in while he stood. Kurt Montana, the HRT tactical commander, sat beside the ship’s captain and all the HRT and Navy SEALs were lined up around the walls facing two large monitors. Even the head of the group of private military contractors who’d rescued them earlier had a seat at the table.
If Haley was intimidated by the amount of testosterone flooding the air, she didn’t show it.
Eban Winters and Max Hawthorne arrived late—Quentin assumed that meant Darby was still out cold as he had been explicit in his instructions. The presence of the negotiators would hopefully remind people that the Alexanders were still believed to be captives, and a rescue attempt needed to be staged if possible. Unfortunately, the time for talking was definitely over. The US government no longer had the patience to bargain with these ruthless killers.
Now that everyone was here, the captain gave the signal. The drone was hovering high above the island where they had almost certainly been held captive. There were so many islands in the region though, they needed to be sure.
The room became silent as the drone operator—somewhere onboard the vessel—took the aircraft lower. It had Tactical Nighttime Wide Area Surveillance and could detect moving targets.
Everyone in the room stared intently at the monitors as the feeds went live. The drone was whisper-quiet, so it was doubtful it would be heard over the nightly noise of the rainforest. The operator zoomed in on the small bay where the yacht had been moored. The boat wasn’t there now.
Quentin made out the small shed were Darby had been held.
“That’s definitely the right place,” he confirmed. He would pers
onally torch that shed as soon as forensics were finished there.
Quentin narrowed his gaze. He’d described to the drone pilot the route they’d taken up to the village, but it had been indistinguishable on the satellite images. He leaned closer as the thermal camera started to pick up the yellowish glow of human beings, but there was something odd about them. They were frozen in place. “Is there something wrong with the camera?”
Kurt Montana shook his head. “I don’t believe so.”
“Why isn’t anyone moving?” Haley voiced the question everyone was thinking.
“They’re either sleeping, or dead,” Montana said grimly.
No one spoke as the drone pilot flew to the main camp. Again, people were visible on the heat profile of the camera, cooler looking than expected, lying haphazardly, all perfectly still.
Quentin clenched his fists.
The pilot moved the drone lower. A couple of dogs trotted out of wherever they’d been sleeping and looked up at the sky. None of the people reacted.
“What’s the plan?” he asked Montana. The FBI was officially in charge of this operation, and Montana was in charge of the tactical side. The Navy might not like it, but they knew how to respect the chain of command.
Montana did not look happy, but that was an almost permanent state of being for the man.
“We need to assess the scene for biohazards before we go in, figure out if these people are asleep or dead. If they’re dead, what killed them. We’ll send in a small team fitted with biohazard suits and see what they find. Continue to monitor the area with the drone as they approach from the north.”
As he’d suspected, there’d been another small harbor on the island with more boats and a helicopter landing pad. Most of those boats were still moored to the floating dock.
Quentin nodded. No one wanted to expose the team to potential hazards, but they needed to know what they were dealing with.
“I don’t understand.” Haley’s eyes were huge.
“Neither do I. Let’s go get some food from the mess hall and wait for these guys to report back.”
Haley pushed back her chair, and he took her elbow, wishing he could shield her from what was likely to be a very ugly truth. Someone had murdered every man, woman and child on that island. The question was, who?
Eban and Hawthorne followed them out. “What do you want us to do, Boss?” Eban asked.
“Make sure Darby’s okay. I want as much information as she can bear to give us on her captors. Hawthorne,” Quentin narrowed his eyes at the former Brit, “find out whatever those guys discover as soon as they discover it.” He pointed into the room they’d just exited. “I don’t want to be left out of the loop.”
Both men nodded and headed off in different directions.
Quentin led Haley down to the ship’s galley where they both ate in silence. Haley yawned and suddenly looked incredibly tired. He felt the same way. He’d spent most of last night on watch.
“Let’s catch a few hours’ sleep. It’ll take the team time to gear up and get to the island anyway.”
At the door to Haley’s room, he said goodnight and went to turn away, even though it felt weird not to be with her.
“Please don’t leave me alone,” she said quietly.
Quentin met her gaze. “Are you sure?”
Her soft smile was all the answer he needed.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Haley stared at the moon through the room’s porthole. Quentin had slipped quietly away half an hour ago, assuming she was dozing. But she was pretending. Before they’d gone to sleep, he’d made her promise not to mention, even to Alex, the fact that all the terrorists who’d attacked them appeared to be dead or drugged. The promise bothered her.
Hadn’t Quentin figured out by now that Alex was one of the good guys? Without him, they’d still be on the island fighting off bandits. Didn’t Quentin trust her judgment?
It was already starting—that awkward compromise between the “man in her life” and her friends/business partners who meant everything to her. And she wanted to watch the raid, but Quentin had said he wasn’t sure she’d be allowed into the operations room for that, and that he’d call if she was.
She wasn’t used to seeking permission or following orders.
Irritated, she reached for the tablet one of the nurses had loaned her and video-called Alex anyway. “Hey,” she said brightly when he answered. “Am I bugging you?”
Alex’s lips curved in a patient smile. He was sitting on the balcony of his swank D.C. apartment cradling baby Georgina. “Nope. We’re out here giving Mallory some time to sleep. Seems like someone takes after her father and is a bit of a night owl.”
“She’s adorable.”
Alex grinned. “I know. We’re going to head down to Quantico to settle into the house with this bundle of joy in the next couple of days. Come stay with us when you get home.”
“I’ll be in the way.”
“You’re family. You’re supposed to be in the way.”
Her laugh came out all wobbly. “Okay. I’d like that.”
“You still holding up?”
Haley felt her smile slip. “You know.” She shrugged one shoulder.
His gaze narrowed. “So, you and the Fed, huh?”
She stared at him, astonished. “How did you know that?”
“I’d like to say it was my innate intuition or some funky bugging device you knew nothing about but actually, Mallory heard it from Lincoln Frazer. He heard it from Steve McKenzie who heard it from the Unit Chief of SIOC. Head of the task force investigating the hotel attack wanted Savage removed from anything to do with the case and flown home immediately, to get him away from you because you might have had something to do with the terrorist attack.”
“What the hell? Me?” Her voice was a quiet shriek of outrage.
“It was a working theory after the task force discovered Savage had run a background check on you a couple of hours prior to the hotel attack.”
“What?”
“I’d have done the same if I wanted to hook up with a stranger at a conference.”
Haley knew her mouth was gaping wide open.
“McKenzie used his influence with the director, and they managed to infuse a little common sense into the situation. You had no motive to kill hundreds of innocent people then get yourself abducted.”
Their “relationship” had already caused trouble for Quentin, but he hadn’t mentioned it to her. Hadn’t blamed her in any way. “When Quentin told me not to contact you and divulge certain pieces of information…”
“He’s trying to keep his job and follow the rules. Feds are big on rules. Ask me how I know?” He pulled a face. “Quentin staked his reputation on your integrity. Don’t tell me anything you’re not supposed to—unless you want him fired.”
“Why would I want him fired?”
“So he’d be pissed off, and you two would have a fight, and then you’d have an excuse to dump him.”
“Alex! What the hell?”
“Haley,” Alex said with exasperation even as he kissed the baby’s head, “I’ve known you for a long time. That’s what you do, especially when you actually like someone. You put up with worthless dickheads twice as long as you’ll date a decent man.”
“Decent men are often excruciatingly boring or pompous assholes.”
“Is Quentin?”
She stared at Alex through the screen for a long time, and neither of them spoke.
She’d already been putting up barriers she realized, so she could justify a retreat when a disagreement came up. That’s why she was calling Alex. Because Quentin had asked her not to, and she didn’t like being told what to do. It smacked of control the way her father had liked to control her.
But Quentin was simply doing his job, and she was acting like a brat.
Dammit. She hated being predictable, hated perpetuating this cycle she was stuck in. No wonder she never had worthwhile relationships.
“Well,�
�� rather than admit Alex was right, she changed the subject, “I actually called to tell you more about the run-in I had with Cecil Wenck the night of the attack.”
He was quiet after she’d relayed every detail of the story. Too quiet.
“I recorded it on my phone, but the FBI has my cell in evidence.” Alex looked like he wanted to hit something. “You’re not allowed to hurt him—not physically anyway. You’re not even allowed to infect his computer systems with a virus as we would be the first people they’d suspect of such a move.”
“No one would ever be able to trace it to me,” Alex assured her.
“But the Feds would suspect, and maybe they’d stop working with us. Maybe they’d stop letting you work with Mallory.”
He narrowed his eyes at the camera. “I can’t believe you’re so calm about this. I want to rip the guy apart.”
And she wasn’t the passive type, except when passive meant survival. “Trust me, I want him to get what he deserves, but I have bigger things to deal with first. Did you figure out why Wenck left early? Did someone warn him?” She might not be privy to investigative details, but Alex was her partner.
“He received a call on his cell around eleven. Headed straight to the airport and his private jet.”
“He had to have been warned. Whoever attacked us didn’t want him dead.”
“I’ve had someone looking into the man’s finances, and he donates a lot of money to many different political candidates at municipal and national levels wherever he owns a mine, which is pretty much everywhere. He has a built-in protection network.”
“I hate how corrupt this world is.”
“We’re never doing business with that douche or his company,” Alex told her.
“I agree. Will you start digging around for me? See if there are any rumors of sexual assaults, or hints of affairs in his background? Some of the women might have been paid off or intimidated into silence.”
“I can do that.” Alex nodded, but the light in his eyes was icy cold.
“The FBI isn’t having much luck getting an interview with him. I bet I could get in to see him.”
Colder Than Sin (Cold Justice - Crossfire: FBI Romantic Suspense Book 2) Page 24