by Paige Tyler
“There are fifty-eight nuclear plants in France alone,” Jones said with a tired sigh. “And fifteen more in the UK. If we scare Yegor off from his original plan, what’s to say he can’t just as easily hit one of those? At least now we have some idea where the threat is coming from.”
Beside Harley, Caleb leaned forward to rest his forearms on the table. “There’s a good chance he might not hit either Gravelines or Penry. Yegor must have assumed Brielle would rat him out, right?”
But Brielle shook her head. “Yegor will assume I’m too terrified to talk. Especially after he had Batu try to kill Julian and me. He has a low opinion of people like you and me, even the ones who work for him. His opinion of women is even lower.”
The Q&A session continued for another fifteen minutes, but in the end, all they could do was wait. They had support team personnel running surveillance on both Gravelines and Penry, praying Brielle hadn’t steered them wrong. Hopefully they’d know the second anything started to happen. Then Harley and everyone else would go in, with McKay and Weatherford staying back to coordinate for local support, and Dr. Jones on the line to provide technical help.
“You coming in with us, Brielle?” Caleb asked as they all got to their feet. “After the way you fought Batu in Greece, we could use the extra firepower.”
Brielle gave him a smile that seemed genuinely rueful. “That was a one-time thing, I’m afraid. But I’ll be back here with the support team, in case you have any questions.”
Harley was surprised to see Caleb look disappointed.
“When you go into whatever nuke plant Yegor attacks, stay on your toes,” McKay said. “We can’t afford to make a mistake. If Yegor pulls this off, radiation will spread across half of Europe.”
And on that cheery note, Jake told everyone to try to get some rest. “We have no idea when this is going to kick off, and we’ve all been going nonstop for days.”
As everyone slowly filtered out of the room, Erin and Elliot wandered over to where Harley stood with Sawyer.
“Sorry we walked out on you the other day,” Erin said. “Finding out that you’re a werewolf threw us for loop.”
Sawyer nodded. “Where were you the whole time? When we realized you didn’t go back to London, Rory and I were worried Yegor had killed you, and we just hadn’t found the bodies yet.”
“We never left Athens,” Elliott admitted sheepishly. “We got rooms at a hotel, then found a bar and drank for pretty much two straight days while we tried to figure out what we were going to do. It wasn’t until we got a text from Rory telling us about the attack on the hospital and explaining you were heading to Calais that we realized we’d been gone long enough.”
Sawyer’s mouth edged up. “Well, I can’t tell you how glad I am that you came back. The team needs you. But more importantly, I need you. When you two walked away like that, I… Well…it was hard.”
Harley felt tears come to her eyes at the heartfelt words. She’d known getting rejected by his teammates had been difficult and seeing how happy Sawyer was because they’d come back made her inordinately happy, too.
Erin gave Sawyer a sisterly hug. “You might be different than the Sawyer we thought we knew, but you’re still the same teammate we’ve always had. It simply took us a while to remember that. There was no way we could let you face Yegor alone.”
Harley was pretty sure Erin was close to tearing up, too, but Sawyer was smart enough to make their exit at that point, saying he and Harley needed to talk about some stuff before trying to catch some sleep.
Once outside, she and Sawyer strolled toward the hops fields behind the brewery, their hands finding each other’s as they walked. The sun had already gone down, but the moon provided more than enough light. Not that she needed the extra glow. Her night vision—which usually wasn’t any better than a regular person’s—had suddenly decided to work for her, so she could see as perfectly as if it were daytime. Surrounded by all the trellises, the earthy scent of hops swirled around them, reminding her a little of a pine forest.
They walked in comfortable silence for a little while before Harley finally gathered her courage enough to say what had been on her mind since long before they’d even slept together.
“After tonight, our respective teams will go their separate ways,” she said softly. “You’ll be back in London, or wherever MI6 sends you, and I’ll be back in DC, or wherever STAT sends me.”
When Sawyer didn’t say anything, she wondered if he’d heard her. Or perhaps he had heard but didn’t know what to say. Maybe the reason he was taking so long to reply was because he was trying to figure out how to let her down gently. Maybe bringing up whatever this was between them had been a bad idea. But if they didn’t talk about it now, there might not be time later and she couldn’t imagine walking away from him after the mission and never seeing him again. The mere thought made her heart shrivel up.
“While that’s true,” he finally said, his voice equally soft in the darkness, “it doesn’t mean we can’t keep seeing each other.”
Harley felt like the sun had just risen somewhere in her chest, and her heart basked in its warmth. She smiled. “I was hoping you’d say that.”
“Did you ever doubt it? I mean, I don’t know how we’re going to make it work with our schedules, but we’ll figure it out.” He gave her a sidelong glance, his mouth edging up. “This is probably going to sound crazy, especially since we just met, but I’ve never felt this way about anyone else.”
“Me, either,” she admitted.
Should she tell him why they were falling for each other so fast? What if it scared him off? Then again, maybe he already knew about the legend of The One. And if he didn’t know about the legend, it was better he learn about it from her rather than someone else in her pack. She didn’t want him thinking she’d kept something so important from him.
Taking a deep breath, she gave his hand a tug, pulling him to a stop.
“There’s a reason we’re both feeling this way,” she said when he turned to face her.
Sawyer studied her in the moonlight, blue eyes curious. Like he thought she was going to suddenly profess her love for him. Crap, was she in love with him? Or was it the soul-mate thing making it seem that way?
“What’s wrong?” he asked when she didn’t say anything.
“There’s nothing wrong.” The night breeze played with her hair, brushing it against her face, and she reached up with her free hand to tuck it behind her ear. “It’s just that there’s this werewolf thing you should probably know about. It’s not really a thing, I guess. It’s more of a legend or a folktale. I wasn’t sure I believed it the first time I heard about it, but it kind of makes sense.”
Harley knew she was babbling, but she couldn’t seem to stop. Hell, she was on the verge of hyperventilating.
Sawyer took her other hand in his, holding on to them both. “Harley, what are you trying to say?”
She swallowed hard. “I’m saying there’s a connection that’s supposed to exist between a werewolf and the person they’re meant to be with. They call it finding The One. As in The One you’re supposed to spend your life with. Like soul mates.”
Sawyer gazed at her for a long time, and for the life of her, she couldn’t read his expression.
“Soul mates?” he echoed. “Like we’re destined to be together?”
She cringed, not sure she liked the way he said it. “I don’t know about the whole destiny thing. I just know that some werewolves are lucky enough to find the person who’s perfect for them. Like Jake and Jes. Caleb told me he’s seen it happen with other werewolves back in Dallas.”
Sawyer didn’t say anything. Crap, she’d screwed up. This was exactly what she’d feared. He might be her soul mate, but she wasn’t his. Maybe he didn’t care for her at all. Maybe his idea of seeing each other was getting together for sex every so often.
�
�Is it that you don’t like the idea of soul mates or that you don’t think I’m yours?” Harley asked softly, barely able to get the words out.
Sawyer stared at her for a second, then his eyes widened. “No, it’s nothing like that! It’s just that until five seconds ago, I thought soul mates were make-believe. Like something in books and movies. It’s a lot to take in. As far as you and me being soul mates? How the bloody hell am I supposed to know?”
Her heart sank even deeper. Sawyer must have seen it reflected in her eyes because he sighed.
“I’m making a mess of this,” he muttered. “Look, I don’t know anything about soul mates or being The One. But I do know that I don’t want to lose what we have. I’ve never felt like this with anyone before and I don’t even want to think about it ending.”
“So, you think maybe we could be…?” She trailed off, desperately wanting to finish with soul mates but terrified of scaring him off.
“I don’t think either of us knows yet what we can be.” He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. “But we’ll only find out if we stay together long enough to figure it out. And I promise I’m not going anywhere until we know.”
Harley went up on her toes to kiss him. He weaved his hands in her hair and kissed her back, the touching of their lips becoming more urgent with every passing second.
“Before we get around to figuring out what comes next, we have to get through this mission,” Sawyer said, cupping her face in his hand. “I want you to promise you’ll be careful. No crazy stuff. After we save the world, we’ll have that serious conversation on exactly what we are to each other and how we’ll make this work, okay?”
Harley smiled and nodded. “Promise.”
She pulled him down for another kiss, about to ask what he thought of making out in a field of hops, when she heard Caleb calling them from the loading dock.
“Stop making out and get back in here. Yegor made his move on the Gravelines plant.”
Chapter 18
Sawyer picked up the scent of blood long before he led the way around the corner and saw the three bodies lying twisted in the hallway of the Gravelines Nuclear Power Station. The large pools of blood near each told him everything he needed to know, even if his ears hadn’t picked up any heartbeats. Rory must have realized the same thing because he didn’t bother to check for a pulse. Misty couldn’t stop herself from at least making an effort. Then again, she hadn’t been doing this job long enough to recognize when it was too late for someone. If she was lucky, she’d never get to that point.
“These people were unarmed. There was no need to kill them,” Misty whispered as they kept moving, stealthily heading in the direction Sawyer hoped would take them to the facility’s main security office. “Yegor’s men could have locked them up in a room.”
Sawyer didn’t say anything. They’d caught sight of some of the armed men herding whole groups of people into various room and locking them in, so he wasn’t sure why the three they’d just passed had been killed while others hadn’t. Maybe because people like Yegor didn’t need a reason to kill. They did it simply because they could.
It had taken Sawyer and the rest of the joint STAT-MI6 team less than fifteen minutes to get to the plant after they’d gotten the call, but in that time, Yegor’s crew had taken control of the power plant, including the two hundred or so people who normally worked the night shift. As far as Sawyer could tell, no one had been able to get away and no one had been able to get a call out for help. In this age of cell phones and smart watches, that was saying something.
They moved through the large complex quickly but carefully, avoiding both people and security cameras. It was actually harder to get past the people than the cameras, since it seemed like Yegor had brought a small army with him.
“We’re almost at the security offices,” Sawyer whispered over his radio. “The place is crawling with Yegor’s men and they’re all heavily armed.”
He, Rory, and Misty had to duck into a supply closet to avoid a group of armed men—five of them moving fast toward the front of the building. As hard as it was to resist the urge to take them down, Sawyer wasn’t there to engage. It was his job to get Misty to the facility’s security offices without Yegor knowing they were here. Once there, they’d take control of all the facility’s cameras, so Harley and the others could slip in more easily. After that, hopefully, Misty would be able to jump from the security computers to the system that controlled the reactors. If she could take all the reactors offline before Yegor got around to doing whatever the hell it was he had planned, they’d be halfway home. Then it would simply be a matter of taking down Yegor and his crew.
Sawyer hesitated as he reached the open door of the facility’s security room, his nose picking up four distinct scents. He turned to Rory and Misty, holding up four fingers before motioning Rory to the right and Misty to the left. Then he pointed at himself and held up two fingers. Rory and Misty nodded, then stepped forward at the same time he did.
Misty might be a technopath, but she could pull the trigger when she had to. All four of the bad guys in the security room went down without a sound.
“The security room is clear,” Sawyer said into his mic, taking in the twenty monitors covering the far wall, each showing a different part of the facility and flipping through scenes that changed every few seconds. “You’re good to move.”
“Roger that,” Jake replied. “We see lots of movement outside one of the containment bunkers—reactor five, I think. Can you confirm that’s where Yegor and his people are headed?”
“Give me a second to figure out what I’m seeing on all these monitors,” Sawyer said. “There are a lot of them.”
He scanned the images on the screens, noting the labels positioned to the lower left of each one. Unfortunately, they were meaningless words and numbers to him. It wasn’t hard to understand what he was seeing when a large room full of nervous-looking people popped up on one of the monitors, though. There had to be sixty or seventy of them, some bleeding from cuts across their faces and heads, others bruised and battered.
As the monitors continued to flip through other cameras, he saw more captives locked away in other windowless rooms.
“Misty, can you get control of these monitors?” Sawyer asked. He was tired of watching the pics flip through so fast he couldn’t understand what he was seeing. “Maybe figure out where Yegor and his crew are and what they’re up to?”
“I’m already on it,” she said.
Pulling out a chair by one of the desks in front of the monitors, she quickly sat down. But instead of clicking on the keyboard, she reached out and put her hand on the closest mouse. Then her eyes went white. Her face went completely still, too, like she simply wasn’t there anymore. If Sawyer hadn’t heard her heart beating, he’d swear Misty was dead.
It was beyond weird. And more than a little unsettling.
Within seconds, the camera views changed to scenes of armed men walking around and vehicles moving outside. One camera froze on what Sawyer knew had to be the reactor room. There was a number 5 on the lower left of the screen, meaning Jake had been right. The place didn’t look nearly as menacing as Sawyer thought it would. There weren’t any glowing pools of blue water or red strobe lights flashing to warn people of the proximity of dangerous radiation material. Instead, there were multiple levels full of pipes, gantries, railings, a few stainless steel tanks, and a floor full of black tiles with numbers and symbols all over them. The only thing that stood out were the men in tactical gear scrambling around the room, wheeling in fifty-five gallon drums with wires coming out of the tops. He didn’t have a clue what an electromagnet looked like, but something told him that’s what they were.
As bad as the scene on that monitor was, the one on the next was worse. A large cargo truck was parked outside the building, the back doors of the vehicle opened to reveal what had to be hundreds of cases of hi
gh explosives, the orange Class 1 hazard labels on the boxes clear as day. As he watched, men jumped in with wires and pry bars in their hands to open the crates, rigging them to blow. He remembered Brielle saying Yegor wanted to take down the walls of the containment structure around the reactor, so the radiation from a meltdown would spread even farther.
He started to fill Jake in on what he was seeing when another monitor lit up, freezing him. Yegor, Seamus, Batu, and about a dozen other men were standing in a room full of computers. Behind them was a wall of panels covered in buttons, dials, and LED displays. Adriana and Kristoff were off to one side, one of Yegor’s goons holding a gun to the blond man’s head. Adriana looked terrified and there were blue sparks already sparkling across her skin.
Shit.
“Jake, reactor five is definitely the target,” Sawyer said. “But we need to move fast. They’re already setting up the electromagnets atop the reactor core, rigging a truckload of explosives outside the containment bunker, and Yegor has Adriana starting to spark in the control room. Misty is inside the computer system, but I’m not sure if that’s going to help now. By the way, both Seamus and Batu are in the control room with Yegor.”
Jake cursed. “Erin, Caleb, Harley, and I will head for the control room. Forrest, Elliott, and Jes will take care of the truck. That leaves the reactor room for you, Rory, and Misty, if you can get her out of that damn computer. You need to make sure those magnets don’t get turned on.”
“Copy that,” Sawyer said.
He glanced at Misty, who looked more like a zombie than ever. Something told him that getting her out of the computer wasn’t going to be easy.
* * *
Harley had shot three men in black tactical gear before she, Erin, Caleb, and Jake made it into the building. And even though the others had done as much damage, it barely seemed like they were making a dent in the numbers they were facing. As the four of them charged through the main doors leading toward the control room for reactor five, they were slowed down by a handful of bad guys ahead of them and another group coming up from behind.