Reckoning

by Leigh, Jo

  “We didn’t get the chemist,” Raines said, his voice muted. “We didn’t get her data. And we lost three men.”

  “We found her once, we’ll find her again. We know she’s still in L.A. And we destroyed the lab.”

  “You found her and lost her. She could be anywhere by now. And the lab was never the problem.”

  “We’re on it.”

  “You’re on it?”

  That was about fifteen decibels louder. By the end of the conversation, Leland fully expected to hear him roar with rage.

  “What the fuck does that mean, you’re on it? Do you know where she is at this moment? Do you know if she’s still connected to that Delta Force bunch? Where’s the soldier who escaped from Colorado? What the hell kind of operation is this, that you can’t find a few grunts and a chemist?”

  There it was. The roar. The voice that carried across the senate floor. Now Leland’s gaze moved down a half inch and he let his shoulders sag by the same degree. “Senator, I’ve replaced the man in charge and I believe the new man will have the Delta team within the week.”

  “Based on what, exactly?”

  “We’re meeting later to go over the details. I’ll give you an update first thing tomorrow.”

  “I’d better have answers I can count on, Leland. We cannot have this situation exposed. The American people have a great need for the money we’re bringing in with this weapon. A great need, indeed. I will not disappoint the American people, are we clear?”

  “Yes, Senator. Completely.”

  “I want that update by seven.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  Raines leaned back and his posture eased. “Bring me up to speed on the plant.”

  This was the part of the meeting Leland had been waiting for. He had no idea how in hell they were going to find the scientist or the soldiers. Eventually, they’d make a mistake and that would be that. Of course, he couldn’t say that to Raines, but he wasn’t too worried. Not yet.

  Now, the plant, on the other hand, had exceeded his expectations. Putting it inside the Air Force base had been a stroke of genius, particularly as even the road leading to the perimeter fence was restricted.

  Leland felt the same obligation to the citizens of this country as Raines. He wasn’t about to let the godless liberals and pantywaists put his country at risk. This country, his country, would not be subject to terrorism again. Not while he still breathed.

  Chapter 3

  Tamara’s gasp woke Nate from the first sleep he’d had in twenty-two hours, but he was instantly alert. He turned on the bedside lamp to find her eyes were wide open, her mouth, too, and she looked as panicked as a person could be and live through it.

  He grabbed her by the shoulders and raised her to a sitting position. When she still didn’t look at him, he shook her gently, then not so gently. Finally, she focused, recognized him. Fell completely apart.

  It killed him to hear her sobs. In all the time he’d known her, in all the horrendous situations she’d been in, she’d never wept, not like this. It was as if he were listening to a heart shatter, to a world come apart at the seams. Which, of course, it was.

  She’d worked so goddamn hard on the dispersal system for the antidote to the gas. When it hadn’t worked, something had broken inside her. Although he’d tried to get her to talk about it, she wouldn’t. All he knew for sure was that she blamed herself for the failure. Shit, it would have been a miracle if it had worked.

  He took her into his arms and comforted her the only way he knew how. He wasn’t accustomed to this role, well, not unless he was trying to get laid. Then he had no trouble offering up a shoulder to cry on. This was different.

  As far as he was concerned, she was a soldier under his command. He didn’t take the responsibility lightly. He’d have given anything to have kept her safe. If there was anyone in the room who’d failed, it was him. He hadn’t been at the lab to protect her. His precautions weren’t sufficient. “How did they know?”

  She pushed away from his shoulder to look at him through tear-filled eyes. “What?”

  “Nothing. It’s not important.”

  She wiped her cheeks with the back of her hand, then sniffed again. “I had a bad dream.”

  “I could tell,” he said, wanting to touch her, but painfully aware that she was naked and that the comforter had fallen to her waist. “Want to talk about it?”

  “Not really,” she said, “but I probably should.” She gazed around the room, stopping at the window. He’d made sure the blackout curtains were closed, knowing how badly she needed to sleep. “What time is it?”

  He looked at his watch. “Almost eleven.”

  “In the morning, right?”

  “Yeah.”

  When she was settled, she pulled the comforter up, covering her breasts. He dragged his gaze up to her face. He tended to think of her as delicate because she was so petite. Though her long hair was black and straight and her eyes were darkly Asian, her skin was creamy pale, as if she’d never been in the sun. But he knew she was tough, stronger than she even realized.

  “I heard someone coming down the stairs, but you hadn’t called. So I got the gun and the flash drive and I hid, you know, in that fake closet.”

  The previous tenants had thought of everything, including false walls and trick doors.

  “They searched the place for a long time. I heard them breaking things and cursing. I just stayed as quiet as I could.”

  The words were so easily spoken, but he could just imagine how terrified she must have been. He should have been there. “When did you call me?”

  She looked at him quizzically. “I didn’t have the phone. I was so busy thinking about the data, I forgot it.”

  “But I got a call. From your cell.”

  “Who was it?”

  “That was just it. No one spoke. I answered, then I heard a gunshot.”

  “There was a fire. I couldn’t stay hidden or I would have burned to death and taken the data with me. When I pushed out the wall, the man was standing right in front of me. I shot him.”

  He liked to think of her as his soldier, but the truth was, she wasn’t. Before they’d met, she’d never even held a gun.

  “You know,” she said, pushing her hair behind her shoulder. “I think that’s why I was able to kill him.”

  “What was?”

  “He hesitated. Because he was dialing the cell phone. He didn’t get his gun up quickly enough.”

  “Let’s hear it for the phone company,” Nate said sardonically.

  “After that, I ran. I headed straight for the stairs. I know someone was behind me, but it was so dark out there I wasn’t as afraid of him as I was of falling down an elevator shaft. I went straight to plan B, but I was sure he was going to catch me. I could practically feel the bullet in my back.”

  He knew exactly what she was talking about. If anyone ever did invent eyes in the back of the head, he’d be first in line with the check. “You lost him.”

  She nodded. “I don’t know how.”

  “Training. That’s what it’s all about. I’m just sorry I wasn’t there sooner.”

  “How could you have known?”

  “The question is, how did they know? I would have expected them to find me long before you. That lab was way the hell off the radar.”

  “I don’t know. I also don’t know what they took out before they torched the place.”

  “Every computer in there was wired to blow without the proper access keys,” Nate assured her. “They won’t get anything important.”

  “But they’ll know that I was working, and they’d have to be stupid not to realize I was all over the antidote.”

  “Yeah, that’s probably true.”

  “Which means…”

  “That whatever they’re planning, the timetable just moved up.”

  “Oh, crap,” she said, with such a heavy sigh that it made Nate laugh.

  “I don’t think it’s very funny.”

&nbs
p; “It’s not. It’s a damn tragedy. But all we can do is what we can do.”

  She shook her head, looking at him seriously, as if she needed him to hear her. He lost his smile and listened.

  “I don’t want to die alone,” she said.

  He almost spoke, but the words had been uttered so softly, so forcefully, that he waited and thought. With her hair a wild dark tangle, her eyes puffy from crying and her skin so smooth all he wanted was to touch her, he understood clearly. It wasn’t that she was almost killed last night, or that she’d had to take a life, but that she was alone. Had been alone for months. He had Seth, Boone, Cade. They all understood exactly what it was to be a soldier. They knew what the risks were, how to cope with the unbearable stress of a mission that seemed to have no end. Even Kate and Christie were holding up their end. But Tam had been forced into a bubble, a tiny world where there was no one to lean on or to question or run her ideas by. She’d been flying solo since Kosovo, and she was exhausted.

  He nodded slowly, wondering briefly how he could justify kidnapping another biochemist to work with her. That was no answer. He had none. “What can I do?”

  “I’m not sure,” she said. “But you can start by taking off your clothes.”

  “Pardon me?”

  Her cheeks had blushed a vivid pink and her hands were twisted tightly together but she looked him right in the eyes. “I think, I hope, that I haven’t been wildly off the mark with you being attracted to me.”

  He thought she was going to continue but when she just kept staring, he nodded. “Yeah.” It was an understatement, but he wasn’t exactly at his best at the moment.

  “I’m attracted to you, too. And since the odds of us living long, happy lives is about one in a million, I think we should do whatever we can in whatever time we have that brings us pleasure. And happiness. And comfort.”

  He ought to have some kind of reasonable argument. He was the team leader. He was responsible for her, for all of them. Having sex would complicate things in ways he couldn’t possibly foresee. But all he kept thinking was thank you, God. Thank you, thank you.

  “On the other hand, if I’m totally freaking you out, we can pretend I never said a word.”

  “What?”

  She looked away, then back again. “Nate, cut it out. If you don’t want to, just say so.”

  “Don’t want to? Oh, Tam…”

  “Oh, Tam, what?” She looked down pointedly. “Naked here. Can we say vulnerable?”

  “Vulnera—Shit. I’m sorry. No. I want to. I just haven’t thought about us actually, you know…”

  “You haven’t thought about it? Wow. I have. A lot.”

  “You have?”

  She nodded. “I had a lot of time alone in that lab.”

  “That’s great,” he said. “Seriously, that’s great, because I have, too.”

  “But you just said—”

  “Don’t listen to me. I think I had a small stroke when you asked me to take off my clothes. I’m better now.”

  Her smile blossomed and it made everything in the world feel as soft and clean as the pretty white sheets. “You’re weird, but then I’ve always liked weird.”

  “Thanks.”

  She laughed. “So we’re just gonna talk about it?”

  “Huh?”

  Her eyes rolled, but she didn’t lose the grin. “I meant now.”

  “Oh. Oh!”

  She flopped her hands on the comforter as she shook her head. “How long has it been for you?”

  His shirt was already on the floor, and he was in the middle of toeing off his socks and undoing his belt. “Doesn’t matter.”

  “No?”

  He shook his head as he unzipped his fly. “Nope. None of it mattered until right this minute.”

  “Because…”

  He slipped off his jeans and his boxers then jumped under the covers. He found her hand and squeezed it gently. “Because now it’s you.”

  * * * * * *

  KATE AND VINCE HAD COME to Boone and Christie’s room at one-thirty. The new arrivals had already checked into the motel, using other names of course, and Seth and Boone had helped them put in the security devices on the front door, the windows and the telephone. Christie and Harper were working at their waitressing jobs. Cade was due in an hour via Greyhound. None of them had heard a word from Nate or Tam.

  “All he said was that she’d been compromised,” Kate related. She sat on the ugly beige couch that was the twin to the one in her room. Vince was next to her, close, touching from shoulder to knee. Milo, Christie’s golden lab, had curled up near her feet.

  Seth stood in the kitchen making a fresh pot of coffee and Boone sat by the small round table in the corner. Both men looked as if they hadn’t slept in a while, and she wondered what these nighttime missions were costing them.

  “Christie said he sounded tense.” Boone bent forward, leaning his elbows on his thighs. “She didn’t think Tam was taken, but maybe she was hurt.”

  “That might explain why we haven’t heard anything.”

  “Maybe.”

  Seth came back into the room. He seemed a lot more comfortable with his prosthetic claw, and Kate figured doing his job again had made the difference. Truth be known, she still felt guilty that he’d lost his hand fighting to save her life. It didn’t seem to matter that it was Omicron bullets that had blown his hand almost all the way off. The guilt was hers and his new ease with his prosthesis didn’t take it away. At least he had Harper now. Kate hadn’t seen them for a couple of weeks, but she’d heard they were doing great.

  “I don’t like it,” Vince said. “If we don’t hear soon, we’re going to have to make some decisions.”

  “Like what?” Kate asked.

  “Like what to do if they don’t come back.”

  Kate shook her head. “They’ll be here. Nate wouldn’t let them get her, not Tam.” She turned to Boone and Seth. “What do you guys need us to do?”

  Seth smiled. “Robbing a bank would be most helpful.”

  Vince laughed. “I could probably pull it off, but man, don’t let ’em send me to an L.A. court.” Vince had been a detective in L.A. for over ten years.

  “Seriously,” Boone said. “What we need most now is cash. Christie and Harper are working double shifts at that damn truck stop, but the tips aren’t that great.”

  “I suppose,” Vince asked, “that Harper can’t let anyone know she’s a doctor.”

  “Nope. Too chancy. We’re stuck paying for these rooms.” Seth got up again and poured himself a cup of coffee. He looked around questioningly, but no one else wanted any. “We thought about renting a house, but we haven’t found anywhere we could all stay that’s discreet enough. We’re too damn close to the Omicron plant to take any risks.”

  “We’ll find jobs,” Kate assured him.

  “No, wait,” Vince said, turning to look at her. “We’ve got some cash. I think we should put all our energy on breaking Omicron’s back. Waiting tables isn’t going to bring in enough to make a difference anyway.”

  “Are you sure?” Kate asked.

  “I’m sure.”

  Seth frowned. “What are we talking about here? A couple thousand…”

  “Over a hundred thousand,” Vince said. “And I can get it here without it being traced or reported to the government.”

  Seth’s brows lifted in surprise. “Good man.”

  “Selfish man.” Vince nodded at Kate. “I want her safe. That’s all that matters.”

  Kate squeezed his hand, but caught Boone looking suspiciously hungry.

  “So how long until the money can be here?” Boone asked.

  “Already?” Kate was teasing. She knew exactly how desperate the money situation was. Besides, she was so busy being proud of Vince she could barely hide her grin. Man, was he ever going to get lucky tonight.

  “There’s a room in the plant that has a biometric scanner to gain entry,” Boone said. “We’re pretty sure it’s where the gas is eith
er stored or poured. Either way, we need access.”

  “You mean it reads fingerprints?” she asked.

  Seth nodded.

  “How are you going to get past that? Aside from borrowing someone’s hand?”

  Boone smiled. “Well, now that you mention it, Katie, that’s exactly what we intend to do. But, we’ll need some cash to pull it off.”

  * * * * * *

  Tam let the comforter fall once more to her waist as she moved closer to Nate. It took her a minute to get her breathing under control after that last statement. It hadn’t even been the lovely words. It was how deeply he’d meant them.

  She’d known for a long time that he wanted her, but she thought it was because she was simply there. Because he had so few options. Her mind couldn’t quite grasp that she’d been so very, very wrong.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked. He scooted closer to her, and she felt his naked skin brush against hers.

  “I’m not very good at this kind of thing.”

  “Don’t worry about it. You’re perfect.”

  “We haven’t done anything yet.”

  He smiled. “Trust me. You’re perfect.”

  She knew it was a line, but what the hell. She’d told him the truth about why she wanted this. She needed to be close to someone, to feel alive again. But she hadn’t told him everything.

  He leaned in and she knew this was it. If he kissed her, it would change things forever. She still had a moment to call things off.

  She parted her lips and closed her eyes.

  His mouth brushed against hers. Soft lips, warm breath, slightly cautious. He didn’t press, just skimmed lightly, letting her get comfortable, she supposed.

  It wasn’t what she wanted, however well intentioned. There was only one thing to do about that. She put her hand behind his neck, held him steady, and kissed him. Hard. Exactly the way she’d fantasized for all those months.

  He got with the program right quick. His tongue slipped past her teeth, and he took over. That was fine with her. She moved her hand down his back then across his shoulders, amazed at the feel of him. She’d never been with a soldier before, or anyone who looked remotely like they could have been one. Nate’s body was like something out of a movie or a magazine. Wide shoulders, perfectly sculpted abs, slim waist and hips, long legs.