by Paige Tyler
Angelo made no comment. Any organization that needed to have a separate set of offices just so politicians would have a place to play wasn’t an organization he wanted to work for. He looked around the lobby and grimaced at the white walls, generic DC tourist pics, and marble accents. How the hell did Landon put up with this crap?
The click-clack of high heels coming down the hall interrupted his musings. Angelo dragged his attention away from the framed photo of the White House and did a double take. For a second, he thought it was Ivy—though he had no idea how she could have gotten here before them when she was with Derek and Danica getting their personal gear together—but then he realized it was her equally beautiful sister, Layla. If she wasn’t ten years younger than he was and already hung up on his former lieutenant, Jayson Harmon, he definitely would have done some serious flirting when he’d met her at Landon and Ivy’s wedding.
Her dark eyes widened when she saw them. “Landon.” She did a quick scan of the lobby. “Is Ivy with you?”
“No. She’s at home.” Landon frowned. “What are you doing here?”
Layla’s fingers toyed with the strap on her shoulder bag. “I had a job interview.”
Landon’s frown deepened. “A job interview?”
“Uh-huh. I got it, too. John wants me to start on Monday.” She caught her lower lip between her teeth, looking at each of them in turn. “Please don’t say anything to Ivy, okay? I want to be the one to tell her.”
“Yeah,” Landon said. “Sure.”
“Awesome. Thank you.” She grinned. “Okay, I’m outta here. Jayson and I are going to celebrate. Nice seeing you again, Angelo. Clayne.”
Angelo barely had time to return the greeting before she hurried out the door, her high heels echoing behind her.
“I’m guessing Ivy isn’t going to be happy about her sister working here?” Angelo asked.
Clayne snorted. “Understatement.”
Considering how the DCO treated shifters, Angelo wasn’t surprised Ivy didn’t want her sister involved with them. Angelo had two sisters he was extremely protective of, so he knew where Ivy was coming from. He didn’t say anything as he followed Landon and Clayne down the hall, though.
Halfway down, Landon stopped at one of the offices and knocked on the already open door, then walked in.
The director of the DCO wasn’t at all how Angelo’d pictured him. He expected a slick, politician type, but instead the man fit the bill of a battalion or group commander. He might dress like the head of a Fortune 500 company, but he looked like he could definitely handle himself in a fight if he had to.
The man’s gaze lingered curiously on Angelo briefly before settling on Landon. “What’s the problem? Ivy said there was something important you wanted to see me about that couldn’t wait until Monday.”
“It can’t,” Landon agreed, then glanced at Angelo. “John, this is a good friend of mine, Sergeant First Class Angelo Rios from my old A-Team. Angelo, my boss, John Loughlin.”
John held out his hand. “Nice to meet you, Sergeant. Would it be too presumptuous to hope you’re here because Landon recruited you to join our ranks?”
Angelo smiled. “I’m happy where I am, sir, but thank you.”
“I thought you might say that.”
John regarded Landon with a calculating look in his eyes, and Angelo suddenly had the feeling that the director wasn’t a man you screwed with. He had enough clout to grab Landon out of Special Forces in the middle of a deployment. He hoped Landon knew what the hell he was doing.
John gestured to the small conference table. “Have a seat.”
If the director of the DCO was behind the ambush in Costa Rica, he was a damn good actor because he looked genuinely stunned—not to mention concerned—when Landon outlined the situation.
“Why am I hearing this from you and not from Tate?” John asked when Landon finished.
“Because Tate thinks you sold them out and walked them right into that hybrid ambush,” Clayne said.
Shit. Subtle wasn’t in Clayne’s vocabulary. Now John would get pissed off, then Clayne would go into beast mode, and they’d never get anywhere. But instead John regarded them calmly.
“And what do you think?” John asked, looking at Landon.
“I don’t think anything. I just know the facts,” Landon said. “You sent a DCO team on an exercise. They were ambushed. Tate, Brent, and Gavin barely escaped with their lives, and Kendra and Declan are missing, maybe even dead. And a pack of hybrids are at the center of it.”
A muscle in John’s jaw flexed. “This exercise has been on the schedule every year for the past decade. Other than choosing the team the DCO sends, I don’t have any involvement.”
Clayne’s eyes flashed gold. “You expect us to believe that Tate’s team just stumbled into those hybrids by chance?”
Angelo frowned. Okay, what hadn’t Landon told him? Because there was way more going on here than his friend had let on. Landon and Clayne wouldn’t be leaning on their boss this hard if they didn’t already have a reason to distrust him.
“I don’t believe in coincidences any more than you do, Clayne,” John said. “Someone obviously set this whole thing up, but I can assure you it wasn’t me.”
Landon and Clayne exchanged looks, though Angelo’d be damned if he could tell whether either of them believed their boss.
John swore under his breath. “I can see that nothing I say is going to sway you one way or the other. What’s important right now is getting Declan and Kendra out of that jungle in one piece. Agreed?”
“Agreed,” Landon said.
“Then let’s table the discussion of whether you trust me or not for another time, and get down to business. What do you need from me to get a search-and-rescue mission going?”
“Weapons and equipment for an eight-person team, not counting Tate, Gavin, and Brent, as well as immediate transport and entry into Costa Rica,” Landon said without hesitation. “According to Tate, politics down there are dicey, so I’m going to need you to make sure no one tries to stop us.”
John’s gaze went from Landon to Clayne to Angelo, then back again. “Eight?”
Landon didn’t flinch. “If you expect us to trust you, you need to trust us.”
John regarded Landon in silence for a long time before the corner of his mouth edged up. “I knew bringing you into the DCO was going to change everything.”
Angelo’s mouth twitched. He and Landon had a lot of conversations over the years while sitting out in the middle of nowhere wondering if they were going to die. But one topic that kept coming up over and over was Landon’s self-doubt about whether the men he led would follow him into danger. Landon might be like a brother to him, but sometimes he was freaking stupid. Men would follow him anywhere, anytime, into any kind of danger. Because he was a leader, born and bred.
“Be at Bolling in two hours,” John said. “I’ll get you, your team, and your gear down there. It will be up to you to get everyone back out.”
Landon nodded. “I’ll get them out.”
“And, Landon,” John said as they headed for the door. “When you get back, we need to talk.”
Landon just nodded.
“Eight of us?” Clayne asked when they got to the lobby.
Angelo was wondering the same thing. It couldn’t be any of the guys from the A-Team because they were all out in Monterey brushing up on their Tajik before the deployment.
“Eight,” Landon confirmed as he led the way to the parking garage.
Clayne grunted. “Whoever these other guys are, they’d better be damn good because we’re already going to be seriously outgunned.”
“Don’t worry,” Landon said. “They’re good.”
Now Angelo was even more curious.
Chapter 4
“Don’t move,” Declan whispered softly in Kendra’s ear.
She nodded, but otherwise remained motionless—as much as she could, considering she was probably freezing to death. Being submerge
d to your neck in cold water and even colder mud could do that. It didn’t help that the temperature had dropped ten degrees after the sun had gone down. But while the mud was uncomfortable as hell, it was the only thing keeping them alive right now.
The hybrids had chased them nonstop since he and Kendra had crawled out of the helicopter wreckage. It had taken every skill he’d ever learned as a forest ranger just to stay ahead of the bastards. If he hadn’t stumbled across a patch of tulip orchids and recognized them for what they were, he and Kendra would have been dead hours ago. Luckily, the hybrids’ sense of smell wasn’t much better than Declan’s, so rubbing the pungent cinnamon-scented flowers all over their skin and clothes had masked their scent.
Unfortunately, it didn’t trick the creatures entirely. Since the hybrids couldn’t seem to track them by scent, they formed a noose around the area and slowly tightened it until he and Kendra had nowhere left to run but into the stream. Instead of a shallow crossing, they found themselves hip deep in thick mud.
As the hybrids converged on their location, Declan did the only thing he could think of—he pulled Kendra against him and sank down into the slime that lined the edge of the water until only their heads were above it. Thankfully, there were enough ferns growing near the bank to hide them.
He hoped the hybrids would sniff around awhile, then leave, but almost half an hour later, there were still nearly a dozen hybrids prowling around, snarling at each other about who’d let the quarry slip through the trap.
Kendra shivered as two of the beasts moved nearer, their eyes glowing scarlet in the darkness. Declan pulled her closer underneath the water. He didn’t blame her for being terrified. Not even hanging around Tanner had prepared him for just how rabid these things could be. The reports Ivy and Landon had written didn’t do them justice.
Around them, the hybrids suddenly fell silent. A moment later, the human soldiers with them did the same.
Declan tensed. What the hell…?
A huge hybrid moved into the thin slice of moonlight along the shore barely fifteen feet from him and Kendra.
Damn.
The dark-haired hybrid on the far side of the stream was at least a half foot taller than Declan and a good fifty or sixty pounds heavier. He was more animalistic than the other hybrids, too. His upper fangs were so long they almost hung below his jawline, like some kind of freaking saber-toothed tiger. His claws were just as big, nearly as long as his fingers. But it was the thing’s eyes that were freaky. They didn’t simply glow red. They burned like fire. Hell, they even flickered.
“Where are they?” the monster demanded.
Every hybrid in the clearing ducked his head and stared at the ground—except one. The beast nearest the big guy stepped forward with a quick nod.
“They’ve slipped through our line. We’ve lost them, Marcus.”
The big hybrid—Marcus—turned to scowl at the other creature. But the monster giving the report didn’t back down and instead stood his ground like a man used to delivering bad news. If Declan had to guess, this hybrid was Marcus’s second-in-command.
Marcus looked mad enough to rip off someone’s head, but the second-in-command didn’t say anything else to provoke his boss. One of the men standing behind them wasn’t as wary.
“You didn’t cast the net wide enough to start with, Captain,” he said, taking a step forward. “These agents aren’t morons like the locals around here. They know what they’re up against, and I guarantee they made a beeline for the Panama border the second they got out of that chopper. You’ve let them get a good head start on us. If you would’ve just listened to me—”
The man never finished his thought because Marcus raked his big-ass claws across the man’s neck and upper chest in a strike so fast it was nearly impossible to follow the movement.
Kendra jerked in horror and probably would have lurched out of the mud if Declan hadn’t been holding her.
The captain regarded the man’s lifeless body coldly before turning on his second-in-command with a growl. “Widen the search grid to fifteen miles.”
“Sir, our ranks will be stretched thin if we do that,” the hybrid said. “There will be gaps they could slip through.”
The leader’s eyes narrowed as if he was contemplating whether to kill someone else today. Lucky for the lower-ranking hybrid, he decided against it. “Not if I tell the doctor to accelerate his process on the other men. Send most of the soldiers south. I want that route blocked first. I’ll send reinforcements as soon as they’re ready.”
The hybrids and their human counterparts disappeared into the jungle, leaving the dead man and the hulking hybrid captain behind. The creature scanned the surrounding jungle with his red eyes before looking right at them—or rather the ferns they were hiding underneath.
Kendra’s breath hitched. Declan squeezed her tighter. Shit. What if the monster had an intuitive sense that told him something wasn’t right, like Ivy did?
But after glancing down at the body of the man lying twisted on the ground, the hybrid turned and loped off into the darkness like the predator he was.
Declan didn’t move for a full five minutes, worried the hybrids had tricked them and were still out there waiting. Even though Kendra was shivering, she stayed where she was.
When his ears finally convinced him there wasn’t a hybrid or human within miles, he slowly eased them both out of the mud. The stuff clung to them like a living thing, refusing to let go, and he swore under his breath as he led Kendra upstream. He resisted the urge to take her in his arms and started cleaning his M4 instead. If they got caught with their weapons plugged up with mud, they were screwed. Beside him, Kendra did the same.
As soon as their essential gear was clean enough to function, they started on their rucksacks and clothes, scraping the worst of the gunk off, then using water from the stream to get the rest. On the downside, that made them wetter and colder than they were before. Within a few minutes, Kendra was shaking so badly she could barely control her hands.
“Here,” Declan said. “Let me do that.”
He worked fast, refusing to think too much about where he was putting his hands as he rinsed the mud out of Kendra’s hair and the parts of her clothes she couldn’t reach. Even the darkness couldn’t hide the fact that her lips were turning blue by the time he was done. But she didn’t complain.
“Let’s get away from the stream and find a place to hole up for the night,” he said softly. He didn’t think there were any hybrids nearby, but why chance it?
Kendra shook her head. “No. We need to keep going.”
“What we need is rest.” He didn’t tell her that hiking through the jungle for another three or four hours would likely kill her. She didn’t need to hear that. “Besides, that’ll give them some time to spread themselves out, so we can escape through those gaps they mentioned.”
When she opened her mouth to protest, Declan took her hand and led her away. She didn’t try to resist or even put on her night vision goggles—NVGs—convincing him more than ever she was starting to show early signs of hypothermia.
He grabbed another handful of orchids as they walked. The flowers were everywhere. After being submerged in mud and water, there wouldn’t be much of the scent left on them.
Declan found a thick cluster of shrubs and brambles growing near a cliff face about a mile from the stream. While Kendra stood guard—she refused to just sit there and rest—he bulled his way into the foliage until he was up against the rock. He ripped a few of the bigger plants out by the roots, then bulldozed with his shoulders until he made a space large enough for the two of them to lie down. When he was done, he looked at the space.
The plants around the makeshift shelter were at least six feet thick in every direction, including over their heads. Someone could walk right by them and never even know they were there. He tossed the orchids on the ground. At least the flowers would cover their scent enough until he could rub them both down again.
Kendra was kn
eeling where he’d left her, covering the approaches to the area like their lives depended on it. She was shivering like crazy, yet she was still stubbornly holding her weapon up, ready to shoot anything that came at them.
He shook his head as he guided her into the dark hole in the brush. He really had underestimated her. Not only had she moved quickly and quietly the entire day, but she’d also displayed a talent with her M4 that made him think she’d been doing a lot more at the DCO complex than evaluating training. When the sun went down, she’d donned her night vision goggles and kept pace with him. He was impressed she knew how to use her gear.
There wasn’t a lot of space in the little hiding spot, but there was enough room to spread his poncho on the ground. Kendra sank down wordlessly on it. Declan debated whether they should change into something drier, but neither of them had much in the way of dry clothes to change into—four days in the Costa Rican jungle during rainy season had seen to that. Instead, he stretched out beside Kendra and pulled her against his chest, hoping to warm her up with the heat of his body. He might hate the idea of cuddling with her, but if he didn’t do something, she’d freeze to death.
Her icy skin started warming up within minutes. If the situation weren’t so screwed up, he would have laughed. If he’d known that this was all he needed to do to get her hot, he would have done it years ago. Well, without the hybrids.
“I’m sorry.” Kendra’s voice was so soft it was barely audible.
Declan stiffened. “About what?”
“That I’m such a mess. I guess I’m not as good at this field thing as I thought.”
For a moment he thought she was going to apologize for failing to notice he existed for the past seven years. “You’re doing better than I did the first time I was in the field.”
She let out a tiny snort. “I doubt that. An hour ago, I couldn’t stop shivering. I’m just glad I didn’t have to actually shoot anything. I’m not sure my frozen finger could have pulled the trigger.”
“You’ve been running all day without food, it’s rained on us half a dozen times in the last six hours, and we just sat in a freezing-cold swamp for freaking ever,” Declan said. “You got cold. It can happen to anyone.”