by April Hunt
The man cursed and the van jerked right, jumping the curb before slamming into something that brought them to a complete stop.
“Fuck!” The driver spun in his seat and held his gun inches from her face. “I should shoot you right the fuck now.”
“We need to split.” One of the other men peered out the back window. “We have about fifteen seconds. What do we do with the woman?”
“Leave her.” Yanking her up by the front of her shirt, Blue Eyes hardened his gaze on her. “But don’t think for one second that this is over, Isabel.”
With a low growl, he slammed his fist into her face. Stars danced across Isa’s vision as her would-be abductors spilled out of the van. Blue Eyes, standing in the middle of the road, aimed his Glock to the right and fired off a shot.
People screamed. Shouting echoed from down the sidewalk as all four captors sprinted off in opposite directions. Now alone, Isa breathed easier, one breath cutting off another until she was on the verge of hyperventilating.
The van’s side door squealed open wider a second before a large figure stepped into view. Isa snapped her leg out and nailed the man in the jaw, whipping his head of dark hair to the side. But despite the blow, he stayed solid on his feet. Isa shifted to kick again, but this time, the man’s hands caught her ankle.
“I know I’m not your favorite person, but I think one kick’s enough, Doc. Don’t you?” Roman Steele’s dark eyes fell on her. The right side of his jaw was red where her sneaker had impacted his face. “Are you okay?”
She blinked, unable to hear him through the sudden train hurtling through her ears.
Roman climbed into the van with a faint grimace, and after producing a pocketknife from his back pocket, cut her ties. “Breathe for me, Doc. Slow it down. In for three, out for four.”
“I can’t…”
He cupped her face and held her gaze on his, his touch surprisingly gentle. “In…and out.”
She couldn’t help but obey, and by the time her ears cleared and her breathing became easier, she was all too aware of his face only inches from hers. Her gaze flickered down to his mouth.
“Are you okay?” He searched her face and slid his gaze down her body and back. “Doc? Did they hurt you?”
“Bastards split up and ran off in opposite directions. They’re in the wind.” A second man jogged over. Despite his casual T-shirt and basketball shorts, he held a gun in his hand, which he tucked into a holster at the small of his back. “I’m guessing you had something to do with them running into the evil bike rack?”
“I kicked the driver.” Isabel winced at the sharp stab of pain that went through her jaw. She’d no sooner reached to test the damage than Roman’s hand gently caught her chin and tilted her head closer for his inspection.
“One of those bastards did that?” His voice dropped.
“When I ruined their plans…whatever they’d been. They were the same guys from the Legion.” She forced herself to pull away before she did something stupid like kiss him, and instead, she shot him a hard glare. “Or I guess you’d just call them my teammates or something, right? You probably think I orchestrated this, too.”
“What makes you think these were the same bastards from the lab?”
Isa thought about Blue Eyes and the scrape of his mouth on her ear. She shivered. “Trust me. It was them. I don’t think I’ll forget that man’s voice for as long as I live.”
“What did they want with you?”
“Hell if I know. They weren’t exactly in a chatty mood.” Isa slid her gaze to the second man and back to Roman Steele, remembering the driver’s words right before she’d kicked him. They’d been tailed. “If you hadn’t been tracking the lab guys, then that means you were following me. For how long?”
He didn’t need to answer for her to know. That eerie tingle she’d been having since being released from quarantine was all thanks to the infuriating man in front of her.
“Well, I hope you got a good peep show, Mr. Steele, because your entertainment ends right now.”
“I’m not getting any enjoyment out of this. Trust me.” He stepped back and let her ease herself out from the back of the van. Her knees buckled, and he was right there, supporting her elbow. “But I’m afraid this isn’t as over as you’d like. It just won’t be happening without your knowledge anymore.”
She shot him a glare. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”
“Not really, no. I don’t give false assurances.”
Upfront and without apologies. Isa wasn’t sure if she liked that about him, or if she’d rather things be sugarcoated. One thing for certain was that the Legion theft tugged her out of her comfort zone, and this second attempt, whatever it was, ripped her so far away from that safe space that she wouldn’t be able to see it with a map and a pair of heavy-duty binoculars.
Chapter
Five
Roman had seen his fair share of ticking time bombs, but this was definitely one for the record books—and it didn’t even have anything to do with what happened a few hours ago. He’d had no choice but to bring Isabel to Iron Bars until they figured out what to do, and if the place had been empty, it would’ve been fine.
But the Steele Ops headquarters was far from secluded. It was damn near stifling with everyone in attendance except Jaz and Ryder, who were still on Frank and Maddy watch detail.
Knox leaned against the far wall, Zoey snuggled against his side, and Cade and Roman’s cousin Grace shared the chair on the opposite side. But the fact that his two favorite women were on opposite ends of the room didn’t settle Roman’s unease at all. It just put them in position to attack that much more effectively.
Like velociraptors.
And judging by the gleam in their eyes, it was only a matter of time before the big pounce happened.
Sitting on the couch, Isa’s gaze soaked up everything from Liam’s tech toys to the weapons cage tucked in the back corner. Up until this point, they’d always been careful to keep the Steele Ops inner sanctum away from outside eyes, but the bastards from the lab hadn’t given them much of a choice.
Roman got up from his chair and paced. “If these bastards already have the virus, why do they need you?”
Isa folded her arms across her chest as she glared. “I asked them, but they were a little too busy dishing out threatening ultimatums to bother giving me an answer.”
“There’s no reason to get snarky, Doc. I’m just trying to help here.”
“You haven’t even seen snark yet. And help? How can you stand there and say that with a straight face? You’ve been following me—judging by the itchy neck I’ve had for the last twenty-four hours—since I got out of quarantine. I’m not delusional enough to think that you’ve kept tabs on me for my safety.”
“Things change.”
Isabel scoffed, muttering, “So glad my almost-kidnapping finally convinced you that I’m not a bioterrorist.”
Zoey and Grace shared a look before locking their sights on him and grinning.
Fuck. That was never a good sign.
Knox cleared his throat, interjecting. “What did these assholes say to you in that van? Anything?”
Isabel pulled her glare away from Roman. “The big one, the one who shot Frank, accused me of not learning my lesson, but I don’t know what lesson I was supposed to learn.”
Grace hmmed in thought. “They obviously see you as a threat to their overall plan, because it’s not like they need you to make the virus more deadly, right? It’s deadly all on its own.”
Isabel nodded. “At this point, our only saving grace is that FC-5 isn’t airborne, but that doesn’t mean that it can’t wipe out entire communities before anyone’s had a chance to identify it. That’s what makes it so deadly. Patients are most contagious when there are few to no symptoms, and when they finally do manifest, they’re like a dozen other illnesses, the common cold included. By the time it presents itself as a hemorrhagic disorder, it’s often too late to quarantine.”
/> Roman grunted. “It’s an ideal compound to use for bioterrorism. Not well known to the public. Not curable. Besides Tru Tech, what labs have access to FC-5 samples?”
“One. A GHO-sponsored lab in Switzerland somewhere, but as far as I know they’re simply storing it, not actively testing. I hate to say it, but as far as viruses go, it’s not one of the sexy ones to people at the GHO.”
Zoey cocked up an eyebrow. “Viruses can be sexy?”
“Not in the Magic Mike way, no. But most of their funding—and their attention—go to the bigger, well-known viruses. Smallpox. Ebola. Things that make appearances in big ways. Because there’s only been two documented outbreaks of FC-5, we barely get a spittle of funds sent our way.”
“But it’s deadlier?”
“Very much so.” Isabel nodded. “Ebola has a fifty percent mortality rate. FC-5 hangs around ninety-five.”
Everyone cursed, dwelling on the shit-storm hovering over their heads, but there was one other thing nagging Roman that he couldn’t quite shake. “You said the lab in Switzerland is only storing FC-5, which means you’re the only one actively studying it.”
Isabel said after thinking about it, “I guess you can say that.”
“So we can safely assume that you’re probably the reigning global expert. There probably isn’t a strand of that viral code that you don’t know. And you said it yourself, you’ve been making some big breakthroughs recently.”
“I wouldn’t call them breakthroughs, but it does look more hopeful than it did…” Isa’s face paled. “They don’t want me interfering with whatever they have planned. They don’t want me finding a cure.”
“Because if their intention is to sell it, or even if it’s to use it themselves, they don’t want someone around who can make it as harmless as a case of the sniffles.” Roman turned to his brothers. “Until we nab these bastards, we keep her safe. We can do that in our sleep. Hell, we have a bunker right here.”
Concern showed on every line of Isa’s face until the mention of her temporary relocation.
“Wait, you expect me to stay here?” Lifting her pretty brown eyes, she locked Roman in a hard, unflinching stare. “I’ll be damned if I hide away and do exactly what those bastards want me to do. They’re threatened by my work on FC-5? Then that’s exactly what I’m going to keep doing.”
“You can’t expect us to let you just walk out of here.”
“You can keep me safe in your sleep, right? You guys do what you do so that I can keep doing what I do. But one thing I won’t do is hide.”
“It’s not hiding, Doc. It’s surviving.”
“It’s giving them what they want, and it’s not happening.” Isabel stood and got within inches of Roman’s face. “Did I not paint a clear enough picture of what could happen if these people decide to expose the public to FC-5? I don’t exactly want to be stuffed in the back of another van—or worse—but I also don’t want to see innocent people dying on the ten o’clock news.”
Roman clenched his jaw until it ached.
Finally, Knox intervened. “No one’s putting you into hiding, Isa. I actually think keeping you visible will work in our favor and possibly make these assholes climb out from under their rocks.”
Roman snapped his attention to his brother. “You mean to use her as bait. No fucking way.”
“Come on, man. You know me better than that. But you have to agree it would make them uneasy wondering why she’s not more concerned with them. It’ll make them nervous…and nervous people make mistakes.”
“They also lash out,” Roman pointed out.
“I’m willing to risk it,” Isabel interjected.
Roman knew when he was beat. A quick glance around the room solidified that Isabel Santiago had already hauled his family and team firmly to her side of the line.
“Fine.” He growled. “But you’re not going topside until we’ve had time to make some kind of security arrangements…both for a personal detail and for Tru Tech. That means you’re staying here until we have both sufficiently in place.”
“Fine.” She folded her arms across her chest. “I hope you work fast because I have every intention of spending a full day at the Legion tomorrow.”
Zoey jumped to her feet. “I’ll go make up a room. You can pretty much have your pick of which one you want, but I’m warning you, they’re all pretty much the same. Bland.”
At the sight of Isabel turning to follow, Roman grabbed the abandoned ice pack on the table and, calling her name, tossed it her way. “Keep this on, or you’ll wake up tomorrow with one hell of a swollen lip.”
“Got punched a lot, did you?” She shot him a coy smirk. “Actually, you don’t need to answer that, because I already know the answer. You have a very punchable face.”
“So each of my brothers have told me on multiple occasions.”
Next to him, Liam barely swallowed an amused chuckle. “Many, many occasions.” At Roman’s scowl, his youngest brother shrugged. “Just agreeing with you, dude.”
“Well, stop.”
Grace left the room with Isabel and Zoey, and Roman couldn’t help but stare in the direction they’d gone.
“So how does it feel?” Knox asked, his mouth twitched into a smirk.
“How does what feel?”
“Getting your ass handed to you by a beautiful woman. Tickles a little bit, huh?”
“You tell me. Zoey’s got you wrapped around her little finger.”
Knox grinned wider, not falling for his bait. “Yeah, she does. And her lips. Her hips. Hell, her entire body.”
Cade smacked his hands to his ears. “Stop! Fuck! Do not say anything else about my baby sister!”
Roman ignored his brothers and friend and stalked toward the gym, where he could whale on something without getting in trouble with his mom.
Isabel Santiago, if he wasn’t careful, could most definitely hand him his ass and probably take great pleasure in doing so. That shouldn’t intrigue him, but it did.
* * *
Isa startled awake, nearly jumping out of both her skin and the unfamiliar bed. With her heart in her throat, it took a few moments for her to collect her bearings, the events of the last twenty-four hours slowly easing their way back: being stalked, being tossed in the back of a moving van, and then being whisked away to a secret underground bunker beneath a distillery just off the Potomac River.
Somehow her mundane, unchanging routine had been knocked on its side and flipped around, and even though she couldn’t directly pin it on Roman Steele, he served as a good target.
Isa reluctantly slipped out of bed, thankful to Zoey for the extra set of clothes, and padded barefoot into the hall. With no one around to guide her toward coffee, she used her questionable sense of direction to find the kitchen and once again was taken in by the industrial homeliness of the Steele Ops common area.
Polished cement floors and red brick walls complemented the warm tans and leather-accented furnishings, and colorful abstract artwork gave the sprawling underground space pops of color. It was the perfect blend of rustic home and modern industrial…and then you looked to the left and it was like stepping into one of the situation rooms you see on television.
Instead of artwork, computer screens took up nearly the entirety of the far wall, and a large cage nestled in the corner held weapons and unrecognizable high-tech toys. Steele Ops had a forward operating base smack in the heart of downtown Alexandria, and the people sipping on boutique whiskey sours above their heads hadn’t the slightest clue.
Isa helped herself to the still warm pot of coffee and, clutching her mug, wandered the underground halls. Music drifted down the corridor. She followed the sound and the vibrating floor and found its source in a gym that made her own community center look puny.
On the left, a modified boxing ring took center stage, and a small army of treadmills and a rower commandeered the right. Isa stepped around a garden of suspended heavy bags and came to a dead stop.
Roman Steele, hair
pulled back into a short ponytail clipped at the base of his neck, sat on a bench, sweat rolling down his bare chest. Faint red welts covered his knuckles as he unwrapped sparring tape from his hands and flexed his fingers.
Whatever he’d been doing down here, he’d been doing it for a while.
Isabel studied his hands. Large and calloused, they were obviously adept at taking and giving a beating, but she couldn’t help but remember how gentle they’d been after her almost abduction. He’d shocked them both when he’d palmed her cheek, and then she’d shocked herself by hoping he’d lean in and kiss her.
Ever since she lost her fiancé, she’d turned off the need for male companionship. Oliver Park had been her ticket to a love like her grandparents had had, and he took that with him the day he died. Standing there wondering what Roman Steele’s hands would feel like on parts of her body that aren’t her face wasn’t the right way to honor him.
Isabel chastised her raging libido just as Roman leaned over, stretching his legs out in front of him. Actually, his one leg and his prosthesis.
Roman’s left below-the-knee amputation took her off guard, but not because she wasn’t familiar with them. In the Army and stationed at Walter Reed’s research facility, she’d seen her fair share of amputations. She just hadn’t known Roman was an amputee.
He removed his prosthesis, a brand she couldn’t pinpoint, and slipped off his sock. The thin piece of nylon fabric protected the sensitive skin from being rubbed raw, but Roman winced as he rubbed his stump. The compression stocking obviously wasn’t working.
Roman’s head snapped up. The second his dark eyes lasered in on her, he replaced his grimace with a determined mask of blankness. “Can I do something for you, Doc?”
“Can I do something for you?” As fast as she’d run away from bedside medicine, sometimes old habits were hard to kick.
Roman’s face looked anything but pleased. “See a lot of BTKs working in the lab?”