by Dawn Ryder
“Something wrong with backstage?”
Thais turned and swept Kirkland from head to toe. He had on oversized clothing and a hat tipped down over his forehead while diamonds winked at her from the rings on his fingers.
“I’m not the sort of girl who gets summoned,” she told him softly.
Kirkland tilted his head to one side. “Bet you come running when your rich daddy calls.”
Thais smiled brightly, but added a sultry look. “I love my daddy. He is never boring.” She started to move past him. “That’s why I answer his invitations.”
Kirkland reached out and gripped her upper arm.
He wasn’t anywhere near as impressive as Dunn …
Thais chided herself. She knew better than to be distracted.
“Oh my,” she purred. “Strong-arm tactics. How very … predictable.”
She snapped her fingers, and Zane stepped into sight. His suit was impeccable, the little clear plastic pig tail wire in his ear adding to his look.
“Is Dunn Bateson more to your liking?” Kirkland asked as he took his hand off her.
Thais offered him a delicate shrug. “Dunn is delightfully rough around the edges. And before you think I mean spanking and flogging, I don’t play games anymore.”
“You might like to play those games with me.” Kirkland was taking shelter in his bad-boy persona. “Come on, girl, what’s it going to take?”
Thais offered him a smile of encouragement. She moved close, pressing against him as she flattened her hand over the gun he had tucked into his drawers.
“Hmmm … you might have potential.”
She was pulling away before he really got the chance to touch her. Thais dipped her fingers into the front of her low-cut dress and withdrew a business card. There was only a number on it.
“Text me if you have something interesting to do,” she said.
She slipped away, feeling him watching her.
There.
That was how a mission should go. Focused and precise.
There was no room for emotional bleed-through.
Period.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Being underground meant Jenna had no sense of time. The temperature stayed chilly and constant. The days of inactivity meant she’d slept too much.
But Dare was suffering from having been on duty.
She eased out of the bunk, grabbing handfuls of clothing on her way to the door and out into the other part of the shelter where she could sort through it with the help of a light. Easing the door of the bedroom closed, she enjoyed a little spark of satisfaction when she succeeded and didn’t hear Dare moving.
There was an undeniable ache in her passage.
It made her grin as she dressed.
Sam would approve.
She ended up smiling wryly as she remembered her compatriot. There was a really big hole in her life where Sam fit perfectly. He’d been the buddy she could commiserate with and expect to kick her in the ass when she was being a wimp.
“Is that coffee?”
Dare was eyeing the little pot she had on the range.
“Depends,” she answered, “on your standards for what you apply the label of coffee to.”
“I was a squid, so, pretty low.” He went around her and poured a mug full before leaning back on the counter and contemplating her.
Her belly did a little flip as she realized it was their first, true, morning after.
“So, is there a plan?” she asked. “I mean, not that I’m not enjoying the unique experience of staying in a Cold War−era location.
Dare offered her a half grin. “Vintage coffee, too.”
“The word is ‘aged,’” Jenna muttered. “And I’m pretty sure that’s only a good thing when applied to wine.”
“Beats camping in the riverbed,” he offered as he tipped his mug up and emptied it.
Jenna suddenly choked as her mind offered up an image of them in the sand. Dare raised an eyebrow as she felt her cheeks turning red. It didn’t take him very long to follow her thinking.
“Agreed,” he muttered as he placed the mug in the sink. “The sand would have been an issue.”
He offered her a wink before disappearing into the bedroom.
A wink.
Jenna sipped at her coffee for a moment while she savored the experience.
You are so never getting over him …
She wasn’t, and honestly it didn’t bother her a bit.
“I never got it until I met you.”
His words rose from her memory. So tender and so completely putting the last nail in … well, whatever it was they were doing.
Was it a relationship? What type? Lovers? Fellow addicts?
All Jenna really knew was that for her, it was everything.
So there was no point in thinking too long and hard about it.
Live in the moment, girl. Sam would have agreed.
* * *
“Kirkland has his network looking for you.”
Ricky grinned in spite of the fact that Kagan was calling the shots. At least the section leader knew how to toss in some fun with the work.
Kagan tossed him a phone. “It’s clean.”
“Even from you?”
Kagan nodded. “Just remember, you don’t need Kirkland left free if you want to get on with setting up a life for yourself.”
Ricky shrugged. “I know how to survive.”
Kagan offered him a slip of paper. “That’s one of Kirkland’s phones. He’s got some of the area fight-club owners looking for you. Even offered a bounty.”
“How much?”
“Ten grand,” Kagan replied.
Ricky punched in the number. It rang a few times before Kirkland picked up.
“Who the fuck is calling me so early?”
“Heard you were looking for me,” Ricky let his Irish brogue out. “But if you’d rather I hang up…”
“No … Fuck … Give me a second.”
Ricky swallowed his snickers, hearing the sounds of women muttering as Kirkland got out of his bed. He hoped the guy was buck-assed naked, too. There was nothing better than catching a guy with his shorts down.
“I was looking for you alright” Kirkland was trying to sound congenial. “Who gave you my number?”
“Since you only offered ten grand for him to call you, I gave him fifteen and told him to forget he saw me,” Ricky said. “I did a lot of business with your daddy. Good business. What the fuck are you doing putting a bounty out on me?”
“I heard you were top notch,” Kirkland came back. “Even heard you were dead.”
Ricky chuckled. “Not even close. Sullivans don’t die easy. Tyler Martin found that out.”
“He was a prick.”
“So get on with telling me what sort of business you have in mind.” Ricky shot Kagan a solid stare. “I’ve plenty to do now that Tyler isn’t in my way with his fucking FBI network.”
“I need help with a Shadow Ops team that’s crawling up my ass,” Kirkland elaborated. “You’ll remember Dare Servant.”
“I know him,” Ricky answered. “Guess you are your daddy’s boy all the way. No way you’d have a Shadow Ops team looking at you if you didn’t have something stinky buried. What are you dealing?”
There was a pause. “Meet me and I’ll show you. In fact, you might be just the sort of man I could use as a partner.”
“Don’t kiss my ass,” Ricky grunted. “I prefer pussy.”
Kirkland chuckled on the other end of the line. “It will be worth your time. And there will be plenty of pussy.”
Ricky let Kirkland sweat for a couple of seconds. “Alright. It’s a deal.”
He listened to the details before killing the call. Kagan was contemplating him with an expression that was almost pleased.
“So.” Ricky looked at Kagan. “What’s the deal with Kirkland? Forewarned is forearmed.”
Kagan’s eyebrow lifted. “Don’t forget who I am, Sullivan. I won’t work over like most of
the people you encounter. However, in this case, I want you to know what we’re looking for.”
* * *
Dare used a towel to wipe their fingerprints off every surface in the bunker before they left. Once outside, he sealed the door, leaving the bunker in darkness just like they’d found it.
“I’ve got to check in,” he offered. “See what has happened while we’ve been off-grid.”
“Lead on.”
He caught her up against him instead. “I have to finish this case, Jenna. What I said, when I dropped those pictures on the bunk next to you, I meant it.”
“Kirkland needs to die,” she agreed.
“I’m going to do my best to make sure he gets locked far away from his lavish lifestyle, in a box, just as he does to those girls. No quick death for him.”
He was brushing the hair back from her face. His eyes shimmering with emotion. It touched her so very deeply. “I understand,” she offered sincerely.
He bit back a word of profanity as he backed up. He was fighting with something, struggling to deal with the same surge of unexpected emotions she was.
“You don’t have to say anything.”
“I sure as hell do.” Dare caught her up against him again. “The truth is, I’ve spent so much time telling myself I wouldn’t go and let myself fall in love with anyone, now, I haven’t the first idea how to start.”
Jenna reached up and placed her hand against the side of his face. He went still, their gazes locking. In that moment, she honestly didn’t know where he stopped and she began. It was like they were one entity. Separating would mean death because they simply couldn’t survive without each other.
“You know how to start…” she whispered. “You learned how, from your father.”
He closed his eyes, savoring the feeling of her hand on his face. When he lifted his eyelids, his eyes were shimmering with unshed tears.
“Let’s live in the moment, Dare Servant.”
His lips curved. “I’ll do my best to stay out of the ‘dick’ zone.”
She laughed as he pulled away and started around the embankment for the river water. The sand was hard to walk through, the bugs rising up from where they’d been laying in the shallow water to try and feast on her unprotected arms and neck, and, honestly, she didn’t think she’d ever been happier in her life.
* * *
Ricky let out a whistle. “Now I am impressed.”
Kirkland was smirking, enjoying being the recipient of praise. “Anything you want…” Kirkland spread his arms out wide to indicate the girls standing in the shadows of the warehouse. “They’ll do it.”
“You’re a fucking slave trader…” Ricky contemplated the girls watching him.
It made him sick.
And he’d done a fair share of messed up shit in his life.
Murder.
Extortion.
Prostitution.
But fuck. This was different. He knew the look on the girls faces because his mother had ended up with a similar soulless glow in her eyes when she’d been forced to trade her body for enough food to feed him.
“What’s the business deal?” Ricky looked back at Kirkland. “Nothing personal, but I’m a fighter, not a pimp.”
“I need Dare Servant off my ass.” Kirkland offered Ricky a stack of pictures. “They bugged my Malibu house and have stuck to me since. It’s costing me a shit load of money every day I can’t have the girls working. There’s a firefighter, too. He’s the one who can’t keep his mouth shut. I need him gone. Permanently.”
“That’s more my style,” Ricky muttered as he flipped through the pictures. “Who’s the girl?”
“She was supposed to be catering my party. Ran into Servant’s team but here’s the fun part.” Kirkland pulled out one of the pictures from farther down in the pile. “Seems Servant’s sheets aren’t as clean as he’d like me to believe.”
“That’s how you get him,” Ricky looked at the picture of Dare kissing Jenna. “She’s his soft spot.”
“I heard you tried that with Bram Magnus and failed.”
Ricky looked up at Kirkland. “You don’t know shit. I was after Tyler Martin. That ass left me to rot in a Mexican prison. You think I can’t throw a grenade and kill at least one member of Saxon Hale’s team? I wasn’t after them. No one fucks over a Sullivan. It was a lesson Tyler needed to learn and as you’ve learned, making sure that Shadow ops team doesn’t have a burning need to find me is a win-win for me.”
Kirkland slowly nodded.
“Half a million upfront.” Ricky wrote down an account number and offered it to Kirkland.
“That’s steep,” Kirkland complained as he took the paper and handed it to Mack.
“So is bribing federal agents,” Ricky argued. “But hell, if you think you can find her”—he held up the picture of Jenna facing the cameras during her press conference—“show me how it’s done.”
“Can you find her?” Mack demanded.
Ricky spread his arms wide. “I can. But it will cost you a full million up front because I don’t like having to waste my time begging for a job. My reputation gets me plenty of offers. I killed Tyler Martin, head of security to Carl Davis.” Ricky let out a low whistle as he started toward the door. “Take the offer or leave it.”
He stopped though, near the door, looking at a girl crouched in the corner. There were still tears in her eyes, telling him she was newly arrived, her dreams of a wonderful life freshly smashed by reality.
“And I want her…” Ricky reached down and grabbed her hand. He turned and looked back at Kirkland. “Any problem with my terms?”
He had the pictures in his left hand. The girl stood up, trembling as she looked at her shoes.
“You do the job, I don’t give a shit what it costs,” Kirkland answered. “Just don’t leave her alive to run her mouth.”
“I’ve got plans for her mouth,” Ricky answered with a smirk. “She looks new to the game. I’ll break her in for you.”
Kirkland grunted as Ricky whistled on his way out the door. The girl didn’t take much coaxing. She was happy to go, clearly understanding that one man was better than what the other girls faced nightly on the docks as Kirkland ran an underground brothel.
He’d done a good deed.
His mother would have been proud of him.
And his father … well … Ricky heard his phone ding with an incoming message as he drove away, proving Kirkland had sent the money. All in all, he’d done the Sullivan name proud for the day.
* * *
“Want me to kill him?” Mack asked.
Kirkland was pissed.
But that didn’t mean he was going to be reckless.
No, that was the real difference between success and failure. He turned to look at Mack. “We need him to find the girl and draw Servant out. Send the money. It will be worth it if we can get back to normal operations.”
Kirkland paced a few spaces, looking at the girls. A couple of them smiled, offering him a warm welcome because they wanted an escape.
He didn’t want another man’s leavings.
It brought Thais to mind.
Now there was a bitch worth breaking. He enjoyed the mental distraction of getting her exactly where he wanted her.
Hell, she wanted danger? He might just bring her along as a little entertainment when Sullivan delivered Jenna.
It would certainly be a night to remember.
* * *
“Going in” seemed to mean traveling in four different directions, under overpasses and across marshy land.
Dare looked back at her at one point, grinning at the look on her face.
“Come on, baby, you can do it.”
The enthusiasm in his voice made her want to strangle him. She opted for a shrug instead. “Thought you told me not to work my backside off.”
He pulled her past him and gave her a soft smack on her rump in reply. “We’ll have ice cream later.”
The sun was starting to sink. Dare
caught her looking at the sky.
“Not much further,” he offered.
They’d hitched a ride at some point, but Dare had been taking her over land for the better part of the afternoon. Florida had lots of marshland with trees. They stayed out of the deeper water as they skirted the Everglades.
“Ready to go in?” he asked at last.
Jenna nodded, following him toward a boarded-up gas station. The length of road was crumbling along the edges, the moist ground shifting and undermining it.
Inside, it wasn’t much better. There was an inch of dust on everything, and she stayed near the center of the floor because the spiderwebs along the walls made her skin crawl. Dare made it around what had once been a counter and reached down.
“This way.”
Jenna peeked around and looked at the staircase he’d exposed. There was pipe railing on either side because it was a steep one with lighting at the bottom.
“The full special agent experience I see,” she said.
Below them there was a complex. Dare secured the door before following her.
“Nice to see you again, Ms. Henson.”
Kagan was leaning against a wall watching the entrance into the area. “You know the rest of the team.”
Greer, Zane, and Vitus were all present. They were clustered around a table that had pictures and maps spread out on it.
“What the hell?” Dare growled.
She was suddenly being shoved behind Dare as he noticed a man against the far wall.
“Told you he wouldn’t like it any better than I did,” Vitus remarked.
“I’m heartbroken,” the man against the far wall informed Dare.
“Not heartbroken enough,” Dare responded. “Because it’s still beating.”
“By my choice,” Kagan informed Dare. “We need him. And before you tell me why we don’t, listen in. He’s got a connection with Kirkland and even brought us a witness. A live one.”
Dare was still rigid. The guy in the corner was enjoying it, too. He had a devilish charm to him and a mop of blond hair. His square jaw had a few scars on it to prove the guy lived rough, and the way he was leaning against the wall, enjoying the way Dare was glaring at him, told Jenna the guy enjoyed his lifestyle.
“Ricky Sullivan,” he supplied as he shifted his gaze from Dare to her. “Kirkland hired me to kill you.”