“You’re a little late to step in with the concern, aren’t you?” Connor asked.
Jana turned to Connor. She put a hand on his stomach. It was a gentle touch but it carried a loud warning for him to behave. “Now is not the time for this. We’ve all had a long day.”
“Understatement.” Shane offered his insight as he stepped to the edge of the porch and looked into the darkening night.
“We need to regroup and talk, and I’m volunteering your kitchen.” Holt pointed toward the inside of the house.
The plan made sense to Connor but there was one man missing. “Where’s Cam?”
“At the charity offices.”
“Keep him there.” The guy needed a break but, knowing Cam, he wouldn’t agree to one. If Connor assigned Cam somewhere, Cam stayed until the job was done.
And there was no question this case was not over. Men crept around everywhere.
Jana made a face. “Doesn’t he need some sleep?”
“No.” But Connor liked her show of concern for the men.
She’d always been like that. It matched her caring nature to take in strays from the team. She’s find extra pillows and make them comfortable, never knowing almost all of them had served time in the military or black ops and could sleep in a tree, if necessary.
After one last lingering look in Jana’s direction, Marcel turned and went inside. Connor found the man totally annoying but didn’t say it out loud. From the look of Shane’s and Holt’s glares into Marcel’s back, Connor guessed he wasn’t alone.
One by one they walked into the house. Connor hooked an arm around her and guided them to the doorway. He wanted them out of sight as soon as possible even though he sensed the attackers were long gone. They snuck away somehow and he doubted they’d return immediately after their successful escape.
She dug in her heels and stopped right inside the door. “Connor, wait.”
Holt turned around and Connor pulled the door shut behind them but stopped walking. Maybe the touch of panic in her voice did it. Connor wasn’t sure but whatever it was had him and Holt rushing to give her attention.
She put a hand on Connor’s arm and the other on Holt’s. “That was him.”
“Who?” Holt asked.
“The one on the left.” She leaned in, clearly trying to tell them something.
Connor had no idea what. “You lost me.”
“On the porch, the taller one.” Her words tripped over each other as she raced to get it all out. “He’s the man who called you. He was the leader of my kidnapping.”
Connor wanted to reassure her and tell her to calm down, but the information had his head spinning. “The blond guy?”
“Good. Nicely done, Jana.” Holt grabbed his phone as if he was ready to search the second Connor gave him a name. “Who was it?”
Connor ran through the mental profile he made for the guy. Calling up an image, he tried to make the guy he saw fit in with a former case. Nothing came to him. “I have no idea.”
Her head slammed back and her eyes grew wide. “What are you talking about?”
“I’ve never seen him before. He doesn’t register at all.” Connor knew that was true. He’d seen awful things but he didn’t block memories. If anything, they tended to flood his mind and he had to relive them.
He’d cataloged every case in his head and flipped through them all now.
Again, nothing.
Jana’s fingernails dug into his forearm. “That’s not possible. He talked as if he knew you.”
That didn’t make any sense. “I’ve got a good memory. Not as good as Shane’s, but still, it’s pretty strong. That guy is not from my past, at least not in any way I remember.”
She glanced at Holt before going back to Connor. “That man even knew we were separated.”
“We aren’t.” Connor didn’t bother to whisper that time.
She threw up her hands. “Use whatever word you want.”
“Married.” That was the only word that applied and if someone tried to say something else, especially Marcel, Connor would stop that nonsense and fast.
“You’re being difficult.”
“Nothing new there,” Davis said, his voice breaking in then fading out again.
Holt got their attention when he shifted and reached behind Jana to lock the door. But his attention stayed on Connor. “Let me get this straight—so now people you don’t know want you dead?”
“Scary, isn’t it?” The news shouldn’t have been a surprise. These cases tended to spiderweb and touch everything. This leader could be anyone, maybe even someone Connor didn’t know existed until now.
But the answer seemed wrong. The guy who arranged this took a deeply personal angle. Attacking Jana was a direct dig at Connor. It also seemed like something someone with a vendetta would do.
The news still circled Connor’s brain but Holt moved forward. “Seems to me we have two possibilities. Either this guy was a behind-the-scenes type or—”
“Or...” Jana filled in the blank. “He answers to someone else who does know you. Someone we can’t track because we don’t know his identity.”
Davis exhaled and the comm crackled. “More good news.”
“Maybe your friend Drake can help,” Holt said.
“Looks like we have some work to do before he gets here.” At least they had a direction to follow. Connor could remember the two faces he just saw. With him, the team, Jana and Drake, they had a chance at figuring this all out.
But he had a new problem. The third attacker, the guy under the tarp, could be the key. And not seeing that guy’s face made Connor nervous.
Chapter Eleven
Luc drummed his fingers on the steering wheel as he watched Rich jog across the open field toward the waiting sedan. With the car turned off the interior remained deathly quiet, which matched Luc’s foul mood. And he wasn’t the only one. Bruce sat in the backseat without making a sound as the five-minute waiting mark passed.
After they’d held up under Marcel Lampari’s porch they’d made a fast break for the hill behind Marcel’s house, but not until Connor and company went inside. The fall back on Plan B was unexpected. So was the lack of return gunfire from inside the house.
None of that explained Rich’s notable absence from the operation and the escape.
A warm breeze slipped through the open window and the minutes after sunset cast most of the landscape in darkness. The light Rich carried cut through the night. It moved forward until it blinked out and the front passenger-side door opened.
“I could have predicted that tactical response would fail.” Rich shook his head as he slammed the door and stared in the direction he just traveled. “Too wide open. Too unpredictable.”
Luc turned on the overhead light and waited for the man to shut up before unloading. “Where were you?”
Rich shrugged. “At the side of the house, as ordered. I sat under that tarp and didn’t move. What a waste of time.”
He knew full well that wasn’t the plan. When Luc and Bruce headed for the porch, Rich should have broken cover and come around the other side. His task was simple: hang back and storm in, taking out the Corcoran men as they stepped outside. But Connor showed up, either without the woman or he had her hidden well enough that Luc didn’t see her.
But none of that was the point. “We needed backup and you disappeared.”
Rich fiddled with the button for the window. With the car off, each tap produced a click but the window didn’t move. “Then your friend here shouldn’t have shot my partner. I become risk averse when I don’t have someone I trust watching my back.”
Luc glanced into the backseat. He expected a reaction from Bruce but the man just sat there. His gun lay on the seat next to him but he didn’t reach for it.
“You want to help me here?” Luc asked him.
“Rich knows he messed up.” Bruce stared at the other man, daring him to deny it. “He was trying to prove a point. Now that he’s taken his stand he’ll conform. Correct?”
Rich’s eyes narrowed. “I didn’t—”
“But you’re both missing the point.” Bruce brushed something off his dark shirt. Something it seemed only he could see. “There is a bright spot in all of this.”
Luc shook his head. “Not that I can see.”
“Which is?” Rich asked at the same time.
“We have a number and we know faces.” Bruce delivered the comment then stopped. When the other men stared without saying a word, he continued. “In addition to Lampari we have three from this Corcoran team staked out in the house and the woman, who had to be there somewhere. There’s no way a man like Connor Bowen would dump her somewhere unless he has access to a bunker, and I doubt that.”
The replay only made Luc’s anger rise. “We should have been able to handle that number of men and subdue Connor. This could be over.”
It qualified as a missed opportunity in Luc’s view. The boss expected results. Failure was not an option. If that meant taking out Rich like Bruce had with Reno, Luc would do it.
There was no way he was paying for this mess. He already had a scapegoat. That plan needed one step, one word from him, and it would be in motion.
“While it’s not easy to collect information on the Corcoran Team, my intel says there are more players,” Bruce said, talking as if Luc had never spoken. “We may have gotten lucky dealing with only three.”
Rich laughed. “One or two more. I still like those odds.”
As if Luc needed further proof that hiring Rich had been a major misstep. The man worked on his own schedule and the results frequently turned out sloppy. He didn’t reason anything through.
The only way to end his position was with a bullet, but Luc needed him right now. “If you think the odds are even, you haven’t been paying attention.”
Rich wedged his body into the corner and leaned against the door. “Meaning?”
This part should be obvious, even to Rich and his muddled brain. “Look at the body count. There’s not even a paper cut on Connor’s side.”
For about the hundredth time since this operation started Luc regretted not taking a knife to Jana when he had the chance. Injuring her, making her bleed or at least injuring her so she was unable to run would have made the tracking easier. Would have slowed her down and increased Connor’s vulnerability.
This is what happened when he decided to be nice. The last time Luc made that mistake he had to double back and clean up his mess. Let it slide when a kid snuck in and saw a transfer that wasn’t supposed to be happening and you ended up with a potentially chatty witness. Scare the crap out of him, threaten to take out his family in the nastiest way possible, then agree not to follow through when the kid begged and you took a big risk. Find out he ran home and told his father and then the whole family had to die.
But that’s what fire was for. Luc didn’t make the rules. He just followed them.
That’s where it all started. The boss kept his fingerprints out of the official records and helped the evidence disappear. Someone else went to prison for the family massacre and ever since, Luc had a debt to repay. Connor would serve as the final payment.
Rich turned in his seat and faced Bruce. “What’s the next step?”
The subtle shift in power bothered Luc. This was his operation. Bruce stepping in and giving orders confused the division of labor. Also threatened to make Luc irrelevant, and that couldn’t happen. Not when Bruce had been handpicked by the boss and his reports could say anything.
Luc jumped in. He had to bring the attention back to him before the leadership role slipped away from him. “Same as it’s always been. Grab Jana and if we can get Connor, take him, as well. Otherwise, she’s a lure to catch him.”
Rich scoffed. “I still don’t get why we can’t just blow up the house.”
Luc did like fire, but not this time. “The boss wants Connor alive but messed up over his missing wife. One mistake with fire and we lose everything.”
“This is the same boss I’m not allowed to meet.”
“Exactly.” Luc refused to have this argument again. You’d think the man would learn since the last round ended with his friend getting a bullet in the brain.
“We go in tonight.” Bruce’s bored tone suggested the entire conversation amounted to a waste of his time. “Wait until they’re comfortable and feeling attack-proof in the bunkhouse where she’s been staying. Clearly she’s back there now.”
“Let’s storm the place now. Shoot first and collect our money.”
That appeared to be Rich’s answer for everything. No wonder the military gave him a one-way ticket out well before his service should have been up. He was too volatile. Too wild for Luc’s taste.
“A little finesse is needed,” Bruce explained. “We have dead bodies strewn all across the desert. Someone is going to notice soon.”
Luc knew their troubles reached beyond the dead. The desert would clean up some of that mess for them. Animals and weather would cover tracks and drag bones.
Shutting down a charity that should be up and running was a different story. “And sooner or later someone is going to want to get in touch with the charity and not be able to get a person, and we’ll have a mess. All it takes is one nosy sort to get the ball rolling before we can finish the job.”
Bruce picked up his gun and placed it on his lap. “We slip in tonight and take her out of her bed in the bunkhouse, like I wanted to originally instead of grabbing her at the office.”
Wrong answer.
Now Bruce appeared as clueless as the idiot next to Luc in the front seat. “I’m pretty sure we’ll be tripping over Connor if we do.”
“What happened to them being separated?” Rich asked.
Bruce shrugged. It was one of the few moves he made since he sat down. “Looks like someone forgot to tell Connor.”
Which was why they needed a clearer plan. Preferably one that involved a quick snatch. Luc used some common sense to put the brakes on the odd bromance blooming in the car. “So we wait.”
“No.” Bruce picked up his gun. “We go in at three.”
Rich clapped his hands. “And now we have a plan.”
* * *
T
wo
hours
later
, night settled in and so did Jana. She’d showered in the space she’d used as her temporary Utah home while Connor and Holt talked strategy outside. Then Connor disappeared over to Marcel’s house and Cam took over what she guessed was the equivalent of wife guard duty.
She wanted to have a clue as to what passed between Connor and Marcel. Knowing Connor’s mood, she assumed it wasn’t good. He’d been furious that the gunfire followed them to the house. Jana got him out of the family room before he abandoned his control. She had to because Connor’s team seemed fine with letting him tear Marcel apart.
That was her fault. She’d stoked the jealousy without meaning to. The decision made sense in her head, or it had at the time. Other than the house with Connor, she didn’t have a home base or an old family homestead like most people did. Her father had moved them around, which kept her relationship roots shallow.
Looking now, the poor judgment behind her Utah choice hit her and she slumped down on the temporary bed she’d been using for months. She suddenly hated the one-room apartment. It stood for everything she’d done wrong.
She’d acted impulsively and now dealt with bouts of regret. She felt naive and stupid. Finding space, running to Utah instead of any other place, only widened the gap between her and Connor. They loved each other and talked about Marcel and work issues, but they never moved one step closer to a solution.
Wearing one of Connor’s faded T-shirts—her favorite one—and a pair of oversized boxer shorts, she crossed her legs and stared at the closed bathroom door. Maybe it just seemed as if Connor was taking the longest shower in history. After all, he wasn’t exactly the run-from-adversity type.
The second she thought it the door pushed open. Steam rolled out and the smell of soap washed over her. Connor stepped out wearing boxerbriefs and nothing else. It was as if he wanted to test her.
The long muscular legs and flat stomach. The tanned chest and scruff of hair over his chin. From the wet, black hair to the shiny gold wedding band on his finger he was the most attractive man she’d ever met. So sexy he made something in her stomach flutter.
From the beginning, he overwhelmed her senses. Back then he’d been careful not to further injure her already broken arm. He kept up a steady line of conversation, nonsense stuff mostly, but his voice hypnotized her. Even now she’d sit and listen to him talk to the team or on the phone and get a little breathless. Firm, husky and so confident.
Her father would have liked him. Any mother would adore him. He was the kind of man who would keep his woman safe.
If only she could just teach him to loosen his hold.
He dried his hair with a towel then dropped it on the floor. Just like home. “What is this place?”
“A sort of bunkhouse.” She scooted over to make room when he looked like he intended to sit next to her rather than in one of the two oversized chairs in the small sitting area of the room. “We get volunteers and workers come in from the field. Marcel built and maintains this space for them to cut down on administrative costs. There are two apartments like this and then a regular bunkhouse.”
“Holt and Shane are setting up in there. I heard Shane call the top bunk.” Connor folded his hands on his lap as his thigh rested against hers. “They’ll take turns keeping watch until Drake arrives.”
“Will that be soon?”
“He lives in Oregon and happened to be home instead of out on assignment.”
“With?”
“The group I used to work for. He’s on the way over and should arrive any time. Davis is guiding him in.”
She didn’t pry because the name didn’t matter. She knew what the rough work did to Connor, how it hardened his edges and shuttered his emotions, and wondered if she’d see the same reflected in Drake. “Poor Davis should get some rest. He has a baby on the way.”
“Not sleeping will be good practice for after the birth.” Connor’s gaze roamed before landing on the table. The same table where she’s set up two of their couple photos. “You’ve been staying here.”
She seriously considered punching him in the shoulder. Not hard, but enough to prove her point. “Of course. Where did you think I’d been sleeping?”
He shot her the side eye. “You don’t want to know.”
Not a surprise but her temper spiked. Zoomed right off the scale.
She turned to face him. “Connor, you can’t think—” When he picked up her hand and caressed each finger, her voice cut off.
“When you’re desperate and angry your mind spins. I can apologize for it if you need that, but it’s not as if I wanted to believe you left me for him.”
She squeezed his hand and stared at him, not saying a word, until he looked up and gave her eye contact again. “I left you because you spent so much time planning my protection that we stopped living.”
“That’s not true.”
“You wanted me to wear a tracker while I was out of the house.” And that was just the start of his odd behavior. It escalated until anxiety ran wild inside her. Without a crackdown in her exaggerated state she feared he’d take her keys and trap her indoors.
“It’s not like the one criminals wear.”
The idea he thought that was the line started a steady banging in her head. “Is that the point?”
“I actually have no idea, since you wearing it doesn’t seem weird to me.”
She guessed she had to spell it out. “It was a tag.”
“Yeah, so?”
In her mind his response proved her point. “Doesn’t that strike you as overkill?”
He dragged her hand to his lap. “I deal in danger. Part of my job is to anticipate problems and neutralize them.”
“You just used the word neutralize in connection with your wife.”