Mission: Her Freedom: Team 52 #6

by Hackett, Anna

  When they headed back into the main room, Lachlan looked up. “You look like shit, Callie.”

  “Gee, thanks, boss.”

  “Rest up. Grab a few hours’ sleep, then we’ll reconvene. We’re going to find these assholes and make them regret their very poor decisions.”

  Lachlan’s scary golden eyes were glowing.

  “Dial back the intensity, Hunter,” Blair said.

  “If someone snatches any of my people, they pay.” His gold gaze moved back to Callie. “You get some rest.”

  “Brooks? He has some burn and bruises that need—”

  “Axel’s taking care of him. Then I’m ordering him to sleep, as well.” Lachlan jerked his head toward the stairs leading to the lower level. “Grab one of the bunk rooms.”

  With a nod, Callie headed to the stairwell. They had a few rooms with beds at the Bunker for missions when they couldn’t head home. They also kept changes of clothes and other spare gear there as well.

  She took a quick shower, pulled on some clean clothes—hallelujah—then went to the closest unoccupied bunk room. She was running on fumes.

  Falling onto the double bed, she stared at the ceiling, expecting to crash out. In the Air Force, she’d perfected the skill of falling asleep quickly. Instead, she found herself wide awake, too many things rushing around in her head.

  Callie thumped the pillow and turned on her side. Then she rolled back again.

  She’d been lying there for a while when she heard the door open. Turning, she recognized the big silhouette in the doorway. Brooks.

  She breathed in and the scent of clean male and soap hit her. He was wearing a clean set of jeans with a gray T-shirt stretched over his muscular chest. There was just enough light for her to make out the small, ball-shaped robot on the shirt along with the words “That’s how I roll.” He also had his glasses back on. Her womb spasmed. Those glasses…

  Callie sat up and watched him close the door. She flicked on the bedside lamp.

  “I wanted to check that you were okay,” he said.

  She nodded and pointed to the bandage on his shoulder.

  “Good.” He hovered beside the bed.

  “Axel took care of your injuries?”

  Brooks nodded. “Used Ty’s super-duper laser and some special gel.”

  She stared at his freshly shaved face, already missing the stubble. There was faint bruising around the side of his face and a haunted look in his deep-brown eyes. Maybe the memories were also bothering him.

  She held out a hand and he took it. She pulled him down beside her.

  “Cal—”

  “Shh, just lie down, Brooks. Relax.” She took off his dark-framed glasses and set them on the bedside table.

  He lay down on the bed and then curled around her body—big, warm, delicious. His arms tightened on her, and then he pressed his face into her hair.

  She felt the tension drain out of him. She turned the light off.

  Surprisingly, her own edginess bled away. Seconds later, she fell asleep.

  * * *

  Brooks woke to his arms full of warm female.

  Mmm. Callie.

  He pulled her closer, breathing in the skin at the back of her neck. God, he loved her scent. She smelled like coconuts and made him think of the beach. Then he heard the sound of a throat clearing and opened his eyes to see Blair.

  She stood beside the bed, her arms crossed, looking down at them. Callie was still asleep.

  “You’d better go,” Blair said. “Lachlan is coming to wake you guys. I’m not sure he’s ready to see this.”

  Reluctantly, Brooks slid out of the bed. Callie shifted to steal his pillow, her black hair spread out everywhere. She looked so peaceful.

  He snatched up his glasses, and Blair gave him a nod and he left the room. He rubbed his eyes before slipping his glasses on. His entire body still felt tired and sore.

  “You tread carefully.”

  He turned back to look at Blair as she closed Callie’s door behind her. “I know Callie wouldn’t really be interested in me. We’ve just been through a tough time together—”

  Blair thumped her fist against his forehead.

  “Ow,” he complained.

  “For a smart guy, you can be dense, Brooks. Why wouldn’t she be interested? You’re a hunky, sexy catch.”

  Heat filled his cheeks. “Ah—”

  “Careful with her, that’s all I’m saying. Callie has scars that she keeps well hidden.”

  Blair swiveled and headed down the hallway. Brooks blinked. Callie was one of the most together people he knew. Still, he remembered her telling him about her dad and sister, and his gut tightened.

  None of this mattered anyway. Slowly, Brooks made his way to the main room and headed straight for the coffee pot. He leaned against the counter and drank one mug, then refilled it. Brooks had fallen for a cheerleader in high school. She’d been a year older than him, popular, pretty, and had shocked the hell out of him when she’d agreed to a date. He sipped the coffee again. He’d been pretty dedicated to learning what girls liked when they let him touch them, and she’d been more than happy to meet up with him where no one would see them.

  The coffee turned sour in his gut. Yeah, he’d been her dirty, geeky secret. Alone, she’d been all flushed cheeks and husky cries. When other people were around, she’d ignored him. When they’d almost gotten caught making out by some footballers, she’d dumped him and crushed his heart. There’d been a girl at college too. A gorgeous law student who’d been way out of his league. She’d been happy to sleep with the sexy geek for a few months, until she’d lost interest and moved on to a popular, fellow law student.

  That had been a long time ago and Callie was nothing like those long-ago girls. But he’d learned the lesson—while women were happy to take a side-trip with a guy who liked computers more than people, they didn’t stick around for the entire journey.

  He heard the others in the conference room and headed in. Everyone was there, including Callie. He tried not to stare at her.

  Lachlan swiveled. “Brooks, we need to find this wind jewel.”

  Brooks nodded. “I’ll get some searches running, but I can share some bits with you already.”

  As soon as he sat in front of the computer, he felt something inside him settle. It felt so good to have a keyboard under his fingers again.

  He quickly typed in some commands. “These are the things we learned while we were being held hostage.”

  “Let’s hear it,” Lachlan said.

  “The wind jewel is associated with the Aztec god, Quetzalcoatl.”

  “The feathered serpent,” Seth murmured.

  “Right. He was the Aztec god of wind, air, and wisdom. He’s usually depicted wearing a ‘wind breastplate’ around his neck. It had the wind jewel, also called ehecailacocozcatl—” Brooks stumbled a bit on the pronunciation. “We’ll have to get Nat to pronounce that properly.” The team’s archeologist, Dr. Natalie Blackwell, knew everything there was to know about anything old and historical. “The wind jewel is described as a spiral, and made of the cross-section of a conch shell.” The image appeared on the screen.

  “It looks like the spiral of a hurricane,” Callie noted. “Or a tornado.”

  “Exactly,” Brooks said. “Representing the wind and storms.” He scanned the data. “Priests and kings wore the conch shell around their necks, and loads have been found in burials all through Mesoamerica. It appears that the jewel gave the god the power to command the wind and storms.”

  “So,” Blair said, “we’re thinking this jewel is something similar to the vajra.”

  Brooks’ gut churned. The vajra was seriously bad, and safely locked away in Area 52’s storage facility. The guys from Treasure Hunter Security in Denver had run across it on an expedition. Vajra was Sanskrit meaning both thunderbolt and diamond. The legends said the weapon had belonged to Indra, the god of rain and thunder. Really, it was a powerful, portable, reusable nuclear weapon capable of
a lot of destruction.

  If the wind jewel was capable of similar things…

  “Sounds similar,” Lachlan said. “Seth, you think January might have more info?”

  Seth nodded. “No doubt. My wife believes she knows everything.” There was exasperation and affection in his voice. “I’ll ask her.”

  The archeologist was pregnant, but still working.

  Brooks cleared his throat. “When I hacked the Smithsonian data for Mr. Ordinary, I also copied a second version of it up to our cloud storage.”

  The team all looked at him and blinked.

  “Really?” Callie said.

  He nodded.

  “Genius,” she said.

  He smiled. “I’ve set a program trawling through the data right now. There’s a lot of information.”

  Lachlan crossed his arms over his chest. “And you should be able to find info on the wind jewel faster than they can.”

  Brooks sniffed. “Of course.”

  “We should call Treasure Hunter Security as well,” Lachlan said. “Dec and his guys might have heard of the jewel before.”

  The security firm out of Denver was made up mostly of former Navy SEALs, who specialized in security for digs and expeditions. It occasionally brought them in contact with dangerous artifacts, and they’d brushed up against Team 52 a time or two. After a shaky start, the teams were actually quite friendly now.

  “I’ll contact Darcy,” Blair said.

  Everyone dispersed, and Brooks checked his searches. He grabbed his coffee mug and saw it was empty. He rose, but instead of refilling his mug, grabbed an energy drink from the fridge. He had a weakness for the damn things, but they helped fuel him when he had butt-loads of work to do.

  He shifted his tablet and saw the sketch of Mr. Ordinary he’d done. It was half decent, even if he did say so himself. He’d already scanned and uploaded it. He was trying a new program that searched social media and online news outlets for a facial match.

  “Who are you, dickhead?” he murmured.

  Tiredness hit Brooks, and he barely noticed when the screen blurred and his eyes closed.

  The nightmare hit like flashes of light. It was like being in the haunted house that his brothers had dragged him to when they were kids. With each flash of light came another horrible memory.

  Being beaten by the goons. Callie strung up being tortured. Choking the guard in the cell. Blood smeared on Callie’s skin. Shooting the drug runner.

  Fingers stroked his cheek and Brooks jerked awake.

  Callie was kneeling beside his chair. “Hey, you were having a nightmare.”

  He pushed his glasses up his nose. “Shit.” Shit. He grabbed his drink can and took a sip. It was warm, and he grimaced. The edginess wouldn’t let him sit still and he stood.

  She watched him carefully. “If you need to talk to someone—”

  “I just need some time, Cal. I…I know killing the guy was the only choice. I’d do it again.”

  She stepped closer and pushed him back into the chair. Then she wrapped her arms around him. He found his head pressed to her soft breasts.

  Her heartbeat thudded in his ear, and he knew he wouldn’t be hearing that sound if he hadn’t protected her.

  He slid an arm around her and held on tight.

  It felt good. Too good. Don’t get used to this, Jameson.

  When he pulled back, he saw she was staring at his glasses. “What?”

  She cleared her throat. “Nothing.”

  Then there was a ping from his computer.

  Reluctantly, he pulled away and glanced at the screen. His eyebrows shot up.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Information on the wind jewel. Call the others.”

  Chapter Eight

  Everyone crowded into the room, and Callie saw that Brooks was in his element.

  He’d clearly shaken off the bad dream, and now his long, sexy fingers were flying over the keyboard.

  Callie watched him and wondered how those fingers would feel on her skin. Desire swamped her.

  She blew out a breath. It was official. She was lusting after her friend.

  Brooks swiveled in his chair. “This is from the data in the Smithsonian files.” A picture flashed up on the screen.

  Lachlan crossed his arms. “The conch shell representing the wind jewel.”

  Brooks nodded. “Most people know that Quetzalcoatl was also linked to the Mayan god, Kukulkan. He was another feathered serpent. They also had an Incan equivalent.” Another image appeared, a stylized image of a god. “This is Viracocha.”

  “What’s in his hands?” Callie asked.

  “Thunderbolts. He could control lightning and storms.”

  “Again, like the vajra,” Seth noted.

  “There’s more.” Brooks tapped his tablet. “The Smithsonian’s data mentions a dig in Mexico in the late 1930s, at an Aztec site.”

  “And?” Lachlan prompted.

  “It was rumored that they found a piece of a sacred jewel. Unfortunately, a terrible, freak storm came out of nowhere and hit the dig. Several people were killed.”

  “The wind jewel,” Lachlan muttered. “Hell.”

  “Or part of it. The notes make it clear that it wasn’t complete.”

  “What happened to the shard of the jewel?” Callie asked.

  “No one knows. The dig was closed down, and the piece of the jewel disappeared.”

  “Main players on the dig?” Lachlan asked.

  An old picture of several men in suits, knee-high boots, and dapper hats appeared.

  “I’ve got the names of the men who funded the dig and their archeologists. I’ve started running them and we’ll see if anything pops.”

  There was a commotion outside the room and a woman’s voice echoed through the Bunker.

  “Where is he? I want to see that he’s okay with my own two eyes.”

  Brooks stood. “Damn.” He tapped the keyboard and the screen went blank.

  A woman shouldered through the door. She was tall, with broad shoulders, an Amazonian body, and her greying hair was pulled back in a tight braid. Her eyes zeroed in on Brooks.

  Then she powered across the room and threw her arms around him.

  “I’m all right, Mom.”

  Callie watched him hug his mom. A man appeared in the doorway. He was a few inches shorter than his wife, but also fit, with a ball cap on his head. He had the same deep-brown eyes as his son.

  “Someone snatched my boy.” Patricia Jameson patted Brooks cheeks.

  “I’m fine,” he said again.

  Patricia swiveled and her gaze lasered in on Lachlan. “You find who took him yet?”

  “Not yet, Mrs. Jameson. But we will.”

  “Make them very, very sorry,” she said darkly.

  “Mom, it’s under control.” When Brooks’ dad drew close, Brooks shared a quick side hug with the man.

  “Your brothers wanted to come and see you,” Tom Jameson said. “I told them you’d call them.”

  “Thanks, Dad.”

  Brooks had a great family. Callie felt a pang of bittersweet envy.

  His mom pulled him in for another bone-cracking hug.

  “I’m fine, Mom.” He patted her back. “Callie got me out.”

  Patricia’s gaze swung to Callie. “Thank you.”

  Callie nodded. “Actually, Brooks did a lot of the work. He did great out there.”

  “Of course, he did. He’s smart.” Patricia looked at her son. “When are you going to find a sweet, smart little thing to settle down with?”

  Brooks cleared his throat. “Maybe we could talk about this when I’m not at work.”

  Patricia made a sound. “If you visited your family more, I could grill you then. You aren’t going to find a nice girl working all the time.”

  Callie saw all the team grinning. She hoped when Patricia looked at her, the fact that Callie had shared a fantastic kiss with her son wasn’t tattooed on her face.

  “Pat, we
’ve seen our boy, we should leave him to his work,” Tom said.

  Brooks’ mom sniffed and pointed at her son. “Dinner. Soon. Bring a girl.”

  Brooks rolled his eyes. “Go. Love you.”

  Patricia’s face softened. “Love you too, baby.” With a wave to the room, she and Tom left.

  “So, Brooks,” Axel drawled. “You going to find yourself a sweet little geek with librarian glasses who likes computers more than you do?”

  Color hit Brooks’ cheeks. “Not my priority right now.” His gaze flicked to Callie then away.

  Callie felt a hit of mixed emotions. She could totally see Brooks with an intense, geek girl, talking tech, and salivating over computer parts. Callie hated the woman already.

  Brooks had already dropped back into his chair, tapping at the computer.

  The team dispersed. Kinsey was making calls, Lachlan was reporting in to the head of Area 52, Director Jonah Grayson, and the rest of them hit the small gym at the Bunker. Thankfully, the treatment the night before meant Callie’s battered body was feeling much better.

  After a quick shower, Callie was in the small kitchen, eating an apple while the others filtered in, grabbing snacks and drinks.

  Suddenly, Kinsey rushed into the room, concern on her face.

  Smith stood. “Kinsey?”

  “It’s on the news,” the blonde said, her voice breathless. “Some sort of freak thunderstorm here in Las Vegas.”

  They all looked out the window. There was nothing but blue sky.

  “It’s weird,” Kinsey said. “The storm seems to be focused on one area. Above a church in west Vegas. The Windvale Church.”

  “Shit,” Lachlan muttered.

  Brooks strode in, tablet in hand. He swiped on his screen, pulling up weather maps. “Guys, this storm doesn’t look natural.”

  Lachlan’s jaw tightened. “I think we might have found that piece of the wind jewel.”

  “They’ve been evacuating the church,” Kinsey said, “but there are people still stuck inside.”