Hotshot

by Mann, Catherine

  Vince tore his eyes off Shay. “How do I come into play, Agent Wilson?”

  “Don Bassett recommended you.”

  And for that matter, what was Don doing here?

  Don nudged aside his full cup of coffee. “I work for the agency now.” The CIA. Holy crap. “Anything I do here is unofficial, since this is FBI territory. I also have an obvious conflict of interest because of Shay, but I had been keeping an ear to the ground on the presecurity because of her involvement. When this came up, I immediately thought of your, uh, skill set.”

  “My skill set? And what would you mean by that?” All signs indicated they already knew, but old habits died hard. Vince rolled out the pat answer he used with his mama, dates, and curious biker mechanics. “I just work in a military test unit.”

  Without identification patches. Developing military equipment no one knew about. Answerable only to the air force chief of staff.

  Don smiled. “Exactly how I would have answered the question. As I said, your skill set could be valuable, particularly with the surveillance, to find out how widespread this problem may be. I presented the proposal to Special Agent Wilson, and she agreed. We contacted the air force, and here you are.”

  Vince stared at his former mentor with a whole new perspective. Don wasn’t just sitting a desk job and stirring interest in CAP in his free time, as would have been his due right. The old guy had traded up.

  Special Agent Wilson continued, “The boy has gone missing, and it’s our belief if he’s been recruited, there could be more. You will stay here in Cleveland under the guise of helping fuel interest in forming a Civil Air Patrol unit. Share your success story of how being recruited into the volunteer group saved you from a life of crime as a teen. Since you and Bassett have a connection from your younger years, showing up here to help out his daughter shouldn’t raise any red flags.”

  Don smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “We’ve even pulled strings with the Joint Chiefs of Staff so your surveillance will blend into standard testing expenses. Beyond helping us here, you’ll actually be able to write this off as a field test and move a project into the war arena faster. A fine economical blending of government resources, if I do say so myself.”

  Special Agent Wilson tapped her thumbnail against the slide changer in her fist. “It’s a lot to absorb, but rest assured, we’re taking care of details. We’re in contact with your squadron commander. In fact, Lieutenant Colonel Scanlon is on standby waiting for your call after this meeting so you can be reassured that we’re on the up-and-up. He seems to have the utmost confidence in your capabilities.”

  No small praise, that. Vince shifted in his chair uncomfortably.

  “You’re cleared for any form of surveillance. Your choice.”

  “I’ll need a support team—”

  “Of course, you’ll have your pick of members from your squadron,” she responded without hesitation. “We’ll leave the specifics of that up to you. Your commander will work out of D.C., coordinating any issues with Congress. Our Congress members here are flying back to D.C., but they’re leaving behind their aides to prepare for the event. However, the aides don’t have the clearance to know about our mission. Are there any questions so far?”

  Like, was there someone else to do this, someone who wouldn’t send Shay running and screaming for the hills? But he owed Don his life. Time to repay the debt. “No questions.”

  Wilson set down the slide changer. “I hope I don’t need to impress upon you what chaos a hit on Congress could cause. We cannot allow another terrorist attack on our own soil.”

  She pinned him with a steely gaze. Was she wondering if he would cut Shay slack because of his loyalty to Don? Did Don think bringing him in would give an edge of leniency if it turned out Shay was involved?

  Good God, there were freaking land mines all over everywhere in this mission, beyond just literal ones some terrorist might plant. Not that he could turn his back on Don and all he’d learned from the man about honor.

  Even if that meant turning Don’s daughter over to the Feds.

  The boy had never called back.

  Not that night or the next.

  Shay had stayed well past the clinic’s closing hours, willing the phone to ring. No one had called, a mixed blessing, since at least it meant nobody else was in crisis.

  She glanced at her cherry red watch her mother had given her as a birthday gift to add to her watch and bracelet collection. The psychology grad student who’d volunteered to pull the eleven o’clock night shift was a half hour late, and she’d had zero luck in reaching him. She would leave him a note and forward all calls to her cell. Plenty of nights passed with no phone-ins, so she should still be able to sleep.

  She eyed the receiver one last time before hitching her small Vera Bradley backpack over one shoulder and turning off the window fan puffing in an unusually cool breeze for once.

  As she pulled her lab coat off the coat tree, the back door creaked open. Finally. The grad student. She would even have time to brief Geoff about the caller before she fell asleep on her feet.

  She started into the hall. And stopped short. A hooded figure slid from the corridor toward the main clinic. Tall, frighteningly so, but with an awkward thinness of either a teen or a junkie.

  Shay stumbled, her chest tightening. If she could just make it back into her office before he—

  Her Nike thudded against the trash can. Shit. Shit. Shit! She stooped to grab it before it clattered to the ground.

  The hooded boy spun to face her, his face covered with a greasy bandanna. “Stop, bitch, or I’ll slice off your face.”

  He swished a machete through the air.

  She held up her hands and patted lightly in a universal calm-down gesture even as the glinting edge made her break out in a cold sweat.

  A member of the Apocalypse gang.

  She knew from the weapon.

  God, how she wished he’d been carrying anything other than a blade. Even a dull butter knife freaked her out to this day with a phobia so strong she avoided them at the dinner table.

  “Stay where you are.” His hand shook, grease under his nails. Did he work in some kind of mechanic shop or garage? “No pressing some secret alarm or anything to bring the cops.”

  Where was the security guard? So far it seemed she was completely alone. She kept searching for clues, anything to give her an advantage in talking to him.

  Anything to take her mind off the memory of the glide of steel across her skin.

  “Your guard guy decided to take a nap in his truck,” he said as if reading her mind. “So let’s step this up before the old fart gets back.”

  “What do you want?” At least her voice didn’t shake. She clutched her tiny backpack closer to her side.

  “I wanted to walk in here without anybody seeing me, but you shot that to hell, bitch. Now open that cabinet where you keep the drugs. And don’t bother telling me you haven’t got a key. I’ve seen you lock it up before.”

  He must be one of the clinic patients. That narrowed the field down to about a thousand.

  Her eyes snagged on the tattoos along the tops of his fingers, tiny rattlesnakes. Recognition flooded through her. She’d treated him last week when he came in wanting drugs for “back pain.” More like he wanted some cash from selling the pills on the street the minute he left.

  Should she let him know she recognized him? Would that seal her very painful death warrant?

  Something prompted her otherwise, a sense from her brief meeting with him that told her he respected strength. And, of course, she did have a protective edge he knew nothing about.

  “You really need to go into another line of work.” She crossed her arms, one hand subtly dipping into her backpack. “All of those tattoos make you too readily identifiable to the police, Kevin.”

  His chin wavered even as his jaw jutted. “If you’re so smart, you shoulda kept your mouth shut.” He tugged down his bandanna to reveal a pale face barely sporting p
each fuzz. “What makes you think I won’t kill you now to keep you from IDing me later?”

  She slid her hand out of her backpack and leveled her small but accurate pistol at him. “What makes you think I won’t shoot you first?”

  His eyes went wide. Good. And thank heavens her risk paid off in mentioning his tats, since he’d been distracted long enough for her to find her own weapon without fumbling. She owed her dad a big fat thank-you for giving her the Khar PM9 when she took this job.

  The angry blade steadied in Kevin’s fist. “You’re not gonna use it, ’cause you’re not a killer.”

  “And neither are you.” She hoped.

  “You’re crazy.”

  Like she hadn’t heard that before. “Which makes me a lot more likely to shoot you.” She leveled the barrel. “Just because I’m not a murderer doesn’t mean I won’t blow off your kneecap. Now put that blade on the floor and get out of here.”

  She would call the police on him the second he cleared the door, a much safer option than trying to subdue him herself. She wanted him and his machete out of her face.

  A rumble sounded outside, growing louder. The growl, growl, growl of a motorcycle approaching vibrated the windows. She could have sworn she felt it in her toes.

  Help?

  Please, not backup for Kevin.

  “Fuck,” the teen spat out.

  The front doorknob rattled. Then creaked.

  The hooded teenager twisted and made a break for the back exit, the machete still firmly in his fist. What was wrong with all the locks around here? She bolted them tight, and still people waltzed right in.

  Her heart rate stuttered. She eyed the back exit and the front entrance. She wasn’t trusting that Geoff would come striding in with his Case Western student backpack this time.

  Shay gripped her gun and dashed back into her office. Fishing frantically through her backpack, she searched for her cell phone. She grabbed the receiver just as a hulking man in motorcycle garb filled her office doorway.

  Definitely not Geoff or Eli.

  Her mouth went dry. Broad shoulders made larger by black leathers nearly touched either side of the frame. His neck was almost as big as his totally shaved head.

  This guy wouldn’t need a machete. He could snap her in two with his ham-fisted grip.

  Her hands started shaking. Her thumb searched for 911.

  “Stand back.” She raised her gun and her phone. She wasn’t taking her sights off the hulk for even a second.

  His eyes were so dark that from a distance she could only just see the thin ring of blue at the outer edges of his wide pupils. His whole badass look was enough to make a woman pull out her Mace in the middle of the afternoon.

  For the first time she truly questioned the wisdom of carrying the small 9 mm, because her feet were frozen and her finger was twitchy. “The clinic closed six hours ago. My gun’s loaded, and I’m not afraid to use it.”

  “Shay, put your weapon and phone down.” He raised his hands to chest level. “I just missed catching the kid when he ran out the back door, and I’ve already called the cops.”

  Something in his gravelly voice reached into her brain, probing around for a place to take hold. She could have sworn she’d never heard those deep tones before. She searched his face, trying to remember where she might have met him.

  When.

  Her trembling hands went still. She wasn’t even sure her heart still worked because of the roaring in her ears. He might not look or sound the same as the dark-haired thug who’d turned her life upside down seventeen years ago, but somehow she knew.

  Vince Deluca was back.

  THREE

  Vince watched Shay cradle her cell phone in one hand and her tiny chick gun in the other, all the while studying him as if he were the same gutter scum he’d been seventeen years ago.

  Was she the same volatile train wreck? Or had she shifted into darker agendas? She definitely still didn’t give a shit about her life, if the past ninety seconds were anything to judge by.

  Vince pressed deeper into the room, biker boots thudding against scarred wood floors in this crumbling dump they called a teen center. “What the hell are you doing hanging around this neighborhood after dark, in an unlocked building?”

  Shay rested her tiny weapon on the corner of the desk with exaggerated care while tucking the phone into her jeans pocket. Faded jeans molded to lean legs with a granola girl appeal.

  “Nice to see you again, too, Vince.”

  “Not so nice to see you’re still in the middle of a mess.”

  He brushed past her to check outside the window, above the fan. A car took a token pause at the red light before roaring through. A kid smoked dope beside a grocery market—a teen shorter than the hooded guy here earlier.

  “As charming as ever.”

  “I’m sorta preoccupied with making sure you don’t get hacked to pieces.” He weighed the option of running after the kid over the risk of leaving her here alone. No contest. “The cops should arrive any second now. It’s best if we both stay put.”

  “I agree, in case you were interested in my opinion.” She hitched a slim hip on the edge of her desk, right beside the gun, as if she didn’t trust him much more than the coked-up teen who’d bolted out the back door before Vince could stop him. “You’re the last person I expected to show up. Why are you here?”

  He stalked closer, having learned long ago it wasn’t wise to take his eyes off Shay Bassett. “I’m on R & R for the next few weeks and decided to visit your father while he’s in town. Do you have any idea why that kid broke in?”

  “Drugs.” Her golden brown eyes flickered with the first signs of something other than irritation. “Is there some other reason for this R & R? Are you all right?”

  “Just overworked. But who isn’t these days?” He scanned the stark office with its old metal desks in three corners, filing cabinets in the fourth, and a huge window with crappy locks. Locks that apparently didn’t get used, because the fan kept the window propped open. “Your father was worried when you didn’t show up at the restaurant.”

  She gave him a one-shoulder shrug, a bead of sweat on her brow the only sign of what she’d been through. “He cancels on me. I cancel on him. It’s a thing we do. Make appointments. Pretend we want to see each other but find an excuse at the last minute.” She straightened, her thumb fidgeting with the butt of the gun. “Were you at the restaurant with him?”

  “We waited for an hour before we started looking for you.” He pivoted back out into the hall toward the rear entrance. He twisted the dead bolt right below a Crime Stoppers placard bolted down at eye level.

  “Don wanted us to meet up?” Shay called from a few steps behind. “That old man is crazier than I thought.”

  “He told me you’re interested in starting up a Civil Air Patrol squadron for teens here.” Vince turned around and shouldered past her on his way to the front door, assessing the place for the best way to stage surveillance.

  The walls were lined with pen and ink sketches and watercolor paintings, obviously by the teens, framed and mounted by the staff in some kind of attempt to re-create a mom’s refrigerator door. As if that would be enough to make them think someone cared.

  Shay reached past to flick both bolts. “You can tell Don I did lock up and set the alarm system.”

  So she still didn’t call Don “Dad.” He’d never understood that. He would have killed to have a father like Don Bassett. “The kid probably picked it open with a fourth grade magician’s set.”

  “Vince, you’re new here. We do the best we can with what we have.”

  “You should have called your dad to meet you here. Any man would have been over in a heartbeat.” He pulled out his phone. “As a matter of fact, I should text him now.”

  “Why don’t you do that on your way back to your car?” She smiled for the first time.

  “Motorcycle.” He glanced down at his cell phone and away from how pretty she looked when she ditched the
scowl. “Your dad hooked me up with a killer loaner while I’m on leave.” He thumbed the rest of his text message to Don. “It’s not often a guy on a government salary gets to drive a 1098R Ducati.”

  “Of course he did. He would do anything for you.”

  He glanced up from his phone. “Aren’t you kinda old for jealousy?”

  She blinked her expression blank, the tiny gold studs in her ears the only visible glint. Even her lips were free of so much as lip gloss. “Thank you for coming in when you did. The police will be here any minute.”

  “I’ll stick around while you wait. They’ll want my statement, too.” Vince stood his ground. The clock ticked through another two minutes.

  She sighed. “Well, Vince, your hairdo—or lack thereof—is different, but you’re obviously still you.”

  He scrubbed his palm over his shaved bald scalp. “Cuts down on morning grooming.”

  Her eyes followed his hand so intently he could almost swear he felt her touch replacing his on his bare skull. A touch he’d wanted once upon a teenage fantasy, except nothing, but nothing could have made him betray Don Bassett’s trust. Even thoughts of getting naked with Shay in those days had left him with a guilt so heavy he’d rediscovered his path to the confessional.

  He pivoted away from her, the air too thick with the scent of soap. Soap, for God’s sake. “Where the hell are the police?”

  “Probably busy with a dozen other bigger problems. I expect it’ll be a while before they get around to taking my statement.” She crossed to the window and turned on the box fan. “Thank you for putting yourself in harm’s way to help. I really do mean that.”

  “Is that gun loaded?”

  Silently, she emptied the bullets on the desktop, each one thudding against her desk calendar.

  Images of her alone with that kid sent his biceps twitching. “Cokeheads have a strength even bullets can’t always stop. What if he’d taken the gun away from you?”

  “He didn’t, and if he’d inched even one step toward me, I would have shot him in the kneecap. Everyone around here knows I don’t back down. He wouldn’t have come in at all if he knew I was still around.”