“It went damned right if you ask me,” Adam growled. “You lived.”
Jameson reached out for a knuckle bump, which Adam obliged. “Yeah, bro, no kidding. Don’t know why, but Delaney didn’t shoot us on the tarmac. Brought us out here to kill us.”
“Reagan’s a high-profile airport. Too many cameras. What else?” Alex demanded.
“Well, Mr. Stewart, when I came to, she and Pops were arguing. I’m pretty sure she slapped him. They were nasty to each other. When they stomped off, I knew we didn’t have much time left. Maddie crawled through the ductwork, made it outside, and…” He turned into the side of her head, close enough to kiss her as he said, “I wasn’t there, so I’ll let her tell you what happened next.”
Alex liked that willingness to share the spotlight.
Maddie cleared her throat and sat up straighter on Jameson’s thighs, her fingers interlocked on her lap. Alex couldn’t detect the hint of a blouse or TEAM polo beneath the jacket she wore. This was the craziest debrief he’d ever held.
“Boss, I, umm…” Lifting one hand, she coughed politely into her curled fingers. “I kind of changed Jameson’s plan once I made it outside. I was just supposed to run and get help, but I had another idea when I saw Delaney’s men’s cars and all those tires and the barn and all that hay—”
“You set the fire.”
Her head bobbed. “Not at first. I was going to, but that’s when I found Mr. Vlad buried in the hay. He said Miss Shade shot him, and he was hurt pretty bad, and he was bleeding, but he couldn’t breathe, so I kinda had to—”
“She fabricated the perfect bandage, Boss,” Eric declared from where he was kneeling by the man in question. “Saved his life.”
Alex look over at Vladimir, who had just given Maddie a weak thumbs-up with his IV-taped hand.
“Boss, this is Mr. Vlad,” she said quietly. “I couldn’t just leave him. I took a first-aid class a long time ago, and I remembered how to plug bullet holes and make bandages with whatever was on hand.”
Man, she was nervous, and Alex knew it was because of him. She’d always been skittish. “Settle down, Maddie,” he said calmly. “Take a breath. You did good. Might have to promote you to junior agent.”
As expected, she shook her pretty blonde head. “No, no, no. This was the scariest night of my life. Well-l-l…” She looked to Jameson. “Almost.”
“She didn’t want to bother you, Mr. Stewart, but she’s got a couple loan sharks pestering her,” he volunteered. “That’s why she’s been late to work. Mind if I take care of them for her?”
“Jameson!” she hissed.
“Stop calling me Mr. Stewart, and we’ve got a deal.”
“Yes, err, umm—”
“Boss or Alex,” Hunter supplied the missing title. “Never sir. He’ll roast your nuts over a slow flame for that.”
“I want in on that loan shark action, Jameson,” Adam said as he reached into the limo and cuffed Maddie’s biceps gently. “Should have told me you were having trouble, Mad Dog. I like shark meat.”
She almost smiled, but Alex could tell she hadn’t wanted her dirty laundry outed. He’d talk with her in private about that loan shark. See what else he could do for her.
“Mad Dog, huh?” Alex lifted a brow. “How’d you come to have Miss Shade’s limo?”
Maddie reminded him so much of Kelsey way back when. Timid, yet strong. Unskilled, yet willing to take on the monsters in her world. Afraid to ask for help, but obviously smitten with the young man holding onto her. Did Jameson Tenney have any idea what a treasure she was? Alex doubted it.
Her tongue made a quick pass over her bottom lip. “Well, Boss, it was parked in the barn, so first, I helped Mr. Vlad to his feet, and I drove him to a safe location, then—”
“After she punched holes in all Delaney’s guys’ tires,” Jameson interjected.
“Well, yes, I thought that was smart, and then I ran back to burn the barn down. W-w-wow. That fire went so, so fast. It got big in a hurry.”
“Old barns burn the hottest,” Alex told her. “Dust and dry timber make an explosive combination.”
“You’re telling me,” she breathed. “My pants were smoking. I almost didn’t make it out of there alive.”
Alex couldn’t help it. He grinned. “You’ve had a busy night, Ms. Bannister.”
“You have no idea. Once I got Mr. Vlad—”
“His name’s Vladimir Morozov. He’s an—”
“He’s an undercover FBI agent?” Jameson asked, his head now canted to the opposite shoulder.
“Yes. He works in their psychic unit. How’d you know?”
“Jameson has mad ninja skills,” Maddie declared, her pretty, light-blue eyes so wide with innocence and honest affection for the guy at her side, that it was hard to look at her and not see Kelsey. Had she ever looked so frightened, yet strong at the same time as Maddie did now? Absolutely.
“I can see that,” Alex admitted quietly.
“Wait. The FBI really has a psychic unit?” Jameson asked, dumbfounded. “Since when?”
“Since a year ago,” Alex admitted. “A couple of my agents now work in that unit. Listen, the EMTs are running late. How about we get Vladimir back to civilization? Looks like you two could use a hot meal and a couple days off.”
Jameson shook his head. “Not me. I’m good, and I’ll be at work tomorrow.”
“You’re a former SEAL,” Alex told him sternly, “which means you’re dumb as a box of rocks and you don’t know when to quit. But you work for me now. Two days R&R. That’s an order.”
Junior Agent Tenney had the good sense to stand down. He looked pretty damned content there with Maddie on his lap and in his arms. She was smiling, and it was happening again. Two people in the right place at the wrong time. Fighting together to survive. Beating the odds. Falling head over heels into who knew what.
“How many bodies did you leave back at that farmhouse?” Alex asked Jameson.
The thing about this young man was he was hard to read. He didn’t blink and his feelings didn’t show, well, except for the tenderness that softened his lips whenever Maddie spoke.
“I’m not sure—”
“Twenty-three,” Adam announced proudly.
Alex cocked his head. “You mean to tell me that Jameson took them out all by himself?”
Again, Jameson gave nothing away as he replied evenly, “I didn’t realize there were so many. I knew I ended the first three who came for me, then the six after Maddie showed up. I had to. It was totally self-defense and I used deadly force to protect Maddie. Luckily, I acquired a high-capacity, twelve-gauge shotgun after the first go-round, so I was prepared. But I lost track of the body count after reinforcements arrived. There were too many, and, oh yeah, Maddie ended Delaney.”
“Way to go, Mad Dog!” Hunter crowed.
“Damn fine shooting, lady,” Eric added.
Adam’s long arm reached in as he ruffled her hair. “That’s my girl!”
But the news stopped Alex’s heart. He turned to his meek, demure Protocol Officer. “You shot Pops Delaney? The godfather of all Irish gangs on the East Coast?”
Her blonde locks bobbed as she nodded, and he’d made her nervous again. “Y-y-yes, I…” Her fingers twisted in her lap. “He… His guys were big and ugly, and he was going to kill Jameson, and I… He made me mad, Boss.” She ended that rambling, timid rant with a definite note of anger. “I couldn’t miss. There were so many of them, and he acted like he was God, but he isn’t! Err, wasn’t.”
Alex had to smile. The untouchable goon from Ireland had been brought down by a five-foot-nothing woman he’d pissed off. “Good job, Maddie. Sounds like Jameson finished what you started.”
“Yeah. I guess.” And she’d fallen back into whatever trap in her past that made her afraid to be the woman she was. Yup. Maddie was Kelsey all over again.
Something cold and sinister crept up the back of Alex’s neck. �
��Where’s Shade?”
“She wasn’t onsite when we arrived at the farmhouse,” Adam answered.
“Didn’t see any sign she was ever there,” Hunter added.
“Except for Vlad and her limo,” Maddie breathed.
“How about you two?” Alex asked Maddie and Jameson. “Did either of you actually see her?” The instant the question rolled off his tongue, he knew better.
“Umm, Boss,” Maddie piped up. “I never heard or saw her, but Jameson can’t see and—”
“You know what I meant.”
“I heard her though,” Jameson answered. “Like I said, Miss Shade argued with Delaney about how it was his fault her plans went wrong. She slapped him. He slapped her back. They said a lot of hateful things to each other.”
“Find her,” Alex growled.
“Will do,” Adam and Hunter answered at the same time.
“And you two…”
“Yes, Boss?” It was uncanny how Jameson Tenney could aim those unseeing eyes at Alex and look right through him.
“Forget the R&R. You’re going into protective custody until we locate Shade. Eric, once you release Agent Morozov to the EMTs, get Maddie and Jameson to a safe house.”
“Will do.”
“But Boss…” Jameson protested.
Alex ended the discussion with a steely glare that, oddly, worked on Jameson as much as it did his sighted agents. “Shade’s behind this, and I don’t take chances. If all she wanted was publicity, she’s damned sure going to get it. But if something else is going on here, I’d rather be safe than sorry.”
Jameson’s whole damned face lit up, like the sunrise creeping over the East horizon. Maddie’s chin lifted. She’d changed. It was easy to see. The poor woman was in love.
“But no foolishness,” Alex scolded.
“Who, me?” Jameson answered, the sly dog.
“We’d never. Promise, Boss,” Maddie said more seriously. Just like Kelsey. So serious and no doubt as honest as Kelsey, too. Damn. Did she have any idea what she was getting herself into with a spec operator like Jameson? Probably not.
Alex turned on his heel, pissed that he couldn’t control his agents, and just as pissed that, a few years back, his wife had looked at him the exact same way Maddie had just looked at Jameson. That Kelsey still looked at him that way today. And he understood, he truly did. Son of a bitch! He’d even hugged Mother tonight, and he’d only done that because he’d recognized himself in her pain. Because that broken something inside of him was suddenly fixed, and it had to do with the little boy he’d been able to give Kelsey, and the little girl she’d given him. When the hell had he gotten so damned sensitive?
His world was changing. Alex just hadn’t expected to change with it.
Chapter Sixteen
By the time Jameson hit the front steps of the safe house in Arlington, Virginia, he was dog-tired, without glasses or cane. It was nearly time to go to work—if he’d been allowed to. Which he wasn’t. Maddie had stuck by his side, so he’d kept one hand on her shoulder as she’d led him inside to the kitchen, where she left him sitting on a stool at the breakfast bar. Then, she hurried down the hall and returned with his jacket on her fingertips. “I’ll get this dry-cleaned for you, but I changed into a clean shirt and—”
He reached out and fumbled for the jacket. “No, you won’t,” he answered as he folded it over his arm. “I might never wash this thing. Why erase a perfectly good memory?”
“Ah… err… Omelet?” she asked amidst a clatter of pans and lids, an obvious attempt to change the subject.
He’d embarrassed her. He could tell. “You don’t have to cook for me.”
“If she doesn’t, I will,” a hearty voice said behind him, as an arm reached over his shoulder and grabbed his hand. “Harley Mortimer, at your service. Sorry I didn’t make it to the scene tonight, Junior Agent Tenney. Had an emergency delivery. Couldn’t get away.”
That explained Maddie’s sudden need to distance herself. She was back in Protocol Officer mode, but he was still in holding, kissing, I-want-to-know-you-a-whole-lot-better mode.
“Good to meet you,” Jameson replied, shaking that callused hand and wondering why a covert operator would be making an emergency delivery. “Pizza or baby?”
Harley cuffed Jameson’s back. “Ha, good one. No, I was the on-call vet for the emergency animal clinic in Arlington tonight. Spent an hour on my hands and knees, waiting for the last in a twelve pup litter. He was stuck. Had to take him by forceps.”
“You’re a veterinarian?”
“Was. This was my last night. Something had to give.”
“It’s about time,” Eric said as he cleared the front entrance, then bolted a noisy series of locks. Jameson counted three. “Holding down two full-time jobs is stupid.”
“Yeah, it was,” Harley admitted, as he fell into the seat at Jameson’s left. Stringent scents of disinfectant and soap drifted between them.
“Honestly, I loved what I was doing, but I missed my wife and my twin boys more. Judy’s been patient, but I didn’t want her raising the monsters alone. And no way was I quitting The TEAM. You need help, darlin’?”
“With omelets?” Maddie asked. “No, thank you. I’m sure I can handle breaking a few eggs. Eric, would you like breakfast?”
“Sure, thanks,” he replied, his gear dropping to the floor. “Got something for you, Jameson. Hold out your hand.”
A long collapsible cane bumped into his waiting palm. “You got me a new cane?”
“Harley picked it up when he bought groceries. Just figured you’d like knowing it was here.”
“Thanks,” Jameson told his benefactors.
“Adam tells me you’re pretty good without it.”
“When I have to be,” he admitted. “But in unfamiliar places, it comes in handy. So you and Harley got stuck babysitting.”
Eric offered a throaty chuckle. He had one of those no-holds-barred kind of voices that belied a love for life, as if he could throw back a cold one, then belly laugh with the best of them. “This’ll be easy duty. Guarding a Navy SEAL. Pretty lady fixing breakfast. Doesn’t sound like work to me.”
“No triplets keeping you up at night, either,” Harley added. He was the one who sounded tired.
“My girls never bother me,” Eric purred, his voice mellow and tender. “Shea’s got help with childcare, remember. Plus her mother’s in town this week. Five women in my house. Figured they didn’t need me hanging around, getting in their way.”
“Those babies love their daddy,” Maddie added wistfully. “I saw that look in your eye when Shea popped into the office with your birthday cake the other day. She and those triplets have you wrapped around their little fingers.”
Eric plopped down at Jameson’s right. “Yeah, well…” he grumbled in that quiet way of men who adored their wives and children. “What can I say? I’m a helluva lucky guy.”
Jameson smiled to himself, content to be sitting among men who felt more like old friends than new acquaintances.
After a quick breakfast, Harley steered him through a tour of the safe house. “Once you about face from the kitchen, stick to your left, and you’ve got a clear shot past the sofa and chairs to the hall. Two rooms on each side, but the first on your right’s the safe room. Had a couple houses explode a few years back. Had to install better protection. Here’s how it works.”
Harley led Jameson forward, then, as if he were dealing with one of his twin boys, he took Jameson’s hand and placed it on a cool glass pad beside a doorjamb. “Mother’s already got your palm print on record.”
The door hissed open. Hmm. Pneumatic locks. “Is this a vault?”
“Yup. The entire room’s secure, exactly like a bank vault. You’ve got trouble? You get inside. To close the door, just say ‘shut’. It’s a smart room and will lock you up safe where nothing can get at you, not even a tank. Plenty of food and water in there and a straight line to Alex. All
you’ve got to do is sit tight until reinforcements arrive. And trust me, once we know a safe house is under attack, it’s all hands onboard. The cavalry will be here within minutes.”
“Independent air?” Jameson asked. This place was an amazing work of art.
“Yup, plus anything else you need. Bunk beds. Cold beer. Root beer. Decent food.”
Maddie came to mind, but Jameson kept that delectable thought to himself.
Two doors down, Harley stopped at the room at the far end of the hall. “This is yours for the duration. Each room comes with its own bathroom and ventilation system, a laptop if you want one. There’s a burner phone beside the laptop if you need it. I’m bushed. You need anything else?”
“If I do, I don’t know it. Just a shower and a few hours of sleep would be great.” A certain woman’s company wouldn’t hurt, but you don’t need to know that.
A warm palm slapped his back. “Then you’re in the right place. Sleep all day tomorrow, err, today if you can. We’ll talk more once everyone’s rested. I’m bushed. Later.”
And that was that. Jameson cocked his head, listening for Maddie. But she and Eric were back in the kitchen, doing dishes and chatting. Which was the way this mission should end. Her, debriefing an experienced TEAM member. Him, going to bed, getting some well-deserved shut-eye, and minding his business. He took a deep breath and accepted the way this day was ending. Him. Alone. Again.
The bedroom was your basic square design, nothing tricky here. He spent a few minutes longer showering, thankful to get the smell of battle off his skin and out of his hair. But along with it went those lovely feminine hints of lavender and Maddie. She’d certainly been a nice surprise.
By the time he toweled dry and ran his fingers through his hair enough for a quick comb, it hit him. His first day on the job had worn him out. Feeling his way across the room, he found the desk, then the laptop, and right beside it, the phone. He rang home.
Jameson (In the Company of Snipers Book 22) Page 15
