by Joss Wood
“Missing?”
Sawyer shook his head. “Not in the traditional sense. We hear from him now and again, from weird places like Myanmar and Bhutan, but he hasn’t been home in years.”
Axl sipped from his bottle and rubbed the back of his neck. He placed his elbows on the table and cast his eye over the bar looking, as he always did, for trouble. His glance bounced off a bunch of attractive but young girls in the corner, saw that they were trying to talk their plump, almost mousy friend into doing something that she didn’t want to do. Judging by their mocking glances and their avid interest, he immediately knew that they were telling her to approach him, wanting to see her fail when he, as they expected him to, blew her off. He’d bat them away. He had at least fifteen years on them. He didn’t flirt, date, or sleep with children.
Axl turned his attention back to Sawyer, who’d turned around to cast a quick look at the table. “Kids,” he muttered. “I wish Jack would raise the drinking age to twenty-five.”
“Tell me about it,” Axl muttered, dragging his hand through his hair. “I feel old . . . Am I old?”
“Ancient,” Sawyer agreed.
Axl lifted his beer bottle to his mouth and watched a slim blonde walk past them on her way to the ladies’ room. She caught his eye, and her plump pink lips curved in a small smile and her mud-brown eyes reflected interest. Funny that brown eyes could be so different. Reagan’s eyes were the color of bittersweet chocolate, sometimes so brown they were almost black. And her hair wasn’t a harsh blond but streaked with honey and caramel and . . .
And why was he thinking about his favorite pain in the ass tonight? Oh, that might be because he couldn’t go without thinking about her for more than ten minutes at a time. And when he said thinking about her, he meant thinking about stripping her naked and making her scream. In a good, non-painful, do-that-again way.
If Mike were here he’d rip his balls off and feed them to him. Doing Reagan on the nearest surface was not what Mike had meant when he’d asked him to look after Reagan all those years ago.
“If something happens to me, keep an eye on Reagan, will ya, Axe?”
They were in their makeshift tent in a rural area of Somalia when Mike’s voice drifted across to him, so low that neither Kai nor Sawyer nor any of the three other men in their team had heard.
“Look after that firecracker? Shit, no! She’s your problem, dude,” Axl retorted, digging underneath him to pull out the stone from under his hip.
“Promise me, Axe. If I’m gone, she’ll need someone to keep an eye on her. Micah won’t.”
Two weeks later Mike was dead, thanks to a detonated IED, and Axl was still trying to keep his promise to look after Reagan.
Not that she allowed him to. Reagan was a carbon copy of her brother: determined, independent, tough.
And, unlike Mike, so sexy it hurt.
Axl lifted his beer bottle to his lips and took a long sip to chase the ghosts away. Talking about Mike hurt just too damn much.
“MKR has been quiet for a while. We haven’t had a case since we went to Nigeria,” Sawyer said.
Morrigan Kidnap and Ransom Crisis Response, or MKR for short, was Axl’s division within Caswallawn. He had agents based all over the world who responded to kidnappings and did hostage negotiation on behalf of families and governments. Occasionally, when there was no other choice and the hostage was either in a tricky environment or in imminent danger, he sent in a team to do a hostage extraction. He and Sawyer and Kai were that team and, thank God, only had a couple of cases a year. Six weeks ago the three of them flew to Nigeria to attempt to rescue a Saudi oil sheikh who’d been kidnapped. They’d lost the sheikh and his bodyguards, and Axl still felt responsible. Working in Africa was hell; he didn’t have the contacts he did in Europe, the Americas, and the Far East, and obtaining information had been a ball ache of magnificent proportions. They’d found the sheikh in an up-market suburb of Lagos. Unfortunately, they were hours too late.
Axl pulled his attention back to Sawyer’s question. “I have a Brazilian banker kidnapped in Colombia and two kids ’napped by their father and taken to Canada. Nothing particularly tricky, and my guys can deal with it without my interference.”
“And how do you feel about Reagan’s request to join our extraction team?” Sawyer asked, leaning back in the booth.
Now there was a subject to raise his blood pressure and spike his temper. “Not going to happen. Not now, not ever.”
“We’ve often said that we could do with another member and you know that Reagan is trustworthy,” Sawyer said.
“I trust her to keep her mouth shut, but on a mission? Sawyer, she’s had fuck-all combat experience and you know that extraction is the last resort. The guys we come up against usually have nothing to lose, and force, sometimes deadly force, is required. Is that what you want for her? And what if something goes wrong and we get taken out and she is left behind? Do you know what those assholes will do to her?” Axl pushed an agitated hand through his hair.
“Of course I know, Axl.” Sawyer snapped the words out before lifting a placating hand. “But you can’t deny that she has some mad skills.”
“Skills mean jackshit without experience,” Axl argued.
“It’s your call. Just remember that Reagan can be damned stubborn when she wants something, and she seems to want this.”
“Then it’s time she realized that we’re her bosses and when we say no she should suck it up.”
Sawyer grinned. “You want to tell her that? And can you do it without getting into a pissing match?”
“Probably not,” Axl admitted.
“It would help if you didn’t comment on every assignment she takes, if you didn’t keep checking up on her.” Sawyer just grinned at his scowl. “Speaking of Reags, she and Callow and his kid, and his private bodyguard, flew into Mercy Airport about an hour ago. She took them out to the Freedman farmhouse and is getting them settled.” Sawyer explained. “I wonder why they call it a farmhouse. The place is anything but.”
“What do you mean?”
“It’s a frickin’ estate. Massive house, heated swimming pool, tennis courts, expensive horses.”
“Who owns it?”
“A company registered in the Cayman Islands. It’s rented out by word of mouth, mostly to celebs who want to drop out of the limelight for a while.”
Axl’s eyes skimmed over the Fox, still looking for trouble, and he sighed when he saw the blonde from earlier eyeing him. He immediately realized that he was the focus of her attention and did an internal eye roll. His lack of energy and interest was frightening.
“Then it’s perfect for Callow.” Axl ignored Fake Barbie, drained his beer, and rolled the bottle between the palms of his hands. “How did Reagan find out about the house? She’s spent less time in Mercy than I have.”
“The last time she was in town, she did a trail ride. She probably came across the estate then. It’s along the route. She asked me about the place in an email shortly afterwards.”
Axl put his bottle on the table and picked up the salt shaker only to put it down again. He ignored Sawyer’s raised eyebrows at his uncharacteristic fidgeting and leaned back in the booth, attempting to look relaxed. “Have you seen her?” he asked, after a short silence. “Is she okay?”
“Reagan?” Sawyer clarified. “I asked if she wanted me to pop by the estate but she said no. That she was fine and that she and Bryn were going to lock up and everyone was going to have an early night.”
Axl glanced at his watch. It was just past eight and she wouldn’t be asleep yet. It would be a while before sleep came easy.
Axl felt the air move behind him, and immediately knew that Kai had arrived, the third of their trio. With his back to the door—he was the only one of them who felt comfortable in that position—he sensed that Kai was standing at the entrance, looking for them. Axl
felt Kai’s eyes on his back and knew he was walking toward him . . .
Axl grinned, waited, and then flew to his feet, and in one fluid, practiced move he had Kai’s hand in a firm grip, his thumb on a pressure point between his fingers. The only hint of discomfiture Kai revealed was the flash of annoyance in his eyes.
“Too slow, bro,” Axl said, dropping Kai’s hand.
Kai slid onto the bench next to Sawyer and shook his head, disgruntled. “I’ve known you for fifteen years and I have never managed to sneak up on you. How the hell did you know I was about to grab your shoulder?”
“Disturbance of the air,” Axl replied. It was his standard reply, though, he had to be honest, it was more than that. Kai had called his sense “spooky” and he supposed, to a degree, it was. It was an intrinsic knowledge, a skill that he’d honed to the point of sensing whether the person invading his space was a threat or not. And that was why Kai wasn’t lying on the floor, cupping his balls. Or dead.
But any opportunity to mess with his mate was never to be missed, so Axl sent him a patronizing smile and lifted a mocking eyebrow. “Being in love has slowed your reflexes, Manning.”
Instead of reacting, Kai just smiled, and a goofy look crossed his face. “Well, yeah. And it rocks.”
Axl and Sawyer exchanged a long, what-the-hell look, and Axl smiled in approval when Sawyer’s hard fist rocked into Kai’s shoulder. “Stop that! It’s creepy.”
“Hey!” Jack yelled from the bar. “That’s my future brother-in-law that you’re beating up!”
Sawyer whipped around, affronted. “Are you seriously defending him?”
Jack grinned. “Shit, no, he’s doing nasty things to my sister. Carry on.”
Chapter Two
AbbyM: What is the name of that tall, built Caswallawn partner with the very dark hair and light eyes? Mr. Sexy-but-Scary? Is he around more often or is that just my wishful thinking?
MandyK: You guys hear that the Freedman estate has been rented?
TessG: We’ve all heard that! What we want to know is who has moved in!
Reagan lifted the spoon of ice cream to her mouth and hoped that neither Knox nor Bryn noticed her trembling hand. And, God, she was still ice cold, despite wearing the thin thermal running top she usually wore in winter under her cashmere jersey. Knox and Bryn, she noticed, were comfortable in jeans and short-sleeved T-shirts.
Reagan looked down at her half-full bowl of ice cream, placed the spoon down, and pushed it away with the tip of her finger. Although she welcomed the cool slide down her still-tender throat, the sweet treat tasted like cardboard.
Reagan flicked a look to her right to Coe, who was eating his ice cream with four-year-old enthusiasm. Kids were so damn resilient. Judging by his boundless energy and joy, he was utterly unfazed at being tossed out of a burning trailer.
She shuddered and briefly closed her eyes, hearing the crackle of flames and tasting the smoke in the back of her throat.
“Reagan?” Coe’s piping voice grabbed her attention and she turned her head to look at him. God, he was cute, a modern-day, dark-haired Dennis the Menace.
“Yep, sport?”
“Who is the asshole?”
Reagan’s mouth dropped open and her jaw nearly hit the wooden table. She heard Bryn’s snort, his behind-his-hand laugh, and ignored the “Coe Devin Callow” roar from Knox that shot across the table.
“Uh, why are you asking me that, sport?”
Coe ran his finger along the side of the bowl and lifted the last remaining drop of ice cream to his mouth, deliberately ignoring his father. Woo boy, Reagan thought. Wasn’t it enough that she’d crawled through a burning trailer last night? Why did she get the tough questions?
“You said that when you were carrying me out of the fire. You also said that you were going to build him a new anus.” Coe turned his inquiring expression from her to his father. “What’s an anus?”
Reagan covered her eyes with her hand as a blush ran up her neck and shot into her face. Oh, God, she seldom let loose with the colorful vocabulary she’d learned from her fellow Cas operatives. And she’d never cussed in front of a kid. Or a principal.
Knox cleared his throat and locked his eyes on Coe, his expression stern. “Reagan was upset at the time and she didn’t mean to say any of the grown-up words she said.”
Coe tipped his head to one side, looking as if he was being handed a load of BS. Which he was. Smart kid. “Sure sounded like she did.”
“Whether that was true or not, Reagan said a lot of grown-up words that, if you repeat them, will result in having your mouth washed out with soap.”
A tiny frown appeared between Coe’s eyebrows. “Why would you wash my mouth with soap?”
“To make it clean because those are dirty words,” Knox explained, and Reagan smacked her lips together to keep her laughter from bubbling out.
“But toothpaste works better than soap to clean dirty mouths,” Coe stated, perplexed.
Bryn and Reagan both lifted their eyebrows at Knox, daring him to respond. When he told Coe to take his dessert plate to the kitchen, they all knew he had no comeback.
Coe: Ten thousand points.
Knox: None.
“But I still don’t know what an anus or an asshole is,” Coe protested as he climbed down from the chair.
Knox tipped his head back to look for answers in the ceiling. “God give me strength.”
They all ignored Coe’s huff of impatience and watched as he stomped from the table toward the door to the kitchen. At the door, he paused and his tiny eyes narrowed. “I will find out, you know.”
When they were certain he was out of earshot, Bryn and Knox dissolved into laughter. Reagan wiped her eyes and thought she should apologize. “Knox, sorry. I was in the moment and didn’t think to curb my language—”
Knox held up his hand to stop her speaking. “Reagan, no worries. Jeez, you were in a shitty situation and I don’t blame you.” Knox ran his hands over his face, stopping abruptly. “You saved my boy. Reags, you could pepper every conversation with an f-bomb and I’d still worship the ground you walk on.”
“I won’t though.” Reagan smiled at him. “Last night I had extenuating circumstances.”
Knox placed his arms on the table and stared at her, his navy eyes somber. “I can’t believe you went back into the trailer to get that damned bear.”
Reagan sighed and wished that Coe had kept his mouth shut. “I was hoping he wouldn’t mention that.”
“He’s four and incapable of keeping a secret. I am so mad that you risked your life for a twenty-dollar soft toy!”
Reagan met his eyes, felt uncomfortable with the emotion she saw brimming within them, and tapped her finger against the edge of her dessert bowl.
“Coe can’t go to sleep without Mr. Brown,” she explained, trying to make it sound like hurtling back into a burning building for a bear was something a reasonable person would do.
“He would’ve cried for a couple of days, but he’s four. Nothing lasts forever when you’re four,” Knox replied, not buying her explanation.
“My mom died when I was Coe’s age, so I know how important it is to have a link to a parent who has passed on,” Reagan explained, knowing that she didn’t need to say more. Mr. Brown was the last gift that Sula gave to Coe. It was a link between mother and son, and she’d brave a thousand burning buildings to keep that connection intact. For all she knew, Knox might have a box full of Sula’s stuff for Coe—and he probably did—but she couldn’t take the chance of Coe having nothing, like she did, linking mother to child.
“Thank you. And thank you for washing him,” Knox quietly said.
Yeah, about that. Reagan placed her elbow onto the table and pushed the tips of her fingers into her forehead. Did Knox know what was inside the bear? Was it her place to tell him? What was on that thumb drive? Had Sula hid
it? Knox himself?
She had to tell him, she needed to tell him . . .
Reagan felt that she was stuck between a rock and a hard place and wished she’d allowed one of Mickey Kane’s interns to wash the damn bear. But she hadn’t, and in doing so she’d found the tiny zip, tucked into the folds of its neck, and then under the first zip she’d found another. Intrigued, she’d opened the second zip and dug her finger inside, immediately feeling the thumb drive. Curious, she’d unzipped the neck of the bear to find a perfect hidey-hole. And within the hiding place was a small, innocuous thumb drive.
A thumb drive? Why?
She knew Knox and Sula’s history. Most of America did. Sula had been, not so long ago, America’s favorite, and reputed to be sweetest, A-list actress. The scandal had rocked Hollywood, Reagan remembered. America’s darling, after the birth of Coe, morphed into someone no one recognized. Rumors of her neglecting Coe soon surfaced—she left him in a lingerie shop once—and Knox had to fly back from a movie premiere in London because she locked herself in a closet and called a popular radio station and told the anchor that she intended to kill herself and her six-month-old son.
Drugs were suspected and Sula had checked into a psychiatric hospital and was placed on suicide watch. Three months after she was released, it was reported that she’d been suffering from severe postnatal depression and that she was on medication. Sula went back to work, the couple were reputed to be more in love than ever, and all was well with their world.
Three days before Coe’s first birthday Sula drove her car over a cliff on the Pacific Coast Highway. Her sporty Mercedes plunged onto rocks at the shoreline seventy feet below, landed upside down, and witnesses watched her lifeless body bobbing in the surf below.
She’d left Coe in his baby seat in a parking lot a kilometer away. An unidentified witness saw her drive off and he stayed with Coe until the emergency responders arrived. The witness disappeared but the bear, Mr. Brown, was found tucked under Coe’s arm, and Coe still couldn’t, three years later, function without him.
