Chapter 25 #2
Jordan added a little fuel to the fire. “You pretty much did.”
“I think you’re hot, in the most respectful and non-threatening, platonic manner possible,” Grady said cautiously. “If you are cool with that and Brynn doesn’t freak out when I tell her about this conversation later.”
“You’d tell Brynn you think your co-worker is hot?” Ryan sounded aghast.
“Yes, I tell her everything that I’m allowed to.” Grady sounded disgusted. “I fucking love her, man. I want to tell her everything. She lost a lot with everything that happened, and I’m trying to help her fit into her new life here, however I can.”
Ryan scrubbed a hand over his face. “I’m happy to come by and tell Brynn she’s hot any time she wants. I always did have a thing for redheads.”
Jordan watched Donnelly stiffen but Grady laughed.
“She’d shoot you if you tried,” Grady countered.
“I thought she’d forgiven me for our little misunderstanding?”
“Ha. It’s not just one and done, man. You gotta earn forgiveness over the long term.”
“Ain’t that the God’s honest truth.” Ryan sighed. “Something tells me offering her sexual favors wouldn’t be appropriate.”
Grady turned around to glare at his colleague, and the car wobbled slightly.
“I’m kidding. Jesus.”
It struck Jordan that Ryan and Daisy had the same attitude toward sex, but both also used it as a deflection away from deeper issues. What was Ryan trying to hide? Jordan glanced from Ryan to Donnelly and back again.
“I think you’re sizzling, Donnelly,” Jordan said quietly.
He caught her smile and Ryan’s frown. Oh, yeah.
She tilted her head to one side as if considering. “I’ll take it. I could do with the morale boost.”
“You need a morale boost? How come? Someone mess with you?” Grady queried with a frown.
She shrugged. “Some jackass.”
Jordan stared hard at Ryan, but his teammate was staring out the window.
“In that case, you’re ghost pepper hot.” Grady told her. “And don’t forget it. And that’s from your partner who has impeccable taste in women, not one of the team Lotharios.”
Jordan grimaced. That people were comparing him to Ryan Sullivan, the consummate ladies’ man, was like a bullet to the chest.
Did Ryan feel as lonely as he did most nights?
Meghan pressed her lips together. “Appreciate it, Grade. Might have to get a tattoo of a ghost pepper on my ass now.”
Ryan groaned.
Grady’s teeth flashed. “Now give me the name of the fucker who hurt your feelings.”
“Just some guy. Doesn’t matter. His loss.” She stared determinedly at the road ahead.
Jordan decided it was his turn to deflect attention now. “Now, if we are all confident of our sex appeal, can anyone give me a SitRep?”
Unusually, Ryan kept his brooding gaze directed out the window on the dark terrain.
Grady filled in the silence.
The world had flipped on its head.
“We have nine confirmed heat spots in a two-story mansion on a lake. Supposedly one woman, eight guys. Can’t get a visual on any of them as they closed the blinds and as we didn’t arrive until after two.
They all appear to be in bed asleep except for a couple of bodyguards who are taking turns patrolling the grounds.
Six bedrooms in the main house and a small servant’s residence in the back, which also seems to be where the security is quartered. ”
“How many people do we have down here?”
“All of Gold Team. They pulled everyone off watching your place for now.”
“What about Daisy’s protection detail?”
He felt the weight of the interest of all three of the other people in the vehicle even though none of them so much as twitched an eyelid.
“Blue Team Echo Squad got pulled in to shadow her,”—she wouldn’t like that—“but they’ve been diverted.
We had a break in the case thanks to a letter Daisy found where she works that turned out to be a jihadist’s suicide note in an almost extinct language from Pakistan.
Blue Team are now assisting local SWAT to bring him in.
” Grady checked his watch. “They are all set to go the same time we move in on this house here.”
Jordan’s emotions swung between fear for Daisy’s safety and the need to put Bocharov in a cage, or a grave, for good. “She’s not alone though, right?”
“Two TacOps agents are with her.”
That should be enough. Regan and Cisco might seem like nerds, but they were both fully fledged FBI agents, and Regan was no fool.
“One klick out from rendezvous point,” Grady told him.
He couldn’t resist any longer. He should be checking his weapon, but instead he pulled his cell and tapped out a quick message.
When this is all over, we need to talk.
Even though it was the middle of the night, the answer came straight away.
Nope. Not interested.
Disappointment filled him, and he thought about how to best play it. Begging wouldn’t work with a woman like Daisy. He wasn’t even sure what he wanted yet, just that he wanted more. Despite Kurt, despite the fact he should know better. He wanted more.
Liar.
Then he turned off his cell, knowing that would infuriate her, and concentrated instead on the upcoming op, that might end the danger for good.