Chapter Six
GREAT. ANOTHER ROUND with the detectives in the interrogation room. Unless she missed her guess, the detectives would insist on interviewing them separately, then compare their answers.
Rayne shoved her hands through her hair.
She knew what would happen. The detective would bring up her role in the death of her father.
Would she never be able to leave that part of her life behind?
If she could do it all over again, she would tell her teenage self to grab a pan instead of a knife and whack her father over the head to knock him out, then ask to be removed from her family home.
But that wasn’t possible. You couldn’t go back for a do-over.
Rayne turned away from the group and sat on a bench to one side of the training room.
She leaned her head against the wall, eyes closed, and fought back tears threatening to spill down her cheeks.
Her past, all of it, would come out soon.
Would her friends and teammates turn against her?
While Grant hadn’t, that didn’t mean everyone else would follow his example.
If this information drove a wedge between herself and her teammates, Rayne would have to find another team with which to work.
That was the last thing she wanted. Artemis was the best part of her life.
To lose them would devastate her even more than losing her mother and extended family because of her father’s death.
Someone sat beside her. Without opening her eyes, Rayne knew Grant had followed her. “What are we going to do?”
“Whatever we must.” Grant clasped her hand in his and raised their hands to his mouth to kiss her knuckles. “Everything will work out.”
She turned her head toward him. “How can you say that? This feels like a trap is closing in on us.”
“We didn’t kill Selena or Dante. The cops won’t find proof we’re guilty because it doesn’t exist.”
“You know better than to believe that.”
“Not this time. Not with Fortress behind us.”
“You have more faith in the system than I do.”
“You’ll see.” He squeezed her fingers.
She hoped she was pleasantly surprised. “What do we do now?”
Grant smiled. “We make them come to us.”
“Won’t that annoy them?”
He shrugged. “Gives us more time to train and look into things ourselves. The priority is training, though. I’ll alert Brent and Zane so they know everything that’s happened. They’ll put the computer geeks on the job. I trust them to find the truth more than I trust the Hartman cops.”
“Agreed. Let’s hope the geeks move fast to unearth the facts we need to clear our names. I have a feeling Brent might deploy our team early.”
That wouldn’t make the Hartman detectives happy. They seemed to be rule followers and would want her and Grant available any time to answer questions.
Iona walked toward them. “Suspects or not, we need to return to training.” She pointed at Rayne. “You have ground to make up. Since you didn’t run this morning, you have the privilege of running five miles before you catch up with the rest of us. Get moving.”
Rayne sighed, foreseeing a need for a soak in hot water with bath salts to ease her aching muscles. “Yes, ma’am.” She stood.
“Same goes for you, Grant. Your pretty face won’t get you out of PT. Move it, buddy.”
He saluted her and fell into step with Rayne. “Your choice of where we run.”
“Indoor track. We can keep track of everyone else’s progress while we run.”
They walked to the stairs leading to the second-floor track. When they reached their destination, Grant motioned for Rayne to take the lead.
She grinned. “You don’t want me to follow you?”
“Are you kidding? I don’t want to frustrate you with my slower pace. Run at your normal speed. I’ll try to keep up.”
Rayne laughed as she fell into her natural running rhythm. She started slowly, then gradually sped up until she was at least half a lap ahead of Grant. The farther she ran, the better Rayne felt.
She smiled, relaxing into the run. This was what she’d needed, to feel her muscles burn and her lungs work efficiently.
When she’d been in gymnastics, Rayne had enjoyed pushing her body to its limits and beyond.
Winning competitions hadn’t been the end game for her.
She had thrived on stretching herself to achieve new heights of skill.
Her smile faded. Everything changed on that fateful night so many years ago.
A split-second decision to grab the knife changed her life and ended her father’s reign of terror behind closed doors.
That choice ended her gymnastics career.
Since none of her relatives would take her in after what happened, Rayne had been tossed into the child protection services system where no one took her in or took an interest in her gymnastics.
She pushed herself to run faster. Rayne smiled grimly. As if by running faster she could leave painful memories behind.
When she breezed by Grant, he called out, “Show off. Way to make me look bad, babe.”
She laughed and kept running. Despite the terrible events of her teenage years, Rayne couldn’t help but be grateful for her life intersecting with Grant and his teammates. They were a special group of men.
As their EOD man, Grant had the dubious honor of handling the assembly and dismantling of explosive ordinances for their group. Rayne had seen firsthand his delicate precision in wielding his instruments as skillfully as a surgeon.
Minutes later, she finished her laps and walked the outside lane to cool off while waiting for Grant to complete his run. He soon joined her.
“Did you set a new land speed record for the five-mile run?” he teased.
She shook her head. “I was a little winded today.”
Grant narrowed his eyes. “You held back, didn’t you?”
Rayne smiled, neither confirming nor denying his accusation.
But yeah, she’d definitely held back. Bad enough that they would be singled out for extra training today because of their delay in arriving at Fortress to join their teams. The last thing she wanted was to add even more reps to their training exercises because Grant appeared to be slacking when the blame lay in the difference in their running pace.
He’d actually improved his running speed by running with her every morning.
Score one for his male ego that couldn’t stand to be shown up by Rayne.
He sighed. “I thought I improved my run time.”
“You did.”
“Nope. I’ll have to put more time into running. Come on. We better go. Seth is giving me his move-it-or-pay-hard look.” They descended the stairs and joined their teammates on the main floor.
“Next stop, the firing range and the kill house.”
Grant rubbed his hands together. “Now we’re talking. I’m ready to redeem myself. Rayne left me behind to eat her dust while we ran.”
“Your pace is better,” Seth said as the members of Echo unit and Artemis grabbed their Go bags and began walking toward the firing range. “What have you been doing to help yourself?”
“Running every morning with Rayne.”
“Well, it’s working. Keep it up.”
“Yes, sir.”
Seth clapped him on the shoulder and jogged ahead to catch up with his wife.
“They’re such a great couple,” Rayne murmured. “He’s so good for and to Teagan.”
“Teagan changed his entire life,” Grant admitted. “I’ve never seen him happier.”
“Noah and Violet are the same.”
“They’re special, all right.” He glanced at Rayne. “So are you.”
Rayne’s cheeks burned. “Thank you, Grant.”
He raised her hand to his mouth and kissed her knuckles. “Stick with me, sweetheart, and you’ll hear more of the same every day.”
She remained silent for a moment, then said, “How long do you think we have before the Hartman detectives show up?”
“We’ll be lucky if we make it to noon. The boss won’t be happy to have our training session interrupted a second time today.”
At 10:05 a.m., Rayne’s phone signaled an incoming message while in the middle of the kill house, stretched along a beam near the ceiling.
She ignored the interruption, focusing instead on the shadows in front of her.
While she heard nothing, her gut said one of her opponents from the other team lay in wait to take her down.
Rayne waited in the gloomy light of the kill house, senses attuned to everything around her.
A slight breeze caressed her face, carrying a fresh ocean scent on the currents.
Definitely not the norm for this building.
A member of the opposing team was nearby, and he’d made the mistake of wearing aftershave or cologne.
Again, she waited and watched. A short time later, something moved in the darkness to her left.
She sighted down the barrel of her laser weapon at the area with movement.
Within seconds, her target shifted his position, inching toward the door to the darkened hall.
Rayne pulled the trigger. A split second later, her opponent’s vest emitted a signal, indicating a direct hit.
A series of vicious curses spewed from her opponent’s mouth as a buzzer sounded throughout the building and lights came on. Brandon Cartwright yanked off his safety glasses and glowered at the empty room. “Come out of hiding, you coward,” he yelled. “I know you’re in here somewhere. Show yourself.”
Rayne’s eyebrows soared. Someone was in a foul mood today. She rose, walked easily along the beam to the wall, then lowered herself to the top of a bookcase. From there, she leaped onto the wooden desk and onto the ground.
Cartwright glared at her. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“Winning a competition,” she said mildly.
Behind Cartwright, Grant and Seth paused in the doorway.
“You cheated,” the irate operative accused. “Should have known you’d pull a stunt like this just to win since you can’t come out ahead any other way.”
Grant walked further into the room and stood beside Rayne. “What’s your problem, Cartwright?”
He jabbed a finger in Rayne’s direction. “She hit me with laser fire while hiding like a coward near the ceiling. That wasn’t part of our instructions.”