And so it began. “Put him through.”
“We just went wheels up,” said Mac. “Sitrep?”
“We’re within a couple hundred miles, but we had storms and need to veer around them.”
“Fuck.”
“Exactly. Doc seems to think he can do it with Moto’s help. We’ll get them out of there and back to the States in a jiffy.”
“Or maybe not. We just got word from Jax, the embassy won’t issue Desjardins and her kid passports. They’ve heightened security coming into the country from Mexico. His contact’s hands are tied, even though McGrath’s probably behind it, not a national security issue as we’ve been told.”
“Hold up a second there, padre. Are we talking about Jacqueline Desjardins, the politician’s wife?”
“That’s the one.”
“She’s dead. Drove off a cliff years ago.”
“My guys swear she’s the real thing.”
He rolled his eyes. “You’re saying we’re helping the not-so-dead wife of the Democrat frontrunner for president of the United States.”
“That’s right. She has my men convinced and is looking for passage back into the country so she can deal with McGrath herself."
It was ludicrous. Absolutely asinine, and these guys should have known it. “Just because somebody tells a convincing story—”
“I’d trust Razorback with my life.”
"I know Razorback, too, and I know what he’s been through.” Cowboy heard the implication in his statement but didn’t back down from it. He didn’t know if Razorback could be trusted, if he was the same-caliber soldier he’d been back then. Hell, nothing was the same as it had been and word on the street was Ian had internalized more than just those flames.
“If you have a problem with my men—”
You bet your ass I do.“I’m saying his judgment might not be enough for me to back them up with my own men and a multimillion-dollar bird on some clandestine smuggling operation back into the States for a dead woman. And if you don’t see the sense in that, Mac, I got nothing else to tell you.”
“Not smuggling. And Jax is on board. He was trying to get them passports.”
Cowboy sighed heavily. If there was any doubt in his mind he was prejudiced against this group of men, his internal dialogue at that moment erased that doubt. “Has it occurred to you that the threat against the Mexican border could be very real, and this woman claiming to be Desjardins might be just the person they’re bending over backwards to keep out of the country? It’s a far more likely scenario.”
“No. She got my name from my old CO, Bill Whitton. A SEAL, Cowboy. There’s nobody I’d trust more.”
“Trust. Hmm.” He squeezed the skin between his eyes. “I got a phone call the other day, Mac. I wasn’t going to bring it up, but now I’m thinking it’s relevant. From an old buddy of mine down at Rikers Island. He’s the superintendent there—you know, the prison in New York City.” The silence on the other end of the phone was exactly what Cowboy had been aiming for. “He says you’ve been down there a lot lately, Mac, and I’m thinking the prisoner you’re visiting says a lot about your judgment, man. A hell of a lot about who I ought to trust.”
“You have no right to snoop into what I do on my personal time.”
“Actually, when you go dropping the HERO Force name, I sure as fuck do. So forgive me if I’m not dripping with confidence in your abilities, or Razorback’s, and I’m not willing to forgo my better judgment because you have the same letterhead I do. So that’s where it stands. We’re going to go in there and get SVX off their scent, but I’m not taking the fall for trusting this woman based on Razorback’s assessment of the situation, or yours. Now have a nice day.” He disconnected the call. “Fuck face,” he grumbled under his breath.
The chopper banked sharply to the right, and Cowboy closed his eyes. The SEALs were a brotherhood, but sometimes you had to hold your brother’s face to the asphalt just to prove a point.
That’s what family was all about.
15
The pungent smell of smoke filled the downstairs hallway, assaulting Razorback’s nose and lighting up sections of his brain that were better left to die. He’d battled fire once before, fighting the eager flames for his very life, and he had no goddamn desire to do it again.
Fuck.
The skin on his face burned with remembered pain as he and Sloan cleared the upstairs rooms, air quality diminishing with every passing minute. But Jackie and Selena were depending on him, and his will was strong enough to prevent even a moment’s hesitation.
SVX was trying to smoke them out, force them to leave the safety of the house and become easy targets for a sniper’s bullet—spurred on by the sound of the HERO Force chopper, no doubt.
