Anders’ lips thin. “Who? Who did we lose?”
“The two new recruits.”
Anders runs his hands through his hair. “Shit. They were damn fine operatives. Hedy had really outdone herself recruiting those two. Any injuries?”
DB’s voice sounds grim. “Yeah, but they fought through it. Got most of the crew, but Joshua Tremaine and a few of his closest guards got away.”
There’s silence on the line. With someone like Tremaine, it doesn’t matter if you decimate the organization they prop themselves up with; they’ll pop up somewhere else. The op was a categorical fail across the board, and from what I know of the Wimberley crew, failure is rare.
Anders’ voice is soft as he asks, “How did this happen?”
Jake takes the question. “I’m in their system now, and from what we can sort through, the two guys y’all took down this morning were playing the FBI, and one of them was Tremaine’s cousin. Looks like they didn’t call in this morning and that set off a system check. I believe Ronan’s been compromised, but we can’t pull him up, either.”
DB comes back on. “Which is how we ended up on a borrowed plane. Three operatives not responding to our repeated calls is not exactly comforting.”
Shit. “Sorry, boss. We were just exhausted.” And sex drunk.
Anders rubs his face. “So, where’s Ronan? I checked in with him after we completed our mission, but we haven’t heard from him since.”
As the words leave his mouth, someone begins to pound on the door. I get up and hop into my jeans, grabbing my gun. I toss Anders his jeans, and he sets down the phone while he wriggles that fucking perfect peach of an ass into them.
“Guys, it’s Ronan,” filters through the closed door, and he steps in front of the window. I swing open the door, finding a slightly worse-for-wear version of the handsome guy we met in video conference. I check the blind spots around him, then step aside and let him in, quickly closing and locking the door.
He walks in a few feet and pauses, taking in Anders and me shirtless. In a cabin that smells like fresh sheets and sex. And, minor detail, Anders has my bite marks all over his collarbones and chest. With a few sex bruises thrown in for good measure.
Not…ideal.
“DB, we’ve got Ronan here, looking like he took a couple hits to the face,” Anders says, quietly tracking my reaction.
My gaze shifts to Ronan and back to Anders’ bruises, and his lips thin, understanding me perfectly.
We need to be a bit more discreet.
There’s a rustling sound and Thane comes back on the line. “Ro? Are you okay?”
Ronan, unaware of the silent conversation behind his back, scratches his collarbone, visibly affected by Thane’s voice. “Um, yeah, Thane. I’m…I’m, uh, fine. Now.”
The phone call switches to FaceTime, and Thane’s huge mug takes up the screen. “Let me see him,” he demands.
Anders complies, and I turn on the lights. Ronan blinks at the brightness and squares his shoulders. He has a decent shiner on his cheek, his lip is busted, and it looks like he walked through some mud, but he doesn’t lookthatbad.
“Do you need a doctor?”
Anders turns the camera and gestures to himself, as if to remind the people in the room and on the phone that he is, in fact, a doctor.
Thane sighs. “Anders, why aren’t you wearing a shirt? And…are those teeth marks?”
Dammit. I yank my T-shirt on and pick up his from the floor, throwing it at him.
“I was napping. Here, Omar, can you hold the phone for me?”
My jaw tightens as I grab his phone and Anders finally pulls on his T-shirt. He walks up to Ronan and quietly asks him a series of questions, so I step aside to give him a modicum of privacy.
Thane taps the camera. “Turn the phone. I can’t see anything.”
So much for patient privacy.I hit the Reverse button on the camera.
“Why is Anders touching his face?”
