“Concussion.”
Nic lifted a hand toward the bandage on his head.“You should be in the hospital.”
Garrett batted the hand away.“You know as well as I do that worse shit happens in the field.I’m trained, I’m qualified, I can help find my sister.I can’t sit in the hospital and do nothing.”
“Fucking jarheads,” Nic mumbled around a chuckle.
Garrett shoved him in the shoulder, likewise smiling.“Fucking frogs.”
Meanwhile, Cam, having vanished from existence, couldn’t help but dwell on what he and Nic didn’t have in common versus what Nic and Garrett did.Their shared past, Victoria and Lette, military service.Being fucking hardheaded when it came to protecting those they loved.
But wasn’t Cam the same in that last regard?Would their dissimilarities versus Nic and Garrett’s similarities stop him from loving Nic?No.Nothing would stop him from doing everything he could to protect Nic and those Nic cared for.Especially when doing so was also his job—the one he did best.
Clearing his throat, Cam leaned toward the speaker.“Did you get the details on the car?The kidnapper?”
“I’m texting all that to Lauren now,” Mel said.“Given that location, there should be footage from multiple sources.”Across from him, Lauren was already focused on her computer.“I didn’t recognize the guy who grabbed Lette.He wasn’t one of Vaughn’s usual men.”
“Too recognizable at this point,” Aidan said.“If they’re smart, they’ve fled.”
“They’re not,” Nic and Cam answered together.
Nic’s smile and his hand on Cam’s shoulder made him feel a bit less invisible.They shared things in common too, including a life they’d begun to build.A pretty damn good one.And if Cam wanted to keep Nic in it, not watch him spiral further into the regret and self-blame that had haunted him for almost thirty years, then Cam had to be there.Had to be the best at what he did.
“Lauren,” he said, “we need the list of all of Vaughn’s properties, personal and commercial, and supplement it with any properties owned or leased by his associates.Same for Bowers.”
“On it.”
He turned to Jamie next.“Planes, trains, and automobiles.Any mode of transportation Vaughn might use to move Lette.”
“Your warrant wide enough for that?”Moore asked Nic.
“Fuck it.”
Cam bit down hard on the inside of his cheek, biting back the warning that wanted out.
Aidan, not so much.“Price.”
“I’ll make it work.”
“We can’t lose her, Nic.”With all the escalating voices, Garrett’s was hardly audible, and not what Cam expected out of the Marine, especially after the earlier back-and-forth.But of everyone in the room, he had the most at stake.“After everything we went through to keep her safe, we can’t lose her now.”
Nic drew him into a hug.“We’ll get her back, G.”
“I will do anything.”
“We’ll do everything.”Nic’s gaze locked with Cam’s.“We’ve got the Bureau’s best kidnap and rescue agent on the case.”
Cam nodded, on board with the everything plan and willing to do anything for the man he loved.
Nic opened the door to Holding Room Two and the urge to strangle the man sitting relaxed on the other side of the table beside his attorney was damn near irresistible.
Since he couldn’t do that, maybe a snarky remark instead?About how nice a good night’s rest must be?Golden hair swept back, bespoke suit pressed, shoes shiny enough to reflect, Vaughn looked his normal, cocky self.
On first glance.
On second glance, however, the man’s normally bright eyes were dull and bloodshot, his hands looked like someone had taken a chainsaw to the cuticles, and his foot was bouncing where it hung over his knee, and not in the bored kind of way.No, it hadn’t been a restful night for Duncan Vaughn.Nic didn’t intend to make it a restful day either.
Keeping it in neutral for now, Nic slid into one of the chairs on his side of the table.“Thank you for coming in on such short notice.”
