Camellia slipped her hand into his, her thumb sliding over the inside of his palm, that caress stroking along those same nerve endings inside his body. He let her take the lead in soothing him, even though he shifted his body so that he could slightly cover her smaller one. He didn’t like that he was sitting and Ryland was standing, giving his commander the advantage in a fight.
“I would imagine that you had forbidden any documentation of your son’s psychic or physical abilities. I say that because that would be what I would do under the circumstances,” Jonas answered honestly. He had known this wasn’t going to be easy. Ryland adored Lily.If she had actually documented Daniel’s abilities without the consent of her husband, there would be hell to pay. All of them knew that.
“Jeff?” Ryland’s tone was mild, but there was nothing mild about the way his very muscular body positioned itself as he turned to face the younger man.
Kaden stood up, a flowing of his tall, heavily muscled frame. He moved casually, partially placing his body between the leader of their team and those seated at the table. Jonas took the opportunity to rise as well, stretching, as if he’d been sitting for too long. He tugged on Camellia’s hand, taking her with him, all but putting her in a corner so she was protected on three sides, with him standing in front of her.
“Jeff?” Ryland said again. “Last time I ask you.”
“Lily came to me a few months ago, Cap,” Jeff said. “It didn’t occur to me that you weren’t aware of what we were doing. I wasn’t about to deny her. She’s Lily.”
“What exactly was it that you two were doing?” Ryland demanded.
Jeff didn’t hesitate to give a report. “Once a week we got together in a dream state. She would dictate her notes on Daniel and file them in her office in the dream. I would ensure she was safe in the dream. Then we would come back.”
“Who guarded your bodies while you were in the dream state?”
“We were locked in the psych room together. We both had messages to send to a guardian if we didn’t report back in half an hour. Lily had one that would go to you, and I had one that would go to Jonas. We never ran into trouble, nor did I feel it was likely we would.”
“You were taking a chance with Lily’s life.”
“I was following Lily’s directive, which I thought was your directive,” Jeff corrected.
“In all those weeks, or months, you never once asked me,” Ryland pointed out.
That was the flaw in Jeff’s reasoning. Jonas knew it. Kyle knew it. Camellia knew it as well. Jonas felt both Kyle and Camellia holding their breath. Waiting.
Jeff sighed. “I realized after a few weeks that it was possible you weren’t aware, Cap. I asked Lily several times, but she refused to give me a definitive answer. When I told her I was uncomfortable continuing and couldn’t without talking to you, she reminded me...” He broke off, shaking his head, clearly hesitant to tell Ryland what his wife had said.
Ryland’s gray eyes appeared to burn through Jeff to the point Jonas took two steps in Jeff’s direction. When he did, Ryland held up his hand. “Don’t you move.”
Jonas halted. “I’m sorry, Cap. I didn’t realize I was interfering.”
Ryland continued looking at Jeff, clearly expecting him to continue.
“Lily reminded me that she saved my life when I had brain bleeds from the stroke that paralyzed the right side of my body. She pointed out that she was the one who hadn’t given up on me and that she worked with me every day and found the right people to help me.”
“My wife guilted you into keeping something important about my son from me, even though you knew I didn’t want it done,” Ryland stated. His tone was back to that soft, threatening predatory sound.
Once again, the predatory as well as protective instincts in Jonas were triggered. He knew this was getting nowhere. Ryland was furious with Lily and Jeff, and Jonas couldn’t blame him. The bottom line was, they still had a traitor to ferret out.
Kaden’s sigh was deliberately overly loud. “It sounds like Jeff was stuck between a rock and a hard place. Loyalty to you and Lily. All of us feel that to both of you. If we’re loyal to one, we’re being loyal to both. I can’t imagine being put in that position.”
“Whoever was paid to betray your team had to be someone whoonly had access to this team, Jonas,” Camellia said, using a very soft, speculative voice. “The person had to know Jeff very well. And Lily too. The person had to know their movements in the household. You know it isn’t a member of your team, but it has to be someone who is around Jeff and Lily. Someone they both trust.”
She spoke as if she were thinking aloud. Jonas knew she was directing Ryland’s attention away from Jeff, just as Kaden had done, but he didn’t have to like it. Ryland immediately turned those steel eyes on her. Camellia didn’t look at him or appear to notice. She frowned, her small teeth biting into her lower lip, long lashes veiling her blue eyes. “There has to be someone, Jeff.”
Ryland’s gaze moved from Camellia back to Jeff. Jeff pushed his chair back and unfolded his frame. At one time, he’d been a champion surfer. He still moved with that grace and balance in spite of the stroke he’d suffered, leaving him with a slight weakness on his right side even after all the hard therapy he’d put in. He worked out hard, trained even harder, determined to be an asset to his team and never slow them down. He began pacing, his sun-bleached hair falling around his face as he went from one end of the room to the other.
“I’m still in therapy for my legs and arm,” he said aloud to himself more than the others. “Lily comes in to oversee what Lydia is doing most of the time.”
Ryland lifted his gaze to Kyle and nodded his head. Kyle used his phone to text someone. Jonas would bet his last dollar it was Flame, Gator’s wife. Raul “Gator” Fontenot was a member of their team, and Iris “Flame” Johnson, now Fontenot, knew her way around a computer. If she was coming after you with her keyboard, there was nowhere to hide.
“That’s Brandon Adams’s assistant,” Jeff continued, muttering under his breath. “I’m such a great case with my brain, you know.”
“What does that mean?” Kaden interrupted before Ryland could.
Jeff scowled at him, not liking his train of thought to beintruded on. “Brandon Adams was the brain surgeon who saved my life. He’s a good friend of Lily’s. He’s followed up to make certain I don’t continue to have problems, which I sometimes did in the past before Lily taught me to develop shields.”
