“Once again,” Christian said, “I ask you: Withwhatweapons you plan to commit this mass murder since we’ve bloody well left everything that goesboomback at Rusty’s?”
“Andagain…” Emily came right back at him. Chelsea could tell Emily had turned from the phone because her voice was fainter. “I’d like to remindyouof two things. One, I’m very creative. Two, you have to sleep sometime.” Emily’s voice became louder as she spoke directly into the receiver again. “Tell me, Chels, do you remember the news story of that woman who waited until her cheating husband fell asleep before supergluing his dick to the inside of his leg? I’ve always appreciated her ingenuity and—”
“You are a complete nutter!” Christian wailed.
“Never said I wasn’t.” There was laughter in Emily’s voice.
“Holy duck fuck!” Chelsea heard Ace shout. “Either you two cut the shit, or I’m going to call Don King and go ahead and make this an event.”
There was a beat or two of silence following that outburst. Then Emily huffed. “Men… They’re impossible.” In a conspiratorial whisper, she added, “And British men are the worst.”
“Uh-huh. Right. Keep telling yourself that, sister,” Chelsea said. If her day hadn’t put her in a terrible temper, and if she weren’t terrified that she had lost Dagan for good, she might have enjoyed Emily and Christian’s banter. As it was, it only gave her a headache.
“What isthatsupposed to mean?” Emily demanded.
“Nothing. I really need to go. Stay safe, Em. Stay away from the cameras when you can. Hopefully once Z and I”—was it her imagination or did Dagan flinch when he heard his nickname?—“are back stateside, we’ll be able to get this mess cleaned up and it’ll be safe to call you all home.”
After they’d said their good-byes, and after Chelsea had returned her phone to her pocket, the car once again filled with silence. There was only the hum of the Renault’s engine, the howl of the wind through the broken window, and the slight whistle of the heat blowing through the vents.
Chelsea was reminded of the Silence Charm Hermione Granger had used on a Death Eater during the Battle of the Department of Mysteries. When she couldn’t stand it a second longer, she finally said, “Thank you.”
Dagan didn’t look at her, but thank goodness the Silence Charm had been broken. “For what?” he asked.
“For back there on the beach. For saving my ass.Again.” For the record, she was still obeying his edict. She was only talking about the mission.
Muscles ticked in his jaw, causing the Beard to twitch. His moonshine voice no longer sounded smooth and distilled. Now, it was dark and harsh. “Just doing my job.”
Annnnddd there they were again, words so cold they left a thick layer of ice around her heart.
She turned the vents more fully toward her, trying to get warm. It was a wasted effort. She would never be warm again. Dagan had taken the fire of his passion, the heat of his love from her, and all that was left was a cold, aching void.
Chapter 49
Chicago, Illinois
Ten hours…
That’s how much time had passed since Chelsea hopped on the flight that had spirited her and Dagan across the Atlantic from Paris to Chicago. Ten hours of not sleeping, even though her eyes were filled with sand and her whole body was one big, exhausted ache. Ten hours of not talking because Dagan had claimed a sofa on the private jet, stretched out, and closed his eyes, effectively shutting her out.
Even after they had landed in Chicago and Becky Knight, a tiny wisp of a woman who had a penchant for lollipops and blowtorches—the latter no doubt developed over the years she had been building and designing the custom choppers that kept the Black Knights’ covers intact—had picked them up from the airport and drove them to BKI headquarters, Dagan hadn’t said more than a few perfunctory words to Chelsea.
And now? Well, now they were sitting in front of the bank of computers on the second floor of the old menthol cigarette factory that had been converted into the living quarters, a shop, and ground zero for all things BKI and clandestine, and Dagan continued to give her the cold shoulder. Anytime she tried to catch his eye, he quickly looked away, a muscle ticking in his jaw.
Everything Chelsea had feared for so long—losing his respect, his support, his friendship, and more recently hislove—had come to pass. She had known it would hurt. But Lordy, she hadn’t been prepared for just how bad it would be.
It felt like someone had ripped open her chest, torn out her heart, and tossed it on the floor. It was difficult to breathe. Difficult to think past the pain. Difficult to—
“This cockthistle doesn’t know what’s about to hit him,” Ozzie crowed, his fingers flying across his keyboard.
Ever since she had planted the virus in Morrison’s computer, BKI’s computer whiz had engaged in a series of cyber battles with someone from either Morrison’s camp or Spider’s. And according to what Ozzie had muttered to her when she arrived and asked how he was coming along, his nemesis was good.He’s faster, Ozzie had said.But I’m smarter by at least two standard deviations.
Now, even though Ozzie’s brow was knitted in concentration, there was a smile on his face.
“Making headway?” Chelsea asked from the rolling desk chair beside him. Becky was occupying herself by cleaning a transmission on the conference table behind them, and Dagan was in the desk chair on Ozzie’s opposite side.
“I’m almost in,” Ozzie declared, and Chelsea’s heart lurched. Maybe there was a way to salvage her mission yet. Maybe it hadn’t all been for naught.
“You go get him, my hunka hunka burnin’ lover,” Samantha Tate, Ozzie’s fiancée, said as she entered the room, steaming cup of coffee in hand.
