Chrissy blinked, as shocked by his deadly tone as he was. He opened his mouth to say… He wasn’t sure what. But he was interrupted by the sound of a honking horn.
One of the taxi drivers hung out the window and yelled, “Hey! Y’all coming or what? I got an airport run scheduled in twenty minutes!”
“We’re coming!” Uncle John hollered back. Then, in a quieter voice, he told the group, “Let’s go, children. I think we’ve all had enough fun for one day.”
Chrissy followed after John, so much weariness in her steps that Wolf wanted to scoop her up and carry her the rest of the way. But she wouldn’t welcome the gesture. The woman prided herself on being as tough as Teflon.
“If you try to use Chrissy’s exhaustion and vulnerability as excuses to seduce her, I promise a slow, painful death,” he said when Romeo fell into step beside him. Each of his words was hard enough to make his jaw hurt.
Instead of looking properly cowed, Romeo grinned that stupid grin that was all perfect white teeth and swarthy swagger. “Handguns or hunting knives?”
“Handgrenades.” Wolf fixed him with his blackest scowl.
Romeo snorted. “That’d be painful. But I’m not sure it would be all that slow.”
“You’renotsharin’ your room with Chrissy.” It wasn’t a question.
“She can have the room I reserved for you, and you can shack up with me. I can make you forget this day too.” Romeo hooked an arm around Wolf’s neck and gave him a noogie as if they were thirteen instead of in their thirties.
Wolf had just had a very, very bad day.
He feared a night stuck in a hotel room with Romeo might be worse.
Chapter 11
9:38 p.m.
“Yes, I understand. I will let him know.” Navid disconnected his call and was quiet for what seemed to Izad to be an eternity.
He tried to be patient. He truly did. His head of security was a thoughtful man, never jumping to conclusions or making snap judgments. But eventually Izad couldn’t take it a second longer.
“Well?” he demanded, raking in a deep breath that smelled of the hotel room service they’d ordered for dinner.
More to the point, the hotel room service theothershad ordered for dinner. Izad had been too nervous to partake. But even if hehadbeen able to keep anything down, nothing on the menu suited him.
American fare was so salty and greasy. They didn’t know how to season their foods with herbs and spices and so added flavor with oil and sodium.
Oh, how he longed for somebaghali poloorFesenjan.
How he longed forhome.
If he closed his eyes, he could almost smell the saffron in the air, see Kazem’s winning smile as the winds from Mount Tochal ruffled his son’s black hair.
And speaking of his son…
The wait to hear from Kazem had been—and continued to be—interminable. As was the wait to hear back from Omid or Cas as to who the survivors were.
Unfortunately, his men had been too late getting into position to see who had exited the Coast Guard’s ship. And the hours since had ticked by like years.
Izad felt ancient. And exhausted.
“Omid has confirmed it.” Navid’s expression was carefully neutral. “Mason McCarthy is alive.”
Izad had stood from the hotel sofa when Navid’s cell phone jangled. Now, he sank back into the cushions, lifting a hand to his pounding temples.
From the other end of the sofa, the American mumbled, “Told you this would happen.”
Ignoring him, Izad beseeched his head of security. “There is more, Navid. I can see it on your face.”
