Prologue
Red Delilah’s Biker Bar, Chicago, Illinois
“Ya know how they say a watched pot never boils? The same is true for cell phones. Ya keep starin’ at that thing and it’ll never ring.”
Samuel Harwood turned his phone facedown on the table. “Sorry. Just a little distracted tonight.”
Which was an odd thing for a man famous for his focus to say. A man who’d become one of the deadliest Marine Raider snipers ever to graduate the programbecausehe had the rare ability to concentrate on a fixed point for hours on end.
Apparently, he wasn’t the only one who found his absent-mindedness unusual. Fisher, his teammate at Black Knights Inc., lifted an eyebrow. Fisher’s signature Louisiana drawl sounded round and sonorous compared to the flat Midwestern accents heard around the bar. “Anything ya want to share with the group?”
“Nah.” Sam shook his head. “It’s nothing.”
Or it’dbenothing if she’d just text me back.
“Hmm.” Fisher narrowed his eyes. “That hang-dog expression says otherwise. Looks like you’re sufferin’ from a bad case of woe-is-mes. Careful there, brother, those can be fatal.”
“Leave him alone, Fish.” Eliza reached across the table to smack Fisher’s arm. “Just because we live and work together doesn’t mean you have the right to shove your nose in everyone’s business.”
“Says the woman who knows everything about everyone,” Fisher countered. “I mean, ya could probably tell me what color underwear I’m wearin’ and what I had for breakfast this mornin’.”
“Your underwear is black because that’s the only color you own. And no.” She lifted a finger when Fisher opened his mouth to say something salacious. “I haven’t been snooping through your dresser drawers because I have some sort of weird boxer-brief fetish. We share a laundry room, and you have a bad habit of leaving your clothes in the dryer.”
“Add that to the list of transgressions ya keep against me,” Fisher grinned at her. “Lazy launderer.”
“As for what you had for breakfast.” She ignored him as she continued. “It was biscuits and gravy. I know that because I made it. And it’s not that I know everything about everyone. It’s just that I have an eye for detail. Which is undoubtedly one of the reasons you all decided to hire me.”
“We”—Fisher pointed to his own chest and then indicated the gathered group of covert operators—“didn’t have any say in that. As I recollect,la jefaherself insisted ya be brought in under pressure from your dear ol’ daddy.”
If indignation had a face, it would’ve been Eliza’s. “Are you saying nepotism is the only reason I’m here? If you don’t think I’m pulling my weight, Fish, I’d be happy to hear what you think I should be—”
“Now, hang on a minute.” Fisher had the good sense to interrupt. Then he proved he didn’t have any sense at all when he added, “Don’t go gettin’ your panties in a wad.”
Eliza’s top lip curled until her teeth showed. “I despise that phrase.”
“Likely ’cause ya got a bit a class and talk of a person’s britches goesbeyond the pale.” The last three words were said in a posh, East Coast accent that mimicked Eliza’s. She opened her mouth to let him have it, but he rushed ahead. “My point wasn’t that you’re not good at your job. My point was that none of us had any say in the matter. That’s all.”
“Well, thank yousomuch for clearing that up.” Her tone was the same one she’d have used had Fisher insulted all her ancestors.
Fisher Wakefield and Eliza Meadows were oil and water. Except, instead of not mixing, they mixed it up on the reg. The two of them couldn’t be in the same room without bickering like siblings stuck in the backseat of the family Volkswagen on a long summer road trip.
Which, if Sam was being honest, was part of the charm of Black Knights Inc. The people who lived and worked there were more than coworkers or colleagues. They were family. The only family he’d ever known since he’d been the only son of a couple of South Side methheads and since his ex-wife had been little more than a stranger who’d accepted his ring and lived in his off-base condo for a short period of time.
His parents had spent his formative years cooking up the poor man’s coke in the abandoned warehouse down the road from their shitty apartment. Which meant he’d been left to raise himself.
Feral.That was a good word to describe his pre-pubescent self.Neglectedandhelplessandmalnourishedall worked too. In fact, were it not for his high school baseball coach seeing something in him and giving him a purpose, he might’ve ended up another sad South Side statistic.
Lucky for him, instead of slinging dope he’d learned to sling curveballs. Not well enough to make it to the Majors, but well enough to get his team to the state playoffs two years running. Which is where he’d met a Marine Corps recruiter. Which is how he’d become a Raider. Which is the reason he’d popped up on Madam President’s radar when she’d been looking to put together her very own fast-action response team.
And, yes, somewhere in the middle of that he’d popped the question, walked down the aisle—er, the steps at the courthouse—andtriedas an adult to build what he’d never had as a kid. But that’d been little more than a blip on the radar of his life, over before it’d even begun. And his ex-wifecertainlyhadn’t filled the hole left behind by his lackluster upbringing.
Which brings us full circle, all the way back to Black Knights Inc.
Sam celebrated the day two Secret Service agents knocked on the door of his quarters in Camp Lejeune and told him the leader of the free world was making him an offer he couldn’t refuse. He celebrated because that offer hadn’t just given him the opportunity to do the kind of work he’d always dreamed of doing—taking on the missions that were too hard, too hot, or too politically unwise for the armed forces or the alphabet soup of American agencies to handle—but it’d also made him part of a family.
A loud, sarcastic, often quarrelsome family. But a family all the same.
And sure, there were times he missed the routine and regimentation of the Marine Corp. Missed the structure and the stability that came from working under a strict chain of command. But he wouldn’t trade the time he’d spent at BKI or the relationships he’d built there for anything.
