Walker laughed. “Feels great.”
“Iwouldn’t know how that feels,” Fia said. “I’m still dead as a doornail.”
“Do you even exist?” Gina asked.
“Ha! Speak for yourself, Spooky.”
“Hate to break up the fun,” Roger Bennett said. “But, we are here for business.” He gestured toward the other people sitting in the great room.
Right. Business.
Fia wrapped Gina’s arm in hers as they started walking.
“You look good. I was worried when I heard the news.”
“Thank you. It was touch and go. He hit me hard.”
“Lachlan hit him back harder is what I heard.”
Gina just smiled.
They took their seats—Watchdog on one side of the table, The Repair Shop on the other.
“Not used to seeing you sitting, Gina,” Atlantis said as she took the chair directly across from him.
“A lot’s changed,” she said.
“Sotheseare your friends,” Jake said as he made deliberate eye contact with each man and woman separately. They looked back impassively.
“No, my friends are all on this side of the table.”
Jake grinned.
“All right,” Roger said as he took a seat at the head of the table. “Everybody at this table ismyfriend, and since this is my house, we’re all going to stop acting like this is another remake ofWest Side Storyand get along. Can I at least get a nod of acknowledgement?”
He got them, reluctant as they were.
“Great! Now that we’reallfriends, let’s talk about your upcoming joint operation.”
“Do we at least get their names?” Jake interrupted.
“Jake,” Lachlan warned.
“No names,” Atlantis said to Gina’s surprise not at all.
Elissa glared at Atlantis. “Then how about maybe an apology for trying to kill Gina? I know I’d love to hear it.”
“It’s okay, Elissa,” Gina said, touched by the ferocity in her friend’s expression. “Water under the bridge.”
Gina smiled sweetly at Atlantis, knowing that she was burrowing deeply under his skin. He knew he owed her and owed her big and it drove him up a wall. So much more satisfying than a boring old apology and much more useful. She’d collect on the debt one day, but in the meantime, it was fun to watch him sweat over it.
“Ladies and gentlemen,” Roger said, ignoring the posturing and passing a stack of folders to Camden on his right. “Your mission.”
Gina opened her folder to a photo of Marcus Porter. She spent the next five minutes committing the rest of the details to memory. It wasn’t quite back to one hundred percent and the memorization took effort. But she knew that whatever she might forget, Lachlan would remember. Her entire team would.
“Any questions?” Bennett asked.
“You sure we have the authorization for this?” Atlantis asked.
