His head whipped toward her. “Intervention? I’m the last guy here who needs that. Start with Force.”
“He’s next,” Brigid said easily, her accent lilting around the room. “You’re now. You’re an excellent strategic planner, and you know, intellectually, that a team is better than a lone wolf. For lack of a better term.” Her smile was sweet and unrelenting at the same time.
Wolfe started to get up.
Angus leaned forward, his eyes a glittering river-bottom green. “We’re a team, Wolfe. Get your head out of your ass and start working with us, because you don’t want to work against us.”
Dana winced, catching the same expression on Nari’s face. That probably wasn’t the best approach with an angry Clarence Wolfe. Even so, she remained quiet, drinking her latte, letting somebody else argue with the stubborn male for a while, considering she was no doubt seriously in the doghouse with him.
Nari twisted her latte around in her hands. “We care about you, Wolfe. We’re family, and when there’s trouble, family sticks together.”
That got to him. There wasn’t much of a visual clue, but Dana could feel the change in his body next to her. He turned toward Nari, and his voice softened. “I’ve lost enough family, doc. You don’t know this guy—if he finds out about any of you, he’ll take great pleasure in killing the people I care about.”
Angus spoke before Nari could. “What the fuck do you think we’ve been doing the last twenty-four hours?”
Nari huffed out a breath. “Angus, just shut up for a moment.”
A collective gasp ran around the room. Nari never lost her cool. It was totally inappropriate, considering the tension surrounding her, but Dana coughed away a chuckle.
Angus drew up short. “Did you just tell me to shut up?”
“Yes.” Nari reached for Wolfe’s hand and grabbed it. “We’ve been working on your case, so the cat is out of the bag, as they say. I’ve called in favors and received every record and file on this guy, and I’ve studied all night. I do know Gary Rockcliff.”
Wolfe’s brows drew down in a way that was deadly. And kind of sexy. “What do you mean, you know him?” He forced the words out in rapid staccato.
Nari’s calm expression didn’t alter. “He’s a narcissist who suffers from a personality disorder, more psychopathic than sociopathic, who tells himself he’s killing people for a desirable end result, but in truth, he enjoys the killing. He’s calculating and methodical, and he likes the risk involved with using explosives, but he’s still careful in the planning of an event.”
Angus sat back in his seat. “He has a need to prove he’s smarter and better than everyone else, and since you survived his attack in Afghanistan, he’s going to become obsessed with you, if he hasn’t already.”
Sometimes Dana forgot Angus had been an FBI profiler before retiring and then returning to work for the HDD to lead this ragtag group.
“Exactly,” Wolfe said. “He’s obsessed with me, and he thinks this is a game. He’d love to extend it as long as possible, and that means targeting people around me before working his way to me. I’m starting to understand how his mind works.”
Angus nodded. “I think there are two reasons he’s left you alone so far. The first is that he has been busy trafficking the heroin from Afghanistan that your team was working on finding, and the second reason is that he hasn’t found you yet. Well, until yesterday.”
Wolfe turned toward Angus. “Thanks for handling the feds.”
Force just nodded.
“We’re in this, Wolfe. It’s too late to turn back now,” Raider said, his dark hair slicked back. With his part-Japanese heritage, his intriguing face was sharp and strong—and at the moment determined.
Wolfe made another last-ditch effort and turned to Malcolm, apparently going for the throat. “You’d risk Pippa?” The sweet introvert wasn’t even a government agent and had even less training than Dana, and that was saying something. She’d recently gotten free of a cult chasing her, and Mal was definitely overprotective.
“I’d risk myself,” Pippa said quietly, her mahogany hair settling softly over her shoulders. Everything about Pippa was soft and kind, but there was a thread of steel in her. “For you, the same as you would for me.”
Wolfe kept his focus on Malcolm.
“I’m already working on security.” Mal slid his arm over Pippa’s shoulders. “We have Millie planting sensors and cameras around our property, and since your house and ours are located at the end of a cul-de-sac, we’re trying to figure out if we can privatize that area and put up a gate.”
“A gate?” Wolfe snapped. “You think a gate on the road will stop Rock?”
“Along with the sensors and cameras everywhere else,” Mal said mildly.
Raider nodded. “I’ve looked into buying the three parcels on the other side of the cul-de-sac, so we own it all. Made an offer earlier this morning.”
Nari angled to the side. “I’d like to buy one of those, if the price is right.”
“It will be,” Raider said.
