CHAPTER 23
The meeting hasn’t been going for five minutes when the team drops a bomb on me.
“I just got an ID on the target they acquired,” Ranger says tapping the screen of a tablet. “When Thane and Colt returned to the site, there were five heat signatures, not four. It appears that someone entered the hunting grounds after you were evacuated. The guy they grabbed was ID’d as Trevor Allen Holt.”
My head cocks left. “Wait. He’s been captured and they’re bringing himhere?”
“Affirmative,” Ranger says. “ETA twenty minutes. The plan is to secure him in the bunker under the garage. We know he was the original instigator you encountered at Jade’s place of employment.”
Holy fuck.
I’m surprised my knuckles don’t break with how hard my fists are clenched.
Axle, one of the new members of the team jumps into the conversation. “You’re not handling the interrogation, I am.”
The air feels like it crackles around my head.
“No,” I say through clenched teeth. “That fucker is mine.”
“What about Jade?” he counters. “She needs you right now. And I need you to take a breath, and let us work.”
I seethe, the room seemingly sucked clean of oxygen.
Axle folds his arms, leans back in his chair, a challenging glint in eyes that looks too damned familiar.
“This is my specialty. You’re not objective. He’ll be dead before we get anything out of him,” he tells me.
Goddammit.
“No, I can control my temper.”
I think.
Axle tips his head, not blinking. Not backing down. “Agile tapped you to lead the team. I respect that. I won’t challenge you on any other orders and I’ll make you this promise—when we’re done with him and we’ve got everything we need, he’s yours. He’s not leaving that bunker until we’re ALL finished with him.”
I scrub my hand over my face, turn to face the bullet proof glass. “You know who this motherfucking cock-sucking lowlife piece of shit is, right?”
“I saw the brief.”
“Well there’s more. Her father gave Jade to him to keep her under control. The old man set it up, made it look like this guy wanted to date her. So he fucked her and abused her.”
I suck air, trying to get my shit together so I can continue.
“When she got too close to the intel that would bury them, they put her on the kill list.”
The place Axle goes is dark, a killing flame glimmering behind his gaze. His broad shoulders rise and fall in a controlled breath. Violence veiled in practiced restraint.
“So he’s gonna have a lot to say when we apply the right pressure,” Axle mutters. “I’ll make sure we get it all. All of his connections. Every last fucking detail. You don’t know me yet, I’ve been working in intelligence for years. Dark shit.”
“Good,” I grit out.
The next ten minutes become a blur. It takes every ounce of my willpower to concentrate on the video call with Agile’s intel team while Jade is in the other room being seen by a doctor and a counselor, and Trevor’s on his way here.
On the same property where she is.
“Ryker, what did he say?” someone asks.
I search my mind for the thread of conversation.
