Page 4 of Ghost

I straightened and let my grin widen now that the immediate threat wouldn’t kill anyone. “Frightened people make worse decisions when everybody around them sounds scared. Calm voices keep them breathing, and humor helps them listen.”

Her expression remained mutinous, though curiosity had begun to push through the anger. She tipped her chin toward me. “So everything is a joke?”

“Nope.” I looked directly at her, enjoying the way her breath caught when my attention settled fully on her. “Making you glare at me is becoming one of the best fucking parts of my evening, though.”

Color swept over her cheeks, while her hands curled against the barrier. Anger kept her focused. The blush told me the attraction was mutual, and her gaze kept returning to the equipment. She could function under pressure even while I made it harder.

“You’re impossible.”

“Known me less than an hour, and you’re already learning.”

I checked the damaged support again, then glanced toward her. She was still watching every move I made. “I need to see the launch diagram.”

Tamsin came around the barrier, ignoring my frown, and hurried toward me with the clipboard she’d retrieved earlier. She flipped to the right-side battery, already reading as she straightened. “What did you see before the rack failed?”

I started toward her. “Status indicator on the right-side battery flickered out of sequence. Did that cue have any reason to reach it early?”

She frowned as she looked from the diagram to the rack. “No. It couldn’t have. That battery wasn’t supposed to receive anything until the next volley.”

I plucked the clipboard from her hands to get a closer look.

“Stop stealing my clipboard!” she gasped in outrage, making a grab for it.

She looked like a hissing kitten, which was cute as hell. I smirked as I held it out of reach again.

“You think this is funny?” she demanded.

“I think you’re really fuckin’ pretty when you’re mad.”

She crossed her arms over her chest, and I had to fight like hell not to drop my gaze to her tits. Her chin rose another fraction. “I am not trying to be pretty.”

“Natural talent,” I teased.

Her mouth pressed into a stubborn line, but the corner twitched before she forced it still. I kept the board as we walked, then we stopped beside the damaged rack, and I turned the clipboard so we could both see it. Field lights threw every bent bracket and scorched cable into sharp relief.

“Tell me exactly what should’ve happened when you hit the emergency stop.”

“Every remaining cue should’ve died.” Tamsin leaned closer and traced the programmed sequence with one finger. “That rack never should’ve received an ignition command, and even if the electronic system malfunctioned, the physical safeguards should’ve stopped the shell from launching. The second fuse definitely shouldn’t have kept burning after shutdown.”

She remained close, her upper arm resting against mine, and I kept my palm at her waist. Her breathing changed when my fingers tightened against her side.

I studied the launch diagram again and asked her to walk me through the right-side battery from the power source to the mortar rack. She kept it concise, and I compared her explanation to what I’d watched happen. The flicker in the indicator, early ignition, failed support, and live fuse that kept burning after the board went dark made me think this wasn’t just an accident.

The angle of the rack mattered almost as much as the failed safeties. Its recoil had not simply knocked it loose. The support had given way in the direction that turned the tubes toward the most crowded section of the meadow. The bad launch created immediate panic at the spectator line and pulled every trained eye toward the low-flying shell.

I looked from the diagram to the damaged rack again. One failure could happen, two could turn a bad night into a disaster, but this many independent protections collapsing in sequence meant some bastard had fucking arranged this.

I began a cautious sweep, separating ordinary blast damage from anything deliberately placed. Hardware had scattered toward the wash, cases had overturned, and smaller components had shifted in patterns consistent with the concussion. My humor stayed easy when Tamsin caught me watching her, but my attention never left the field for long.

Something near the pyrotechnics trailer caught my attention. One Bellamy case sat apart from the cluster, upright despite the force that had knocked surrounding equipment onto its side. A compact component showed beneath its lower edge, tucked too deliberately against the trailer to be debris.

My smile disappeared. The first malfunction had drawn responders into the staging area, while this device waited beside enough material to turn the rescue into a larger disaster. It could ignite the trailer, erase the scene, and catch the people who came back to help.

“Clear the fucking field,” I ordered over the comm. “Everybody back now. Expand the perimeter another hundred yards and move every Bellamy employee with it.”

My club brothers responded instantly as the remaining crew and responders withdrew. Stryker reinforced the order while prospects redirected anyone approaching from the crowd side. I kept my eyes on the device until movement beside me made me turn.

Tamsin started away, then stopped after several steps and looked back at the trailer. Determination tightened her expression as she turned toward me. “I know the approved layout. I can identify every case and component that belongs there.”