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Elliot could hear Deacon’s raised voice through the thick oak of the closed library door. Not that she blamed him. It had been a long afternoon of frustration and anger, not to mention hiding it all behind a pleasant mask so as not to upset Sydney. None of them wanted to worry the little girl, although Elliot had a sneaking suspicion her charge understood more of what was going on around her than the other adults realized. She certainly sensed Deacon’s moods. Kids were like that, or at least Elliot had been. And she’d learned well to hold it all inside so as not to add to the burden her mother and stepdad carried. She’d never really had a chance to be a child, carefree and naive. Knowing Sydney was being forced along a similar path made Elliot itch to find Mansa and stop him as soon as possible—permanently.
Right now, though, it sounded like Deacon was the one who needed her, odd as that seemed. When had they gotten so close that she knew he’d turn to her and not Fionn? Or maybe it was just wishful thinking and aberrant hormones—that had to be it. She sucked in a deep breath, filling her lungs to the bursting point, grasped the doorknob, and walked inside. Her silent exhale was lost beneath the quiet whoosh as she closed the door behind her.
No one paid attention to her entry; like Elliot, the team was focused on their client. Deacon glared down at a large computer screen centered on the library table, the image of a young, geeky-looking woman trembling before him, face a blotchy red swath. Elliot felt a moment’s sympathy for her, though from the volcanic anger raging across Deacon’s face and the near-to-breaking tension in his body, the woman should be grateful she wasn’t in the same room with him and call it even.
Elliot moved to the empty spot next to Dain.
“Sir, I can’t find something that isn’t there.”
“Bullshit!”
Yeah, Deacon’s attention wasn’t going anywhere anytime soon.
“It has to be there, Sheppard. It’s impossible for nothing to be setting off the alarms. Either something physical is causing this, or something electronic. Now which is it?”
“I don’t know, damn it!” She waved a hand at the desk littered with more computer screens than Elliot had ever seen in one place, a dozen stacks of reports, and an astonishing number of coffee cups, coming close to knocking over one or two. “Every square inch of the grounds has camera coverage. You have manual surveillance. We have the satellite for only a limited time per day, but we do have it. There aren’t any gaps that I can pinpoint from here. It has to be something on your end.”
Deacon leaned harder into the fists he’d planted on the edge of the table, getting nose to nose with the screen. “Are you saying my team isn’t doing its job?”
Sheppard’s eyes went suspiciously bright. “I’m saying your team—and I—are doing the best we can.” She blinked behind her glasses. A single tear escaped. A hasty swipe removed the evidence quickly. “Why do you think he’s not coming inside? Because I made damn sure he can’t, not without being seen.”
Deacon slammed one fist into the oak table. “It’s not enough.”
Elliot watched over Deacon’s shoulder as Sheppard threw a shaking hand up. “It’s all I can do, sir. Diagnostics are clear. Camera records show no interference—and believe me, my team has gone over it with a fine-tooth comb. Every feed is perfect. I’ve searched every line of code in the programs, every hidden niche, every back door. There’s nothing wrong with your security.”
“Sheppard, goddamn it!”
Elliot had her hand on his shoulder before she even realized she’d approached. “Deacon...”
He spun on his heel, his big body knocking into her, but the moment he saw her stumbling back, the worst of his aggression seemed to fizzle out. He grabbed her midfall and settled her on her feet, dark eyes burning with apology as the entire room seemed to hold its breath. Deacon ignored them all, however; for the longest moment it was as if no one but the two of them existed in the universe.
And then Fionn was easing himself between Deacon and the screen, leaving Elliot off balance and more than a little wary, though not of Deacon’s aggression. She managed threats much easier than she did emotions, and that look had been a physical caress, a stroke of pleasure that sent a hard shiver through her.
When everyone’s attention returned to the screen, Elliot took the opportunity to slip back beside Dain, giving herself some breathing space.
“Sheppard,” Fionn asked, “can we be pinpointing the exact location on the triggers? We know about where they came from, but do the diagnostics give you specifics? Is he targeting points in the blind spots of the cameras? Is that it?”
“Even if he was,” Dain pointed out, “we should pick up some hint on visual inspection. The north side is wooded, so minimal exposure. But this last alarm was on the opposite side, nothing but pasture and grass—nowhere to hide, no cover. How did he know patrols wouldn’t walk right up on him, out in the open like that?”
“Maybe he didn’t,” King suggested. “Maybe he’s a brazen bastard and took a chance.”
Elliot could see Deacon absorbing the rush of information before he blinked hard and pivoted to face the room.
“It has to be some kind of hacking bullshit,” Fionn argued.
“That doesn’t sound like Kivuli’s MO,” Dain said, rubbing at the stubble on his chin. “How does the ghost know when he can be a ghost? Some kind of surveillance?”
The question shot through Elliot like a bullet finding its mark. She glanced toward the screen, her gaze meeting Sheppard’s, recognizing the flash of awareness in the young woman’s red-rimmed eyes. “A drone,” they said at the same moment.
Hissed curses filtered through the room.
“Wouldn’t the satellite pick it up?” King asked.
Sheppard’s frown was their answer. “To be detectable, the drone would have to be flying during the same window as the satellite’s orbit brings it over the area. If it’s big enough, the machine can hover too high for human ears to hear the engines, which eliminates manual detection. For twenty-three hours a day it could be in the air with us completely blind to it.”
“What about antidrone technology? Some kind of jamming?” Elliot asked.
Fionn frowned. “You’re talking a feck-ton of money for anything like that. GFS has the technology on the compound, so we’re somewhat familiar. The system they use can jam a drone’s transmissions from two miles out, even interrupt the connection between machine and operator. But eliminating drone surveillance on private property is no’ monetarily feasible.”
Which meant they now had to adjust their security in response to a new threat.
“But the minute Kivuli or anyone else associated with Mansa steps directly onto Deacon’s land, they’ll be caught in the surveillance net, right?” King’s elegant brows were crinkled together. “So what are we worried about? Let them wear themselves out trying to keep us on our toes.”
“It’s not the false alarms we have to focus on, per se,” Dain agreed. “The question is, if Mansa is willing to spend six figures on a high-tech drone, how much more will he spend? Enough for serious long-range firepower? Enough to bomb us off the grounds, forcing us into a vulnerable position? Enough to—”
“Dain.”
The barked command startled her, but one look at Deacon’s white face, the stark fear in his eyes, and she got it. Without thinking she reached a hand out to grip his thick forearm.
Deacon turned blindly toward her, his back to the others. “I can’t lose her, Elliot,” he whispered, low enough that the rest of the room wouldn’t hear.
“You aren’t losing her. I won’t let anything happen to her, and neither will they.”
He nodded at her words, but she couldn’t tell if they’d actually registered. Rubbing a hard hand over his head, he pivoted back to the screen and Sheppard. “You have anything else?”
Sheppard’s trembling was no longer visible. She blinked at him from behind her glasses. “Not yet, sir. I’ll let you know when I do, I promise.”
Her final words were drowned out as a harsh beeping sounded in Elliot’s earpiece. She closed her eyes against rising frustration, listening to the team scramble to face a threat they couldn’t find.
Yet.
“Dain.”
Elliot opened her eyes in time to see her boss lift an eyebrow in Deacon’s direction.
“You and Sheppard work on real-time data.” The security tech was already scrambling from computer to computer on the screen, hopefully tracking the threat better now than after the fact. “I want reports as soon as they become available. Fionn and King, do a visual sweep of the entire perimeter, not just the affected quadrant. Full-alert, weapons hot—don’t miss anything, and if there’s a threat out there, make sure they miss you. Elliot—”
A pause. Deacon’s fists were opening and closing, his jaw clenching. Her heart twisted.
“I want you online,” he finally said. “See what chatter you can track down. Anything new from anywhere you can get it.” Without another word, he turned for the door. “I’ll relieve Saint.”
Tough-guy code for I need to be with my daughter. Her heart wrenched that much harder at the realization.
She got to work, but her search yielded no fresh intel. The rest of the team likewise came up empty. By the time she began filling a tray of food for Deacon and Sydney, they were all exhausted and frustrated, and she was more than happy to escape. Upstairs, Sydney’s bedroom door stood open. The little girl lay sprawled on her rug, a board game set up between her and Deacon, who mimicked his daughter’s position.
“Dinnertime.”
Sydney jumped to her feet. Elliot quickly lifted the tray to safety before it got knocked from her hands. “I take it you’re hungry.”
“Yeah!” Sydney tugged Elliot toward the game. “What is it?”
“Nachos.”
“With cheese dip?” Sydney asked.
Elliot gave the girl an incredulous look. “You do know we have Saint on the team, right? He’s not letting anyone have nachos without the appropriate queso.” And homemade salsa. And guacamole. The man was a slave driver when it came to his favorite foods, but at least his whip cracking had given them all a break from the futility of their individual searches. Sometimes you needed to work together as a team to meld once more, even if that was over a pot of cheese dip and chips.
“I hope Saint is also planning to clean up,” Deacon said, the faintest hint of teasing in his tone. He set a plate in front of his daughter’s place on the rug before accepting one of his own.
“I think he said it was Sydney’s night to do dishes.”
“What?” Sydney paused with a chip halfway to her mouth, both eyebrows practically up in her bangs.
Elliot couldn’t hold back a chuckle or the automatic way her hand moved to ruffle Sydney’s hair. “Don’t worry. I paid him five bucks to do it for you.”
Sydney’s shoulders visibly relaxed. “Oh.” The chip went in her mouth.
Deacon shook his head. “Such a literalist.”
“What’s a litalerist?” Sydney asked, looking at Elliot.
“Your dad can explain.”
Deacon speared her with dark eyes. “You’re not staying?”
“I already ate,” she said. “Think I’ll take a shower before this munchkin uses all the hot water for her bath.”
Sydney smiled a cheese-and-salsa smile, not the least ashamed of the accusation.
“Not with your mouth full, Syd,” Deacon warned.
Elliot slipped out while the two took their next bites.
The shower was a godsend, the super-heated water pummeling her tense muscles, driving out the aches and easing the pain in her head. She took her time, conditioning her hair, shaving her legs. Imagining Deacon walking in.
No, she definitely wasn’t imagining that. He was worried about his daughter. Sex was probably the last thing on his mind—and hers.
The heavy feeling below her belly button called her a liar, but whatever.
Saint wasn’t doing the dishes, Fionn and King were, but that didn’t mean she was duty-less. Before the hot water ran hot, she turned it off, dried, and smoothed lotion on, then dressed in her usual pajamas. When her hair was mostly dry and the bathroom was neater than when she’d come inside, she opened the door to her room and stepped out.
Into darkness.
The ghostly green light of the monitor barely illuminated its own corner, much less the room, the closed door to the hall guaranteeing no further light would assist. After a few moments to adjust to the dark, she noticed the faintest gleam of something pale near the window.
Skin.
“Deacon?”
He turned. The greenish glow caressed a few dips and hills—his shoulder, his bare chest. She’d seen dozens of male bodies in her line of work, but not his, and definitely not when she was alone in a private space with the body in question. Still she couldn’t stop looking; she needed to trace every last inch with her gaze. Her fingers.
Her tongue.
She cleared her suddenly constricted throat. “Where’s Sydney?”
Deacon faced the window again, staring out into the night. “Asleep.”
The word was more growl than speech, rumbling with frustration and tension and an anger she understood all too well. She’d lived futility, waded in it—ultimately drowned in it. She’d choked on the dregs until she wondered why she bothered fighting to take another breath. And in the end she’d decided it was because the only other alternative was to let the fucker who’d killed her mother win, and no way in hell would she do that. So she breathed. And fought her way forward.
And now she had her chance. And so would Deacon, if he could keep his head on straight.
A glance at the screen showed Sydney curled beneath her fluffy pink comforter, Katie Kitty tucked into the crook of her elbow, eyes closed.
“I... Uh, I have the monitor on. You can take a shower if you want,” she told him.
“No.”
He didn’t turn, didn’t explain. A hint of uncertainty flickered in her belly. “Okay.” A tilt of her head toward her bed, as if he could see it. “I’ll just turn in then.”
Nothing.
Okay.
She crossed toward him, eyes narrowed on his powerful shoulders silhouetted against the night. At five feet away she began to feel his heat, his tension. At three, she could see the rock-hard state of his muscles. At two, she could hear the heavy tone of his breathing, echoing with anger. He’d never sleep like this. He was a soldier; he knew better—
And sometimes all the head knowledge in the world wouldn’t make the emotions go away.
She sighed, watching his skin pebble with goose bumps as her breath caressed it. “You need to relax, Deacon. You know it, I know it—”
“Of course I know, damn it. I’ve been on more ops than you’ll probably see in your lifetime. That doesn’t mean I can snap my fingers and feel better about this. My daughter’s life is at stake.”
I know it is. And he knew she knew, so pointing it out would only make him angrier. Still, “You can’t help her if you’re dead.”
The roar that left his lips shook the floor beneath her feet, the curtains hanging in front of him. Even the little monitor, when she glanced at it, shook with tremors, but the child in the greenish-gray picture didn’t stir. Elliot didn’t want her to stir. She didn’t want Deacon raging either, but when she opened her mouth, nothing came out. And then she found herself lifting her arm, placing her palm on his rigid back—stilling when he went still. Motionless, like he’d stopped breathing. Was he afraid of scaring her off? Because she was doing a damn good job of that without his help, thank you very much.
Deacon swung around without warning, bringing them chest to chest, so close a shallow breath rubbed her nipples along his ribs. Could he feel how hard they were? Did it disgust him or excite him?
For that matter, what did it do to her?
He stepped closer. The friction sent a shaft of tingles from her breasts to someplace low and heavy and hot in her pelvis. Elliot tried to stifle the moan that rose in her throat—because God, how embarrassing—but the tiniest bit escaped anyway.
It didn’t stop Deacon; he slanted his chest across hers, chafing her nipples a second time. Confirming their hardness. “Is this what you’re offering me, Elliot? Your body for my anger? Sex to calm me down?”
She couldn’t answer. She didn’t know for certain what words would come out of her mouth. For the second time in a week, her courage was lacking—and not because she was afraid of offering herself.
No, she was terrified he’d refuse her.
Deacon didn’t bother waiting for a response. “Because you know what I’m gonna say, right?” One hand came up to cup the full weight of her breast.
Her shoulders went back automatically—a soldier under inspection, and yes, a woman desperate for one more touch. But it was the woman who spoke. “You want...?”
She couldn’t read his eyes, but she could feel his stare. It was focused on her barely covered breasts, the hard tips begging for his attention. “I want whatever the hell you’ll give me. Every time. All the time.” A thumb tapped one sensitive point, pulling a gasp from her. “Could I resist you? I don’t know. I don’t want to know. I just want you.”
Elliot let her eyelids slide closed, protecting her from the intensity of the moment, of his gaze. With a single deep breath, she let go. “Then take me, Deacon. Now.” Before I do something I’ll really regret, like come to my senses.