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Sam took the mug of coffee Seth prepared for her and, although she’d visited this room a few times before, she couldn’t help thinking the incident room looked like a Hollywood action movie set. A massive wall was covered in screens, each showing a different news feed or transmitting video from God knew where. Cracker, Pytheon’s computer expert, AKA white-hat hacker, sat at the first desk in front of the bank of screens, his chair pushed back and his sneakers on his desk, his fingers flying across a small keyboard balanced across his knees.
A long counter separated Cracker, and his desk, from the rest of the room. Around thirty Pytheon analysts sat at generic desks, all wearing headsets and intense expressions. Cracker was the only one looking like he was having any fun at all. But that could be because he was steadily making his way through a bumper packet of chocolate covered peanuts. Who could be unhappy with a fistful of candy in one’s hand?
At the far end of the room was a ten-seater conference table and Sam sank into the seat Seth pulled out for her, conscious that Jett was still behind her, somewhere, hopefully not looking at her ass.
Or, if he was, she really hoped he liked it. Not helpful, Samantha.
Seth, holding his mug of coffee in his hand, tapped the built-in screen at the top of the conference table and the noise of the incident room disappeared. It was like invisible walls had fallen into the room, blocking the noise but not the view.
Seth caught her surprise and shrugged. “Noise canceling technology. We can’t hear them, they can’t hear us.”
“Cool,” Sam said, impressed.
Stone took a seat next to her and Jett, damn him, dropped his long frame into the chair across the table from her, his expression lazy but his eyes alert. His gaze didn’t stop moving around the room. He was hyperaware, totally dialed in, ready, despite his indolent posture, to spring into action.
And, damn, so hot.
Seth cleared his throat and Sam pulled her eyes off Jett and blushed at Seth’s raised eyebrow. Rolling her eyes so hard she was in danger of giving herself a concussion, she mentally urged him to start the meeting so she could walk out of Pytheon and find herself a brain surgeon because she was, obviously, in need of a reboot or an upgrade to her operating system.
You are not allowed to lust over, think about or date dangerous guys.
Seth tapped the built-in monitor and a screen descended from the ceiling. A projector hidden God knows where tossed a photograph of a handcuffed man onto the screen. From the view behind him, Sam knew it was taken on top of Table Mountain, Cape Town, South Africa and that the cuffed man was there at the behest of The Recruiter. Five minutes before that photo was taken, he’d held a gun to Leah’s head but Seth, somehow, talked him into surrendering. How had Seth managed to remain calm while the person he adored was under threat? Oh, some of it was training but he had to be a certain type of person to stay cool and collected when life hurled him into a hurricane.
They were warriors and she was normal. Well, relatively speaking.
Seth used his cup to gesture to the screen. “Burt Frame, AKA Fake Ben, was found dead in his room at Valkenberg Psychiatric Hospital in Cape Town this morning.”
Sam snapped her head around to look at Jett, who’d uttered an obscenity. His arms were now resting on the table and he was scowling at the screen, his eyes a bleak blue. “Dead how?”
“Officially, he suffered a heart attack.”
“Unofficially?” Jett demanded.
Seth lifted one shoulder and held Jett’s hard look. “We all know that there are numerous drugs that can induce heart attacks, some of which are undetectable by a tox screen.”
Sam’s eyes flicked from one hard face to another. “Are you suggesting that someone killed him?”
“I’m suggesting that it’s a strong possibility,” Seth replied, placing his cup on the table.
“But on the mountain, Frame said that he had no idea of The Recruiter’s identity and that they communicated via phone calls and online,” Stone commented.
“He was still a loose end and The Recruiter doesn’t do loose ends,” Seth replied.
“Is Fayed a loose end?” Stone asked.
Fayed? Right, the radicalized teenager who’d left home thinking he was joining an Islamic terror cell but who’d actually been used as a pawn by The Recruiter to get Seth to Cape Town.
“We have eyes on him but we don’t believe so,” Jett answered. “He definitely had no contact with The Recruiter so we think he’ll be okay though the little shithead is still, apparently, mouthing off about the evil West.”
Sam wriggled in her seat. As interesting as this was, Sam had a busy day ahead of her. She had a consult with Ross—a forensic investigator she often worked with—at ten and she was expecting the crime scene photographs of a series of abductions of young woman in the Portland area.
She had her own work to do but Stone and Seth—and Jett since he was also alpha and hard ass—wouldn’t think of that. Pytheon first and always.
Jett looked from her and Stone and back again, his eyes serious. “Does she know about the photograph?”
“She,” Sam said, her tone icy, “has a name. What photograph?”
A black and white photograph materialized on the wide screen in front of her. It took her a minute to realize that the red Xs were their faces; that the photograph was taken at a restaurant in the village they’d dined at a few weeks ago. Sam pushed back her chair and stood up, her hands flat on the desk, squinting to read the message written over Daisy’s beautiful face.
She had to read the sentence a few times before the words made sense. Her family was expendable but The Recruiter intended to sell Daisy, to some sick bastard a world away.
Sam quivered with rage. “That’s not going to happen.”
“Damn straight it’s not,” Seth agreed. “Jed and Mac and the kids are already out of the country.”
Sam nodded as her brain regained a measure of control over her fear. Jed would never let anything happen to his family.
They were safe.
Sam gestured to the photo. “When did this arrive?”
“Stone and I received the photo via email this morning. Cracker tried to trace it but it was bounced through so many ISPs, the source of the email undetectable. This guy is good,” Seth answered her. “The photo was lifted from a social column; it was posted the morning after we ate at that restaurant. I spoke to the paparazzo who shot the picture, he only sold it to one publication and it hasn’t appeared on any other social media site.”
“So anyone could’ve saved the image from the net?” Sam clarified.
Jett nodded. “Pretty much.”
Seth half sat on the table, his attention back on Jett. “Have you heard anything new on our favorite douche bag?”
“Apart from that photo, sweet”—he glanced at Sam and swallowed the swear—“nothing. No new reports, no new chatter, nothing. He’s gone underground.”
“That photo tells us that he’s focused on Pytheon and that he’s not going to give up or go away.” Jett pushed back from the table and paced the area next to his chair, one hand in the back pocket of his jeans. He pushed his messy hair off his face and sent Seth a half smile. “Your threat to hunt him down pissed him off, big time.”
“It wasn’t a threat; it was a promise,” Seth growled.
Sam was reminded this man, these men, were warriors and were not afraid to make the hard decisions, the tough decisions, the end someone’s life decisions. She didn’t know if she agreed with the whole “sometimes justice is found outside the law” argument but their decisions weighed heavily on them, and were never taken lightly.
“My point is that he isn’t sitting in a corner shaking with fear. As this photo shows, he’s coming back and he’s swinging. He wants to see you, and Pytheon, destroyed.” Jett’s hard gaze swung around to land on her and Sam swallowed at his intensity. She forced herself to concentrate; she was Pytheon’s consultant psychologist and maybe it was time she earned the big retainer Stone paid her.
Sam stood up and folded her arms, tapping her finger against her bicep. “I can’t disagree. Look, I’m making assumptions here because I have so little to work with but, at the very least, he’s a psychopath. Which means that he is utterly self-confident. You messed up his plans in Cape Town and that, because he believes that he is vastly superior to you, would’ve enraged him. The derailment of his plans would be utterly unacceptable and he will want to rebalance those scales. Not to prove to anyone else what a badass he is, but to reaffirm his superiority over you.” Sam bit her lip and looked at Seth. “Especially you, Seth. You seem to be his biggest target.”
Seth pushed his hands into his hair and held his arms behind his head. He was a good-looking man but he didn’t rev her engine like the dark-haired man across the table did.
Not that she’d allow him anywhere near her engine...oh, shut up, Stone!
Concentrate.
“I don’t think that’s true.” Seth yanked a chair back and dropped into it. “Look at that photograph...” Seth gestured to the screen, keeping his eyes on her face. “You and Stone are in the middle of the frame, you can only see half of my face and Leah isn’t in the picture at all. Jed is also only half there, Daisy is sitting on his lap and blocking him.”
Sam scrutinized the photograph again. “The Xs slashing my and Stone’s face are deeper and redder, the Xs over the other faces are smaller, quickly done,” Sam agreed, trying to forget that she was talking about her face, her brother’s face. “Targeting Daisy was just to get a reaction.”
“It freaking worked,” Seth muttered.
“It would also give Jed a damn good reason to remove himself from the scene,” Jett mused. “The less help you have from people you trust, the more vulnerable you’ll be.”
“Shit,” Stone muttered, rubbing the back of his neck.
“But why?” Sam demanded. “Does he know us? Have a beef against us?”
Seth nodded. “Yes and yes.”
“But what about?” Sam cried and, as the words left her mouth, she knew it was a stupid question.
Her father had been one of the most powerful men in the world, a senior adviser to two presidents and the man who controlled a billion-dollar family empire built on timber and transport. After leaving the White House, he established Pytheon International, an organization well known in certain circles for coloring outside of the lines by retrieving information, people, and items that would not be safe, or constructive, in enemy hands. Sam was fairly sure that the US government was Pytheon’s biggest client and that “plausible deniability” was their code word.
Sam thought of her father’s business and political enemies and rejected the idea. She placed her hands flat on the table and looked at her brother. “This is personal, Stone. This doesn’t have anything to do with business.”
Stone frowned at her. “How can you tell?”
Sam wished she had something to back up her claim, something science-y and academic but her mind was blank.
“Gut instinct?” she ventured, thinking she’d probably be laughed out of the room.
Instead of laughing at her, three sets of intelligent eyes just looked at her. Jett was the first to speak. “On a scale of one to ten, how strong is that instinct?”
“Uh... nine?”
“You asking me or telling me?”
Sam narrowed her eyes at his demanding tone. “Telling you.”
Jett just nodded and looked at Seth who gave a sharp nod. “Good enough for me. So where do we start? Who do we look at?”
Sam felt like the room was spinning out from under her. She held up her hand to get them to stop talking. “Wait! What? You can’t just go off half-cocked because I have a feeling this is personal!”
Jett’s smile caused the dimple in his cheek to deepen and the elastic in her panties started melting. “Sure we can. In the field we often make decisions on gut instinct. It’s one of our most powerful tools.” Jett took his seat again and placed his ankle on his opposite knee. “But, before we start ripping apart your lives, maybe we should talk security.”
“Security?” Sam asked, still feeling like she was standing in a vortex. “What security?”
Jett pointed at her, then at Seth and then at Stone. “Yours and theirs. You all need personal protection, starting immediately.”
“I can take care of mys—” Seth said.
“Oh, hell no!” Stone muttered, throwing his hands up in the air.
“Not negotiable,” Jett stated, his voice colder and harder than a vicious winter’s night. “Do not even try to tell me that you can protect yourself!” Jett held their hot, accusing stares and Sam thought that he had the biggest set of balls she’d ever seen. Very few people stood up to Stone and Seth and it, yeah, kinda, sorta, hopelessly turned her on.
“You two are the most valuable assets of Pytheon and deserve the highest level of security. You cannot protect yourselves.” Jett leaned forward, pulled his phone from his jacket pocket and stared down at the screen.
“I’m calling in reinforcements,” Jett stated.
“I have people within Pytheon who can be reassigned to follow us around,” Seth argued, his expression sour.
Jett shot Stone a quick look and shook his head. “I’d prefer to work with my own team.” Jett turned to Stone. “Draw up a temporary contract for three months with an option to renew if this situation drags out, these guys won’t want to be tied down for longer than that. Two guys on you, two on Leah, two on Stone. One more for Sam. Seven, yeah, that’s doable.”
“Can we discuss this?” Stone demanded.
Jett looked at Stone, shook his head, and snapped out a brisk “no.” He then spoke into his phone, “I need all of you in New York ASAP. Yeah, the entire crew. Text me your ETA.”
Seth shook his head, looking almost bemused. “Hell, JSJ, you have a big set of balls, ordering us around like this.”
Jett had the audacity, the temerity, the sheer arrogance to smile. “So they tell me.”
“Except, hotshot,” Stone said, his voice and face expressionless.
Sam tensed. She recognized that look; Stone was beyond pissed.
“I’m not happy that we have two bodyguards and Samantha only has one.”
Jett tipped his head to the side and stared at Sam, his blue eyes smoking.
After a long wait, three seconds, thirty minutes—who knew?—he turned his attention back to Sam. “That’s because I’m going to be looking after Samantha. She’ll be my responsibility.”
Sam squeezed her eyes shut. “Oh, shit,” she muttered.
Jett saw the panic in Sam’s violet-gray eyes and grinned. She was more worried about them spending concentrated time together than the threat of The Recruiter and he couldn’t blame her.
Lust, attraction, desire, passion... call it what one would... arced between them and she didn’t like it. He wasn’t too crazy about it either. Sam Stone was smart and sexy but tumbling Sam, his boss’ sister, into bed would not be a smart career move.
Why was he even thinking about dating Sam? He didn’t want to date her... he didn’t want to date anyone. Dating implied he was interested in a relationship and he really wasn’t, wouldn’t allow himself to be. His profession was hell on relationships; he’d meet a girl, start something, fall for her and she’d promise him, faithfully, she could handle his sudden disappearances, his lack of contact. She’d be strong, she’d assure him, she wouldn’t stress or fret or hurl recriminations at his head when he eventually surfaced. Promises were tossed out like confetti and those promises were always broken. He’d yet to meet a woman who could cope with his lifestyle, his occasional radio silence, and they always, always threw reproaches and accusations at his head. His lovers simply could not cope with the danger of his job, with the uncertainty that he might not make it back. He was tired of looking and, honestly, tired of feeling disappointed by the Dear John emails and text messages.
His broken engagement a year before had been the last straw. Women were too much hassle, sucked up too much emotional energy, so he tossed the idea of love and commitment—maybe to be revisited when his job was less time consuming—and he was, at this point in time, only interested in hookups and no-strings affairs. Of which, since Gemma returned his ring, he’d had, if he counted them, exactly none.
A year was a long time to be celibate. Sam was the first woman who’d raised his interest in a long, long time. Dammit. Why her? Why now? Yeah, the universe was having a fine time screwing with him.
“As good as you think you are,” Stone stated, his voice flat, “that’s still two bodyguards on us and one on Sam. It should be the other way around.”
“Kelby, also Unit, will be working with me to protect Samantha,” Jett stated.
Kelby Marrow, his most trusted friend and former teammate, left the Unit at the same time Jett did and, like him, was still trying to find his way in the civilian world. He was currently flipping a house in Baltimore and the fact that he’d agreed, without asking any questions to get the team to NYC as soon as possible told Jett exactly how bored he was with construction. Like Jett, Kelby liked the adrenalin and the action.
Kelby would be in town by this afternoon and there was no one he trusted more to safeguard Sam’s luscious ass. He trusted Kelby with his life and he trusted him with Sam’s as well.
The only problem he had with Kels was the fact the dude was a chronic flirt and could charm birds down from trees and bras off nuns. He’d have to explain that Sam was firmly off-limits and that if he made a move on her Jett would rip off his dick, best mate or not.
“With two Delta Force operatives looking after you, you’ll be as safe as you can be,” Stone told Sam but Jett noticed his eyes remained worried. “They are the best there is.”
“Yay,” Sam muttered, not sounding or looking impressed. “Who is going to be guarding Stone and Seth and Leah?”
“Other colleagues of mine. Equally proficient,” Jett replied.
Sam pushed elegant fingers into her fiery curls. God, he wanted to touch her hair, smell her shampoo, feel her curls brush his stomach as she moved her mouth down his abs...
Jett was grateful the conference desk hid the pole in his pants. If even thinking about Sam’s lips sent his blood rushing south what would touching her, kissing her do? He’d probably spontaneously combust.
Really, he had to get his head in the game. The Recruiter wouldn’t hesitate to use Sam to get to Stone. He couldn’t afford to be distracted because being distracted could result in him being dead. That would be a bad outcome for him and pretty damn horrific if it happened to Sam.
Not happening, not on his watch.
Giving himself a mental punch, Jett looked at Sam. “I need to gather some intel.” He tossed Seth and Stone a look. “When I’m done with Sam, I’ll connect with you two. If you could email me a list of your daily schedule and Leah’s, Seth, I’ll pass that information to my crew.”
“You’re not going to bring them here, to Stone Tower?” Sam asked.
Jett shook his head as Stone and Seth rose to their feet. “I don’t want to bring any more attention to them than we need to. My guys like to, as much as possible, fly under the radar.”
Stone nodded and left the room, Seth trailing behind him. Jett watched them go and, when Sam cleared her throat, he looked at Sam. “My brother and Seth rarely take orders from anyone and never from anyone in their employ.”
Jett shrugged. So he was a take charge type of guy. “I appreciate the fact that they don’t let their egos get in the way of getting shit done. They know that they need protection and are smart enough to accept my crew’s help.”
“Don’t they have jobs, commitments, wives?”
“Like I said, they aren’t crazy about being tied down and they know that I would only ask for their help if I really needed it. They are highly trained soldiers and Pytheon is one of the few organizations around who can afford to pay for their skill set. Some of them could use the cash.”
Sam leaned back in her chair, her eyes curious. She picked up a pen, slid it between her fingers and suddenly he could imagine something else that was long and straight that needed to slide between her fingers.
Yeah, not helpful, Smith-Jones.
“Are you really the best of the best?”
Jett pulled a face, uncomfortable with the question. How was he supposed to answer that? Yes, the Unit selected guys from all the other special operation units, yes, the battery of tests they had to undertake was rigorous. But the best of the best? Who cared? Nowadays he just aimed to do the best job he could all the time and achieve the objectives of the mission. He did that, nine times out of ten. He’d earned his so-called “legend” status when operations went sideways and he had to get creative and it was a combination of balls to the wall, desperation, and sheer luck that some of his dumbass decisions paid off. Luck and kickass training.
“We’re up there,” he finally answered Sam. Not wanting to answer any other questions, he changed the subject. “I need a copy of your schedule for the next week. Do you have an office in this building?” If she did, protecting her while she was at work would be a breeze.
“I have an office here but I don’t use it much. Mostly I work out of my home in Boerum Hill.”
“Brooklyn?” When Sam nodded, he fired another series of questions her way. “Apartment? Condo?”
“Brownstone.”
A home office in a brownstone. Not ideal. She was a psychologist and a steady stream of patients was going to be a pain in the ass, mostly because there was an ice cube’s chance in hell she’d allow him or Kelby to be present in the room when she was counseling. “How many patients do you see a day?”
Sam shook her head. “None. My counseling work is done pro-bono and I’m contracted to do psych evals to Pytheon. But the bulk of time is spent as a forensic psychologist specializing in criminal behavior. I consult for the BAU, police forces, prosecutors, sometimes for defense lawyers. I have a special interest in serial killers.”
I have a special interest in serial killers... she spoke those bone chilling words as lightly as she would order a cup of coffee.
Jett frowned. “Seriously? Serial killers?”
Sam smiled at him and he felt like he’d touched the sun. “Relax, I’m not having lunch with them on a regular basis.”
“So, do you examine crime scenes, cold case files, do victimology reports?”
“That too. I frequently get pulled into task forces and help the investigators profile the killer, and the victims.”
Jett gestured for her to continue. “I’m often called to be an expert witness for prosecutors and I teach a class on criminology at NYU. At the moment I’m doing research on female serial killers and what drives them to kill.” Sam released a tiny laugh. “The title of my paper will be a lot weightier but that’s the gist of it.”
Jett was impressed. Beauty and brains. It was a killer combination. Though, in light of what they were discussing, maybe not the best terminology.
Sam tapped her fingernail on the table. “Actually, I’m due to interview an inmate at Little Siberia next week.”
“Little Siberia? Remind me where that is again?”
“The Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora, New York. The person I need to speak to is the husband of Sarah Wooly. Together, they murdered and dismembered seven women in New Jersey. He picked the prostitutes up and together they raped and tortured the poor women, keeping some of them for weeks before killing them and disposing of their bodies.”
Jett felt a little nauseous. He was intimately acquainted with violence, had seen—up close and personal—what people did to each other in war but nobody he’d ever come across, not friend or foe, considered the killing to be fun.
“Can you postpone this interview?” Jett asked. They were dealing with enough without adding psychopathic serial killers to their to-do list.
“Unfortunately, no.” Sam bit the inside of her cheek. “It’s taken months to get Wooly to agree to do this interview. If I postpone it, he might not give me another shot. If I don’t interview him now, I might never get the chance to gain insight into Sarah’s psyche. Did he coerce her? Did she encourage him? How did their partnership of evil form?”
“Why won’t he talk? Don’t they love to brag?”
“Some do, some don’t,” Sam answered him. “Wooly doesn’t like me much because he thinks that my profile on Sarah led the police to them. Sarah has all but told me that if he could, Wooly will hire someone to take me out, brutally.”
Jett looked up at the ceiling and tried to keep calm. The thought of Sam being targeted by The Recruiter was bad enough, now she was telling him she could also be the target of a pair of serial killers?
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Jett let out a muted roar.
“Shush!” Sam reached across the table and slapped his hand. “Be quiet, I don’t need Stone to know!”
“Gee, I wonder why,” Jett muttered. “He might be a tad concerned.”
“They are playing mind games to scare me. It’s the only fun available to them.” Sam shrugged off the threat as one would a fly. “My colleague, Ross Knox, is going with me to interview Wooly so you don’t need to worry about me.”
“And who is he?” Jett asked.
“He’s a forensic specialist with an interest in the psychology of killers. He helps me understand crime scenes and I help him with the psychology. We often work together. So, he’ll collect me and he’ll drive us to the airport.”
Jett just stared at her. Sam smiled, obviously thinking she’d got her way. Not even close, sunshine. Her face fell when he uttered a single, hard “no.”
“But—”
“No to him collecting you, no to you flying with him. Just no. He can meet you at Little Siberia and he’ll leave you at Little Siberia.” Jett held up his hand to forestall her arguments. “Or, to make this easier, just tell him that he’s not needed.”
“You’re being unreasonable,” Sam argued, her voice coated with irritation.
“If something happens to us, if we are ambushed on the way, then I’ll have two civilians to protect and not one. His presence might compromise your safety and that’s not a chance I’m prepared to take.”
Sam’s eyes widened at his vehemence.
She twisted her hands together and pulled a face. “He’s not going to be happy.”
His heart bled.
Jett kept his face impassive and after a minute, Sam lifted her shoulders in a resigned shrug.
“Okay, I’ll talk to Ross. I need to inform the prison that you will be accompanying me. I’ll ask for a private room, one with one-way glass so that you can watch the interview from the next room.”
She had to be shittin’ him.
“I’m either going to be in the room with you or this interview won’t happen. There is no way that you are interviewing a serial killer without me being there.” Sam started to speak and Jett talked over her. “And I don’t care if he is in shackles!”
Sam winced and looked down. Then she stared at a point past his shoulder, her eyes bouncing from Cracker to the wall of screens and back to Cracker. She wasn’t meeting his eyes. Why not?
A horrible thought occurred to Jett. “Please tell me that he is restrained—arm and leg shackles—while you talk to them.”
Sam, about a hundred years later, met his eyes. “Shackles, chains, and handcuffs don’t inspire trust and conversation and having their hands free is a show of good faith on my part.”
Fuck me and the boat I came in on. Ice invaded his veins. “You talk to killers with no protection?” he asked in a low voice. Kelby, and any of his other teammates, would’ve instantly recognized his low-and-slow tone, it was a fairly good indicator he was about to lose his shit. Most people backed the hell away from him at this point.
“The guards stand outside the door. They check on me periodically. The warden at Little Siberia did make me sign about a million indemnity forms stating that the prison wasn’t liable if anything happened to me.” Sam blithely added, “I can almost guarantee that he won’t try anything stupid but it freaks Will out.”
Jett put his elbows on the table and held his head in his hands. “Dear God, you need more than a bodyguard, you need a goddamn keeper.”
And why did he keep thinking that he was the man for the job?
A thought struck him and he snapped his head up. “And who the hell is Will?”