Forged in Smoke (Red-Hot SEALs #3)(68)

“Now that the women and kids are safe, how do you two feel about stepping outside? Taking care of business?” Mac suddenly asked, his gaze shifting between Rawls and Zane.

“I’m looking forward to it.” Icy anticipation chilled Zane’s face, glittered in his green eyes.

Rawls, well, he wasn’t quite as eager. Yeah, he was all for leveling out the playing field and taking some of those bastards down—but there were Faith and Kait to consider. He needed to be on hand if they took a turn for the worse. And then there was his ghost. If the bastard made a reappearance, out there on the battlefield, there would be even more weapons for him to play with, and ways for him to interfere.

Best not chance it.

“Get Cosky,” Mac told Zane. “We’ll head out in five.”

Rawls had opened his mouth to man up and inform his commander that he wouldn’t be embarking on the mission with him, when Jude chimed in.

“No.” The refusal was emphatic.

Mac stiffened. Slowly his head turned. Thick black eyebrows shot up. “I don’t remember asking you.”

“My brothers are out there. Clearing a path for you. Leaving now endangers you both.”

Mac’s eyebrows collapsed into a scowl. “Wolf and his men are here? Now? Outside?”

Jude simply nodded.

“Son of a bitch . . . ” Mac’s grim voice trailed off.

“I’m all for taking the initiative for a change, but with Wolf and his team already in the field . . . ” Zane shook his head, frustration and regret flashing through his eyes. “It’s ripe for friendly fire.”

“No shit.” Mac looked even less happy than Zane. He turned his scowl back on Jude. “We need to grab one of those bastards who attacked us. Preferably someone up the food chain. Someone with answers.” He paused, pinned Jude with a hard look. “It’s the best shot we have of tracking these bastards down.”

Jude’s expression didn’t alter. “What you seek already walks among you.”

Rawls rocked back on his heels in surprise. The ambiguous warrior had to be referring to Pachico. But just how the hell did he expect them to pull answers from the surly ghost? Pachico was hardly in an accommodating mood.

“What the f*ck does that mean?” Mac exploded. “And while you’re at it, you want to explain how you even know your buddies are out there? You have no radio. No sat phone. No motherf*cking technology to contact your brothers, but you somehow—by osmosis, apparently—know where they are?”

Jude simply shrugged, that enormously annoying aura of serenity surrounding him again.

But the question niggled at Rawls.

How did Jude know his team was out there? What mystical technological advances did their new allies have up their sleeves?





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Chapter Fourteen




* * *





IS SHE OKAY?” Faith asked, hovering above Kait, torn between wanting to help and not wanting to get in the way.

“She’ll be fine,” Cosky said gruffly. He glanced up, his face tense, his left hand resting on the back of Kait’s head. And then his gaze sharpened. After a quick up-and-down scan that took in Faith from head to toe, he raised dark eyebrows. “How are you holding up? You had Rawlings pretty damn freaked out back there.”

She had?

“I’m fine,” Faith assured him.

“Good to hear.” He turned his attention back to the woman beside him. There was a world of worry in the gray eyes watching the blonde goddess lying so limply on the rough-cut stone floor.

Judging by the glimpse she’d caught of Kait’s face earlier, he had reason for his concern. His girlfriend had looked awful—bright red, sweaty face, exhaustion evident in the curve of her shoulders and limpness of her muscles. She’d barely been able to hold her head upright. And then there was the condition of her shirt. It was soaked with sweat down the length of her spine, as well as under her arms.

The woman was obviously running a fever. She must have been hit with a nasty flu. What terrible timing. Running for your life was bad enough, doing so with a high fever and dogged by the flu had to be even worse.

Suddenly Rawls’s account of what had happened earlier burst into her mind. He’d claimed she’d died and Kait had healed her. But Kait had been in a different cabin, with separate tunnel accesses. Which meant she must have doubled back in the tunnel system to look for her.

Even burning up from a fever, exhausted to the point of collapse, she’d still braved a collapsing tunnel system to find and help a virtual stranger? Granted, they’d spent the past week in somewhat close proximity, but they’d hardly interacted enough to become friends—mild acquaintances at best.

Would a con artist do that? Driven by self-interest, a con artist wouldn’t put their own life and health in jeopardy to help someone else, would they? Not when they had a perfect excuse to stay put and avoid additional danger.

After that talk with Rawls in the kitchen, she’d been convinced that Kait was playing everyone—although how had been uncertain. According to Rawls, she refused monetary reimbursement for her self-proclaimed healings. But maybe she received other benefits from her con.

Faith glanced at Cosky as his mother came bustling over with a bottle of water. The lieutenant didn’t seem the type to fall prey to a con artist. He appeared far too guarded and intelligent for that. But then, beautiful women had been beguiling men for thousands of years. He wouldn’t be the first wary, smart man to fall for the wiles of a temptress. He wouldn’t be the last either.