Full Throttle (Black Knights Inc. #7)(43)
“He is.” Dan nodded. “He’s being kept apprised of Steady and Abby’s position and northward trajectory by my HQ.”
She’d learned that when he and Steady were talking about “geeking up,” they were really referring to the tracking chips they’d both implanted in their wristwatches. Talk about state-of-the-art accessories. Not that she should be all that surprised. Because, if she’d guessed correctly, they were the commander in chief’s very own gang of merry current and/or former military men.
“Since you brought it up,” she said, her first order of business being Abby, always Abby, “are they still en route to the border?”
“At last check,” Dan assured her. “And as soon as the SEAL team gets here, they’ll fly over and pick ’em up.”
“Which means another unit couldn’t be mustered on such short notice.” She wished this suckass day would just end already. Wished Abby was back with her safe and sound so she could hide herself away somewhere and give in to the grief clawing inside her chest. “The president has to be beside himself with worry.”
Dan shrugged. “He trusts Steady to get the job done. As for…”
She stopped listening after his first sentence because she wanted to yell, Oh, for the love of—it’s not like you guys are superheroes or anything!
Or maybe they were. Because that’s obviously how POTUS was treating them. She tilted her head, trying to see if Dan was sporting an invisible cape.
“…but I know someone who can translate for us. Someone I can trust to get it right and not paraphrase or lose something in the translation. And someone who won’t breathe a word to the press.”
“Who is he?” She lifted a brow. “And how do we get him here?”
“It’s a her. And she’s not coming here. We’re gonna call her.”
Not waiting for her acquiescence to the plan—so what else is new?—he reached into his pocket and extracted his cell phone.
Turning his back on her and the still-blubbering maid, he punched in a number before lifting the device to his ear. When Bertha Bomber continued to sob and wail, he frowned over his shoulder and plugged a finger in his opposite ear. “Hey, Rock,” she heard him say after a moment. “I need Vanessa. She around?” A couple more seconds passed, then, “Hey, beautiful. How’s your Malay?”
Beautiful? Beautiful? Uh-huh, Penni was pretty sure if she squinted, she’d catch a glimpse of a green-eyed monster sitting atop her left shoulder. Which proved how far off her rocker she’d fallen. She had no claim over Dan. She wanted no claim over Dan. But try explaining that to her new emerald-eyed friend.
“Excellent,” Dan said into his receiver, turning to smile and wink at her.
When she smiled back, he cocked his head, his expression faltering. Obviously she’d flashed too many teeth. More snarl than smile.
“Penni”—he took the phone away from his ear to switch it over to speaker—“I’d like you to meet Vanessa Cordero. Vanessa is a comm specialist extraordinaire.”
A low, husky voice, like what Penni imagined phone-sex operators might use, sounded from the device. “Hello, Penni.”
The monster on her shoulder doubled in size.
“Hiya, Vanessa,” she ground out, feeling terrible because the name sort of stuck in the back of her throat. One almost sexual encounter with the guy and suddenly you’re all Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. Could you be any more of a penis-wrinkle, Penni?
“Rock,” Dan said, “you still on the line, too?”
“Oui, mon frere,” a deep, melodic baritone slid through the phone’s speaker. “I’m here.”
“Good.” Dan nodded, glancing at her. “So you’re also talking with Rock Babineaux. He’s a bony-assed Cajun who happens to be a leading expert in interrogation techniques. I’m hoping these two, working together, can pry some information out of our…uh…far-from-friendly friend here.” He jerked his chin toward the maid.
“I take exception to the bony-assed comment.” That smooth voice echoed through the little room, sounding like a late-night radio host.
One corner of Dan’s mouth twitched, a light entering his eyes that couldn’t be mistaken for anything other than the gleam of camaraderie. Dan and this Rock guy were obviously friends. Friends and coworkers and—Zoink! Penni’s green-eyed pal blipped out of existence. Gone so fast she wondered if he’d ever really been there at all or if she’d simply imagined him, her mind struggling for anything with which to occupy itself, since every time it turned toward thoughts of her colleagues, she damn near hyperventilated.
Like now…
She concentrated everything she had on not letting the tears prickling behind her burning eyes fall. She couldn’t let them fall. Because once she started, she figured she might not be able to stop for a full week.
One second stretched into two. Two became three. And then she lost count. Time seemed to warp and expand like the taffy she’d seen pulled on the machines in the confectionary shops along the boardwalk as a kid. In fact, she was so lost in herself, so lost in simply taking one breath after another, that she jumped, the legs of her chair scraping against the floor tile, when Dan laid a warm, heavy hand on her shoulder.
“You don’t hafta stay in here for this,” he assured her. “We can handle the—”