Full Throttle (Black Knights Inc. #7)(92)
“But not us. Right, LT?” the SEAL nicknamed Romeo said, turning to Leo. “After this last mission in Pakistan, we’re out.”
“The hell you say.” Boss’s big jaw jerked back like Romeo had socked him on the chin.
“It’s true.” Leo grinned, crossing his arms over his chest and nodding. He unhooked his aviator sunglasses from the collar of his gray T-shirt and slid them onto his face with dramatic flair. Then he wiggled his eyebrows until they bounced above the mirrored lenses. “We’re buggin’ out, boys. Kissin’ the Teams good-bye and headin’ down to the Keys to take over my family’s salvage business…and do a little treasure huntin’.”
“Wait, treasure as in pirate treasure?” Dan said, his tone and the smirk on his lips broadcasting just how hilarious he found this idea to be. “Pirate treasure as in argh!” He closed one eye to indicate the thing might be missing and covered with a patch.
“Yuck it up, *,” Leo told him. “You won’t be laughin’ when—”
Boss’s cell phone came to life in the front pocket of his jeans. “Excuse me for one sec,” he said after pulling it out and glancing at the screen. Steady could tell by the look on his face that the president was on the horn. Boss’s mouth always pinched in a certain way, his eyebrows nearly touching over the top of his nose when POTUS called.
“Hey”—he jogged after Boss, who’d started toward the metal staircase that led up to the second floor—“tell him he better start answering my frackin’ phone calls!”
Boss frowned back at him, waving him off. But Steady thrust out his chin, sending Boss a look that very succinctly conveyed, I’m not f*cking around.
After Abby dropped her bomb, he’d sat there, staring, blinking at her in dumbfounded disbelief for all of about ten seconds. But that’s all it had taken for the door on the jet’s fuselage to burst open and admit a glut of Secret Service agents. The suit-wearing throng had immediately gathered Abby and Agent DePaul up, bustling them off the aircraft before he had the chance to ask Abby what the hell she’d meant by that statement. Because I killed your sister…
Huh? I mean, what the ever-loving huh?
She hadn’t killed Rosa. A terrorist had killed Rosa. End of story.
He’d tried to go after her, but one of the SS agents had placed a firm hand in the middle of his chest, shaking his head. “That’s a negative on leaving the aircraft,” the guy had said. “The press has gotten wind of Miss Thompson’s abduction, and they’re waiting on the tarmac. As such, the president insists you remain onboard during refueling. The pilot already has the go ahead to drop both you and you’re…uh…compatriot,” this was the part where Dan had glanced back at him, raising a brow and mouthing compatriot, “back in Chicago.”
And even though every single one of Steady’s instincts had been screaming at him to go after the woman he loved and demand she explain herself, the fact of the matter was, he couldn’t risk the presence of the press. Black Knights Inc. may have been forced from the closet, its operators’ identities revealed to the DOD and some of its subordinate agencies, but they could never, repeat never, divulge themselves to the civilian press. Doing so would be the equivalent of a death knell, ringing in the end of the BKI’s clandestine operational capabilities.
And so, good little soldier that he was, he’d stayed aboard the jet, allowing himself to be ferried back to Chicago where he’d immediately begun leaving messages for Abby.
But given she was being hounded by reporters seeking the inside scoop on her recent ordeal, it was no big surprise she’d had her cell phone disconnected. Which had left him no other recourse but to leave a half dozen messages for el Jefe himself, insisting on an explanation for Abby’s outburst.
So far? Radio silence. On all fronts. And for the last two days he couldn’t escape the feeling that he was pushing a wheelbarrow full of shit up a very steep hill.
He crossed his arms, shaking his head when Boss stopped near the foot of the staircase, turning to shoo him away. “Fuck no,” he said. “I’m not moving until he agrees to answer my questions.” He’d already decided when he awoke this morning that he was giving everyone twenty-four more hours to start talking, or he was mounting up on Ranger, roaring his way to Washington, and demanding an audience.
Boss rolled his eyes, then said into the phone, “I don’t know if you’re aware, sir. But the Alpha platoon boys are here with us.” He listened for a little while longer before, “Yes, sir. Just wanted to make sure you were okay with their presence here.” Then he reached out to slam his hand over the big red button above the ten-drawer rolling toolbox behind him.
A loud beep, beep, beep similar to the reversing sound made by the small forklift truck they kept onsite for moving the larger of their machinery around echoed through the expanse of the shop, bouncing off the soaring leaded glass windows. A red light beside the staircase blinked out a warning, and Steady lifted a brow, a question without words. Boss nodded, answering him in the same vein before clicking off his phone and sliding it back into his hip pocket.
“What the f*ck?” Leo Anderson breathed as one entire twelve-foot by twelve-foot section of bricks on the far wall punched out and slid to the left, rolling noisily against the metal tracks. Within seconds, the big motor operating the door—the thing was known to be unreliable, but today it seemed to be working just fine—finished its task and the secret tunnel that ran from Black Knights Inc. under the north branch of the nearby Chicago River to a similar hidden access point in a parking garage two blocks west was revealed.