Hell for Leather (Black Knights Inc. #6)(39)

“Sure.” Ozzie smiled, before his expression turned into more of a snarl. “But in order to access Eyes in the Sky, I’d have to use BKI’s routing system, which we all know has been compromised. I’m not saying I couldn’t do it, but they’d know I was doing it. And since Zoelner’s friend is now our supposed liaison, I—”

“She’s not my friend,” Zoelner interrupted. Something in his tone caused Mac to turn and study him curiously. What was the matter with his face? Why was it all red and blotchy and…hot damn, was Zoelner actually blushing?

“Well, whatever she is,” Ozzie waved off Zoelner’s objection, ignorant of the fact that something was boiling just beneath the former agent’s surface, “she offered to help. I think this is one instance where we should take her up on it. I mean, geez, it’s just a quick infrared scan.”

Mac watched the muscle on the left side of Zoelner’s jaw twitch, and part of him—the part that could totally understand not wanting to get another woman involved here, especially not one who seemed to have the same effect on Zoelner that Delilah had on him—almost told Ozzie, to hell with it, just hijack the goddamned satellite. But the other part of him, the part he prided himself on, the professional part, knew the kid had a point. If the CIA was going to know they were using the satellite system anyway, and if they could do the deed more quickly and more efficiently, why not just let them do it? As an added bonus, it could work as a test, of sorts, to see just how well the spooks were willing to play in the whole “joint assistance” arena.

“Is it that much of a problem for you?” he asked Zoelner.

“No.” Zoelner frowned hard enough to strain a facial muscle. “It’s not a problem. I’d just rather not have to deal with Ch—” He stopped, forcing himself to take a deep breath before continuing. “With those folks.”

Mac hadn’t missed Zoelner’s truncated slip-of-the-tongue. There was definitely some sort of history between Zoelner and this agent named Chelsea. “Look, man,” he placated, “this might be our opportunity to—”

“Fuck it,” Zoelner spat viciously. “I’ll do it.”

Mac opened his mouth, but before he could say anything, a thump sounded overhead followed by a strange moaning sound. And a handful of hours after he had his first heart attack, he experienced a second one…

***

Beyond disappointed, and exhausted to the point of delusion apparently, Delilah spiked her phone into the orange shag carpeting and groaned her misery. Because the thought had occurred to her while she’d been in the shower that maybe her uncle had called. That maybe his disappearance had, indeed, been some kind of huge mistake. That maybe he and his old Marine buddy, Charlie, had gone somewhere to pull a Cheech and Chong, or else get their knobs polished—erp, she sooo didn’t want to picture that—and he’d awoken this morning to leave her a message explaining everything. The idea had taken such a hold on her while she’d been shampooing the highway from her hair, that she’d almost, almost convinced herself it was real.

But after hastily pulling on a clean pair of jeans and her favorite T-shirt—the hot pink cotton read Asphalt Angel and had been washed so often it was soft as satin—she grabbed her iPhone only to find its screen glaringly blank. And even though Fido snored softly over in the corner of the small, dimly lit bedroom, sprawled on his back, legs bent and twitching as he chased rabbits in his dreams, the stark silence of her phone’s empty voice mail messages seemed to scream.

Tossing the damp towel she’d been using to dry her hair to the floor, she collapsed onto the edge of the bed and cursed the tears that pricked behind her eyes.

Don’t do it, she fiercely scolded herself. Don’t you give in, yet. Don’t you give up, yet.

But to her utter humiliation, she couldn’t dispel the sense of helplessness, the sense of…hopelessness weighing her down like a lead anchor attached to her soul. And, then, as if things weren’t bad enough already, a vision of Buzzard in his last moments invaded her consciousness.

So much blood…

There’d been so much blood. Everywhere. All over the bar. All over the floor. And even though she’d had a team come in to scrub it away, even though everybody told her there weren’t any stains, every time she walked into the place she would swear she could still see it there, dripping from Buzzard’s usual stool, falling into a growing pool of red on the floor.

To put it simply, what happened that afternoon…Buzzard’s death…it haunted her. And even though she’d moved his favorite song into permanent shuffle on the jukebox, even though she’d started serving shots of his customary whiskey at half price, even though she’d had a plaque with his name imbedded into the bar, even though she’d done everything she could think of to memorialize him, she was still…haunted. Her heart damn near threatening to burst anytime she was caught off guard, like now, with the memory of him.

Would she soon be attending another funeral for someone she loved? Someone who’d still be here if not for her? Because no matter how hard she tried to convince herself otherwise, she couldn’t shake the idea that none of this would have happened if she’d been tough enough to get her shit together and get back behind the bar where she belonged, instead of using every excuse she could think of to avoid the place…i.e., encouraging her uncle to go on an impromptu road trip. Jesus, if not for her cajoling, Uncle Theo wouldn’t have taken Charlie up on his invitation for a visit, and he wouldn’t have gotten embroiled in whatever trouble Charlie Sander was obviously involved in.