Too Hard to Handle (Black Knights Inc. #8)(51)

“I thought I was crying,” she said, wonder and something that sounded strangely like satisfaction lacing her voice.

“Huh?” That seemed to be his word of the day.

“During the gunfight,” she explained. “I felt this hot wetness running down my face and I thought it was tears. Thought I was being a total skootch.” Skootch? Oh, he did so love her Brooklynisms. “But I must’ve been cut by one of the flying chunks of concrete when the post was taking a beating.”

Taking a beating. From goddamned bullets!

“Damn, Penni,” he cursed, pulling her back to him and breathing in her delicate scent. Needing to assure himself once more that she was safe and solid and alive. “Seeing you there, spraying rounds like you were Rambo—”

“Rambina,” she interrupted, her lips moving against his ear and her arms winding around his neck. “Let’s hear it for the girls.”

“Hear! Hear!” Chelsea concurred.

“Nearly gave me a heart attack,” he finished because he had to get this next part out. “Don’t ever do that again.”

“Oh?” she whispered as another police cruiser zoomed by them, its siren bleating off into the night. “You mean don’t ever save your ass again?”

And although he would not have thought it was possible at a time like this, he found himself chuckling. “You’re a grade-A smart-ass, Penelope Ann DePaul. Anyone ever tell you that?”

“As a matter of fact, they have. And thank you for reiterating. Because I take being labeled a grade-A smart-ass as a compliment.”

He snorted and squeezed her tighter because…well, just because he could.

“And don’t act like you don’t like it.” Her breath feathered against his cheek and ear. She wanted this part to stay just between them.

So did he when he whispered, “I more than like it, woman.”

And then as if his words thrilled her—or either she just couldn’t help herself—she gently kissed his earlobe. It was sweet, tender, in stark contrast to their hell-bent-for-leather race down the streets of Cusco. And it had that warm glow he’d felt earlier, that flicker of hope, replacing the icy cold fist of fear that had kept him in a choke hold ever since he’d been lying on the ground beside the fountain, watching her rain hot lead into the dark corner where the mysterious shooter had been doing his or her damnedest to fill them all full of extra holes.

As if Zoelner was reading his mind, he asked, “Who was that f*ckass taking potshots at us? Kozlov? Did he get out of his restraints?”

When Chelsea skidded off the city streets and onto the road that would take them to the airport, Dan and Penni slammed into the back of the driver’s seat. Automatically, Dan’s hand went up to protect her head, which meant his shoulder took the brunt of the blow. The socket ached. His skin would most certainly be bruised. But he barely noticed either. All he cared about was that Penni didn’t sustain one more injury.

Another image of her face, stark white except where the blood stained it red, superimposed itself over the memory of his wife in the first seconds after her death. But he was able to push the soul-shredding vision away before it got the better of him, before his stomach turned upside down and he lost his dinner, and before he was sucked back into that surreal in-between world where the past meshed with the present, and remorse sunk its teeth into him until all he wanted was a bottle—or two—of whiskey.

“Well?” Zoelner asked again. “Did anyone get a look at the shooter?”

“I didn’t see who it was,” Dan said. “But I doubt it was Kozlov. Unless—”

“Three minutes to ETA,” Chelsea interrupted, her usually husky tone now sharp with surging adrenaline.

Penni shifted against him, turning her head toward Zoelner. “But who else would it be if it wasn’t Kozlov?”

“You’re all idiots!” Winterfield snarled, holding his wounded arm and rocking slightly in the bucket seat like a guy in some serious pain…or one who was out of his ever-lovin’ mind. It was hard to tell the difference.

And for a man who’d sent the entire world into a tizzy, Luke Winterfield was remarkably…well, unremarkable. With mousy brown hair, a scraggly goatee, and wire-framed glasses, he certainly didn’t look like the kind of guy who would be the target of an international manhunt. Quite the contrary. He looked like he should be wearing a pocket protector and working for Google.

“You have no idea who you’re dealing with!” he finished, his voice cracking like a pubescent teenager’s.

“We know exactly who we’re dealing with!” Zoelner thundered. “A traitor. A jackass Judas. A motherf*cking scumbag.”

“Not me.” Winterfield’s eyes were huge and wild behind the lenses of his glasses. “Him! You led him right to me and now…” He started panting, rocking faster. “He’s going to kill us all! He’s going to put a bullet in each of our brains and—” He grabbed Zoelner’s wide lapels and yanked until the two men were nose to nose. “We’re dead!” Winterfield screeched. “We’re all dead! You just don’t know it yet!”

Dan exchanged a quick look with Penni at the same time Zoelner said, “Dude, you are completely corked.”

“I’m not crazy,” Winterfield said, releasing Zoelner and going back to his rocking. “I’m not crazy. I’m not crazy.”