Too Hard to Handle (Black Knights Inc. #8)(66)

“I figured,” Z said.

“Yeah,” she agreed, then sighed again. The way Dan and Penni were together, hot to trot for each other while still completely at ease, made her wish for…so many things she didn’t have. So many things she might never have.

“What?” Z cocked his head. In the dim light of the instruments, she saw how the move caused a mink-colored curl to hook around the top of his left ear. Which was a weird thing to notice but was par for the course, really, considering that everything about this day had been a little twilight zone-y. “Why are you wearing such a hangdog expression? I’d think you would be jumping for joy. You helped catch the CIA’s most wanted man, something your colleagues couldn’t do after months of trying. You’ll probably get a commendation or a promotion for this.”

“Bah.” She waved a hand through the air, wincing when it came within inches of the yoke. She tucked her arm back around her waist. “I don’t care about any of that.” She realized how that sounded and was quick to clarify. “I mean, I care that we caught Winterfield, but I don’t care about the other stuff. Besides, I didn’t do much. You guys were the ones who managed all the heavy lifting.”

“Oh, come on, Chels.” He turned to face her more fully. His shoulders seemed too wide for the small space. She eyed the distance between his calf and that panel of knobs. “You did great back there and you know it. From interrogating Kozlov to hot-wiring the van to laying down cover fire…we couldn’t have done any of it without you. And in case everyone else forgets to say it, thank you.”

Thump! That was the sound of her jaw falling into her lap.

“What?” He lifted a brow.

She was able to reel up her bottom teeth. Barely. Shaking her head, she said, “It’s just that you’re not usually one for doling out praise.”

He made a face. “I dole it out when it’s warranted and deserved.”

“Maybe so,” she allowed. “Um…thanks then. I guess.”

“You’re welcome.” He winked.

And there went her jaw again, falling into her lap. Dagan Zoelner never winked. And especially not at her. Does he have something in his eye?

Well, regardless of whether it was an intentional or unintentional wink, there was no denying his praise had been real. And she hadn’t felt such a sense of accomplishment, such a sense of joy, since she won her eighth-grade spelling bee. A warmth spread from her stomach into her chest and further, into her cheeks.

“Well”—she played it off so he wouldn’t know how much his words meant to her, how much he meant to her—“truth is, I think I prefer my tidy little cubicle and my endless lines of Intelligence to actual fieldwork.”

“Not as fun as you thought it would be?”

“Ha,” was all she said, which expressed what she was feeling precisely. “You know, I once heard a field agent tell another field agent that there’s nothing more exhilarating than being shot at and missed.”

“You think he was wrong?” Z asked, his eyes blazing through the low light in the cockpit to burn across her face. She always felt his stare like a physical touch. A hot physical touch.

“It was a she,” she corrected, pushing her glasses up her nose. “And I don’t think she was wrong. I think she was cah-razy.”

He smiled. An actual, factual smile. The sight of his white teeth in the middle of his tan face was so sudden and blinding she almost lifted a hand to shade her eyes. She hadn’t even been trying to make him grin, which was probably why his smile had caught her so off guard. And then it was gone. As quickly as it had appeared. And he was back to being Sourpuss Face Dagan Zoelner.

Damn. She blew out a disappointed sigh. “On the subject of being shot at and missed, who do you suppose that guy was at the airport? One of Kozlov’s cronies, maybe?” she asked. “Kozlov could have been yanking my chain when he told me he was working alone.”

“Fuck if I know.” Z shrugged. “I didn’t get a good look at him through the pouring rain.”

“Neither did I,” she agreed.

Then, for a few seconds they sat in silence, Z flicking his gaze over the control panel, her flicking her gaze over his handsome profile. She didn’t like the idea of having to shrug and say whatever when it came to the guy at the airport, but there was nothing to go on and no way to investigate while she was twenty-something-thousand feet in the air. So she shoved it all aside and tried to clear her head. When she did, her mind wandered back to Dan and Penni, to the affection the two seemed to share, and before she even knew she was going to ask the question, she blurted, “Did you know Dan’s wife?”

Z turned to her. Slowly. Then he sat perfectly still. Eerily still. Which is how she knew she’d touched on a subject he in no way wanted to discuss. His words confirmed it. “One sentence in and I’m already hating the new direction of this conversation.”

Still, she’d already broached the topic. In for a penny, in for a pound. “Did you?”

“No,” he admitted after another long pause. “She died before I joined BKI.”

“Oh.” She nodded, then ventured, “Do you supposed Penni knows about her?”

“I have no idea.”

“I don’t think she does,” she said contemplatively.