Too Hard to Handle (Black Knights Inc. #8)(92)
The sound of footsteps pounding down the stairs heralded the arrival of Dan and Penni to the party. “Penni…” Dan’s voice echoed around the corner. “Wait a goddamn minute, I—”
Dan was cut off when Penni breezed into the room and asked Ozzie cheekily, “So how was the date with the reporter?”
Zoelner tilted his head, frowning. There was something weird about Penni’s face—besides the beard burn that pinkened her cheeks. It was her smile. It looked forced. Brittle. He imagined if someone flicked a sunflower seed at her teeth, every single one of them would shatter. Curious, he glanced behind her to see that Dan was looking… What was that exactly? Distressed? No. Maybe distraught came closer to describing it.
Uh-oh. Trouble in paradise. Though what could possibly have happened to pop all those heart-shaped bubbles that appeared over Dan and Penni’s heads when they were in the same room together was a mystery. From the sounds he’d heard coming from Dan’s bedroom not too long ago, the pair should be moony-eyed and lethargic with postcoital bliss.
“Pssht. I had Samantha Tate eating out of my hand,” Ozzie boasted, oblivious to the strained atmosphere accompanying Dan and Penni. “Who wants to bet she’ll be phoning me up, asking me to bury my bone by the end of the week?”
“She better not,” Boss boomed upon exiting his office. “When it comes to sex with reporters, I’m instating a no-tolerance rule.”
“What? Why?” Ozzie ran his hands through his hair like that was the most outrageous thing Boss could have said. When he lowered his arms, his too-long hair was standing out, making him look a little Einstein-esque. “It’s the best way to keep her from nosing around here again.”
“How do you figure?” Becky asked, skirting Boss’s back and grabbing a seat near the head of the conference table.
“One night with the Oz-Man and she’ll be too distracted with thoughts of repeating the process to worry about what she thinks we might be hiding here,” Ozzie bragged.
Becky snorted. “I swear, just when I think I’ve seen the outer limits of your ego, there’s so much more to be discovered.”
“Thank you,” Ozzie said, doing his best Elvis imitation. “Thank you very much.”
Zoelner realized with a little start that he’d missed the Knights in the last three months. He hadn’t been with them from the beginning, having only signed on with the outfit a couple of years back. But in that short time they’d become more than teammates and coworkers. They’d become…friends. Family even.
He blinked, a little thrown by the thought.
He’d never really had much of a family before. His mother had died when he was too young to remember her. His father was a bastard and a half. And his younger brother? Well, Zoelner had spent so much of his life trying to keep the little shit out of trouble—all to no avail—that he’d never really had the chance to develop any sort of familial feelings beyond duty and responsibility.
“I need coffee!” Rock’s southern drawl traveled up the stairs before he did. “Tout de suite!”
Becky jumped from her seat and rushed over to grab the pot and the stack of Styrofoam cups sitting on a cart by the wall. She filled one cup and handed it to Rock when he appeared at the top of the stairs. After a nod of thanks, Rock grabbed a seat beside Chelsea. Vanessa came out of Rock’s office the moment she heard his voice and sat next to him, her expression concerned.
“No worries, ma chérie,” Rock assured her, squeezing her hand. It was no secret Rock hated doing interrogations. “This one was a piece of cake.”
“Good.” Vanessa blew out a breath, waving off the cup of coffee Becky offered her. “No thanks. I don’t think my stomach lining has recovered since the last time I drank that swill.”
“I’ll take some,” Zoelner told Becky, having grown accustomed to the motor-oil-strength java Boss liked to make.
“Dare I?” Chelsea asked him, eyeing the pot in Becky’s hand.
“Depends,” he told her. “How strong is your constitution?”
She blanched and shook her head, pushing her glasses up her nose. “I think I’ll follow Vanessa’s lead and take a pass.”
“Probably wise,” he agreed, thanking Becky when she handed him a cup. He breathed in the slightly muddy aroma of coffee beans that’d had the shit brewed out of them, but Penni diverted his attention when she sat in the chair next to him, fisting her hands in her lap until her knuckles turned white. He frowned at her, then lifted a brow at Dan, who grabbed the seat at the end of the table. Dan just closed his eyes and shook his head, a classic guy move that said, I f*cked up, so don’t ask.
Zoelner offered him a sympathetic grimace before turning to watch Boss click on the triangular-shaped conference-caller in the center of the table. Boss dialed a number, and after the first ring, an officious-sounding woman answered, saying without preamble, “Please hold for the president.”
“The president?” Chelsea squeaked, her eyes wide behind the lenses of her glasses.
She knew the reporting structure for BKI, but as a true blue, wrapped-in-the-flag Intelligence agent, she found it a little awe-inspiring that they had a direct link to the commander in chief. Zoelner knew just how awe-inspiring from experience. The first time President Thompson arrived through the secret tunnel to have a meeting with the Knights, he had sat there blinking at the president, feeling like he’d fallen down a rabbit hole.