You Only Love Twice (Masters and Mercenaries #8)(89)

He stepped out of the frame, his face never turning to the camera.

“Jesse? Are you all right?” He heard Simon talking, but it sounded far away.

Before he really knew what he was doing, he found himself running. There were shouts behind him, but he paid them no mind. He wasn’t going to listen to that voice in his head. That voice led him nowhere. There was a new voice that shouted for him to take action.

He ran out of the suite and headed for the stairs. They would be so much quicker than the elevators. His team might catch him waiting for the elevators. They wouldn’t understand. The devil had to be caught. The devil wouldn’t be caught with cameras. He could manipulate those. He could only be caught by someone who knew him.

His mind raced as he flew down the stairs. One flight and then two and three and four. He lost track of how many. All that mattered was getting to the ballroom and unmasking the devil, showing him for the true evil he was.

His eyes caught on the door that led to the ballroom and he burst through it.

Sound and lights hit him. He was suddenly surrounded and in a sea of white.

His breath shuddered, but he forced some calm to slip over him. There were a few business suits, but mostly the entire room consisted of men in thawbs and keffiyehs. What color had the headdress been?

Red. It had been red, right?

Did every f*cker in the room have to be wearing some damn form of red on his head?

His heart rate ticked up. He was here. The Caliph was here and he was wearing a mask. How the f*ck was he supposed to find him when they all were wearing the same masks?

And there it was. That was the same keffiyeh he’d seen in the video feed. Red and black. He’d found him.

Jesse reached for the Caliph’s elbow, pulling him around, ready to stare into the face of his own nightmare.

“Can I help you?” an elderly man asked, his brown eyes softening with concern. “Are you all right?”

Not the Caliph. Not even close. Jesse stepped back. “Sorry.”

His heart sank and he stumbled a bit. He wanted to shout. Thought about it for a half a second. He could shout out and finally be done with this.

“Jesse?”

He stopped in the middle of the room. Phoebe. His hands were shaking. His heart racing. He wanted to walk away from her so she didn’t have to see him, didn’t have to know how this affected him and made him turn into a reactionary moron who hadn’t even thought about the consequences of running in here like a madman.

He looked up and hundreds of eyes were watching him. He was supposed to be a ghost, someone who clung to the sidelines and no one noticed, but he’d just made himself a massive target. He’d placed them all in danger because he couldn’t control himself.

He turned, knowing he had to get them out of here. She would be furious. He plastered a smile on his face that utterly belied his need to scream and roar and berate himself. “Hey, I was looking for you.” Yeah, they would believe that. “Heard you had some trouble.”

Erin was standing beside Phoebe with a frown on her face. “We took care of it. Looks like you’re having some trouble, too.”

“Back off,” Phoebe said under her breath. “We’ll deal with this upstairs.”

He turned and suddenly was taken back to that moment he’d been placed on an airplane to go from Ramstein AFB back to the States after he’d been found. He’d been in the hospital for weeks, and then they’d come for him. Five MPs. They’d been there for his “protection” his CO had claimed, but that hadn’t been how it felt.

He’d felt like a prisoner, like a man no one trusted.

As Simon and then Theo took up places on either side of him, he knew what it felt like again.

He walked forward toward the elevators, his gut in a nasty twist. He’d f*cked up and it was going to cost him everything.

They got into the elevators and the silence was damn near devastating.

Phoebe’s head went down, avoiding the cameras this time. “I know. Ten, I will handle it. I don’t care. Yes, I’ll let him know.”

“Jesse,” Simon began.

Phoebe turned, her eyes flashing. “You will wait until we get upstairs and then you will wait until I’ve had my talk with him. Is that understood?”

So Phoebe was going to deliver the dressing down. Yeah, that was the icing on the cake. That was the final f*cking blow. He was going to lose his job and her in the same moment.

“You don’t have to say anything,” he began.

“Be quiet,” she ordered.

The doors opened again and they marched out toward the suite. Ten was standing there waiting when they walked in.

“Do you have any idea what you just did? Every security team here is trying to figure out who you are. You have put every single one of us in danger,” Ten said, his voice as cold as ice.

Phoebe got right in her brother’s space. “I told you to stand down.”

“You don’t run this team,” Ten shot back.

“I don’t care. He’s mine and I will take care of him. You and everyone else will back the f*ck off. I’m going to do this in private. We’ll deal with fallout later and that is my final say. Unless you want to fire me, you will let me deal with this my way.”

Ten scrubbed a hand through his head and stalked off.

Phoebe’s hand found his. It seemed a little cruel of her, but he was numb. He allowed himself to be led off. She walked right to the bedroom they’d shared. She wouldn’t be sharing with him anymore. She led him inside and then turned and locked the door.