Julie Walker - Hell for Leather

Delilah’s mind raced to reach the same conclusions the Knights evidently already had. “Excuse me,” she said after a beat, raising her hand like she was still back in school. “Can someone please explain to me what in the world all of that means? I mean, I get that you guys are under the impression that this al-Whoever guy—”

“Al-Hallaj,” Chelsea added helpfully.

“Yeah, okay.” Delilah nodded. “So, I get that you think Winterfield sold the files to al-Hallaj. And I get that al-Hallaj took Sander and my uncle in order to try to…uh…get the locations of the warheads from them.” She couldn’t bring herself to voice the word torture. “Am I correct in believing that once again technology has advanced to a point where some or all of the remaining five might be salvageable?”

The CIA agent nodded, and Delilah’s heart sank. If she wasn’t mistaken, the thing was hanging out somewhere in the vicinity of her kneecaps.

“So, let’s not get into the discussion of why we, the United States of America, haven’t gone to secure the warheads, and jump instead to the question of why I’ve been targeted twice. It doesn’t make any sense.”

“Unfortunately, it does,” Mac murmured, the muscles in his mile-wide shoulders twitching fitfully.

“It does?” she asked. “But, why?”

Mac turned his face slightly, his distinctive profile in view. And if she’d ever seen a jaw looking harder than his, she couldn’t remember the occasion. That redwood of dread in her stomach hit a growth spurt, sending branches up to strangle her throat.

“It means they’ve been unable to get the information from the men by traditional means.” Traditional means. She knew he meant torture. “So, they’re attemptin’ to use you as leverage.”

Uh-huh. Okay. Right. So…terrorists—freakin’ frackin’ terrorists—wanted to use her as leverage. Against her uncle. In order to find nuclear weapons…

She bent at the waist, trying to decide if she was going to puke or pass out. Fortunately, she was saved from doing either when the soft muttering of helicopter blades sounded overhead a mere second before the front door exploded open. What was left of the ruined slab of oak disintegrated on impact with the wall.

She bolted upright just as three men in full-on SWAT gear poured into the house, their huge, black machine guns up and at the ready. The Black Knights answered in kind, handguns whipped from waistbands and holsters in the blink of an eye. Each group aimed for the other. Each group yelled for the other to drop their weapons. It was a rootin’, tootin’, gun-totin’ Yosemite Sam melee.

And Delilah was caught smack-dab in the middle of it. Yippee!

“Get behind me,” Mac bellowed to Delilah, barely sparing her a glance as he kept his weapon trained on the intruders. But that quick peek was enough to tell him her face had completely drained of blood. It was as white as the chalk he and his father had used to paint the cattle with during culling season.

“Don’t move!” yelled one of the three men decked out in expensive tactical gear.

Mac knew a CIA wet unit when he saw one. Not that he was all that impressed. After all, whatever training these spooky boys had gotten back at Langley, he knew it couldn’t possibly compare to the rigorous, months-long physical hell Frank “Boss” Knight had put him through before allowing him to join the ranks of Black Knights Inc. You might not officially be a Navy SEAL, Boss had thundered more than a time or two while watching him struggle to keep from drowning in the frigid waters of Lake Michigan or having him fire so many rounds that his fingers went numb, but, fuckin’-A, I’ll make sure you should have been.

Mac had survived that ordeal. And many, many more in the years since. Which meant that although he had a small amount of respect for the skills of the black-suited men in front of him—small being the operative word—he’d still bet a dollar to a doughnut that he and the two Knights lined up beside him could drop the fancy boys faster than a buckin’ bronco could blaze out of a chute.

“I said, don’t move,” the man—obviously, he was the team leader—yelled again when Delilah started to head for Mac. And then the idiot made his second mistake. His first had been daring to come at the BKI boys with guns hot, of course. But now the dumbass had the unmitigated gall to train his weapon on Delilah.

“Uh-uh,” Mac tsked, his finger tightening on his trigger, every muscle in his body tensing to absorb the coming recoil should he have to fill Dumbass SWAT Guy full of hot lead. “You best keep pointin’ that iron at me, friend. Because if you don’t, I’ll drop you so fast you’ll be kissin’ St. Peter hello within a second.”

The guy must’ve known Mac wasn’t whistling Dixie. He hesitated barely a heartbeat before once again aiming the black eye of his quick-firing Colt in Mac’s direction.

“That’s better.” Mac jerked his chin in a nod, his anger going from a rapid boil to a slow simmer. “Now, we’re all just gonna hold our fire and our breath while Delilah makes her way over to me, capisce?”

“I’m on orders to take Miss Fairchild into protective custody,” the guy said, one small drop of sweat glistening on the bridge of his nose. Besides his eyes and the tops of his cheeks, that was the only part of his face not covered by the black, tactical balaclava he wore.

“You’ll take her over my dead body,” Mac growled.

Delilah quickly flitted across the room. When she ducked behind him and shoved her fingers into the top of his waistband, he heaved a secret sigh of relief.

“Your dead body can certainly be arranged,” Mr. Asshat SWAT-man retorted, the smug, self-satisfied gleam in his eye all but screaming that he was the winner in the big dick lottery, the hot girlfriend competition, and the sharp-shooting championship. And although Mac was well versed in dealing with the immeasurable arrogance of Company Men—even as a Fed he’d had to suffer their occasional association—he discovered he had an intense desire to wipe that look off of Asshat’s face with a well-placed strike from his handy-dandy Ka-Bar. Or a well-aimed bullet. Either one would do nicely.

“Oh, for the love of—” Agent Duvall jumped into the fray. “Are you guys kidding me with this? I mean, I’m just spitballing here, but aren’t we all on the same friggin’ team?”

“Morales informed me the Black Knights might not be willing to hand over the woman,” Mr. Asshat explained. “In which case, I’m instructed to take her by force.”

Mac’s finger twitched on his trigger as the fire under his anger flamed with new life.

“Jesus Christ,” the little CIA agent huffed before screaming into her earpiece at whatever now-deaf technician was on the other end. “Get Morales back on the goddamned line!”

As she waited for the call to go through, she let her gaze ping-pong back and forth between the two opposing groups. “This place could seriously use a Xanax salt lick,” she muttered, shaking her head in exasperation.

Ozzie chuckled despite the charged atmosphere. “You’re funny, Agent Duvall. Has anyone ever told you that?”

“Not since I gave up stand-up comedy for a regular ol’ nine-to-five,” she said, tapping her foot impatiently.

This time Ozzie barked with laughter. “There are two things I know for certain,” he said, and Mac would have rolled his eyes had he not been inclined to keep his blinkers trained on Asshat SWAT-guy. Because he was fully aware of what was coming.

“Oh, yeah?” Agent Duvall asked, falling hook, line, and sinker. Mac was pretty sure that grumbling noise he heard was coming from Zoelner. “And what two things are those?”

“Number one,” Ozzie began, “Warrant is one of the most underrated hair bands of the eighties.”

“Oh-kay. And number two?” the little CIA agent prodded when Ozzie hesitated.

“You’re going to marry me someday.”

Mac felt Agent Duvall’s look of disbelief more than he saw it. “Are you serious?” she demanded. “Are you really doing this right now? Flirting with me?”

“Yeah.” Ozzie shrugged. “I figured I’d just go for it.”

When Agent Duvall opened her mouth to say, “You know what? You’re not as good-looking as you think,” with a hint of laughter in her voice, Mac peeked over at Zoelner, not surprised to find the guy had settled into that weird state of statue-like stillness.

“Not as good-looking as I think?” Ozzie retorted. “I find that hard to believe. I do own a mirror.”

This time Agent Duvall laughed outright, and Zoelner hissed, “Why don’t you stop being such a goddamned hemorrhoid, Ozzie.”

With that, Mac’s suspicions about Zoelner’s feelings toward Chelsea Duvall were confirmed. Because, unless he was mistaken—and he very much doubted he was—the ex-spook was absolutely green with jealousy.

And, okay, given the fact they were in the middle of a good ol’-fashioned standoff, Mac fully recognized how ridiculous the entire last three minutes—aka the circus that was Ozzie, Zoelner, SWAT Guys, and Agent Duvall—had been. In fact, he reckoned the only thing they were missing here was a clown car. But it was the sheer absurdity of the entire thing that made his anger dissipate enough for him to realize Delilah had pressed herself against him, turkey peeking around his shoulder at the scene being played out like some sort of poorly written slapstick comedy.

And even though he had one very large machine gun pointed at his chest, the only thought to run through his mind in that instant was…boobs…

Great, glorious, good-God-almighty boobs…

Then he was distracted—thank you, sweet Jesus—when Agent Duvall lifted a hand to the Bluetooth device in her ear and said, “Sir! Excuse my French, but what the hell is going on here? I’ve got three guys in full tactical pointing weapons at me and saying they’re working on your orders to take Delilah Fairchild into custody.”

* * *

“What do you mean I’m not safe with the Black Knights?” Delilah demanded in response to the declaration Chelsea made after finally signing off with her supervisor. The call had lasted five eternal, god-awful, soul-sucking minutes. And Delilah figured if she heard one more, “Yes, sir. I understand, sir,” she was going to grab Mac’s gun and shoot the CIA agent in the ass. After all, it was her they were talking about here. The fact that they wanted to take her into custody.

“I mean just that,” Chelsea said. “You’re not safe with the Black Knights.”

Delilah was no longer hiding behind Mac’s back because the mysterious Morales had apparently issued an order for the three Men in Black to stand down, and the tension in the room had leveled out in response. Oh, it was still a pretty hairy environment, what with six heavily armed, testosterone-laden males scowling and posturing toward each other, but at least now Delilah felt safe enough to stand in the middle of them, hands on hips, scowl pasted firmly in place.

Not safe with the Black Knights? Preposterous! If she wasn’t safe with them, then she wasn’t safe with anyone. She flicked a quick glance toward Mac. Unfortunately, she could read nothing behind the Mask of Inscrutability. Her heart skipped a beat. Give me a sign, Mac. Let me know Chelsea is chock-a-block full of crap…

And maybe he was a mind reader, or maybe his Spidey sense worked for more than just piecing together clues, because his electric blue eyes alighted on her face for a brief second, one heartbeat…then two. But it was enough. Because the flicker of dead-eye certainty she saw in his gaze took the tiniest edge off her screaming nerves.

“We lost al-Hallaj,” Chelsea said. “And since the Black Knights have not been unable to assure your safety from him on two separate occasions, my supervisor would feel more comfortable keeping you under the CIA’s protection until such a time as we have al-Hallaj in custody.” She gestured toward the Men in Black. “And these men are here to—”

“We might have,” Zoelner interrupted, his voice so low and raspy Delilah wondered who’d been shoving tacks down his throat, “been able to keep Delilah safe had someone,” he lifted a meaningful brow at Chelsea, “told us there was a fucking terrorist on the loose!”

“As I already explained to you,” Chelsea shouted, two red flags painting her cheeks, “we weren’t certain of that fact at the time!”