Singed (22 page)

One of the cops smashed a section of the privacy fence in just as the two double taps rang out, four shots in quick succession. The final shot didn’t come, telling him someone had held off on the standard head shot.

Gage stumbled forward through the opening in the cedar fence, one arm slung across the shoulders of another cop as the man steadied him. His attempt at running had damn near killed him. He was still shaking, sucking wind and his chest hurt like hell, a damn sight more than the scalded side of his face. Before him in the yard stood Hunter and Ellis, their backs to him, weapons raised. Mostaffa lay flat on his back near the rear privacy fence, bleeding from a grouping of center mass bullet wounds.

Shit. They needed him alive.

“Get a medic,” Hunter yelled back at them. He approached Mostaffa with Ellis at his back, kicked something out of the tango’s hand. Gage let go of the cop and hurried forward as fast as he could given his shitty breathing. Hunter whipped his shirt off and stuffed it against the bullet wounds while Ellis checked Mostaffa for a carotid pulse. He looked over at Hunter and shook his head. Hunt swore and started chest compressions through the bloodstained shirt, though there was really no point. Even if a medic had been standing right beside them, there was fuck all he could do without starting a transfusion instantly.

Shifting his gaze away from the downed terrorist, Gage focused on what Hunt had kicked from the guy’s hand. Something small and black lay in the grass. Squatting down, he examined the remote, aware that this little piece of plastic and circuits had damn near killed him earlier.

“Shit,” Hunter muttered, sweat rolling down his face as he kept up with the compressions. “Where the hell’s that medic?”

“Too late, man,” Ellis said, easing back onto his haunches. “He’s gone.”

The cops swarmed the yard. Hunter let out a vicious curse and kept going for another few seconds before Ellis reached out and stopped him. Hunter snarled in disgust and stood up, running a bloody hand through his hair. “Fuck, we needed him for questioning. God
dammit
.”

Gage walked over and pointed to the remote. Hunter’s gaze shifted up from the device into Gage’s face. He shook his head in disbelief. “How the hell’d you get here, anyway?”

“Piggybacked,” he gasped out, jerking a thumb over his shoulder at the cop who’d helped him. The rest of them were securing the scene, taking possession of the body and questioning Ellis. Hunter would be next, but at Gage’s wisecrack the team leader’s harsh features transformed into a broad grin.

“Hardcore, man.”

“Yeah.” Shit, he barely had the strength to stay upright now. “Give me…a ride back …so I can…see Claire?” He paused to wheeze in another breath, clammy all over and shaky as hell. Chances were good he was worse off than he’d thought. “She’s probably…freaking out.” She’d been screaming his name as he’d tried to chase after Hunt and Ellis. Hell, she’d no doubt run after him before one of the cops stopped her to keep her back. He wouldn’t be surprised to walk out of this yard and find her standing there on the sidewalk, waiting to throttle him in front of everyone.

Hunter shook his head in a kind of fond resignation, clapped a solid hand on Gage’s shoulder. “You’re not going anywhere except to the hospital in the back of that ambulance. And that’s an order, even if I have to sit on your chest to make you stay put.”

He grinned, pulled in a pained breath. Already felt like he had an elephant sitting on there, he didn’t need Hunt’s added weight as well. “Look after…Claire for me.”

Hunter smirked and motioned to someone behind Gage. The paramedics. “You should be more worried about what she’s gonna do to you when she sees you next. She was pretty upset when you took off after the tango. Last I saw she had two cops holding her down on the ground.”

He winced. “Shit.” He was so gonna get it.

“Scared of your woman, Gage?”

“She’s gotta…temper.” And she wasn’t afraid to use it, at least with him.

Hunt snickered. “Then you’d best get your ass on that gurney they’re bringing before she shows up, huh?”

“Yeah.” He allowed them to get him on the stretcher, but only after he climbed onto it under his own power.

Chapter Thirteen

Zahra sat alone in the conference room at NSA headquarters, working on the last bit of translation Alex had asked her to finish before leaving for the night. Most of the team had left over an hour ago, except Sean and she hadn’t seen him since he’d disappeared around the same time with Alex to work on something else. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that it was dinner time and she hadn’t eaten since that stir fry Claire had thrown together back at the safe house.

She finished translating the last of the Pashto and Urdu in front of her, shut down her laptop, and stood to stretch out her lower back and legs. Her right leg was giving her trouble again, the muscles stiff and painful from her being stuck in a seated position for so long. She eased her right outer thigh and hip into a stretch, grimacing at first then sighing in relief as the pain faded. The conference room door swung open, startling her.

Sean strode in holding his cell phone in one bronzed hand. The man was as delicious as ever, just under six feet of dark, muscular sex appeal. But his usual smile of greeting was missing, and the set expression on his face sent a wave of unease through her. She straightened and faced him, hiding a wince as the muscles in her hip continued to protest. “What’s wrong?” Though she didn’t know him well she could tell something was definitely not right.

The muscles in his lean jaw flexed for a second as he stared at her. He seemed genuinely upset. “Someone blew up the safe house and Gage with it. They’re transporting him to the hospital by ambulance right now.”

Zahra’s eyes widened and her stomach sank. “Oh my god, I’m so sorry.” Without thinking she dropped her usual guard, closed the distance between them and slipped her arms around him in a comforting hug. She didn’t expect him to return it but he did, spectacularly, squeezing her tight against his hard frame and pressing his cheek against her hair. His unexpected response shocked her into stillness. The warm, woodsy scent of him rose up to tease her, her body flooded with a barrage of endorphins from the feel of him so hard against her. He felt and smelled amazing. Too amazing.

Pulling back, she cleared her throat and searched his eyes. He had gorgeous eyes, so dark they were like espresso, but this close she could see the warm flecks of chocolate in them. “What happened? Is he going to be okay?”

“Mostaffa rigged the furnace into a bomb and waited for the team to go back to the safe house. Hunt and Claire saw him driving by, started to chase after him when he remote detonated it. Hunt and Ellis got him but the cops and FBI aren’t gonna get anything out of him because he’s dead.”

That twisted bastard, she fumed. She wasn’t a bit sorry he was dead. In fact, she hoped he’d suffered excruciating agony before he’d died. “What about Gage?”

“Hunt said he was conscious and even tried to run after the guy when Claire spotted him in the crowd, the stubborn dumbass. He’s banged up pretty bad and they’re pretty sure he has at least one partially collapsed lung.”

That sounded serious enough to be scary. “What was he doing trying to chase after him in that condition? Claire must have lost her mind.” Zahra shook her head, incredulous.

“She was pretty mad but she went with him in the ambulance. I’m going up to the hospital to meet everyone.”

“I’ll go with you.” Since it belonged to the company she left her laptop and files on the table and grabbed her purse. There was nothing sensitive in the papers and no one would be able to access the information on her laptop without either her or Alex’s codes. When she turned back she saw the hint of a smile playing around the edges of Sean’s full lips, softening his grim expression.

“What?” she asked, wondering why he was staring at her like that.

“I’m glad you’re working with us, that’s all. Real glad.” His voice held a smoky edge that she found incredibly sexy, her vow to become a reclusive cat lady notwithstanding.

She mentally shook herself. “I’m glad to help. I just wish I’d have found something in time to stop the attack.” They’d been so close to cracking the case. God, poor Gage. She couldn’t imagine what Claire was feeling right now, but Zahra was going to be there to lend her a friendly shoulder to cry on if she needed one.

Sean shrugged, the leather of his jacket creaking. “You tried your best. We all did. Come on.” He nodded toward the door and held it open for her. Stepping past him into the hall with a murmur of thanks, she drew up short when Alex and Evers appeared at the end of the corridor.

“We were just coming to get you,” Alex said to her then looked at Sean. “You tell her?”

Sean nodded. “She’s coming with me to the hospital.” He urged her forward gently with a hand on the small of her back. That simple touch caused a spike of heat to radiate out from his palm into her muscles and across her skin in a series of tingles. It felt so good she didn’t pull away.

The earlier stretching had helped somewhat but her hip was still stiff, making her gait more awkward than usual. Though she tried to mask it Sean’s gaze swept down the length of her body in quick assessment before coming back to her eyes but he didn’t say anything. Come to think of it, none of the team members had asked about her limp and she was glad because she didn’t want to talk about it. Alex knew everything, of course, because he was her boss and he’d been very thorough with her background during the interview process. It meant he knew exactly how much she wanted to help rid the world of Islamic extremists and their brainwashed, backward beliefs.

“We’ll meet you there,” Alex said to Sean as he and Evers fell in step with them and walked toward the elevators. He waved to his assistant, still at her desk. “Go home, Ruth. See you in the morning.”

The sixty-something woman waved and answered with a tired smile, looking relieved to be sent home for the night. “Okay. Good night.”

Alex punched the call button for the elevator and waited for the car with hands on hips. Sean stood to the side with Zahra, his hand still against her lower back and she liked the feel of it there too much to draw away. After a moment Alex shook his head and looked over at her and Sean. “From this moment forward we’re going to have to take increased precautionary measures.”

“Such as?” Zahra asked, guessing he meant more than simple security measures and sensing there was more to this than he was letting on.

Those silver eyes hardened like steel. “Besides Evers and the rest of the team, the only other people who knew the safe house’s location work for the NSA,” he began in an ominous tone, the words sending a shiver of foreboding up her spine. “That means whoever leaked it to Mostaffa’s contacts was one of us.”

Zahra’s gut tightened. She hadn’t even thought of that, she’d been too caught up in the news about the bombing and Gage being injured to consider such a thing. The elevator arrived and Alex and Evers stood back as Sean ushered her inside with that guiding hand low on her back. As the doors slid shut, the reality hit home that they had a traitor in their midst.

Maybe even someone in this very building.

****

It took four excruciating hours before Claire was finally left alone with Gage in his private hospital room. The entire crew had shown up after Gage was admitted, including Tom and Hunter’s girlfriend, Khalia, who was now on her way to DC for a convention. Dunphy and Zahra had shown up with Alex and Evers. Zahra had sat with her and Khalia until Mel and Claire’s parents had both arrived. They’d all waited with Claire in the waiting room while the doctors had inserted a chest tube into the side of Gage’s ribcage to re-inflate his collapsed lung and then performed a battery of tests on him.

The X-rays showed no visible fractures in his ribs or skull, although he wasn’t in the clear yet because they were still waiting on the final word about the CT scan on his brain and internal organs. Due to the concussion he’d suffered and the risk of more possible symptoms developing in the next few hours the doctors were keeping him at least overnight. And Gage wasn’t happy about it.

He shifted again on the uncomfortable hospital bed and she could tell from the disgruntled look on his face that he was feeling caged and in a lot more pain than he’d told the nursing staff. “Will you please just take some of the pain meds the nurse left you?” she pleaded, loud enough to ensure he heard her.

His gaze shifted to her, full of annoyance, his eyes even bluer with all the dark bruising around them from the concussion. The right side of his face was still raw but they’d put some antiseptic cream on him and dressed the worst of the scorched skin with a bandage. Beneath the pale blue gown he had on, his whole chest was covered in cuts and bruises. At least his breathing was back to normal. “I’ve been hurt worse than this before,” he grumbled. “It’s nothing I can’t handle and I just want out of this goddamn bed.”