Protecting his Witness (HERO Force Book 9) Page 2

  “We can put you up at a hotel for the night. Maybe see about something longer term, some kind of protection until this guy is found, but I can’t make any promises with the budget cuts the city’s been dealing with.”

  Snow flew furiously outside the hospital window like a solid wall of white, visibility zero. She wanted nothing more than to go home and collapse in her own bed, but with Galbraith on the loose, being alone held the possibility of deadly consequences.

  She frowned, turning back to the detective. “I’ll be safe?”

  “For the night, yes.”

  That wasn’t good enough. What the hell was she supposed to do tomorrow? If the police couldn’t protect her, then who could? Weariness weighed her down. She swallowed against the dryness in her throat, trying not to cry.

  It was over. Jacques was dead, they’d been double-crossed, and she didn’t know if they could scrape together the resources to try again.

  Her father walked into the room, leaning heavily on his cane. “The brancium’s gone!”

  “What?”

  Her mouth dropped open. If there was any way to make this situation worse, that was it. Brancium was needed to create the intense photon beams required for testing Alloy 531, but it was one of the rarest elements on earth, with only a hundred and forty-five grams in existence.

  Buying it had been the most expensive part of the entire testing procedure, and finding it in the first place, the longest. It had taken them almost a year and a half to locate a seller with a large enough block. If it had been destroyed, there was no doubt they would go bankrupt before they completed the trials.

  “I don’t understand. The blast shouldn’t have been strong enough to destroy it. It can withstand forces far greater than—”

  “It wasn’t destroyed, it was taken. The coupler is still on the machine, but it’s empty. This is sabotage.”

  Sabotage.

  She’d worked with Galbraith. He had a hard time with authority, which was why he’d been fired, but he was also a top-notch aerospace engineer. Alias or not, he worked in the industry. And if that was true, he was working for a competitor. Galbraith hadn’t just destroyed their chance at finishing their tests on 531. He’d taken their brancium to test his own alloy and steal those government contracts right out from under their nose. “They’re making their own.”

  His eyes lit. “My thoughts exactly. We have to get it back.”

  “How the hell are we going to do that?”

  “We call HERO Force.”

  She shook her head and held up her hands. “Oh, no. No, we’re not.”

  “Why not? I heard you talking to that detective. He can’t help us. You need a protector. Someone to watch over you and help us get the brancium back. We need their skills. They train for stuff like this.” He held his cane in the air. “Missions and covert ops.”

  “Jesus, Dad.” He’d always thought the SEALs walked on water, his belief in the group of military men like some kind of religion that even outlived his son. “We don’t need them. We’ll find another way.”

  “Summer Marie, this isn’t about your brother.”

  “I didn’t say it was.”

  A white-haired nurse walked into the room. “One last check of your vitals, missy, and we’ll get you signed out of here.”

  Summer held out her arm, the blood pressure cuff squeezing too tightly as her father stared her down. She knew from the article HERO Force provided personal security detail, and he was right, they could probably find the brancium if they had their help. She sighed heavily and addressed the nurse. “Any chance you have yesterday’s newspaper lying around?”

  The nurse yanked the Velcro off Summer’s arm. “They’re always floating around the waiting room. I’ll run out and check for you just as soon as I’m finished here.”

  3

  The only way Luke Arroyo could tolerate New York City was to arrive long before the masses of commuters, when the rising sun cast long shadows and the wide sidewalks were dotted with stray joggers instead of tightly packed with pedestrians, undeterred by the fiercely cold weather and persistent snowfall they’d been experiencing.

  He was prone to waking up at two or three in the morning, unable to sleep, so he drove the two and a half hours in and got to HERO Force by six. This week the trip had taken longer, the temps too cold for salt to clear the roads, lengthening his normal commute.

  It didn’t matter anyway. He wasn’t going to be doing it much longer. He wasn’t sure the exact moment he’d made that decision. He only knew his days at HERO Force were numbered, the pendulum that had swung him into this life already pulling him away.

  He couldn’t stay here, couldn’t do what Mac had asked him to do. He wasn’t a Navy SEAL anymore and he sure as hell wasn’t anybody’s hero.

  Once a SEAL, always a SEAL.

  The line repeated itself in his head unbidden. They could call him whatever they wanted and it didn’t make a damn bit of difference. He just needed to break the news to Mac, and the sooner he did that, the better off he’d be.

  He fired off several rounds. He had the range to himself for an hour before anyone else came in, time he was able to shoot and sort out his thoughts before he had to hold a conversation. His social skills were rusty from a year and a half in the woods, and he was anxious to get back there and away from all these people.

  His property was a twenty-three-acre peninsula tucked into hundreds of square miles of heavily forested government land. The Blackwater Creek ran along the civilized side of his acreage, a narrow dirt road the only access to his cabin.

  It was close enough to towns and people that only his desire to be alone had truly kept him isolated, his private oasis in the foothills of the Catskill Mountains like a quiet little room with a very heavy door, his reasons for being there the padlocks that kept it shut.

  But Mac O’Brady had come knocking.

  Goddamned Mac, his old CO from Afghanistan. And somehow he managed to convince Luke to join this team of messed-up SEALs, with promises of second chances and a sprinkling of redemption thrown in.

  That wasn’t what he’d said, but it had taken Luke all of two seconds to look around the New York office of HERO Force and realize what was going on. Mac had collected a motley crew of guys who’d been damaged in some way, like his own personal island of misfit goddamned toys.

  Razorback with his burned face, barely recognizable as human. T-ball with the marks of torture forever carved into his skin. Sloan only had one arm, mechanized metal in place of muscle and bone, and the list went on. But the worst of their wounds were invisible, and it pained Luke to be included with this bunch.

  He’d lost his leg, sure, but it took his membership in the misnamed HERO Force to make him clearly see the damage within, and he wasn’t exactly grateful to Mac for pointing it out. Miranda Leveen, the therapist on staff, recently began hounding him to come see her. What kind of heroes needed a fucking therapist?

  He wasn’t an idiot. He had his issues, sure as anybody else. And yes, they could easily be traced back to his SEAL days and Afghanistan. But so what? Who gave a flying fuck? Nothing that woman or anyone else could say was going to change a goddamn thing. She couldn’t undo what he’d done over there. Couldn’t erase it or reframe it or put it in a more flattering light.

  There was no going back.

  No forgiveness for him, no redemption.

  But none of that was the reason he was leaving. Hell no, it was simpler than that. He’d frozen up on a mission. Known what he needed to do and been completely unable to do it. He was useless here and he knew it.

  At least you can still fire a weapon.

  There were guys here who couldn’t even do that, and he wondered why the hell they were on the payroll, Mac’s wounded heroes functioning like some kind of social services organization. It made Luke’s stomach turn. He switched his gun to his left hand, working on his nondominant hand-eye coordination, the white paper target glowing in the distance as if on stage.

 
He was aware he had company long before he turned around, the hair on the back of his neck standing on end. It was time, then. He emptied his magazine and removed his ear protection, relief flowing through him despite this pending confrontation. “Hey, Mac.”

  The other man’s deep voice bellowed across the range. “How the hell do you do that?”

  “You can’t tell when you’re being watched?”

  “Sure I can, sometimes. But I don’t have eyes in the back of my head to see who it is.”

  Luke reeled in the target, two separate groupings coming into view — one dead center, the other down and to the right.

  “Different guns?” asked Mac.

  “Different hands.”

  “I wanted to talk to you.”

  I’ll just bet you do.

  They hadn’t spoken about what happened. Luke crossed his arms over his chest and widened his stance, eyeing his old commanding officer. “The bomb.”

  Mac nodded, crossing his arms in front of his chest, too, a mirror image of Luke. Shadows formed between the muscles on his dark brown skin. “You had some trouble there.”

  “I couldn’t set a charge. Detonate it.”

  Mac gestured to the paper target. “You’ve got no problem with firearms.”

  “Let’s not pretend.” An invisible hand squeezed his heart. “I’m an explosives expert who can’t blow anything up. I’m done.”

  “You still have value to the team.”

  Images of flames, circular balls of fire appeared in his mind. He clenched his jaw. “Fuck the team.”

  Mac narrowed his eyes. “What are you saying, Wiseman?”

  “I ain’t never been wise. Time to stop pretending I am. I’m leaving HERO Force.”

  “You’re one of the best.”

  “Not anymore.”

  “I have faith in you, man. I’ll keep you on until you’re ready. Help you get there.”

  “I don’t want it.” He turned away, reloading his gun, thinking of every man like him who’d opted for a bullet instead of this path he was on. Wondering if they’d been right.

  “You should talk to Miranda.”

  Luke laughed without humor. “I don’t need a shrink.”

  “Fuck, we all need a shrink. You aren’t special. I was there, remember? That call was as much mine as it was yours.”

  “Of course I remember.” Trouble was, he couldn’t forget. Not in the light of day and sure as hell not during the night. He closed his eyes for a beat too long before opening them again. “And the call was mine alone.”

  “I don’t give a shit about the past, and I don’t care if you can blow something up.” Mac shook his head. “But a judgment call where you need to decide if there’s such a thing as an acceptable loss? Definitely. You need to be able to do that.”

  Luke squatted and picked up his spent shells. “You’re not hearing me, old man. I don’t want the job. I’m done here, Mac. I never should have come in the first place.”

  “You’re giving up.”

  “It’s not giving up. It’s admitting my faults. Refusing a handout. I’m not a welfare case and I don’t need you holding my hand and teaching me how to be a soldier again. I don’t want to be a soldier.”

  “We all need help.”

  “Bullshit.”

  The men faced off. The lights flashed once, a loud beep interrupting the moment.

  “Yes?” said Mac.

  A voice came through the intercom. “Summer Daniels is here to see you.”

  The name catapulted through Luke’s mind at light speed. Summer Daniels, Edward’s sister.

  Buckeye.

  Sweat broke out on his palms, a sickening dizziness fighting him for control of his own body.

  “I’ll be right out,” said Mac, meeting Luke’s stare with wide, knowing eyes.

  “What’s she doing here?” Luke demanded.

  “I have no idea. Is that who I think it is?”

  “Buckeye’s sister. You haven’t been in contact with her?”

  “No. You still want to leave, or are you coming with me to find out what she wants?”

  A smarter man would have backed away from his own personal Kryptonite. Luke gestured toward the door. “You know I’m fucking coming. Lead the way.”

  4

  Summer had always been uncomfortable around good-looking men, their appearance seeming to magnify her own shortcomings. She sat at the conference table at HERO Force headquarters, the lights too hot and her chair leaning too far back. The water in her glass moved gently side to side, a testament to the windy weather and the tall building they were in, and she ignored an answering wave of nausea that rippled through her stomach.

  Five of the most physically intimidating men she’d ever seen stared at her, listening intently as she struggled through the explanation of what transpired at Daniels Aerospace last night, and she felt like she was testifying before a grand jury.

  No, a military court-martial.

  Her eyes rested on Mac O’Brady, the leader and the least stressful one to look at in the bunch—not because he was unattractive but because he was kind. He was older than the others, maybe fifty, with a shiny bald head.

  But it was the Latino on the end who was really making her nervous. Luke Arroyo.

  He hadn’t said anything since introducing himself, but the look he gave her was oddly intense, as if they shared a personal connection. She twisted her hands in her lap, one fingernail digging beneath another. She took in a shaking breath and finished her story. “That’s what I need you to do. Help me find Steven Galbraith—or whatever his name really is—get back the brancium, and keep me alive in the process.”

  Luke leaned forward. “What about your father? Are you concerned for his safety?”

  “No. I’m the one who saw Galbraith running from the scene, not him.”

  Mac tapped his pencil on the shiny wood table. “We don’t know their motives. We’re not even completely sure who ‘they’ are. You saw your former employee, but do you know who he’s working for now?”

  “I made some phone calls. According to the grapevine, he went to work for a competitor, AGL Aerospace.”

  “And you think it’s the brancium they’re after. But it could be a personal attack. They might be interested in hurting your father, in addition to destroying his business.”

  She felt the blood drain from her face. “I hadn’t thought of that. What do you suggest we do?”

  “One bodyguard on your father, another on you. Personal security comes first. Then we assemble a team to find Galbraith and the brancium while you two stay safe in the wings.”

  She shook her head. “No. I’ll be looking for it, too.”

  Luke’s eyes challenged hers, and she noted they were brown, nearly black, set firmly in his angular face. “Bad idea.”

  “You don’t understand. It’s about the size of two nickels stacked on top of each other. We may need to search an entire office building. I know what it looks like.”

  Luke shrugged. “So describe it to us.”

  She could feel control of the situation slipping from her fingers, control she desperately needed to maintain. “That brancium is everything. My family, our livelihood, the future of our company. I’m not willing to sit idly by while someone else goes looking for it. That’s not what I’m hiring you for.”

  Luke shook his head. “No. You’re hiring us to keep you safe, because you witnessed a murder and someone tried to kill you. Don’t let a piece of metal and a shareholder report make you forget that.”

  “If I hire you, you work for me.” She lifted her chin. “I’m coming with you, or I’ll find someone else to help me.”

  He shook his head. “Ridiculous. Who are you going to find? The other SEAL team down the block? No such thing, sweetheart.”

  Mac cleared his throat. “Miss Daniels is part of this extended family. Even if there were somewhere else for her to turn, she wouldn’t need to. Miss Daniels, we’re happy to help in any way we can. Of course you can l
ook for the brancium.”

  “You want to give her a gun, too?” asked Luke. “Let her fly the chopper?”

  Mac glared at him. “That’s enough, Wiseman.”

  It couldn’t be. She tilted her head. “Wiseman?”

  Luke shrugged. “Yeah.”

  “My Wiseman?” She didn’t think about how that would sound, and as all eyes slowly turned to Luke, she felt her cheeks heat. Their letters had been strictly platonic, never crossing the line into something more, but there had been an intensity to the relationship that made her heart beat faster when she saw his name in her inbox. When he stopped answering her messages after Edward died, a part of her had felt dumped, for sure.

  A shadow covered his eyes like a cloud blocking the sun, before one side of his mouth hitched into a smile. “Yeah.”

  The intensely personal stare made sense now, the connection between them exposed. She longed to go to him and give him a hug, but something felt off and she wasn’t sure he would allow it. What had happened to their friendship? At one point, he’d held a special place in her life, albeit a small one. She turned to Mac. “I want Luke as my bodyguard.”

  Mac tapped his pencil faster. “T-ball has a great deal of experience in personal security.”

  “I want Luke.”

  Mac looked pointedly at him.

  “Sure. No problem,” said Luke.

  Mac nodded. “It’s settled, then. It’s nine thirty. Miss Daniels, with your permission I’d like to lead a team to investigate the scene at the testing facility, and I’d like you to come along. We’ll also take you home so you can pack a bag, then you and Wiseman can spend the night in a hotel here in the city. You’ll be safe that way. In the meantime, we’ll see what the team can find out about AGL Aerospace and this Galbraith character.”

  She squeezed her knees together. “Sounds good to me.” Her eyes went back to Luke. She had the distinct impression it sounded a lot less favorable to him, and they had nothing but time alone together to find out why.

  5

  A headache gnawed at Luke’s temples as he pushed into the situation room, the cool air vibrating with a low hum. The space was a mix of dark and light, the perimeter alive with bright screens contrasted by silhouettes of men sitting in darkness. In the center were four quarter-round tables facing each other to form a broken circle, three chairs at each.