Surrendering To Her Sergeant (33 page)

Get a grip, T-Bomb.
He wasn’t the one who currently resembled a
mash-up of
Lawrence of Arabia
and
Electric Boogaloo
Goes to Morocco
. Maybe he needed to cut
Archer a little slack.

Over at the tent, Fulsom began
directing his assistants in positioning his tripod, the set floods,
and the reflector panels, which helped illuminate a large bed and
the seventy pillows piled on top. A moment later, Lor finally made
his appearance in his typical tailored suit and silk shirt. Ava
Chestain, Bella’s stylist, was with him. Tait jotted a mental note.
Pretty boy Lor seemed seriously into her. If the woman was woven
into Lor’s plots, even unknowingly, things were going to be messy.
She and Rayna were tight.

He exchanged a nod with Kellan. The
moment had come to move closer to the man. Ethan offered his arm to
Bella and followed their path across the lawn.

As they neared the tent,
Tait noticed the light wasn’t the only thing that began to change.
Ethan’s mien, which had been so full of calm focus just a minute
ago, now seemed nettled as a panther that’d been awakened by a
she-cat’s mating scent. Trouble was…that cat wasn’t Bella. Ethan
followed every move
Ava
made, completely locked as the woman helped
Fulsom’s assistant to put the last-minute touches on Bella’s exotic
look. Since that put Ethan’s head and eyes in her general vicinity,
Bella didn’t pick up on the nuance. The actress was glad to be the
center of attention in any way she got it.

Tait released a black laugh
to himself. Maybe Kellan
had
been right yesterday. Watching camels spit and
sand fly was a hell of an easier gig than this.

The shit got thicker when Lor finished
up his banter with Fulsom then walked over to the bed, where the
crew now positioned Ethan and Bella for their first shots. While
Kell engaged Fulsom in a battery of questions about crap like
f-stops and digital tweaking, Tait was able to fully observe Lor,
picking apart the man’s behaviors for anything remotely
suspicious…not to mention any wayward memory sticks that might
conveniently fall out of his pockets.

The guy was smooth. Tait could confirm
that much. Lor bantered with Bella with every speck of charm
intact, pressing a kiss to the back of her hand like an admiring
prince instead of the guy who’d been banging her in Malibu less
than a week ago. When he turned to Ava, he simply squeezed out a
bigger glob of the royal court formula, bussing her knuckles but
turning her hand over and grazing the inside of her wrist with his
lips, too. He gave her a gaze filled with the same seductive
intent.

Though Ava pulled her hand away from
Lor right away, teasing that she was working and he had to behave,
it was like tossing a cup of water at the forest fire of murderous
intent now raging across Ethan’s face. It was a good thing the only
“weapon” the guy could conceal in those pajamas was his
cock.

Tait looked at Kell, who’d caught the
same bead on Ethan. Kell twitched just the top of his head toward
Lor but thanks to their Bullet Ninjas telepathy, that was the only
directive needed. Tait made his way toward Lor. Time to creatively
divert the target, before their teammate killed the guy for kissing
a woman’s hand.

He got drop-kicked and sidelined after
barely hitting the field. By a spook in a bun wig, a pencil skirt,
and black platform pumps. And new for today, a pair of thick black
glasses and a formfitting, pale purple sweater set that made his
palms itch to rip up a little cashmere.

“Mr. Lemare.” Luna layered a Southern
farm girl accent to her voice that surely revirginized her with the
force of its innocence. “Hi! Ahhh, I’m Ronni—from Accounting? I
dunno if you remember me?”

“Not really,” the man murmured,
letting his gaze linger over the swells of her breasts, “but that
is completely my fault, dear girl, not yours. What can I do for
you?” Since he got away with ogling her top half, he openly admired
her hips and legs.

Tait suddenly felt a lot more
sympathetic toward Runway’s jealous pain. The only thing that
stopped him from lunging and clocking the guy was the supposition
that Lor’s lothario bullshit was just a half-plausible cover. If
people fled from Lemare the skank, they wouldn’t see Lor the
terrorist, right?

Luna let her eyes go wide. She added a
“nervous” little lip bite and a thoroughly convincing blush. That
made it official. Once Tait had her alone again, he was going to
throttle her—before kissing her until she never thought of turning
that color for anyone but him again.

“I’m so,
so
sorry to bust in on
you here,” she declared to Lor, acting the part of a production
minion to perfection. “I mean, everyone on set knows how important
this photo shoot is. I normally wouldn’t have left to come bother
you like a stalker in the corn, but with the shooting schedule
changing up to allow all this, along with the extra rehearsals
everyone’s attending for the live broadcast, I didn’t know when we
would see you on set again, and—”

“It’s fine.” The man had clearly
reached the tolerance point for his accountant’s babbling, no
matter how stunning her rack. “How can I help you?”

“We just need these checks signed.”
She giggled and bobbed her head back and forth. “You know what they
say. Gotta pay the piper, right?”

Lor obliged “Ronnie” by scribbling on
a handful of checks. Luna maintained the chatter stream the whole
time, commenting on everything from the weather to a “mighty fine
wedding reception” she attended at the hotel up the hill a few
years back. Tait couldn’t keep his eyes off of her. The way the
woman committed to her cover identity…it was goddamned impressive,
a skill at which even well-trained agents had to labor. She
fascinated him even deeper. Made him want her even more.

Burned him up with the longing to
protect her. Especially now.

He wasn’t clueless about
this shit. Luna had been sent here without previous notification to
any of them, meaning it was urgent—and also required her to get so
close to Lor, she could likely tell what he’d had for lunch just by
sniffing his breath. It set Tait on a razor’s edge of apprehension,
especially when he watched her slip a hand into the man’s
inner
jacket
pocket.

Screw the pooch
sideways
. If Lor noticed her action in the
tiniest corner of his eye, “Ronnie” would be caught and—

Caught at what?

Tait muffled a growl. From the grunt
that came from Kell, who’d made his way back to his side, it didn’t
sound like he was the only one. “What the hell’s going on?” his
friend grumbled.

Tait gave him three
syllables in answer. “NFC.”
No fucking
clue.

Lor pivoted back on Luna just as her
palm cleared the pocket.

The man’s face darkened to a full
glower.

For two seconds.

“Bee!”

Luna whacked at his coat
and the air, adding shrieks to the mix. A loud
clang
from the tent compounded the
chaos. Ava winced sheepishly in front of the prop hookah and copper
urn she’d just toppled.

“What the hell?” Grant
yelled.

“My thought precisely.” Lor glared at
Luna.

“It—it was a big bee,” she explained.
“Really. Whillikers, it was huge!”

“I just need to know if it’s gone.”
The interjection came from Ava. She was in the corner of the tent,
visibly shaking now. “S-sorry. I’m allergic. A lot allergic. And my
epi pen is—”

“Where?” Ethan issued the charge,
enforcing it by lunging off the bed and to her side. Fulsom fumed
in impatience, Bella frowned in confusion…and Ava bowed her head in
submission.

Comprehension slammed Tait
now. Archer wasn’t just playing with the idea of being with Ava.
Hell, he’d already gone there—and was clearly burning to go back
again. No wonder the guy’s tension level was taking bites out of
the ozone layer. Adding insult on top of that injury on this crazy
anomaly of a mission was the target who’d made Ava
his
target. If Lor hadn’t
made that obvious before now, he did so by rushing to Ava himself,
clutching both her shoulders in order to turn her totally from
Ethan.

“Mi
dolce
,” he murmured, “I had no idea, about
your condition. Perhaps it is not a good idea for you to be out
here,
sì
?”

“She’s not an invalid.” Ethan exhaled,
clearly trying to be diplomatic instead of defensive. “She just has
to make sure her epinephrine pen is nearby.” He hiked a brow at
Ava. “And it is, right?”

Tait didn’t know whether to
slam his hands to his face or
whomp
them in applause. Had Archer just pulled an openly
Dominant move on Ava while she stood in the arms of another
man?

As riveted as he was by
the
cojones
of his
teammate, another sight took urgent priority. Knowing Kell had an
eye on things under the tent, he took advantage of the chance to
beat feet toward “Ronnie,” who gathered up her folder and purse
then hustled her tight-skirted ass back toward the Huntington’s
main entrance.

He followed her into the next themed
botanical area, a collection of palm species that formed a lush
grove around winding paths. Despite tottering on the hard-packed
trail in those damn heels, Luna picked up the pace, looking like
she was fleeing a swarm of zombies.

He caught up to her at a spot where
the path expanded into a little clearing that included a bench and
natural rock waterfall. He would’ve chuckled at how incongruous she
looked, missing only the pencil in her ear in a setting that
warranted more a caftan and flats, but he was busy fighting off the
alarms of apprehension she’d set off ever since her hand came out
of Lor’s pocket.

“Luna.
Luna
.” After a burst of speed, he was
able to pull her into an area submersed in deep shade. He expected
her to struggle a little. He didn’t expect the whack she sent
across his face. “What the hell?” he seethed. “It’s me, damn
it.”

“I’m aware of that.” She stared back
with eyes that were darkened by abject panic as well as the dreaded
blue contacts. “I’m also aware that I don’t have time for your
drama right now, Weasley. Let me go.”

Good thing for her he was an expert on
shoving aside frustration in favor of rational thought. “Imagine
that. I don’t have time for drama, either, especially after I
watched you pinch something from Lor’s jacket. Based on the
determination that those checks are fakes and your real reason for
getting here so urgently was whatever you took from—”

She silenced him by holding up one
object. A black computer memory stick. “You mean this?” While he
gaped at the treasure, she explained, “Rhett caught a break when he
lingered after a script revision meeting. He saw Lor move the stick
from his satchel into the jacket. We moved fast, not knowing how
long he’d keep it there.”

He clenched his jaw as his senses
seesawed between elation and irritation. “I don’t know whether to
kiss you for the stones it took to do that, or boot your ass for
not letting us handle it.”

“Right,” she sneered, “because Lor’s
suspicions wouldn’t have spiked with even one of you Tarzans pawing
at him. And don’t harp at me about how you would’ve tricked him out
of the jacket by spilling something on him, or whatever the new SOF
trick is. Short of burning the thing off his body, none of you were
getting close to it any time soon.”

“Okay. Point taken. But what happens
when he notices the stick’s gone? He tucked it in close for a
reason.”

“I’m new, not stupid. Slipped a
duplicate in its place. With any luck, we’ve bought ourselves a few
hours, maybe longer. Let’s just hope the stick still works with the
first laptop.”

She finished that by peering around
him, still breathing hard as if she expected those zombies to bear
down on them any second. Tait gave in to the craving to nudge her
face around with a firm hand, backing it up with an unwavering
stare down at her. “So you headed back to the studio
now?”

“No!” She forced down a long breath
before repeating in a more subdued cadence, “No. ‘Ronnie’ is
leaving the Accounting pool and ‘going back to Arkansas’ right
away. From now on, I’m back to playing exclusive engagements at the
Foxfire. Laudia the smart-ass bartender will keep mixing the G and
T’s while praying her buddy Enzo isn’t into playing the ‘gee, you
remind me of someone’ game.”

The words shifted into sarcasm but
everything about her face, from the evasion of her eyes to the
trembles of her lips, betrayed what was really going on beneath her
bravado. “Hey,” he murmured, prodding her face higher, “listen to
me. Colton knows that Lor’s going to be jumpy. He also knows he
can’t have you at that bar without some backup in place,
and—”

She cut him off by beating
his hand away. “
Stop it
!” The thin veneer of her composure toppled. Her face crumpled
and her body sagged despite how she hugged herself so tight, she
rocked from the effort. “Don’t do that to me. Don’t make me think
everything’s simply going to be all better.” When she glanced at
what must’ve been the mute perplexity on his face, she grated, “I’m
the last thing on Dan’s mind right now, okay? Whatever this
is—whatever the
hell
Lor and the Aragons are up to—it’s a giant arrow dipped in
some crazy-ass poison, and we still have no idea where it’s coming
from or whose ass it’s aimed at. You know what that means?
Collateral damage, that’s what that means.”