Fewer still could earn their male counterparts’ admiration while managing to hold onto that indefinable female essence that made every man in the room aware of her on a primal level. Jordyn had all of that and more. People could depend on her and she was easy to be around.
Except apparently for him, since he’d spent way too much time over the past seven months fantasizing about what her naked body would feel like beneath his if he’d let things go further between them that night. And that made him
such
a skeezy asshole.
He pulled a chair out from the table and scooted in next to Hunter. “Okay, show me what I missed.” Maybe that would distract him from the thought of Jordyn curled up in his bed upstairs.
****
Blake was waiting for her when Jordyn emerged from the second floor conference room at NSA headquarters at Fort Meade the next morning. He rose from the bench he’d been sitting on and tucked his phone away as he offered her a smile. She struggled to ignore her body’s inevitable reaction to the sight of him as he spoke. “How’d it go?”
“Good, I think. Man, that was a lot of paperwork I had to fill out though. I’d forgotten how intense this all is.” She had a solid feel for the company and the men behind it at least. Tom—a former SEAL in his late forties—and Hunter had both asked her questions, then Alex Rycroft had joined them for a few minutes. “Alex is running the last bit of my background check right now, and Tom and Hunter are checking one more of my references.”
Although she couldn’t be certain, for things to be moving so quickly they must have done the bulk of the screening prior to the interview. Her gut told her the job was hers. Question was, did she truly want this? Yeah, the money was great and the change of scenery would be nice. But mostly she wanted to make a difference again and put her skill set to good use. If she could be an asset to Blake and the others, she wanted to do it.
“Guess they liked what they saw,” Blake said, the golden flecks in his eyes standing out as he smiled. The night he’d kissed her, they’d been molten with desire. She pushed the thought aside.
Not wanting to seem overly confident, she shrugged. “So, now what?” She looked away from the tempting sight of male perfection before her to scan the hallway they stood in.
“We could grab something to eat before I take you back to the house.”
“Sure.” She fell in step beside him as they headed for the elevators at the end of the hall.
In the cafeteria they sat together at a table in the corner, sipping coffee and snacking on muffins while they both fumbled for things to say to fill the silence. Jordyn tried her best to loosen up, but something inside wouldn’t let her. So ironic that she’d finally ended up in Blake’s bed, just not the way she’d always envisioned it. After he’d left his room, sleep had been a long time coming and once it did it had hit her hard. She’d been practically unconscious when her phone’s alarm had woken her at five-thirty.
She’d just popped the last bite of muffin into her mouth when Blake’s cell chimed. He pulled it out, read whatever was on the screen and a sardonic smile spread across his lips. Those golden hazel eyes flicked up to hers. “That was fast.”
“What was?”
“Wait for it.”
Before she could ask him what the hell that was supposed to mean, her phone rang. She’d only received it back from security a few minutes before the interview ended because they’d had to check it. She dug it out of her pocket and blinked when she saw an unknown caller’s number. “Hello?”
“It’s Tom. We checked your references and security clearance and everything looks good. You want the job?”
Holy hell, they worked fast. “Yes, I do.”
“Then you’re hired. Have Blake bring you up to Alex’s office to sign the paperwork. You’ll be attached to my crew through the NSA taskforce.”
She met Blake’s amused gaze. “Now?”
“Now,” Tom confirmed. “See you upstairs.”
She hung up, feeling a little disoriented. “Wow, okay. Guess they’re desperate for a mechanic, huh?”
“Ready to head upstairs?” He rose and grabbed the empty cups and wrappers, tossed them in a nearby trashcan.
“Yeah.”
On the floor where Alex’s office was, she stepped out of the elevator and followed Blake past an empty desk. It seemed weird to have such a prominent workspace empty. Shouldn’t someone have been there to direct people once they got off the elevator?
“Ruth’s gone.”
She half turned to him. “Ruth?”
“Alex’s prior assistant,” Blake told her as they passed by.
“Oh.” Had she died or something?
“Long story,” he said quietly, “but the short answer is that she’s under arrest. I’m sure Alex will fill you in once you sign the contract.”
The one procuring her confidentiality along with the terms of employment. “Okay.”
But Alex wasn’t in his office. A young woman stood there instead, and smiled at them when they entered. “Hi, I’m Corinne, from the legal department. Alex is in another meeting but he asked me to review this with you.”
Blake gestured to the door. “Want me to leave?” he asked her.
“No, you can stay.” Jordyn sat in the chair offered to her and went through the contract with the woman. Since it all looked good on her end, she read it over again and signed all three copies.
Corinne put out her hand. “Welcome aboard.”
Jordyn shook it, a surreal feeling overtaking her. Alex and Tom sure knew how to cut through red tape. Rising from her chair, she took her copy of the agreement and looked at Blake. “So…now what?”
“Let’s go down the hall and I’ll introduce you to the rest of the team.”
At the very end of it was a big, sleek conference room. Blake opened the glass door for her. Four people looked up as she entered, two men and two women. She broke into an easy grin when she saw Sean Dunphy at the table, working on a laptop next to a pretty dusky-skinned woman with long black hair.
“Jord, how the hell are you, hon?” he asked, jumping up from his chair to stride over and envelop her in a bear hug.
“I’m great. It’s good to see you,” she said as she pulled back. He still had that devilish gleam in his eyes.
“This is Zahra, translator and hacker extraordinaire,” Sean said, indicating the woman he’d been sitting beside.
The look in his eyes when he gazed at the woman told Jordyn all she needed to know. Not once in all the time she’d known him had Dunphy ever looked at a woman like that. He was into her, deep, and it was sort of unreal and awesome to see. “Hi.”
Zahra’s welcoming smile turned into a grimace as she got to her feet and Sean rushed over to help her out of her chair. That’s when Jordyn noticed the bandages around her left calf. “Sorry, I’m not usually so slow,” Zahra said and shook Jordyn’s hand. “Still recuperating.”
“No worries.” Jordyn cast a glance at Sean and then Blake for a clue as to what that meant, making a mental note to ask Blake later. Clearly something had happened to her that no one wanted to talk about.
Before she could say anything more, Blake spoke. “Everyone, this is Jordyn Bridger, the newest member of our team.” Zahra and the two people she hadn’t been introduced to yet stared at her and Jordyn forced a smile. “That’s Gage,” Blake told her, indicating the tall, well-built man on the other side of the table. He was somewhere in his early forties with short red-gold hair and bright blue eyes. Both arms were covered in full sleeves of tats. His whole demeanor screamed military authority.
“Hey, nice to meet you,” Gage said in a deep voice tinged with a southern drawl, and reached out a big hand to shake hers. The tats stopped right at the end of his wrist.
Jordyn shook his big hand. “You too.”
Next Blake indicated the woman beside the second-in-command, somewhere around thirty with shoulder length caramel brown hair and pretty gray eyes. “This is Claire, one of our techno wizards. And Gage’s better half.”
“I can’t argue with that.” Gage grinned as Jordyn and Claire shook hands.
She could still feel that intense blue gaze on her as she pulled her hand free of Claire’s. She couldn’t help but glance at Gage.
He was eyeing her thoughtfully. “So, you’re her.”
“Sorry?”
“I’m looking forward to seeing you put some rounds downrange,” was all he said.
“Oh. Sure, whenever you want.” Wasn’t some kind of test, since she’d already been hired. But so far it looked to her like she was the only female here with military training. She was used to that though, and had no problem with proving herself to her male counterpoints. Once they saw her with a rifle, they usually stopped resenting having her around. She hoped that was true for these guys. Not that she’d have much opportunity to prove herself in a support and maintenance role.
“So, Jordyn,” Gage continued as he dropped back into his chair and maintained eye contact. “How much do you know about our team?”
“Not much.”
“Then let’s bring you up to speed.”
She sat and pulled her chair into the table as Blake took the seat next to her. The man smelled delicious, soap and clean male musk. Doing her best to ignore the distraction he posed, she focused on what Gage was saying about the current security situation.
Two minutes in, a flurry of activity broke out in the hallway. Gage trailed off with a frown and peered through the glass door as the others swiveled in their chairs to see what was going on. Seconds later Alex appeared on the other side of the door. He thrust it open and strode in, his face grim. Hunter was right behind him, his expression scary to behold. Jordyn’s hands curled around the armrests in reflex.
While Hunter stayed off to the side of the room, Alex picked up a slim remote from a table on the far side and pointed it at a TV screen mounted on the wall. “Take a look at this.”
The screen flashed on to show a female news reporter standing in front of a burning building, and the caption at the bottom read Breaking News. Alex turned up the volume just in time to catch what she was saying.
“Sources now say that a third explosion has gone off a little under ten minutes ago, this one at another residence in a Baltimore suburb. Police say they are searching for the bombers. From eyewitness accounts, possibly as many as seven men are involved in this latest attack to rock the city.”
Beside her, Blake tensed. Jordyn looked away from him to glance around the table, and every single person’s eyes were glued to the screen as the picture flashed from the burning house to a different building.
The reporter continued. “Officials have not yet confirmed the number, but there are reports that four people were killed in this blast alone, and many more were injured.” The footage showed images of what looked like an apartment building fire. People stood out on the sidewalk across the street, staring at the flames while fire crews rushed to douse the blaze. Young children were crying, clinging to their parents. Zahra had a hand over her mouth. Jordyn’s skin prickled.
“That’s my old apartment building,” Zahra said shakily. Sean slid his arm around her shoulders and bent to murmur something in her ear.
“And the first one was my place,” Alex added tightly, the muscles in his jaw flexing as he stared at the screen.
Jordyn sucked in a breath. What the hell? Under the table, she reached out and sought Blake’s hand. He wrapped his fingers around hers and squeezed once in reassurance but didn’t let go and she was glad. Targeted attacks on the team members’ previous residences?
While everyone absorbed that new information, Alex reduced the volume and turned to face them all. “Three coordinated bombings on three separate targets in the past hour—my old place, Zahra’s, and another NSA safe house no one was supposed to know about. They either found the locations from Ruth before we arrested her, or they have better intel than we thought they did, because they planned this strike carefully. It’s Sunday, which speaks volumes in itself, but this attack was carefully synchronized.”
His silver gaze swept around the room, resting on each one of them, and Jordyn felt a shiver of unease zip up her spine. “Hassani wants us to know how close he is. He failed to get us twice before, but he’s letting us know he’s only one step behind.” He tossed the remote onto the conference table with a clunk, anger and frustration pulsing off him in waves. “Everybody break into teams and get ready to go wheels up. We’re gonna go nail this bastard.”
“I just heard from Jalil. All three targets have been destroyed.”
Malik leaned back in the comfortable leather chair he’d been reading in and regarded Bashir thoughtfully. Having both grown up poor, risen through the ranks of the military and then through the ISI together, they understood each other in a way no one else could. They also both hated how weak the current government’s foreign policies were. “Excellent.” It was the first good news he’d had in a long time. “Casualties?”
“A few. One of the cell members was injured in the second blast. His wounds weren’t life threatening but they’re severe enough that he’ll need treatment. The authorities will be questioning him within a few hours, I think.”
Malik waved that concern away. “No matter, Amir will have told them the same information already. It’s time for us to move on.”
Bashir’s gaze sharpened. “To where? Karachi?”
“No. I plan to stay local for a while longer.”
He frowned. “I think that’s unwise, considering the amount of pressure they’ll be putting on our network to locate you. I’d feel better if we moved you to a different city, at least for a day or two.”
“No. I’ll stay here until I’m ready to use my escape route. Traveling anywhere else now would be stupid. I’ll be crossing the border soon enough.” And then he’d escape into the mountains and accept the hospitality of the Taliban leaders he’d so carefully garnered over the years.
Bashir sighed, resigned to following orders. “When?”
“When I decide I’m ready,” he said in a hard tone, resenting that his plan was being questioned. “They’ll be coming here now. I want them on our soil before I make my next move.” The NSA’s Alex Rycroft would be here soon. It wouldn’t do to escape the Americans unnoticed.