“Will do.” Maya tossed her tablet onto the table and grinned. “Y’all need anything else from me? Because if not, I’m gonna go watch Gray do hot sexy building things.”
Rainbow wrinkled her nose, prompting a laugh from Nina as she swung the girl up in her arms. “We’ll go with you. We’re taking some lunch over.”
“I’ll catch up later,” Rafe told them, dragging Maya’s tablet toward him. “You mind if I look over that location data?”
“Knock yourself out.”
“See you guys tonight,” Dani told them. “Clem’s. Don’t forget.”
Maya followed Nina and Rainbow out the door, leaving only Dani, who was methodically removing the remaining pictures from her corkboard.
The silence lay between them, heavy and fraught. Rafe could think of about ten ways to break it if he wanted to provoke an explosion … but should he? He’d had some pretty wild relationships in his day, including one or two that had been straight up cheerfully kinky, but there was nothing particularly healthy about the way he and Dani swiped at one another.
He just wasn’t sure either of them wanted to stop.
Instead of poking at Dani, he glanced over the location data, hoping to see something Maya might have missed. But she was right. The Protectorate was everywhere. Literally everywhere.
“Do you need any help?”
Rafe looked up. Dani was standing beside the table, watching him expectantly.
The death glare was gone. Now he was looking at Dani the professional—cool, collected. Brilliant and deadly.
His fatal weakness.
He slid the tablet over to her. “I was hoping I’d notice a pattern Maya missed, but I should have known better. If it was there to see, she would have spotted it.”
“Maya doesn’t miss much.” She didn’t even look at the tablet, but her situational awareness was so precise she managed to turn it off and toss it on top of the other two Maya had been working with. “So. Do you want to tell me how this is going to work?”
He tore himself away from pondering the hotness of her casual competence. “How is what going to work?”
“Backup. Do I coordinate with whoever’s available, or should it be you?”
An odd warmth spread through his chest, along with something sharper. He refused to call it jealousy. “It can be me. It should be me.”
“Okay.” She nodded decisively. “I’ll be ready when Maya gets together the intel on our next target, then.”
“Do you know who she’s looking for?”
“You know.” She lifted that damned bare shoulder in a careless shrug. “Your former coworkers.”
Rafe flexed his fingers, mostly to keep from lifting them to the back of his neck. It had been more than six months since he and the rest of his squad had cut out their trackers and left the Protectorate.
Left was far too passive to describe those frantic weeks. The preparation, the fear, the knowledge that one wrong move could result in a fate worse than death. All of the planning and praying, all of the impossible odds that had somehow broken in their favor …
And they’d gained freedom only to discover the one person they needed to survive was missing.
Rafe supposed that had worked out the way it was meant to. Recovering their biochem hacker had brought Nina, Maya, and Dani into their lives, after all. Knox certainly wouldn’t go back and change it, not when he was currently playing house and raising an adopted daughter with Nina. Gray wouldn’t, either. He’d found the center of his universe in Maya.
Funny, that. On the first night they’d met the three women, Rafe had been the one starry-eyed and softhearted, to the point where he’d received multiple lectures on how he wasn’t allowed to fall in love with Dani. But here they all were, smitten and domesticated, and Rafe …
Rafe was still waiting.
Something about his gaze must have gone a little too soft and yearning, because Dani took an abrupt step back. “I’ll keep you posted,” she mumbled, then took off for the stairs like her ass was on fire.
If his heart wasn’t on the line, Rafe might have laughed. Hell, he laughed anyway, a hoarse, rueful chuckle as he rubbed his hand over his face and reminded himself of the harsh truth.
If he planned to wait for Dani, he might be waiting forever.
CLASSIFIED BEHAVIOR EVALUATION
Franklin Center for Genetic Research
HS-Gen16 remains our most frustrating failure. The potential of this genetic strain outstrips any comparable generation. They exceed expectations across the board.
Unfortunately, their failures are proportionately dramatic. So is the danger they represent without careful handling. Our hubris will be our downfall if we don’t proceed with caution.
Dr. Reed, July 2080
THREE
Saturday nights at Clementine’s were starting to get crowded.
The regulars had arrived long ago, shuffling off to their usual tables and booths to talk and laugh and drink the night away. Music and smoke hung in the air, but the place was quieter—and brighter—than usual.
Probably because there were far fewer troublemakers around these days. Most of the small-time criminals had taken one look at Knox and his men and had chosen to ply their trades elsewhere. The Silver Devils may have left the Protectorate in grand, spectacular fashion, but they still scared the shit out of the common thieves and con artists in Five Points.
Dani slapped a hand on the bar to get Clem’s attention. The aging proprietor and namesake of the establishment had finally hired some help in the form of a burly young barback, but she still handled the drinks herself.
The silver in Clem’s ginger hair caught the light as she paused in pulling a beer and tipped her head in Dani’s direction. “Another round?”
“You’re busy.” Dani stepped up on the steel rail that ringed the lower part of the bar, leaned over, and grabbed two bottles. “I’ve got it.”
Clem grinned. “I’ll put ’em on your tab.”
“I’d be disappointed if you didn’t, Clem.” Dani loaded a tray with shot glasses and the bottles. Balancing it was tricky, and she almost dropped it once or twice, but her enhanced reflexes saved the booze.
Dani made her way to Nina’s corner booth first. She and Knox were deep in conversation with Syd, a guest from out of town. Syd was a bit mysterious, a slightly older lady who wore her years effortlessly. Her auburn hair framed her lightly tanned face, and she carried herself like a soldier. Like Nina, she was a product of genetic modification, created by a paramilitary program tasked with engineering perfect mercenaries.
Syd had never said so explicitly, but Dani assumed that her second-in-command, Max, had been part of the same program. He was younger than Syd but looked about the same age, with his salt-and-pepper hair and beard, a contradiction that spoke of a hard, hard life. His eyes were bright, clear blue, but he had a somber, guarded air, as if the mere thought of smiling hurt.
Dani slid the tray onto the booth’s scratched and gouged table and smiled. “Pick your poison—whiskey or tequila.”
“Tequila,” Syd replied. “How’s life treating you, Dani?”
“Cannot complain.” She poured two shots and slid them over to Syd, then raised an eyebrow at Max, who shook his head. “Work is going smoothly, and the weather’s been beautiful. What more could a woman ask for?”