Great. Nothing says merry Christmas like being the jerk who ruins the holiday for the world’s most adorable four-year-old little girls. Maybe this was what Henry and Janie had been up to all along. Accepting my rejections, biding their time, waiting for the perfect opportunity to reel in the least family-oriented guy on the planet—or at least in our ATF office—to their family celebration.
And I couldn’t even be mad about it because they did it out of love.
“I have Mason’s bachelor beer brunch,” I said. Mason’s brunch, which was followed by a long afternoon of low-stakes poker, was as good an excuse as any to avoid more traditional celebrations.
“I remember it well.” Henry had introduced me to Mason, and he’d attended the event back in his own bachelor days. “And I assume it still starts around noon.”
“Give or take,” I said.
“That’s perfect, because the girls will want to open presents around zero dark thirty. I’ll have a pot of black coffee ready by oh-seven-hundred.”
He knew this was hard for me, so he waited in silence while I considered the offer. Sweat beaded on my forehead as if I’d just walked up to an unknown explosive device with nothing but a bomb suit between me and eternity. It had been twenty years since I’d thought of the holidays as anything other than torture.
My phone rang. I jumped at the chance for a distraction, but when I saw the number, I didn’t know whether to grimace or smile. I held up my phone to show Henry.
“Logan Lang?” Henry didn’t hesitate. He scowled. “The last time he called you, you disappeared for a week.”
And found my life in jeopardy twice, but Henry didn’t know that. The kind of work Lang did, the jobs he occasionally pulled me in on, were for a covert agency known as HEAT, the acronym for the Headquarters for the Elimination of Advanced Threats. The off-the-books agency was hidden beneath layers of national security protections and couldn’t be discussed with anyone. Not even with an old friend who wanted to make me a part of his family for Christmas.
“I have to take this,” I said.
“Do you, though?”
“I owe him,” I answered. All of us who’d served with Lang when we were Army Rangers owed him for something or other. “But,” I took a deep breath and plunged into the breach, “if I’m in town on Christmas morning, I’ll be at your place. And I like my coffee strong enough to stand up a spoon in it.”
Henry grinned. My answer worked for him because it would satisfy Janie. He clapped me on the back. “See you then.”
“Thank you, and thank Janie for me,” I called after him. Alone in the locker room. I picked up Lang’s call on the fourth ring. “Roman here.”
“How the hell are you, asshole?” Lang’s deep voice boomed into my ear.
I grinned. “I’m still one fine specimen of man. How about you, asshole?”
“You wish. As for me, my team and I are in a bit of a situation.”
“Yeah, I figured you weren’t calling just to flirt with me.”
He snorted. “You should be so lucky.”
“What’s up?” I sat down on the wooden bench running between the rows of lockers.
“We have something here... We could use a weapons expert, preferably one who still holds a high-level clearance.”
“Shit.” I rubbed my hand over my eyes. Not that his answer was unexpected, given his—and occasionally my—line of work. But damn, high-level-secret work was always mired in red tape, which meant a lot of time. “How long do you need me?”
“Twenty-four hours. Maybe a little more.”
“That’s it?”
“It’s not a hard job, just a specialized one. But...”
“But there’s a catch,” I finished.
“I can’t go into all of it on this line,” he said, referring to my unsecured phone. “But I can say we’re not the only ones aware of the thing we have, and those other interested parties can narrow down the list of possible experts we might bring in.”
I sat up straighter. “Am I being watched?”
“Not yet,” he said. “But some very bad people will have eyes on plane and train manifests to see if you or anyone with your particular skillset is on the move.”
