Page 8 of Weston’s Treasure

This time when Silver asked there was a hint of trepidation in her voice. Weston hated the sound but was relieved she was finally understanding she’d placed herself in the middle of a serious shitstorm.

“Wouldn’t take much,” Holden told her. “The men we’re dealing with are not stupid, they pay attention. And if they have someone on the inside, helping them move the drugs down the canal and into the harbor, it would be even easier.”

“You think someone I work with is in on it?”

“Absolutely. You don’t move millions of dollars of coke unless you know you have safe passage,” Chasin weighed in.

Weston hadn’t taken his eyes off Silver. She was clever—hell, she’d been the one who’d put the pieces together and brought it to the Coast Guard and the DHS. He was waiting for her to come to her own conclusions about the situation and when her brows pinched together, Weston knew she was closing in on the reality of the state of play.

“If it’s an employee they’ll have my address,” she blurted out.

There it was, she was figuring it out.

“And if it’s someone in the Coast Guard…” Silver didn’t finish her sentence and she didn’t need to, the men in the room all understood what that meant.

Silver hadn’t gone in quietly, she hadn’t anonymously reported the issues. She’d marched her happy ass straight into the Coast Guard station in Baltimore, uncaring the station was actually a repair yard, and she’d demanded to speak to the Captain. It wasn’t her best play but luckily Captain Stewart had taken her concerns to heart and used his contacts at Homeland to help her.

“Captain Stewart is on the up-and-up and no one on Alec Hall’s team would turn on you,” Nixon commented. “It’s someone you work with.”

“I can—”

“You’re staying here,” Weston told her before his brain had fully engaged, allowing his mouth to speak without thinking of the ramifications.

Weston felt his teammates staring. They hadn’t talked about what to do with Silver or where they were going to stash her until the operation was over, but the more Weston thought about it the more he realized staying at the farmhouse with the team was her best option.

Though he wasn’t sure he’d make it through the first twenty-four hours of her being in his space.

A gag or hearing protection might be a worthy investment if he had to be around her for any lengthy period of time.

“I am not staying here,” Silver protested. “I can find a hotel.”

“Actually, Weston’s right,” Chasin agreed. “You staying here means we don’t have to rotate security detail.”

“Security detail?” She gaped. “I don’t need a detail.”

Christ, just when Weston thought Silver was finally taking the situation seriously she sank back into her stubborn ways. Only this wasn’t her being pig-headed, it was her being careless and stupid. And since Weston knew she wasn’t stupid he was back to thinking she was obstinate and careless.

“Are you purposely trying to get yourself dead? Or are you just so goddamned determined to be a pain in the ass, you’re gonna fight against us even when we’re trying to save your ass?” Weston growled. “Serious as shit, woman, I cannot for the life of me figure you out.”

Silver’s eyes flashed hurt and Weston felt like a dick, but as quickly as she’d allowed some vulnerability to creep in, she masked it and spewed her vitriol.

“I don’t need anyone to save my ass and I certainly have no desire to get dead. I can take care of myself. I don’t need you—”

“You don’t? Funny, I think it was my team that got you off that yacht. And before you say it, yes you’d got yourself out of the cuffs, which I admit was impressive. What wasn’t, was you thinking you were gonna somehow escape by throwing bricks of cocaine at your captors. What the fuck did you think you were gonna accomplish by that? Have them OD as powder floated through the air? It was stupid and potentially deadly. If that coke had fentanyl in it, we’d both be dead right now. So, I’m sorry to burst your stubborn-ass bubble, sweetheart, but this isn’t something you’re just gonna get out of. And the only way you’re gonna be safe is by me and my team making you that way. Unless you got some mad tracking and sniper skills we don’t know about. By all means, now’s the time for you to share you’re really an undercover assassin. But I have to say, knowing what I know about you, I know you’re fucking not. So we’re your best option. Like it or not.”

“I don’t like it,” she snapped. “Not one fucking bit.”

“You don’t have to. But what you have to do, is accept it.”

“I don’t have to—”

“Goddamn, woman. Listen to yourself. We’re offering to protect you. To keep you safe. The alternative is you’re picked up again, only next time when I find you, it won’t be amusing. Mainly because you won’t be tossing drugs at my head, then you won’t be walking off the yacht with your arms around me. It will be me carrying you in a fucking body bag because you’ll be fucking dead.”

Weston watched as Silver paled. She didn’t frown, she didn’t spew shit, she simply shrank into herself as her shoulders hunched forward, and damn if Weston didn’t hate it. Hated that she looked sullen and beat down—and what was worse was that Weston had been the one to put the look on her face and he knew it. Felt down to his soul that he’d been a prick and gone too far.

But he didn’t know any other way to make her see she needed them. Needed him. And he wasn’t lying—it would be him carrying her lifeless body, because for some asinine reason he felt responsible for her. Through all of her prickly, brash bullshit, Weston still couldn’t stop thinking about her. Hadn’t stopped since the day he’d met her. Could not get her fire out of his belly, and her go-get-it attitude out of his head.

He’d never simultaneously disliked and wanted a woman so badly.