Page 45 of Deep Cover

Grieving her. His family. The loss of his dreams.

He’d sacrificed everything to save the people he loved, and he’d had to live with that alone.

She reached for his arm, gently pulling it away from his face. His eyes were red-rimmed and raw with emotion.

Something shifted in her chest. This time it wasn’t the tearing sensation that came every time she’d heard his name, seen his handwriting or passed a restaurant they used to love.

Some old scab had finally lifted away from the wound she’d carried so long. And underneath it…instead of the raw ache she braced for every time it was ripped open…she found smooth skin.

Healed.

She didn’t have words yet for what that meant. But for the first time in years, she could think about Reid without bleeding all over again.

ELEVEN

Rivers had spent eight weeks itching to get back on an op. Today he was praying that wasn’t Cannon’s reason for calling them to the war room.

Sierra had already gathered around the table, the usual low conversation filling the room. Cannon stood at the head, with Rorke nearby and Rome, Younger, and the others taking their usual seats.

But Rivers barely registered any of them.

One look at the front had his gut clenching and his heart picking up. Caryssa stood before a large board dotted with sticky notes and lines. Today she wore her warm brown hair drawn into a ponytail that showed off the sexy line of her neck.

When she angled her body, he got a good view of her trousers hugging her hips, and the silk blouse she wore was tailored perfectly to her curves.

Without taking his eyes off her, he took his seat and tried not to think too hard about the orders they were about to receive.

Sierra could get five minutes’ notice and disappear for five months. They never knew what command might throw at them. Hell, Cannon had been known to move before the orders came down if he saw a situation going sideways.

The table looked the same as it did any other day, with energy drinks sweating rings onto the wood and a bag of beef jerky making its rounds.

Younger dug through the bag for a decent-sized piece. “Hey, Romey. Why hasn’t Stina made cinnamon rolls lately?”

Rome shrugged, his expression glum. “Wish I knew, man. Beats this crap.” He snatched up the bag Younger tossed down. He pulled out a small chunk and gnawed despondently on it.

Rivers passed on the offer of jerky and fixed his attention on Caryssa, the guys’ banter fading to background noise. Caryssa had his sole attention. Even the way she wielded the marker in her hand and the blocky letters she wrote intrigued the hell out of him.

He grew aware of some bickering between Younger and O. Rorke got in on it, and at that moment Caryssa faced the table with a crease between her brows.

She cleared her throat twice, but no one heard over the argument. Rivers was about to put a stop to it on her behalf, when she glanced at Cannon, one eyebrow raised.

Rivers could almost hear her question: are you going to handle this, or shall I?

Cannon cleared his throat once. The table went quiet.

Caryssa panned over the group, lingering for a beat on Rivers before she twisted to the whiteboard. The wall monitor lit up too with a profile already half-built, a photo in the upper corner with a timeline underneath it in red.

“All right.” She pointed to the red lines drawn between data points. “Our focus today is on a man named Bill Kohler. Our dead guy isn’t just some unlucky bystander. He’s tied directly to Blackout’s supply chain. Government contracts, legitimate on paper. But dig deeper and the picture gets a lot less clean.”

And he was the connection Doyle had sent her here to find.

Bill’s phone tied him to Antonio’s. His delivery history tied him to Blackout. Though the little information she’d learned from Jolie and Stina wasn’t groundbreaking, it had provided a better picture of how the stolen weapons moved after Echo was compromised. She would need to work harder to earn their trust. One small detail could break the case.

Now she needed to find out where Bill fit between the two.

She tapped the photo of him in the corner of the board, and more spread out on the monitor.

“He was murdered in New York City six days ago. Some of the items collected from him included a cell phone, a set of keys and a wallet with eighty-two dollars in cash and a few credit cards. “