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“My secretary has provided you with a summary in English of what we intend to accomplish during this evening’s meeting,” the CEO said in heavily accented English as he, Dermott, Jase, and myriad other RTP Enerji executives seated themselves around a highly polished conference table. “My team has already familiarized ourselves with the summary. We will break for dinner in two hours, then continue on for another three.” Ryker and Linc stood at the ready, against the wall, behind the two Americans.

A dull-looking woman with gray hair, dark skin, a beige boxy pantsuit, and beige hijab handed Jase and Dermott leather portfolios that were embossed with the company’s logos. When she went to sit back down in her chair in the corner of the room to ostensibly take notes, Ryker saw the keen intelligence in her eyes.

There you are. Good to meet you.

Damla Akbas briefly caught his eye, and he could have sworn he saw a moment of acknowledgment, but it came and went so fast that he couldn’t be sure.

Dermott was making a great show of going through the document with his pen, circling items, nodding, and making stupid-ass noises like he understood things, or found things interesting. He was coming off like a fool. In the meantime, Jase was quickly reading through the document, circling nothing.

Then the meeting started to drone on…and on…and on. Occasionally Dermott would ask another stupid question—not that Ryker was paying attention to the actual words, but he could see by the pained expressions of the RTP Enerji executives that they were dumb questions—and then they would answer with small words and exaggerated slowness. It really was painful to watch, so it was easy enough to zone out.

Ryker thought about his last conversation with Amy…again. He was absolutely positive that everything came down to family. For some reason, Amy didn’t want to meet his family because something was up with hers. Hell, she’d never even said the word dad, and the word mom might have come out of her mouth twice.

Here he was calling Dermott stupid when he was the one who asked about her family and was satisfied with answers only about her cousin and nephews and verbal side-steps. He was the dumbshit. There was something hinky going on with her family, and that’s why she didn’t want to meet his.

He wanted to just call her out on it, but he was pretty sure this was a deep scar, not something you just had a blunt conversation about. He never wanted—never ever wanted—to cause Amy either physical or emotional pain. One of the things that his friends and maybe even his sister didn’t get, is why Amy was his catnip. The woman might be all fight and claws, but they were kitten claws. She needed someone like him to protect her, even maybe, from herself. The last thing he intended to do was dredge up things that would upset her, but at the same time, if it was getting in the way of them moving forward, it was something he’d have to get her to face…with him.

He started to pay attention again when Jase started talking.

“This is good information.” Jase stopped and rubbed his temple. “I would like to study it more in-depth at my hotel tonight,” he added.

“It is proprietary, it cannot leave this room,” the CEO stated.

“I und..understand, Kaplan-Bey,” Jase nodded quietly.

What the fuck? What was wrong with Jase?

“I have a question on item seven on the second page,” Dermott said.

Dumbass probably didn’t even know what the hell item seven was, he just wanted to sound important.

“We will get to item seven after we go through items three through six. Let’s continue from where we left off,” the CEO said with exaggerated patience.

Ryker watched as Jase started to rub his temples in earnest.

The first hour of the meeting seemed to go well. The RTP executives did most of the talking, and the two questions that Dermott asked were met with raised eyebrows until Jase intervened to clarify. The problem was that Jase’s voice sounded slurred.

“Now here we are at item four,” Kaplan-Bey started. “This talks about the amount of petroleum we have in reserve at any given time.”

Jase put his elbow up on the table, but then it slipped off. The CEO stopped talking. “Mr. Drakos, are you all right?”

“I suffer from migraines. My medicine went with my luggage to the hotel. It’s gotten so bad, that even when I take my dose, I’ll have to lie down for a couple of hours.”

That sounds like complete bullshit.

Ryker took out his phone. “With your permission, I would like to text the backup security team to swap out so that I can take Chief Petty Officer Drakos back to the hotel,” Ryker said.

The CEO nodded.

Ryker started to text Gideon.

“I want to assure you that even with Drakos leaving, I can handle the rest of this evening’s meeting just fine,” Dermott assured everyone at the table. “I’ve looked over the upcoming topics, I’ll be able to handle things until Chief Petty Officer Drakos can return.”

Ryker: CPO, Drakos is ill, I’m taking him back to the hotel. Need Team 2 to come and relieve Linc.

Gideon: Ill?

Ryker: One of his debilitating migraines.