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She did as instructed. Without waiting for a reply to the text, Goliad opened the driver’s door and got out. Timmy did likewise on the passenger side. Brynn got out. Rye was the last to alight, his bag shouldered, the box secured between his other arm and his torso.
“I’ve never been here before,” Goliad said to Brynn. “Lead the way.”
She made brief eye contact with Rye as she walked past him and toward a single elevator. It took forever to arrive. While they waited, no one said anything, although Timmy was cracking his knuckles and whistling softly through his teeth.
They crowded into the small enclosure. Brynn punched the button for the fifth floor. They rode up; the door slid open. As they stepped from the cubicle, Brynn motioned them to the left. A man was standing in an open doorway where the lushly carpeted and richly paneled hallway came to a dead end.
At his first glimpse of Nate Lambert, Rye decided he didn’t like his looks any better than he’d liked his phone voice. Men that skinny and pale shouldn’t shave their heads or wear trousers that narrow in the leg and cropped at the ankle. Even someone as untutored in fashion as Rye could’ve told him that.
The four of them filed down the hall, Brynn in the lead, Rye behind her, Goliad and Timmy bringing up the rear. Lambert acknowledged the two heavies with a nod. He spotted the box under Rye’s arm, and it held his attention for several seconds. Then, as they got closer to him, he focused on Brynn.
“So glad you could make it, Dr. O’Neal.”
She fired a volley back. “It hasn’t been a fun day for me either, Nate.”
“That’s not what I heard.” He looked Rye over, his distaste apparent. “This is the dashing bush pilot you found irresistible?”
Brynn drew herself up to her full height but didn’t honor the insult with a comeback, demonstrating a hell of a lot more class than Lambert. For all his nattiness, he was an asshole.
Rye stepped forward, coming even with Brynn. “You want this box, or what?” He whipped the receipt from his back jeans pocket and extended it, still folded, to Lambert.
The doctor pulled a pair of reading glasses from the breast pocket of his shirt and put them on. He took the sheet of paper by one corner as though it were germy and made a production of shaking it out. He scanned it, then snapped his fingers repeatedly and impatiently. “Pen?”
“Photo ID?”
Lambert glared at him over the top of his silly glasses. “Excuse me?”
“Photo ID,” Rye repeated.
Steam could have been coming out of his ears, but he took a wallet from his pants pocket and showed Rye his driver’s license. “Is one sufficient? I also have several that are professionally related.”
“One’s fine. Anybody got a pen?”
Brynn didn’t act on the request. She stood with her arms crossed over her middle and stared at the floor. Goliad produced a ballpoint pen. Lambert snatched it from him, flattened the paper against the wall, and scrawled his name across the bottom.
He gave the sheet to Rye, who refolded it and stuck it in his pocket, then passed the box to Lambert. “You want to open it, check the contents?”
“The samples have already been exposed to air unnecessarily.”
“Then that’s a no?” Rye said. “Good. Sight of blood makes me queasy.”
Lambert tucked the box under his arm and asked with impatience, “Is that it, then?”
“Delivered. Everybody’s happy. I’m gone.”
As he turned away, Brynn caught the sleeve of his jacket. “Thank you.”
Her touch, the husky intimacy with which she’d spoken the two words, elicited heat, low and central and deep. He looked down at her hand, then into her eyes, and all too aware of the onlookers, said, “Just doing my job.”
After the slightest of hesitations, she said, “Fly safely.” Then, withdrawing her hand, she stepped around Lambert and went into the office.
Rye turned. Right behind him were Goliad and Timmy, standing side by side. He pushed his way between them and continued on toward the elevator. He overheard Lambert say, “Thanks for your intervention, gentlemen. If you can see yourselves out? The Hunts are waiting to hear from me.” Then the office door was soundly shut.
At the elevator, Rye punched the down button. When Goliad and Timmy joined him, he held out his hand, palm up. “I’ll take my clip now.”
“I think I’ll keep it,” Goliad said.
“Oh, now that’s a shocker.” Rye muttered an obscenity, then, turning away from them, said, “I’m over the two of you. I’ll take the stairs.”
