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“Is your mind racing?” she asked me as we walked the length of the hall. “Because mine is.”
“I don’t think it’s taken a break since the first night I saw you at the players’ lodge,” I admitted as we turned into a bedroom.
It was eerily quiet, and I struggled with taking the time to encourage her to finish her story. “I know you have a lot more to tell me, but . . .” My attention swiveled to the closet, then back to her, and I let go of her hand.
“Yeah, we should wait until we’re somewhere safe,” she said, gently placing a hand on my chest. It wasn’t a no, just a not here. “Let’s see if these guys have good taste, I guess.” Her casual tone managed to ease my nerves a bit as she opened the double doors to the closet. Her long fingers flew across the row of shirts hanging there before she settled on one and removed it from the hanger. “Bad guys iron and hang tees? Who would’ve thought?”
“Not me,” I said, returning the small smile she’d sent me while holding out a black tee with U2 emblazoned on the front.
“I’ll give this to Lucy.” She draped the shirt over her arm, then grabbed a handful of others and dropped them on the bed covered in what looked like a quilt made by someone’s grandmother.
I snatched a plain blue tee and pulled it over my head before removing the hangers from the rest. “Weapons room, and we’re good to go,” I said, feeling damn uneasy about being there any longer than we needed to.
Charley grabbed the shirts, clutching them to her chest like a security blanket, and followed me to the room I’d clocked earlier while clearing the house.
A mess of weapons were all over one table, oddly situated right next to what appeared to have been a game of unfinished beer pong likely interrupted by the call to come find us in the jungle.
Grabbing a black duffel bag from the floor, I knocked the red cups from the beer pong table to the floor, set the bag on top of it and began loading it up. I snatched the only vest I could find and shoved it her way. “Wear this over your shirt. It has a chest plate.”
“Bulletproof vest?” She handed it back to me. “If there aren’t enough for everyone, I’m not wearing it.”
I cursed under my breath in frustration, but there was no sense arguing with her. “I assume there are more vests, but they’re currently strapped to dead bodies in the jungle.”
“And the vests didn’t do much to help them,” she shot out with a little shrug.
Okay, she had me there. I grunted and tossed the vest onto the table before zipping up the bag. “Yeah, yeah. Let’s get out of here.” I tipped my head toward the door, and we made our way to the front porch.
Mya and Lucy were already back outside, but I hadn’t expected to see Gray, Carter, and Mason there as well.
“Where’s Jesse?” I looked toward the Bronco, not seeing Oliver there. I dropped the bag as Charley began offering shirts to our semi-naked team members. “And Oliver?”
“Camila’s other guys are heading back her way, so we don’t have anyone on lookout. I sent Jesse and Oliver outside the fence to keep an eye on things.” Carter exchanged a grim look with Gray and nearly growled out, “Someone pulled my image from the cameras back at the lodge. All our faces, in fact.” The ice in Carter’s voice had Gwen flinching.
I supposed Carter still wasn’t aware of the Camila–Gwen thing. Of course, I doubted Carter truly blamed Gwen for the fact his face wound up online after he’d warned her “it better not happen.” Because, seriously, none of us could’ve predicted this all going sideways the way it had. Well, fuck. Except Camila. “How do you know they identified us?” I finally spat out, then snatched a bottle of water from Mya’s bag, realizing my hazy thoughts and lightheadedness were from dehydration.
Before taking a sip for myself, I nudged the bottle into Charley’s hand, and she hesitantly accepted it. I focused back on Gray as he pointed to the computer on Gwen’s lap, and she spun it around to show the screen with our faces and names there.
Well, that sucks.
“Camila just called to let me know the Feds are swarming the lodge. Show is officially canceled,” Carter piled on the bad news that’d be a deterrent in potentially completing part of our mission. “And the Feds aren’t just looking for Charlotte and Lucy, they’re now here for me, too,” he seethed, not even trying to hide his disdain for the three-letter agency. “My guess is my plane back in Tabatinga is now under the FBI’s control, too.”
“Wait, you’re wanted, too?” The bottle slipped from Charley’s hand, but I snatched it in time and my dry lips craved the water, so I stole a drink myself.
Carter swiveled his attention her way, brushing her off with an icy glare. “It’s a long story.”
“Aren’t they all?” Charley whispered back.
“True.” Carter dedicated his focus back to the laptop. “We’re going to use their smuggling routes to get to Peru undetected before the Feds catch up with us. I’ll have my other pilot fly my second jet there to extract us tomorrow.”
“And how exactly are we using their smuggling routes to escape?” Charley asked him.
“Their smuggling routes are navigable by car,” Gwen said after switching the screen. “And this map shows us which way to go.”
Well, that’s one way to do it. I squished down the now-empty bottle between my palms. Do these fuckers recycle?
“Won’t the cartel find us if we’re using their routes?” Charley’s eyes dipped to where I held the crushed bottle before her attention climbed back to my face.
I tossed the bottle back into the bag with our other supplies, because yeah, maybe I just killed a guy, but fuck littering.
