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“Not a great idea.” The magician shoved Pegs out the door in front of him and pulled her close, shoving the barrel of a pistol into her temple.
Her small frame radiated fury. “He was waiting for me. Told me if I didn’t get you here, he’d detonate the bomb.”
Bridger stopped dead, his eyes never leaving his mentor’s face as he holstered his Sig Sauer. “No worries.”
If the man was good enough to fool Pegasus, he was good enough to fool Bridger. Or anybody else on their team. Plans disintegrated more often than not. He was used to rethinking, rejiggering and even retreating, when necessary. Whatever it took to complete the mission.
“Kick your weapon over here,” Romero commanded him.
Bridger complied instantly. No reason not to. The Baretta against Pegs’ skull precluded a gun battle, obviously. They’d have to defeat the fool using their wits. Same way they’d done a thousand times already.
He stared Romero in the face. “You hurt Pegs or Jane and you die. Although I’m probably going to kill you anyway, just for being a jerk. Fair warning.”
The man shot him a pained, patient look, like a middle-aged dad confronting an angry teen. “Whatever you say, son. But from where I’m standing, it looks like I’ve got all the high cards.”
Bridger crossed his arms over his chest, ruthlessly suppressing a wince at the shaft of pain that shot from his bicep up through his shoulder. “Game’s far from over.”
“Agreed.” The man shoved Pegs in the back, making her stumble forward. “How about we move on to the next phase?”
“Which is?”
“You fly me where I tell you to, and I let the ladies live.”
Ice choked Bridger’s throat, blocking off his airway. The downward glance, and the tightening of the guy’s throat muscles and the tiny strain in the man’s tone left no room for misinterpretation.
Romero was lying.
He wasn’t going to let Jane live. Probably not Bridger or Pegs, either. He couldn’t afford to. They could offer way too many clues to his potential whereabouts. Especially Pegs. She’d already found him once.
One look at his mentor’s stoic face told him she realized it, too.
Pegs turned on her former colleague. “Why involve Bridger? I could have flown you somewhere.”
“And then he and his crew would have hunted me down,” Romero pointed out.
Yeah. The guy had a point. And he was supremely confident. His arms and legs were loose, his verbal cadence even and unpressured. Romero fully believed he had Bridger and Pegs over a barrel.
Which just might give Bridger the leverage he needed. Overconfidence would keep the man from shooting them, for the moment, but no one was perfect. The magician would slip up. And Bridger would be on him like white on rice, as Tai would say.
White. On. Rice.
Romero held up the detonator like a threat. “First thing you can do is load my things into your aircraft.” He pointed at the dinged-up hangar door behind him. “The Porsche’s in there.”
Detonator in his non-dominant hand, Baretta never wavering from Pegs’ head, Romero ordered her to step out of the path Bridger needed to traverse to get to the hangar.
Rage blinded Bridger. Like a dog lunging against its collar, he strained to control his fury. Anger wouldn’t save Jane. He needed every ounce of brainpower to defeat Romero. He’d have plenty of time later for rage.
Pegs watched him, her body rigid. When she saw he was looking at her, she nodded, one quick, infinitesimal movement. Her lips worked. In, she mouthed. Out. Hold. In. Hold.
The breathing cleared his head, bringing his thoughts into sharp focus. Oh yeah. He had it now.
He strolled toward the hangar, careful not to move too close to the pair. “This reminds me of that time we tried to order sushi but we ended up in a knife fight,” he said, staring at Pegs the whole time. “You never know who you’re really dealing with until the cards are on the table, do you?”
Nothing gave it away, not a glimmer in her eyes, or the tiniest movement, but Bridger knew, he just knew, Pegs caught his reference to that nightmare op in Seoul. He’d been lucky to walk away from that one. Wouldn’t have if Pegs didn’t have such outstanding reflexes. He prayed age hadn’t worn the edges off.
Once he started this, it would be on her to finish it.
“You two are too cute,” Romero cut in. “Nice try with the covert slang. I get it. Teammates to the end, and all that. Just remember who has the detonator.” He waggled the phone in the air, daring Bridger to make a move.
