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“You have a strategy?” Anna said, her eyes gleaming with admiration.
“Yes. We know our local bad actors. I have several confidential informants who are very good at rooting out odd activity and keeping their eyes and ears peeled for any type of terrorist activity. I have faith in them and through them we’ll get the intel we need.”
“And if we don’t?” Kodiak asked.
“I don’t want to be a defeatist or be overly optimistic. We will do our damnedest to uncover all the plots.” She sighed. “I don’t want to sugarcoat things. AFP is the trip wire. The threats come in. We figure out the best way to handle them. If we can’t stop an attack before it happens, before the smoke clears over the target there will be an investigation with a precise purpose. Find out what went wrong.”
“A defensive role,” Reck’d said. “We don’t plan to be in a defensive role any longer.”
“To be sure, but if we study the attack—break it down into its individual components to see how the terrorists carried it out, then we can see our flaws and hopefully we correct them or devise new security tactics that fill the gaps the attack exploited in the first place.”
“A sound perspective,” Hazard said.
“In this instance, we have no idea how long NSH has prepared for their three-pronged attack, but our goal is to stop them before they succeed in their plans, and to do that, I have studied the Paris attacks and the Bolivian attacks. It was advantageous that you had a laptop with intel for the London attacks.”
“We still got played there, and it undermined our…cohesion. I don’t want that to happen again, and communication and caution need to be our watchwords. NSH is cagey and that bastard plans ahead, every freaking step of the way. We need to be fluid in our approach and always working at seeing what his ultimate goal is. We can’t afford to miss one thing here.”
She released her breath. This man was…powerful, not only in his body and looks but in his calculating mind. Her intense awareness and reaction to Kodiak was like nothing she’d ever experienced for another man. Did that mean there had to be something there…something else besides the overwhelming temptation of him physically? She stuck to that stubbornly. There was no way she would just interact with a man physically, unless it was some one-night stand, and she didn’t participate in that kind of activity either. Her upbringing was too ingrained in her for her to venture into that kind of behavior.
Except the flipside of that coin was that she shouldn’t want to explore and experience this undeniable chemistry between them. Their situation and forced close proximity only heightened the smoldering heat and awareness she wanted to skirt until this mission was over. But she was stuck. She had to work with him. There was no choice in the matter unless she quit her job, and she wasn’t going to do that for anyone. If she did decide to move on to something else, and she had thought about going an international route, maybe Interpol, she would make that decision based on her needs and aspirations, not to avoid some man who would be gone in a matter of weeks.
But ignoring his existence for those weeks was going to be virtually impossible, she knew. Even if he was invisible, everything that made her inherently female would sense whenever he was near, would feel his eyes wandering over her. He’d be close enough at all times, like now for instance, for her to inhale the warm, virile scent that was uniquely his—an arousing blend of heat, sex, and pure male temptation.
“This all sounds good. Why don’t we reconvene after lunch, and you can brief us on your thoughts? In the meantime, I have some agency business to attend to,” Anna said, ending the meeting.
Kaiya nodded, breathing a sigh of relief, feeling even better when the SEALs discussed using their shooting range. She turned away, glad to get a breather from Kodiak. Grabbing her laptop, she headed for her office, shut the door, and pulled out her cell phone. She dialed Freya first.
“Freya, Kaiya. What’s up with Mickey?”
“Some altercation near Jackson’s Junkyard late last night. We responded to a call that two men were chasing a homeless man. When we got there, Mickey ran right in front of our patrol car. We nabbed him, thinking he was the guy being chased. But when I recognized him, I let him go. He was spooked. I thought you should know.”
“Ta, Freya. I’ll call him.” She dialed Mickey and he picked up on the first ring.
“Where the hell have you been? There are some of Lenny’s thugs down here chasing some guy, and I’m the one who gets caught up.” His voice was shaking, and he sounded really spooked.
“I’m so sorry. Are you all right?”
“Yeah, yeah, but I don’t like it when I can’t reach you.”
“I know. What guy?”
“Some homeless man…Archie something. I can’t imagine what Lenny wants with him. He’s got no scratch to speak of, no valuables and he’s not selling on Lenny’s turf ’cause I would know that, mate. I can’t imagine that he owes Lenny anything.” She could hear street traffic. “Bugger, unless this guy saw something he shouldn’t. I might need to lay low?—”
“No, I need you out there, Mickey. How about I come down there, and we can talk more?”
“Okay but come alone.”
Kaiya hung up. What a strange situation. If Mickey didn’t know why these guys were chasing the homeless man, then something was strangely up. Her gut told her to check it out. First to make sure Mickey was all right, and secondly to glean any information she could about the incident. She bit her lip as she reached for the door handle, intending to slip out, talk to Mickey, and then slip back in. She didn’t want anyone to go with her as it would spook her informant. They wouldn’t miss her. They were all at the range.
She pulled the door open and came flush up against Kodiak, who was lifting his hand to knock on the door. Instead, his knuckles brushed against her hair, a touch she moved instinctively, naturally, into, before she could marshal any rational, cognizant thought. The instant she did, a mere split second later, she tried to correct the motion, but it was already too late. He was far too close to her and in violation of her personal space.
He didn’t move back as she expected. She should step back. Or at the very least say something to mitigate this. Only her body wouldn’t respond to any command she gave it. It was too damn busy reacting to all those hard muscles from his chest all the way down to where their hips met.
He had an amazing body—athletic, and honed to perfection from his job. She took in the breadth of his shoulders, which tapered down to his lean waist. Her insides turned liquid, and her breathing rasped.
She tried to go right, and he also went right, then she went left, and he went left. Now they were dancing in her door frame.
“Whoops,” he said, grabbing her under the arms, his massive biceps bunching with tension, and lifting her off her feet, twisting to set her in the hall still way too close to her. She’d automatically put her hands on his shoulders at the unexpected maneuver, and they flexed beneath her palms, and his breathing hitched. She felt the heat of him through his shirt, every muscle in her body went taut with awareness. Desire coursed through her, her blood rushing, her skin hot. When he set her down, practically allowing her to slide down his body, she was caught up in one of the most sensual moments of her life, unable to get her heated brain to work once she brushed against his groin. He was hard, definitely more than a handful. Heat curled low and deep in her belly at the heady thought of that aggressive male flesh filling her in all the different ways she wouldn’t let herself imagine.
