Deceptive Treasures: Slye Temp Book 5 Read online

  “I thought you ran ops with your HAMR teams. Sounds like you’re more a negotiator or international diplomat.”

  Logan didn’t smile, but it was there in his eyes. “Words can often be as powerful or dangerous as a weapon. My friend had a sub in the area to begin joint maneuvers with China’s navy in two days. He told me he’d let his sub give your team a ride as long as I assured him they wouldn’t have to engage the DPRK.”

  “That’s why he didn’t surface until the Korean forces turned around and headed home after blowing up our patrol boat.”

  “Right. They knew he was out there, but they don’t want to mess with Russia or China.”

  “You took a helluva gamble.”

  “Not really,” Margaux Duke argued, entering the conversation as she sat across from them on a sofa.

  She smiled at him. “I told Logan that worst-case scenario, you would unleash your secret weapon and take the risk of starting a third world war.”

  Tanner smiled for the first time in what felt like days. “Nick?”

  She nodded, grinning.

  “We’re all lucky that submarine captain has a sense of humor.” Tanner rubbed his aching head.

  Logan, who had been smiling at Margaux, his not-quite-fiance-but-more-than-girlfriend, turned a dark frown on Tanner. “What the hell happened?”

  “Nick tried to convince the captain to teach him how to drive the sub, but the captain just grinned at him.”

  “Hell.” Logan shuddered.

  Margaux burst out laughing and, in two seconds, Logan was back to smiling again.

  She was now part of Logan’s HAMR Brotherhood. From what Sabrina had told Tanner, the HAMR Brotherhood was made up of teams in places all over the world, and had been only men until Logan took on Margaux. But the men on his personal team had no trouble accepting her after all she’d done. She’d helped Logan escape after being tortured in a South American jungle, then she’d taken one for the team in a terrorist attack in Seattle last year. Logan did covert work for INTERPOL sometimes and had used those contacts to create an identity for Margaux that allowed her to disappear.

  Someone from her past wanted her dead.

  That person had better never go up against Logan or anyone from Slye. Margaux might be part of HAMR now, but she would always belong to Sabrina’s team.

  Tanner recalled their last parting and asked Margaux, “How’s primitive life?”

  “I keep trying to explain to Logan that my idea of roughing it is a hotel without a flat screen TV,” she quipped, cutting a look at Logan that caused him to smother a laugh. Margaux hated anything that smacked of camping and Logan spent as much time in a jungle or wilderness as he did in civilization.

  She was one dangerous operative and more than capable of defending herself, but Logan was in a league of his own and would bring the world down on anyone who touched her. They were crazy in love, even if their relationship made no sense to Tanner.

  She’d walk through fire for Logan and wanted only him, but she drew the line at walking down the aisle.

  The man who figured out women would rule the universe.

  The plane leveled off into cruising altitude.

  Margaux scooted forward to the edge of the sofa and kept her voice down now that the engine noise was a dull drone. “What’s the deal with your girl?”

  Jin wasn’t Tanner’s girl.

  He ignored that just as he’d been ignoring the silent figure sitting in the dark at the rear of the open cabin area. He explained, “Like I told Sabrina, Jin showed up with intel that the mission had been compromised, then had a way out of Pyongyang through the tunnels.”

  “That could be a stroke of luck,” Margaux said, thinking out loud. “Or a set-up.”

  Tell me about it. That conflicting thought had bounced back and forth in his mind to the point his head should have dents from the inside.

  Tanner had the time during this trip to Los Angeles, then the leg to Atlanta, to figure out what he was going to say in his report about Jin. He’d have to hand over all three North Koreans to Sabrina when he reached Slye Temp headquarters located near the Atlanta airport. Sabrina would transfer them to the person she’d cut the deal with in the State Department.

  Someone who did not want his identity known, so the transfer would happen in the underground offices at Slye Temp. Street level was a corporate security business, but missions were planned for national security in the basement operations center beneath the offices.

  Jin, Pang, and Har would vanish the minute Tanner handed them to Sabrina.

  Once that happened, no one on his team, including him, could say a word about this trip or those three. Ever. Sabrina would bust a blood vessel if he so much as hinted at wanting to know how it turned out for Jin.

  Margaux twisted to her right and stretched her long neck, staring at the back of the airplane.

  Now what?

  She flipped back around and told Tanner, “You going to recline her chair or make your prisoner fly the whole way sitting up?”

  What kind of asshole didn’t consider that?

  Me, I guess.

  “Thanks, Duke,” Tanner muttered.

  She grinned. “At your service.”

  It grated on him to thank her for pointing out his lack of consideration for the prisoner. Margaux liked to be right and he hated to admit when she was.

  Guilt jumped up and slapped him in the face.

  Jin had dragged him and his team through tunnels they never would have found and he hadn’t said two words to her since landing in that life raft.

  Tanner stood, feeling every minute his banged-up body had endured to get here. Jin would be asleep by now if he’d taken the time to check on her and get her comfortable, but he’d been avoiding any show of concern for her that might be misconstrued.

  And why was he beating himself up?

  They’d only been in the air about ten minutes.

  He knew why. He’d intentionally been avoiding anything more than professional contact with her, and he was doing it for her welfare even though he couldn’t point that out. His report on how she’d aided their mission would carry more weight if no one got the idea that he was sympathizing with her.

  Using the tiny, ankle-high lights, he walked quietly down the center of the dark airplane to keep from disturbing the others, but they were all in deep sleep.

  Blade had set up Har in the private area just past where Jin sat. Not totally private right now, since Tanner had not allowed Har to close the door. He wanted to be able to see the lump back there on a sofa.

  Pang was in the front, just as gone.

  Tanner had separated all three of them as soon as possible. Standard Operating Procedure.

  Everyone had been given an hour in a hotel to shower and change into clothes Margaux supplied. She’d taken Jin into a separate hotel room and stood guard while Jin washed the salt and grime from her skin and hair.

  Margaux had tried to engage her, but Jin gave only one-word answers.

  Jin had walked out of the hotel room with her dark brown hair twisted up in a knot, giving Tanner his first good look at her. She had freckles. Not many, but that little sprinkle across her nose surprised him. He was having a hard time getting them, or the silver-blue eyes out of his mind.

  Blade had checked the cut on her head and told her to keep it clean, but remembering how she’d gotten the injury backhanded Tanner with another slap of guilt.

  As he walked up to Jin’s seat, he took in the soft, blue warm-up pants and gray sweatshirt she wore, and her slender wrists, bound by flex-cuffs. Also standard operating procedure. She was huddled into herself. Was she still cold?

  Her hands were in her lap and clenched so tightly her knuckles had lost color.

  What was wrong with her?

  Panic over an unknown future?

  He gave an internal headshake. She was the one who’d refused to provide more than her name being Soo Jin, no last name. Before they’d boarded the jet, he’d pulled her aside
and warned her that any hesitation to share information on her part would not go well.

  Her answer? “You know as much as you need to know about me.”

  Should he play the tough guy again and warn her how bad it would be when they reached Atlanta if she didn’t cough up something the State Department would consider usable, or go the nice guy route and cajole her into giving up a few nuggets of information to see if she had anything of value to offer?

  She chose that moment to lift terrified eyes that smashed any chance of his playing the tough guy.

  He moved over to squat in front of her. Her face was as pale as her knuckles and she was shaking. He asked, “What’s wrong?”

  She clamped her jaw, refusing to answer him.

  “Look, I told you what you need to do for us to cut you some slack.”

  “I …”

  “You what?” He leaned close. “You can tell me.”

  “No.”

  Her breathing tripped up to hyperventilation level. He reached into a side pocket on her seat and found a bag for airsickness. Opening it up, he moved it toward her face.

  She jerked back. “Get ... away from me.” That came out with a gasp between each word.

  “Does flying make you sick?”

  Her jaw muscles kept flexing with the strain of her trying to keep quiet and struggle with every breath. “Go. Away.”

  “No,” he said gently. “Talk to me.” He had to consider that this might be nothing but a ploy to get her wrists freed.

  The shaking intensified.

  Her pale blue eyes were unfocused. That didn’t look like an act. She was going to black out from not getting enough oxygen any minute now.

  He lifted the bag to her face and told her to breathe into it. This time she did, over and over, but the shaking wasn’t getting any better. This was full-blown panic attack.

  Tossing the bag aside, he put his fingers under her chin, turning her to face him. “Tell me what you can, Jin. I’ll help you. I promise.”

  She looked up at him with so much fear and pain he felt it slam him in his abdomen. Her shoulders were lurching forward and back with trying to breathe. “Airplane...” More hard breathing. “Dangerous.”

  Ah, shit. Pteromerhanophobia. He knew the name because his sister Hannah feared flying and nicknamed her phobia terra-Hannah syndrome—as in terrified Hannah. Jin had probably never been on an airplane before now.

  She shoved her bound hands to her face and rocked.

  Hannah had told Tanner what not to say when someone had a panic attack, especially on an airplane.

  Never say to calm down. That was like telling someone with a gash in his chest to stop bleeding.

  Never tell them their fear is irrational. And he shouldn’t tell them to just stop it unless he wanted a voodoo doll created in his likeness.

  Just thinking of Hannah and the idea of his sister’s hands bound while she panicked turned his stomach inside out.

  Screw this.

  Tanner dug out a pocketknife and used it to slice the flex-cuff on Jin’s wrists. He’d followed protocol for transporting someone of unconfirmed identity who’d appeared unexpectedly during a mission.

  There wasn’t actually a protocol for that so much as Sabrina’s order to do so. That was the only reason he’d sucked it up and handcuffed Jin.

  Yep, that had killed another part of his soul.

  Sabrina wasn’t here right now and this was still Tanner’s operation. She could rip him a new one later.

  He dropped from a squat to land on his knees and pulled Jin to him.

  She was stiff at first, but her fear was so strong it apparently overrode any pride she had that would make her refuse his help after he’d handcuffed her.

  He rubbed her back, whispering to her to take it easy and breathe. “Count with me. One, two, three ... something.”

  Not a word at first then she mumbled, “Four ... five.”

  She’d gasp then count a little more with him urging her on. Her breathing slowly leveled out and the shaking began to subside. He kept holding her and rubbing her back because, well, he liked it. She was warm and soft.

  When was the last time he’d held warm and soft?

  Too damned long ago.

  Allie, the soul-eater, had screwed with his mind. After her, he’d only been interested in fast, hard and no long goodbyes. He thought too much of the nice girls his mom and sisters kept trying to pawn off on him to ever date one. A prick like he was needed to stick with the cold ones who also wanted fast, hard and see ya, thanks for the fun.

  But the female in his arms didn’t fit in either of those groups.

  She’d saved their bacon and he’d handcuffed her like a criminal.

  He’d be pissed too if that had happened to him.

  And now she’d had to admit to a phobia in front of him, when she was not only furious with him, but probably trusted him about as much as a pet rattlesnake.

  In complete conflict with Jin’s initial reaction to his touching her, she turned cuddly as a baby kitten.

  Where had her fury gone?

  He got his answer when he heard a soft snore. Exhaustion had drained the fight out of her. He kissed her hair and picked her up, then looked around belatedly to see if anyone was watching.

  A tiny reading light on a stem glowed near Margaux. She was facing in his direction, watching. He’d never hear the end of this.

  She stood and walked silently through the group of dead-to-the-world bodies and came back to him. Now was not the time for verbal warfare with her.

  Without a word, she opened Jin’s chair to recline position and stepped away, but not without sliding a smirk at him.

  Tanner placed Jin down carefully, hoping she wouldn’t wake anytime soon and have to face her fear again. He’d ask Blade to give her something to handle the last leg of this trip from Los Angeles to Atlanta. They’d stop just long enough to fuel and go.

  Margaux dug around in another compartment and handed him a blanket. She could have put it on Jin herself, but no, she just held it out with a look of I’ve-got-your-number on her face.

  He covered Jin and followed Margaux back to where Logan was sprawled across the sofa.

  Margaux dug out an armful of blankets. She tossed one at Tanner then dropped one in the empty chair next to his and used the last one to cover Logan. She smoothed her hand over Logan’s face with a tenderness Tanner had never witnessed when she’d been on the Slye teams.

  He’d have jerked her chain over it, but it made him feel good to see her happy. She used to bust his chops constantly in the Slye Temp war room. It irritated the hell out of him until Tanner realized that was her version of bonding.

  Until he realized how very alone she’d been.

  Anything that hinted of real emotion sent her racing in the opposite direction.

  The Duke, as she was affectionately known, had been one of the toughest and most dependable agents he’d ever worked with, but she’d been hollow inside. Logan changed that and gave her a chance at a real life.

  Tanner would overlook any asshattery from Logan for that reason alone.

  When Margaux settled across from him and shook the blanket over her legs, she lifted a face empty of all humor to Tanner. “You can’t save them all, cowboy.”

  “What are you saying?”

  “The people in trouble. I’m slowly learning that you just save as many as you can and that has to be enough.”

  “I know that.”

  Margaux’s steady gaze questioned if he accepted that truth. She mused on it a few seconds and added, “Everything about her is suspicious.”

  “Yep.”

  “If they think she’s a spy or a plant, they’ll lock her up. She’ll never go home and she’ll never be free in our country.”

  That was why Tanner felt claws ripping through his insides. Jin needed help, but there wasn’t a thing he could do for her once he handed her off.

  Chapter Sixteen

  At the Pentagon ...

&n
bsp; The General lifted his head from reviewing the budget for another prototype stealth aircraft with some impressive capabilities. The person he’d been waiting for stood in his office doorway to report in.

  He dropped his pen and leaned back. “Close the door, H.P.”

  H.P., which stood for Huang Phon, stepped inside and made his way to the leather chair that faced the desk. He was in the State Department and overseeing the secret mission to get two physicists out of North Korea.

  Nodding politely first, H.P. began in a cultured voice gained from growing up in the US. “I have news on our project. The two physicists escaped Pyongyang, but not through the anticipated route where we could intercept them before they arrived here.”

  “What? Find those two and bring them in.” The General slammed his palm on his desktop. “I got you this State Department position so that something like this would not happen.”

  “The contractor handling the extraction is waiting on word from her people.”

  “Her? Who is this contractor?”

  “Sabrina Slye. She executed classified work for the CIA at one time, but dropped out of sight for a while after a disagreement on her last mission for the spooks. Now she is in Atlanta, where her cover company caters to corporations and select clientele who require specialized security.”

  The General leaned forward and growled, “You told me you had a way to bring them here without tying up any funds. No paperwork. Why’d you choose her outfit?”

  “She owed the DEA a mission and the DEA owed us a favor. You said you didn’t want the military involved, sir. Sending Sabrina’s people fulfilled that requirement. I spoke to the Slye woman moments ago and she assured me that her people were bringing the two physicists out alive.”

  The General grunted his approval. He’d spent a fat chunk of money and favors getting H.P. into a position that afforded The General a layer between him and operations such as this one.

  “What happened to the exit route we arranged, H.P.?” The smugglers were to bring the two physicists into South Korea, where The General had his man Len Rikker and a team ready to capture them and take them to a secret location where The General would put them to work. Somewhere no country would interfere.