“What?” he snarled into the phone.
“Please hold your position, Alex,” the cocky director of the FBI’s one and only psychic team, Tucker Chase, ordered calmly. “Tell your men to stand down. Don’t you dare shoot my guy.”
Alex hated working with the FBI, but Tucker and his psychics? They weren’t so bad. Had actually been helpful once or twice. Just annoying.
“Belay that order!” he told Eric, Harley, and Jameson. “Son of a bitch, Tuck, which one is yours? Lucy Delaney or the lone man still inside the warehouse?” At this point, he honestly didn’t know who was who.
“The cocky son of a bitch standing at the open door is mine. He’s now looking square at your man on the ground, whose body is spread over… What’s her name?” he asked someone else. Had to be chatting with the psychic agent Alex now had in his crosshairs.
Tuck came back with, “Maddie Bannister. Your man’s protecting your protocol officer and she’s scared shitless. Jameson Tenney—he’s the lucky bastard on the ground with his body on top of hers. Don’t worry. Delaney got off a few rounds, and Tenney’s hit, but he’s a former SEAL. He’s tough. He’ll be okay. The other round hit that old guy with you. Is that… My hell, that’s your father?”
Tuck never waited for an answer, not like Alex would’ve provided one. “You never told me your dad was in town. Bottom line, both Tenney and your old man aren’t seriously injured. Eric Reynolds and Harley Mortimer are with you, too. Sure wish you’d promote Zack Lennox. He’s long overdue to be senior agent.”
“Shut up,” Alex snapped. Tuck always did talk too much, and now that he was FBI director over the psychic team, he seemed to think he knew too damned much as well. “What do you need?”
Delaney opened fire again and—
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! Jameson Tenney fired three answering shots in lightning quick succession.
The wooden louvers above the open warehouse bay cracked outward. The new boss of the Irish mob tumbled through them. Like a bag of cement with arms and legs extended, Lucy Shade fell face first to the concrete dock a good forty feet below. Her weapon shattered on impact.
Jameson Tenney, the one and only blind TEAM agent, had just taken out the mass murderer no one else could see. Made a man wonder what else he could do.
Tuck’s man strolled forward and looked down at her, his weapon poised to deliver a double tap if needed. Which it wasn’t. The human skull wasn’t much different than a melon when it impacted concrete from that altitude. Lucy Delaney expired on contact. Good riddance.
“You know she also set charges inside that warehouse, don’t you?” Tucker purred through Alex’s phone’s earpiece. “She planned to blow the entire place, leave no evidence of her old man’s legacy behind. She wanted a fresh start. New crew. Apparently, new inventory, too.”
“I know now,” Alex groused. “Has your man secured the detonator? Or do we need to call in EOD?”
“Nah. My guy already disarmed the device. One more thing. That warehouse is stacked to the rafters with illegal hardware. Machine guns. Rifles. LAWs. Tactical helmets and vests, NVGs, you name it. And enough ammo to supply every household on the East Coast with a dozen boxes. I’ll let you know when or if any of that goes on FBI auction.”
Which Alex doubted. The Bureau would be wise to add this stash to their inventory instead of auctioning it off to John Q. Public. Might save the taxpayer a couple million. Not that the Bureau was that kind of smart.
“Anything else?”
“Think about what I said. Zack’s a good man. You don’t want to lose him.”
“Not worried about Zack leaving me, Tuck,” Alex replied with venom. “Just remember, two of your men are on loan from my TEAM. The day they come back to me, you’ll lose Eden, possibly Isaiah, too. So back off.”
Tucker chuffed. “Good working with you again.”
“Copy that,” Alex replied tersely, switching off that irksome call and turning back to his TEAM.
By then, the local police had arrived on scene. Several vehicles full of agents from the Massachusetts Port Authority, too. A couple fire engines and a raft of radio and television reporters. A damned local news helicopter.
Alex pushed to his feet while Eric and Harley ran to assist Jameson and Maddie. The show might be over, but the circus was just beginning.
Chapter Twenty-Six
“Why the fuck are you here?” Jameson growled down at Maddie, damned angry with her for charging into trouble without thinking things through. Without bringing him! Yet at the same time, thankful she wasn’t the one lying twenty feet away with her face poured over concrete.
“This was all my f-f-fault,” she stuttered. “I killed her dad.”
“So? Pops Delaney had it coming. He meant to kill us, remember?” How could she forget who’d abducted them?
“Yessss, but...”
Jameson’s cock went hard at the soft, sweet whisper of her tongue sliding over her lips and the way she smacked her lips… and shit. It was impossible to stay angry with this woman. He’d lost his glasses in the mad dash to get to her and… Damn! He’d give anything to be able to see her, to really look into her eyes. Yet he couldn’t let her off easy. He’d just killed the woman bent on killing Maddie, and the resounding adrenaline dump after taking a life was a hard beast to rein in.
“You wanted to be a Marine, well, listen up, Mad Dog. Team members don’t leave each other behind, and they sure as fuck don’t go off half-cocked on a revenge killing! You hear me, Bannister?!”
He waited for an answer, but when she said nothing, he let her have it. “If I was Alex, I’d fire your ass. And you’re supposed to be his Protocol Officer?! Shit. I’d have you peeling potatoes until—”
“I’m not Mad Dog!” she yelled back at him, her body shaking. “I’m just me! You’re just like my dad! Stop trying to make me someone I’m
