Cowboy snorted. “Like that’s stopped you before.”
Danny’s grin stretched across his face. This time with pride. “Damn straight.”
“I reckon after the Marines, Jason will be a deadly shot.”
Those years of practice—with his natural skill—would make him a sought-after sniper. “I hear Jesse’s thinking of waving college for him.” While agents weren’t required to have a college degree—unless like some agencies where it was a job requirement—it’d been a Hamilton family standard. “Plus, I don’t think he’s told his parents he’s considering the Marines instead of following in his dad’s footsteps and joining the Army.” Danny paused on that thought, then added, “Following either of his dads.”
Jason’s bio-dad had been a Navy SEAL and his stepfather had been an Army Ranger. Both tough careers to follow.
“Then,” Cowboy said, “he can hurry his ass on back here because we need a sniper.”
Danny grunted. Alpha team lost their sharpshooter when Sugar married Boss and left the teams. Bravo team had two snipers, but one was also the medic, which conflicted with his role on the field.
Hearing the “all clear” signal to Jason through his earpiece, Danny refocused on the target. Absently, he said, “I’m not sure it matters.”
“Come on, come on,” Cowboy chanted, as if Jason could hear.
Quirking an eyebrow, even though they both faced the action, Danny asked, “You’re cheering him to fail at his task? I’m guessing this is more about not losing forty dollars.”
In his peripheral vision, Danny caught Cowboy shrugging. “I’d never put money before bullets.”
They stilled as the target jerked and the report of a rifle followed.
Cowboy lifted the binoculars he held and focused on the target. When he took a moment, Danny knew. Checking himself, Jason had hit center mass as directed by Jesse—a sniper himself. Like father, like son. Or stepfather and stepson. However one looked at it.
“Shit.” Cowboy dropped the binoculars back to his side. “So, how’s the dating going?”
A chuckle left Danny at the change of subject. “Smooth transition.”
Reaching back for his wallet, Cowboy grinned. “Sugar still setting you up?”
Samantha had been tagged with Sugar as a callsign the moment she’d met the teams. Her voice was sweet as sugar. That southern accent did it every time. Damn, they missed her humor and skills.
“God, yes.” He groaned at the thought of all the failures to find him the right woman. Especially Barbara.
“Still crazies?”
When Sugar left the teams, she knew he wanted to marry, so she made it her mission to find him the perfect woman. Although he doubted it would happen on a blind date, he’d agreed to please her. Secretly, he did have hope that one of those dates would work out. Heck, anyone on the team—including Cowboy—would’ve dated to please her. As Boss’s wife, she held their respect, but as a former team member, she was held in high esteem.
Since then, he’d consented to six dates. It’d taken her time to find the women since she’d been new to Baltimore. When she’d said it’d be her mission, she’d meant it. She joined several gyms, met school teachers at her godson’s school, chatted up women at the supermarket, and so the list went, so she could find someone for him. It did touch him that she put so much effort into it. Happily married women wanted all their friends to be the same. Some—like Sugar—went out of their way to make it happen.
After these dates—one of which he’d gone on a second date with, but that was it—he ended up blocking the women from his social media pages as they either clung, begged, or bitched about him. He’d also had to block the first few women’s calls on his cell because Sugar had provided his phone number. After a serious discussion with her, she stopped that practice.
Danny should’ve been proud he’d been friendly enough they’d wanted to see him again, but he’d had no desire to deal with their shenanigans.
“Pretty much. She actually set me up with Barbara last night.”
Cowboy stopped in the process of dropping the owed money into Danny’s outstretched hand. “Barbie?” he asked in disbelief.
A smile tugged at the corners of Danny’s mouth. He could laugh now, but had shuddered the night before. “Yep. One and the same.”
After shaking his head, Cowboy slapped the money into Danny’s palm. “How’d that happen? I’d think you’d have recognized that psycho bitch’s name.”
Cowboy had been privy to all the stupid shit Barbara had done after meeting Danny a few years back. She showed up wherever he was, called at all hours, harassed women he dated after her. At least she hadn’t been violent. She did, however, need to learn how to deal with rejection.
Danny snorted. “I didn’t even ask this time. Although it wouldn’t have mattered. She gave Sugar a fake name. She knew Jen—the last blind date, and thought it might be me, so she pushed for the date.”
“No shit.”
No longer wishing to discuss the leech he hoped hadn’t reattached herself to him, Danny checked his watch. 1400. Declan and Moira should be in the air. He’d made a plan with Declan to hide him, after leaving Ireland, until Diana’s father was no longer an issue. It’d been easy since it truly involved finding them a place to stay, some security, and help settling in or finding a long-term location in Baltimore or elsewhere.
The 0900 call had been a surprise. The escape had been planned for a month from now. The Gallaghers arriving now created no problem except accommodations, but what caused the rush hadn’t been discussed. He’d find out later today. They should arrive around 1800.
“Remember when I told you about my friends from Ireland arriving next month?”
Cowboy nodded. “Sure. We were going to
