Raw Edge of Danger (The Omega Team Series Book 1) Page 9
“No one wants to go inside,” Athena whispered.
“They all want the freedom to get away in a hurry if they have to,” Grey whispered back.
The entire thing played out like a ballet, he thought, each man with his own dance steps. The supplier came out of the office carrying what appeared to be a gun box. The middleman got out of his Humvee and walked to him, motioning him to open it. He inspected it carefully then nodded toward the lead SUV. Bostic exited, and his phalanx of bodyguards moved behind him, guns at the ready. The three men engaged in conversation, intense if their body language was any indication. Grey couldn’t hear what was being said, but he knew Riddick and his men were capturing it and recording it.
As Grey and Athena waited for the actual takedown, aware they might not have any role other than observing, a sharp sound split the air, and all hell broke loose.
“Fuck.” Grey pushed Athena flat on the ground then racked the slide on his weapon.
“That was a shot.” She sounded shocked.
“No shit. Don’t move. I want to see what happened.”
She yanked on his sleeve. “If you go, I go. I’m a cop, remember? Or I was.”
On the heels of that one sound came others. When Grey peeked around from behind the dumpster, the muzzle flashes told him they seemed to be coming from all directions. Everyone scrambled to get back in their vehicles, impeded by the unceasing spray of gunfire. As he looked up, one buzzed over his head so close it almost parted his hair. He scooted back and leaned against the metal shield.
“Fuck. Just fuck,” he growled.
“What?” She had her gun at the ready.
“I think someone’s trying to kill us. I should have trusted my gut better on this one.”
“But who?”
“It has to be someone from the ATF. No one else knew we were even going to be here,” he reminded her.
Suddenly, the gunshots ceased, leaving the night empty of all sound. Then voices and the sound of engines starting.
“Should we go see what’s happened?” Athena asked in a low voice.
“No.” He whispered. “Just stay here and follow my lead.”
He squeezed her arm then lay flat, face down, his hand and the gun in it slightly under the edge of the dumpster. He took one brief moment to reach inside his jacket and press a button. Over many missions he’d trained himself to pick up even the most muffled sounds, so he wasn’t shocked when he heard footsteps approach quietly, as if whoever they belonged to was walking softly. Only one set. Figured. He kept his eyes closed when the person stopped right beside him.
“I’m sorry,” Riddick said. “I wish I could have figured out a different way to do this. Killing good people is never any fun.”
With the lightning skills he’d developed through what felt like a million missions, Grey yanked his hand out, rolled, and leaped to his feet. In seconds, he had the gun leveled at Riddick, whose own gun remained uselessly at his side.
“I had a feeling it was you,” he told the man who was his boss. . “You had the most ability to make things go away and the most to lose if this went down the way we planned. Athena, take his gun.”
Riddick just stared at him, the area lights catching the anger flashing in his eyes. “You’re not dead,” he said at last.
“No. Whoever got the assignment was a very bad shot or else miscalculated.” He grunted a rude noise. “Good help is hard to find these days. Maybe you should have done it yourself.”
“You were going to ruin everything. I had less than a year to go before I could safely retire and cash in on everything.”
“Nice big nest egg waiting for you somewhere.”
“No one will ever believe your story,” the ATF agent said with confidence.
“Hey, chief.” Adam came puffing up to where they were all standing. “What’s going on? This sure has been a fucked-up op.”
“Yes, it has.” Grey never took his eyes from Riddick. “But not the way you think.”
“What are you talking about? Athena? What does he mean?”
“He means, Adam,” Athena said in a shocked voice, “that your chief is on the take with Bostic and just tried to kill us.”
“What?” Adam practically shouted the word. “That’s crazy. I mean, that’s just fucked.”
“Hey!” Ezra Burns jogged to them. “Everyone’s waiting. We need to get back to the office and figure out what the hell went wrong tonight.”
“Ask your chief,” Grey said in a controlled voce. “He’s got all the answers.”
“The man’s crazy,” Riddick said. “Adam, I think your friend was taken in by him. Maybe he has PTSD or something.”
“Nice try.” Grey reached inside his jacket and pulled out the micro recorder he’d stashed in there. Always be prepared, his commanding officer’s words still echoed in his ear. He pressed Play and Lige Riddick’s words drifted out into the night air.
“You were going to ruin everything. I had less than a year to go before I could safely retire and cash in on everything.”
“Nice big nest egg waiting for you somewhere
“No one will ever believe your story…”
Riddick lunged at Grey who took a big step backward, and the man fell face down on the ground. Adam and Ezra stared at their boss in shock.
Adam found his voice first. “What the fuck?”
Before the chief could rise, Grey knelt on his back. “Any of you lawmen got a set of handcuffs?”
It was sunrise by the time they got it all sorted out. There were a lot of shell-shocked people at the Division of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Grey knew this would reverberate through the agency, in fact all of D.C. before the dust finally settled. The head of the ATF, roused from his bed by Ezra Burns, had flown in in the agency’s private plane and taken command at once. People from the Tampa office got the warrants they needed and arrested Drake Bostic before he could hightail it out of the country in his private plane.
Before it was even light, a phalanx of high-priced attorneys arrived to bail out their client, only to be told that at arraignment the government would request—and get—no bail. Grey knew this would be a scandal that would rock the country for months to come, and probably prompt a good housecleaning at ATF. All he knew was he had kept his promise and avenged Lucky’s death.
“You expected something like this,” Athena said when they were back sitting in his kitchen with their ever-present mugs of coffee.
“I’m always prepared,” he told her. “It just didn’t make sense that Bostic could operate on this scale for so long without someone on the inside taking care of things for him.”
“When you showed up with proof, he had to figure out a way to get rid of you before everything went public.”
He nodded. “I’d say he’s been asshole buddies with Bostic since the man first began his rise to power. Maybe Riddick tried to take down one of his deals and decided a payoff was a lot better. It just grew from there.”
“If this hadn’t worked, if Riddick had decided to call it all off for whatever trumped-up reason, what was your Plan B?” She gave him a tired grin.
“The power of the press,” he told her.
“Oh?”
“There’s a hotshot reporter covering stuff like this for one of the major news networks. He’d have jumped all over it.”
“Just out of curiosity, why didn’t you go that route first?”
He shrugged. “Maybe, in spite of everything, I’m still a company man at heart. Too many years in the military. I like to follow procedure when I can, and I still believe in the letter of the law.”
“There’ll be a big stink over this,” she told him.
“I expect so. And who knows who else will be uncovered when they clean out the cesspool.” He took a big hit of his coffee. “You can probably go back to work now,” he pointed out. “Bostic won’t be around to pay off your bosses and get his shenanigans covered over.”
She studied him over the rim of her mug before sh
e answered. “I think I’m done being a cop. At least an official one.”
He raised an eyebrow. “What do you plan to do? I can’t see you taking early retirement.”
“Hardly.” She gave him a pensive look. “What about you? Where do you go from here?”
He was silent for a moment. “More coffee?”
She laughed. “That’s your answer to the question? Okay, I’ll play along.” She held out her mug.
Since everything had gone to hell tonight—no, even before that, when he knew his mission would soon be over and he’d be at loose ends—he’d had a thought in the back of his mind. When they were seated at the table with freshly filled mugs, she looked at him with a question in her eyes.
“Okay, give. What’s going on in that brain of yours?”
“You ever hear the definition of an Omega man?” he asked.
She stared at him as if he’d gone crazy. “A what?”
He laughed. “An Omega man. He doesn’t care about being seen by his peers as the toughest, smartest, most popular.”
“Like the typical alpha,” she commented.
“Exactly. Omega men have a resourcefulness and cunning to get the job done with their own skill. They are all things alpha and more.” He swallowed some coffee. “When I left for the Marines, my father gave me a tiny pin to wear, the Greek Omega symbol. He told me to carry it into battle and use it as a guiding force in my life. It gave me strength without wearing my ego on my sleeve.”
“And you’ve done that,” she said.
He nodded. “I was known as someone who could get even the most dangerous task accomplished.”
“Well, I guess after this business I have to agree with you, but how does that affect me and my future? And you?”
“I have a proposition for you.” He set his mug on the table. “There are a lot of situations like the one we just came through. Not necessarily arms deals and terrorists but events that require something beyond the boundaries of the law. Protection. Bodyguarding. Hostage rescue. Maybe things where the hands of law enforcement are tied.” He shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe I’m just spitting in the wind here, but I have it in mind to start an agency. The two of us, if you’re interested. I’ve got a nice little nest egg accumulated, and Lucky left me his. Which, by the way, puts mine to shame. It can give us a good startup fund until we get some clients.”
“And how exactly would we do that?”
He shrugged again. “Word of mouth. I can put it out there to some buddies of mine. I hear about stuff all the time, people saying if only there was someone who….” He paused for a moment. “Things will probably be slow at first, but I think we can make it work. We made a good team this time. We read each other’s signals, and we each come to it from a different perspective.”
He could almost see her brain working.
“I have some money I can throw in, too,” she said at last. “And I sure need a new lease on life.”
He reached for her hand. “We have great chemistry, Athena. I think we can go somewhere with that, too. So what do you say? Fifty-fifty? Partners? The Omega Team.”
Suddenly, she laughed, a warm sound. “Yes, yes, yes. Let’s do it.”
He pushed back from the table and lifted her in his arms.
“I think we need to seal the deal in the bedroom. Tomorrow, we’ll figure out the rest.”
About the Author
Known as the oldest living author of erotic romance, Desiree Holt has produced more than two hundred titles in nearly every subgenre of romance fiction. Her stories are enriched by her personal experiences, her characters by the people she meets. After fifteen ears in the great state of Texas she relocated back to Florida to be closer to members of her family and a large collection of friends. Her favorite pastimes are watching football, reading, and researching her stories.
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Table of Contents
From Desiree
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
About the Author