Encrypted (33 page)

Groaning, Ronnie really started to doubt herself. “Picking up any signals?”

They had knocked out all satellite feeds
in
the area and shut down the site’s radar and thermal imaging capabilities, but still…

“Besides a rather loud Mexican radio station giving away what sounds like bull testicles to the sixth caller, no.”

“Are you sure
?
The CIA has been toying with
—
”

Quirk’s deep frown stopped her inquiry. Of course
,
Quirk was checking all the frequencies and bandwidths.

“Sorry.”

Normally
,
he would have made her pay for her micromanaging with some form of
1980s
music trivia, but clearly Quirk was giving her some leeway
,
given the circumstances
.
For that
,
she was grateful
.
She really was not in the mood to figure out the B-side track from the
1982 single by A
Flock of Seagulls,
“
I Ran
(So Far Away)
.
”

“And just
as
a heads
-
up, it looks like this plague is on steroids,” Quirk reported, texting his contact back.

Like Ronnie needed any more bad news.

“So
,
check your lymph nodes already,” Quirk scolded. She wasn’t going to check anything until Zach was safe and sound.

“Is that a friendly?” the pilot asked.

She scanned the area ahead
.
The dirt road appeared empty. Wait
!
W
as someone
leaving
the
safe house through its
dented tin door
?
M
ore
accurately,
someone
was
stumbling
out the door
.
Trying to adjust the binoculars, Ronnie knocked them out of focus
.
Her fingers scrambled to bring them back from blurry-
ville
.

“Should I fire?” the pilot asked casually.

“For the love of all that is holy,
no
!”

Ronnie fumbled with the dials until the image fuzzed out
,
and
then came back into sharp focus
.
She would know that chin anywhere.

“It’s a friendly
,
” Ronnie said with a smile. It was the friendliest.

* * *

Quirk took the binoculars from Ronnie
.
How such an incredibly competent hacker could mess up the world’s most expensive binoculars was beyond him
.
Fiddling with the multiple rings, he brought Zach’s face into such relief that it looked like the FBI agent stood right in front of him.

Even in pain, those features were chiseled to perfection
.
Quirk let out a whistle. “Even bruised
,
he is one fine specimen.”

Ronnie did not argue with him as she turned to the pilot
.
“Set us down.”

But the beefcake shook his head
.
“No can do.”

“Um…
yes
can do,” his boss countered.

Quirk could have warned the pilot not to bother arguing with Ronnie when she was in this mood
.
B
ut in truth
,
Quirk wanted to watch the pilot’s jaw tense up and down. Clearly
,
his
lymph nodes were not bursting with the Black Death.

“We are in a hostile environment chosen by the enemy,” the hunk
guffed
. “If I land, we lose any slight advantage
that
we may have.”

His boss put two fists on her hips and skewered the pilot with a look that would have melted solid metal
.

“Yeah, like you said. It’s
my
dime.” Even more forcefully
,
Ronnie commanded, “
Land
.”

The pilot grunt
ed
.
Not quite accepting
,
but not arguing
,
either
.
So maybe the guy was as big a teddy bear as he looked.

While the pilot maneuvered the chopper, preparing for a landing, Quirk’s phone vibrated in his pocket.
For the tenth time.
He loved Jennifer with all his heart
,
but he just didn’t have the time to dis
h
on
why
Tim Gunn wasn’t a part of
Project Runway All Stars
. There it went again. Okay, maybe it was actual plague stuff she was
talking
about. Quirk pulled the phone out and scanned her texts. Jennifer was asking for CIA clearance? Um, a weird request
,
but since he was already patched into the agency’s mainframe, there was no reason he couldn’t accommodate
her
. The CIA wasn’t exactly in Quirk’s close friend “circle.”

“As you wish,” he typed
,
and
then routed the data stream to her IP address. Quirk certainly hoped Jennifer’s day was going better than theirs.

Then the helicopter set down on the dusty, dusty ground
.
Before Quirk could offer even the slight
est
scolding on how careful she should be, Ronnie was out of the helicopter
.
As soon as her boots hit the dirt, the chopper lifted off again.

“Um, I think Ronnie meant for us to
stay
on the ground.”

The pilot looked over his shoulder
.
“Sorry. It’s
not
your dime
,
”
he said.

Even though their gaze
s
met for only a second, Quirk felt his cheek
s
flush and his heart race.

A teddy bear
and
a top
?

This must be Quirk’s lucky day.

“So,” Quirk said as he sat down in the copilot’s seat. “How long have you been an illegal mercenary pilot? Hmmm?”

* * *

Ronnie raced toward Zach as he lurched forward
.
She caught him just before he went down.

She forced a playful tone
.
“Hey, sexy.”

Zach couldn’t pretend
that
he was in anything but agony. “Hey there, yourself.”

Even that seemed to take the last of Zach’s energy as he sank to his knees
.
Ronnie lowered beside him. To her surprise
,
his lips tugged up in a little grin.

“I don’t know what you were expecting,” Zach said through pain-clenched teeth, “But this is
not
how I pictured our first date.”

She couldn’t help but smile back
.
“Yeah, you missed quite the outfit.”

How many times had she dreamed of this moment?
Their slow walk across the room.
Her hair flowing back.
His eyes gazing into hers.
The reality? She was too busy choking on dirt to really appreciate the moment.

Besides
,
they didn’t
have
a moment. They needed to get the hell out of
t
here before the CIA decided to drop a bomb on them.
Literally
. Ronnie rose to her feet, expecting Zach to follow, but he stayed down.

“Um, I
’
m digging the scenery,” Ronnie said as playfully as she could under the circumstances, “but we’ve got to get back into the air.”

Zach tugged up his shirt, exposing his midsection
—
mottled in blacks, purples, and blues
.
Ronnie’s hand flew to her mouth
.
She
knew
he had been tortured, but to
actually
see
the damage…

And all for
her
.

He could have just told them where she was
.
He could have lured her here without her being any the wiser
.
She would have followed him without question
.
Yet he hadn’t
.
Zach had taken this beating to protect her
.
If they weren’t under threat of death, she would have laid a lip
-
lock on him right there.

However
,
she saw the pain in his eyes
.
Not from the physical pain
,
but from shame
.
That somehow it was his fault
that
he was injured
.
Too injured to even rise
.

Men
.

So she joked, “Okay, this is going a little far to prove
that
you didn’t stand me up.”

He chuckled
.
Even that seemed to hurt
,
but it softened his features.

“Come on,” Ronnie encouraged. “We’ve got an
ultrasound
on
board
.
Let’s get you up there.”

Ronnie watched Zach
accustom
himself to the pain
.
He
gritted his teeth and
took three short breaths before he leaned in
to her
.
It took
the strength of
both of the
m
to get him on his feet
,
and even then
,
Zach pressed against her
.
Not that she was complaining.

As they hobbled over to the landing helicopter, Zach winced
.
“An
ultrasound
machine
?
On a helicopter?”

“Yeah, and trust me,” Ronnie said
.
“It did
not
come cheap.”

* * *

Zach landed hard on the
chopper
floor as it lifted off before they
climbed
fully in
.
Zach
would
have thought
at some point
that his
pain receptors would give out
.
H
owever
,
that was just wishful thinking. T
he helicopter lurched
,
and he slammed into a metal bench as his vision blurred
.

Ronnie tried to steady him, but the damage was done. As tenderly
as
she could while riding a bucking, accelerating helicopter, Ronnie helped him into a jump seat. Even with all of that, he couldn’t take his eyes
away from
her. Okay, some of that may have been him trying to keep his head from spinning. The other
was for a much less practical reason.

She turned to the pilot, sending her blond
e
ponytail swishing across his face. Zach wouldn’t complain. They were finally in the same
ZIP
code
and
on the same chopper. Too bad
that
he felt halfway to passing out.

“Anything?” she asked the pilot.

“All clear,” the big man replied.

“
All
?” Ronnie emphasized.

“Nothing on the deck,” the pilot said as he
held
the cold butt of a cigar between his teeth. Zach knew from experience that old dogs like the pilot didn’t like to be questioned.

Ronnie swung back to the young man sitting behind half
a
dozen monitors. From the dark hair to the well-manicured fingertips, Zach could only assume
that
it was Quirk.
How very jealous Warp would be.