LITMIR.BIZ

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account for the subsequent attack on Ike Rombout, the tech-savvy, terminally annoying woman who’d helped Max track down Forsythe, and it didn’t account for whoever was blackballing Vasek & Caine now.

      That left it up to Vasek & Caine—or rather left it up to William—to identify the other eight members of the supposedly nonexistent group and bring them to justice. He’d be ensuring the company’s safety and future. He’d be saving the scientific community from their very own version of organized crime. And as an added bonus, he’d be showing up his former boss, FBI Special Agent in Charge Michael Grosskill.

      The thought had William checking his watch again. “You’re going to be late if you don’t get going, and we both know Raine doesn’t do late.”

      William liked Max’s wife a great deal, but she fell square into the high-maintenance category in his brain. Not because she liked expensive clothes and makeup—hell, he liked his women to look like women, and that required some mirror time. But Raine also ran a company of her own, and since the wedding, Max had been putting as much effort into Rainey Days as he was into Vasek & Caine.

      William understood that a man had to protect what was his, but he had a strong feeling he wasn’t going to like Max’s solution. Mentally bracing himself, he said, “Come on, give with the favor. It can’t be that bad.”

      “I want to take on someone to help you. Someone who can do the data crunching while you pound the pavement.”

      William shrugged. “Tempting, but we can’t afford a receptionist, never mind a—” He broke off as he made the connection. His mind clicked on the image of a tall, lean woman with a killer body, three earrings in one ear, a mean-ass attitude and a fondness for tight black leather. His blood flared hot, then cold, and he said, “Oh, no, you don’t. Hell no. You’re not saddling me with that know-it-all Matrix wannabe.”

      “Ike is hell on wheels with computers,” Max argued. “She knows way more than either of us about data mining and she’s got sources we can’t even dream of. She could help you find the names. Maybe even identify the next target.”

      I already have a name, William thought. I’ve even got a meeting set up. But he kept that to himself, instead saying, “The Nine already went after Ike once. What’s to stop them from trying again if she gets involved?” He might find her annoying, but a woman’s skin was a woman’s skin, and it was no place for a bullet wound. Worse, a man had died when The Nine had attacked Ike earlier in the year. The Vermont cops had ruled the ski slope shooting a random homicide, and Grosskill and the rest of the FBI had agreed, but Max, William and Ike knew better. They knew it had been a warning from The Nine. Stay out of our business or else.

      Max grimaced. “Trust me, I don’t want her involved. But she’s got another opinion.”

      “Now there’s a surprise,” William muttered, leaning back in his chair. As far as he could tell, Ike Rombout was all about opinions. “And in case you missed it the first time, no. I don’t care how good she is with the tech stuff, I don’t want her anywhere near The Nine.” And I don’t want her anywhere near me.

      He wasn’t sure where the thought came from, but it struck a chord. Ike wasn’t his type of woman—she was too brash and in-your-face. And she wasn’t his idea of a coworker for a potentially dangerous op—she had breasts.

      He wasn’t proud of the chauvinism, but he figured he had a damn good reason for it.

      “She’ll stay in Boston, I promise,” Max persisted. “Give her some data to crunch, some leads to dead end, I don’t care. Just let her feel involved. She needs this, William. They killed someone she cared about.”

      That resonated, but William was no fool. “If all you wanted was some long-distance data crunching, you would’ve just turned her loose. Hell, that was how she found Forsythe for you. So give. What do you want from me?”

      Max grimaced. “I need you to keep her busy and I need you to make sure she stays in Boston.”

      A chill skittered through William. “You don’t think she’d actually go looking for—” He broke off and muttered a curse. “Of course she would. Hell. I don’t have time for this.” He glanced at Max. “And neither do you. But you’re still trying to save her from herself, aren’t you?”

      Max shrugged, rueful amusement tugging at his lips. “Ike calls it my DIDS. Damsel in Distress Syndrome. I can’t stop myself from trying to save them.”

      William could relate to that, but where Max saved people one at a time, William focused on the big picture, which sometimes demanded individual sacrifices in the name of the greater good.

      Like Sharilee? a small thought prompted from within, bringing the smell of blood and gunfire and the sound of a soft body hitting the floor.

      “Fine,” he said before the memory could form. “You owe me big-time, but I’ll keep an eye on Ike for you, starting tomorrow.”

      He already had plans for tonight.

      HOPING NOBODY HAD seen her sneak across the dark, deserted seventeenth green, Ike shimmied up the side of the brick building, her breath adding white puffs to the clinging fog.

      She couldn’t believe she was actually doing this on her own, but what other choice did she have? Educated guesswork and an intercepted e-mail ghost had convinced her that several members of The Nine were meeting here at the Coach House, a posh country club restaurant outside Greenwich, Connecticut. She’d thought about asking Max to meet her, but given the way he’d been behaving lately, all Neanderthal and pat-the-little-woman on-the-head, she’d nixed that idea and driven down from Boston alone.

      It was just recon, after all.

      But as she hauled herself up to a narrow ledge of stone trim that ran most of the way around the second story of the brick building, her doubts crowded closer. She was a computer geek; she wasn’t trained for this sort of thing. Sure, she’d done surveillance before, both for freelance gigs and for HFH. And, yeah, she’d been on the edge of the action once or twice, even before Max had stumbled over evidence indicating that The Nine really existed.

      This time, though, she was on her own. There was no employer backing her, nobody waiting for her to check in.

      You’ve got your gun, she told herself. You can handle this. More importantly, she had to handle it. Zed deserved more than he’d gotten in the way of justice. She owed him.

      Taking a breath of damp air that threatened rain, she edged across the brick wall. A series of lights set high on the building were tilted to illuminate the golf course beyond, their beams furred with mist. That same mist slicked her hand- and footholds as she pressed herself against the flat surface and began to move, using her black-gloved fingers to grip a thin pipe overhead while she clung to the narrow stone ledge by the toes of her black rubber-soled running shoes.

      Her destination was a half-open window about fifty feet away. Based on her assessment of downloaded blueprints, the window should open into the meeting space. Even better, the rear wing angled off the main building near the window, forming a corner where she could fade into the shadows.

      Score one for all black, Ike thought, comfortable in her trademark tight dark clothes, one of the few constants she allowed herself.

      “Over here,” a male voice said unexpectedly from below.

      Ike froze. Too late she heard the sound of footsteps on wet pavement.

      Pressing herself against the building, heart hammering, she held her breath and tried to become one with the rough bricks.

      Don’t look up, she thought. Please don’t look up.

      “You got the stuff?” a second male voice asked, higher and a little nasal.

      “You got the cash?”

      She relaxed slightly at the sound of crinkling paper and plastic. It was just a drug buy, she thought, then quirked her lips at the just. Under other circumstances, she might’ve waded

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