Forged in Fire Read online

  “Mac—” Cosky started to say.

  “Not one more word, from either of you.” Mac issued the warning through his teeth. He didn’t take his gaze off Zane’s face. “Do I need to make this an order, Lieutenant Commander Winters?”

  “We’re on leave.”

  “I’m still your fucking commanding officer.”

  Zane opened his mouth, his eyes blazing emerald fire, and Mac knew with gut-wrenching certainty that his best friend was about to throw himself in front of a fucking Zodiac and all because of a goddamn woman.

  Except that the woman in question slammed her elbow into Zane’s chest hard enough to shut the bastard’s mouth. As Zane shifted his glare to her, she turned toward Mac and pinned him with disgusted eyes.

  “If you two Neanderthals are finished with this useless display of testosterone, I’d like to remind you that the only person who has any say over what I do and who I do it with—is me.” She turned her glare back on Zane. “If I want to speak with Commander Mackenzie, I’ll speak with him.”

  Sheer frustration flashed across Zane’s face. “Goddamn it, Beth.”

  Her mouth dropped open, outrage flashing in her eyes. “Did you just swear at me?”

  Zane took a deep breath. Held it. Considering the combination of frustration and fury flashing across his normally calm countenance, the technique didn’t work any better for him, than it had for Mac.

  The woman turned her back on her fiancé and yanked herself out of his arms. The glare she turned on Mac didn’t look any friendlier—which didn’t fit with how she should have been acting, according to his profile.

  Surprisingly off balance, he watched her approach.

  “Commander Mackenzie,” she said, a militant look on her face, “of course I’ll speak with you.”

  “Beth—”

  “As soon as you say please.”

  Mac’s eyebrows slammed down. His head reared back. “Please?”

  She nodded once, sharply. “And Zane remains with us.”

  Mac scowled and stepped forward threateningly. “Alone.”

  Crossing her arms, she rocked back on her heels and lifted an eyebrow. “You do realize that I am not under your command. You cannot order me around. If I talk with you, it’s because I choose to, which will only happen if Zane remains.”

  Reassessing his approach, Mac studied her face, measuring the depth of her determination. She looked pretty damn determined. And since he didn’t have any jurisdiction here, he couldn’t force her compliance.

  “Fine,” he growled.

  She nodded, abruptly regal. “We’ll be right with you, after we speak with these FBI gentlemen.”

  Her emphasis on the last word was a blatant dig at his less than gentlemanly behavior. Mac rubbed his lips to hide their sudden twitch. Christ, she was a snippy little thing. All spit and hiss, like a kitten that thought it was a tiger.

  “Cosky and Rawls will be happy to take this turn with the feds,” Mac drawled as the door to the conference room opened. Apparently, their five minutes were up.

  Her eyebrows knitted again and she started back in with the glaring.

  He matched her glare and raised it a scowl. “You may not be under my command,”—a fucking pity—“but they are, and they’ll be happy to take this turn with the feds. Won’t you, boys?”

  “Yes, suh.” Rawls’ drawl was more pronounced than ever.

  “I’m certain the FBI would like some say in who they interview.”

  Those purple eyes were back to spitting at him. The woman obviously liked getting her way. Too bad. He always got his.

  “Absolutely,” Mac mimicked her pronunciation, and watched her eyes fill with frustrated temper.

  He turned to the approaching agents. “I need to speak to Lieutenant Commander Winters. Lieutenant Simcosky and Rawlings will accompany you for the debriefing. I’ll send Zane as soon as I’m done with him.”

  Mac waited until the agents escorted Simcosky and Rawlings out of the room. As soon as the double doors closed he took the scrambler out of his pocket and flashed it, before shoving the cylinder back in his pocket.

  “It’s a scrambler,” Zane explained to the woman in a low voice. “It scrambles any electrical signals. Bugs. Microphones. Cell phones. Cameras.”

  “Which means we can talk freely, so why don’t you explain to me what the fuck’s going on?”

  Zane watched him with absolute stillness. “You know what’s going on. They found the guns.”

  “I’m not talking about the guns. Or the hijacking. I want to know what the fuck you’ve got yourself involved in, what you’re lying about.”

  Something flickered across Zane’s face. Although, it was gone instantly, Mac knew with raw certainty that his best friend was about to lie to him… again… because of a fucking woman.

  “Don’t you dare lie to me. I know you better than that.” He wondered if it sounded like a plea. It sure as hell felt like one.

  For one long moment Zane stared back. Mac could read the regret on his face, in his eyes. Yeah. The fucker was going to lie, and nothing would be the same between them again.

  “Tell him the truth.” Beth broke the tension-filled silence.

  Slowly, Mac turned his head in her direction.

  Zane’s breath hissed between his teeth. He raised his hands and scrubbed them down his face. “Beth… just stay out of this.”

  She put a hand on his forearm. “I told you this was a mistake. If you’d told him the truth in the beginning, we could have avoided all this.” She waved her hand back and forth.

  “What’s going on?” Mac asked again, only this time he directed the question to the woman. “The guns were exactly where he said they would be. That plane was about to be hijacked. I’m confident when the targets they rounded up are identified, they’ll prove to have been responsible for taking down the Argentina planes. So what the fuck is he lying about?”

  She breathed a ghost of a laugh and held his stare without flinching. “You see, that’s the lie.”

  “Beth, for Christ’s sake. You don’t need to do this.”

  Mac frowned in confusion. “What’s the lie?”

  “That the guns were where he said they’d be. That he was the one who identified the hijackers.”

  Mac put two and two together instantly. “You were the one who knew.”

  The news didn’t surprise him. He’d suspected as much. The big surprise was that she’d admit it.

  “You were the one who knew this flight was going to be taken, who knew where the guns were, who knew what the hijackers looked like. You passed this information on to Zane.”

  She squared her shoulders and nodded.

  Zane cursed softly, dropped his hands, and stared at Mac with grim frustration.

  “So Zane didn’t dream any of this. The dream was the lie.”

  She sighed. Shook her head. Shot a fleeting glance toward his Lieutenant Commander. “No. The dream was the truth. The lie was who had it. Zane isn’t the one who dreamed about the hijacking. I was.”

  Chapter Eight

  With a muttered curse, Zane watched Mac’s spine turn to stone.

  What a fucking disaster.

  “You dreamed the hijacking,” Mac repeated with a total lack of expression. His dark head tilted back until he was staring at Beth down the barrel of his nose. “You’re serious? You’re going with that psychic bullshit?”

  From Beth’s resigned expression, the question didn’t surprise her. It didn’t surprise him either. Mac’s very DNA was wired with suspicion. As a kid he’d probably done perimeter searches before letting anyone out on the playground, checked beneath swings and slides and merry-go-rounds before climbing up to play. His Special Operations training had taken that inherent caution and ratcheted it up several degrees, turning him into a razor-sharp, deadly operator. There were few people Zane would rather have at his back.

  But when you needed him to suspend that suspicion, it was like trying to convince a hungry lion not to ta
ke down an injured gazelle—completely against his nature.

  Nor did it help that Mac had a fully armed landmine clinging to his shoulder. Detonation code name: women.

  “You have these psychic episodes often?” Mac asked dryly.

  Beth snorted and blew a wisp of hair off her forehead. “Didn’t we just do this?”

  “What?” Mac’s chin came down a notch.

  Beth rolled her eyes. “The explanations. Suspicions. Doubts. Accusations. No, I am not psychic. This was the first—and hopefully the last—time I’ve ever dreamed something that came true.”

  “So you just happened to dream about this flight. Wait. Let me guess. You dreamed it because Zane was on board, your soul mate.” He shook his head in a do-you-really-think-I’m-that-stupid gesture.

  With an audible slap, Beth’s palms came down on her hips. “Considering I didn’t know Zane existed until this morning, I’m guessing your theory sucks saltwater.”

  Zane groaned, and waited for the shit to hit the fan.

  “You need to keep track of your lies, sweetheart. You met him over the weekend—”

  Beth glowered back. “I’d know when I met him better than you and it was—” She consulted her watch. “Just over three hours ago.”

  Mac paused, his eyebrows bunching as he worked the pieces into place. “You’re not engaged.”

  “Give the man a cookie.” She frowned. “We were going to play the couple, so the hijackers wouldn’t question why we were leaving the departure gate.” Her frown deepened. “Beats me how that escalated into an engagement.”

  Mac shot Zane a grim look. “Why’d you approach Zane in the first place?”

  She shrugged and wrapped a tendril of hair around her index finger. “I heard Rawls call him Lieutenant in the dream. I hoped that meant he had contacts. Someone who could get the plane grounded and searched.” She held Mac’s gaze. “Like you.”

  With a grunt, Mac shifted, squaring his shoulders. As his commander swung toward him, Zane braced himself. Things were about to get ugly.

  “Jesus Christ.” The muscles in Mac’s forearms bunched. “How the hell could you fall for this?”

  “I knew something was wrong an hour before she arrived.” Zane tensed, fighting to keep his tone calm.

  “That’s not the point, which you fucking know. I don’t doubt those flashes of yours were at work. But she has to be involved in this.”

  “She’s not.”

  “You don’t know that.” Mac’s voice sharpened. “You’re compromised. You’ve convinced yourself she’s the one. It’s your blind spot.”

  Whoa. This conversation needed to switch focus fast. He wasn’t explaining his family’s quirks to her in the middle of an argument.

  Besides, it was too soon. Once she was comfortable with what was happening between them, he’d ply her with a couple glasses of wine and a couple of hours of lovemaking. And while she lay there sated and lethargic, basking in a post-alcoholic and orgasmic glow, he’d explain.

  “You’re not seeing her clearly,” Mac snapped.

  “I’m not the one wearing blinders.” Zane folded his arms across his chest. “She’s not your mother. Or your ex. Or Jenn.”

  “What the fuck do they have to do with this?” Mac’s voice deepened and rose, until it rumbled through the room like a Blackhawk on lift-off.

  “You know damn well what I’m talking about.” He watched Mac’s eyebrows slam down over the bridge of his nose. “You don’t know her, yet you’re already lumping her into the same category as all the other women in your life. You’re already assuming she’s up to no good.”

  “That’s the goddamn point. I don’t know her. Neither do you. You met her three hours ago, and you’re already claiming an engagement? You don’t think that’s cause for concern?” He stalked forward, fury vibrating off him in waves. Lifting his index finger, he pointed it like a gun. “You roped me, Cosky and Rawls into this lie, threw us under the fucking beach boat and all to protect some broad who has to be involved.”

  “Well, you know the truth now,” Beth pointed out tartly. “You can tell everyone how you found out about the guns and your conscience will be clear.”

  Zane could just imagine the feds’ reaction to that bit of news. He reached out to take her hand, craving the feeling of her skin against his. Her fingers entwined with his. The thought of never touching her again, of feeling that warm, soft strength against him, of smelling her strawberry scent spurred coils of panic twisting through his gut.

  Christ, he’d just found her. No way in hell was he losing her.

  “Yeah? How’s that going to work?” Mac swung toward Beth with a snarl. “The feds think the info came through fresh intel. If I reveal the fresh intel was your dream, how long do you think those assholes my boys nabbed are going to stay in custody? Not to mention Zane will spend a good share of his life rotting in the stockade, and ST7 will become the butt of every stand-up routine for the next year.”

  “How this works,” Zane interrupted flatly, “is you trust me to know she isn’t playing us. You trust me to know the difference.”

  “Trust you?” Mac’s voice swelled. “When you’re basing every decision on the fact she’s your predestined mate, the woman you’ve been waiting ten fucking years for?”

  For a second sheer silence reigned. Zane had one raw, wrenching moment of hope—maybe she hadn’t been paying attention.

  And then her hissing exhale filled the room. Her mouth dropped open.

  “What?” Her voice climbed shrilly.

  Son of a bitch.

  “Didn’t he tell you? See, Zane’s the psychic. Hell, his whole family is. And the men in his bloodline have this handy-dandy little trick—they can sense the woman destined to be their wife, their soul mate, the mother of their children.”

  Beth’s eyes rounded with each word. She jerked her hand from his and stepped back. Zane’s chest clenched. It was too soon. She wasn’t ready to hear this. He needed more time, the chance to prove to her how good they could be together.

  Goddamn it. With a deep breath, he refocused.

  He could hardly call the happy tidings back, so he’d have to play the hand Mac had dealt. Besides, his original plan remained sound. The sparks were still there, the heat between them as fiery as ever. He could use that. Tie her to him with sex, and then ease her into marriage.

  Mac’s furious gaze settled on her dismayed face and he suddenly frowned, looking uneasy.

  Before Zane had a chance to move in with some major damage control, the door flew open. The feds had been remarkably accommodating, even respectful. Something of a surprise, considering the amount of posturing that normally accompanied cross-departmental interaction. For them to barge in, without warning, meant that something had changed.

  Had the jammer been compromised? Someone was constantly coming up with new ways to circumvent stealth equipment. Had the feds been listening in?

  The man who filled the doorway scanned the room with sunken brown eyes; his gaze lingered on Mac for a second before shifting to Zane.

  Deep grooves scored his face. His hair was mahogany, graying in streaks, but the quality of the suit marked him as someone high on the food chain.

  “Ms. Brown.” His gaze fell on Beth.

  Zane tensed as the new arrival raked Beth from head to toe. There was more than interest in those eyes. There was suspicion as well.

  Silently, he crossed to her side and slid an arm around her waist. He half expected her to pull away, but she must have sensed the danger because she didn’t flinch as he drew her against him. Heat flared where their bodies touched. Christ, it felt good to hold her again.

  “I’m John Chastain, Special Agent in Charge of Seattle’s Counterterrorism Division. You need to come with me.”

  “Chastain.” Mac stepped forward and held out his hand. “Commander Jace Mackenzie. We spoke on the phone.”

  Zane caught a faint trace of contempt in Mac’s voice. The fed acknowledged the introduction with a n
od and an abbreviated handshake, but his attention didn’t budge from Beth’s face, which told Zane everything he needed to know.

  Beth had moved onto their suspect list.

  * * *

  Zane was psychic?

  Mac’s voice echoed in Beth’s mind. She’d wondered why Zane and his teammates had believed her so quickly. Apparently, Cosky and Rawls had bought into her story because of Zane, because he was psychic. But if this were true, wouldn’t he have known something was going to happen on the plane?

  Her memory flitted back to the closet, to when she’d first told them about the dream, to all those quick glances and intense silences. Something had passed between Cosky, Rawls and Zane. She’d even sensed it at the time.

  Maybe he had known. Maybe all three of them had known. And then she’d come along with her hijacking dream…. Rawls and Cosky must have believed her because of Zane. Because he was convinced she was his predestined mate. His soul mate.

  Predestined mate.

  Soul mate.

  The words rolled round and round Beth’s mind, a pair of pinballs that knocked every other consideration out of her head. They were all she could think about, which was aggravating considering she needed to focus on the FBI agents across the table.

  The room to which this newest pair of federal agents had escorted them was a lunch room. A large round table swallowed the middle of the room. There was a refrigerator in the back corner. A microwave on a cart next to it. A stained but clean Formica counter ran the length of the back wall. Cupboards climbed the wall above and below the counter.

  It was similar to engineering’s lunchroom. Except this one felt like an interrogation room.

  The fact they’d allowed Zane to accompany her was a surprise. Was he was under suspicion now too?

  She suspected the agents were trying to throw her off balance with their silence, hoping to unnerve her. Hoping her fear would escalate until it weakened her resolve and she blurted out confessions just to fill the void.

  Any other day the tactic might have worked. Today it barely registered. All she could think about was that she was the supposed soul mate of a gorgeous, sexy stranger. The predestined mate of a man she’d only known for three hours, a man with whom she had absolutely nothing in common.