“I agree with Ten,” Taggart said right before his left fist came out and he punched Ten right in the nose.
“Damn it. I just fixed my nose, asshole.” Ten put a hand to his face. He grabbed a napkin to wipe up the blood.
Tag smiled and went back to unpacking the food. “This is really the greatest thing that ever happened to me. Well, besides the whole wife-coming-back-from-the-dead and having a baby and shit, but other than that, getting to punch Ten at random is really the best.”
“See, anger issues,” Kai said with a nod. “Hey, is that lemon?”
“Touch that tart and my anger issues will get shoved right up your ass, Ferguson.”
They were still arguing as he left the conference room. Jesse walked out with a smile on his face. It was time to get his girl.
Phoebe stood on the rooftop. She probably shouldn’t be up here, but she needed fresh air. She took a deep breath and leaned on the wall that surrounded the roof. Someone obviously spent time up here. There were a couple of lounge chairs and a wrought iron table with four seats around it. A long bench was covered in shiny, healthy looking green plants.
At least now she knew why the shrink’s assistant came up here every day.
She liked Dallas. She hadn’t at first, but then it always took her a while to see the beauty in things. Unlike Jamie. Jamie had a never-ending zest for life. The first time they’d gone to Tokyo together she’d been put off by the lights, the foreignness of it all, but Jamie had been utterly fascinated. After a while, she’d learned to see life through his eyes.
Jamie tried to make even the worst events into something fun. God, when she really thought about it, he was so much like Jesse it hurt. Jesse tried to see the good in everything.
Like the night she and Jesse had gone to some fancy place where they’d been given a tiny plate of food that wouldn’t have fed a bird. Most people would have been angry or embarrassed, but he’d laughed and taken her hand. He’d run to the nearest food truck, and they’d sat in their nice clothes in a park and eaten hot dogs and turned something bad into a great memory.
He wouldn’t be able to do that with the night before.
She shouldn’t have tried. Actually, he’d kind of tricked her. He’d done all that alpha male Dom stuff and she’d been confused. That was it. Most of the time Jesse was sweet and he allowed her to run things. He was devastating when he was sweet, but she could hold him off. When he was sweet and alpha male, it was a combination guaranteed to ruin her common sense.
Once she was back in Virginia, she would find her footing again. Ten was bluffing about quitting the Agency. It was his life in a way it never had been hers or Jamie’s. She couldn’t imagine a world where Ten didn’t follow in their dad’s footsteps. Hell, he’d been given full reign over his own team, running and directing some of the most top secret missions the US conducted. He would never leave that.
She glanced down at the parking lot below. She caught sight of Tag’s massive SUV and a Jeep she didn’t recognize. It was kind of beat up, but it was clean. It must be the shrink’s. She’d been told to expect him to join their little band of merry guessers. That’s what they were doing at this point. They were guessing and they were gambling with Jesse’s life. She couldn’t stand it. She wanted facts. She wanted to know exactly where to point and who to shoot at.
Across the street, she saw a truck parked at an angle that would make surveillance easy. She wondered who was on duty and if they were bored out of their minds. Most likely they were calling to tell on her, and someone would be up here to drag her back into the building any minute.
She watched as a van drove slowly by. What would it be like to be normal and happy and able to drive down the damn street without worrying about someone sniping the man you…liked…cared about…? She played around with the words in her head, careful to avoid the one word she couldn’t use with him.
She heard the door creak open and turned around.
Jesse stepped out into the sunlight. He was wearing jeans and a black T-shirt that showed off how lean and cut he was. God, he was delicious. His golden hair caught the light and he smiled her way, making her forget about the sun. She was lucky she didn’t drool. “Hey, your brother will murder me if you get killed up here.”
She turned back to the street, unable to watch him anymore. It hurt too much. “My brother hasn’t been trapped inside for a week.”
She heard him walking up behind her. “It hasn’t been so bad.”
Yep, Jesse was already trying to rewrite history, to take something horrible and make it better. She just couldn’t do it. “You’re kidding, right? Tell me you’re not going insane.”
“Nah. I kind of like the company.”