Feeling a might full of himself for the coup he just pulled off filled Drae with a satisfying surge of enjoyment. He got off on being a conduit of positive energy, especially when it was put to good use. His scheme to mentor trade workers and craftsmen had quickly grown to bigger and better things. The thought within a thought that he’d been quietly ruminating on for the past few months found its footing in an unusual but not surprising place.

Caleb Merrill was a good friend to Family Justice. He and his co-pilot, Charlize Wilde, drifted in and out of Bendover. They were the official project people. Wanted something done—big or small? Caleb’s design skills could turn a potato into a five-story castle, and the Justice ladies immediately embraced Charlie for her prodigious creative talents.

Because life was about one thing leading to another, Cal’s business partner and older brother, Jax, turned out to be a veteran. A veteran with PTSD from serving in Iraq. Jax was also a sought after builder with renovation expertise. Alex sucked him in right away to support Cal’s redesign work. He’d flown to Arizona for a fast seventy-two-hour whirlwind to help solve a critical historical issue at the Villa, and after a brief back and forth with Alex, him, and Cam, the idea of Drae’s scheme was floated for a tiny home village to house homeless vets and family.

He’d just come from a meeting with Sullivan and a financial advisor who had put together an impressive package for the back-end financing. Along with a few handpicked investors, they formed the Justice Consortium. If everything went smoothly, they could start location scouting in the spring.

The killer prime rib plate he polished off in a self-congratulatory late afternoon power feed had him feeling damn good. There really wasn’t much in the world of foodie satisfaction that could compare with the gratification factor after a fabulous slab of meat slid into his gut.

Yanking on the door of the bathroom stall, he sniggered when his reflection in the long sink mirror revealed his usual sartorial perfection topped by a mane of hair and some facial scruff that probably needed an intervention.

He liked pretending to be a vagabond craftsman. Discovering he was more comfortable with a tool belt than he was with a computer or a spreadsheet had given his inner turmoil a place to go. If flannel and ripped jeans along with an aversion to the razor were part of his routine, he was fine. And since his wife didn’t object, it really was all good.

The stream of water into the long trough sink was just warm enough. He squirted soap into his palm and was starting to work up a lather when a stall door opened and a voice—an oddly familiar voice—spoke.

“Do not react or speak, Draegyn St. John. Clear your throat if you understand.”

Recognition hit him in a mind-blowing whoosh. In the pulse of a single heartbeat, a whole shit ton of stuff suddenly made sense. Like what Victoria and Alex were hiding.

He cleared his throat, rinsed his hands, straightened, and zeroed in on the reflection of the man behind him who was clearly hiding in a restaurant men’s room stall. All Drae’s senses went to high alert.

“Act normal and listen.”

He reached for some paper towels to dry his hands and chuckled. Act normal? Jesus fucking Christ. A guy he hadn’t seen in a couple of years was acting sketchy in a way that screamed surveillance, and he wasn’t supposed to react?

“Does Alex have the scent? Just nod yes or no.”

It required several seconds of careful thought before he nodded. He knew Alex had something—he just didn’t know what. But the sudden re-appearance of Liang Zhū was a gigantic red flag.

“They’re watching you. Movements, public spottings.”

Drae leaned into the mirror in a pantomime of checking for spinach in his teeth. He needed to speak. Liang was too rattled to walk a straight line. Drawing on years of surveillance savvy, he acted as though his phone went off. He reached into his pocket, punched the home button, and put it to his ear as he turned and rested his ass on the sink. This way he had direct eye contact.

Into the phone, he said, “Can you hear me now?”

Liang froze. He looked around the stall as though a threat was about to jump out of the toilet paper holder. Jesus. Rattled didn’t do justice to how jumpy the guy acted.

“Yes, but use your head, okay?”

“Understood, buddy!” he exclaimed with high spirits to throw off any eyeballs—something he easily assessed was a possibility through the open plantation shutters on several high windows. “Who is they?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

Drae remained passive, but his glare made a point. He immediately countered with a direct command. “Give me the abbreviated details. Quickly.”

Liang nodded and answered in short, staccato bursts. “Obsidian pulled me in. At first, it was a breeze. They handed me tinker toy projects and put huge checks into my bank account. Then the questions started. About Alex. Always Alex. It creeped me out.”

“What did you give them?”

“Mostly bullshit. I saw right away that something wasn’t right.”

“Why didn’t you walk right then and there?”

Silence. Uncomfortable silence met this question.

“I have a kid,” Liang muttered.

Aw, fuck. They had him by the balls. “We can bring you in, man. Protect your family.”

“Don’t be naïve, Drae. This isn’t like your little legacy mission in Pakistan. It’s deeper than you can possibly imagine.”

Liang’s throwing of Pakistan in his face was significant. It meant their clandestine takedown of a rogue asshole did not happen in secret.

“Is this connected?”

“No, not the way you think,” Liang quickly replied. “Polaris was a full-on nutjob and needed putting down, and that probably would have been the end of it, but the Major pissed people off by calling in a favor—I’m assuming to protect whoever double-tapped. Alex has powerful friends and vengeful enemies.”

Drae’s mind was ticking like a son of a bitch. Liang didn’t realize it, but he was giving up a raft of information. To keep his reactions in line with acting normal, he laughed into the phone, then turned to glance at the mirror, but instead of checking out his reflection, he gauged Liang’s fear factor.

The guy was lit and nervous as fuck. There was little doubt he was taking a big risk by exposing himself to Drae in a public restroom.

An inevitable snort of amusement sounded when he replayed this thought. Saying Liang exposed himself in a restroom probably wasn’t the best way of putting it.

He didn’t have much time left. If he was being tailed, an extra-long bathroom visit might draw scrutiny, and he didn’t want to put Liang in more jeopardy. Thinking about what Alex would want to know, Drae organized his thoughts.

“Who’s on the inside?”

Liang’s derisive huff was interesting. “Nobody. He’s chum. Guaranteed he has nothing. There’s always a little man someplace who wants a bigger dick.”

Drae nodded. He recognized the phrase as one of Alex’s sayings. Little men seeking bigger dicks are literally the crowd gathered on the sidewalk waiting for admittance to every mercenary tribe and rogue outfit spanning the globe. And Liang was right—those wannabes were fish bait queuing up to be used and spit out.

“I need a name. Don’t fuck with me if you want to leave this room alive.”

The seconds ticked by. Drae held Liang’s gaze. Finally, the other guy conceded the point. He knew who he was dealing with.

“Check the end of the alphabet.”

Instant analysis. Alex already knew this.

“There’s another,” Liang muttered. “I think.”

“What’s the end game?”

“Total annihilation.”

“Why?”

“Payback.”

“Is there a wrong to be righted?” Drae’s eyes pierced Liang’s skull as he waited for the answer.

“No.”

“So it’s personal?”

“Very.”

“Target?”

There was an odd pause and then Liang placed an Easter egg at Drae’s feet. The sort of specific, nonspecific gem that Alex ate for lunch and shit out by dinner.

“The manifest for the Pak trip. That’s all I know.”

So the whole team plus Sullivan. Including Parker was significant.

He had just one more question. The question that might be the key to unraveling whoever was pulling Liang’s strings.

“Past or present?” Another hesitation so Drae prodded, “During or after?” They both knew what he referred to. Was this war related or not?

“During. And after. You’ll have to figure the rest out by yourself. Now get out. Leave the restaurant and draw their attention so I can melt away.”

He spoke into the phone but held Liang’s gaze once more. “I meant what I said. If you need to come in, we’ll handle it.”

Drae put the phone away and checked his appearance. On his way out, he began whistling in an offhand way as though nothing at all was on his mind. Stopping to do the married guy flirt with the pleasant hostess manning the front of the restaurant, he played it as cool as he could. Snatching a handful of wrapped mints off the hostess stand, he winked playfully and sauntered out the door with the St. John signature cockiness dogging his every move. Sometimes that tired old shit came in handy.

He talked sports shit with the guy at the valet stand and made a big deal when they brought his fancy new Mercedes Maybach to the curb. Sports chatter and car talk—it didn’t get more normal than that.

The car was a sight to behold. Victoria teased him endlessly about his fascination with the luxury vehicle. She indulged him by encouraging the outrageous purchase—a fact he greatly appreciated. They had better things to do with their time than argue about what they spent their money on.

After driving away from the restaurant, he checked for the presence of his security detail. How was it possible for them to have round-the-clock professional security, yet nobody picked up that they were being watched? If surveillance was active, and Alex’s high-alert protocol wasn’t catching it, there had to be more than one mole inside.

His eyes narrowed, and the grip he used on the steering wheel tightened. Someone else on the inside, someone in a position to mess with security, was a threat to his family. A threat to Family Justice.

A dark and fearful rage cracked open inside. He felt the angry explosion that released his warrior beast. It rocked him to his soul.

Alex needed to know what he did. Immediately. The car’s speed increased as he drove away from town onto the desolate stretch of road leading to the Villa. His mind was whirling a million miles an hour.

Who could he trust?

“Fuck.” He snorted. Cam, of course.

He activated the Bluetooth on his phone and put in a call. Cam answered right away. “Builder Bob? Is that you?”

“Focus, Cam. I’m coming in hot. No one but you, the Major, and me. Understand? No one.”

“Understood.”

“Fifteen minutes. Secure room.”

He didn’t wait for Cam to respond before cut the call. His inner turmoil was pushing him into dangerous territory. If he didn’t want to end up wrapped around a phone pole, he needed to control the moment. Thinking about Victoria’s beautiful brown eyes, eyes that reminded him of her favorite hazelnut decaf drink, he found the focus he needed.

The energy of Sinjin was nudging him toward the locker room. It was time to suit up. His family—hell, his whole fucking world—was in danger, and there was no fucking way he was gonna put up with that.

Alex felt the vibration from the phone in his pocket and sighed. Why’s it gotta be this way, he mentally groused. Here he was, enjoying a perfectly lovely afternoon siesta with his sexy wife and beautiful babies. And then the damn phone had to go and ruin it.

Biting back a sigh that would get Meghan’s attention, he slid the phone out and glanced at the screen. His instant reaction nearly dumped his wife on her ass when he shot off the sofa and stood. Luckily, neither baby reacted to his sudden move while his mate shot him a damning glare.

“Alex!” she whisper-yelled. Her irritation was painfully obvious. So unmistakably apparent that he had the good sense to cringe.

They had a safe word and a time-out phrase. The time-out expression was for emergencies and singular moments that demanded complete attention. He used it for the first time, and she reacted exactly the way he expected.

“Egyptian plum,” he said in a commanding voice. There was a whole thing behind the phrase, but now wasn’t the time to have a flight of fancy. He had to focus.

Her eyes flashed bright green. She tensed, and her lips drew into a tight line. “Go,” she murmured as her arms moved protectively around their twins. “I’ve got this,” she assured him.

He loved her so fucking much his heart nearly burst. Filled with pride for the extraordinary women he was blessed to have as his mate, he bent and kissed her fiercely. “No one, Meghan. No one. Understand?”

“Yes. Go on, baby. I’ve got your back.”

He kissed each baby and sprinted for the door. His heart hammered in his chest as he raced from their master suite, trying to get to the kitchen driveway as fast as humanly possible without crashing into the antiques lining his path.

Cam was pulling in as he dashed from the Villa and drew to a fast stop at the end of the walkway. “Hurry up. Let’s go,” he grated after rolling down the driver’s window. 

Alex noted the tension in his face. There was a familiarity to Cam’s dark scowl.

He swung into the passenger seat without saying a word. A thousand questions were swirling in the air, but he kept his own counsel for the time being.

They drove into the Justice compound and parked at the meeting center. He strode alongside Cam, not at all surprised to see they were en route to the secure room.

Alex’s heart beat like a bass drum as they marched along in silence. Inside the secure room, he peppered Cam with questions the second the door shut.

“Start with facts,” he demanded.

“Sinjin,” Cam said with precision. “He’s coming in hot.”

All his senses went on high alert. Using Drae’s military call sign indicated that something serious was happening.

When Drae appeared, Alex and Cam shot to their feet—not just because he finally arrived but because of how he looked.

The shaggy casual look was gone. Drae was clean shaven, and his hair had the distinct look of having been styled fifteen minutes ago with a pair of scissors.

If shit getting real required an image, Draegyn St. John exuding the air of a warrior was enough to get him on his feet.

“There’s been first contact,” he growled with enough menace to earn a second look from Cam.

“Give it to me,” Alex demanded sharply.

His mind was reeling when Drae finished. Somehow, he’d always known the Polaris thing was going to come back and bite him in the ass. Calling in a high-level favor was a risk, but he’d had no choice. Putting a protective screen around his crew—especially Smoke—had warranted his actions. He grimaced, thinking about how high up the chain of command he’d gone and started reassembling the game pieces accordingly.

“I apologize for hitting you,” Drae grumbled. “But I realize now why you did what you did. You had Liang, didn’t you?”

“Yeah. He’s the only person aside from Tori or Calder who knew my system well enough to look for the back door. It took me a while, though, and by the time I figured it out and went looking, Liang had erased his entire footprint. He was smart to do that.”

“Does Obsidian have something to do with this?” Cam asked.

“I don’t think it’s them, per se. They were pawns. Getting at Liang was the end game.”

Drae’s mind was ticking so loud Alex swore he could hear it.

“So it’d take an imbecile not to see that there are nimble fingers pulling these strings, and you know what that means.”

“I fucking hate politicians,” Cam mumbled darkly. “And all the toadies they spawn. It’s always about power, isn’t it? Who has it, and who wants it.”

They stewed in angry silence for a good long time before he spoke again.

“Show of hands, gentlemen. Outside of the immediate family and Team Justice, who do we trust?” He started naming names.

“Winston?”

All hands shot up. Duke’s ethics were unimpeachable.

Then he went through their security team one at a time. He noticed Cam’s infinitesimal pause. It was enough. Alex knew he didn’t need to push. Cam would pick everything apart and find whatever was hiding in plain sight.

“Right now, with no delay, I want an in-depth debrief. If this thing involves Parker, then it’s rooted in the past. Everything, no matter how insignificant. Whatever comes to mind during the time he was DOJ. Smoke and Dallas, too. I think they pissed off some people along the way.”

Drae suddenly perked up. “And Sawyer? Is he involved?”

Alex frowned. “He knows shit—maybe too much shit. But he’s given up everything I’ve asked for and is scared shitless.”

“Can I play with Zimmerman? Pretty please,” Drae sarcastically drawled. “Promise not to hurt him.”

Cam cracked his knuckles. “Remington confided to me that she wasn’t sure about him. Ever since the drone incident, her threat assessment senses have been pinging.”

Alex was reminded just exactly what he was capable of when his lips curled in a snarl. Knowing Richie Zimmerman was chum intended to distract them from the real threat hadn’t stopped any of them from wanting to pound that little fucker into the ground. Being jealous of Brody made the guy do stupid things—like messing with Bella. And don’t even get him started about the whole drone incident. The razzle dazzle worked. They focused like madmen on the ancient piece of Russian-built garbage, a knee-jerk reaction that set them up for a probing. A probing he missed at first.

But he was a big believer in that old saying: Fool me once; shame on you. Fool me twice; shame on me.

“Parker isn’t going to come when he’s called,” Drae pointed out. “He isn’t going to burp up government secrets just because you ask.”

Alex was ready for just such a thing. As a matter of fact, he was having dinner tonight with his oldest friend and their dads. He knew convincing the former Department of Justice lawyer to spill his guts was going to take creativity, hence Alex bringing their fathers along. And if that didn’t work, he had the ace of all aces to play. Angelina.

“What’s up with you, girlfriend?” Lacey asked between spoonsful of chocolate ice cream. “And don’t blow sunshine up my skirt with a bunch of nonsense. You seem reluctant to leave the house. Am I missing something?”

The questions made Angie uncomfortable. Explaining the gibberish in her head wasn’t easy. She licked her spoon clean and scooped up more chocolate decadence while Lacey waited her out.

“Can I be honest?” she asked.

Lacey made a face. “No. I came here to question you so you could practice making stuff up. Of course, you can be honest!”

A hundred different thoughts flew around in Angie’s mind. So many that she wasn’t sure which were the result of pregnancy hormones and which were real, but if she didn’t open up to someone soon, she was afraid of bursting.

“Lacey,” she carefully replied. “I think whoever is threatening the family used me to get at Parker.”

“What?”

Yeah, Angie thought. It sounded just as crazy to her, but when it was picked apart, she was sure something was there.

Finishing the last spoonful of ice cream, she put everything down on the coffee table and wiped her mouth. Her hands caressed her tummy for a minute, and then she sighed.

“Blame this on being Alexander’s little sister because I think some of his strategic leanings have infiltrated my thoughts. He’s always droning on and on about chess pieces on a board and all that rubbish. You feel me, right?”

“Completely,” Lacey said with a smirky chuckle. “His legend looms large.”

Angie caressed her baby bump again. The baby knew when her mommy was stressed, so she was always mindful of her tone and how fast she was breathing.

“She knows,” Angie murmured by way of an explanation. “She knows something isn’t right.”

Lacey reached over and stroked Angie’s belly. She was sure the baby reacted with an outpouring of love for her auntie.

“Will we be allowed to laugh and tease you if this little one is a boy?”

“As if!” Angie drawled. “Didn’t you know? What Parker Sullivan wants, Parker Sullivan gets. It’s always been that way with us.” She giggled. “And I wouldn’t have it any other way. His love is worth it.”

“That’s so sweet, Ang. He’s a good guy, and I can tell you that Cameron is thrilled for you guys. After all, he’s known you both for a long time. Parker better than you, but my husband loves you like a sister because of Alex.”

She clutched her hands together over her heart and made a face. “I love Cam,” she declared. “Even when he was mad all the time and about as serious as heart attack, I knew he cared.”

“We all care, sweetie.”

Tears threatened. They were always threatening these days. “Parker said he wanted a daughter with my eyes. There’s no way the universe or a bunch of bad guys are going to mess with that. Ballerina Sullivan agrees,” she added with a laugh.

Lacey smiled broadly. “You'll be such a wonderful mommy. Now tell me why you think the way you do. About Parker and all this threat stuff.”

Angie took a deep breath. Explaining wasn’t easy.

“Okay, so, right from the start, it struck me as odd when that filthy blind item in the news suggested something hinky went down while I was in Spain. With Ronaldo Esperanza. Even Alex asked what that maneuver served. And then nothing came of it until the incident with Sophie and me where she said someone took my picture. Why would anyone take my picture? When Mom and Aunt Wendy divulged that they’d been contacted about winning a nursery prize package only to be quizzed about my birth plan, my antennae went up. Why me? If it was to get at Alex, there are better ways to do that than through me.”

“Oh, my goodness,” Lacey exclaimed. “I see where you’re going.”

“It’s Parker, I just know it. If you wanted to hurt him, even destroy him, the best way is through me.” She covered her baby bump protectively. “Whatever is going on involves my husband, and frankly, Lacey, saying that out loud scares the shit out of me. As well as I know Parker, it still came as a complete shock when he got sucked into that Team Justice crap earlier in the year. I had no idea he was involved in any of that. We were estranged through most of his time at the department. Was it a shock to find out he was up to his eyeballs in terrorism stuff? Hell, yeah.”

Lacey sat quietly. She nodded several times and seemed to be gathering her thoughts.

“Have you said this to anyone else?”

Angie scoffed. “The real question is whether my brother has reached the same conclusion. And if he hasn’t, why?”

“Good point, good point,” Lacey murmured. “Hmm, maybe the answer lies in what you just said. Parker’s terrorism work.”

“He’s a closed book on the subject. You’d think he was in witness protection from what he doesn’t say.”

They looked at each other.

“Well, anyway, Mrs. Cameron. All that addresses your initial observation about me staying home. I know I have a security minder and all, but I’m not comfortable.”

A good deal of her anxiety subsided when Lacey gathered her into a warm hug.

“You do you, Angie. Whatever makes you comfortable.”