TREX HQ

“What do you mean, he tried to back out?” Bailey didn’t attempt to hide the worry in her voice. Harold Ryan was supposed to be her gold star. Her sure win. He was who she planned to use as her poster child for the program. No way did he try to back out of his first training.

Jason looked to Jackson, who waved for him to continue. “We ran the final test.”

“Literally,” Jackson grumbled.

“And?” She’d jumped from worry to desperation. “What’s that got to do with him trying to back out? Is he worried about the physical aspects of the program?” It wasn’t unheard of for a gamer to be more of a couch potato than a marathon runner.

“He can run circles around us,” Jackson pointed out. “Literally. He’s clearly in better shape than either one of us. He already had several miles in by the time we joined him. That’s not it.”

“Then what is it?” When Jackson wouldn’t answer her, she focused on Jason. “Jas? What’s really going on? Because I don’t think you guys are worried about Ryan missing his first workout.”

“He challenged me,” he finally said.

“So? I challenge you all the time.”

“No, Bails.” He pushed off the wall. “He challenged me. Like full-on, in my face challenge. If we weren’t in a booth, he probably would have bumped my chest.”

“I don’t…”

“Tombstone courage.” Jackson crossed his arms. “I’ve seen it too many times in rookies. They think they have to take on every threat just to prove themselves.”

“Not every threat,” Jason corrected and regarded Bailey. “Only when it comes to his girl.”

Her heart skipped. That sounded all too familiar. Jason did stupid things when it came to her. Stupid things like flying to Montana to confront her big BIL, who’d taken on the role of overprotective brother—like she needed another one of those. She already had four who were blood relatives. Add in her plethora of cousins, and David Snyder would have to stand in line to protect her.

None of them scared her nearly as much as her brother-in-law. Maybe not scared her. More like made her scared for the guys she dated. She’d been with Jason Bowman since David had married into the McKoy family. So, yes. Her big BIL made her scared for Jason. He didn’t like Jason and made that no secret.

“You’re saying he may not be a viable prospect because he challenged you to protect Emma?”

“That’s exactly what I’m saying.” Jason looked to Jackson, who agreed with a nod.

“That’s what you have to go on?” Her anxiety lifted. “That his protective instincts kicked in? How is that a bad thing?”

“It could get him killed if he’s on a find and his protective instincts kick in.” Jackson used air quotes to emphasize the words. “If he’s only focused on protecting her, he may miss critical signs of threats that are right in front of him.”

“At least he’s got instincts,” she countered. “I’ve been on too many finds where the agent missed the signs because he didn’t know what to look for. We can teach him how to recognize threats. We can teach him when to engage and when to stand down. What we can’t teach him are instincts. Those come naturally. You either have them or you don’t. Ryan has them.”

“What are you saying? You want us to let him out of his first day of training all because you think he’s got sound instincts?”

“I’m saying I want you to trust our first member of the internship program. I expect each and every one of them to challenge us. We have things to teach them. What makes you think they don’t have things to teach us?” A buzzer sounded, announcing someone at the front door of the building. Bailey glanced at the monitor. “So much for him backing out of his first training.”

“I’ll get him,” Jason offered. “Jackson pulled the TREX card at breakfast and had the poor guy shitting himself.”

She glared at Jackson. After Jason left the room, she snapped, “Are you trying to screw this up?”

“I’m doing my job by vetting prospective agents. We can’t afford to dilute TREX by allowing in the runts of the litter.”

“Do you think he’s weak?” She waited. He didn’t answer and crossed his arms, working his jaw. He would no longer look at her. When he squared his shoulders, she lowered hers. Ah, hell. She recognized that body language. Having an entire family of over-the-top alphas gave her the advantage when it came to reading the opposite sex. “We’re not talking about Ryan, are we?”

Jackson looked at her before quickly jumping his gaze to the door. It took two minutes and forty-five seconds to get from this room to the front door and back. They had enough time to talk about what really had him tense enough to shatter.

“What’s going on with you? Jackson, talk to me.”

“Why would I talk to you?” He forced out a harsh laugh.

“Do you think I’m one of the weak ones?”

“It’s not you,” he pointed out. “It’s the company you keep.”

“You think Jason is weak?” That shocked her. Jason was one of the strongest agents she knew. No, this wasn’t about Jason. This was something else. “You don’t like him with me.”

He looked at her. “I don’t like him. Period. He’s too arrogant.”

“An arrogant TREX agent? Oh, no. That’s completely unheard of.”

“This is why I didn’t want to talk to you about it.”

Jason opened the door and led Ryan into the room. Bailey placed her back to them and held Jackson in her sights. “We’ll talk more later.”

“No,” he shot back. “We won’t.”

“Set your stuff wherever,” Jason instructed Ryan. He entered the room and gave it a cursory glance before dropping a gym bag next to the door. That told her he hadn’t made up his mind whether he planned to stay or not. They’d put him through a series of tests. It was now their turn.

“Welcome to the TREX internship program.” Bailey held out her hand.

Ryan accepted it and glanced around again. “Am I the only intern?”

“At the moment.”

He eyed the door. “You mean for the training?” He regarded her. “Or for the program?”

“Both.” She followed up by repeating, “At the moment.”

“Is that a problem?” Jackson asked.

Ryan barely gave him a second look. Maybe he didn’t scare as easily as Jason thought. Either that or he was very good at hiding it. Bailey had a knack at reading people. Ryan didn’t give off any signals of being scared. Curious, sure. Cautious, absolutely. But not scared.

Another sign of a good agent.

“Have a seat,” she instructed and motioned at the giant conference table in the center of the large room TREX had convinced the university to reserve for the program. It took a few calls from Special Director Weber to convince the powers that be, but the agency got the room in the basement of the rec center. It stayed cool, didn’t have any windows to distract the interns or attract unwanted attention, and was as close to soundproof as it got without lining the walls. Any noises would be covered by the everyday sounds of the gym above them. “The first thing we need to do is—”

“Stop,” David interrupted as he barged into the room, a computer bag in hand, which caught Bailey’s eye. He wasn’t one to use computers.

Ryan sat up a little straighter. “Agent Snyder, sir.”

“Hey, kid.” He nodded, clearly impressed. Ryan knew who to suck up to. Observant. “I wish I were here with good news. As part of the agreement to allow us into the university, we had to make a few concessions.”

Bailey didn’t like the way David looked at Ryan. “No.”

“Sorry, Bails. He’s off-limits.”

“But…” she trailed off, not sure what else to say. David wouldn’t interrupt them to deliver this kind of news unless it came from higher up.

Ryan stood. “What do you mean, off-limits?”

“We’ve got our orders. We aren’t allowed to touch you.”

“Whose orders?”

“Stuart Ryan, your father. He practically owns this university. If we want in, we have to play by his rules.”

“That’s not… That’s bullshit.”

“It is what it is.”

“No,” he insisted and pounded his fist on the table. “I won’t let my dad take this from me.”

David sighed and pinched the skin above his nose. It was something she’d seen Weber do. A lot. Her BIL must have picked it up from his best friend. “We don’t have a choice here, Ryan.”

“The hell we don’t.” He stormed to the door and grabbed his bag. “I’ll take care of this. Text me the time of the next training. I’ll be there.” He walked out with purpose.

Bailey wanted to scream. Who was Stuart Ryan to take this from his son? “That selfish bastard. I can’t believe he’d…” She stopped when she caught David smiling. “What?”

“He said we. He’s already associating himself with TREX.”

“And?” There was always an and when he had that glimmer in his eye.

“We’re not in the position to go up against Stuart Ryan and his power.”

“But his son is.” Bailey made the connection aloud. It bothered her. Oh, how it bothered her. “Ryan is a bigger asset than just being a connection to his father. Please tell me that’s not your angle.”

“He seems a solid choice,” David answered without actually answering. “Let’s see how he handles this.”

“Something tells me it’s bigger than Daddy worried about his boy getting hurt.”

“It is. Stuart Ryan is to colleges what Rupert Murdoch is to media. He doesn’t just have his fingers in Bainbridge University. Most of the major universities this side of the Rockies have some sort of Ryan stamp of approval. This goes much deeper than him not wanting his son involved with an agency that specializes in finding things.”

“If he’s in bed with so many colleges,” Jackson started.

“He can control the curriculum,” Jason finished. “Why would he want to do that?”

“If you own the information,” Bailey said in a mutter. “You can bend it any way you want.”

“I don’t think that’s what this is.” David set the bag on the table and pulled out a laptop. “The board can direct, but they don’t have final say on the curriculum. There’s more to this, more than we’ve been able to dig up—yet.”

“Until Ryan.” Bailey made the connection.

“That’s why Stuart Ryan doesn’t want TREX to touch his son. This isn’t about Daddy worried his kid will be in any danger. He’s worried Ryan will put it all together, which is exactly what we need.”

“What’s that?” Bailey nodded at the beefy computer.

“This is how Ryan is going put it all together.”