P.J. didn’t look haunted, as one might expect. Yes, it had taken time for her not to react to the knowledge of a woman being abused, but she’d become more adept at hiding her reaction.
Then Hancock’s gaze settled on Resnick and flickered dispassionately over the teams standing behind the man who dangled an unlit cigarette from his lips. That gaze went back to Sam, studying and measuring, asking the silent question.
“He can be trusted,” Sam said. “We need all the firepower we can get. It’s not going to be a walk in the park to take Maksimov down, but first we have to find him, and that’s where Adam has proven himself to be particularly useful in the past.”
“You should know,” Resnick said in a sour tone. “You shot me and hacked into my computer.”
Hancock didn’t bother giving fake remorse. They all knew that their jobs made for less-than-desirable missions, and every single person in the room had been forced at one time or another to go against their personal code in the name of good.
Hancock ignored Resnick’s dig, and his gaze found Maren’s again. “Cope is hurt. I need you to look at him. Viper too. You said it yourself. I’m not dying. Yet. Take care of them.”
Then he gazed fiercely at Rio and included Sam, who stood beside Hancock’s former team leader. Though Sam led KGI, it didn’t bother him for Hancock to look to Rio. Rio had been to Hancock what Sam was to Rio and the rest of KGI.
“The priority is Honor. I don’t give a fuck about Maksimov. Another day. Another time. There’ll always be another time. But not another Honor. She has to come first. Swear it. She has to be the priority.”
Rio knelt and grasped Hancock’s uninjured arm in the grip of one warrior to another.
“You have my word on it, brother.”
It was the first time Rio had acknowledged the once strong bond between himself and the man he’d trained. And Sam knew how Hancock felt. Every man in the room knew how he felt. They’d all been in the position of knowing the woman they loved had to come before all else. The mission. The greater good. That in some cases, the good of the one did goddamn well outweigh the good of the many.
“I’m already on locating him,” Resnick interjected. “He could goddamn be anywhere, but I’m working on the logistics given our present location and what I know to be some of his hidey-holes. The problem has never been not knowing where Maksimov is, but rather being able to nail the bastard down. He’s a fucking escape artist. There one moment, gone the next.”
“I was arrogant,” Hancock admitted painfully, looking up to find Swanny. His brother-in-law of sorts. “I should have put a tracking device on her like you did Eden. There just wasn’t much time and I was so sure I could just take him out and Honor would never even wake up.”
“Why did you drug her?” P.J. asked angrily.
Her teammates eyed her warily, and Cole’s expression turned grim even as he gathered his wife close to his side.
“You made her helpless and you didn’t plan for the worst. You always plan for the worst,” she said hoarsely.
Hancock closed his eyes. “I had no choice. I was working without a net. No backup plan. It was the way Maksimov wanted her delivered, and I had to make it look good or we would have never gotten close enough to take him out. Not that it did us any good.”
His tone was bitter and filled with self-condemnation.
“I found his mole buried in Bristow’s organization, but there was obviously another. That or one of my men is or was dirty, and I can’t believe that.”
“You know you can’t assume anything,” Rio said bluntly, reprimanding his former man.
“You know them too, Rio. You look at them. You look at their faces and see how they feel about Honor. Then you tell me one of them sold her—us—out.”
“What’s the damage to him, Maren?” Steele asked, interrupting the tense exchange. “Is he up to this? Because I have no qualms about sidelining him if I think he’s going to get any one of us killed.”
“Free-floating piece of broken rib,” she said briskly. “The vest saved his life, but at such close range, and with the caliber bullet used, he’s fortunate the bullet didn’t go right through the vest. Conrad alleviated the pressure on his lung and drained the fluid and air so it could reinflate. Not saying he could go to war, but he’ll do. Provided he rests and doesn’t move until go time.”
Hancock nodded, surprising Sam with his acquiescence. Judging by the paleness and sweat, Hancock was suffering far more than he was letting on. But his physical suffering paled in comparison to his emotional pain.
“Then let’s get to tracking down this motherfucker and take him out,” Garrett said, speaking up for the first time.
Every single person in the room—KGI, Titan and Resnick’s teams—all echoed the sentiment in unison. There was an innocent woman in the hands of a monster, and while that was reason enough to stage the takedown of one of the world’s most dangerous men, this wasn’t just any woman.
She was the only woman Hancock had ever shown any vulnerability over, and that made her even more important.
CHAPTER 36
HONOR lay in her cage, curled into an unfeeling ball. She sensed Maksimov’s frustration, his mounting rage. And his puzzlement over her ability to withstand his repeated attempts to hurt her. But she simply felt nothing at all. It was hard to hurt someone who simply didn’t care and no longer had anything to live for.