Viviana ignored the little man slamming a sledgehammer around in her brain and padded into the kitchen for coffee. She stepped over Riley and Bree. Halted in a bit of confusion when she saw Rhea on the floor a ways away. It wasn’t the woman sprawled alone that surprised her. They’d crashed there the past few nights, mainly to keep Mary from climbing the walls since Dylan was gone. It was the silent man watching them all sleep.

“Fallon.” His name came out as more of a pained whisper than greeting. She dragged a mug down and filled it with coffee. He made noise as he progressed into the kitchen, intentional on his part since he was always lethal quiet. Not like Jud, but lethal nonetheless. “Coffee?”

“Yeah, black.”

Like he’d ever drink it any other way. He’d probably spontaneously combust if he drank it with cream or sugar. She looked around, wondering how long she could stall before he’d get bored and go away. It’d been two days since she’d screwed up and his team had almost paid the price. Although she’d semi-accepted she couldn’t have done more, suddenly seeing him in person awakened the almost-comatose guilt.

“I didn’t realize you all got in,” she said. “Gage and Addy were supposed to wake me.”

“We got in a couple hours ago. We decided to crash a few hours before debrief,” he commented as he took the mug she offered. “Got an earful from Addy, then Rhea when I came over here a while ago. Seems you and me should have a one-on-one debrief before we all get together.”

Her insides churned. She focused on a lone dish in the sink. The water turned hot as it cascaded onto her hand. She wiped the dish, the motion repetitive and hypnotic. If she focused hard enough she could almost pretend he hadn’t taken two steps forward and was now within reaching distance. “I’m sorry.”

Fallon settled a hand on her right shoulder and turned her until they faced one another. “Before I got an earful from Addy, I got one from Jud. Have to admit that man intimidates me.”

Vi couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdity. The two men were more alike than any of the others at The Arsenal. Both were private contractors, or had been. Fallon recently signed on and was now a team leader. “Funny. I don’t think either of you could ever be intimidated.”

“You and Edge did a hell of a good job, nothing you could’ve done better. The feeds the teams got were only their own, but I got them all. I heard all four strikes. The fact you did all that while the compound was under attack…” His jaw twitched. Lips thinned, he glanced away. “Don’t take blame that isn’t yours to own. You blaming yourself for that means we all get to blame ourselves for not being here when the compound needed us. You want that?”

No. Talk about stupid. How could they possibly be blamed? They had a job to do and had been in the middle of…

She swallowed the rest of the mental diatribe and narrowed her gaze. Not even the little voice in her head that blamed Vi for everything could argue with his logic.

“What happened?” She took a sip of her coffee, forcing the liquid down. “I replayed your feed and it was silent. Who got the jump on you?”

“Friendlies, or so we thought. The SEAL team hanging out with us didn’t suspect them being anything other than that either. They were CIA contracted, never got the letters behind them. All I know is one minute they were chatting us up and the next they had us taken down. We were outnumbered three to one, but that’s no excuse. I trusted them because of who they worked for and shouldn’t have. It won’t happen again.”

So the NSA fed intel to a CIA team and Zero somehow got wind of it. “They were dirty.”

“Yeah, they were dirty. We went with them without a fight because we knew we’d get away at some point. I wanted more information on who they were working with and what their end game was.” Fallon paused for a sip of coffee. “Before we could make a move, they got a call saying they’d been burned and to pull out immediately. We eliminated them before they eliminated us. We were outnumbered, but not by much at that point. Some of them had left, thinking they had us sufficiently secured.”

Big mistake underestimating a SEAL team and an Arsenal team combined. “We knew there was Hive involvement in this mess at some point. I should’ve had a better contingency plan in place.”

“The one you had in place worked. There’s a big enough mine field left out there for us to navigate without you throwing this into the mix. We’re good. The only injuries were minor and the bad guys didn’t walk away.” Fallon bumped her nose with his index finger and grinned. “Let’s focus on kicking some Collective ass.”

Vi was on board with the idea. She and Mary had refocused everyone’s—mainly Rhea, Bree and Riley—nervous, apprehensive energy into an offensive plan. Proactive, not reactive. Not exactly the best motto, but way better than run and hide or cower and cry. They’d spent yesterday holed up in what was now known as the white-board room. At first, she hadn’t wanted to involve the other women, but then Mary pointed out the obvious.

They were involved the second this compound was hit. They had the right to fight back. Them helping unravel the data about The Collective was them fighting back.

So, the three women were now neck deep in forensic data mining at its best. Addy had even taken a seat at the table for a change and gotten involved. The hard drive she’d taken from Jian, when combined with what Jud had provided a lot of data—HERA had been processing since late yesterday afternoon. Vi hoped the system would spew data out in time for it to become part of the debriefing, but from what she’d seen so far, she suspected they’d need a third dataset.

“I’ll see you later. Chin up. You kicked ass with this one, like always. Don’t ever doubt yourself,” Fallon said.

“Thank you,” she whispered as he drew her into a hug.

“Guess I’m not the only one looking for a shot of sass this morning.”

Vi shoved away from Fallon as if he was on fire. The operative chuckled as he took a couple steps back and greeted Jud with a weird handshake and half-hug back slap greeting.

“Just ironing out the wrinkles in her head,” Fallon said. “Didn’t want another earful from anyone about her falsely taking the blame for what went down.”

“You good?” Jud asked her.

“Yeah, I’m good.” She busied herself pouring another cup of coffee. “Afraid I’m low on sass, though. You’ll have to go sans sass this time around.”

“I’m thinking Fallon’s not the only one overdue for a conversation with you.” He boxed her into the L of the kitchen counter. A hand on each side of her, he leaned in. “And you’re never sans sass.”

Vi’s gaze roamed down Jud’s naked torso. Definitely more definition than her code lines. “You have a problem keeping clothes on.”

His full lips upturned into the nuclear smile, the toe-curling one. “There’s the sass.” His words were a husky whisper as his eyes closed.

Jud feathered his lips across hers, the contact so slight if her eyes weren’t still open she would’ve missed it altogether. She settled a hand on his stomach, savoring the ripple of muscle beneath her fingertips. She deepened the contact, fused their mouths together. He tasted of minty toothpaste. A rumble rolled through him.

Images flashed through her mind, her pinned beneath him in a bed. Hearing him rumble as he…

She stifled a shocked yelp when he hoisted her up to the counter and stood between her spread legs. The kiss turned carnal, a downright dirty wrestling of tongues and lewd dances. She wrapped her legs around his waist as his hands slid beneath her thin pajama top. He explored her back, the side of her breasts. He broke the kiss as he grazed her nipple with his fingertips.

Awareness shot through her entire body with the slight contact, an arrow striking the target dead on.

“I have no control around you,” he muttered against her mouth. “I’d better stop before I carry you to your bed and keep going.”

She was totally okay with continuing.

“We’ve got lots of fires going, but we’re going to stoke this one, see what happens. Tonight,” he declared.

“Okay.” She wasn’t sure what else to say. Her pulse raced faster than a greyhound. Her entire focus honed in on Jud’s hand beneath her top, meandering across her skin in a slow, easy manner. There was nothing slow or easy about Judson Jensen.

“You’ve been avoiding me,” he said.

“Yeah,” she admitted. “I needed my focus on data gathering. You muddle my brain.”

The toe-curling grin returned. Heat rose in her cheeks as he cupped her face. “I’m liking that I muddle your brain. It can be my new superpower.”

“You don’t need any more of those. Little Penny the Persian couldn’t keep up with you if you got too many.”

“Penny, huh?”

“Yeah. Fluffy, all white with one of those squirrel-like tails that swishes when she walks. I bet you can train her to walk on a leash.”

“Penny the Persian is a hard no. The only sass I need in my life is you,” he replied. “Just to say, Viviana, you don’t have to toss out Penny to keep the conversation light. I know this is moving fast, probably faster than you need. I’ll pump the brakes a few times, ease back into the slow lane.”

Vi stared into his eyes a moment as her brain absorbed his words. He’d read her play before she realized she’d even made it. He was right. Penny the Persian was totally thrown out to keep them from getting too intense. She didn’t want to analyze why she’d ignored him the past couple of days. He terrified her in every conceivable way, not all of them bad. Most of them were pretty damn good if she were being entirely honest.

“I’m not ready for a NASCAR racer, Jud, but I’m not looking for a grandpa on a Sunday drive either.” She put her hand on his chest and swallowed as her eyes feasted on his bare flesh. Jud would never be a Sunday driving grandpa. Her body turned molten as her mind wandered down that trail, the one with the white picket fence and two point five kids. He’d be a fiercely protective dad. She smiled at the notion. His poor daughter wouldn’t ever date because no teenage punk would measure up to Jud.

“What was that thought?”

“Nothing,” she lied.

“Pains me to admit, but I came here for a reason. The rest of the families are arriving in a bit, probably any minute now.”

Dread blasted her insides with the force of an IED. So far, they’d situated Bree’s family. Everyone else had required a bit more time to coordinate. Riley and Momma Mason had taken charge of the family portion of their plans, so Vi hadn’t been too heavily involved. Marshall and the brothers had arrived stateside early yesterday morning, but had opted to move families after a brief delay—one which gave them time to make sure the families weren’t compromised. Mary had coordinated that effort with Dylan and Jesse.

“Come on, let’s go,” he said, as if sensing she’d avoid it as long as possible. “Get dressed. I’ll fix a coffee to go for you.”

Her insides warmed. He’d fix a coffee to go for her. Judson Jensen was dangerous to the senses in every possible way.

* * *

Vi walked like a prisoner headed to the execution chamber rather than a woman greeting her parents. Anger rose in him with each darted gaze she cast, each nervous squeeze of her hand on his. He looked down at the deathlike grip she’d maintained on him since they’d left her bungalow-style house. He wanted to assure her it’d be okay, but what little he’d seen of her parents nixed the idea. They were likely a real piece of work.

The area outside the compound was filled with people. All the teams were back. Operatives wandered about, interspersed with men, women and a few children. Luggage was piled up. Bree was flitting about with her equally friendly parents and sister. Fallon was glaring at an older couple in an obviously heated conversation with Rhea a ways away. A younger woman about Jacob’s age watched, a baby in her arms.

Riley walked over to them, clipboard in hand. “I’d say good morning, but that’d be a lie. Talk about chaos.”

“That bad?” Vi asked.

“Oh, you have no idea. Mom is on a tear. She’s less than thrilled at Marshall for vacating most of his operatives from their rooms so we have enough space for everyone’s families to have some place to stay that’s more like a cheap hotel room instead of a barracks-style setting.” Riley looked up at Jud. “Thanks for moving, by the way.”

“No problem.” He’d moved his one bag to the upper level barracks, the one that’d gone unused so far. It was four rows of twelve cots each set. A small chest was at the base of each “bed”. A nightstand completed the areas cordoned off with partitions that could be pulled around them to offer a bit of privacy, but not much. Fortunately, the bathrooms weren’t toilets and urinals lined along the back wall, but gym style with actual showers. Bathroom stalls.

He’d been in a lot worse.

“We didn’t have to move many operatives out, just a few,” Riley said. She chewed on her lip. “Your parents are here, Vi. Jesse took them into the visitor’s area. They were a bit…irritated.”

Jud grunted. He didn’t want Viviana exposed to irritation; especially if it was like any of the bullshit he heard when she’d called him. She was already in motion. He wrapped an arm around her, and slowed her progression. “Look at me, Viviana.”

Ashen, wide-eyed, she peered up. “I haven’t seen them in a while.”

“There a reason you let so much time go by?”

She shrugged. “The last time didn’t go too well. We had a situation at Hive and I mistakenly had them stay with me at the safe house.”

Son of a bitch. “That didn’t go well.”

“Nuclear meltdowns had less fallout,” she commented. “I learned to hole them up somewhere not near me, but this situation is a bit different. We need everyone contained in one defensible position.”

The last thing she needed to worry about was parental bullshit. He kept his thoughts to himself. He’d been blessed with a family who loved him, parents who’d rather sleep on the ground under the stars than put anyone out. The door chimed when they entered. Nolan and Marshall bookended their mom behind the reception desk. Both men glowered at the couple Jesse had corralled in the area to the right. A man was asleep on the sofa behind them.

“There you are. It’s about time, young lady. What is the meaning of this? We were dragged from our home like common criminals and hauled here like cargo.” The woman charged forward. “What have you gotten into this time? I don’t understand why you can’t have a real job like a normal person. You’ve been nothing but trouble.”

“Hello, Mother. It’s nice to see you, too.”

“Don’t smart mouth me, young lady. You have a lot of nerve dragging us into your mess. We aren’t cleaning it up.”

“I don’t think a used car salesman from Hoboken and his housewife have the necessary skill set to clean up this mess, but good to know where you stand.” Viviana crossed her arms. “This is Judson, a friend of mine. I see you’ve met Jesse. His brothers Nolan and Marshall are behind the desk. This is their place. They’ve graciously offered to keep everyone safe until everything is cleared up.”

“We were perfectly safe where we were, away from your chaos.” The older man’s gaze narrowed. “Who are these cretins anyway?”

“I just introduced them, Father. These are my coworkers and friends, the men who will keep you safe.”

“Right, the ones probably fixing the problems you caused.”

“Everyone, these are my parents, Ralph and Olivia Chambers. The guy passed out on the couch is my brother, Rich.”

“Of course he’s passed out,” the father argued. “He was dragged out of bed.”

Jesse stood silent, arms crossed and jaw twitching. He’d clearly had about all he could stomach from the duo.

“Really, Viviana. Are all these dramatics necessary?” Her mother scrutinized her daughter. “You can’t even dress like a normal adult. I see you still dress like a homeless person.”

“I’d say that’s somewhat appropriate given the fact you kicked me out when I was a teenager,” Viviana replied.

“We hardly kicked you out, young lady. You were the one who chose to go off and gallivant with those people instead of doing what normal people would do.”

“It’s called an education, Mother.”

“Watch that smart mouth with your mother, little girl. I’m a good mind to…”

“I’m glad you’re here safely,” Viviana interrupted. “I’ll take you to your rooms.”

“Don’t you interrupt your father with that disrespectful tone. You know better than speak out of turn. That damn mind of yours is always moving and going, making you think you’re better than everyone. Smarter. Nothing but disrespect.”

“I’m a good mind to…”

Jud had stomached enough. He positioned himself between Viviana and her father when the red-faced man raised his hand and took a menacing step toward his daughter. He squeezed the older man’s shoulder until he grimaced. “I’d look around and make a better decision. You aren’t getting any closer to Vi.”

“The nerve. Ralph, step away.” Olivia Chambers grabbed her husband’s hand and dragged him back a couple steps. “She’s clearly associating with common hooligans.”

The couple would likely pee their pants if they knew what all Jud had done. For once he was tempted to share exactly what kind of hooligan he was. Maybe he could scare some common decency into them. His gaze swept the area. The three Masons were one degrading comment away from tossing them on their asses. Momma Mason was red faced and being held firmly between her two oldest sons.

The door chimed. Jud turned and couldn’t help the smile that spread on his face. His mother lunged, slamming into him with full-force. He took a step back from the impact as she crushed him against her. Tears trekked down her cheeks as she burrowed against him. She laughed as she said his name over and over in a whispered chant.

“Judson, Judson, Judson.”

“Hi, Mom.” He squeezed her tight and did the same thing with his father.

The two took turns hugging him tight enough to knock the wind from his lungs.

“He has a couple cracked ribs,” Viviana whispered as she gently tapped his mom’s shoulder.

Pale-faced, his mother gently touched his sides. “Oh, dear. You should’ve said something. Judson, Judson, Judson. You’re skin and bones.”

His father laughed at the outright lie. Only his mom would think that. “It’s fine. I’m glad you’re all here. Jacob’s around here somewhere, likely holed up with the computer equipment. You know him.”

“It’s been too long,” his mom whispered. “Are you okay? Are you safe?”

He was safer and more okay than usual, but far from what she’d deem acceptable. He nodded and smiled as she kissed his cheek and patted his chest. “We’ll get through this. We always do.”

“Son, we got a call a few days ago. I was going to reach out and tell you, figured it’d come better from you than us, but Danny’s convoy.” His dad’s lower lip trembled. “It’s not good, son.”

“He’s okay.” Judson motioned toward Jesse. “This is Jesse Mason. He was one of the team leaders for one of the teams who rescued Danny and the rest of the convoy. Two of his brothers are back there, Nolan and Marshall. That’s their mom. The other three brothers are wandering around here somewhere.”

“Oh, you look just like Dallas. He was such a nice young man.” His mother walked over and patted Jesse’s cheek as she looked over at his mom. “You’ve raised some fine, handsome and polite young men.”

“I have,” Mrs. Mason replied proudly.

“Thank you for getting our boy back to us,” his dad said. “Danny’s not blood, but he’s a Jensen through and through. We wouldn’t be the same without him.”

“He’s coming home soon. They wanted him and a couple of the others to stay in the hospital a few days, just to be on the safe side. They’re in Germany. Once you’re settled, I’ll take you both to chat with Doc Logan. He can answer any questions you might have.”

“I see things are complicated, son.” His father looked around. “Dallas didn’t say much, just that we needed to be secured for a few days. What can I do to help?”

The difference between his parents and Viviana’s was so notable it whipped through the room in an awkward tension. He wanted to introduce the woman beside him to his parents, but knew they’d recognize who she was immediately if he did. She’d been through enough with her parents without adding his family’s reactions to the mix. They’d hopped onto the adoration bandwagon for the Quillery Edge long ago.

“Why don’t you go and get settled? Viviana was about to grab some breakfast. They’ve got a nice cafeteria here for the soldiers and operatives. I’ll join you shortly. I have something to attend to first.”

His mother’s eyebrows lifted. “Yes, I see that. Well, if you need help, you know I enjoy a good challenge. It’s been a few years since I’ve taught lessons, but I have a few left in me to dole out.”

Challenge wasn’t the word he’d use, but he smiled and entrusted his parents to Viviana, whose eyes were wide and expressive.

“I should stay here,” she whispered into the silence.

“Yes, you should, young lady. What have you gotten into this time?” Mr. Chambers looked over at his son. “Why can’t you be more like Rich?”

Jud touched Viviana’s face and forced her focus on him instead of her parents. He leaned down and lowered his voice. “Let me handle them. Show my parents the cafeteria and grab some breakfast. I’ll catch up with you soon.”

“But…”

“I need to take the lead on this one. Don’t ask me to step aside, not for this.” He forced a smile as their eyes met. “Save the fight for when it matters.”

“Okay.”

Nolan entered the fray. He handed a couple badges to her and whispered something in her ear. She nodded.

“Mr. and Mrs. Jensen, we have a room ready for you both. I’m afraid it’s nothing fancy. We’re still working on getting guest quarters built.” Viviana motioned toward the back hall leading into the building. “You’re bound to be hungry.”

“Jarold, be a dear and get the bags so Dallas can get back to whatever he needs to do.”

“It’s no trouble at all, ma’am,” Dallas replied from the doorway. “I’ll get these put in the room for you two.”

“So polite,” she commented. “That seems to be a trait lacking in some these days.”

Jud chuckled at the not-so-subtle jab at Viviana’s parents. His mother pointedly glared at the other couple, who’d grown quiet amidst the crush of Mason men now surrounding them. He leaned down and kissed his mom’s cheek. “We’ll catch up in a few, Mom.”

“Oh, take your time. Viviana and I will get to know each other.”

That’s exactly what he was afraid of.