Zane stood outside in the darkness behind the Sarah’s beach house with his feet bare and the phone clutched hard to his ear. “What now, Sutton? What am I supposed to do here?” He threw his hand up. “I told you I think Harris is on to me.”

A long pause. “You said you were up for this mission.”

Zane resisted the urge to throw the phone again, hating himself for being out of control like this. “I am, but I might be too close.” He shook his head, wondering when he’d last had a clear thought.

“Are you compromised?” Sutton’s voice was smooth, calm, collected. Everything Zane usually was.

“I might be. I told you I was at the meeting tonight. The freaking guy told me his nephew had been killed by the violent American military machine.”

Sutton swore, making Zane jolt with surprise. He couldn’t remember Sutton swearing before. “That son of a—”

“So am I made?”

“No,” Sutton said quickly. “Harris has always hated America. Makes sense he would be selling weapons to Mexico.” Sutton exhaled. “This is worse than I thought.”

“Why?”

“Because he might not know who you are yet, but he will.”

Zane didn’t react. He’d already suspected this.

Sutton swore again. “Or he knows and was playing you. That means he’s playing me.” He didn’t speak for a few moments, then asked, “So what is your plan?”

Sucking in a breath, Zane thought of how he could go with his guys, stealthily move into Harris’s home, extract him, and torture him.

“Don’t say take him and torture him,” Sutton said softly. “Even though part of me wants that. But we still need to find a way to get information on how he’s delivering weapons.”

Zane frowned and rubbed his forehead. “Usually, I can think clearly about things like this, but …”

“I presume you are referring to Ms. Hamilton.”

“Yes.” Zane thought of where he could take her to keep her safe. She would hate it, but they might not have a choice.

“Don’t leave yet,” Sutton said, sounding more like himself. “The henchmen are monitoring the house. Just—Just hang tight.”

Zane looked around, the hair on the back of his neck sticking up. “Where?” He moved around the side of the house to the front.

Sutton was quiet for a moment. “Nothing. It’s fine, just people walking the beach. We thought someone was there.”

Zane’s heart was racing. He walked around the house faster, but tried to be quiet so he didn’t wake Sarah or Tyler.

“Do you need me to call in someone else? Tell me straight. If Harris wants mind games, I can send in Blayze—”

“No.” His answer was swift, and he hadn’t known how certain he was about that point until this moment. No way. Like he would let someone else protect her. The center of his chest squeezed as he thought of kissing her yesterday. Man, this woman could unhinge him in an instant. Then he thought of Tyler, of the way he looked at him with hero worship and how he’d tried to protect his mother. “I’m staying on this op. We just need to figure out who is breaking in and why she has been targeted, but I’m not asking her to get close to that guy.”

“Fine. Just do what you have to do.”

It surprised Zane to hear Sutton talk about this so blatantly. Usually, it was standard on these ops to bring in reinforcements where they could. All five of the original Warrior Project guys had gone to England for River and Sutton’s big rescue. Sure, they were a vigilante lot, but they tried to do it right, even if that meant admitting the need for backup.

“What about the FBI?” asked Zane. Zane had learned the value in dotting his i’s and crossing his t’s. Sure, the basest part of him wanted to kill Harris, but he knew the law was the right option.

“I’ll call Cheryse and tell her he might be checking you out. I’ll be in touch.”

Zane sighed. He could do this. He was calming down and felt better. No case had ever been this personal before. “Okay.” At least he had Sutton. He had the FBI. They would catch Harris. Meanwhile, he was here. He would protect Sarah and Tyler. The only certainty he had was that he would take care of her.

He nearly dropped the phone when he heard the lock on the office doors jiggle. A guy dressed in black was standing outside of Sarah’s office, staring at the lock like he was confused. Zane took off for the guy, running fast and coming behind him to put him in a chokehold before the guy knew what was happening.

The guy struggled, and Zane saw the flash of a knife in the guy’s hand before pain stabbed into the outer part of his thigh. On instinct, he used the same leg the guy had knifed and kicked him as hard as he could in the chest. While he was down, Zane punched the guy’s face and took his knife.

At this point, it was all reaction as he grabbed the guy’s shirt and slammed him down on the ground, getting in his face and then closing a tight grip around his throat.

The guy couldn’t be more than twenty. A punk.

Zane didn’t want to wake up Sarah. He wanted to handle this himself. He didn’t want to get the police. He wanted information.

Resisting the urge to do more harm, he stood, ripping the kid to a standing position. The kid couldn’t be more than a buck fifty. He yanked him toward the beach, still holding him by the scruff of his neck. “Who are you?” he demanded, the knife still in his other hand. No pain registered from the thigh yet. Zane had had many knife wounds; this one was practically a walk in the park.

“I don’t know what you—”

Zane broke off the denial with a swift headbutt, not even feeling it with his adrenaline surging. The kid tried to fall, but Zane kept hold of him, pulling him down on the beach closer to the water. Once they were far enough away, he threw him down, pinned him, and got in his face. “You better talk or you’re dead.”

Of course, he wouldn’t actually kill him, but the kid didn’t know that.

The kid put up his hands and sputtered. “Wait. Wait. I didn’t know this would be the job tonight. Some guy hired me, told me to break in and—”

“What? What guy?”

The kid started crying. “I don’t know, man. I just need to make a couple hundred bucks for prom. I was supposed to just go in and put something under the desk by the door.”

“What?” Zane demanded.

The kid extracted a bug from his pocket, the same kind of bug Zane had thrown from the house. “I don’t know. I—”

Zane shoved him down and stood, inspecting the bug. “Who hired you?”

“I don’t know. I met him at a party tonight. He gave me the two hundred dollars and told me he’d never see me again unless I didn’t finish the job. If I didn’t, I would pay.” The kid began crying again. “I’m sorry, man.”

“Where was the party? What did the guy look like?”

The kid pointed down the beach. “Down there. The guy was shorter than you. He had black hair.”

Zane glared at the kid, then held out a hand. “Get up and come with me.”

The kid tried to squirm away. “Don’t hit me again.”

Zane took him by the scruff of the neck and pulled him to his feet. He had compassion for the kid, even though he was an idiot. “We’re going back to that party, and you’re going to help me find that guy.”

The kid looked like he would throw up. “I knifed you,” he said, pointing out the obvious.

Zane winked at him, shoving the knife into his belt. “And you’re not getting the knife back either.”

The kid was confused. “Okay.”

Zane tugged him down the beach. “I want answers.” He remembered how Tyler thought Zane was some kind of superhero, and wondered if he should say something Captain America would say. He decided it couldn’t hurt. “And stay in school, kid!”