Jina’s gaze darted around at all of them, though she was too on edge for her to really see their faces or focus on anything other than that they were big, and they had her surrounded. Don’t show fear, she thought; they might attack. No, wait, that was dogs. Regardless, she knew she needed to be cool about this. Instinct also told her not to get pissy about being called a girl; a successful battle was about timing, and this wasn’t the time, not on the first meeting and with them looming around her, probably a little hostile and already doubting she could do the job. Instead she said, “Then I guess you’re my boys.”

The big dude stared down at her. “Babe,” he said, his tone faintly astonished. They all looked taken aback by her voice, which, yeah, was deep and smoky, a little raspy, and way sexier than her appearance. She’d dealt with that raspy voice her whole life; even when she’d been a little kid, people on the telephone had thought they were talking to an adult.

Another guy said, “I think you just named her.”

What? No! Alarm shot through her. She knew what they meant. They all had nicknames, and she didn’t want to be a “Babe,” either human or pig. She wanted a cool nickname, a kick-ass nickname, something that would make people think twice about messing with her. “Babe” practically invited messing.

“Not Babe. I don’t like Babe,” she said. “I like Grenade, or Mankiller, something like that.”

A round of snickers greeted that. “Sorry, you don’t get to choose,” the big dude said.

“No one will take me seriously.”

“We don’t anyway,” he replied coolly.

How was that for smacking her in the face with the unvarnished truth? She couldn’t even disagree with them, considering the circumstances. “Maybe you don’t now, but you will,” she said, and scowled at him to show she meant it.

They laughed, all of them except the big dude. He didn’t look as if he had much of a sense of humor—not that she’d been joking, but still.

“We’d better, since our lives will depend on you being able to do your job.” Big Dude looked impassively down at her. “That’s why we’re taking over your training. It’s already set up.”

Uh-uh. No. No way; they’d kill her. They were way out of her league. She wanted to run in the middle of the pack of FNGs, she didn’t want to humiliate herself by demonstrating all that she couldn’t do to a group as superbly trained as these guys were. Maybe in six months she’d be ready to join them for more training. She waved in the vague direction where she thought the others had gone. “No, I need to stay with my group. I’m not ready for your level, honest.”

“We know that,” the smallest guy said, small being a relative term because he was still a six-footer. His face was so dirty she likely wouldn’t recognize him after he washed, but he had blue eyes and what looked like two small round scars in the middle of his forehead. “But we’ll bring you up to speed faster than Baxter will, because he has to focus on everyone and we’ll be focusing just on you.”

A dread deeper than the Grand Canyon seized her. She swallowed hard, and said, “My cup runneth over.”

“You have no idea,” Big Dude said and crooked his finger at her. “C’mon, let’s get started.”

Oh. Hell.

Six hours later, Jina lay flat on the ground staring up at the blue sky and thinking breaking a bone would be preferable to this. Maybe she could manage that, fall off or over something, break one or both her legs, get a concussion—anything to get her out of this hell. She didn’t like being dirty and sweaty, but every inch of her was covered with grime. She didn’t like physically pushing herself to the point of puking, but she’d done that twice already, puking in front of her new teammates. Unfortunately, puking hadn’t earned her any sympathy from her tormentors; instead, the blue-eyed one—his nickname was Snake—had said, “We’ve all been there,” and the big dude, who was Ace himself, had said, “Get up and get your ass in gear.”

Asshole.

They all were assholes, but he was the biggest one, literally and figuratively. He was also the boss asshole, and something about the look in his eyes, as if he fully expected her to bail out and she’d have to scrape the bottom of the bucket to get as low as his opinion of her, kept her from bailing no matter how much she wanted to. She got her ass up and got it in gear. It was a gear that barely ground along, but she was moving, even when she’d have sworn she couldn’t.

A bottle of water gripped in a big, grimy hand appeared in front of her eyes, and a drop of condensation dripped off the bottle onto her face. “Hydrate,” Ace ordered, and she managed to move one aching arm enough to take the bottle from him, though how she was going to drink while lying flat on her back was another question entirely. Maybe just pouring it over her face would let her suck in an ounce or so.

No, not going to work. Puking in front of them was bad enough; she would damn well sit up and drink her water.

Groaning, she rolled to the side and got her left elbow braced under her, then heaved herself into a semierect position. More painful effort got her sitting up, though her body was unhappy about it. She twisted the cap off the water bottle and tilted it up to drink. She’d already learned not to guzzle, so after two sips she lowered the bottle and glared at Ace. “I hate you,” she said grimly. “I hate all of you. You’re bullies and sadists. You probably kick puppies for a hobby. You scare little kids at Christmas instead of Halloween. All of you,” she said again, in case he thought she was railing against him in particular, though as team leader he was the worst of the bunch.

Snake dropped to the ground beside her. “Now, don’t be like that,” he said cheerfully. “We’ll have you in the best shape of your life. You’ll be able to run and swim for miles—”

“I don’t want to run and swim,” she interrupted. “I want to not hurt when I breathe. I don’t like dirt under my fingernails, and look!” She held out her hand; all her nails were not only dirty, most of them were also broken and jagged. Not that she kept her nails fashion-model long, because long nails got in the way on the computer keyboard, so she could deal with the broken nails. Dirt—no. Just no.

One by one the team dropped to the ground until they were all in a rough circle. During the last six torturous hours, she’d learned their names. Ace was Levi Butcher, team leader, head badass. She had a tough time thinking of him as “Ace,” which seemed kind of lighthearted for someone who wasn’t. He was one scary dude, mostly because of the way his expressionless dark eyes drilled holes through her. He’d made it plain he didn’t want her here, but because she was, he’d get her in shape if it killed her. She wasn’t certain which he wanted to do most: kill her or get her in shape. She was betting on the first choice.

Snake was the team medic and he was generally the most cheerful, which at first had made her think kindly of him, but on second thought, what kind of sadist was put in such a good mood by making someone else suffer? She kind of wanted to smack him for making her distrust cheerfulness.

Crutch was blond, kind of quiet, which was misleading because from what she’d seen he was the most likely to pull a practical joke. His quietness was a dodge, and knowing he was deceitful that way made her give him a wide berth, lest she fall victim to one of his pranks. She couldn’t handle pranks right now. She could barely handle walking.

Then there was Boom, who looked to be the oldest of the bunch, maybe late thirties. He was kind of bulky in build, but fast and agile anyway. She figured “fast and agile” was in the job description, so what the heck was she doing here?

Trapper seemed as easygoing as Snake, and again that was misleading, because she’d figured out that Trapper was the team sniper, which meant he was very good at killing people. Jina couldn’t quite get her head around that. It wasn’t that she didn’t know what the GO-Teams did, but somehow she’d expected that they wouldn’t seem so normal—excepting their superman physical conditioning, of course. Trapper was like one of the guys, kidding around, laughing at jokes, joining in the competitive nature with which they tackled everything.

Jelly, on the other hand, looked barely old enough to be shaving. He was also the most likely to instigate the others by ragging on them, sitting back with a smile of satisfaction if he could get something started between the others. He bore watching. What was it about these guys that made her suspicious of cheerfulness, smiling, and low-key geniality? That was just wrong. This whole situation was wrong.

Last was Voodoo, and he looked less pleased by her presence than even Levi. He’d had nothing to say to her, hadn’t given her any tips or encouragement, hadn’t interacted with her in any way. She might as well have been invisible to him. Too bad she hadn’t been invisible to the rest of them.

“Drink all the water you can,” Snake advised. “It’ll keep you from getting so sore.”

“Fat chance,” she muttered. “I won’t be able to move tomorrow.”

“You will,” Levi said. “One way or the other. When we’re on a mission, we do whatever we have to do, no matter how it hurts or how we feel.”

Great. She took that to mean she wouldn’t get a day off to heal and work out some of the inevitable soreness.

“Soak in hot water,” Snake continued. “Then cold water, ice if you can stand it.”

Her horrified look told them how she felt about that, because most of them chuckled—not Levi or Voodoo; they both looked even more grim.

She drank more water, then capped the bottle and determinedly struggled to her feet. “It’s been great, guys—” Not. “But unless you want to continue killing me after dark, I need to get back to my group and go home.”

“Good luck with that,” Levi said, tipping up his own water bottle. “They left over an hour ago.”

What? Jina whirled—ouch—and in horror surveyed the empty training field. Even Baxter was gone. There were still some vehicles parked to the side, seven of them, which meant they belonged to the seven team members who had been getting their jollies by tormenting her.

“I’ll take you home,” Jelly offered.

“Don’t trust him,” Trapper promptly said. “He drives worse than a drunk eighty-year-old. I’ll take you.”

Snake snorted. “Forget that. You’d take her home via New York and think it was funny. I can drop her off.”

“I’ll do it,” Levi said, getting to his feet. His deep voice cut through the chuckles, stopping the discussion in its tracks. “I need to brief her on some things anyway.”

That was that. There were no more offers, no joking. The boss had spoken, and while they didn’t hesitate to involve him in their rough joking around, when it came to GO-Team business, he was undisputed. “Let’s go,” he said, striding across the uneven ground to where the vehicles were parked. Resigned, Jina trudged in his wake.

There were two types of vehicles, she noticed: three sports cars, and four four-wheel drive pickup trucks. She was hoping for one of the sports cars, figuring she could simply drop into the seat, but of course her luck wasn’t going to turn on a day that had been sucky from start to finish. He went straight to the truck that looked as if Darth Vader should be driving it. It was black, but not the shiny black of a normal paint. Instead it was matte, no shine to it. In fact, there was no shine anywhere on the truck, not an inch of chrome, not on the wheels, not on the rearview mirror or side mirrors, not even the door handles.

“How do you find it in the dark?” she asked. “Tie a balloon to it?”

“I’m good at finding things in the dark.” He didn’t crack a smile. “The doors are unlocked, get in.”

Get in. Yeah, uh-huh. Already knowing what she would face, she opened the passenger door and stared inside. The floorboard was at least a foot higher than that of a normal truck, but on a normal day she’d have hoisted herself inside without much trouble. This, however, wasn’t a normal day. Every muscle in her body was quivering with fatigue, to the point that walking was an effort. And he didn’t even have running boards. The truck was as stripped down and no-frills as he was.

He slid behind the wheel and sat there, watching her expressionlessly.

Was this some kind of test? Was he expecting her to ask for help? Say she couldn’t get in his freaking Vadermobile?

She started to do just that. Maybe she’d wash out; maybe all that was needed was for the team leader to nix her as an addition to his team. MacNamara had said that if any of them couldn’t handle the physical demands, they wouldn’t be fired. If not getting into Levi’s truck would also get her out of this physical torture, wouldn’t she be smart to jump at the chance?

Except she couldn’t. Giving up wasn’t in her. No matter how tempting it was to take the easy way out, she had to give her best effort or know she’d been a quitter.

Her best meant she mumbled a grumpy, “They must have been out of tanks when you went car shopping, so you settled for this,” as she gripped the armrest with her right hand and stretched to grab the sissy handle. She strained, lifting one foot, her arms trembling as she tried to pull herself up far enough that she could get one foot on the edge of the floorboard. Didn’t happen. Her biceps gave up the effort and with a grunt she dropped back to the ground.

Darth Vader didn’t make a sound, just waited, his soulless dark gaze on her.

She glanced over her shoulder. All six of the others were standing shoulder to shoulder, watching. Even if they offered help, she couldn’t accept, not that it mattered, because none of them looked as if they had any intention of offering. They weren’t her friends. She had to remember that. She was here because she’d been more or less forced on them; she suspected straws had been drawn, and Levi had gotten the short one.

Short one. Hah! She cracked herself up.

By God, she’d get in that truck if she had to stick a knife in all the tires and bring it down to her level. She enjoyed that mental image enough that she managed to put some extra effort into her next lift and heave—for all the good it did, because she still couldn’t manage to get her foot quite high enough.

One toe, she thought grimly; she needed just one toe. She didn’t need her whole foot on the sill. She looked around, searching for a block, a bucket, a . . . rock, about as big as her fist, right beside the front tire as if God had placed it there to see if she’d yield to the temptation to throw it at her tormenters.

“Hold on,” she said, stretching her leg under the door toward the tire and using her foot to drag the rock toward her.

“What’re you doing?”

“There’s a rock here. I need it.”

“Don’t throw—”

“I’m going to stand on it,” she said tersely. “Don’t be a moron.” Oops. She probably shouldn’t have called the boss a moron. “Sorry,” she tacked on, while thinking, Not sorry.

He tapped his fingers against the steering wheel, waiting.

Okay, this was it. If the rock didn’t work, she doubted he’d hang around while she scouted for something else to stand on. She could bum a ride with one of the others, but damn it, this was a test. She might fail, but it wouldn’t be for lack of trying. She put her left foot on the rock and lifted herself a couple of precious inches. Gripping her handholds again, she mentally yelled at her quivering muscles to get their act together for just a few freaking seconds, bent her knee, and launched—well, kind of launched—herself upward at the same time as she pulled up for all she was worth.

Her left arm gave up the effort, the weakling, but her right arm hung in there. She twisted, swung her right leg, and by God got her foot high enough to hang her toes on the doorsill. Her leg muscles quivered, her arm shook, and the bastard sat there watching her with that inscrutable expression as if he didn’t care whether she got in the truck or fell dead to the pavement, where he would undoubtedly run over her body as he left. She ground her teeth together, biting back her anger before she said something she might regret—though the “might” was just a faint possibility—and concentrated her puny store of remaining energy into boosting herself up using one arm and a tenuous connection with one foot.

Okay, maybe “boost” was optimistic. In reality, she hauled herself partway up, then her foot slipped out from under her but she landed on her knee, and that was better, more secure. She grabbed the far edge of the seat with her left hand, wedged more of herself into the floorboard, and from there laboriously crawled into the seat and sat down.

The six men watching from outside, lined up like cheerleaders, applauded and hooted. She shot them all a middle finger, then slammed the door, fastened her seat belt, and silently stared straight ahead. That was the only way she could resist shooting another finger toward the man behind the wheel.

He started the truck and put in in gear. The smooth, deep rumble of the engine caught her attention. No factory engine sounded like that, as if it had never had a catalytic converter anywhere near it. Considering the appearance of the truck and the sound of the engine, the modifications he’d done or had done had likely voided every warranty on the truck.

She wrinkled her nose. The truck stank. Or rather, Levi Butcher stank, fouling the air with his sweat and dirt and testosterone. After another sniff, she admitted that she herself was adding to the stench. Lord, she was rank! She needed a shower even more than she needed to lie down, which meant the situation was dire. Good thing the truck seats were leather, because cloth seats would be ruined.

“So you know where you stand,” he said without preamble. “We don’t want you here. None of us, and I’m talking about all the teams, like having to drag amateurs along with us. Untrained personnel can get us killed. Because you’re a woman you’re even more of a liability; I got saddled with you because Mac judged if anyone can deal with the handicap, we can.”

“Wow,” Jina said. “I’m honored.”

The sarcasm in her tone wasn’t subtle. He shot a her a dark, level glance. “That isn’t sexist. We work with female agents all the time. But they’re trained, and they want to be there. You don’t tick either one of those boxes.”

She’d like to argue with that, but couldn’t . . . damn it.

“If it comes to a choice between you and my men, I’m going to choose my men, every time. Don’t think you being a woman means we’ll jump in front of a bullet for you, because that won’t happen.”

Okaaay. That was plain. In case she ever mistakenly began thinking she might be of value to this bunch, all she had to do was remember this conversation. “Got it,” she said. “I’m of no value.”

Again the dark glance, but he didn’t jump to reassure her. He let his statement stand. “You won’t be going with us for a while. You have a lot of training to get through, not just physical training with us, but the tech stuff with the camera drone, plus enough weapons training that you aren’t a complete burden in a tight spot, jump training—”

What?

“What?” she interjected. “Jump training?”

“Sometimes we have to insert by parachute. We can’t run a special road delivery just for you.”

“Uh-uh. No. I do not jump out of airplanes.” She meant it. The very idea filled her with horror. She wasn’t afraid of flying, or of heights, but her sense of survival was too fine-tuned for her to even try bungee jumping.

“You will,” he said, his tone saying Don’t argue.

She shut her mouth. She wouldn’t argue now, but that didn’t mean she was giving up. She’d find a way out of this, a suitable work-around—something, anything.

“Some of the places we go, you’ll need to wear dark contacts. Your eye color is too light. Get some, and get used to them. Also, if you aren’t already on long-term birth control, take care of that too.”

She firmly kept her mouth closed. This was one of the times when no comment was the best response. Whether or not she was on birth control, and what type, was none of his business. Besides, she could see his point, and he didn’t need to belabor it. They would be in some dangerous places; if she was captured, her treatment would be rough, rape a given. Her stomach knotted at the dangerous turn her life was taking, and whether or not she could go through with this. Maybe she should walk away now, given that her heart wasn’t in this. She could walk into Axel MacNamara’s office and tell him she couldn’t do it, let him fire her, and collect unemployment while she looked for another job.

She didn’t have to stay in the D.C. area. She could always go home, to south Georgia. Her family was there, she’d have support, and she could slip back into the lazy stream of life there as if she’d never hit the banks running in her haste to establish herself as an independent adult.

But she’d left because she wanted to test herself, and she’d stumbled into a damn interesting job. She was well paid, and even more, she looked forward to going in to work every day. That was worth a lot.

Quit?

How could she make herself quit? How could she stop trying?

A sane person would quit. A sane person wouldn’t sit there listening to her boss telling her that everyone else on his team was worth more than she was.

This was proof positive that she wasn’t sane, because instead of telling him she quit, she said, “Do you have a tracker on my car, or do you need to know where we met the van this morning?” Because he hadn’t asked, and if he was taking her to the office building he was wrong; this morning they’d been directed to meet up at a different parking lot some distance away.

“I put the tracker on last night,” he said tersely.

To her silent astonishment and fury, he wasn’t lying.