“I’m not even going to ask about it,” Jasper said, staring up at the hallway ceiling as he walked next to Tucker. Was he looking for anything in particular, or just a way out of the conversation?

Tucker waited until they reached the elevator doors before replying. “We were just watching a movie, a rom-com, and then we feel asleep. I didn’t think that—”

“Tucker, I don’t even want to know.”

“You wouldn’t stop asking about it yesterday.”

“That was before getting the call from Jackson.” Jasper reached over and clicked the down button. “Shit’s ready to hit the fan. That’s all I care about right now.”

“I know.” Tucker made sure they made eye contact before saying, “Macy wants to help. She really does.”

“Help?”

“She wants to have a role in this. You know she’s capable.”

“Of course she is. CIA trained.” The doors slid open and they walked into an empty elevator that smelled vaguely of cigarette smoke. Jasper continued, “And she survived two years of hell. We’re all really impressed by that. But this is a little different.”

“How so?” Tucker waited for an answer, but got none. “What, it’s more ‘nuanced’?”

“It’s not Rambo stuff; you can’t just jump into it. Even you, Tucker. Think about how much you were vetted before you even knew what we really do.”

All Tucker could really think about was Macy, that hint of sadness in her eyes when he left her room.

“Throwing people into the team in the middle of a potential shit show can backfire,” Jasper said. “Badly.”

“I trust her.”

“I know you do. But I don’t know her from Adam. And neither does Jackson.”

“I’m not asking for her to be assigned into the heart of the operation. But, I mean, she’s not cargo.” Tucker had said it before remembering her voice saying that same phrase. He’d assured her it wasn’t like that then, but now he understood exactly why the idea had bothered her.

“Okay,” Jasper said with a frown. “You’re right, she’s not 250 tons of enriched uranium. She’s not as heavy.”

“Or as dangerous,” Tucker said. “You can trust her. And she can help us.”

The doors slid open with a chime. “I know she’s helped you,” Jasper said.

“It was the movie that helped.”

“Sure.”

Tucker lowered his voice as they crossed the busy hotel lobby. “It relaxed me, put me to sleep.”

“Yeah. I know what else does that.”

“I thought you were going to stop talking about her like that.”

“How should I talk about her, then?”

“Like an associate. A professional.”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Jasper, it’s not hard. All it takes is you not being so much of an—”

“—What I meant was, I’ll see what I can do about getting her involved.”

“Oh,” Tucker said, a little shocked. What could he say to that? Finally, as they stepped out into the cool morning air, he looked at Jasper and said simply, “Thanks.”

“Sure,” Jasper said. “But if it goes south, it’s your ass, not mine. And because you’re the new guy, that might be all it takes to get you dumped out of here.”

“Roger that,” Tucker said. “And I’ll let her know how much faith you have in her.” He stared into Jasper’s eyes.

“Please do. I want her to know what the score is more than anyone else. If she’s the professional you say she is, it’ll only motivate her to do better.”

Do better? How could she possibly do any better?

Tucker put it out of his mind. She’d been through hell, but they had to get through today first, before he could help. At least now she wouldn’t be stuck on the sidelines feeling useless. Macy deserved more than that. He looked forward to telling her about it. He looked forward to her in general.

A black Mercedes pulled up in the valet lane, and a red-vested parking attendant stepped out and gladly collected an American twenty spot from Tucker. When both men were in the car and the door had closed behind them, Jasper turned and said, “You don’t have to tip him.”

“Huh?”

“I already did from the get-go. An exorbitant amount.”

“Is that the cost of having a bomb-free car for the day?”

“No,” Jasper said, pulling out a small device from the glove compartment that looked like any old mp3 player. “The cost of that is in the high thousands.” He showed him how it worked, a digital device that detected the type of frequency emitted from implantable explosives. After he was done with it, Jasper said, “Still, I like to pay those guys a lot just to keep an eye on things. No matter how much tech we have, and no matter what Tansy has to say about it, nothing beats good old-fashioned friends.”

“An expensive friendship,” Tucker said.

“Cheaper than your life.”

Tucker nodded, while a morbid set of images flashed, exploded, and burned through his mind. As they drove away from the hotel, Tucker stayed silent. Both of them did. He needed it, to finally process the events of the last hour. He’d barely had time to think it through. Just what the hell happened in Macy’s bed? How did it get started? Were they drunk?

He still wasn’t sure what to make of it, the whole thing emerging organically from sleep. A slow wakeup, from dream to waking dream, darkness to darkness, skin on skin. He remembered waking with the sensation of someone’s hand in his, holding warmly, a small yet strong hand, Macy’s fingers wrapped around his. It had been easy, comfortable, like he’d always woken that way. Lying next to her, holding her hand, touching her. What followed was a little less familiar, but a lot more exciting. It was definitely more than he’d bargained for when agreeing to watch a movie with an old friend. He hadn’t gone in with the intention to do any of it, despite wanting it so badly. Maybe she had? Had it been perhaps her intention, her hand seeking his? Her hand seeking other places, too.

There would be some awkwardness, he was sure, as there had been awkwardness in the brief moments before he’d left her room—the scene of the crime. Yes, there would surely be some price to pay for their indiscretion. Though he didn’t want it to seem like part of that price would be his having Macy join the mission. He wasn’t doing it out of appeasement, or some misguided sense of owing her something. He truly believed, especially after seeing her in action, that she was more than capable, more than trustworthy, more than a one-night stand in a Johannesburg hotel room. But while he was certain what it was more than, he still wasn’t sure exactly what it was, itself. A mistake? He hoped not. He sure as hell hoped that Macy didn’t see it that way. Was it a one-time deal? Part of him hoped not either, especially that part of him that was left interrupted and unfinished.

Tucker’s mind went back again to the fogginess of how it all started. They’d only had one beer apiece, so he couldn’t blame it on the booze.

Could it have been old feelings resurfacing? She’d been just a good friend when he was a rookie cop, but it had only taken a single glance yesterday to realize she was way more than that now. Had she always been and he was just too green to recognize it? All it had taken was one day—one hell of day—for them to resurface, to transform into an array of hot impulses. Mutual attraction, their animal pheromones pulling them together, his face guided between her legs. Tucker felt the attraction again as he sat next to Jasper in his car, looking out the window at the blur as his thoughts moved with the same blurred confusion. A fitting view. The silence of his contemplation was broken by Jasper’s sullen voice. “So, where’s your head at?”

“What do you mean? It’s here.”

“I don’t want to keep bringing her up, but . . . You’ve definitely been a little . . . ”

“A little what? A little tired from flying sixteen hours in twenty-four?”

“Is that what it is?”

Tucker sighed. No. That was definitely not all it was. “Don’t worry,” he finally said. “I’m good.”

“I just need to know that your head’s clear,” Jasper said. “I don’t care what’s going on with you and—”

“—Nothing’s going on,” Tucker interrupted.

“Whether it’s something or nothing, I don’t care. Believe me. What I do care about is getting this shipment safely to US soil.”

“Me too,” Tucker said. But even as the words left his mouth, he knew it wasn’t true. Not entirely. He might be able to force his mind to focus, but his heart was definitely distracted. The discovery of Macy in Angola, as well as the recent developments in her bed, had nudged his concentration well off the path of DARC Ops. Jasper was right in worrying about him. Tucker worried about himself a little.

“So we’re all good then?” Jasper asked.

The world around him suddenly felt so much more complicated—even more than it had already, dangerous uranium and terrorist groups and all. It was pulling him apart at both ends, a tug of war. World peace versus inner peace with a woman he might be falling in love with.

“Yeah,” Tucker said. “We’re good, I’m good.”

That was the last of Jasper’s questioning, their conversation having died to silence, but the inner dialogue continued, rambling on louder and louder until Tucker had to try desperately hard to quiet it. He resorted to talking to himself as a drill instructor, a personal trainer. He could do this, he just needed to keep himself on the straightened path.

He took a deep breath, flushing it all away. He gripped both armrests and leaned his head back, taking in the scene before him. Jasper steered the car around a tight downtown Johannesburg corner. A moment later, a red car swerved in front of them, cutting off the nose of their car.

“What in the fuck is this?” There was an almost urgent sense of worry in Jasper’s voice.

“Back up,” Tucker said. “Back up! Reverse!”

The car had pinned them against the curb, both of its doors suddenly opening and two nylon-masked men leaping out. White men with sleeve and neck tattoos, and automatic weapons drawn. The black metal of their assault rifles gleamed in the morning sun as they stalked forward while Tucker reached for his own weapon. Just as one of the men approached the side of the car, Tucker heard the deafening pop of gunfire. Jasper was already firing through the car door. Tucker didn’t have time to see if he’d hit anything, already having his gun trained on the other assailant. He went to aim, but his backdrop was unsafe—a minivan directly behind. Even if he brought the gun sight to his eyes and shot through the window, it would have been an iffy shot. Half an inch either way and it would have gone into the van in the background. He held his fire, relieved when seconds later, Jasper threw the car in reverse and gunned it backward. Tucker’s chest lurched against the seat belt from the G-force.

“What the hell was that?” Tucker said, checking behind the car for any other masked or suspicious-looking cars.

“You know what that was,” Jasper said.

“Friends of Browning?” Tucker turned back to look through the windshield. One man was down on the ground bleeding, the others running back to their car, jumping in and driving away. No honor amongst thieves or assholes. “What if it was just a car-jacking attempt?”

“Really? Just an innocent car-jacking attempt?”

“It’s possible.”

“So is me getting a raise from Jackson out of this.”

“Huh?”

Jasper grimaced, pulling on the wheel. “Tucker, think about the odds of that being just an isolated incident car-jacking. It’s next to impossible.” Still driving backward, he yanked the wheel hard and the car spun around to face the opposite direction, almost sideswiping a bus in the process. They were facing the wrong direction for a minute, before Jasper took a quick left and then drove down a narrow side street.

“So what’s the protocol for this usually?” Tucker said.

“Usually?” Jasper laughed. “You think this happens a lot?”

“I feel like it’s been happening a lot to me.”

“That’s probably because you’re hanging around with Macy, and now it’s rubbing off on all of us.”

“So what do we do?” Tucker said. “Police? Should we report it?”

“We need to get to Pretoria,” Jasper said. “If we call the police . . . Okay, give Jackson a call and update him. Whatever that was, he’ll straighten it out. We just need to get going on this uranium shipment before Browning’s government gets too far ahead of us. We’re already well behind.” Jasper banged the steering wheel and swore. “The guys at Pretoria are gonna chew our asses out.”

For a moment, Tucker agreed with Jasper’s urgency to get to Pretoria, the administrative capitol of South Africa. He was fine with leaving a would-be car-jacker—or assassin—bleeding and dying in the street without so much as even calling the police about it. But then he remembered how the gun glinted in the morning sun and his thoughts immediately swung back to Macy. It made him happy to be alive.

But there was something else.

Fear. Macy, alone, back at the hotel.

“Wait,” Tucker said. “Hold on.”

“What?”

He took a moment to think of how he could say it and get Jasper to agree.

“Come on,” Jasper said. “Don’t do this to me.”

“I have to.”

“No.”

“Yes. Turn the car around, Jasper.”

“No,” Jasper said. And then a second later: “For Macy? No.”

“Yes. She’s alone. When the hell will I figure out not to leave her alone?”

Jasper sucked in a breath through his teeth. “See, now this is where it gets complicated. I knew it.”

“And you know that little stop back there was meant for her. No one even knows we’re here. No one knows who we are.”

“Come on, Tucker. You don’t really think Browning has his own intelligence team? You don’t think they know exactly what’s going on in their own damned backyard?”

“What intelligence team can track us? And take a right here, so we can connect back with the—”

“I’m going left,” Jasper said. “I’m going to Pretoria.”

“After we grab her.”

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I can’t. It’ll be my ass. Do you get it? I’ll be the one taking the heat if—”

“Well then fuck it,” Tucker said, interrupting him.

“What?”

“Fuck it. Drop me off.”

Jasper said nothing as he yanked the wheel and stabbed the gas pedal angrily.

“Go ahead,” Tucker said. “Stop the car.”

When Jasper pulled the car to a stop along the curb, he kept his gaze straight ahead. Tucker waited for eye contact, wanting to at least say something to his face before he left the car. It wasn’t how he wanted to leave things, but he was damned if he was leaving the city with Macy still alone at the hotel.

But there was nothing. Jasper, still gripping the wheel, waited silently in front of what looked to be a museum of modern art with a few strange subcultures dotting the entrance.

Tucker grabbed his laptop bag from the back seat and leapt out of the car. He spun around and, before closing the door said, “It’ll be alright. I’ll see you at the headquarters, with Macy. And we’ll work as a team.”

“Clock’s ticking,” Jasper said, still not looking in his direction.

But perhaps if he would have looked in Tucker’s direction, the DARC Ops squad leader would have noticed the large transport truck barreling down on them. Tucker only heard it, the throaty roar of its diesel engine. He didn’t expect it to actually keep driving. But then he turned around and saw it barreling straight for their car.

“Jasper! Incoming!” Tucker barely had enough time to climb up onto a giant concrete embankment, a square slab that was meant to be some minimalist artwork. He pulled himself up onto it and then turned, hoping to see Jasper not too far behind— at least Jasper away from their car in time for the collision. And while Tucker was happy to not see him still in the car, he couldn’t see him anywhere. Before he could scan the area, the deafening crunch of metal came, a heavy and deadly velocity slamming into their Mercedes rental car and flattening it against the embankment, the shock wave of the impact knocking Tucker off his feet.

He lay flat on his stomach, his head arching around to look through the dust and smoke, squinting, straining for any sign of his comrade. His mind hadn’t yet begun to process what had just happened, and why. The only thing that mattered right now was finding Jasper and then getting to Macy. A wave of relief crashed through him when Tucker first spotted that single hand reaching up to the lip of the embankment. He rushed over to the hand, not knowing whether it was Jasper’s or the truck driver’s, but he needed to help either way. Despite how their morning started with the car-jacking, Tucker couldn’t be sure that this again was another intentional attack. It could have just been a simple accident. It was possible.

Or maybe not. He peered down at the twisted metal and billowing smoke erupting from below. And then the hand, badly cut up from shards of glass. Tucker reached down to lift the man out of the smoking debris. Fuck, it was Jasper. His face was bloody, but he was in one piece, as Tucker pulled him safely up and out of the carnage.

“Jasper, can you hear me?”

He had Jasper up on the concrete, dragging him away from the increasing heat of the wreck, when the first shots rang out.

At first Tucker thought it was the tires popping or something exploding inside the truck engine. The flying shards of concrete as bullets skipped off the artwork made his mistake obvious. He dragged Jasper across the top of the concrete until he teetered off the edge on the opposite side. Tucker jumped down first, and then reached back up to pull Jasper down by his ankles. The heavy, limp weight of his C.O. fell into his arms, nearly knocking him over until he leaned forward and rested Jasper against the side of the slap. They were protected there behind ten feet of concrete, both of them huddled there. He almost felt bullets impacting through the concrete when Jasper’s eyes flickered open. Eyes that finally locked onto his. Jasper was awake, and coherent.

He even smiled a little when he turned to Tucker and said, “Just another accident, huh? Another coincidence?”

He shook his head, running his hands over Jasper’s arms and torso. “Maybe not. Where are you hurt?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“Are you armed?” Tucker already had his weapon drawn, shoving another clip inside and smacking it up with his palm, locking it in as another round of fire strafed against the concrete.

“Not armed.” Jasper said, wincing as he raised his hand to his forehead. “I left it back in the . . .”

“What?”

“Fuck.” Jasper’s eyes looked more focused. His face changed, too, as if he’d just woken up from a bad dream to a living nightmare. “We’re fucking pinned, aren’t we?”

Tucker had already scoped and planned out multiple exits. Always have two exits, a backup plan. They indeed had two. The only problem was that one of them faced out into the smoking wreckage.

“We could retreat and find cover on the other side of the museum.”

“But we need covering fire,” Jasper said. “Can you lay down some suppressing fire and we’ll—?”

“Can you run?” Tucker interrupted him. “Suppressing fire won’t mean shit if you’re limping along.”

“I’m fine.”

Tucker looked over his friend’s body again, his ripped and bloodstained clothes. “How are your legs?”

“Bleeding,” Jasper said.

“No shit. Can you walk?”

He was wincing again. Through the blood on his face, Jasper’s face paled further and sweat dotted his forehead. Shit. He was going into shock. At least, Tucker hoped it was just shock and not a more severe symptom of massive internal blood loss. “How do you feel?”

“How the fuck do you think I feel?”

“I can carry you.”

“No,” Jasper said. “Let’s move.”

“Should we radio in to—”

“—Tucker, let’s move. You ready to fire?”

Tucker gripped the gun.

“Start laying it down to the right . . .” Jasper seemed to be getting sleepy again. “Go and we’ll get the hell out of here.”

“Jasper, I’ll fireman carry you.”

“Just lay it down, Tucker,” Jasper said, his chin almost slumping down to his chest.

Tucker scrambled forward, scoping the area around the concrete corner. He aimed his gun across the street at a human shape of olive drab military fatigues crouching behind a tree. He readied himself to let off a barrage of shots that might cover their attempt to flee the kill zone, given a small miracle. He pulled the trigger, and nothing happened. “Fuck!”

“Come on, Soldier,” Jasper said. “Lay it down!”

“I’ve got a jam.”

“Clear it.”

Tucker struggled with the gun, flipping the metal back and forth, but nothing. He pulled the trigger again. Nothing.

“Can you clear it?” Jasper asked.

“Negative.”

Jasper groaned as he crawled around the other side of the barrier, moving past Tucker and then peeking his head out the side. He didn’t take long to peel his head back, his face even paler from the effort. “They’re coming.”

Strangely, Tucker felt only a mild sense of panic building up. They were unarmed and stuck. Jasper was wounded. And the only other direction of escape would be through the now-flaming wreckage. “Should we go through the wreck?” Tucker asked.

Jasper didn’t say anything. But the look on his face made it clear that he did not want to revisit the wreck and its flames. His hair was singed, his clothes even more bloody than his face. Either way, it really was going to take a fucking miracle to survive. They were sitting ducks.

Tucker took one last look around the corner. A man was approaching, crossing the street. He was in green fatigues, and armed with what looked like an AK-47. Tucker turned back to Jasper. “I think we’re fucked.”

“Yeah, getting it from both ends.”

Tucker kept trying to clear the jam, rattling the gun, the synapses in his brain firing away as he tried conjuring up an escape plan. He’d try anything, an idea offering even the slightest possibility of surviving—and doing it unarmed. But he kept coming up with blanks. Duds, just like his Glock. “If one of them gets here,” Tucker said, “I’ll charge him, just go for it, while you get away.”

Jasper shrugged almost imperceptibly, his face looking serene. The calm before the storm.

“I’m not sure what else we could do,” Tucker said.

Jasper was looking down now, his head slumping like a heroin addict. He nodded, but couldn’t be bothered with saying anything in particular. It was in that eerie quiet that Tucker realized he was alone. Alone and about to die.

He looked back around the corner. The man was still approaching slowly, gun drawn. He watched his killer approach. And then he watched something blow through the man’s body, some great force, a gust of wind kicking up the edges of his clothing and smearing a look of shock across his face.