“Oh. Ew,” Becca said amid the men’s chuckles. “Yes, do take care of that, Shane.”

He grinned over his shoulder and tossed off a salute. “Ma’am, yes, ma’am.” Leaving the joking and laughter behind him, Shane hightailed it inside and took the industrial staircase two steps at a time. In the quiet of the stairwell, the questions that had plagued his run returned, but this time they came with something of an answer.

He couldn’t do anything to save Molly. Sixteen years too late for that.

And he couldn’t control his subconscious.

But he could find out what had happened to Crystal after they left. The question was just when to go, how to approach her, and how to keep from getting caught. Oh, and how to get the guys on board with the plan.

Easy as sin.

Right? Probably not. But Shane was like an old dog with a new bone when he wanted to be. And this was one of those times.

Chapter 3

I’d like to propose a toast to Becca, for bringing us all together. And for this amazing meal,” Shane McCallan said, raising his glass and hoping it would help make amends with her.

Becca smiled and ducked her chin as Nick pulled her in snug against his side. All around the makeshift plywood-and-sawhorse table, glasses went up along with appreciative comments about the incredible dinner Becca had spent the day preparing. A mountainous platter of fried chicken, huge crock of homemade meatballs, overflowing bowls of mashed potatoes and roasted vegetables, and a plate of fresh corn bread stacked a mile high filled the table, not to mention an apple pie and a chocolate cake. It was all the favorites everyone had asked for to celebrate Charlie’s rescue.

And what they’d accomplished was worth a celebration because they’d been ass deep in alligators. Dumb luck had played far too great a role in everyone making it home safe and mostly sound. They only had a few scars to show for it, thanks to Becca’s skilled nursing.

“You’re more than welcome,” Becca said, raising her own glass. “But I have to make a toast of my own. To each of you—” She swept her gaze around the table, from Nick beside her, to Shane at the end, to Jeremy and Easy across from her, and to Beckett and Marz on her other side. “This dinner does not begin to be enough to thank you for everything you’ve done for me and Charlie, nor are my words. But know I’ll do everything I can to help you right the wrong that was done to you. And that you all have a place in my heart. So, to each of you.”

The toasts were more subdued this time, but the expression on every man’s face made clear the respect he felt for Becca.

“Now, let’s eat!” she said with a big smile.

“I hope there’s enough,” Jeremy said, setting off a raucous round of laughter.

“You think he’s kidding,” Nick said. “Boy might be skinny, but he can pack away some chow.”

As everyone filled their plates, Shane glanced around the table and took a long pull from his beer. The group of old friends—and a few new—ate and laughed and joked and shared stories. Hard to believe they’d only been reunited for a few days.

The food and the conversation were great, but the restless energy that had buzzed through Shane during his run, at the grocery store, and as they worked with Jer’s friend to install the barbed-wire fencing still flowed through Shane’s veins so fast and so thick he could barely sit still. Over this goat fuck of an operation. Over the cover-up that had changed everything for him. Over the woman he’d met last night and what might’ve happened to her after they bugged out of there.

Crystal.

“You okay, Shane?” Becca asked.

He smiled. “Happy as a pig in a poke. Food’s delicious.”

Becca laughed.

“Try to restrain your inner redneck, there, McCallan,” Easy said with the hint of a grin. You might’ve thought a big black guy from inner-city Philly and a good old boy from the South wouldn’t get along, but Shane and Easy had been fast friends from the beginning. In fact, Shane was responsible for crafting the guy’s nickname out of the initials of his full name, Edward Cantrell. And Easy, well, Easy was responsible for almost single-handedly holding off the tangos who’d ambushed their convoy, giving Shane, trained as their team’s backup medic, time to patch up the damage a grenade had inflicted on both Derek and Beckett.

Shane held out his hands. “Gotta be who I am.”

Easy chuckled. “Well, be who you are without hogging the mashed potatoes. Pass ’em on down here.”

Before long, everyone was clearing away their paper dinner plates in favor of clean plates for dessert. By the way they all attacked the cake, pie, and vanilla ice cream, you’d have never known they’d just demolished a veritable feast.

After inhaling his first piece of chocolate cake, Jeremy scooped another wedge onto his plate. “What?” he said as he dug in.

“Nothing.” Becca smiled, affection for the younger Rixey plain on her face. “Eat up.”

Nick stabbed his fork into Jeremy’s cake and scooped a huge chunk for himself.

“Hey!” Jeremy yelled, scowling and tucking the plate against his chest and that ridiculously awesome beaver T-shirt.

Nick grinned and winked at Becca. Man, the guy had pulled a total one-eighty in the days since they’d been reunited. From sullen to almost playful. Well, as playful as war-hardened soldiers who had been cheated out of their careers by betrayal and corruption could be. Sonofabitch. But, one thing was for sure, Nick Rixey wore a new lightness like a second skin.

No matter how tense things were between him and Nick, no matter how pissed he was at Nick’s silent treatment for the past year, Shane couldn’t begrudge the guy a slice of happiness. Not after everything they’d been through together.

Watching Nick and Becca smile and touch and just find solace in one another’s presence set off an old ache in Shane’s chest. Because he would never have that with someone.

God knew he didn’t deserve it.

There were some things you could never atone for.

Molly’s eight-year-old face came to mind. With her freckles, dimples, and pigtails, his sister had defined cuteness. She’d looked up to him like the sun rose and set at his feet.

And he had failed her so spectacularly that the guilt and grief had been imprinted into his very DNA. God, in the list of moments he’d accumulate in his lifetime that he wished he could take back, telling her to go away and leave him alone would never, ever be surpassed. Because an hour later, she was gone. On his watch. Forever.

So solitude was his penance. Not that it was enough. Not that it would ever be enough.

Jesus H. Christ, this is supposed to be a celebration, McCallan.

A click sounded at the door to the warehouse-turned-gym, now their situation room in an operation they were still trying to make heads or ass out of. Nick’s friend Miguel Olivero entered. “Look who I found wandering the halls,” he said in the jovial tone Shane already associated with the private investigator. Miguel ushered Charlie in through the doorway, Eileen hot on their heels.

Becca flew to her feet. “Charlie, what are you doing up?” She rounded the table and rushed to his side. The guy had been racked out in Nick’s sister’s room in the apartment across the hall since the early hours of the morning. Charlie looked about a thousand times better than when they’d grabbed him from the basement of Church’s strip club, but it was still possible a hard wind could blow him over. Not surprising given he’d been dehydrated, tortured, and maimed at the hands of the Church gang less than twenty-four hours before. A ball of gauze surrounded his right hand, shielding the stumps of the two fingers he’d lost. Shane had to give him props, though, because the guy hadn’t spilled a bean to the gang about the information his computer hacking had apparently revealed.

That someone or something named WCE had made a shitload of deposits totaling $12 million to a Singapore bank account in Frank Merritt’s name.

“Eileen had to go out,” he said, his voice like sandpaper. While Charlie’s dark blond hair was just long enough to be pulled back in a knot at the nape of his neck, his blue eyes, height, and lankiness all resembled his old man.

After learning about the money, Charlie had suspected his father was on the take, so he’d dug into the old man’s affairs, too, which led him to Nick. But his online “research” had apparently been noticed—by who they didn’t yet know—because Charlie had been kidnapped by the Church organization and interrogated about a whole host of things, including how he knew about the account, whether he had the passcode for it, and what else he knew about his father’s activities.

Becca and Miguel led Charlie to the folding chair next to Jeremy, then Miguel took the last empty chair next to Nick. The eight of them made up the “team” responsible for saving Charlie’s life. The newcomers dug into plates of food Becca had set aside for them.

As everyone cleared their plates, Nick excused himself, crossed the room to Marz’s makeshift computer desks in the back corner, and returned with a legal pad. Sitting again, he said, “We need a game plan.”

Murmurs of agreement echoed the sentiment.

“These were the questions we came up with last night. First, who or what is WCE? Second, how was Merritt connected to them and to Church?” He stabbed his pen against the paper as he articulated each of the questions. “What were they looking for when they ransacked Charlie’s and Becca’s houses. Who was Church’s company at the club? And what do the codes we found in Becca’s bracelet go to?” He scanned the group. “What am I forgetting?”