Dangerous Ground 3:

Blood Heat

Josh Lanyon

Chapter One

Lightning flickered in the blue-black distance. Somewhere in the sultry, moonless night, a coyote yipped. Still farther away, another answered. There was no movement in the barren, walled yard. A single light burned in the second story of the pueblo-style house.

“I don"t like it,” Will muttered, ducking back from the gate to land against the thick adobe wall next to his partner.

Taylor shot him a quick look and laughed, a ghost of a sound. Taylor hadn"t liked this setup since they"d arrived in Denver to find their prisoner, suspected terrorist Kelila Hedwig, had somehow charmed her way out of police custody and was once more on the run.

Hedwig was the prime suspect in the death of Los Angeles Field Office Director Henry Torres, which was why DSS Special Agents Will Brandt and Taylor MacAllister had been tasked with escorting her back to the City of Angels.

Technically, pursuing and re apprehending her was a job for the US Marshals, not the Bureau of Diplomatic Security. But Taylor, ever a cynical and suspicious son of a bitch, had suggested that the cowboys on Nineteenth Street had already had their shot and blown it—in his opinion, a little too conveniently. From the first, there had been an ugly rumor that Hedwig was getting help from the inside.

Will doubted it. He"d seen a couple of photos of Hedwig. She was a frail slip of a girl behind oversize spectacles. True, he was no expert, but he thought it unlikely she"d seduced anyone. He figured Denver PD had underestimated her resourcefulness—and desperation. It happened. It didn"t automatically follow that there was a conspiracy afoot. 

If she was getting help, it wasn"t very expert help because, after fleeing Colorado, she"d headed straight back to the mountains of New Mexico and an ex-boyfriend, Reuben Ramirez.

Ramirez was Hedwig"s high school sweetheart. Not that either of them had attended high school on a regular basis. He was an ex-con currently on probation for drug-related charges. Apparently Hedwig wasn"t too much of a bad-girl superstar to forget the little people.

“It"s too quiet,” Will said.

“Nah. Ramirez is a punk. Strictly small-time. It"s not like he can afford to keep a standing army.”

Taylor"s eyes looked silver in the gloom as they met Will"s. His broad but bony shoulder was hard warmth pressing against Will"s, and Will felt a disconcerting stirring in his groin. It caught him at unexpected times, this distracting awareness of Taylor. They"d been partners and best friends for three years, but lovers for only four months. They were still adjusting.

Some parts needed more adjusting than others. He shifted uncomfortably against the still-warm adobe bricks.

“Are we doing this?” Taylor asked when Will didn"t say anything else.

Were they? It had seemed like a good idea at the time, but now as they waited outside the mud walls of Ramirez"s hacienda, listening to the crickets, the hot wind skipping across the rocks and sand, and the distant rumble of thunder, Will wondered if they shouldn"t maybe have requested backup from at least the Ruidoso Downs Police Department.

Taylor"s view, unsurprisingly, had been that local law enforcement was likely to get underfoot and complicate things. Taylor had a refreshingly direct approach to such matters. He was also, for such a deceptively graceful-looking guy, a little on the forceful side.

The thought brought a faint, self-conscious smile to Will"s face. 

It was too dark to read each other"s expressions, but Taylor must have sensed the smile, because he whispered, “What?”

“Nothing. Are you sure you don"t want to bring in some support on this?”

“I don"t like the fact that it took the feebs nearly a year to track her down, and then twenty-one hours after she"s finally incarcerated, she manages to slip through the cracks again.”

That bothered Will as well. “All right. We"ll do it the old-fashioned way.”

“Rape and pillage?”

“And people say you"re the sensitive one.”

Taylor"s grin was a glimmer of white in the darkness. He turned from Will, slapping his hands against the dusty brick. “Give me a boost.”

No. Let me go first.

Will caught the words back in time. Technically Taylor was the senior member of the team. Besides, lighter and faster than Will, Taylor had always taken point on this kind of op. But four—no, nearly five—months ago on a routine investigation, Taylor had been shot in the chest and nearly died. He"d recovered and was back to full field agent status, but Will was never going to be able to erase the memory of Taylor slumped on his side, scarlet spreading across his chest as his life"s blood pumped out…

He was smart enough to keep that worry to himself, though. He linked his hands together. Taylor planted his boot squarely in the stirrup and vaulted lightly up, balancing briefly on the wall before dropping down.

Diplomacy in action. Like the slogan said.

Will heard the dull impact of his landing. A few seconds later, the wooden entrance gate was swinging creakily open.

Will slipped through the gap, the soles of his boots whispering on sand.

In the kennels behind the house, dogs were going crazy. Not guard dogs, fortunately. Ramirez fancied himself as some kind of hot-shit breeder. Over the past thirty-six hours, Will had observed that no matter how much noise the dogs made, no one from the house came out to investigate. Being a dog lover, he found himself irked by that on a number of levels—though it was a plus for their immediate purposes.

A minus was the long empty stretch of unlandscaped yard around the house.

There was nowhere to hide once they were out of the deep shadow of the surrounding walls. No way to reach the house without running across several very exposed lengths of dirt and rock.

On the bright side—or, actually the not so bright side—the moon was down and there was a heavy indigo cloud cover pierced only by the occasional fork of faraway lightning. Taylor was a swift shade zigzagging through the darkness toward the garage.

Will went left, jogging for the main entrance in the portico beneath the exposed wooden beams. The familiar surge of adrenaline lent him speed, feet pounding the hard-packed earth, pebbles skittering as he ran, ears attuned to the night sounds.

He reached the heavy front door without incident and spared a quick look over his shoulder. There was no sign of Taylor. He would be in position by now—or nearly.

Will wiped his forehead with his arm—the moist air was surprisingly warm—and knocked on the door.

He waited.

Will"s official knock was not easy to ignore, but there was no response from within.

He rapped again, and a dog began to bark inside the house.

Will swore under his breath. He could get a lot louder and a lot more vehement, but he and Taylor had discussed this, and their idea was to attract as little attention as possible since they were, in a manner of speaking, out of their jurisdiction. 

Seeing movement out of the corner of his eye, he turned to spot Taylor sprinting across the flat top of the garage.

Now what the hell was that about? Taylor was supposed to be watching the back entrance, not playing one-man assault team. No way was he going inside without Will to back him up. Will took a couple of steps in brief retreat and sized up the front door. Kicking any door down was nowhere as easy as movies made it look, and this was a massive and rustic structure. But as far as Will was concerned, that door was kindling. He launched himself at it.

Light flared behind the downstairs windows. Will stumbled to a halt as the front door opened a crack and two suspicious black eyes peered out at him. One eye—a bleary, red-rimmed eye—was human. The other was canine and belonged to some breed of shepherd with a black rectangular muzzle and a lot of sharp white teeth.

“Who are you? What are you doing here?” growled the human.

The dog was less articulate but more convincing.

Will kept his voice low. The last thing he wanted to do was spook Ramirez"s houseguest. “Special Agent William Brandt. I"m with the Bureau of Diplomatic Security.” He held his badge up so there could be no mistake. “You better hear what I have to say.”

The dog made another lunge through the opening between door and frame.

Will took a hasty step back. “Hang on to that mutt if you don"t want me to shoot it.”

“He"s not a mutt. He"s a purebred Anatolian shepherd.”

It didn"t really seem like the time or place for semantics. Will opened his mouth to make himself heard over the snarling dog, but the sound of a shotgun blast from overhead ripped through the night.

A woman started screaming. 

The shotgun wasn"t Taylor"s. Taylor and Will were carrying their roscoes and wearing underarmor, but that was the extent of their regulation equipment. Which meant Taylor was under fire.

Will grabbed the edge of the door. Ramirez, if it was Ramirez, let go of the dog, which lunged through the doorway, nails scrabbling on brick as it tried to get to Will.

“Shit!” Will twisted left, then right, like a bullfighter dodging a set of razor-sharp horns. He flung himself forward, bursting through the entrance in the opposite direction of the charging dog, almost simultaneously slamming the door behind him. His heart drummed in his chest as he slumped back against the uneven wooden surface. Shit, shit, shit. Their plan, such as it was, was already crumbling away like sandstone.

The snarling dog threw itself against the door. It sounded like a bear clawing the timbers.

Will had other, more immediate concerns. There was another blast from overhead. The shotgun"s second barrel—definitely not Taylor"s .357 SIG. Taylor was not firing back. There were plenty of reasons for that and none of them meant Taylor was in trouble, but Will still had to fight that instinctive and all-consuming rush of fear.

Ramirez had already fled the tile entryway and was running barefoot for the wooden staircase. His feet slapped the tiles, the tiny, desperate sound carrying oddly down the hallway. Will tore after the man and managed to tackle him three stairs up. Ramirez fell back, and they tumbled down the steps to the tile floor below.

Will"s forehead grazed the edge of one step; his elbow and knee connected sharply with the floor. A goddamned disaster was what this was. He grunted and wrestled his way on top of Ramirez, who was short but muscular, compact and pumped up on adrenaline and possibly other things.

Ramirez flailed with arms and legs. He jabbed at Will"s throat with a move unapproved by the WWF. Will blocked and grabbed Ramirez"s hand, bending it back in a maneuver also frowned on by most wrestling associations. He followed it up with a knee in the groin that would have ended the fight then and there if it had connected as intended.

It didn"t.

Ramirez screeched and began kicking with renewed energy—if not accuracy.

Upstairs the woman was still screaming, which Will distractedly registered as a positive sign. If she was screaming, chances were Taylor was still a threat to her, and that meant he was likely unhurt. In fact, over Ramirez"s gasps and curses, Will could just make out Taylor"s muffled tones.

Will got his handcuffs out and half dragged, half wrangled Ramirez over onto his front side. Straddling his quarry awkwardly, he snapped the cuffs around thick tattooed wrists.

Ramirez yelled. “What the fuck do you want?”

“I tried to tell you. You"re harboring a fugitive, asshole.”

“You"re no cop!”

“If you don"t stop resisting arrest, you"ll find out how much of a cop I am.”

Ramirez tried to rear up and throw Will off. “I"ll fucking kill you if you hurt her.”

“Nobody"s going to get hurt if you shut up and settle down.” Will checked the cuffs and jumped up from Ramirez, avoiding one of his wilder kicks.

“You"re dead. You"re a dead man!”

Ramirez"s curses and the barking of the Anatolian shepherd outside followed Will as he took the stairs two at a time. His footsteps pounded on wood, the staircase shaking beneath him.

He reached the second story and scanned the unlit hallway. At the end of it, light pooled from an open bedroom door. The woman had stopped screaming. The sudden absence of sound was nearly as jarring as the shrieking had been.

Will heard Taylor say quite clearly, “Oh fuck.” 

Will drew his weapon, holding it at low ready. “MacAllister?” Something in the tone of Taylor"s voice had raised the hair on Will"s nape. It brought to mind too many alarming—though as yet unrealized—images: Taylor looking down to see he"d been mortally wounded, Taylor realizing he"d just pulled the pin on a grenade, Taylor—

“Brandt, you"d better get in here.” Taylor"s voice interrupted Will"s alarmed speculations.

Will was already on his way down the hall.

Taylor blocked the doorway. He was holding a shotgun in one hand and his weapon in the other, but neither was trained on the room"s occupant.

There was no noise from within the room at all. Jesus. Was it not Hedwig?

Had Hedwig been shot in the altercation? Or worse, had someone who was not Hedwig been injured in the altercation?

Will came up behind Taylor, trying to see past him into the room. “What is it? What"s wrong?”

Taylor retreated another inch—actually stepping on Will"s toes. Will manfully managed not to yell. In their entire three years of partnership, he had never known Taylor to retreat so much as a centimeter. From anything.

He put a steadying hand on Taylor"s back. “What"s the matter?”

Taylor jerked his head as though it should be obvious what the matter was.

Will stared past him. There was a chunk of plaster on the floor where one of the shotgun blasts had taken out a section of the ceiling. The woman was not dead. She didn"t even appear to be injured. She was sitting on the foot of the bed. At first glimpse, Will thought it was not Hedwig. She"d dyed her long, lank hair blonde again, but that was her only effort at disguise. She looked older, her face was a little fuller, and she was not wearing her glasses, but it was unmistakably Kelila Hedwig.

Will threw Taylor a quick, questioning look. Taylor"s profile was grim. 

Will turned back to their prisoner. Studied her more closely. She was wearing a big, white, voluminous nightgown, and her skinny arms were wrapped protectively around her midriff. Around her basketball-sized midriff.

“Oh shit.” Will turned back to Taylor. Taylor was shaking his head, repudiating what was only too obvious. “She"s pregnant?” 

Chapter Two

“That"s just great,” Will said. He sounded uncharacteristically put out. “How the hell did that happen?”

“Don"t look at me.”

Will muttered something that could have been, “Dumb question.”

Taylor acknowledged the words absently. Now what? In all his envisioning of possible scenarios, this one had not occurred. He glanced doubtfully at Will, who was looking unusually ruffled, dark brown hair standing up in tufts like someone had tried to grab fistfuls of it out by the roots. Beneath the navy bulletproof vest, the sleeve of his yellow T-shirt was torn, revealing a hard brown bicep. He had a scrape over one blue eye. Otherwise he looked unharmed. He was still breathing hard, but no wonder if the sounds from downstairs had been anything to go by.

Their prisoner seemed to pick up on Taylor"s thoughts. “What have you done to Reuben?” She had a light, girlish voice. It was more like the voice of a hair salon receptionist than a terrorist. She peered nearsightedly at them with wide, pale eyes that reminded Taylor of a frightened white rabbit.

“Nothing too serious from the sound of it.” From the way Ramirez was shouting threats and obscenities, he sounded pretty healthy to Taylor. Hedwig looked unconvinced.

She licked pale lips. “You"re really marshals?”

“DSS. Bureau of Diplomatic Security.” The law enforcement arm of the State Department, if someone wanted to get technical. 

Hedwig shrugged as though it were all the same thing. Had it been all the same thing when she"d gunned down Henry Torres in that underground parking lot?

“It"s just the two of you?” She watched them warily.

“That"s right. But don"t get any ideas.” Taylor handed Hedwig"s shotgun to Will. Some girls had a thing for shoes; some girls had a thing for double gauge. His was not to reason why.

Will"s gaze held his for a moment, his eyes dark with emotion. That would be Will fretting over the idea of Taylor nearly coming down with a case of lead poisoning. Taylor sighed inwardly. Will needed to get over it. Especially if he wasn"t going to be around to watch Taylor"s back anymore. He holstered his own weapon.

“Were you followed?” Hedwig looked from Taylor to Will.

“Why would we be?” He drew his handcuffs and approached the bed. Hedwig awkwardly levered herself up, her expression defiant.

Taylor stopped. “Seriously? Didn"t we just do this?”

In answer, she tucked her hands behind her back.

“Oh for—” He looked at Will. Will, damn him, looked like he was trying not to laugh. Like this was funny? Well, maybe one day. Not at the moment. “Feel free to jump in here anytime, Brandt.”

“Why? You"re doing fine.”

Taylor looked back at Hedwig. She bared her teeth at him. No shit. Bared her tiny white teeth like Monty Python"s Rabbit of Caerbannog. Like something raised in an underground den—which was probably not far from the truth.

“Listen, little girl. We can do this the civilized way, or I can knock you on your ass and do it the other way. Why don"t you think about that kid you"re carrying?”

“I am thinking about him!”

The dark side of Planned Parenthood.

“We need to call for backup,” Will said. 

He was right, as much as Taylor hated to admit it. This was already way more complicated than he"d anticipated, and transporting a pregnant female prisoner from New Mexico to Los Angeles…

“No.” Astonishingly, Hedwig caught his arm. “Please no.”

Taylor took advantage of her distraction to grab her right arm, turning her to snap the cuff on her wrist. She began to struggle. “Front or back?” he asked Will.

Will looked blank. “Front or back what?”

“Cuffing her. Do I cuff her in front or in back?”

“How should I know? You"re the one with the nieces and nephews.”

“So far I haven"t had to arrest any of them.”

William grimaced. “There"s protocol on this, right?”

“I assume.” He"d also assumed Will would be familiar with the protocol. Will was generally better at dealing with the gentler sex. Not that their prisoner exactly qualified.

Taylor stepped forward, using a standing leg sweep to knock Hedwig"s feet out from under her. She overbalanced and dropped down on the bed again, bouncing a little, puffing angrily. She glared up at him as he snapped the second cuff on her.

It had to be the pregnancy thing, because no way should he be feeling anything but cold contempt for this murdering bitch.

“How far along are you?” Will joined them bedside.

She tossed her hair out of her face. “Eight months.”

Taylor met Will"s eyes. Will shook his head. Taylor sighed. “I"ll call for backup,” Will said again, and Taylor nodded.

“No. Please no.” Hedwig held up her cuffed hands in supplication. “I"ll make a deal with you.”

“This ought to be good.”

“Save your breath,” Will told her. 

“But I didn"t kill that man. You have to believe me. I didn"t have anything to do with it. I swear.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Taylor said. “You weren"t even in LA at the time.”

“I wasn’t in LA at the time.”

Will already had his cell phone out and was dialing.

Hedwig said desperately, “If you call the police, they"ll hand me straight over to the FBI and I"ll be killed. And my baby too.”

“Someone"s been watching the X-Files again,” Taylor told Will.

Will snorted.

“Anyway, you won"t be handed over to the FBI. You"ll be handed over to the Marshal Service, who may or may not hand you back to us.”

It worried him, though. That…teary-eyed intensity as she gazed up at them.

Not that he hadn"t known his share of bold-faced liars. Enough so he thought he was pretty good at telling truth from fiction. Believed he had an instinct for it. And it was a silly lie—not being in LA at the time—easily disproved, right? So she"d probably come up with something better if she was alibiing herself. She"d had enough time to think of a stronger story. Seven months.

Hedwig was still pleading, still insisting. “It"s the truth. I"m telling you the truth. If you"re not going to listen to me, if you"re going to drag me back to LA, then at least do yourself a favor and take me in on your own. If you"re halfway good at your job, we all might even make it alive.” Even with her hands cuffed, she unconsciously, protectively cradled her belly.

It wasn"t science, but…

“Brandt, wait.”

Will paused, his look watchful.

“We"ve got her in custody. We don"t need local support now. Let"s take her back on our own.” 

Will"s expression was pained. “Come on. You don"t believe that bullshit about the police and the FBI trying to kill her?”

“No.” Taylor said more firmly, “No way. But it won"t hurt to be on the safe side.”

“Yeah, well I don"t think you and me trying to transport her back to LA is on the safe side.”

“If she cooperates—”

Will"s jaw dropped. He recovered immediately. “Uh, buddy boy…” He glanced at their prisoner, who was tensely following their exchange. “If anything goes wrong…”

“What could go wrong? We"re just going to drive up to Sierra Blanca, board a plane with her, and fly back in to Los Angeles.”

“Like she goes into labor.”

Taylor chewed his lip.

“It"ll be our heads on Popsicle sticks.”

Taylor nodded. “But what if, just on the off chance, there is something to what she"s saying?”

“What is she saying? So far all I"ve heard is the usual I been framed!”

“I was framed,” Hedwig put in.

Will raised his eyebrows.

“Who framed you?” Taylor asked.

“I don"t know.”

“Oh! Well!” Will gave Taylor an exasperated look.

“If I knew, I"d have given the name up a long time ago,” Hedwig protested.

“But it"s someone at the DEA. I know that for sure.”

“Why"s that?” asked Will. “Why couldn"t it be the FBI? Or the CIA? Or the PTA?” 

“Because I was working with the DEA as an informant, and some of the information I had implicated agents at a high level.”

The pause that followed her words was filled in by the dogs baying in the kennel behind the house and Ramirez"s continuing, though increasingly hoarse, rants from downstairs.

“You"re saying there"s a mole in the DEA?” Taylor headed off Will"s questions.

But Will had another question in mind. “Who were you informing on? Who was the target?”

Hedwig hesitated.

Will"s gaze met Taylor"s. “Who?” they questioned at the same time.

“Mikhail Bashnakov.”

“Who?” Taylor could feel Will"s stare.

He said carefully, colorlessly, “Mikhail Bashnakov. The Technician.”

“Yes,” Hedwig said softly.

There was a flash of white outside the bedroom window, followed by a long rolling boom of thunder. Perfect timing. Pretty funny, in fact. Except…not. Taylor had the horrifying sensation of having reached his hand into a cookie jar, only to find a coiled rattlesnake.

“Who"s Mikhail Bashnakov?” Unlike Taylor, Will made it a policy not to concern himself with crimes that were unrelated to the DSS. It was Will"s view that their game preserve was stocked with all the bad guys they could ever require—and that was certainly true.

“He"s a kingpin in one of the Russian drug cartels,” Taylor told him.

Hedwig nodded confirmation.

“Oh. Good.” The mildness of that made Taylor"s lips twitch. Yeah. No wonder he loved Will. 

“Let me see if I have this straight,” Will stated. “You were framed for killing a DSS director by someone within the DEA who was afraid that your information would implicate him—or her—in the Russian drug trade?”

“Yes. That"s what I believe.”

“And I believe this is total bullshit.”

“What if it"s not?” Taylor intervened.

“You keep saying that. What if it is?”

“Well, what does it matter in that case? I"m not saying we turn her loose. I"m saying we take her back to LA ourselves. That was the original plan, right? Escort her back to LA?”

“Yes.”

“So?”

When Will had no immediate response, Taylor pressed, “So that"s what we do.

Except we don"t advertise the fact that we"ve picked her up. We just…take her back.”

“Yes,” Hedwig pleaded. “That"s all I"m asking. That you take me in yourselves.”

“See. I don"t trust that.” Will nodded at Hedwig"s strained face.

“I don"t trust it either. That just means we"re prepared for anything she might try.”

He could see Will struggling with it, but it made sense. Right? This had been the plan from the beginning—before Denver PD lost Hedwig in the system.

Whatever the hell system that had been. True, the original plan would have supplied them with backup and resources they didn"t currently have, but if there was a chance that what Hedwig was telling them was true—and Taylor followed the news enough to know there was more than a chance that it was—the best chance of all of them reaching home safe and sound was to slide in under the radar. To make it back to California before anyone knew they"d even located their quarry.

“This is the way you want to play it?” Will asked finally. 

Taylor nodded.

“Okay.” Will"s smile was sour. “Your call. For the record, I think it"s a lousy idea.”

Will went downstairs to have a friendly chat with Ramirez while Taylor gave Hedwig five minutes to dress and pack an overnight bag. He had no idea what essentials a pregnant woman might need. He"d been overseas during his sister"s pregnancies—not that the circumstances were similar, and not that he would have paid attention even if they had been. If their prisoner wanted anything very complicated, she was going to have to do without. Anyway, it was a little over an hour to the airport, and then a short, hopefully direct flight to Los Angeles. A toothbrush and her spectacles ought to do her, in his opinion.

He kept the door half-open while she dressed, observing impersonally while offering the illusion of privacy.

Downstairs he could hear Ramirez bellowing at Will and Will"s quiet responses. It took a lot to get Will really worked up. Like Will, Taylor wasn"t concerned with Ramirez. If he needed persuading to go along with the change in plans, Taylor had no doubt that Hedwig could handle it. She seemed like a resourceful girl, appearances to the contrary. Either that or unbelievably lucky.

The door to the bedroom swung open. Hedwig had changed into jeans and a loose green and white-checked smock thingie. Her hair was tied back in a lank ponytail, and she wore her glasses. She carried a white denim jacket draped over one arm, and she held a small flat overnight case. She looked like a timid kindergarten teacher. Taylor took the jacket and the overnight case, setting them aside to examine at his leisure.

Hedwig made a scornful sound at this display of suspiciousness.

“Hands behind your head.”

“How stupid do you think I am?” she demanded as he briskly patted her down. 

“I don"t know. How stupid do you think I am?”

“Totally stupid.”

He laughed. “Ask a silly question.” He sort of liked the sheer outrageous balls of her. Anyway, he was just making double sure, knowing Will would expect this, but he didn"t expect—nor did he find—that she"d tried to arm herself while he was looking on. “Sorry, but I have to cuff you again.”

“That"s not necessary.”

“Maybe not, but that"s the way we"re doing it.”

Taylor snapped the cuffs on her wrists again, retrieved her bag and jacket, and nodded for her to precede him down the hall, watching critically as she moved. She didn"t have that ungainly pregnant-lady waddle, but no way was she going to be outrunning them. That didn"t mean she wouldn"t try any other means that presented itself to get rid of them. He would. Anyone would. Yep, it was better to keep her cuffed.

“Did you search her?” Will asked when they reached downstairs.

Taylor assented.

Ramirez was still cuffed. He sat on the floor, glaring out of a puffy eye. Blood crusted his nostrils.

“You okay, chiquita?” he asked Hedwig.

She nodded. “I"m so sorry, Reuben. Did they hurt you?”

Ramirez shook his head. “It"s my fault. I should have shot this pig when I had the chance. I should have turned the dog on him. I should have—”

“Don"t blame yourself, Reuben.”

“Cute couple.” That was Will.

“Yeah. Reuben and Juliet. You better explain the facts of life to your boyfriend,” Taylor told Hedwig.

“He"s not my boyfriend.” 

Will"s gaze rolled to meet Taylor"s; Taylor could practically hear the casters clicking. “This could take all night.”

Taylor ignored that. “Well, whatever Señor Ramirez is, we"d prefer to turn him loose, but if he comes trailing after us, things are going to get messy. If what you"ve told us is true, the less attention we attract, the better.”

Hedwig scowled over this, then rattled off a string of Spanish.

“In English,” Will interrupted.

“It"s better if I go with them,” Hedwig told Ramirez. “Better for everyone.”

“They"re not cops, chiquita. You can"t trust them. They"re Feds.”

“I know. They"re Diplomatic Security.”

“Who? What"s Diplomatic Security? I never heard of them.”

“I think our PR machine is broken,” Taylor told Will.

“If they were part of it, we"d be dead now,” Hedwig said. “They"re going to take me in themselves.”

“Bullshit. Don"t trust them, Kelila.”

“The trust is all on this side.” Will was losing patience. “In fact, if I had my way, you"d be on your way to jail and we"d be handing your girlfriend over to anyone who"d take her.”

Taylor couldn"t tell if he meant it or not. If Will really was dead set against this—well, there was more at stake here than the honor of the DSS or their own professional reputations. More at stake for Will, certainly. But if Will was dead set against taking her back themselves, he"d say so. He wasn"t one for beating around the bush.

Ramirez was stubbornly shaking his head. Taylor"s unease increased. “We can"t waste any more time here. Make up your mind.”

“Reuben… please.”

“Here"s what we"re going to do,” Will said. “I"m going to take the cuffs off you.”

He was talking to Ramirez. “You"re going to get hold of Cujo out there, and then the three of us are walking out of here. If it all goes smoothly, that"ll be the end of it.

Your part of it, anyway. If you do anything stupid, I"m arresting you and handing you over to the Ruidoso cops for aiding and abetting a fugitive.”

Ramirez looked at Hedwig. “It"s okay,” she said. “Really. Just do what they tell you. Please.”

Ramirez was still shaking his head as he rose. He stood sullenly while Will uncuffed him. Well, he didn"t like it, but that made it unanimous. So long as he followed orders…

He did. He went to the door and shouted for the dog. It trotted inside, nails ticking on tile, woofing aggressively. Ramirez grabbed its collar and held tight, muttering what he apparently imagined were soothing noises.

Dog and man watched in silence as Will, followed by Hedwig and then Taylor, moved briskly across the exposed yard. The night air smelled of distant pines and approaching rain. The Sierra Blanca Mountains stood silent and silver beneath the scaffolding of clouds and stars.

Man and dog were still silhouetted in the lighted doorway when they reached the road.

Will closed the heavy wooden gate behind them, and they started, still single file, down the dirt road lined with the twisted, tortured forms of Joshua trees.

They"d parked the rental car about a mile from the house. It felt like the middle of nowhere, nothing to see but sagebrush and cactus. Lightning flashed overhead like a failing light behind a lavender veil. Thunder boomed and rolled away into the forest-covered mountains.

Beautiful if you liked that kind of thing. Taylor didn"t particularly. He was a city boy through and through.

Fortunately it wasn"t cold. In fact, despite the threat of rain, it was unseasonably warm for this time of year in the Lincoln National Forest.

The girl, Kelila—no, better to think of her as Hedwig—was breathing fast as they hurried her along the deeply rutted road. Were they pushing her too hard? 

Speaking for himself, Taylor felt they couldn"t get to the car a minute too soon. The vast panorama of the desert, however majestic, made him feel too exposed.

Vulnerable.

He was relieved to spot the gleam of the car roof a few yards ahead.

The moon had been out when they"d parked earlier that evening. Now it was too dark to see past the brush and cactus. Still, everything seemed undisturbed.

Several feet from the car, Will swore and stopped in his tracks.

Taylor tensed, his hand automatically rising toward his shoulder holster.

“What"s wrong?”

“We"ve got a flat.”

Taylor moved past the girl. Sure enough, the right side of the sedan slumped to the side. The front tire was completely flat.

“Hell.” He quickly scanned the surrounding landscape. Between the razor-sharp rocks dotting the sand and the wickedly spiked cactus, a flat wasn"t impossible, but his disquiet ratcheted up another notch.

Will gave voice to his own thought. “This just keeps getting better and better.”

Hedwig laughed, the sound startling in the still night.

Taylor rounded on her. “Why don"t we have you change it?”

Will made a faint sound. Something between calming and disapproving.

They returned to studying the tire as though there might be some trick of the light. “Rock, paper, scissors?” suggested Taylor.

“No way. It"s your turn to change it.”

“That"s not how I remember it. Come on, Brandt.”

Will sighed, long suffering, and scissored his arm three times. Taylor followed suit.

They both came up with fists.

“I may kill you before the night is over,” Will said. “Just so you know.” 

Taylor laughed.

Once again they sliced the air three times.

Taylor came up rock again, but this time Will chose paper. He laughed at Taylor"s chagrin and grazed his chin with a friendly fist. “You"re getting predictable, sweetheart.”

“Sweetheart?” Hedwig repeated curiously. Taylor had nearly forgotten about her. She leaned against the fender, catching her breath and watching them.

Will tossed the car keys. Taylor caught them one-handed and walked around to the trunk.

“What do you want to bet there"s no jack in here?”

He didn"t catch Will"s muttered response. If there wasn"t a jack in the trunk, they were going to have to walk back up the road and borrow Ramirez"s pickup. He could just imagine how well that would go over with all concerned parties, but standing out here waiting for the AAA was not an option.

He unlocked the trunk and raised it. It took his eyes a second to discern what he was seeing in the dark interior—and his brain a few seconds after that to make sense of it.

For the second time that night he was staring down the barrel of a shotgun. 

Chapter Three

“So are you gay?” Hedwig asked.

The raised hood of the trunk blocked Taylor from Will's view. He half turned, surveyed the mutable shadows ringing them: the jagged outline of mountains, the pale shifts of sand, the black outline of Joshua tree and yucca.

Hedwig's question refocused Will's attention on her. “Because I called him 'sweetheart'?” He infused his tone with amusement, although he wasn't amused.

His and Taylor's sexual preferences were not a secret from Uncle Sam. His and Taylor's relationship was. That was to protect their working partnership. Early in their…er…romance, they'd agreed they wanted to keep working together for as long as possible.

Of course, that might be moot now. If he took the posting in Paris.

It was a big if.

Wet flicked his face. The first fat drops splattered the hood of the car. It was starting to rain. Naturally. Because a downpour was all that was keeping this from being the perfect evening. The drops came faster, plopping down, dimpling the dust at their feet.

“Because of the way you are together,” the girl answered.

Will shrugged. “We've been partners a long time.”

She briefly weighed it. “If you weren't together, you'd have just said so. You wouldn't try to explain.”

It was the first indication Will had that she might be smarter than the average bimbo. 

Motion behind the car caught his attention. Taylor stepped back from behind the slant of the raised lid. His hands were locked behind his head, and even in the poor light, Will could see enough of his profile to know they were in trouble.

“Get down,” Will told Hedwig, drawing his pistol.

She dropped into an awkward squat behind the fender.

Will was already scrambling around to the far side of the car, watching as the figure unfolding from behind the trunk door kept getting taller.

Jesus fucking Christ. Taylor was tall, but this guy was a monster. A giant of a man with a Mohawk and a sawed-off shotgun. Will could see his pitted profile in what little hazy light there was. His profile and Taylor's.

Taylor's jaw could have been cut from stone as he said in a flat voice, “You're making a big mistake.”

“Shut up.” The guy had a very deep voice, distinctive even on those two chopped syllables. Maybe an accent?

The lid of the trunk blocked Will's view of the giant's body. He could try for a head shot, but what he could see of the shotgun barrel was aimed directly at Taylor's forehead. If the guy's finger tightened on the trigger…

Will's palms felt damp. Not a chance he was willing to take if he didn't have to.

Without turning his head, the giant called, “Come around the other side, hombre, if you do not want your partner's brains splattered all over those cactus.

And you, milaya moyna. You can quit hyperventilating behind the fender and get your skinny ass over here.”

“Don't do it,” Taylor said.

Will watched the shotgun barrel. It never wavered. The giant said, “You do not want to fuck with me.”

Definitely an accent. Eastern European? Surely not Russian? The guy had one of those basso profundo voices all these oversize dudes seemed to possess. Was that anatomy or showmanship? 

“We're federal agents, asshole.”

Taylor's voice was cold and clear. Would it kill him to soft-pedal once in a while? As dearly as Will loved his toughness, his sheer…grit, sometimes he wondered whether Taylor secretly had a death wish.

“I know. I know you are Feds. I am a Fugitive Recovery Agent.”

“You're a what?”

“Bounty hunter,” Will supplied automatically.

“That is right. Ioakim Nemov. Licensed by the Colorado Insurance Division of the Department of Regulatory Agencies.”

“Colorado? You've been following us since Colorado?”

“That is right. That is exactly right. I followed you, and you led me straight to little Kelila.”

Little Kelila sounded like she was getting ready to give birth any second.

“Show some ID,” Will said.

“I don't care if you're licensed by the Better Business Bureau,” Taylor cut in.

“You're going to be under arrest yourself in a minute for interfering in a federal—”

“No. I do not think so,” Nemov interrupted. “I have been watching you two hombres. I have been wondering why there are no cops around. No FBI. No one but you two. You know what I think? I think this is a black op.”

For the life of him, Will couldn't think of an answer. For once, even Taylor seemed to choose discretion over valor.

Nemov laughed. “I am right! I knew it. When I watched you scale the perimeter wall of the Ramirez property, I knew. Very smooth, that was. Textbook.”

“You're Russian mob,” Taylor guessed.

“No. Certainly not. What interest would the bratva have in this little girl? I have told you who and what I am. Here. I have identification.” After a moment, ID was proffered, a wallet being shown to first Taylor, then flashed in Will's direction. 

Not that Will could make a damn thing out at this distance, and not that it mattered anyway. ID or not, this guy was flirting with charges for everything from interfering with law enforcement officers to kidnapping. “If you're legitimate, what the hell do you think you're doing?”

Taylor said slowly, “He's after the RFJ.”

The Rewards for Justice Program. That's what Taylor meant. Nemov was after the five million dollar reward the Bureau of Diplomatic Security offered to those with information leading to the arrest or conviction of anyone who planned, committed, or attempted terrorist acts against US persons or property.

One problem with that plan: the RFJ program was designed to prevent international attacks. Not domestic.

Maybe not the best time to bring that up.

“That's only for international terrorist acts, dumb shit,” Taylor said.

“But Kelila is married to a Russian national,” Nemov said, unperturbed. “Her strike against the DSS was masterminded by none other than Mikhail Bashnakov.”

“That's not true!” Hedwig said shrilly. “That's insane. None of it is true.”

Will turned on her. “You're not married to Bashnakov?”

“Yes. All right, that part is correct, but—”

“That's something you left off the CV.” He hadn't thought that drug lords bothered with polite conventions like marriage.

“No way are you collecting that reward,” Taylor said. “She's already in federal custody.”

“She was. Now she's in my custody. Get over here, milaya moyna. I won't ask so nicely again.”

If only the bastard would look away from Taylor long enough for Taylor to make a move for cover. But Nemov was too experienced.

“Don't let him…take me,” Hedwig panted, clinging to the front bumper like an old-fashioned suffragette. 

“He's not taking you anywhere,” Taylor said.

He had to speak up to be heard over the rain now rattling loudly off the surface of the car and pouring to the ground. At this rate, they were going to be mired in mud.

“Let me explain your options,” Nemov said. “Or rather my options. Option one.

I give up and go home. That is not going to happen. Option two—”

“My partner blows your head off while we're standing here shooting the breeze.”

That was Will's order to shoot. That was Taylor telling him as clearly as he could to take the shot. And Will could do it. He had about as clear a shot as he was going to get, and he was an excellent marksman. But there was still the chance that Nemov's dying reflex would be to blow Taylor's head off.

Nemov laughed. “I think your partner is not so reckless as you, little man. He knows it will be very hard to explain away two bodies—especially if one of them is yours. I think he will wait to hear option three.”

Will said, “Which is?”

Taylor was apparently still trying to absorb “little man.”

“I take the girl and deliver her safely to Los Angeles, and we all forget about this unpleasantness. No good can come to any of us if word of tonight's showdown gets out. True?”

“You've got to be kidding me,” Taylor said. “You think we're going to hand her over and let you walk away?”

“Yes. Why not?”

“No. Way.”

But Will was already convinced. They had to end this standoff. Get themselves into strategic position. Let Nemov take Hedwig. Worst-case scenario, they'd have the cops pick them both up at Sierra Blanca. But better yet, they'd overtake them on the way to the airport, retrieve Hedwig, and continue on to LA. If it was true that he and Taylor couldn't afford to let anyone know about this evening's activities, it was equally true Nemov couldn't.

“Deal,” Will said.

Hedwig cried out. Taylor looked his way in disbelief.

Nemov laughed. “What did I tell you? Your partner is a practical man.”

“Brandt—”

“He's got a fucking gun to your head, MacAllister. Now is not the time.”

Nemov said, “Throw your weapon away, Agent Brent.”

Will tossed his weapon to the sand.

Nemov made a sound of disgust. “Now kick it away where you cannot grab it quickly.”

Will kicked his piece farther away.

“Now clasp your hands behind your head and stand up slowly.”

“You can't let him just take me!” Hedwig cried as Will complied.

Will spared her a look. He'd lost whatever sympathy he had for her—pretty much nil—at the news that she'd been married to the Technician, but she was his prisoner and he had a sworn duty to protect her. He reassured himself he was only temporarily relinquishing custody, but he didn't like what he was doing. He was furious at being placed in the position of having to choose between her and his partner, but there was no question in his mind whose life was more important.

“Just calm down and do what he says. You'll be fine.”

“I won’t be fine. He's been sent to kill me.”

“If that was the case, I'd have shot this agent when he opened the trunk,”

Nemov pointed out. “Then I'd have shot Agent Brent, and then I'd have shot you.”

Was that option four? Judging by the way he trotted out the scenario, Nemov had clearly been considering wholesale slaughter as a possible game plan. 

Of course, if Nemov believed Will and Taylor would be willing to sacrifice one terrorist skank to preserve their careers, he might plan on executing Hedwig once he had her on his own. That saved him a potential gun battle and the risk of the DSS coming after him following the inevitable full-scale manhunt that would result from the murder of two agents.

“Now you,” Nemov told Taylor. “Slowly.”

Taylor obeyed, unspeaking. The fact that he was unspeaking was a very bad sign, but there was nothing Will could do about that now. In some ways Taylor was as direct as an arrow to the heart. It was possible he was never going to understand—Will wasn't sure he understood—the choice Will had just made. But Will couldn't stand by and see Taylor die. Not if there was any chance in hell of avoiding it.

“Get your cuffs out.”

“They're on the girl.”

“Oh? Agent Brent. Take your cuffs out and walk over here. The right side of the car, please.”

“My right or yours?”

Nemov chuckled. “I like you, Agent Brent. You are of a pragmatic nature. As is Nemov.”

Will walked around the front of the car, passing Hedwig, who was crying quietly. He joined Taylor in front of the sawed-off shotgun.

Taylor didn't look at him. Will clenched his jaw against the protest, the explanations. In the end there was nothing to say, no excuse, and—for him—no choice.

“Cuff yourself to your partner.”

Still not looking at Will, Taylor shoved his arm forward, offering the lower part of his forearm.

Good thinking, MacAllister. 

But it was a no-go. Nemov said, “Uh-uh. I know that trick. He has skinny arms, your partner. Make sure the cuff is tight around the wrist.”

In stony silence, Will snapped the cuff around Taylor's bony wrist. Will clicked the metal circlet around his own wrist, joining them.

“Keys to the handcuffs?”

Will handed them over.

Nemov smiled at Taylor. With tight, quick movements, Taylor used his free hand to pull his ID out and awkwardly remove the key from behind his badge.

“You are the wily one, yes? Not so wily as Nemov, though.” Nemov took the key with every appearance of good humor. “Throw the car keys as far as you can. And do not throw like a little girl.”

Taylor gave Nemov a baleful look, felt around for the keys in his Levi's, dangled them fleetingly in front of Nemov's long nose, and then hurled them with ferocious energy across the yucca and Spanish bayonet. They glinted as they fell like a shooting star.

“Nice. You play baseball, I bet. All right, milaya moyna. Time to go.”

Footsteps dragging, Hedwig came slowly around the car.

“Just do what he says,” Will told her. “You'll be okay.” He felt he was speaking as much to Taylor as Hedwig.

“Listen to Agent Brent. He is a smart man.”

Will couldn't seem to tear his gaze from Taylor's averted face.

“Start walking,” Nemov ordered. “I will be right behind you.”

Hedwig stumbled past them and started up the increasingly muddy dirt trail.

Nemov said quietly, “Now, my young friends, you find out what teamwork is really about. Take my advice. Forget about Kelila Hedwig. If anyone asks, tell them you followed a cold trail. She was gone by the time you found Ramirez's. No need to wreck your careers over this, you will agree.”

A pulse jumped in Taylor's temple, but to Will's relief, he restrained himself. 

Nemov backed away, keeping the shotgun trained on them until his tall figure dissolved into the darkness. They could hear his quick stride down the road as he followed Hedwig.

Taylor swung on Will. “What the hell were you thinking?” he half whispered.

“For God's sake, Will. You surrendered your weapon—”

“I know what I did.”

“You let him take our prisoner.”

“I know.”

“You allowed him to take you hostage.”

“I know.”

Will's quiet response seemed to confuse Taylor. He peered at Will through the rain-swept gloom. “I don't get it. Help me understand. How could you do that?”

Will shook his head.

Taylor's voice rose again. “Goddamn it. It's not only against agency policy and training, it's against common sense.”

“I don't need to hear this from you. Not right now.”

“Will…” Will could practically see the wheels turning. Taylor said, “He was not going to shoot me.”

Despite Will's determination not to defend his decision, he heard himself arguing, “You don't know that. My instinct is he would have shot you. Maybe he wouldn't have killed you, but he was ready to shoot you.”

“Then you'd have shot him, right?”

It took a second to work past the sweeping obliviousness of that. “Right. You'd still be dead.”

“Your way, we both could have been dead. And the girl too. It's totally against policy, and you damn well know it.”

“Don't you throw policy at me.” 

“Anyway, there's no way he'd have shot a federal officer.”

“Of course not. That never happens.”

“For Christ sake, Will. The fact that I got shot once—”

“Twice.” Will said fiercely, “I've seen you take a bullet twice.”

“You didn't even see it the first time!”

“What the…? Like that makes a difference? I saw the result, Taylor. I saw you lying there in what looked like a lake of your own blood. I saw you choking, trying to breathe with a hole in your lung.”

The anger drained out of Taylor. “Will,” he said helplessly. “You've got to let it go. We've talked about this. You can't make decisions in the field based on my safety.”

He was right. About all of it. Which was one reason Will had never wanted their relationship to move from friends to lovers. But that was ancient history. They were lovers, and there was no going back from it. Not for Will. Not now.

“Like you wouldn't have done the same goddamned thing?”

Taylor's expression—what Will could see of it—was decidedly weird. “No. I wouldn't have.”

He could hear the rain pattering off the stiff material of their vests. “You don't—” Will stopped. “Look. This isn’t the time.”

The rumble of a car's engine drifted across the distance.

“Come on.” Will started to move in the direction Taylor had thrown the car keys. “I hope you took time to pick a landmark.”

Taylor didn't budge, and the steel tether yanked Will back. He whipped around, his temper suddenly soaring. Maybe it was true that there was nothing he feared as much as losing Taylor, but for one blazing instant, he was ready to kill his partner himself.

If Taylor saw his anger, he gave no sign. He said mildly, “I didn't throw the car keys.” 

“What? I saw you.”

“I threw my own keys, not the rental car keys.”

Will stared at him and then, surprising himself, started to laugh. “You're kidding.”

Taylor shook his head. He reached into his pocket, dragging Will's hand along as he wiggled his fingers, feeling for the rental keys. The denim was stiff and already wet through from the rain, making the body beneath seem warmer than ever. Warm. Alive. No, Will could not regret any decision that kept Taylor living and breathing. Even if that decision ultimately cost him Taylor.

“Got 'em.” Taylor held the plastic fob up triumphantly.

“Nice going.” Will meant it.

“Thanks. You can pay for the rekey of my house.”

Will ignored that. “Now we just need to get rid of the bracelets. I've got an extra set of handcuff keys in my luggage.”

“Back at the hotel? How's that's going to help?”

“Hey, I'm open to suggestion. Unless the suggestion is you want to shoot the cuffs off.”

“It works in the movies.” Taylor was moving along the road, searching for his pistol. Will was forced to follow.

“I hope you're kidding.”

Taylor grunted. He squatted down to retrieve his pistol, and Will was forced to squat too, watching as Taylor dusted off the clumping sand.

“Nice of him to leave us these. We'd have a hell of a time explaining how we both lost our pieces.” Taylor shoved the pistol into his shoulder holster.

“No kidding.” Will met Taylor's eyes. “Hey.”

Taylor was silent.

“Just so you know, if I have to be shackled to someone, I'd choose you. Every time.” 

He saw the glimmer of Taylor's teeth as he curled his lip in something that was not exactly a smile. “Just a wild and crazy romantic, aren't you, Agent Brent?”

“Yep, little man, I am.”

Taylor gave him a friendly shove, and they both nearly overbalanced.

Maybe the camaraderie was a little forced, but it helped ease the strain between them. Dusting off their hands, they went to retrieve Will's weapon.

He found his SIG Sauer P229 a few feet from the car. Wincing at the thought of grit working its way into the mechanism, he wiped away as much wet and sand as he could with the tail of his T-shirt. He reholstered the pistol with a feeling of relief.

“I lost my pen,” Taylor said. “Do you have yours?”

Will felt around, handed his pen over.

Taylor held it up. “I can't see anything.”

“What is it you need to see? Because unless you're planning on writing your resignation, we need to get out of here pronto.”

“I know. Let's get in the car.”

“Uh, don't we need to change the tire first?”

“First we need to get out of these cuffs, but I have to be able to see what I'm doing.”

“What are you doing?” Will inquired as they unlocked the car. Taylor crawled in first, followed by Will, who slid beneath the wheel. The pine tree-shaped deodorizer swayed gently, its artificial scent mingling with that of wet clothes and desert rain.

“I'm going to make a shim and pick this lock.” With his free hand, Taylor reached up and turned on the dome lamp. Pallid light illuminated his face. For a second, Will stared at him, stared at a face he knew as well as his own: the wide, long-lashed green eyes, the full, sensual mouth, the silver streak in the dark hair starting to curl with the damp. 

Unaware of his scrutiny, Taylor was busily taking the pen apart, prying the silver clip from the body. “Hold your wrist up.”

“I don't recall lock picking as part of my FLETC training.”

Taylor grinned faintly as he slid the piece of dismantled pen between the teeth and the mechanism of the cuffs. There were goose bumps on his brown, thinly muscled forearms. The tip of his tongue touched his upper lip. Will felt an inappropriate longing to pull him into his arms and hold him for a moment.

Possibly more than a moment. And possibly do more than just hold Taylor. But definitely inappropriate.

Taylor levered the shim, wiggled it, pushed, and the teeth of the lock, thrown out of alignment, clicked over. The cuff opened. He smiled broadly.

Will rubbed his wrist. “Nice job, MacGyver.”

“Thanks. Now me.” He frowned, trying to crane his head to see the lock mechanism properly.

“Someday you're going to have to tell me where you learned some of these esoteric skills of yours.”

“Boy Scouts.”

“You weren't in the Boy Scouts.”

“True. I knew one or two, though.” He spared a wink for Will. “Hold that cuff out of the way.”

Will obeyed.

It took a little longer, but in another minute or so, Taylor too was free.

Will expelled a long sigh of relief. They were back in action. Hopefully not too late to fix this fucked-up operation. “Let's get that tire changed.”

Taylor tossed the broken pen into the cup holder. “Roger that.”

“And then,” said Will, yanking open the car door again, “we're going to knock that goddamned giant off his goddamned beanstalk.” 

Chapter Four

The rain lashing out of the darkness and streaming in rivulets down the windshield looked white-blue in the artificial glare of the headlights. The wipers could barely keep up. Ahead of them, the narrow road was a winding, slick ribbon of night. The hills around them were shapeless black bulk.

Eyes intent on the muddy road ahead, Taylor was glad Will had elected to drive. He'd rarely seen worse weather conditions outside of Japan. “God almighty.

What is with this rain? It's summer.”

The car lagged as Will shifted into a lower gear. “We're in the mountains. And July is the rainy season.”

“Great. On the upside, they can't be making much better time than we are.”

Will, his attention on the winding road ahead, grunted.

Taylor glanced at the dashboard: 3:18. It was beginning to feel like the longest night in his life. He refocused on the screen of his BlackBerry GPS—essentially useless at the moment thanks to the lack of steady signal. Happily he could still read a map, and the BlackBerry was at least serving as a light for his navigating.

“Sierra Blanca Regional Airport is northwest of here. It looks like it's just over an hour.”

“Okay. What am I looking for?”

“West Smokey Bear Boulevard.” He looked up from the map to stare at the nightmare landscape swinging past as Will sped along the canyon road. “Jesus, I believe it. It's like the Black Forest through here.”

“City boy.” 

Taylor acknowledged it without resentment. “You know, no way is Nemov going to try and drag her on a plane. He can't depend on us not going for help.”

Will threw him a somber look. “No?”

“Okay. Maybe he can. But I still don't think he's going to make for the airport.

Not the local airport anyway. I think he'll go for one of the larger, busier airports.

Somewhere he's guaranteed a direct flight to Los Angeles.”

Will mulled it over. “Agreed.”

“So…Albuquerque? He's going to travel back roads for as long as possible. At least till he's sure he's lost us.”

“If he's taking her to LA. He could have been lying about that. Maybe he'll take her back to Denver.”

“True.” Taylor hadn't considered that possibility and wasn't any happier for having it pointed out.

Will's jaw clenched still tighter, but he didn't respond. Watching him, Taylor said, “Listen…if this all goes south—or further south—I'll take full responsibility.”

“Why would you?”

“Snatching her from Ramirez was my call, and it was a bad call. We should have sent for backup the minute we located her. You would have if you'd been on your own. I fucked up.”

“You didn't hold a gun to my head. We both fucked up. Now we've got to fix it.

Fast.”

“Right. I just…want you to know that whatever happens, I won't let it mess up your promotion.”

Will looked away from the road long enough to offer a disbelieving face. “Not this again. I already told you—”

“That you're not sure you'll accept the Paris tour. I know.”

“I haven't decided anything.” 

Taylor nodded. Realizing Will probably couldn't see that gesture, he said again, “I know.”

“Really? Because every time this comes up, you make it sound like a foregone conclusion that I'm going.”

“No.”

“I haven’t made my mind up either way.”

“Yeah. Well…”

“Well what?”

He couldn't tell him, but that was part of what hurt: the fact that Will was seriously weighing taking this overseas assignment.

“It's just…ironic. I guess. We knew one of us would get marching orders, but—”

“We thought it would be you.”

“Yeah.”

Taylor was the senior agent and due for promotion, and he'd been back in the States longer than Will. Four years now. But in June, Will had been part of a protection detail for the French president's wife during her stay in Southern California. Apparently he'd made such a favorable impression that a request had come through the highest channels that he be invited to fill a vacancy at the embassy in Paris.

Taylor summoned his energy and hoped any lack of enthusiasm would be put down to natural fatigue. “It's a big honor, and it's an incredible opportunity. A hell of an opportunity.”

“So you keep saying.”

“And I'm proud of you. Happy for you.”

Except…

Except it would mean Will would be posted in Paris for a minimum of two years. 

Two years apart.

“But?”

“There is no but. I'm happy for you. I'm proud of you.” The more he insisted, the less sincere he sounded, and he was afraid Will could hear it.

There was an uncomfortable pause.

“Right. But if you'd been offered the assignment, you'd have refused it.”

The bitterness of Will's tone shocked Taylor silent for an instant. And then he was angry.

“Yeah. I would've.” No question in his mind. Taylor had already thought it through, and he'd decided that if he couldn't avoid another overseas tour, he'd resign. Leaving a job he loved was obviously the final recourse. He was pretty sure that with his excellent record and history of foreign service, he'd be able to postpone another overseas assignment for a couple more years, until he and Will were on more stable ground.

“Bullshit.”

The fierceness of Will's denial shut him up. He shouldn't have brought it up in any case, least of all now. But the unfairness still rankled. That was the way Taylor would have played it, whether Will wanted to believe it or not. Taylor was trying very hard to be supportive of Will—which meant fighting his own worst instincts.

It'd be nice to get a little credit.

“Fine. Forget I said anything.”

“Sure. No problem.”

He could hear the controlled anger vibrating in Will's voice. Unlike Taylor, it took a lot to rile Will, so he was obviously feeling self-righteous. Maybe Taylor really was in the wrong here. The promotion was Will's, and Will wanted it. Of course he did. Taylor couldn't blame him for that. It was a plum assignment, and there was no telling where it might ultimately lead. In fact, if it wasn't for his relationship with Taylor, Will would probably have accepted the minute he'd been offered the tour. 

Nor had Will been with the service long enough to be as sure declining an overseas posting wouldn't have a detrimental effect on his career.

There was every reason to accept—and only one to decline. And Taylor knew he was a selfish bastard for even thinking Will should put their still-tentative relationship first. At least he hadn't committed the cardinal sin of asking. Not in so many words, anyway.

He said, trying to undo some of the damage, “Look, I don't know how we got off on this. All I meant to say was…I don't want your choices to be limited because of what we did here tonight.”

“Don't worry about it. I make my own decisions.” Will scowled, concentrating on the storm-swept road.

True enough, but Taylor knew he'd dragged Will along on this New Mexico detour. Left to his own recognizance, Will would have played this by the book and Kelila Hedwig would now be safely in custody and on her way back to Los Angeles.

For a few minutes, the only sound was the hiss of tires on wet road and the beat of the windshield wipers. There was no sign of taillights anywhere in the darkness stretching ahead.

“I believed her,” Taylor said, thinking aloud. “Believed her…fear that she wouldn't make it back to LA alive. I read genuine terror there.”

It was satisfying, even reassuring, the way Will instantly returned to business as though their earlier argument had never occurred. “That could have been fear of what she's facing in LA.”

“Yeah. Fair enough.”

And if Hedwig had been telling the truth, maybe Nemov was tasked with making sure she never reached her destination.

He felt rather than saw Will look his way again. “Hey. I trust your instincts, MacAllister.” There was an apology of sorts in there.

Taylor nodded. 

“Although you've got to get over this notion that you're bulletproof.”

Taylor snorted.

Will reached over, found his hand, and squeezed briefly before steadying the wheel once more. “It'll be okay. We got into this together. We'll get out of it together.”

Taylor nodded, already missing that hard, warm hold. Will had been making more of these physical gestures lately. It was one reason Taylor was pretty sure Will was taking the Paris job, even if he didn't know it himself yet.

“Any sign of that sonofabitch ahead of us?”

They crested another rise in the road. Taylor scanned the ink-washed world.

“No.” He returned to studying the map by the light of his BlackBerry. “If he avoids the main highways—and he will because he thinks we'll be looking for him to take the fastest route possible—it should take him over four hours to get to Albuquerque.

Probably more in this weather.”

“Assuming he thinks as logically as you.”

They were both silent as the car seemed to sway, buffeted by a gust of rain, before Will corrected. Visibility was increasingly bad.

Taylor said evenly, “So once we find West Smokey Bear Boulevard, we'll follow it for about twenty miles.”

“Jesus Christ.”

Taylor's head jerked up. He stared out the windshield, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. A tree seemed to be flying out of the darkness and down the road toward them. The next instant, he realized the uprooted tree was in front of a wall of brown water rushing their way.

Flash flood. He'd read about them, seen their aftermath on the nightly news, but he'd never witnessed that sheer destructive capability firsthand. The little he knew was enough to freeze his brain. 

In what felt like slow motion, he watched Will wrench the wheel to send the car skating off the road and sliding across the shoulder, heading for the tree-studded hillside. The earth was soft and muddy on the shoulder, and Taylor felt the front tires sink, felt them spinning. Will swore, cut the gas, gunned the motor, then took his foot off the accelerator again. Miraculously, through that alternating on and off of gas and neutral position, they gained traction.

Where the hell were they going?

The car shot forward, bumping and grinding up the grassy slope, ripping out saplings and brush as they went.

They were traveling at a diagonal, the hillside grade too sharp to permit a straight approach.

“Come on, baby.” Will gritted the words out as they plowed through a dense thicket of coarse shrubbery.

Taylor realized he hadn't taken a breath since they'd left the main highway.

He looked past Will and saw a brown river tumbling just a few feet below them—

where no river had previously existed.

The car's chassis slammed down on what felt like solid rock. The transmission screeched. The tires spun. They dragged forward another yard and lurched to a stop. The car balanced precariously, the left side tilting downhill. A pinecone hit the windshield and bounced away. It was followed by a tree branch.

“That's not good.”

Taylor wasn't aware of speaking until Will, staring down the hillside at the rapidly rising water, released a startled choke of laughter and turned back to him.

“You think? We've got to get to higher ground.”

“You can't drive any farther up this slope.” It seemed to Taylor that Will had defied gravity to get this far.

“No. We'll have to climb. Move it.” Will pointed. “Your side.” 

Taylor shoved the door open against the wind and rain beating down. He crawled out, then held the door, reaching back for Will. Will scooted gingerly across the gearbox and then froze, his knee planted in the passenger seat.

Did the car slide a few inches? Taylor couldn't tell, but it was only too likely.

“Hurry the hell up, Brandt.” His hand locked on Will's, and he hauled with all his strength. Will scrabbled out to stand beside him, breathing hard.

The muddy water was steadily rising. Taylor could make out the murky tide through the pelting rain. He stared, fascinated, as the water crept still higher. How could it move so fast?

“Climb.” Will punched him on the shoulder.

Taylor obeyed, turning to climb.

His boots slipped in the pine needles and mud. He grabbed for a low-hanging branch, used it to support himself till he could wrap an arm around a narrow tree trunk. Will was right on his heels.

They left the trees and clambered up a few unsheltered feet. Taylor leaned into the wind and half crawled, half staggered forward. The wet stung his face and knocked the breath out of him. This was July? It felt like December.

A tree branch slapped him in the cheek as they reached another stand. His skin was so numb he barely felt it. What had happened to all that sultry, sodden heat?

Another branch hit him, and he swore. The wind snatched his words away.

Taylor trudged on, slithering every few feet, clutching boulders, branches, jutting roots, anything to keep moving. A quick glance over his shoulder showed the paved road below submerged beneath maybe sixteen feet of water that seemed to boil through the canyon curves like a soup of boulders and tree trunks and pieces of house siding.

Their car had slid back a few feet and was leaning still more alarmingly. It wouldn't take much to send it toppling down into that flood. 

Vaguely, he wondered if Will had bothered to take out insurance on the rental.

It seemed a trivial concern at the moment, merely a point of curiosity.

“Keep moving.” Will threw the words at him.

Unnecessarily. Taylor might be a city boy, but he was survivalist enough to know that even six inches of water could knock a man off his feet. A foot of water could float a car. The water he saw below them? That much water could wash a small town away.

He continued up the wet hillside, grateful as the trees grew denser, offering a little respite from the wind and wet at last. By then his muscles were burning and he was drenched in sweat, a sobering reminder that if they weren't in peak physical condition, they'd probably be dead.

After what felt like an eternity, Taylor reached the top of the hill, huddling beneath the dripping branches. He dropped back against the rough trunk of a pine tree and closed his eyes.

Will, shaking with cold and exertion, crawled beside him. Taylor opened his eyes, acknowledging Will's presence, then closed them again and concentrated on catching his breath.

“Too close,” Will huffed, sounding equally out of breath. “That was too…damned close. You okay?”

Taylor coughed, nodded, and wearily raised his eyelashes. “You?”

Will nodded.

“That was…” Words failed him. He stared at what he could see of Will's face.

“Among other things, that was the best goddamned driving I ever saw in my life.”

Will laughed shakily, acknowledging what a close call they'd had. Not like their jobs weren't plenty dangerous enough without Mother Nature getting into the act. 

He reached out, hauled Taylor awkwardly into his arms. For a few seconds, the world narrowed down to the hard breaths, to the hard, shaken pound of their hearts through wet clothes, to the hard grip of arms.

Taylor's wet face was pressed to Will's; their breath warmed each other's faces.

“It could have been worse.”

“I'll say.”

“It could have been my car we left on that mountain.”

Will gave a half laugh. They moved apart enough to study each other.

The night was fading. It was too early to be called dawn yet, but Taylor could just make out the outline of Will's weary, unshaven face. His deep blue eyes were the only color in the gray world of rain and shadows.

Will leaned in, and his mouth covered Taylor's, rough but sweet, his tongue seeking Taylor's. Taylor opened willingly to that kiss, forgetting for a second his scratched, scraped hands and the rain running down the back of his neck. They kissed a lot these days, especially for men who had never been much for kissing.

Taylor had become expert in all Will's kisses, from the hungry, lustful kisses that always made his own cock rise so fast it hurt, to the tender, almost cherishing kisses that Will generally saved for when he thought Taylor was sleeping. That dawn kiss beneath the pine trees rippled through him like an electric shock, a reminder that, tired, wet, and lost as they might be, so long as they were together, they were all right.

Better than all right. Much better. 

Chapter Five

They parted reluctantly.

“Now what?” Taylor asked.

“Now we try to find someone with a working phone.”

“Well, that shouldn't take long. Ranger Rick is probably on his way to pick us up right this minute.”

Will recognized that little sarcastic note as a sure sign Taylor's nerves were fraying fast. Not that he blamed him. Taylor didn't like the great outdoors when everything was going beautifully.

Things were not going beautifully.

“There are homes and campsites sprinkled all through these mountains,” he reassured Taylor. “We'll find someone. Worst-case scenario, we wait till we run into the emergency vehicles and rescue teams that'll be combing the area before long.”

Taylor shivered. “There were pieces of broken houses in that flood.”

“I know. It channeled right through the canyon, though. And a lot of those structures are vacation homes, not permanent residences. It could have been a lot worse. Especially at a different time of night.”

“Do you think Nemov got caught in that?” It was a pointless question since Will had no more way of knowing the answer to that than did Taylor. But he understood Taylor's anxiety. The knowledge that Kelila Hedwig and her unborn child might have died as an indirect result of their failure to report her whereabouts the minute they discovered where she was holed up…

That was something Will didn't want to contemplate. 

He said quietly, “I don't know. We don't know for sure they even came this way.”

“True.”

Will gazed up through the tree branches at the gray flannel skies. He looked back at Taylor, who was chewing at a ragged thumbnail and scowling. Will smiled faintly. For all his pale weariness, the little lines of stress and worry, Taylor alive and in one piece was still the most beautiful thing Will had ever seen.

“Good news,” Will told him.

Taylor directed a skeptical look his way.

“It's stopped raining.”

* * *

According to Taylor's watch, it was after six in the morning by the time they started down the far side of the mountain and found the black SUV mired in mud up to its custom rims.

By then the rain had stopped and the water had receded considerably. The canyon road was a knee-high swamp of debris and water, but the danger was past.

“It could be anyone's vehicle,” Will called as Taylor splashed through the water to peer through the tinted side windows.

“Sure,” Taylor said. “Who doesn't go on vacation without taking their leg irons?”

Will joined him in the water-filled ruts at the side of the road, making a frame for his face and trying to see inside. “Are you sure?” He could just make out a baseball bat, what looked like a military utility bag, and, yes, metallic links that appeared to be leg shackles. “Hmm. You just might be right.”

“I guess someone could have kinky tastes.”

“You ought to know.”

Taylor grimaced.

“Which is one of the things I like best about you,” Will added. 

“Just a born diplomat, aren't you? No wonder you're climbing through the ranks.”

Will had no reply to that. They sloshed through the water and clambered back to the relatively dry area of the hillside.

A flash of blue caught Will's eye. A blue jay landed on the branch of a pine tree and greeted the morning with its harsh song. The sun was rising, and it was already growing warm. The receding floodwater had a dank, unhealthy smell to it.

Taylor wiped his forehead. “Which way do you think they went?”

“Assuming they aren't lost or didn't get swept away, they'll be heading the same direction we are. They need food, water, and shelter, the same as us.”

“Hedwig couldn't climb these mountains. Could she?”

Will shrugged. “I guess if she had to, she would. I've seen pregnant weight lifters. In magazines.”

“She didn't look like the athletic type to me.”

“Maybe Nemov carried her. He looked like he could.”

“He looked like he could carry his SUV. I don't know why he didn't.” Taylor had his BlackBerry out and was clicking away and frowning at the results. Or lack of same.

“You're not going to get any reception down here.”

Taylor muttered something uncomplimentary, though whether to the national forest or Will was unclear.

They began to walk, continuing at a brisk pace until the sun appeared over the trees. There wasn't a cloud in the sky. Pine needles glistened and sparkled in the pure sunlight.

“You have to admit this is beautiful country,” Will said, shading his eyes and gazing up at the distant snowcapped mountains. 

Taylor opened his mouth—though it was unlikely he was going to admit anything of the kind—when something big, mottled brown and gray burst out of the brush and took wing, gobbling in fright.

He jumped a foot and gazed openmouthed at Will. “Jesus. What was that?”

Will dropped against a tree trunk and tried not to laugh. He didn't really have the breath to spare, but Taylor's half-alarmed, half-offended expression struck him as hysterically funny.

“Wild turkey. A hen, I think. You should see the size of the toms.”

“No thanks. I prefer my turkeys on a Thanksgiving platter.”

Again, Will had to struggle not to laugh.

They resumed their hike, having found what looked like an old track. Possibly a former stagecoach route. It paralleled the highway for a time and then led up into the hills. It was Will who spotted the two sets of footprints in the mud. One large, one smaller.

“That answers one question. They both made it out of the flash flood.”

Taylor nodded. He looked as relieved as Will felt. “They'll have holed up somewhere ahead of us on the trail. No way did he drag a pregnant woman up and down a mountainside in the middle of a rainstorm at night—even if he wanted to.

She'd never have made it.”

“Maybe he doesn't need her to make it.”

Taylor stared at him, thinking it over. He shook his head. “In that case, I think he'd have taken advantage of the flood to arrange a fatal accident. Plenty of opportunity. Especially if he left her handcuffed. Get her halfway up the slope and then give her a little push. Oops.”

“You worry me sometimes.”

“Good.” Taylor grinned a brief and dangerous grin.

“I think you're right. If he got this far, he must have been working like hell to do it.” 

They continued to work their way up the rough track, keeping an eye out for signs that they might be closing in on Nemov.

“I didn't think turkeys could fly,” Taylor said suddenly, seemingly still brooding over his close encounter with the local inhabitants. “You don't think there are any bears or anything out here?”

“No way,” said Will, who did absolutely think this state forest had bears, mountain lions, rattlesnakes, and a whole lot of other critters Taylor didn't need to know about.

He bit back a smile, thinking of their one and only camping trip in April. He'd heard Taylor's story about his run-in with a bear a couple of times. He loved that story. It was classic Taylor.

He studied Taylor's wide shoulders and trim Levi's-clad butt as he scrambled agilely up a natural staircase of lichen-covered boulders. Watching him, Will was hit by a wave of affection—hell, of tenderness—that almost brought him to a halt.

He moved quickly to catch up to Taylor, falling into step beside him.

“Hey.”

Taylor shot him a sidewise look. “Hey.”

“You know…I mean, I know you know this, but I just want to say it in case… If I do take the assignment in Paris, it doesn't mean that we're not still together.”

“Other than the six thousand miles between us.”

“Five thousand six hundred and sixty-one miles.”

“But who's counting.”

“MacAllister…Taylor…I'm not leaving you. I still want everything we talked about. I just…we're just talking about postponing it for a little while.”

“Two years. Minimum.”

Will caught Taylor's arm, bringing him to a halt. “I want this. I've worked hard for it.” 

Taylor sucked in a sharp breath and then let it out slowly. “I know you do. I know you have.”

“It's not about us. I haven't changed my mind about us. I never will.”

The difficult part was watching how hard Taylor worked to hide his feelings, how hard he was trying to be fair about this. Will wasn't sure he'd be that noble. He wanted to think he would, but he'd wondered how they—how he—would adjust when Taylor got his next overseas posting. It shook him that Taylor seemed so sure he'd turn such a posting down. How could he be sure when he had no idea what the assignment would be? And yet Will believed him. One thing he'd learned through the years: if Taylor said he would do something, it was as good as done.

“I…just don't see why I can't have both these things. We're not the first couple to have to deal with a long-distance relationship.”

“I know.”

“It's only two years. Look how fast the last five months have gone by.”

“I know.”

“We'll spend our vacations together.”

“Yep.”

“We'll spend every possible minute together. I promise you that.”

“Yep. You know it.”

“We'll…work it out.”

“We will.” Taylor nodded. His mouth was firm and smiling, his eyes miserable.

Abruptly, Will let him go and turned to lead the way down the path.

* * *

It was Taylor who noticed the thin white trail of smoke drifting from the ruins of what had once been Hoskin's Store.

A quarter of a mile back, they had passed through the remnant of an old graveyard, silvered wooden markers with names faded out by sun and rain, so, even before they spotted the first crumbling adobe structure, they'd known they were close to one of the ghost towns that dotted these mountains.

After the discovery of the graveyard, they'd stuck mostly to cover where they could find it. The sun was up by then, and the mist had cleared. They'd spotted helicopters in the blue distance, but nothing within signaling range. The National Guard and FEMA would have their hands full with the more populated areas, at least for the next couple of hours.

Taylor, who was in the lead again, raised his hand, gesturing to Will. Will acknowledged with a curt nod, and they split up, each taking a side of the wide, weedy dirt lane that was all that remained of Main Street.

There was nothing left of the majority of the buildings but gaping holes in the ground and rubble. Antique timber and genuine adobe had a way of disappearing from abandoned towns like this, only to turn up on trendy new construction sites.

Hoskin's Store was the tallest remaining structure, and it was mostly just a foundation and three walls of white-painted brick. Not much of a shelter, but any port in a storm, Will supposed.

They moved quickly through the wreckage of the few broken buildings until they had positioned themselves outside the foundation of the store.

In the intersecting far corner of the two standing walls, Nemov knelt over a small fire. His trusty shotgun leaned against the wall within reach. A bedraggled Hedwig was huddled close to the feeble flames. She wore a jacket that was too big to belong to anyone but Nemov.

Taylor signaled to Will. Will signaled back and drew his weapon. He trained it on Nemov, who was busily throwing handfuls of what looked like bird's nests into the fire.

“Morning,” Will said laconically, stepping out from behind the wall.

Hedwig gasped. Nemov lunged for his shotgun.

“Hold it right there.” Taylor appeared behind the waist-high wall. 

Nemov froze.

“Not a good feeling, is it?” Taylor said as Nemov gazed down the barrel of his SIG.

“No.”

Will started toward the fire and Hedwig.

“In fact, it's pretty sickening thinking about what a bullet can do to you.

Especially a .357 cartridge. Have you ever been shot?”

Nemov swallowed. “No.”

“I have. I don't recommend it.”

Will listened to this exchange with half an ear. His attention was on Hedwig, who had her eye on Nemov's shotgun. He didn't like her expression.

“Let us make a deal,” Nemov said.

“Let us not,” Taylor returned, “and say we did.”

Hedwig sprang for the shotgun, but Will was faster. He dived, grabbed her by her ponytail, and dragged her back. She let out a squeal of pain and fury but stopped struggling, folding her arms protectively around her middle.

“Down, girl.”

Hedwig let off a stream of invectives that might have made a Russian drug lord blink. If he wasn't already used to her winning ways. She finished inexplicably with, “You have no right!”

“You see,” Nemov said. “You should leave her with me. I will split the reward money with you.”

“What have I told you two about eating juniper berries for breakfast?” Will confiscated Nemov's shotgun. “Why'd you uncuff her? It seems rash.”

“She could not climb in handcuffs.”

“Well, we'll give her a helping hand with that.” Will reached for his handcuffs. 

Hedwig gave a vicious but inaccurate kick at his legs. He jumped aside. Nemov laughed nastily.

“I'm really getting tired of you two,” Taylor commented. “You, the Mad Russian, take your—actually my—handcuffs out. Good. Now siddown, hands behind your head.”

Nemov slowly complied. Taylor reached across the wall, took the cuffs, and locked one end around Nemov's hairy right wrist, looped the other through one of the rusted rods partially sticking out of the bricks, and locked it around Nemov's left wrist.

“That ought to hold you for a bit.”

Hands fastened behind his head, Nemov glared up at him. “This is not legal.”

“Isn't it?”

Taylor looked at Will in surprise. Will said, “Uh, you really want to leave him like that?”

“What I'd really like to do is shoot him, but I was thinking you'd probably object.”

Will hoped—assumed—he was kidding. He looked at Hedwig, who was still glowering up at him. “My partner's not in a great mood. I'd advise you to start cooperating. If you don't, the first thing we're doing after we drag your ass off this mountain is call the marshals and let them deal with getting you back to charm school.”

She bared her teeth at him.

“I'm sure I can find a stake to chain her to,” Taylor said.

“You'd like that,” Hedwig said. “You don't care about me. I'd be safer with him.” She jerked her head at Nemov.

Nemov nodded approvingly.

“Yeah, but who'll protect him from you?” Will knelt and got Hedwig handcuffed. For all her quivering fury, she didn't put up any resistance. If she was half as tired as Will felt, she had to be ready to drop. Weren't pregnant women supposed to sleep a lot anyway? Maybe Hedwig hadn't gotten the memo.

Will helped her to her feet. “Do we leave the fire or not?” he asked Taylor.

“What do you think?”

Will considered. “There's nothing for it to burn in here, but while it's going it'll keep off predators and act as a beacon for the choppers.” To Nemov he said, “The first phone we get to, we'll contact the sheriffs and have them send someone for you.”

“I will not be here.”

“That would be my suggestion, but if you come after us, you'll wish you'd waited for the sheriffs.” 

Chapter Six

The Mountain Inn in Carrizozo was like a lot of motor courts built back in the thirties and forties. At night its blue and pink neon lights beckoned the weary traveler. By day it offered adobe-style cabins with royal blue doors, paintings of Southwest Indian designs on the stucco facade, and shady, juniper-lined walkways.

The pool was bone-dry, aqua paint flecking away in the white-hot sunlight, but the ice machine still worked. Taylor could hear it thumping and rattling outside their cabin window. It was the closest thing to air conditioning the Mountain Inn offered.

Inside the cabin, the red and brown furnishings were ugly and worn. The furniture was battered, but the rooms were clean and the beds looked comfortable.

Of course, anything short of a slab in a morgue looked comfortable to Taylor at that point.

It had taken them two hours to get down the mountain to a fire road. By then Hedwig had been out on her feet. Rescue had come in the unexpected form of a bumblebee yellow Hummer driven by a self-described “rock hound.”

Apparently flash floods were the equivalent of Christmas for lapidaries. When the waters dried, all kinds of goodies could be discovered in the silt. Crowded in the backseat, shoulder and thigh pressed against Will's, Taylor had listened in a kind of dream state to their bewhiskered savior drone on about fire agates, Mexican opals, Apache jasper, and petrified wood. When Will had asked about flood damage in the surrounding area, the Good Samaritan had been vague but professed a belief that there had been no loss of life. 

He'd dropped them off in Carrizozo, population one thousand (give or take), a per capita income of slightly over twelve grand, and an open invitation to any and all renewable energy companies looking to invest. Welcome to hell, in other words.

It did have an airport, but it sounded too small for their purposes.

After checking in to the Mountain Inn, Will had handcuffed Hedwig to the bed in the adjoining room of their cabin—probably unnecessary as she was asleep before her head hit the pillow—and he and Taylor had spent the next hour calling rental car companies, ranger stations, and just about anyone they could think of.

“Who calls Cooper?” Will asked.

Cooper as in Assistant Field Office Director Cooper. Their boss. The man who would have a few things to say about a pair of special agents who took it upon themselves to go hunting a fugitive suspected terrorist when their assignment was merely to escort her to LA.

“I will,” Taylor said. “It was my idea.”

“For the last time. You didn't force me into this. We came up with this plan together.”

“Do you think it makes it better or worse that it took two of us to come up with this scheme?”

“I think we should hold off talking to Cooper.”

“You mean because of the supposed leak to the DEA?”

Will shrugged. “I'm just saying.”

“We can't stay off the radar indefinitely.”

“I know. But—”

“I'll tell him we're following up a lead.”

Will's mouth opened in objection.

Taylor added, “And I'll call the office while he's at lunch, instead of calling his cell.”

“Good thought.” 

“Easier to ask forgiveness…”

Will was nodding. His own cell rang, and he reached for it, frowning as he listened. “Right. Thanks. Appreciate it.” He disconnected.

“Nemov?” Taylor asked.

“Long gone by the time they got there.”

“We knew that would happen.”

“True.” Will went to the adjoining room and looked in at their prisoner. “She's still out for the count,” he told Taylor, leaving the door open a crack. “I didn't know women could snore that loud.”

Will's mother had passed away when he was six. He'd grown up in an all-male household, which, in Taylor's opinion, was one reason Will retained such chivalrous ideas about women.

Taylor tugged his remaining boot off and let himself fall back on the Indian-patterned bedspread with a groan.

It was going to be a scorcher of a day. The noon breeze was desert dry and scented with the burgers frying in the coffee shop next door to the motel.

“I don't think I could move if my life depended on it,” he muttered as the mattress sank beneath Will's weight.

He managed not to jerk as Will's hand rested on his brow. Will slowly stroked the hair back from his forehead. Taylor kept his eyes closed. That uncharacteristically open tenderness made his heart ache.

“You get some sleep.” Will's voice was low. “We've got a couple of hours before we need to leave for the airport. I'll call Cooper when I'm sure he's left for lunch.”

Taylor snorted; it was more of a tired sniff. His eyelashes felt too heavy to lift, and he didn't want to see what was in Will's face anyway. Regret? Apology? Good-bye? Sometimes he was so angry with Will it was all he could do to control himself.

How could Will do this to them?

Other times he was just…sad. 

Will's warm lips nuzzled his temple. Taylor's eyes flew open. Will's eyes crinkled at the corners.

“Save me a place in those dreams.”

Taylor summoned a weary grin. “Front row. Always.” He let his lids fall shut, closing out Will's smile.

* * *

He must have slept deeply, because when Will stretched beside him, Taylor had no idea how long he'd been out. It could have been five minutes or five hours.

The curtains were closed against the harsh daylight, thin plaid fabric rustling in the occasional gusts of hot wind.

“Time?” he mumbled.

“We're good. We're flying out of Ruidoso at five. We'll have to take the back way because of flood damage, but we've got time for a little siesta.”

Taylor yawned. Rubbed his eyes. “I thought that was the back way?” He let himself be tugged over to Will, although it was really too hot for cuddling. Too hot for anything—except maybe a cold shower.

Cold showers seemed to be the last thing on Will's mind. They embraced, and Taylor buried his head in the strong curve of Will's shoulder.

“You're beautiful.” Will's voice was rough, uneven. “You know that?”

Face hidden against Will, Taylor shook his head.

“Yeah, you do. And yeah, you are.”

Taylor pulled himself together. He nipped the fleshy part of Will's shoulder and drew back. “You're not so bad yourself.”

Will's blue eyes were solemn. He'd showered and shaved. Taylor didn't remember that, so he must really have been out.

Will continued to study Taylor like he was trying to memorize his face. “I love you.” 

Taylor moved his head in assent. His mouth tingled as Will traced his lower lip with the pad of his thumb. He lightly bit the finger.

“You think Patty Hearst is liable to wake up?”

Will shook his head, his gaze sharpening.

“In that case…let's save the siesta for the plane.”

Will groaned soft accord, moving to undo the buttons of Taylor's shirt. He laid the khaki cotton wide and bent his head, his lips warm on Taylor's already flushed skin.

Taylor's breath caught as Will's mouth trailed, tasting, kissing from his collarbone to his chest. The combination of soft lips and sharp teeth was maddening in the best possible way. He ran his fingers through the damp, dark silk of Will's hair, raised his head to kiss Will's ear, which was all he could reach. He groaned and dropped back as Will's mouth closed around one of his nipples. Excitement and pleasure arrowed straight to his groin. He gasped, arched up, pushing the hard, sensitive nub of flesh into Will's mouth.

“I like that.”

“I know you do.” Will was smiling indulgently. He didn't find having his breasts touched nearly as arousing as Taylor did. In fact, Taylor suspected it made Will a little uncomfortable, but he seemed happy to oblige this kink of Taylor's. He nibbled and licked his way to Taylor's other nipple and then sucked hard.

“God. Will.”

Will bit him gently.

Taylor whimpered. He was already erect and aching, his cock bobbing over his flat belly.

“I know, sweetheart.” Will gave Taylor's taut nipple a final wet lick. He lifted up, straddled Taylor, trapping his cock between Will's buttocks. Will clenched his muscles around the shaft while leaning forward to claim Taylor's mouth again.

“Nice…large muscle control,” Taylor gulped out when he could breathe again. 

“Wait'll you see my fine muscle control.”

Taylor shivered and then laughed. He slipped his hand down between the hot, moist press of their bodies and began to stroke his belly, slowly, deliberately stimulating himself for their mutual enjoyment. Will teased him about being an exhibitionist, but Will definitely liked to watch. And Taylor liked to be watched by Will.

Will's eyes were so dark they looked black as Taylor stretched his spine, arching. His own gaze lingered on Will's lean, tanned, muscular body. Will's cock thrust up out of the black, silky thatch of his pubic hair.

Reaching out, Taylor feathered his fingers down Will's cock, stroking the thick, hot shaft. He could feel the pulse of blood throbbing beneath the satiny skin. You wouldn't think it could possibly feel good to have something that big and stiff shove into your ass, but it did. It was the best feeling on earth.

“What do you want?” Will whispered, as though reading his mind. “Want me to fuck you?”

Taylor nodded urgently.

“I love it when you say it.”

“Please, Will. God. Please fuck me. I need it.” Taylor had no inhibitions about asking for what he wanted. He had few inhibitions, period. Not being afraid to face what he liked gave him control, even power in this delicately balanced relationship of theirs.

He could see the effect of those words on Will, see Will's expression transform into a revealing composite of desire and vulnerability. “Oh yeah—” Will's face fell.

“Oh hell. Hold on!”

He was off the bed and heading for the bathroom.

“Was it something I said?” 

Will's strangled laugh came from the bathroom. Taylor, absently stroking himself, watched as Will reappeared. He was back on the bed in a leap and a bounce.

The bounce nearly sent them both through the mattress. Taylor started to laugh.

“What the hell was all that about?”

Will held up a small bottle of complimentary hand cream.

“Ah.” Taylor nodded approval. “Good thinking.”

“Assume the position,” Will told him, and Taylor wriggled more comfortably into the disarranged bedding and lifted his legs.

Will squirted some pale, scented lotion into his hand and lazily stroked Taylor.

The liquid felt cool and slick on heated skin. Taylor murmured approval.

“Hedonist.” Will tickled his balls, which began to tighten. Taylor sucked in a breath as Will's fingers grazed the crevice beneath his cheeks.

Will squirted more lotion into his palm. He traced up and down the moist curve of Taylor's buttocks. Taylor groaned, gazing dizzily up into Will's gravely smiling face. “Oh God. Yes. Do it to me, Will.”

Will slipped his fingers inside, making Taylor cry out sharply and toss his head against the flat pillows.

“Shhh.” Will threw a guilty look at the door dividing their room from their prisoner's.

Taylor acknowledged the warning, but the feel of Will's fingers moving inside him was exquisite. He stretched and pushed down, aiding Will in that quest to find the spongy nub of his prostate.

“Good?” Will watched his face.

Taylor swallowed. Nodded. Hard to find words in the face of pleasure that intense. He closed his eyes and simply felt. The scent of musk and flowery lotion, the prickle of hair and fingernails… 

As always there was the little regret when Will's fingers gently withdrew. But the next moment, Will's thick cock was pressing into him, pushing, piercing him slowly, deeply.

“Tay,” Will breathed.

There was a brief pang of resistance, the alarming, stretching pull of skin and muscle, the almost unbearable pressure, and then the instant overwhelming pleasure.

Taylor wrapped his legs around Will's lean waist. His hands rested on Will's broad shoulders, smoothing, absently urging him on. Will began to move into a more powerful rhythm, and Taylor pushed back into it, the blood-hot clutch of flesh on flesh. Fevered, damp, restless…he rode the tiger, absorbed the pounding flash fire inside himself, both their bodies slick and shining with sweat, incalescent…

The pleasure of his coming was almost painful, so ferocious it racked him. The sun seemed to fill the room with light, brighter and brighter, burning him up—and then pinched out.

* * *

“You're right,” Will said sometime later. “I did screw up out there last night.

With the Mad Russian. I could have got us all killed.”

Taylor turned his head on the pancake pillow. There were lines in Will's face he only remembered seeing once before. That had been the afternoon he'd thought he was dying. The afternoon they'd both believed he was dying.

“Sometimes it does get in the way. My feelings for you. I can't…”

“I can't either,” Taylor said. “But we agreed that it was better to take our chances together than apart. We knew it would be hard sometimes.”

Will's jaw worked. Taylor brushed his knuckles against the tight, smooth skin.

“That why you feel you need five thousand miles between us?”

Will shook his head. “That's not fair. You know why I want this job.”

Taylor turned his face away. Stared at the dark, scarred paneling. “I know.” 

“I'm not running from us. I'm not running from anything. You said yourself it's a huge opportunity for me. It's the chance of a lifetime. I can't turn it down. It would be stupid to turn it down.”

Taylor closed his eyes against Will's pain—and his own. “I know. Sorry. I'm being a jerk.”

“Taylor, you know I love you.”

Taylor opened his eyes, turned his head, and Will's face was for once unguarded, all his feelings there to be read. His own throat closed. He nodded.

“I know you don't believe it, but it's just the same for me. It's exactly the same for me. The thought of these two years is killing me. But if I don't take the posting, I'm afraid of what it will do to us. I'm afraid I'll resent that decision later on.”

Taylor nodded. “I know. I'm afraid of that too. You need to go.”

But two years? Two? He missed Will when they were working apart just for a couple of days.

It would be a mistake to cry, not least because he'd never get over the humiliation, but he was about as close to tears as he'd ever been in his life. It was a real struggle, and he wasn't totally sure he wouldn't drown in all that backwash of dammed-up emotion. He kept his eyes screwed tight, but for expediency's sake, he had to open his mouth and drag in a soggy breath.

Will groaned. “Don't. God. Don't.” He gathered Taylor tight, burying his face in Taylor's shoulder. He could feel Will shaking with the same effort at control.

Paris seemed a long way away. 

Chapter Seven

The heat shimmered off the cracked asphalt and seemed to settle on the drooping leaves of the pecan trees along the wide street as they went into the coffee shop next to the Mountain Inn motor court.

“I don't understand why we're flying out of Ruidoso,” Hedwig said once they had been seated. “There's an airport here.”

“Because if anyone is following us, they'll expect us to fly out of the airport here,” Will told her. “Besides, if we'd waited for a flight out of here, we wouldn't have been able to get a connecting flight to Los Angeles from Albuquerque this evening.”

She gave him a long unreadable look from behind her glasses and picked up her menu.

Will shook his head inwardly. Through the coffee shop's plate-glass windows, he spotted Taylor, wearing a new pair of aviator sunglasses, walking from the parking lot.

A moment later, the glass door pushed open. Will's heart skipped in that funny way it had a habit of doing these days at the sight of Taylor's lean, rangy figure.

He raised his hand, and Taylor crossed over to them and sat down in the crescent- shaped booth across from Will. “We're all checked out at the motel, and the rental car is in the parking lot behind this place.”

“Good.”

Taylor's face was unreadable behind the shades, but Will had the sense that Taylor wanted to tell him something. 

He raised his brows. Taylor gave a slight shake of his head.

Will asked, “Do we have time for lunch?”

Hedwig looked up in surprise.

“Why not?” Taylor picked up a menu.

The waitress arrived, and Hedwig, presumably eating for two, ordered a Monte Cristo sandwich, a strawberry milkshake, onion rings, and fried shrimp. Even Taylor, who most often had an appetite like a young wolf, seemed in awe over the fried shrimp. He opted for the Santa Fe salad with chicken, black beans, and tortilla chips. Will ordered a burger and fries.

The business of ordering taken care of, Hedwig folded her arms on the table and scrutinized Taylor and then Will. “Do you two live together?”

“Not your business, is it?” Taylor said, checking e-mail messages on his BlackBerry.

That was the correct answer, so Will was startled to hear his own voice simultaneously answer, “Yes.”

“Yes?” Taylor questioned, looking up as though someone else had answered.

“Half my stuff is at your place. My dog is at your place.”

“That's not the same as living together.”

“According to Riley it is.” Will was trying to joke, but Taylor was unsmiling.

“You have to hide your relationship,” Hedwig deduced.

“Not anymore,” said Taylor.

Apparently the truce Will thought they'd reached earlier that day was already at an end. “Wait a minute.”

Taylor's gaze was cool. “Our relationship won't be a problem once we're not partnered.”

That was true. Will hadn't thought about it before. He said staunchly, against the sinking sensation in his belly, “That's one of the positives then.” 

“Yeah.” Taylor returned to studying his e-mail. “I know I'm thrilled.”

Will folded his lips against all the things he wanted to say. He needed to be sensitive to Taylor or this long-distance thing was going to rip them apart, and he had no intention—regardless of what Taylor believed—of letting that happen. So he would bite his tongue and keep biting his tongue, and eventually Taylor would get over his insecurity and they'd be okay again.

“How'd you get involved with Bashnakov?” He thought Hedwig looked mildly disappointed at his change of subject.

“I met him when I was an exchange student in Moscow. I was friends with his son Alexi. Mikhail and I…there was an instant…connection. The age difference meant nothing.”

“How long ago was that?”

“I was in high school. When I came home, I wrote him. He wrote back.” She shrugged. “One thing led to another.”

“Those must have been some postcards.”

“Then, when I was at Barnard, Mikhail bought an estate in New York—”

“You went to Barnard?” Taylor interrupted.

“Yes. Why not? Oh. Because I don't fit your preconceived notion of what a Seven Sisters graduate is like?”

“You don't fit my preconceived notion of what a junior college graduate is like.

Or a normal high school graduate.”

“Okay,” Will said. “Don't make me separate you two.”

Hedwig gave Taylor her bared-teeth expression. Fortunately, their lunches arrived, ending further civilities. Hedwig tore into her plate of shrimp with the savage satisfaction of a great white.

When the meal was over, Will went to pay the bill. He was replacing his credit card into his wallet when he spotted a familiar figure heading in to the Mountain Inn next door. 

Of course it was possible there was a dog show in town, but somehow Will suspected Reuben Ramirez might have another reason to be wandering around Carrizozo. He returned to the dining room.

As he reached the table, Taylor, apparently reading his expression, hooked a hand around Hedwig's arm and drew her to her feet.

“I have to use the ladies' room.”

“You're going to have to hold it,” Will told her.

“I can't hold it!”

“Make it snappy.”

She yanked her arm away from Taylor and sailed off to the restrooms.

“We should have left her handcuffed,” Taylor said.

“The idea was to avoid attracting attention. That might be academic now. I just saw Reuben Ramirez go in to the Mountain Inn lobby.”

“That's quite a coincidence. Here's another one. There's an automotive repair shop next to the car rental place. Guess who I spotted getting a tire replaced on his SUV?”

“Our friend with the Mohawk?”

“Da.”

“Great. The sooner we get out of town, the better. Hopefully Ramirez and Nemov will stake out the airport. Or each other.”

“I'll go watch the rear in case Mother Russia decides to climb out the bathroom window.”

Will nodded. Taylor disappeared through the crowded tables of diners and exited through the glass door.

A few minutes later, Hedwig pushed out through the bathroom door.

Will hustled her to the parking lot. Taylor joined them, and they piled into the rental SUV. 

Nobody appeared to be following them as they left Carrizozo in the red dust and started the drive to Sierra Blanca. Nor did anyone have much to say. To fill the silence, Will turned on the radio, and they listened to weather and traffic reports.

There was an update on the flash flood cleanup efforts. It seemed that their rescuer in the Hummer had been correct. No lives had been lost, though property damage had been considerable. That section of the national forest was currently closed to visitors.

“Have you ever been with a woman?” Hedwig asked suddenly from the backseat.

Pop goes the weasel. She had to be doing it on purpose, Will decided. Either because she liked mixing things up or because she believed she could gain some advantage by keeping them distracted and on edge.

“What is it with you?” Taylor asked, possibly reaching the same conclusion.

“I'm curious. In the Mafiya, it's one of the four unforgivable transgressions. It carries a death penalty.”

Taylor made a sound of amused disgust.

“Anyway, how do you know you wouldn't like sex with a woman if you've never tried?”

Will said, “I have tried.”

The words just…popped out. Seeing Taylor's astonishment, Will wished he'd kept his mouth shut.

“You have?” Taylor was frowning. “When?”

“Back in high school.”

“High school? You never mentioned it before.”

Will shrugged. That was one thing that had always surprised him about Taylor. For all Taylor's sexual adventures, one thing he'd never tried was intercourse with a woman.

Hedwig asked, “You didn't like it?” 

“I liked it fine.” Will was a little irritated at the way Taylor was staring at him—as though Will had confessed to having an extramarital affair. It was kind of ironic coming from a guy who'd had intimate acquaintance with such items as butterfly boards and piercing needles.

“Did you only try once?”

“Mind your own business,” Taylor told Hedwig. To Will he said, “How many times?”

Will sincerely wished he'd kept his mouth shut. “I don't know. A few. I had a girlfriend.”

“A girlfriend? A steady girlfriend?”

Will nodded. Why the hell was this a big deal? For the life of him, he couldn't imagine, but he could feel Taylor's shock like an electromagnetic field.

“Why've you never mentioned this?”

“I have.” Will knew he hadn't, actually, but not because it was some deep, dark secret. It was just a long time ago and…well, a little painful.

“No you haven't. I'd have remembered.”

Will glanced in his rearview mirror. Hedwig was staring out the window as they wound higher up into the trees and hills. Apparently she'd lost interest in the conversation. Nice. Had her only purpose been to wind Taylor up? If so, she'd succeeded.

Seeing that Taylor was still waiting for a reply, he said mildly, “Why would you? It's not a big deal.”

“What was her name?”

“Madonna.”

“Madonna? What kind of a name is that?”

“Catholic, I guess. Her family was Catholic. You're acting kind of weird about this, in case you haven't noticed.”

Taylor sat back in his seat. He was still eyeing Will narrowly. 

“So…you consider yourself bisexual?”

“No, I don't consider myself bisexual. What are you talking about? Because I had a girlfriend in high school? A lot of people have girlfriends in high school and college.”

“And college? Were you still seeing her in college?”

Will could happily have bitten his tongue out. “It's just a…an example.”

“Were you still together in college?”

Goddamn that persistent, ruthless investigative streak of Taylor's.

“For a little while,” Will admitted.

“Well.” Taylor had that huffy, irritable tone he got when he was edgy or nervous. “This is certainly an interesting development.”

Will looked away from the road to throw him an exasperated look. “Why would it be? It's nothing. It was a million years ago. A lifetime ago. I can't figure out why the hell we're even still discussing it.”

“So this is why I've never met your family?”

The sheer breathtaking illogic of that jump was only secondary to the deadly intuitive accuracy of it. Until Taylor had put it into words, it had never occurred to Will that it was one thing to admit to your all-American, red-blooded, manly man family you were gay. It was another to bring your male lover home to meet the folks. And maybe that difference was one reason he'd always managed to arrange visits to his family when Taylor couldn't go.

“That's the most fucking ridiculous thing I ever heard!”

Taylor said with infuriating calm, “Okay, okay. Just asking.”

From the backseat, Hedwig suddenly sucked in a sharp breath.

“Now what?” Will growled.

Her wide bespectacled gaze met his in the rearview. She swallowed. “I-I think… I'm not sure… Could you stop the car?”

“No,” Taylor and Will answered in unison. 

“But I think the baby is coming!”

* * *

The middle of nowhere. That's about as close as Taylor's trusty GPS seemed to be able to narrow their location down to. A small grassy knoll in the middle of nowhere. On either side they were surrounded by hills and trees. Behind them, the clearing fell away to a long series of steep slopes covered in more rocks and trees.

Hedwig was walking a big circle around the glade, hand pressed to her bulging belly, taking deep, distressed breaths.

Standing by the car, watching her, Will said, “Maybe she's just carsick.

Considering what she put away at lunch…”

Taylor was scowling at his BlackBerry. “I still can't get a signal.”

“If she is in labor, we could have hours, right? It can take hours.”

Taylor shook his BlackBerry. In a minute, he'd be knocking it against a boulder.

“Don't you think?” Will persisted. “It's not like in the movies.”

“True. I guess.” Taylor scowled across the clearing at Hedwig, who continued to make her big slow loop. “She's got to be faking.”

“I know. But for the sake of argument, let's say she's not.”

Taylor shook his head. “I don't know.”

“We've had training on this.”

“Good. You can deal with it.”

“I can't remember anything about it except how to tie off the umbilical cord.”

Taylor looked horrified. “Her…uh…water has to break, right? I don't think it did.”

“How would you know?”

“She'd have said.” 

Will nodded, relieved. That made sense. “Should we head back to Carrizozo or try to make it to Sierra Blanca?”

“I say we try to make it to the airport.”

“The airport?” Will was doubtful about that.

“Maybe not the airport itself, but Ruidoso. She's got to be faking.”

“Okay. They'll have more extensive medical facilities, anyway. It's—” He broke off as a long black sedan with tinted windows pulled off the road, tires shelling rock as it drew into the turnout.

“I don't like this,” Taylor remarked, planting himself squarely in line with Will. “Is this somebody we know?”

Will cast a quick look back at Hedwig. She had stopped circling the mini meadow and was standing in a pose that conveyed a creature at bay. At his quick gesture, she moved toward the stand of trees. One thing he couldn't fault was her instinct for survival.

The passenger door of the sedan opened. A short, slender form emerged. A man with cropped, fair hair. He wore dark sunglasses and a black tailored suit.

“Is everything all right? Can we offer assistance?” Not a man. A woman. It wasn't just the voice. Unless Will was very much mistaken, there were small breasts beneath that sexless suit.

Will politely waved her off.

“Does she look familiar?” Taylor inquired out of the side of his mouth.

“The car does.”

“It does?”

“Classic movie villain wheels.”

“True. So are the threads. They scream 'Hit Person.'”

Will grunted a laugh. He sobered as the driver's door of the car swung open.

“Here we go.”

A man got out, blond counterpart of the woman. 

“They could be feebs.” Taylor looked back at where Hedwig was hiding, then looked at Will.

“I don't think so. They'd have identified themselves by now.” Will called to the woman, “Thanks again. It's under control.” Under his breath, he said to Taylor,

“Shit. They're not going to buy it. Move.”

He was aware of the man reaching beneath his blazer. Hip holster, probably.

He was aware of Taylor leaping for a cairn of rocks. That was all there was time for; Will himself was already moving. He raced for the edge of the hillside to his right, throwing himself down behind a shoulder of rock and grass, drawing his weapon.

What he wouldn't give for one of the standard issue Colt SMGs or even a Remington 870.

“We just want the girl,” the woman yelled.

“We're federal agents,” Will shouted back.

“Give us the girl, and no one has to get hurt.”

“You're not getting the girl.”

A granite splinter just missed the tip of his nose, and he heard the familiar whine of a bullet ricocheting off stone. In reply came the brisk, untroubled bang of Taylor's SIG.

Will rolled over and risked a quick look. The female shooter was situated behind a boulder near the edge of the road. The male shooter was behind his vehicle, wasting ammunition like it grew on trees. He was focusing his firepower on Taylor's position, but Taylor was safely dug in and not easily flustered.

Will fired a succession of rounds at the car to give Taylor a little breathing space. He hit the gas tank twice, but of course it was only in movies that cars conveniently exploded. He nailed the front right tire and, with grim satisfaction, watched the front half of the vehicle sag.

Dropping back, Will ejected the SIG's magazine, replaced the empty clip with a full one, slapped the magazine back into place. 

Taylor was conserving ammo, laying down just enough fire to keep the other two from advancing toward the copse where Hedwig hid. The female shooter was equally conservative, biding her time, watching closely for a clear shot.

Two on two. Well, they'd certainly had worse odds. With the road in front of them and the downside of the knoll to their rear, they were in pretty good position.

If they had to fall back, the trees and vegetation supplied plenty of camouflage. Yes, it could definitely be worse.

And it could definitely be better. Will was disgusted with himself for missing the fact that they'd picked up a tail. Even if they had been keeping well back—a big black sedan? It didn't get more in-your-face than that. How long had he and Taylor been followed? He'd been so preoccupied with Taylor and keeping an eye out for Nemov, he'd missed the obvious. And what was Taylor's excuse?

The male shooter made an attempt to get to the rocky incline to the right of the car, but Will held him off with three well-placed shots. The woman directed her attention his way. Taylor revived her interest in him with resumed fire.

The male shooter scrambled back into the car and blared the horn loudly. The female left cover and ran for the car, firing off a few wild shots and throwing herself inside.

The black sedan roared forward, knocking the silver SUV rental a few feet to the side and plowing past. The sedan fishtailed, screeching up the road several yards and disappearing around a bend. The engine died.

They weren't going far. Even if they wanted to, a couple of holes in the gas tank were sure to slow them down.

Taylor was up and running for the stand of junipers. Will started for the SUV.

If it was still functional, they'd head back for Carrizozo rather than fall into whatever trap the suits in the black sedan were planning.

“Brandt!” 

He turned. Taylor reappeared, shaking his head.

“Is she hit?” Will gasped, sick at the thought. “She's not dead, is she?”

“Gone.” 

Chapter Eight

“Signal?”

Taylor shook his head. He resisted the temptation to hurl his BlackBerry at the nearest mountaintop. “We didn't run them off. They're either blocking the road ahead or going for a better position.”

“Or both.”

“Or both. Either way, we can't retreat. Not without the Bionic Baby Maker.”

“She's not going far.” Will ejected his pistol magazine, checked the clip, reinserted the magazine. That would be his second and last clip. At a rough estimate, Taylor guessed Will probably had six, maybe seven, rounds left. He hadn't been planning to go to war. Neither of them had. He reached in his pocket, tossed Will one of his extras. It wasn't regulation, but Taylor always carried extra extras.

Will took it, slipping it in his vest pocket. “I guess that answers the question about whether she was faking labor.”

“I guess. Listen, Brandt. If that car's still running, I think you should take it and head for the nearest ranger station. We need some support here. There isn't any point trying to keep this thing secret now.”

“And in the meantime, you're going to do what?”

“I'm going to find Hedwig and go to ground with her until you show up with reinforcements.”

“The guy who thinks Descanso Gardens is a wilderness is going to try tracking someone through Lincoln National Forest? I don't think so.” 

“Hey, she's no wilderness expert either. I'm the perfect choice to track her.

She's going to think like me.”

“Very funny. We're sticking together.”

That was the way Taylor would prefer it, but honesty compelled him to speak.

“We need some backup. We've got Dick and Jane ahead of us and, for all we know, Nemov coming up on our ass. Ramirez might even be out there somewhere. The situation is out of our control. We need help.”

“We're sticking together.”

“Would you listen to me?”

“Would you listen to me? I'm not leaving you out here.”

What a really bad time to get choked up, but Will was glaring at him, mouth thinned to a white line and eyes so bright they were glittering. Bad timing for both of them.

“Will…”

“I'm. Not. Leaving. You. Got that?”

Taylor took a deep breath. “It's okay. I know you'll come back.”

To his surprise, Will's hand closed on his shoulder and pulled him forward into a fleeting but adamant press of mouths.

“You're right. I will. Always.” He released Taylor and turned away. “Let's go. It can get dark fast in the mountains.”

* * *

“Is there any chance she didn’t come this way?” They had been searching the tree-covered hills for half an hour with no sign of Hedwig anywhere. Now it was mostly a series of rocky downhill slopes. Where the ground wasn't rock, it was covered in golden wheat. Or something that looked like wheat but was more likely weeds. There were a few scraggly pine trees and a lot of juniper and cactus. The air was sharp and clear as a crystal bell, and every clack of rock on rock seemed to carry for miles. 

“This is the closest thing to a trail.”

Which wasn't saying much.

Taylor paused to look over his shoulder—which was when he felt the ground give way.

For a confused instant, he thought he'd misstepped, that he was falling down the hillside, and then he realized that he was falling into the hillside. The ground caved in around him, dirt and rock crumbling down on him as he sank.

He seemed to hang, suspended, clawing the thick, moist dark, trying to climb back up to air and light, squinching his eyelids, spitting, breathing out against the smothering shower of debris. It felt for a moment like he might fight gravity.

Then he plummeted. He landed in soft earth, though hard enough to knock the wind out of him.

He could hear Will yelling. It sounded like a long way away.

Taylor blinked a couple of times and began to rapidly take stock. Fingers, toes, hands, feet, arms, legs…everything seemed to be working. He gingerly lifted his head. A cone of light spilled down from the hole in the ceiling above his head.

A good twenty feet above his head.

“Taylor? Can you hear me? Are you okay? Can you hear me?”

Will's head appeared in the opening above.

“Brandt!”

“Jesus Christ. You scared the shit out of me, MacAllister.”

You and me both. But Taylor refrained from saying it. Will sounded about as rattled as Taylor'd ever heard him.

“You can move? Are you injured?”

Taylor slowly picked himself up. “I'm okay.”

“Are you sure?” 

“Uh, I think so.” He moved into the shaft of sunlight, brushing the grit and pine needles from his clothes and hands. “Yeah, I'm fine.”

“Do you see a way to climb up?”

Taylor looked around. He was forced to reluctantly admit, “No.”

Will swore.

“Tell me about it. Why does this stuff always happen to me?” He thought of all the movies he'd seen where caves were filled with snakes or skeletons or bears.

Occasionally treasure, true, but usually snakes, skeletons, and bears. With his luck?

At the very least, giant spiders.

It occurred to Taylor that Will had been silent for a couple of minutes. He looked up. Will was still there, looking down at him. Taylor began to see Will's predicament.

“See, if you'd gone for help when I asked…”

“Not funny,” Will said tersely.

“All right, all right.” He felt around in his pockets. He was going to have bruises all over his body from falling on the junk he carried. He pulled out his pencil flashlight and shone it slowly around the walls of his prison. Rock…earth…jutting roots…a darker shadow…

He went to examine it.

“What are you doing?” Will called.

“Hang on.”

That darker shadow turned out to be a slit in the wall. Taylor shone his light into it. He could feel cool air pushing against his skin.

He moved back into the ring of light. Was it fading? He couldn't tell.

“There's some kind of an opening in the wall. Maybe a tunnel.”

Will was shaking his head. “No. Not a good idea.”

“Really? What's your plan?” 

Silence. Poor Will. Taylor sympathized. Will didn't like not being in control, and this situation was definitely out of control.

“Listen. Try and find the girl. I'll see if I can find another way out of here.”

“You listen. Some of these New Mexico caves are huge. Miles long. You can't tell how big yours might be from the chamber you're standing in. And there isn't going to be any light. You won't be able to see a foot in front of you.”

“I'll be able to see exactly a foot in front of me.” Taylor held up his pencil flashlight.

“Seriously?”

“We don't have a lot of time here, Brandt. Our friends in the hearse could be closing in on Hedwig right now. You need to go.”

“Do you have a way to mark your trail?”

Taylor held on to his patience with an effort. “I could take a leaf from Riley's book, but no. Short answer? No.”

Will raked a nervous hand through his hair. “I don't like this.”

“I'm not loving it either. Would you just go hurry up and find Hedwig? She's probably giving birth under a tree right now.”

Will swore. “All right. But…watch yourself. Don't do anything I wouldn't do.”

“You mean besides falling into an underground cave?”

“Besides that.” Will stood up. “I'll be back.” He disappeared from the opening.

“So you keep telling me,” Taylor muttered.

* * *

The tunnel smelled weird. It smelled sulfurous and animal. Hopefully there was no poison gas…

Maybe the tunnel led to the center of the earth. Maybe it was the pathway to hell. Either way, it was pitch-dark and narrow—and perhaps he was even working against an upward incline. It was hard to tell in the disorienting dark. So narrow in a couple of spots that Taylor had to fight with himself to keep going. He had never been claustrophobic before, but the fear of getting trapped in this hole in the ground kept skyrocketing his pulse and turning his legs to jelly.

As lean and wiry as Taylor was, he had to wriggle through a couple of very tight places, and he wasn't sure he could wriggle back. It was only the knowledge that Will needed him—and the belief that the cool wafts of fresh air he felt on his perspiring face meant there was an opening somewhere close by—that kept him moving.

He was surprised to find he was about as scared as he'd ever been. He was not going to like being in tight, enclosed spaces after this; that was for sure.

The flashlight beam fluttered against the slick darkness like a white moth, and a couple of times—to his frank horror—it faded out.

If the light went entirely, he wasn't sure he wouldn't break. Better not to think about it. Better to just keep moving, keep pushing and wriggling—forget about the fact that he probably couldn't get back if his life depended on it, that he might die, wedged here beneath this fucking mountain.

There was more air against his face. He could feel…a breeze. And perhaps the pitchy blackness was fading a little?

Yes. There was light ahead. Light spilling through a jagged lightning-shaped opening.

He sped up, stumbling toward it, almost dizzy with relief.

Fresh air. Daylight. Freedom. He was embarrassingly close to hyperventilating his abject gratitude. Thank God there was no one to witness—and he sure as hell was never going to tell Will how bad it had been. How bad he had let it become in his mind.

Taylor reached the opening. It too was narrow, but it would have had to be the size of a paper cut to prevent him from getting out. He stuck his left hand and leg through and started to wriggle.

The sound of voices stopped him. 

Male and female.

“I can't tell if they came this way or not,” the male voice said.

Not Will.

Taylor drew hastily back. He listened.

The woman answered, but her voice was less distinct. She was farther down the hillside, already past the cave but out of his sight line.

He heard a clattering sound of falling rocks. It sounded still farther away. So where were they?

Taylor stuck his arm and leg out of the opening and began to twist. The rocks tore his shirt and scraped his skin, but that didn't matter. It was wide enough, and he was getting through.

He wriggled some more, and then he was out. Out into the amber sunlight.

Yellow dust motes floated above the wheat-colored grass. And far down the hillside—much farther than he'd thought from the sound of their voices—were the man and woman from the black sedan. 

Chapter Nine

He almost stepped on her.

Hedwig had taken shelter beneath the ragged boughs of a big juniper bush.

Will spotted the white of her jeans. Probably the only white patch left.

He squatted, keeping a wary eye on her hands. She was clutching a thick, short branch, and he didn't think it was to chew on during labor. “All right. Come out of there.”

“I…can't.”

He controlled himself, but it wasn't easy. Every time he thought about Taylor wandering around in that underground cavern, he felt he felt the rein he was keeping on his emotions slip. “Kelila, get your ass out of there, or I'm coming in after you. Believe me; you don't want that.”

She stared back defiantly. “The baby is coming.”

“We've all heard that before. Tell the baby she needs to postpone her flight.”

“He. It's a boy.”

“I don't care what it is.” He felt a warning prickle down his scalp, that sixth sense that had kept him alive and in one piece as a marine and later in the DSS.

Turning, Will spotted two dark-clad figures switchbacking down the golden hills behind him. From the way they seemed to study the ground, he didn't think they'd spotted him yet.

“Company's coming, so unless you want an audience for the delivery, you better get moving.” 

Kelila half crawled, half rolled out from under the bush. Will helped her to her knees.

“Don't stand up. Where the hell did you think you were going?”

“Mexico.”

“On foot?”

“Plenty of people do it on foot.”

“I don't think most of them are ready to drop a kid any second.”

“I could make it.”

He was beginning to believe she could.

He felt her stiffen as she spotted the sleek figures moving down the hill in the fading light. “You recognize them. Who are they?”

“Gretchen and Victor Hart. They work for Mikhail.”

“Let me guess. Not bill collectors?”

“No. Mikhail must have found out about the baby.”

“You mean it would be news to him?”

“I left when I realized I was pregnant. I didn't tell Mikhail.”

Will had been helping her crawl along from bush to rock perpendicular to their pursuers, but at that he stopped. “I thought you left when you realized your life was in danger from someone highly placed in the DEA.”

Kelila nodded. “Yes. That was why I knew I had to run. I had to think of my baby at that point.”

“And who were you thinking of before then?”

She looked confused, throwing nervous glances at the figures still relentlessly combing the hillside blocking their way back to Taylor.

Will said, “You had a thing about Bashnakov from the time you were in high school. You apparently broke up his marriage—”

“He was widowed.” 

“But then before you ever know you're pregnant, you start working for the DEA as an informant. Why?”

“Why? Because I learned my husband—my wonderful, charming, handsome husband—was a murderer and a drug dealer.” Will must have looked as baffled as he felt. She spat out, “That's not okay!”

“I know it's not okay. Are you saying you went voluntarily to the DEA?”

“Yes.” She met his eyes unswervingly. Not that that meant much. Will had met plenty of bald-faced liars in his time.

“You volunteered to act as an informant for the DEA?”

“Yes.”

“And what's the name of the highly placed DEA official you believe set you up?”

“Deputy Administrator Ted Bell.”

If it wasn't the truth, it was a damn good facsimile. Even Will had heard the rumors about DA Ted Bell.

She said, suddenly alarmed, “Where's your—Where's Agent MacAllister?”

“He's waiting for us. I hope.” Will scanned the hills. The Harts had reached the flatland now. If they could circumnavigate them, if Will could get Kelila up the hill without being seen…

That still left the problem of Taylor.

One thing at a time. Getting up that hill unseen. That was the first thing.

And it was liable to be the last thing. They'd be sitting ducks all the way up that hillside.

He glanced at Kelila's drawn face. If ever a girl was game, it was this one.

* * *

Hiking down, the hills had seemed reasonably gentle. Climbing up felt like scaling Everest. Their progress was agonizingly slow. Hedwig labored ahead of him, mostly on hands and knees, panting hard. The bare stretches with only the gold-tipped grass swaying in the breeze for cover seemed miles long.

It was inevitable that they would be spotted. Will knew it, was prepared for it, but the first blast sent his heart into overdrive. Kelila let out a shriek and scuttled away.

“Get down!” Will yelled.

She was a slow-moving target, awkward as an anteater, but for some reason neither Gretchen nor Victor took the shot. In fact, all their firepower seemed to be trained on Will. Bullets chewed up the earth around him, took bites out of the sparse vegetation, nibbled at the rocks and sent them flying.

Will flattened himself to the warm soil, locked both hands around his SIG, and laid down a steady return barrage. It was only a matter of time before one of them nailed him, but he would give Kelila every possible second. He was aware of her making her spiderlike way up the slope to the left of him. Panic in slow motion.

Will changed clips.

Sorry, Taylor. Sorry, sweetheart. If it was going to end like this, Will was actually glad Taylor was safely trapped belowground, no chance of him doing anything stupid and suicidal until the danger was past.

His finger tightened on the trigger, squeezing—he was down to his last rounds.

Like a thunderclap from overhead came the loud bang of a .357 SIG.

Will's heart jerked with each bullet crack.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

That rapid, even staccato was as familiar, as welcome as the voice of a lover calling down the mountainside.

It was his ticket home. He turned, relying on Taylor to cover his retreat, and sprang up the hill in a couple of bounds, catching Kelila a few yards ahead and half dragging her along with him. 

They reached the top. Taylor was lying in the deep grass, looking remarkably unruffled. He had that tight-jawed, implacable expression Will recognized from other tight corners, and though his eyes flicked briefly over Will, making sure he was still whole, his attention was focused on the two he had pinned down below.

“Can she make it to the car?” he asked.

“She'll make it.”

“I'll cover you.”

“Don't be too long about it.”

“I'm right behind you.”

By now Kelila had reached the end of her strength, and all the panic and adrenaline in the world couldn't drive her any faster. Will put an arm around her waist and towed her along over uneven ground. A few yards from the SUV, he picked her up and carried her, his back muscles screaming protest.

Reaching the SUV at last, he tumbled her into the rear seat. Hair spilled over her face, she sprawled on the pseudoleather, gasping out little moans and convulsively rubbing her belly.

Will ran around to the driver's side and slid behind the wheel. He patted frantically for the keys. Christ. He could have dropped them anywhere at any time…

No. There they were. He jammed them into the ignition. He had just long enough to wonder how badly the SUV had been damaged by the sedan crashing into it, and then the engine roared to life.

Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Taylor cresting the hill and running for the SUV.

Will reversed sharply, rolling back a few feet. He lunged across the console and shoved open the passenger-side door. A second later Taylor jumped in, hauling the door shut behind him. 

“They're right behind me. I think I winged the guy. Go.”

“Gretchen will kill you for that,” Kelila panted.

“Gretchen wants to kill me anyway.” Taylor was reloading quickly, throwing hasty looks out the side window.

Will jammed on the accelerator, and the SUV shot forward. The tires spun on gravel, and they bumped onto the highway. The vehicle seemed to be responding okay. Will spared a quick look at the gauges. No red lights. The left rear was dragging a little.

He gave her a little more gas, and they sped round the first bend only to see the black sedan parked squarely across the narrow road.

“Shit.” Will braked hard, steering into the skid, a tight hand-over-hand maneuver so that the SUV rocked to a halt lined up parallel a few inches from the bullet-riddled sedan blocking their way.

There was a long wooded drop on the left and a steep rocky climb on the right.

No way around the sedan and no way through.

“We've got to go back.” Taylor gave voice to Will's thoughts.

Will nodded tightly. “Get on the floor,” he ordered Kelila.

She obeyed, moving with what seemed to him clumsy, shaking slowness.

Taylor rolled down his window and scrambled to sit on the ledge, bracing himself. He thumped the roof of the SUV. “Go.”

“Hang on, for Christ's sake.” Will reversed, yanked the wheel, and they spun out, hurtling back down the narrow road.

As they swung around the curve, he saw Gretchen and Victor waiting for them. At the same moment, Taylor opened fire.

Will floored it. He felt the thunk of bullets hitting the side of the SUV, heard Kelila screaming, felt the burn of glass on his neck as the side window behind him shattered.

Taylor was still firing in quick succession. 

And then they were around the next bend and flying down the road back to Carrizozo.

The sound of shots faded. Gretchen was a tiny, dark figure in Will's rearview, running out to the blacktop to fire final, wild shots after them.

Taylor slithered agilely back through the window and dropped heavily into the seat beside Will.

Will threw him a quick look. “Okay?”

Taylor assented. He wiped his forehead. His eyes met Will's “You?”

Will nodded. He looked in the rearview. “Everyone okay?”

No response from the backseat.

Taylor half turned, reaching down to Kelila. “You all right?”

She groaned. “I think the baby's coming.”

“You always say that.”

“My water broke.”

Taylor returned to facing forward in his seat. “Did you hear that?”

“Roger.”

“Do we try to make it back to Carrizozo or try to find a ranger station?”

“What's a ranger supposed to do?”

“What are we supposed to do?”

“How long before the baby comes?” Will called back to Kelila.

She was carefully picking herself up from the floor and lying on the seat. “I'm not flying anywhere till this baby comes.”

“That's not what I asked you. How long till he comes?”

“It could be anytime. It could be twelve hours. It could be twelve minutes.”

Taylor said suddenly, like a student recalling the answer to a tough exam question, “Are you having contractions?”

“Yes.” 

“How often?”

“Often enough.”

Far down the road, Will spied another vehicle. The first they'd seen other than the Hart's sedan. “Let's head for Carrizozo.” He threw another glance at Taylor, who looked about as tired and disheveled as Will had ever seen him. “How did you get out of that cave?”

“I walked. It turned out not to be Carlsbad Caverns, after all.”

“It could have been.”

“Yeah, but it wasn't.” Taylor sighed wearily. He ejected the magazine, removed the clip, squinted at it. “Two rounds left.”

“Did you nail Victor?”

“It looked like it.”

“Gretchen will kill you,” Kelila offered by way of comfort.

“Been there, done that.”

Will reached out to pat Taylor's thigh. The approaching car was black. An SUV. Taking the winding road very fast.

Too fast.

“What I want to know is how they found her.”

“Who?” Will asked.

“Victor and Victoria. They didn't track us from Colorado. I can accept that we missed one tail. But two? No way.”

“Reuben,” Kelila said. “Reuben must have called Mikhail and told him about the baby. And Mikhail sent Gretchen to bring us back.”

“Nanny get your gun,” Taylor said. “If you knew Ramirez couldn't be trusted, why the hell did you run to him?”

“I didn't know where else to go. My parents believe all the lies the government has told about me.” 

“Oh right. Like the fact—”

“Trouble,” Will snapped.

Taylor was instantly all attention. He observed the vehicle speeding their way.

“Black SUV,” he said thoughtfully. “You think it's Nemov?”

“I think I don't want to depend on coincidence.” He threw back to Kelila, “Get down and hold on.” Will craned his head as Taylor leaned across him to grab his shoulder strap and fasten his seat belt.

Taylor sat back, buckling himself in. His pistol rested between his hands, relaxed and ready.

Will spared him a crooked grin. His gaze returned to the road. Tinted windows, heavy-duty roof rack. Nemov. But what did the crazy bastard think he was going to do?

Wait. Had Nemov recognized them? He wouldn't expect them coming this direction.

Maybe…

There was a turnout a couple of yards ahead. Will slowed.

Taylor cast him a quick look. “What are you doing?”

“He's speeding trying to catch us. He thinks we're miles ahead. He may not even know what we're driving. Is there a map in that glove compartment?”

“I picked a map up at the motel.” Taylor shook out the folds.

Will braked, and they swung neatly into the turnout. Will grabbed the map, holding it up. Taylor leaned forward, keeping his head beneath the dashboard as Nemov screeched past.

Will watched the black SUV disappear around the bend.

“Go,” Taylor said, sitting up. “He's going to run into that sedan in about four minutes, and it won't take him long to figure out what happened.”

Will hit the accelerator, and they sped out of the turnout. 

Neither of them spoke as they wound their way back down through the golden, shimmering hills. The squeal of the tires picked up a kind of rhythm as they banked into the curves and straightened out once more.

Taylor sat half-turned to watch the road behind them, but the road remained empty. 

Chapter Ten

Hedwig's contractions were coming faster by the time they pulled into the nearly empty parking lot of the small grouping of adobe buildings that comprised Carrizozo Indian Hospital.

“Is this place even open?” Will asked, turning off the ignition.

“It's supposed to be.” Taylor double-checked the directory on his phone.

“Thirteen beds. Family practice. Inpatient and outpatient.”

“I need a real hospital,” groaned Hedwig.

“This is a real hospital.”

“You're going to kill me and the baby both.”

“You couldn't find anything else?” Will asked, uneasily watching the writhing in the backseat.

“This is the closest. She keeps saying she's going to have this kid any second—”

“All right. Can you make sure they're open before we try dragging her out of the car?”

Taylor got out of the car and went up the cement walk. The heat of the day was fading, but the walls of the building still radiated warmth. Wilted flowers struggled in the baked dirt of what was optimistically intended as landscaping. It did look sort of deserted, but there was a shiny new pickup in the parking lot, as well as a very old ambulance.

He pushed through the double glass doors, and a wave of antiseptic-scented, chilled air hit him. 

A plump Indian boy of about seventeen stood behind a counter. His eyes widened at the sight of Taylor. And if Taylor looked half as rough as he felt, no wonder. It had been one hell of a long day.

“Are you open?” Taylor asked.

“Yes.” The kid seemed to collect himself. “If you want to sit down, I'll bring you the paperwork.”

“It's not for me. I've got a woman in the parking lot who's about to give birth.

Do you have a doctor on the premises?”

“My mom—that is, Dr. Cruz is over at Happy Pete's having her evening break. I can page her.”

Taylor sincerely hoped Happy Pete's was not a bar. “Could you? That would be great.”

“Sure, I'll—”

Whatever else the kid was about to say was lost in the jarring sounds of skidding tires, blasting horns, and breaking glass from outside. The unmistakable accompaniment of a car crash.

“It's an accident!” the kid exclaimed, coming around the counter. “It happens all the time on this corner.” He ran out through the glass doors.

“Are you kidding me?” Taylor asked the empty room.

Apparently the joke was on him. He shoved open the glass doors, narrowly missing being mown down by the kid, who was already racing back, looking stricken.

“There's a guy with a gun out there!” He ran to the phone on the desk.

Taylor banged out through the entrance. He drew his weapon, keeping his pistol at low ready as he jogged down the cement walk.

“But the baby is coming. I can't walk.”

“You can walk, milaya moyna. I guarantee you will find the strength. Or perhaps you wish to watch me blow a hole through the chest of this agent?” 

“No, I don't want that, but—”

“I do not negotiate. Come.”

“Don't get out of that car,” Will ordered thickly. “Keep the doors locked.”

Taylor leaned against the grainy bricks and poked his head around the rounded corner of the building. Nemov stood by their vehicle. He had one arm wrapped around Will's throat. He held a new shotgun in the other. It was pointed at Will's head.

“There you are, little man,” he said, spotting Taylor. “I thought you would be here faster. Come out where I can see you.”

Taylor leaned back against the wall and closed his eyes in brief prayer. He brought his weapon up and stepped out in firing stance.

“Federal agent. Drop your weapon.”

Nemov seemed taken aback. He laughed. “Do you not see I have your partner?”

Taylor's eyes met Will's. Blood was running down Will's face from a cut in his hairline, but he seemed otherwise okay. Taylor flicked a quick look at their vehicle.

Nemov had charged his reinforced SUV into their rental, crunching its nose into the tall brown trash Dumpsters.

Will had either gone for Nemov or been stunned just long enough for the bounty hunter to drag him out of the car. Either way, Hedwig had had the sense to lock herself in. The windows that weren't broken were firmly sealed.

“The sheriffs are on their way. Drop your weapon.”

“Do you not see we have the Mexican stand—”

Taylor fired.

He had to hit Nemov at exactly the right place in the shoulder in order to paralyze his arm, and that meant grazing Will as well. He didn't want to, but he couldn't take the chance of an involuntary reflex of Nemov's fingers on that trigger.

If Taylor'd stopped to weigh all the possibilities, he might not have made the shot as cleanly as he did going simply by instinct. As it was, Nemov howled his pained outrage and dropped the shotgun, which hit the asphalt and exploded, taking out the tire of their SUV.

Will stumbled free and kicked the shotgun farther away. He clamped a hand to his bloody shoulder.

“You shot me!” He was staring at Taylor in utter disbelief.

“I know. Sorry.” Taylor brushed past him, slamming Nemov over the hood of the SUV. “I need your handcuffs.”

Will groped one-handed, found his cuffs, and tossed them at Taylor. “You fucking shot me, MacAllister.”

“I know, Will. I'm very sorry.” He adjusted the cuffs for Nemov's massive wrists, clamped them on, and knocked him to his knees.

“I am injured,” roared Nemov. “I am bleeding.”

“You, I did mean to shoot, so just be grateful we're at a hospital.”

Taylor stood as a white and gray cop car turned into the lot, lights flashing, siren screaming. It was followed by a second car with the sheriff's insignia.

The SUV door swung open. Hedwig stepped out, clutching her belly, and tottered slowly toward the walkway.

“Where are you going?” Taylor called.

“To have my baby!”

The sheriffs piled out of their cars as still another police vehicle screeched into the lot.

“This is just great,” Will said.

“Hands up! Throw down your weapon!” The officer using the bullhorn wore a white cowboy hat. Clearly one of the good guys.

Taylor nodded, stooped to lay his pistol on the blacktop. He rose and locked his hands behind his head.

The sheriffs rushed forward. 

* * *

“I still can't believe you shot me.”

“I know. I'm sorry. It is just a flesh wound. The crack on your head needed more stitches.”

“That doesn't exactly make it better.” Will was scowling, although he permitted Taylor to hold his hand as he perched on the edge of Will's hospital bed.

Will looked rakishly handsome with the white square of bandage on his forehead and the dark five o'clock—make that eight o'clock—shadow on his jaw.

Taylor lifted Will's hand in both of his and kissed it.

“It hurts like hell.”

Taylor nuzzled Will's knuckles. He kissed each finger with a tiny, sucking kiss.

“Hmmph.” Slightly mollified, Will said, “The baby's okay?”

“Small but healthy. Six pounds, nine ounces. William Taylor Hedwig.”

“Christ.”

Taylor laughed.

“And what did Cooper have to say?”

“Ah. Apparently Hedwig—Kelila—was telling the truth. She was working voluntarily with the DEA.”

“What happened?”

“She uncovered a connection between Bashnakov and a DEA deputy administrator.”

“Ted Bell.”

“Yeah.” Taylor was surprised. “How did you know that?”

“Kelila and I had a chat earlier.”

Taylor raised his brows. “Well, around the time her contact at the DEA suffered a mysterious and fatal accident, Kelila realized she was pregnant. She decided to get out while she could. She got in touch with one of our people working in liaison with the DEA, and he put her in contact with Henry Torres. The DS was going to take on the internal investigation of the DEA, but then Torres was killed and Kelila was framed for his murder.”

“So…?”

“So it turns out our new AFOD was working from Torres' notes and files to try and nail Ted Bell, which is why we were sent to retrieve Kelila. Cooper needs her as a witness. His case rests on her.”

Will's face stilled. “Oh.”

Taylor grimaced. “Of course he couldn't tell us that because there was obviously a leak somewhere.”

“What happens to Kelila now?”

“After Cooper's got what he needs, she and the kid go into the Witness Protection Program.”

“And what happens to us for going off the reservation?”

“We got her back safely; that's the main thing. Cooper's flying out tonight to get her deposition.”

Will's blue eyes watched him closely. “Good. What aren't you telling me?”

“Nothing. Everything's good.” Taylor took a deep breath. “You have to make your mind up about the Paris assignment. They…need an answer. Cooper's going to ask for your decision when he gets here.”

Will's eyes closed then. His hand tightened on Taylor's fingers, bruising them.

“It's okay. I already know.” Taylor said it so calmly, he almost believed it himself.

When Will opened his eyes, they were wet. “I…”

“You don't have to say anything.” That much was the truth. He couldn't handle seeing Will tear himself up over this. “We'll be okay. It's like you said. Time flies when you're having fun.”

Will pulled him forward, wrestling him into a kind of bear hug where they could hang on tight and neither had to see the other's expression. Taylor rested his face in the bare, warm curve of Will's uninjured shoulder and listened to the shuddery sounds of Will fighting his feelings. He could hear the slow, heavy pound of Will's heart, and though he was not much for poetry, he suddenly remembered lines from some forgotten time and place—all his times and places having led, it seemed, to this moment.

The bleeding to death of time in slow heart beats, Wakeful they lie.

Josh Lanyon

Josh Lanyon is the author of numerous novellas and short stories as well as the critically praised Adrien English mystery series. The Hell You Say was shortlisted for a Lambda Literary Award and is the winner of the 2006

USABookNews awards for GLBT fiction. In 2008, Josh released Man, Oh Man: Writing M/M/Fiction for Kinks and Ca$h, the definitive guide to writing for the m/m or gay romance market. Josh lives in Los Angeles, California, and is currently at work on his next manuscript.