Samurai Game (30 page)

“The cartel was used before,” Azami said, “in an assassination plot against the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. Is there some faction in Iran working with the cartel and now they’re making a grab for Daiki and Eiji?”

“I doubt if it’s some faction,” Kadan said. “But anything’s possible. At least we know how they got in to the country and how they got out again.”

“It isn’t the first time the cartel has been in bed with Iran,” Ryland said. “There are rumors that they’re training the cartel’s hit squads in terrorist tactics, but so far we don’t have anything concrete on that.”

Azami smiled. “A high-resolution satellite would change that for you. I’ve got pictures of camps.”

Ryland leaned toward her. “Have you shared that information with anyone?”

“Who would I share it with? I have a mission, and that’s to try to cut Whitney off from those who enable him in his brutal experiments.”

“How do you plan to go about doing that?” Ryland asked, his tone almost gentle.

Again, Sam tightened his fingers around Azami’s in warning, although he shouldn’t have worried. She shrugged her slender shoulders. “There is no clear path,” she said, her statement as much of an enigma as she appeared to be. “But I will find one.”

Kadan burst out laughing. “You’re not going to get anything out of that woman, Rye, so short of torturing her, you may as well throw in the towel. She beat you at your own game.”

Azami continued to look innocent as if she had no idea why all the men were smirking.

“If we’re finished here,” Sam said. “I have to go talk to Azami’s brothers.”

“Tonight?” Ryland asked. “Sam, you need rest.”

“That’s all I’ve been doing lately and I’m asking before she changes her mind.”

Ryland looked straight into Azami’s eyes. “Do you plan on changing your mind?”

“That is to be seen, isn’t it?” she said softly. “If we’re done here, I must return to my room and rest for a little while.”

“Will your brothers be awake?” Sam asked.

She smiled her mysterious smile. “Of course, they would not sleep while I am being asked questions by Captain Miller. They are as protective of me as I am them.”

Sam’s head came up.
They’ve been listening this entire time?

Do you think they would leave me unprotected? Had your captain deemed me dangerous and attempted to arrest me, we would have fought our way to freedom, or died trying.
Her eyes met his.
Be very certain I am the kind of woman you wish to spend your life with.

Sam looked into those dark, liquid eyes. She possessed a kind of magic no other woman held for him.
You’re
exactly
the kind of woman I want. Don’t think you’re getting out of this by trying to warn me off.

Her mouth turned up at the corners, a soft smile meant only for him, and then she very gracefully rose from the table, gave a slight bow to Ryland and the others, and slipped from the war room without a whisper of movement.

“Holy cow, Sam.” Gator fanned himself. “You’re goin’ to be in more trouble than I am if you marry that girl.”

“Do you have any idea what you’re getting yourself into?” Ryland demanded. “She gives nothing away. She doesn’t show emotion at all. How can you know she feels the same way about you? Feels anything at all for you? Because I didn’t see it.”

“Public displays of affection are against her nature,” Sam said. “Believe me, she feels.”

“What’s not to like, Rye?” Kyle demanded. “She’s beautiful, exotic, and wealthy.”

“How’s it going to work, Knight?” Ryland asked Sam, ignoring Kyle. “She owns a company in Japan. Her family is there. You’re a soldier, sworn to protect your country. You’re a GhostWalker, and you damn well belong here—with us. Do you really think she’ll be happy living up in the mountains? It snows here and we can barely make it out. We have money to make life a little easier, yes, but she’s used to a different way of life altogether.”

“Is she?” Sam asked. He pushed himself to his feet, wanting to end the discussion. He’d already considered everything Ryland was telling him and he didn’t want to go over it again. What did a soldier have to give a woman like Azami? Why had she even looked at him twice?

“I’m not finished. Do me the courtesy of listening, since you can’t obey a damn order,” Ryland snapped.

Sam tightened his jaw, but dropped back into his chair. He’d been lucky that Ryland had backed off from the order. He rubbed his jaw, regarding his friend carefully. “I’m in love with her, Rye. I know all the objections. Do you think I haven’t thought of all of them myself? Yes, it happened too fast. I’ve been in her mind. I know what she’s like . . .”

“You know what she wants you to know. All of us have the ability to open up or close off and without a doubt, she’s that good.” Ryland sighed and got up to pace across the floor, picked up a mug, and poured hot coffee into it. “You and I both know she took Whitney’s pipeline out. She assassinated three people.”

Sam shrugged, careful now, on shifting, dangerous ground. “Maybe. I’ve assassinated a hell of a lot more than that. I don’t exactly have room to throw stones. None of us do.”

He studied Ryland’s face. They were more than friends. They’d gone to battle together and watched each other’s back. They had complete trust in each other. Ryland was concerned for him, that much was obvious, and Sam couldn’t blame him. It wasn’t that Ryland didn’t want to see him happy; hell, he hadn’t known he was unhappy. He’d been just fine until Azami had come along. No wonder Rye thought he was crazy.

Sam looked around the table at his silent companions. Normally they were all heckling one another and playing juvenile pranks on each other. They were all just as concerned as Ryland. He didn’t know what to say to reassure them. There wasn’t a single part of him that had a doubt that Azami was the woman for him—yet what could he give her? He couldn’t argue with Ryland, not because he wasn’t certain of his choice, but he wasn’t certain how he could be her choice.

“You aren’t going to be reasonable about this, are you?” Ryland asked.

“No. I made up my mind. I’m asking her brothers for permission. I don’t want to wait. I want her with me. She knows I’m a soldier and that I belong here. I know I can help her in her work just as she’ll be an asset in mine.”

Ryland’s frown deepened. “She isn’t part of this team.”

“Not any more than the other women, Rye, but she’s a GhostWalker and she belongs with us. She fits with me.”

“Are we going to talk about what she said? About the orders coming down to us?”

Again Sam shrugged. “It won’t be the first or last time one of us has been targeted. If she’s right, we’ll handle it.”

“Sam . . .” Ryland started to say something and abruptly cut himself short.

“Say it.” Anger welled up. He looked around the room. “I know exactly what you’re thinking. I knew it the moment Azami mentioned those orders and you made such a big deal out of telling her you pick your own team. This isn’t the first time anyone’s implicated the general in wrongdoing. Yes, he was Colonel Higgens’s friend. He knew Whitney. He knows a lot of people. He wouldn’t sell me down the river because a madman asked him to. Even if he specifically names me to go, Rye, that doesn’t mean the orders come from him.”

“I’m not saying you should suspect the general of being in league with Whitney,” Ryland hedged. “It just makes good sense to watch your back. People aren’t always what they seem, Sam. The people we can trust are the ones in this room, not out there.” He pointed out the window. “And just for good measure, the general is the one person we shared Lily’s work on second-generation Zenith with.”

Sam pushed down anger. “The general has been a father to me. I joined the service to be like him. Don’t stand there and tell me you’re not suspicious of him, because you’ve been suspicious from the day everything went to hell. You’re a paranoid son of a bitch, Rye. And now you’re suspicious of Azami. You think everything’s a conspiracy and everyone is involved.”

Ryland’s eyebrow shot up. “Aren’t they? Isn’t everything a conspiracy?”

Sam didn’t smile as he knew Ryland wanted him to. General Ranier had fallen under suspicion several times and each time he’d come back clean, yet his unit didn’t altogether trust him. Sam loved the general. He’d given up a lucrative job in the civilian world to follow the general into the service. He loved and respected the general more than anyone else in the world.

Sam ducked his head. That wasn’t entirely the truth. Ryland had come to take that place, and somehow, the general had slipped down a few notches, which was why Sam was so belligerent and defensive when the subject was brought up. He felt guilty. Plain and simple he felt guilty because more than once, he’d had the hairs on the back of his neck stand up around the general and he hadn’t said a word to anyone else. He was guilty either way. Not telling his team his strange feelings, and not believing in the man who had taken him off the streets.

What had made him worry? Sam shook his head to clear it. Little things. Shadows. Whispers. The general had always had a schedule, a fixed routine, and he stuck to it. The last year, there had been phone calls, meetings at odd hours. Ranier was responsible for national security, so a clandestine meeting shouldn’t have raised an alarm, but Sam had sensed something different in the general and twice, when he’d asked, Ranier had avoided meeting his eyes. That was
entirely
wrong.

“What is it, Sam?” Ryland asked.

Sam detested the quiet sympathy in Rye’s tone, as if he’d already tried and condemned the general. “Nothing,” Sam said. “Nothing at all.”

“She is beautiful,” Ryland finally admitted.

“She’s a hell of a fighter,” Sam said with a small smile, willing to allow the subject to be changed. “She’ll be a big help working with Daniel, Rye. She learned to teleport at an earlier age than I did. She made more mistakes and is probably more aware of the dangers to a child.”

Ryland nodded, not quite assenting. Sam knew it would take a lot for both Ryland and Lily to trust an outsider with their child. Right now, he didn’t want to stop and reassure Ryland. His heart was pounding and his mouth was dry. He was going to put his neck under the blade of a samurai sword tonight.

He pushed himself up again and held on to the table until his protesting wound stopped the persistent throbbing. He wouldn’t have minded a glass of whiskey right now, but he wasn’t backing out. If asking her brothers permission to marry her was what it took to get into their family, he was all for it. He started out of the room and then hesitated, turning back. He couldn’t just leave them all exposed.

“When we teleport, we need to know exactly where we’re projecting our body to. We can’t just arrive in the middle of the room where a table might be. We have to have eyes at least and sometimes ears. I use cameras. Very small cameras when I’m going to teleport in a crowded area. I study the terrain ahead of time. And in case you’ve forgotten, I always have backup. Azami as good as told you she did as well.”

Comprehension dawned immediately. Ryland swore under his breath. “The room is bugged.”

“She had to have had eyes in here,” Sam said. “And if you were her brother and she was about to sit on a hot seat, what would you do?”

“Find the bugs,” Ryland said, sounding tired. “I hope to hell you’re right about that woman, Sam. Gator, go wake up that woman of yours. I need some answers. We need her to run the computers for us.”

“Tonight, Boss?” Gator complained. “I had other ideas.” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

“We all did. Hop to it.”

“What about Sam?” Tucker asked. “His woman is the one who got us into this.”

“I’m wounded.” Sam clutched his abdomen dramatically and staggered with quick, long strides so that he made it to the doorway in three quick steps.

Jonas coughed, sounding suspiciously like he’d muttered “bullshit” under his breath. Kyle threw a peanut at him and Jeff surfed across the table in his bare socks to try to catch him before he bolted.

“He’s in
love
, boys, let him go. He’ll probably just get laughed at,” Tucker said. “Do you really think Azami’s brothers are going to allow her to hook up with Sam? She’s fine and he’s . . . well . . .
klutzy.
”

“That hurt,” Sam said, turning back.

“Did you get a good look at those boys? I thought Japanese men were supposed to be on the short side, but Daiki was tall and all muscle. His brother moves like a fucking fighter,” Tucker added. “They might just decide to give you a good beating for having the audacity to even
think
you could date their sister, let alone marry her.”

“Fat help you are,” Sam accused. “I could use a little confidence here.”

Kyle snorted. “You don’t have a chance, buddy.”

“Goin’ to meet your maker,” Gator added solemnly.

Jeff crossed himself as he hung five toes off the edge of the table. “Sorry, old son, you don’t have a prayer. You’re about to meet up with a couple of hungry sharks.”

“Have you ever actually used a sword before?” Kadan asked, all innocent.

Jonas drew his knife and began to sharpen it. “Funny thing about blade men, they always like to go for the throat.” He grinned up at Sam. “Just a little tip. Keep your chin down.”

“You’re all a big help,” Sam said and stepped out into the hall.

This was the biggest moment of his life. If they turned him down, he was lost. Azami wouldn’t go against her brothers. She might go her own way in battle, but she would never defy her family over something so important as a spouse. He wished he’d asked her a few more questions about the customs. He had no idea what would be an insult and what wouldn’t.

Sam moved through the house to the second wing. Lily and Ryland’s home contained all the offices and a maze of halls that led to Lily’s laboratories. The guest wing adjoined the meeting rooms, giving guests and the resident family plenty of privacy. Each of the members of Team One had their own home, built in the forest but protected by the main compound. The training center was on the other side of the laboratories, a large complex where the team could practice on a daily basis. There was a large indoor pool to work out in as well as an armory, although each home contained a separate armory.