Page 70 of Gryphon

“In what?” The heat-driven currents in her teacup had subsided. A careful sip proved it needed another few minutes to cool sufficiently. “Oh, guessing. Mike is the best at it. Holly tends to jump to conclusions but is easily dissuaded from those. Or Andi. She was very good at that too.” She’d been good at so many things. Miranda closed her eyes, but that did nothing to assuage the pain of her abrupt departure eight months ago. It still cut at her every day.

“Ms. Chase?” The man’s deep voice dragged at her.

“Yes?” Opening her eyes proved difficult. Meg sleeping warmly against her chest wasn’t helping.

“Oh dear,” Klara Dahlberg hurried over. “You look utterly exhausted, Miranda. We must let you get to bed.”

“My tea…”

“I’m sure they’d be happy to make you a fresh cup tomorrow. Come,” Klara held out a hand.

Miranda handed Meg up to her. Klara took the terrier as if the dog might explode. Or perhaps she worried about Meg’s light gray fur shedding on her burgundy blouse. But Meg woke up only long enough to snuggle into Klara’s arms.

Miranda didn’t remember the nameless man’s question until she was in the elevator.

54

Holly barely resisted targeting the potential shooter. She could estimate the distance of the person wielding the gun, sight unseen. But the echoes of the underground room, especially not knowing its general shape, blurred his exact location.

Instead, she jerked the door closed behind her to protect Mike and Tad, then dove aside as she heaved her knife out of its sheath and upward, handle first, in a single clean yank.

With a sharp crack and a tinkle of glass, she smashed the light out.

She rolled into the room beyond, crashing into a set of chairs perched upside down on a table. Two of them landed on her as her knife clattered onto the stone floor behind her.

She pulled out her belt knife and the HK 9mm she’d favored in her SASR days. She didn’t carry it often, but the shooter with the Stinger missile back in Sweden had set a definite tone to how the day might unfold.

The bar beyond wasn’t dark, except by comparison to the bright light that had been shining into the entryway. She peeked through the fallen chairs.

In the sudden silence, she flicked off the safety. The bright click echoed off the arched brick ceiling. A long bar ran along the far wall.

Well to the left of where she’d expected, a big man with a thick beard and a bald head aimed a shotgun at her. He had it aimed directly at her squat under the table.

“What did you bring to a shotgun fight?” He called out.

“HK USP Tactical. Nine millimeter.”

“That Aussie you speaking there, girl?”

“Might be,” Holly admitted.

He swung the shotgun up to rest the barrel on his shoulder, offering her a clear view of it. If he clicked the safety on again, she didn’t hear it.

“Benelli M4. Never actually shot one of those.” She rose slowly, clicked on her own safety but did not holster it. “Why choose that over the Mossberg?”

“It’s what they issued me first day in the GDF.” Meaning he’d now shot it so often that it felt like a part of his arm.

“Roger that. Val says hi, by the way.”

“Nice lady for a spook.”

Unlike Val’s boss, who was a stone-cold bitch. Holly kept that thought to herself.

There was a pounding on the door.

“Better let your friends in.”

“Mind putting that away first?” Holly nodded toward the shotgun.

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