Page 1 of Hazard

1

“What a pretty little piece of fluff,” Cooper “Skull” Sullivan said through Archer “Hazard” Booth’s earpiece. He and Skull were currently in the financial city of Milan, hunting Enzo Russo, the money man for the ‘Ndrangheta, an Italian Mafia-type association whose primary activity was drug running, but they also dabbled in arms trafficking, money laundering, racketeering, extortion, and loan sharking. It was powerful enough to influence local and national politics and infiltrate sectors of the legal economy in Italy, with their yearly haul estimated at fifty-four billion.

They were currently tracking Isabella Lombardi, a model who had caught Enzo’s eye when he’d been shopping with his gorgeous wife. She was his newly minted mistress. The guy was a glutton, and he and the team hoped he was too besotted to stay away from his latest conquest. From his vantage point in the vehicle, they were using to trail after the “little piece of fluff,” he had to agree with Skull. The woman had it all from the navy and white peep-toe spectator heels to the stylish white Panama hat on her head, her hair all but tucked beneath with silken blonde strands drifting down the nape of her neck. The tight navy-blue dress sheathed a sweet body, every curve a deadly hazard, the hem hitting her at a slender, toned cream-colored thigh that socked him hard where it hurt.

She bent over the jewelry counter in Dior, giving the clerk a generous view of her small but prominent breasts—all the cleavage the clerk could ever want. He wondered what kind of bra she was wearing that cupped her so well, and was it as white as the piping of her dress, or as dark as the navy? Nevertheless, women called that a push-up bra, right?

He’d learned something from watching Sex and the City, and he smirked, realizing it was all about lacy, sexy underwear. He wasn’t going to apologize for being a red-blooded American male. He’d also learned that women knew how to use their wiles, but he didn’t need Carrie and the girls to teach him that one. When encountering women on the battlefield, special operators double-tapped them first. He’d even seen women, devious and cunning when encountered outside the wire and sometimes deadly, using their children to deliver bombs to unsuspecting American soldiers. Even in Milan’s pretty streets and elegant society, Hazard and Skull were very much outside the wire.

“Get ready. She’s on the move,” Skull said, following her to the next section full of women’s handbags. Stalking their quarry, Skull entered the store, his gaze riveted to her.

“Is there a back exit to this place?” Hazard murmured.

“I think so. She’s looking like she’s made me, but that’s not possible.” Skull sounded strangely skeptical. He’d rarely heard his brother sound anything but confident. “Her charms are all about getting what she can out of a man, and pegging security types shouldn’t be on her radar.”

The last thing Hazard could handle, under any circumstances, was to get mired in a woman’s …ah…charms.

Leigh Waterford popped into his head. She was much more endowed than Enzo’s pretty model, but that prickly woman was definitely lacking in the charm department. In fact, she probably didn’t know how to spell charm.

But Hazard didn’t mix combat with romance. It was, as far as he was concerned, a recipe for disaster, even in the face of four teammates finding their true loves on the battlefield. His boss, Master Chief Christopher “Iceman” Snow had romanced and married their previous CIA handler, Rose Sinema, and now they were expecting their first child. Subsequently, Senior Chief Petty Officer Boyce “Preacher” Carmichael had gone through a little bit of hell wooing his bride, former CIA Shadowguard Luna “Karasu” Shimora who was now working as the head of security for the White House. Then Petty Officer Remington “GQ” Nash, the other half of the Goldilocks Twins, succumbed to brilliant National Security Agency computer genius Celeste Potter. And, finally, after a harrowing race to find Rose, Karasu, and Celeste after their kidnappings by the notorious terrorist organization No Safe Haven, Petty Officer Jayesh “Kodiak” Lyta had, against all odds, found Kaiya Pawar, an investigator in the Australian Federal Police’s Counter Terrorism and Special Investigations Unit—CTSI. She had been instrumental in tracking down and foiling NSH’s plans for terror against US citizens in Sydney, Australia.

NSH was finally dismantled, but the team had been just as busy. Their participation in a raid in collaboration with the Italian branch of Interpol, and the cooperation of the four branches of their police force to take down ‘Ndrangheta’s arms trafficking of seriously powerful US weapons led to their surveillance of this particular “little piece of fluff.” They hoped she would lead them directly to Enzo, who was wanted for questioning regarding his employment by the elusive Angel Alzate. It seemed Enzo and the Alzate Cartel were in cahoots, and the financier was taking care of the cartel’s funds.

Isabella set down a purse she was looking over and walked over to one of the dark-suited men standing near the doorway into the purse section. She gestured him down to her petite five-seven height and whispered something into his ear. Immediately, the man stiffened and turned to look at Hazard.

“The shit has hit the fan,” he growled into his earpiece. “She’s making a move, and she’s made us. Don’t lose her. I’m about to be detained.”

“Sir, don’t move.”

Hazard stood loosely, working hard not to give in to his impatience to take out this guy and follow his buddy. He was his backup. Not that Skull couldn’t hold his own against a petite blonde or some upscale money man.

“Hold on,” Hazard said, reaching for the badge Interpol had given him to get him out of just this kind of a sticky situation. “Gun,” the man yelled, and several men converged on him, taking him down to the ground. Hazard allowed them to handle this situation to keep eyes on this op to a minimum, but he chaffed at the time it was taking to keep this mission as classified as possible. They did indeed find his firearm, tucked into a holster underneath the sports jacket he wore.

“Stand him up,” the main security guy said, and he was unceremoniously pulled to his feet. “That lady accuses you of following her and making lewd advances. We will be calling the police to?—”

“Don’t bother. I have a badge in my front inside pocket.”

He nodded to one of the men who kept his hold on Hazard with one hand and dipped inside to remove the badge. The man’s face went sour, a frown forming as he realized he’d been duped by a pretty face and killer body. He flipped it open and sighed, turning to the main security guy and showing him.

“Our apologies,” he said. When they let him go, Hazard wasted no time in running for the back door where Isabella had disappeared. It exited to an alley, and he heard a scuffle coming from his right. He ran in that direction. As he turned the corner, he saw a slim dark-haired woman slam something against the back of Skull’s head. She was dressed in black leather from knee-high boots, slim mini-skirt, to the short biker’s jacket. She looked like a dominatrix.

But it was the blonde who stunned him. That “little piece of fluff” had Skull down on his stomach with the heel of that pretty spectator pump in the middle of his back. At first his mind went blank. Skull had been bested by the petite model and a tall dominatrix. What the actual fuck?

The blonde turned to look directly at Hazard, giving him a complete once over, all that vacuous innocence and light that had been on her pretty face replaced by something he’d seen plenty of times before. The hard expression of an operator…a pro. Then she raised one appreciative eyebrow, her sweet mouth curving into a self-satisfied smirk.

Hazard noted Enzo was near a dumpster, cowering in his flashy black slacks and once pristine white sports coat, red silk shirt, his noticeably thin, dark hair hanging in a braid over his shoulder with his three bodyguards around him and down for the count. What the hell was he doing here? What a fuckup. No guts, no glory, but plenty of time and money on his hands, most of it spent trying to carve a niche for himself in a pack of world-class wolves and jackals.

And he’d just met a couple of alpha she-wolves.

Without a word, the blonde bent down and whispered something to Skull, then she straightened, motioned to the woman, and they grabbed Enzo, rushing down to the end of the alley. The blonde put Carrie Bradshaw to shame—kicking a Navy SEAL’s ass and sprinting like a runner off the line—all in heels. They disappeared around the corner.

Hazard was already running toward Skull. “Buddy, you okay?”

“Don’t let them get away!” Skull hissed, obviously in pain, clutching the back of his bloody head.

Hazard, against his better judgment, left him and raced to the end of the alley. He looked left and right, people milled around, traffic whizzed by, but they were nowhere to be seen. Those bitches had their HVT and there was nothing Hazard could do about it.

Goddamn it! What a fucking goat fuck!

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