Page 76 of Fire for Effect

“Only the biggest legend among spooks, second only to the Ghost.” I clenched my fist over the steering wheel. “I thought he was just a myth, but you’re saying he’s real?”

“And apparently Russian,” I said, trying to burst her bubble.

“Eh, nobody’s perfect,” she dismissed. “I have found some information that I will need to talk to you about. In person. I can’t transmit over unsecure comms.”

I was about to tell her where I was but she stopped me before I had a chance.

“I know where you are,” she said. “I can see your tracker.”

“How do you have access and I don’t?” I watched Taz as she took a hard turn up her long drive, back to the trailer.

“Because you’re shit with computers. It’s not your skillset,” she said with no remorse. “I’ll be there in a few hours. Be ready for me.”

“Is that a threat?” I asked, knowing that it wasn’t. “Also, how can Cerberus microchip me?”

Like… we had rights? I mean, we didn’t, as government employees, under the most technical specs of our contracts and terms of employment. We didn’t get judicial trials, we got secret military tribunals. Civil liberties weren’t something we could afford. Things were always a bit gray as far as we were concerned, but I felt the slight violation of that chip.

“You agreed to it in the fine print, when we signed up to have the cyanide implants,” I could imagine Sierra rolling her eyes.

“Who the fuck reads the fine print?”

“Apparently no one in the western world,” she sighed. “But if you grow up in the former soviet bloc, you know that no one gives a shit about respect to privacy.”

“I do.”

“Yeah? How’s the tracker I put in the bracelet doing?”

Taz slowed down as she came to the trailer, with my truck in the background, headlights facing us - because like a real soldier, she always backed up into her parking spaces to make a hasty exit.

“Oh no, I’m hitting a place with no coverage…” I said, as if I was about to head into a tunnel. “I’m losing you. The signal’s about to drop—”

“I know where you are, asshole. We use cell towers on these trackers.”

“Oh, no! I’m heading into a tunnel, under a bridge!” I made static noises with my mouth.

“Mm-hmm. Tell our wife hello!” She cut off the call before I could.

If she thought I was going to share Taz, we’d be fighting to the death, and then where would that leave our pod?

Taz cut the engine, lifting that sweet ass so she could dismount the Ducati and take off her helmet. Even with the helmet hair, and flushed cheeks, she looked fucking gorgeous.

I quickly parked, killed the engine, and got out, dumping my keys on the ground beside her bike.

“Run,” I told her.

I needed to resolve this. I needed this chase to end on my terms, with her in my hands, and bite marks on her skin. I was done being jealous, and uncertain of where I stood with her. I needed this… now.

And she did too.

Her eyes looked at me, confused, and irritated. She opened her mouth to speak, but I grabbed her by the chin, and forced her to look into my eyes.

“I almost watched you die for the third fucking time today.” I came face to face with her, as I took her helmet, and placed it in the backbox of her bike. “I need you to keep running now, so we can finish this bullshit game of cat and mouse. I catch you, you’re mine. Get it?”

She shook her head, but I knew she understood.

Everything between us was clear as fucking day now. More than conversation, more than words and gifts, and promises. Taz was a woman of action and having her back today told her far more than what I could say with words.

She wasn’t just my buddy, my teammate, or my friend.

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