Page 44 of Bullets and Dandelions

I glared at him and stroked my guns. “You can’t take off without a front tire.”

“Do you know what you have done?” Kamous’s hands balled into fists.

“I stopped you from killing my squad.”

Stone’s hand closed over my right hand. “Roberts kidnapped his wife and little girl.”

“Oh. Why didn’t you say so? I know where all of his hidey holes are. We’ll find them.”

“Was that info on the microdots?” Stone asked.

“No.” I started coughing again.

Stone practically carried me up the stairs and put me in a chair. “She needs oxygen, Tex.”

I stared at the heavily tattooed man duct tapped to a chair. It was hard to tell what nationality he was. The look in his weird white eyes gave me the willies.

Tex placed an oxygen mask over my mouth and nose. “Breathe.”

I nodded. The tattooed man kept staring at me like I was a piece of Godiva chocolate he really wanted to eat. If he wasn’t gagged, he would be licking his lips. “Stop looking at me.”

The jerk eye-fucked me.

My temper flared to life. I yanked off the mask and swung the oxygen tank at his head.

Thunk!He slumped over.

Stone growled. “What in the hell is wrong with you?”

“I don’t like the way he’s looking at me.”

My squad carefully dropped chocolate bars in my lap.

“We needed him awake to find out where Kamous’s wife and child are,” Stone snapped.

I sucked in some oxygen. “They’re in New Zealand.”

“Why do you think that?” Kamous demanded.

“The gray mud on his boots has a sulfurous stink. Mango groves always smell like rotten eggs. Plus, he has yellow manuka pollen on his pants, which is only found in New Zealand’s North Island. I know for a fact that Roberts has a house on stilts in the middle of a mango grove. It’s about a mile south of Lake Matheson. It’s his favorite interrogation place, because no one can hear his victims’ screams and getting rid of bodies is easy.” I inhaled more oxygen.

Rodriquez interjected, “I’ll call Jenkins and see if he can get us some satellite pictures of the area.”

“We’ll need to commandeer an aircraft for a HALO parachute jump too.” Stone eyed me. “You can do a high-altitude jump, right?”

“Yes, sir.” Okay, I had only done it once, but he didn’t need to know that. Right?

“Let me see if I got this right. Your father not only trained you to be a sniper, a helicopter pilot, he also taught you commando skills and then he sent you to school to become a CIS technician too?” Johnson inquired.

I dropped the oxygen mask. “Yep. I’ve had four semesters of crime scene evidence classes.” I picked up a candy bar, ripped the paper off and happily ate it.

“I have a spare tire in the cargo bay,” Kamous exclaimed. He grabbed my face, kissed me hard on the mouth and charged down the stairs.

My left hand dropped to my gun. “If he does that again, I’m shooting him.”

Stone just shook his head and followed Kamous out of the jet.

“You continue to surprise me.” Tex knelt beside me. “I need to take your blood pressure and listen to your lungs. Do not shoot me.”

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