Page 120 of The Bodyguard

The door opened. John Patterson strode in. “Sounds like a good chat.”

Angela ground her molars. The door opened again, and Sawyer entered apologetically. “We should go, Ange.” He placed a hand on her shoulder and squeezed. “You two can talk later.”

Reluctantly, Angela followed. Her ribs and muscles ached. More than that, she felt defeated. Not that she had any expectation of how this meeting should have gone. But it didn’t feel like it should have ended this way. “Why the sudden interruption?”

“He took a phone call and said the meeting was over.”

“Who called?”

Sawyer shrugged. “I doubt we’ll ever know.”

“Unless it was my mother,” she muttered. “What are they going to do with Mylene?”

Sawyer shrugged again. They reached the elevator. A uniformed man stood at its side and swiped his keycard to call it. Five minutes later, Roman drove them from the black ops site. No one in the vehicle said a word.

CHAPTER FORTY

Titan Group’s US headquarters, situated in Northern Virginia, was very different from its headquarters in the Middle East. Both areas had pockets of immense wealth, but Abu Dhabi’s was far vaster and more apparent. The US headquarters was an obvious fortress. Their offices in Abu Dhabi were surreptitiously hidden inside a luxury hotel skyscraper—two, actually, both towers connected by sky bridges every few floors.

But the offices were nearly interchangeable. Both war rooms contained imposing conference tables and high-tech communications equipment. Parker’s US-based tech lair was similar to Abu Dhabi’s nerve center, where Amanda and Shah held court.

Angela seemed at home in the conference room and spent the afternoon arranging for her necessities, clothes,identification, and whatever else she deemed necessary. Sawyer had felt far less comfortable. Sure, he had access to whatever he needed, but the longer he stayed in the US without an agenda, the longer he felt the pull to escape.

He wandered to Angela’s conference room. The door was ajar. He knocked and stepped in. She was on the phone but beckoned him in, whispering, “Give me a minute.”

He walked to the windows. Everything was so green here. He hadn’t realized that green trees and bushy shrubbery could make him nostalgic.

“I’m glad you’re starting to feel better—uh-huh.” Angela laughed. “All right. I know. I’ll check in later.” She hung up, still smiling in a way that made Sawyer feel like he was intruding. “That was Chelsea.”

“You didn’t have to get off the phone for me.”

Angela’s eyes twinkled. “We were done.”

“Why do you look like that?” He studied her expression. She needed time off to relax with her girlfriends. Angela spent most of her time in the office, where she was surrounded by friends. Not like her current gig, stuck with him. Working ops could be lonely. “You need time off.”

“No, I’m fine. I was just checking in on her. She was feeling a little headachey and pukey.”

“Chelsea? Or Amanda? I thought Amanda was sick before we left?”

“Yup. Guess it’s going around.”

“Maybe Titan should invest in masks and hand sanitizer.” It wasn’t like Chelsea or Amanda to orbit their coworkers when sick.

“They’re not contagious.” Angela shrugged and wouldn’t meet his eyes. “Nothing a little ginger ale and crackers won’t fix.”

Something in Angela’s expression wasn’t the least bit concerned about her friend being ill for several weeks. Then again, Sawyer couldn’t stand hospitals or doctors. He wasn’t a germophobe, but why tempt fate? It would be better for both women to be out of the office, recovering, than to spread the flu.A noncontagious flu. The thought stopped him cold. “What kind of sick?”

Angela shrugged and returned to her phone. “Something they picked up, I guess.”

Sawyer didn’t remember Amanda coughing and sneezing, but he did remember a few queasy looks.

“They’re both sick?”

“Think so.” Angela’s evasion said far more than her denials.

“Are one of them—” Cold needles crawled up his spine. “Is one of them pregnant?”

Surprised, Angela peered over her phone. “What would make you think that?”

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