Page 102 of Wicked Sexy (Wicked Games 2)
I have a really bad feeling about this.
The COM center is buzzing with activity when we walk in, but as soon as we’re spotted, it falls dead silent.
Miranda stands by the windows, her head bowed, her arms crossed over her chest, her complexion as pale and severe as the tailored suit she’s wearing. The FBI agents are broken into several close-knit groups, standing together around their computers like satellites hovering around a mother ship. Special Agent Chan is standing beside O’Doul’s desk, looking shell-shocked, his black hair standing at odd angles, his striped tie askew.
Off by himself near the whiteboard stands Rodriguez. He’s staring straight at Tabby with an expression that can only be described as pure, unadulterated rage.
My nerves, which normally simmer somewhere around DEFCON 3, slam up to DEFCON 1. My ears prick. My muscles tense. Every sense screams into high alert.
Ryan makes a beeline for us from where he’d been standing at a respectful distance from Miranda near the windows. As soon as he’s close, I ask in a low voice, “Where’s O’Doul?”
Ryan glances at Tabby. His expression is neutral. “Went to Florida to head up the tactical op in coordination with SWAT, didn’t he?”
Translation: O’Doul is scatte
red in a thousand bloody chunks over some neighborhood in Miami.
I look at Tabby, hunting for her eyes, but she keeps them averted. I feel her react to the realization that O’Doul is dead, and then force herself not to react. After a heartbeat of frozen silence, she gives off a dangerous, crackling energy, as cold as black ice and just as deadly.
Ryan feels it too. He looks at me with his brows quirked just so, in warning.
“You,” hisses Rodriguez into the awkward quiet, “fucking cunt!”
Then somehow I’m across the room, standing over Rodriguez, who is writhing on the floor, clutching the bloodied pulp of his nose which I’ve just smashed with my fist.
The room erupts. Three guys are on me, then four, then five. It rapidly devolves to a free-for-all, a half dozen FBI suits vs. the dynamic duo of me and Ryan, shoving and shouting insults and really just letting off some steam. When it’s over, we’re no worse for the wear, but the suits are looking pretty goddamn rattled. No bones are broken. Other than Rodriguez, no blood has been spilled.
Across the room, past all of us as if we don’t exist, Tabby and Miranda stare at each other. Tabby has this weird look, this thousand-yard stare that I’ve seen once or twice before on the best military snipers.
“Special Agent Chan. You’re in charge here now, I assume?”
Tabby keeps her gaze on Miranda as she calmly speaks. Chan nods, rakes a hand through his disheveled hair, nods again. When he realizes Tabby’s not looking at him, he says, “Yes.”
“With your permission, I’d like to inspect the data you pulled from the phone call.”
His look sharpens. “Why?”
Tabby is statue still, in full control of whatever she’s feeling. Not even a muscle twitches on her face. But I know behind that mask of placid loveliness is a storm of biblical proportions.
“Because I think Søren fed false data points into your software. I think he led you where he wanted you to go. I think he knew he was being traced.”
“That’s impossible,” says Chan.
Slowly Tabby turns to look at him. Pinning him in her icy stare, she asks softly, “Is it?”
For a long moment, Chan says nothing. Except for the sound of a fly buzzing against the windowpanes, the room is eerily silent. Then: “I can’t trust you around a computer.”
From the floor, still cradling his bleeding nose, Rodriguez says bitterly, “Amen.”
When I glare at him, he blanches and looks away.
“I’m not asking for your trust,” says Tabby, “or for anything else for that matter. I understand…”
She falters for the briefest of moments, her voice wavering before she reins it back under that tight, frozen control.
“I understand that what happened is because of me—”
“It’s not,” I say loudly, stepping forward. Without looking at me, she holds up a hand.
