Page 144 of Black to Light

“And you lookgaos-damned hot like that, all wet and flushed and purring.”

I raised my head, glanced around the cabin, realized we were, miraculously, alone, and quirked an eyebrow at him.

“Inappropriate,” I said loftily.

“Not even a little bit,” he scoffed.

He checked his watch, and I saw the heated look in his eyes fade slightly as his mind zeroed back in on why we were here. “Fuck,” he muttered. “We’ve got twenty-eight minutes.” He gave me an apologetic look. “You good? I should go talk to the others before we arrive.”

I shooed him off with my fingers, taking another luxurious swallow of coffee.

I knew my lounging days would be over in minutes, if not seconds.

“Go,” I said imperiously.

Once he’d clicked the cabin door shut behind him, I set down my coffee cup again and sighed as I pulled myself to my feet. I found my boots first, and pulled them on over my socks. I moved on to weapons next, then replaced my sweater with a light jacket after checking the weather app on my phone.

It would be warm here by midday, but it was still fairly cool.

Anyway, the jacket worked better than a sweater with the guns.

I was just finished checking my second gun and shoving it into my ankle holster, when Black opened the door and walked back into the cabin.

He looked me over approvingly.

“You ready?” he asked. “It looks like they’re still in Nice. No trips to the airport. No beeline for the bus stop, or a rental car. They’re on foot now, after a taxi dropped them off on the other side of the port. They’ve been on foot since they left the taxi, butthere are ferries that leave from the port, so I want us over there as soon as possible.”

I was already back on my feet.

“I’m ready,” I told him.

I’d dusted off the last of the cappuccino minutes ago.

Honestly, I kind of wanted another one, but it could wait.

Black touched his earpiece. “Dog? Hey, d’you mind grabbing the doc another cappuccino while you’re there?” He paused. “Yeah. No sugar. Three shots. Thanks.”

He clicked off the transmitter, and I frowned.

“We’re still using those?” I asked, motioning at the earpiece. “You know Brick might be able to hear that. Anything you say could be picked up by him or his people, even if you changed channels. Alisha told me it was actually a weakness of the organic design, that we needed to work on a different type of encryption going forward, so she could cut off individual earpieces when they get compromised like that. It’s just that none of us have ever lost one before now, and––”

“I know, doc,” Black broke in, smiling.

He looked me over, his eyebrow quirked.

“I know,” he said.

Iwas surprised to find three, white SUVs waiting for us on the curb outside the station after we got off the train in Nice. All of them had darkened windows. All three of them were BMWs, and probably had bigger and faster engines than what generally came standard.

Ishouldn’thave been surprised.

Of course, Black had called ahead.

Everyone felt somber to me as we piled into the cars and found a place on one of the three rows of seats. I sat shotgun with Black, who climbed into the driver’s seat of the first car before I realized the original driver had gotten out and handed him the keys.

Once Black had his seat adjusted and clicked on his seatbelt, he didn’t wait, but put the SUV in gear and took off from the curb. He pulled around to the end of the pick-up area and aimed the car smoothly for the main road outside the station.

After a left at the first driveway, he gunned it, then wove skillfully through the morning traffic.

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