Page 188 of Homecoming

The other two were shouting, turning, but Tenny and Reese had them. Carter registered the glint of a knife, heard the muted sound of a suppressed gunshot.

Carter propped the rifle on his shoulder, shoved the goggles up onto his helmet, and said, “Leah.”

Her face went blank with shock. And then crumpled. She ran at him, already crying, and hit him like a missile, arms tight around him at once. Pressing her first sob into his collar.

“Oh my God,” she choked out. “Oh my God, you’re here.”

Carter looped his arm around her and held her back, dropped his face into her hair, briefly, breathed her coconut shampoo, and the clean skin of her scalp. Alive. Safe. And so, so brave.

“You’re here,” she repeated.

“I’m here, baby, I’m here.”

~*~

Reese pulled off his belt and knelt beside the wounded civilian – who gasped and tried to scramble back from him. In as reassuring a voice as he could manage – he wasn’t practiced in this sort of thing – he said, “I’m here to help.” Brushed a weak hand aside and tied the belt off above the wound as a tourniquet. “You shouldn’t walk.”

“I can carry him.” Reese glanced up to see a pale, trembling young man in a suit standing above them. His expression was determined, through the fear.

“Good. Get him out. Carter can help you.”

Carter, still with an arm around Leah, nodded. “What about you guys?”

“We need to find Ian,” Tenny said, straightening. He’d bent to wipe his knife clean on the dead man’s pants leg. “He’s still here.”

Reese stood, and nodded. “We’re fine. Go.”

Carter didn’t argue. Whispered something to Leah, who nodded and wiped her face, and then moved into position to help lift the wounded man.

Reese turned full toward Tenny. “The knife. Really.”

Tenny grinned at him, all sharp white teeth beneath the gleam of his goggles. “You aren’t going to suggest this is actually a challenge, are you?”

Reese stared at him – but couldn’t deny it. As far as troops went, these weren’t the best.

“Don’t spoil my fun.” His grin widened an impossible fraction. He patted Reese’s cheek with a gloved hand and headed for the door. “Come on, then.”

Reese sighed…and resisted the urge to smile himself.

~*~

“You have holdings in New York?” Luis asked.

Ian didn’t grace him with an answer. If he knew what sort of wedding he’d had, then he knew that he had holdings in New York.

Luis made an impatient sound. “I came here today to enlighten you about your opportunities.”

“I thought you came to blow up my building.”

Luis grinned – but the impatience glittered, still, in his gaze.

“Is there in fact a bomb?”

“If you cooperate, then you’ll never have to find out.”

“I thought this was an opportunity.”

“It is.” Voice tight, now. He wasn’t in control; even though he had the guns, and the goons, and had taken over the building, he couldn’t pin Ian down mentally, and that was getting to him. “You aren’t like the Dogs. You and I both know it. You lack their inconvenient scruples and hang-ups about certain necessary evils. You’re a businessman, a true one, and you’ve clearly done quite well for yourself.”

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