“It’s me. Open sesame.”
With a chuckle, Shane let Darnell inside and they hugged. “I’m fine.”
Darnell slapped his back. “You look like you rolled around in a tube of rocks.”
“Thanks. Feel like it too.”
Darnell stepped back and kissed him lightly. “You slept at all?”
“Nope.” Shane rolled his neck, wincing as the bones cracked. “Just got home and showered. Fuck, it’s been a long day. Long night before it.”
“I bet. I won’t stay long. Just wanted to make sure you’re okay.”
“Thanks, man.” Shane went to the kitchen and twisted the cap off a bottle of beer, passing it to Darnell before getting his own. He seemed unendingly thirsty and should probably have more water, but screw it. He’d earned a beer. It was getting dark, and he flipped on a few lights and made sure to close his blinds up tight.
Darnell sat on the couch and patted the cushion beside him. “Let’s talk about you.”
“Do we have to?”
“Afraid so. Doctor Darnell is in session. Start spilling.”
Shane dropped down beside him and stretched his legs onto the coffee table, crossing his ankles. “Hell. I can’t believe it happened. We train so much for it, but part of you never thinks it’ll really happen, you know? That someone will actually make a move on your protectee. I’ve never felt so damn scared.”
Darnell pointed at the shallow wound on the side of Shane’s head where the bullet had grazed him. “Close call.”
“Yeah. They bandaged it up, but it came off in the shower. Eh, it’s fine.”
“Still makes you think about life, doesn’t it? Remember when I took that hit in my leg a few years back? Flesh wound, but the what-ifs got pretty loud for a while.”
“Yeah. I guess I haven’t really had time to think about it. Spent most of the morning at the site taking them through it. Then at HQ. And it doesn’t matter about me. Rafa’s okay. That’s what counts. And thank Christ Alan made it through surgery. Can’t see him yet. Wanted to go anyway to be with his wife, but they sent her home with some Valium. Tomorrow, I hope.”
“He’s tough, right? He’ll make it. And it does matter about you, but I hear what you’re saying. Any idea how the fuckers got to you? Rumor in the news is that it’s Chechen radicals. Pissed about Castillo’s involvement in the treaty with Russia.”
“Could be. They sounded Eastern European.” Shane blinked, images of dead men swimming before his eyes.
“First time you’ve shot anyone on the job, right? Or off it.”
“Yeah. It was…I don’t know. Loud. Dark. I guess I should be upset that I killed people.”
“You did your job. You did what needed to be done to get Rafa back. Those men made a choice, and they suffered the consequences. This is what we train for. Not that it isn’t hard. I’m sure the service will send you to a shrink to talk about your feelings.”
Shane grimaced. “I’m sure they will. It was strange, you know? I’ve practiced so many times over the years. We go to the training center regularly and run through protocols and act out scenarios. The natural instinct when a person hears a gunshot is to drop to the ground. We have to train to stay on our feet and block our protectee. Take the bullet if need be. We’ve trained over and over to stay calm and use deadly force when it’s called for. So I did it. And it wasn’t like training, but it still doesn’t feel quite real.”
“I’m sure it’ll sink in. But you know, you don’t have to be upset about it. There’s no rule. Like I said, those men made their choice.”
“I’d kill them again in a heartbeat. When I think about what they would probably have done to him…” Shane gripped his beer bottle and forced himself to breathe. “I don’t know how they could have followed us. How they’d even have known we were leaving Castle. It was a pop-up. Rafa had a fight with his parents and we barely managed to follow him ourselves. Never seen him like that. So upset.” Shane shook his head, shoving away the thoughts of Rafa. “I think it was an inside job. Told them it had to be.”
“Any idea who?”
“Not a fucking clue. I don’t want to think it was someone in the service. We all have each other’s backs. We have to. If we don’t…well, I guess this is what happens.”
“Anyone else getting those updates while you were on the road?”
“Sure. The team at Castle, and any number of people at Joint Ops at HQ. There’s regular communication, and since the kidnappers managed to block our sat phones after they moved in, it stands to reason they could hack them earlier. It could have been anyone. For any number of reasons. Money. Revenge. Who knows.”