Sharpshooter (Shadow Agents 3)

A muscle flexed in Gunner’s hard jaw. “You thought I wanted you.”

This was the hard part. The part that would tear her pride to shreds, but what did pride matter now? “No, but I knew I wanted you.” That was her secret shame. She’d been with Slade; she’d met him first...

Then she’d met Gunner.

And in the beginning, Gunner had made her nervous. He’d put her on edge, every time that she was near him.

Slade had been the one to offer quick compliments. To take her out on fun dates.

She hadn’t exactly had a whole lot of fun in her life up to that point.

Her parents had always been so strict, her dad an ex-colonel who ran a tight ship.

Then her mother had died. A sudden heart attack when Sydney was just fourteen. Her dad and his tight ship...they became lost after that. Broken. She’d had to be the caretaker, growing up too fast.

Until her father had slipped into a bottle and not come out again.

She’d been eighteen when he crashed his car.

She’d joined the air force just two weeks later.

Slade had been the Ortez brother she met first. The one with the ready smile, the big dreams.

But it had been Gunner whom she was always so intently aware of. Gunner who put her on edge with his heated stare.

She’d agreed to marry Slade, though, because she did love him, and he’d said that he loved her.

While Gunner...back then, he’d barely seemed to tolerate her at all.

Gunner wasn’t saying a word now. Just staring at her. And she’d already said enough for them, hadn’t she? “Get some rest,” she told him, and turned away. She was supposed to stay in another villa, the one on the far end. Only she wouldn’t be going there first.

She needed to talk to Slade. Alone.

She headed for the door. Logan had his back turned to her as he talked into his phone, but she had no doubt that he’d heard every word she said to Gunner.

“You don’t have to lie.” Gunner’s flat words. Stopping her.

Insulting her. “Is that what you think I’m doing?” Her fingers curled around the doorknob. “Then maybe you don’t know me half as well as I thought.”

And she left him.

* * *

“CALE, DO YOU mind if I speak to Slade alone?”

Cale stood in the doorway of the second villa, his broad shoulders stretching to take up the space. He stared down at her with hooded eyes. “You sure that’s what you want to do? He’s pretty messed up right now, Sydney.”

“I need to talk to him.” To find out what had happened to him. Where he’d been all that time.

Cale gave a slow nod. “Okay, but if you need me, I’ll be right outside.”

Her eyebrows climbed. She was EOD; she could take care of herself.

But Cale’s lips curved in the ghost of a grin. “You just look so delicate...”

A lie. But she used that delicate trap to fool many of her enemies.

“Sydney?” Slade’s voice sounded subdued. Good. Maybe he was calming down.