The Squad

“I need to call my uncle, let him know I’m okay or he’ll worry.”

“Sure, but first, hand it over.” The Mancini guy held out his hand with a smirk, and my cheeks reddened. How did he know?

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” He started to walk towards me, and Jason got between the two of us. The hair on my arms stood up at the sound he made, and Mancini stepped back with his hands up.

“No harm meant, Roxy put it back.” He spoke to me but kept his eyes on Jason, and I was beginning to wonder as the rest of the men in the room shifted subtly just what the hell was going on.

“Jason?” One of the men who I hadn’t met when we landed stepped forward with a frown as he addressed Jason.

“It’s okay, Thorpe, she thunder-bolted him.” I have no idea what Lyon meant by those words, but the room seemed to relax even more, and there were murmurs of understanding among the men, and some of them outright laughed as if they were sharing some inside joke.

Mancini still had his hand out, and I was beginning to wonder if this whole place was rigged. Granted, it had been my decision to sleep in a room other than the bedroom that had been assigned to me and had chosen to sleep in the weapon’s room instead, so I can’t fault him if there were cameras in there. How else would he know that I’d taken the laser gun?

Last night or early this morning, to be exact, when Jason had brought me down here to sleep, I’d convinced him that I couldn’t sleep in a strange place unless I knew what was around me. He’d shown me around every area except the bedrooms where people were asleep. He didn’t know it, or maybe he did, but I was looking for an escape route just in case shit went south.

I’d come here for one reason and one reason only, how I was going to get back home afterward is something I’ll have to think about. Right now, I needed to see her with my own two eyes first, and then I can go on from there. So after I’d suckered him into showing me around, I’d barricaded myself in the weapon’s room after pushing him out.

Now they were all staring at me, waiting to see what I was going to do. “You’re not going to meet her unless you hand it over.” That one surprised me, and I studied this Mancini guy some more. All the men here were handsome in their own way. Most of them had tats that were on full display, and if I’m not mistaken, more than a few of them were military. You can’t hide that stance no matter how long you’ve been out.

Since all eyes were on me, including Jason, who’d turned his head to look at me, I was beginning to feel gauche. Something I haven’t felt since I was an innocent child. I took a deep breath and rereleased it before pulling my bag around off my shoulder. “I don’t see what the big deal is, you let me keep my knives.”

I’d been very surprised by that, but I wouldn’t have stayed here without them. “What you took is a hundred times more deadly than your knives.”

“Didn’t you promise me that you’d behave, kid?” For some reason, that Lyon guy can make me feel two feet tall. I actually started to fidget under his look before I caught myself.

“Well, you shouldn’t have left it lying around.”

“I didn’t, and you weren’t supposed to be in there. But since you were, I made that particular case easy for you to break into. I just wanted to see what you’d do.” My shoulders slumped as if I were being scolded by an elder, and I looked away from all of them.

Is it my fault that I couldn’t help myself? He has about a thousand weapons in there, some of which I’d never even heard of. The little laser pen thing I took was perfect. It fits in the palm of my hand easily and could be kept in my pocket for easy access. I didn’t think of it as stealing more like payment for my coming here, which I still have no idea why they wanted me here in the first place. I know why I came, but that’s another story.

Then his words sunk in, and I looked at him coldly. “How do you know who I want to meet?”

“You asked for her as soon as you landed, remember?” I creased my brow in concentration as I kept my eyes on him. Is that really true? I don’t remember doing that, but maybe in my tired state I had. Somehow I don’t trust him about that, though.