Tate muttered something Angelo didn’t catch, then let out a heavy sigh. “Okay, I hear what you’re saying. But I need you to control the operation—marginalize his influence as much as you can. And I want your word that you’ll handpick the team that comes down here. If you don’t trust someone, don’t let John send them.”
“You have my word,” Landon assured him. “I’ll select the team myself. They’ll be people I know and trust personally.”
While Landon discussed the details they needed in order to link up with Tate, Ivy pulled out her cell phone and began making calls. By the time Landon hung up, Ivy was putting down her phone, too.
“John is at the main office in town,” she said. “I’m not sure what he’s doing there on a Saturday, but I told him we need to talk to him immediately. He’s waiting for us.”
Landon nodded, then looked at Angelo. “I hate to do this to you guys, but—”
“We’re both in,” Angelo said.
“In? As in going with us?” Landon shook his head. “No way. You guys are on leave. I can’t ask you to fly down to Central America and risk your lives.”
“Then don’t ask,” Angelo said. “Kendra is a friend—not to mention a possible soul mate for Derek. We’re going.”
Landon looked from him to Derek and back again. “Thanks.”
Ivy ran her hand through her waist-length, dark hair. “Okay, that makes six of us.”
“Five,” Danica corrected. “I’m supposed to go undercover at Chadwick-Thorn on Monday. It’s taken weeks for the Bureau to get me in there. If we pull out, we may not get another shot at them.”
“Good,” Clayne said. “I don’t want you going.”
Danica’s dark eyes narrowed. “Excuse me?”
“I’m sorry, babe, but I don’t want you within a hundred miles of a damn hybrid. They’re too dangerous.”
“But I’m supposed to be okay with you going up against them, right?”
“That’s different. I can handle myself,” Clayne told her.
Angelo winced. He might not be able to connect with women, as Derek put it, but he knew that probably wasn’t the best thing to say.
“Excuse us,” Danica said, grabbing Clayne’s hand and dragging him inside.
Angelo frowned as Danica slammed the door closed. “Do we need to run interference in there with those two?”
Ivy shook her head. “No. Clayne may have the sensitivity of a bucket of mud, but his heart is in the right place. He’s as afraid for her as she is for him.”
Angelo shook his head. That only confirmed serious relationships and dangerous fieldwork didn’t mesh. He never wanted to be in the position of seeing the woman he loved having to deal with him deploying to dangerous places over and over, or worrying about her while he was on the other side of the world. That was something else he’d learned a long time ago. A soldier’s wife wasn’t the only one who paid the price when he went on a mission.
Derek leaned back in his chair so he could see through the glass door into the living room where Clayne and Danica were arguing. “Things look pretty tense in there to me.”
“They’re fine,” Ivy said. “Right now, we have a bigger problem. Like who else we’re going to recruit for this little search-and-rescue mission.”
Angelo took another look at Clayne and Danica and saw them hugging. Apparently, Ivy knew what she was talking about when it came to men and women.
Angelo was thoroughly unimpressed with the DCO offices. He didn’t know what he’d expected, but an unmarked set of glass doors in the parking garage of the Environmental Protection Agency wasn’t it.
“This is just the place where the politics are played,” Landon explained as Clayne opened the door for them. “All the real work happens out at the training complex near Quantico.”
Angelo made no comment. Any organization that needed to have a separate set of offices just so politicians would have a place to play wasn’t an organization he wanted to work for. He looked around the lobby and grimaced at the white walls, generic DC tourist pics, and marble accents. How the hell did Landon put up with this crap?
The click-clack of high heels coming down the hall interrupted his musings. Angelo dragged his attention away from the framed photo of the White House and did a double take. For a second, he thought it was Ivy—though he had no idea how she could have gotten here before them when she was with Derek and Danica getting their personal gear together—but then he