clad in black, in almost identical riot gear to what the henchmen wore, slid through the shadows.
“We have a problem,” Oscar breathed, squeezing her wrist slightly.
“How to get him away from them?” she asked.
The henchmen had split into two groups—Boss and Number Two talking quickly in Serbian. Chicago, Teenager, and the other four huddled together, speaking quietly in English. They occasionally threw looks her way. Looks that said the unimaginative assholes were tired of abusing Luca and looking for their next target. Between her and Oscar, she was the far more obvious victim.
“Or are you worried about the way they’re looking at me?” she asked when Oscar didn’t reply.
“Black SUV.”
“What?” Was Oscar losing it? Maybe the stress of the situation had gotten to him.
“I think I see a black SUV in the distance.”
Selene’s heart stopped.
Oscar turned toward her. “There are men approaching. Black clothing, no markings. Not SWAT. Not police. I don’t think they’re—”
Glass shattered, and she had a brief view of a small black canister sailing through the air before the world exploded with light and sound.
Chapter Five
Oscar slitted his eyes open. Red spots danced in his vision. They went with the ringing in his ears.
He could see just enough to make out that around the room, everyone—including Selene—had hit their knees. Most had their eyes squeezed shut and hands over their ears. Only the two less stupid guys—the two he was pretty sure were foreigners with limited English—had managed to hold on to their guns.
Luca, bloody and lying on the floor, blinked, seeming to stare into middle space. He’d had his eyes closed when the light and sound bomb—a flashbang—had come through the window. Oscar had been turned toward Selene, which had saved his vision.
Plus, he’d had experience in the aftermath of a flashbang. Langston had gone through a period where he’d developed a couple of versions of the explosive with various levels of light exposure, decibels of sound, and also a few that gave off smoke.
Oscar had learned to work through the blindness and deafness so he could chase down his brother and beat the shit out of him.
There was no point in talking, Selene and Luca wouldn’t be able to hear him, so he dashed forward and yanked Luca off the floor.
Luca started to fold, dropping back to his knees, so Oscar shook him. Luca blinked, focused, realized who had grabbed him, and miraculously was able to stand.
Oscar gave him a shove toward the interior kitchen door, and Luca stumbled into the hall. He hauled Selene up. She started to shove him away, her eyes open but completely unseeing. Damn it, she didn’t know it was him. Oscar cupped the back of her head and kissed her.
That worked.
She stopped fighting and reached blindly for him. He grabbed her hand and dragged her out the door and into the hall. He glanced back in time to see the presumed leader of their first attackers look up, notice Luca was gone, and then raise his gun.
The fact that, with his ears ringing, he wouldn’t hear the sound of the shot before he felt the bullet rip through him somehow made this worse.
Just before he slapped the door between the kitchen and hallway closed, he saw the back door explode inward and two men, moving at a crouch, their faces obscured by black face shields, entered the house. Their gear was uniformly black, no “police” or “sheriff” or “SWAT” patches anywhere in sight.
Fan-fucking-tastic.
How many people were after these fucking plans?
Oscar grabbed Luca again, hauling both him and Selene toward the front door. As they passed, he looked around, hoping to see Bill and Wayne, but they were nowhere in sight.
A quick glance out the front windows showed two black SUVs flanking Luca’s car and a team of four men standing on the porch.
He was not waiting around to find out who those jokers were.
With a snarl he couldn’t hear, he changed course. Bill and Wayne had parked on the side of the house, so he led his people into the small makeshift office that was just off the main living area. The window shutter probably made a racket when he unlatched it, but hopefully everyone was still in partial hearing loss. The window itself was heavy duty, dual-paned, but after he unscrewed the sash lock, it slid open easily. Knowing his luck, the damn thing had probably screeched, so he waited, muscles tense, but no black-clad men appeared.
He slid out the window, dropped to his feet, and waited, ready