SHE HADN’T EXPECTED a bloodbath. Sydney Sloan raced through the senator’s mansion, her gun in her hand. Jasper hadn’t been outside. He should have been out there, waiting for her.
Instead, she’d just found the ground littered with bodies. Some still alive, some way past dead. Cops. Men in ski masks. Men with pain contorting their faces.
But she hadn’t seen the two men that she needed most. Gunner and Jasper. Where the hell were they?
She’d called her boss, Bruce Mercer. Federal agents were minutes behind her. Whatever screwup had happened with the local law enforcement, it wouldn’t be happening again. The agents would take care of the cops and men who still lived. She just needed—
A ragged groan came from the right. Sydney tensed as adrenaline spiked through her body. She flattened her body against the wall, sucked in a deep breath.
Then she rushed into the room with her gun ready to fire.
“Freeze!” she yelled.
But the men before her didn’t freeze. Jasper was crouched over Gunner, and they were both covered in blood. Gunner wasn’t moving. He barely seemed to breathe.
She grabbed for her phone. “Where’s the ambulance?” Sydney demanded. This scene—it was too similar to one she’d seen before. Only, that time, she’d lost her fiancé.
She wasn’t losing her best friend.
Sirens wailed outside, answering her question before the other agent on the line could.
“Get those EMTs into the house,” Sydney ordered. “Second floor. First room on the right. We’ve got an agent down, and he’s priority one.”
The only priority for her then.
Sydney dropped to her knees. Jasper had his hands over Gunner’s wounds, trying to keep the pressure in place. She added her hands, not caring that the blood soaked through her fingers. “What happened?”
Jasper grunted. “Susan—she was working with Guerrero. She got too close to Gunner.”
Because Gunner always had a weakness for the helpless damsels. She shook her head and blinked eyes that had gone blurry. When would he learn?
“Guerrero took Logan and Juliana.” Jasper’s voice vibrated with his rage. “I tried to stop them, but...”
Then she realized that all of the blood wasn’t Gunner’s. Her eyes widened.
“I knew if I didn’t stay with him he’d die.” Jasper didn’t even glance at his own wound. He came across as a tough SOB.
And he was.
But he also cared about his team.
“We’ll get them back,” she promised. There wasn’t an alternative for her. She’d lost others she cared about over the years. She wasn’t losing any of her team.
Shouts came from downstairs and drifted up through the broken window. Sirens yelled. The ambulances had arrived. Backup.
“Hurry!” she screamed.
Soon there was the thunder of footsteps on the stairs. The EMTs pushed her back, but...but Gunner grabbed her hand.
His eyes, weak, hazy, opened and found her. “Syd...”
She swallowed and tried to pull back. “It’s all right, Gunner. You’re going to be fine.” He’d have to be.
He tried to smile at her, that disarming half grin that had gotten to her so many times, but his lashes fell closed and his hand slipped from her wrist.
Her heart slammed into her chest but the EMTs were working on him. They got Gunner out of that room, into the ambulance. The lights were swirling. Agents were racing around the scene.
She wanted in that ambulance, too. She wanted to be with Gunner, holding his hand.