Two hours later Ian slid another book on the shelf as Jason entered the study. “I need to talk to you about something.”
Turning, fatigue gripping him, Ian dusted his hands against his jeans and looked at the man he’d once called friend. “What?”
Gina slipped into the room and sat behind the desk. Jase shot a pointed look in her direction and raised a brow at Ian. Ian looked at her and sighed. “You can talk in front of her. Whatever you know, she needs to know, too. These guys aren’t playing around. Tell us what you found out.”
Gina’s appreciative glance warmed him even as he worried about what Jase had to say and how it might affect her.
Jason hesitated, then said, “I talked to several guys in the unit. Everyone is still together except you, me, Mario, Bandit and Les.” Les Carson had been one of the team, a Ranger who’d taken a liking to Mario and had been one of Mario’s best buds. As had Bandit McGuire.
“Where’s Les?”
Jase rubbed his face and shut his eyes for a brief moment. “Dead. The official report says he was killed on a mission.”
“The unofficial report?”
“He was arrested for treason and managed to hang himself in his cell.”
Ian flinched. He hadn’t heard this. How had he not known this? He looked back at Jase. Of course, the team would have covered for him to save his family from both the humiliation of having a traitor in the family and possible retaliation from those with a grudge against a man who would betray not just his country but also his team.
“What about Bandit?”
A shrug. “No one seems to know. He dropped off the edge of the earth about a year ago. If anyone knows where he is, no one’s talking. Not even to me. He’s either so deep undercover he’ll never surface or he’s dead and no one’s talking about that either. I asked Mac about him and got shut up fast.”
“And is Robbie Stillman still with Mac?”
“Yes. He took your place.”
“That’s what I heard.”
“He’s all right, I guess. Not the friendliest guy around but does a good job. I’d trust him with my back. Seems like he’s got a lot of personal problems, though.”
“Why are you helping us?” Ian stared hard at Jase, demanding a truthful answer, remembering his worry that he was trusting the wrong person.
Gina watched them from her seat behind the desk, quiet, almost invisible. Ian hadn’t forgotten her presence, though.
Jason paced from one end of the den to the next. “When you called me, I wasn’t sure if I should get involved.”
“Again—why?”
“Because you and Mario were close, like brothers. Then you disappeared. And then Mario’s behavior right before he died…It was so off.”
“That’s what you said. Can you think of anything more?”
“After one of our missions in South America, he seemed to withdraw from the rest of us. He would have surges of anger and would disappear for long periods of time…and other stuff. He even requested a leave of absence from the unit, but no one seems to know why.”
“Was the leave granted?”
“No.”
Ian frowned. “Why not?”
Jase shrugged. “I have no idea—he never said—but it was right before he died.”
Gina intervened. “His grandmother died about a year ago. Maybe he was upset about that. He never really had time to process the loss. The day after her funeral he was deployed to a mission in Venezuela, I think.”
“Could be—” Jase paced over to the bookshelf “—but like I said, the guys aren’t talking much. There’s something else going on and they’re covering for him.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean the fact they all basically clammed up when I started asking questions about him. Makes me think it was possible he was into something he shouldn’t have been and no one wants to be the guy to say anything about it.”
The bad feeling in Ian’s gut grew to mammoth proportions. “And you’ve no idea what it could have been?”
Jase hesitated once more, shot Gina another look then shook his head. “Not a clue.”
Narrowing his eyes, Ian studied the man. Was he hiding something or did he just not want to say something in front of Gina? He’d get Gina out of the room in a minute and find out, but for now he followed Jase’s line of thought. “Or, they could honestly not know anything to tell, especially if Mario was keeping his mouth shut because he didn’t know who to trust.”
“Yeah, that’s possible, too.”
“Hey, look at this,” Gina exclaimed.
“What?” Ian strode to her side to look over shoulder. She had a Bible open on the desk. It was the piece of paper in her hand that had her attention.
“It’s a letter from Mario.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when the window shattered, glass flying. Gina screamed as Ian tackled her to the floor.
FIVE
A whimper escaped Gina and she bit her lip. Heart pounding, adrenaline rushing, she prayed as she shoved the letter into her pocket with a trembling hand. God, what’s going on?
More gunshots sounded from outside, and she flinched at each report. Raising her head above the desk, she saw Ian crouched in front of the broken window, his gun pointed toward the darkness. He clipped off two more rounds. “Jase! Are you all right?”
Gina grabbed the phone from the desk and punched in 911.
Then realized she had no dial tone.
Throwing the thing down, she scrambled across the floor and saw Jason on his back, blood flowing from a wound to his head.
“Oh, no,” she whispered and worked her way to his side. She felt for a pulse. Strong enough to reassure her. “Okay, okay, Jase, you’re going to be all right.”
Ian fired another shot through the window, then turned to her. “We’ve got to get out of here.”
“We can’t just leave him!”
“Wouldn’t think of it.” He held up his cell. “I’ve already called for backup and an ambulance.”
“What do we do until they get here?”
“Hold these guys off. Did Mario keep any guns around here?”
“I don’t know. If he did, he never told me where they were.”
A groan brought her attention back to the man on the floor. “Jase, Jase, can you get up?”
“My head,” he moaned. “What happened?”
Another bullet pinged against the old fireplace. Gina ducked, although the bullet wasn’t anywhere near her.
“You were shot, but I think it’s just a graze,” Gina whispered.
“Hey, buddy, you okay?” Ian asked as he kept his eyes on the action outside.
“Yeah. Yeah.” He blinked and Gina watched his eyes slowly focus, although they stayed narrowed against the pain. “Where’s my gun?”
Gina scanned the floor. “Over there.”
With a wince, he shifted his weight and rolled to go into a position where he could reach the weapon. Then he weaved his way over to the window.
“You