Samurai Game (GhostWalkers #10)(59)
Author: Christine Feehan

Ryland’s frown deepened. “She isn’t part of this team.”

“Not any more than the other women, Rye, but she’s a GhostWalker and she belongs with us. She fits with me.”

“Are we going to talk about what she said? About the orders coming down to us?”

Again Sam shrugged. “It won’t be the first or last time one of us has been targeted. If she’s right, we’ll handle it.”

“Sam … ” Ryland started to say something and abruptly cut himself short.

“Say it.” Anger welled up. He looked around the room. “I know exactly what you’re thinking. I knew it the moment Azami mentioned those orders and you made such a big deal out of telling her you pick your own team. This isn’t the first time anyone’s implicated the general in wrongdoing. Yes, he was Colonel Higgens’s friend. He knew Whitney. He knows a lot of people. He wouldn’t sell me down the river because a madman asked him to. Even if he specifically names me to go, Rye, that doesn’t mean the orders come from him.”

“I’m not saying you should suspect the general of being in league with Whitney,” Ryland hedged. “It just makes good sense to watch your back. People aren’t always what they seem, Sam. The people we can trust are the ones in this room, not out there.” He pointed out the window. “And just for good measure, the general is the one person we shared Lily’s work on second-generation Zenith with.”

Sam pushed down anger. “The general has been a father to me. I joined the service to be like him. Don’t stand there and tell me you’re not suspicious of him, because you’ve been suspicious from the day everything went to hell. You’re a paranoid son of a bitch, Rye. And now you’re suspicious of Azami. You think everything’s a conspiracy and everyone is involved.”

Ryland’s eyebrow shot up. “Aren’t they? Isn’t everything a conspiracy?”

Sam didn’t smile as he knew Ryland wanted him to. General Ranier had fallen under suspicion several times and each time he’d come back clean, yet his unit didn’t altogether trust him. Sam loved the general. He’d given up a lucrative job in the civilian world to follow the general into the service. He loved and respected the general more than anyone else in the world.

Sam ducked his head. That wasn’t entirely the truth. Ryland had come to take that place, and somehow, the general had slipped down a few notches, which was why Sam was so belligerent and defensive when the subject was brought up. He felt guilty. Plain and simple he felt guilty because more than once, he’d had the hairs on the back of his neck stand up around the general and he hadn’t said a word to anyone else. He was guilty either way. Not telling his team his strange feelings, and not believing in the man who had taken him off the streets.

What had made him worry? Sam shook his head to clear it. Little things. Shadows. Whispers. The general had always had a schedule, a fixed routine, and he stuck to it. The last year, there had been phone calls, meetings at odd hours. Ranier was responsible for national security, so a clandestine meeting shouldn’t have raised an alarm, but Sam had sensed something different in the general and twice, when he’d asked, Ranier had avoided meeting his eyes. That was entirely wrong.

“What is it, Sam?” Ryland asked.

Sam detested the quiet sympathy in Rye’s tone, as if he’d already tried and condemned the general. “Nothing,” Sam said. “Nothing at all.”

“She is beautiful,” Ryland finally admitted.

“She’s a hell of a fighter,” Sam said with a small smile, willing to allow the subject to be changed. “She’ll be a big help working with Daniel, Rye. She learned to teleport at an earlier age than I did. She made more mistakes and is probably more aware of the dangers to a child.”

Ryland nodded, not quite assenting. Sam knew it would take a lot for both Ryland and Lily to trust an outsider with their child. Right now, he didn’t want to stop and reassure Ryland. His heart was pounding and his mouth was dry. He was going to put his neck under the blade of a samurai sword tonight.

He pushed himself up again and held on to the table until his protesting wound stopped the persistent throbbing. He wouldn’t have minded a glass of whiskey right now, but he wasn’t backing out. If asking her brothers permission to marry her was what it took to get into their family, he was all for it. He started out of the room and then hesitated, turning back. He couldn’t just leave them all exposed.

“When we teleport, we need to know exactly where we’re projecting our body to. We can’t just arrive in the middle of the room where a table might be. We have to have eyes at least and sometimes ears. I use cameras. Very small cameras when I’m going to teleport in a crowded area. I study the terrain ahead of time. And in case you’ve forgotten, I always have backup. Azami as good as told you she did as well.”

Comprehension dawned immediately. Ryland swore under his breath. “The room is bugged.”

“She had to have had eyes in here,” Sam said. “And if you were her brother and she was about to sit on a hot seat, what would you do?”

“Find the bugs,” Ryland said, sounding tired. “I hope to hell you’re right about that woman, Sam. Gator, go wake up that woman of yours. I need some answers. We need her to run the computers for us.”

“Tonight, Boss?” Gator complained. “I had other ideas.” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

“We all did. Hop to it.”

“What about Sam?” Tucker asked. “His woman is the one who got us into this.”

“I’m wounded.” Sam clutched his abdomen dramatically and staggered with quick, long strides so that he made it to the doorway in three quick steps.

Jonas coughed, sounding suspiciously like he’d muttered “bullshit” under his breath. Kyle threw a peanut at him and Jeff surfed across the table in his bare socks to try to catch him before he bolted.

“He’s in love, boys, let him go. He’ll probably just get laughed at,” Tucker said. “Do you really think Azami’s brothers are going to allow her to hook up with Sam? She’s fine and he’s … well … klutzy.”

“That hurt,” Sam said, turning back.

“Did you get a good look at those boys? I thought Japanese men were supposed to be on the short side, but Daiki was tall and all muscle. His brother moves like a f**king fighter,” Tucker added. “They might just decide to give you a good beating for having the audacity to even think you could date their sister, let alone marry her.”