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Dev’s
mind, it was definitely Itor, although the other two agencies had their reasons
for also wanting his parents dead. That alone was enough to shove Dev firmly
away from the government and into ACRO’s fold.
    Today,
when the government and the military came to him for help, they played by his
rules. Dev had tightened security until it squeaked, expanded the ACRO
divisions to include rare operatives his parents never dreamed of—he took in
those rare men and women who limped in from the military or wherever, like
refugees who’d lost their homeland; he embraced them, trained them. Saved them.
All they had to do was pledge loyalty to ACRO.
    Those
were the easy ones—the desperate ones, the ones who didn’t mind joining the
land of the freaks.
    The
others did not go down easily. Or quietly. And those were the ones they needed
most. He needed to make the old guard around here understand that change might
not always be easy but more often than not it was for the best.
    He
let his mind wander over Henry and Jason again—each a more than perfect
candidate to be the leak—a leak they needed to plug, and fast. He’d just
learned that one of his operatives had died in China, and the only way that
could have happened was if the mission had been compromised. From the inside.
    There
were very few people at the agency he could actually trust without fail, and
one of them was gone, in the field, probably fucking his goddamned brains out
as per orders.
    Dev
wasn’t ready to share his suspicions with his assistant, although he knew
Marlena would do whatever she could to help him get to the bottom of things. If
nothing else, she’d go out of her way to help take his mind off the intrusion,
if only for a few minutes.
    He
smiled briefly and buzzed her in without another thought. Coming might not
focus him, but it never hurt.
    TUESDAY
7 P.M. MST
    Kira
stepped out of the shower, glad to have washed the day’s farm grime from her
body, not so glad to wash away Tom’s scent. She loved how he smelled, loved the
way he’d looked at her, touched her. She’d taken a lot of lovers in her life,
most of them during the weeks of desperate need that made her life a living
hell, but while all had served their purpose, none had excited her as much as
Tom had.
    She
couldn’t wait to do it with him again—not because she’d needed to, but because
she wanted to. These weeks might be hell, but they allowed her to spend a brief
amount of time in a man’s arms, to take joy in human contact most people took
for granted. When strong hands stroked her skin and warm lips caressed hers,
her loneliness dissolved, if only for a few precious moments.
    Her
bedroom door squeaked open, and Babs, a Weimaraner who’d been at the refuge
since before Kira arrived almost two years ago, trotted inside and jumped on
her bed.
    “Hey,
girl.” She ruffled Babs’s ears. “You didn’t happen to notice if Tom and Derek
finished their chores?”
    One
of the men must have come inside the house, because Babs had been near the barn
when Kira had come in for her shower. A mix of images flickered through her
head…Babs, digging at a gopher hole, then jumping into the back of Kira’s
pickup, then Derek opening the upstairs door and letting the dog through. Derek
had apparently finished with the fence repairs.
    She
dressed in cargo shorts and a T-shirt, not bothering to do anything with her
wet hair but put it up into a high ponytail. She padded into the orange and
gold kitchen that was all but a shrine to the seventies, and turned on the
radio on the windowsill. Bouncing to the oldies, she pawed through the
cupboards. Neither Tom nor Derek had taken her truck today to go to the store,
so she’d prepare a big dinner, and if they wanted to share, they’d be welcome.
    She
scrounged up enough tofu and fresh veggies for a decent dish that would feed
three, and with practiced hands, she sliced, diced and tossed the ingredients
into a wok.
    The
animals migrated to the