Reckless Pleasures

JASON SQUINTED UP at the blinding orange ball of the midday sun, thinking conditions couldn’t possibly be worse.

“Things could always be worse,” Megan said next to him. “There could be a hurricane heading this way.”

He stared at her. “Is there?”

“Nah.”

“Thank God for small favors.”

He blew out a long breath from between his teeth, staring at the clearing around them. Five minutes ago they’d both emerged to find the nonstop rain they’d woken up to this morning was being replaced by the scorching sun. It didn’t feel like a sauna—it felt worse.

Megan plucked the material of her T-shirt away from where it clung, soaked, to her stomach. He tried not to watch, but couldn’t help himself.

Another team member emerged from across the fifty-yard clearing in the middle of the forest.

“Anything?” Megan called.

The agent indicated in the negative and then backed up until he was once again protected by the tree line.

Good idea.

Jason did the same and Megan followed suit. He glanced at his watch. They’d been at it since early this morning. That meant five hours of slogging through the trees with only a minimum of breaks, a protein bar and water bottle the only sustenance.

Megan leaned against the trunk of a tall pine and drank sparingly from her own canteen, dragging the back of her hand across her mouth afterward as she considered the clearing.

“Not a scrap of fabric, no sign of tracks…nothing.”

Jason grimaced. “Same here.”

Of course, had any of them found anything, they would have contacted the others via the radios they each carried.

Jason picked up his radio and told the rest of the team about the clearing, then advised they take at least a twenty-minute break and eat something before continuing.

Megan edged down slightly, propping her back against the tree in a semiseated position without actually sitting down. The ground was so sodden, she was denied that luxury.

“Christ, it’s hot,” she said.

“Tell me about it. I’d take a hundred and twenty degrees in the desert heat of Afghanistan over this any day.”

She looked at him. “Me, too.”

They fell silent. Jason quietly cursed himself. He hadn’t meant to inspire thoughts of Dari, but he was sure that’s where her mind had wandered. If he had any doubt, all he had to do was watch her take out her cell and check it before frowning and putting it back in her pocket.

They’d all been supplied with lunch rations, modified MRE—meals ready-to-eat—that were fresher and a little more appetizing, but just as safe and portable. He took his out and offered it to Megan. She stared up at him.

“Thanks, but I have my own.”

Her curious gaze made him look the other way, even as he tore open the package. Of course she had her own. What the hell was he thinking, offering her his?

He wasn’t sure what was happening here, but he’d better snap out of it before Megan started thinking something was up.

Problem was, something was up. Big-time. Last night he’d woken up in the middle of the night with a massive hard-on…and it had Megan’s name written all over it.

He was relieved when Dominic popped up some twenty yards to his right and headed in their direction.

“Hey,” he said, leaning against a tree on the other side of Jason.

They answered in kind and all three ate in relative silence.

“There’s still so much ground we’re missing,” Megan said quietly, tucking away the wrapper from a piece of cheddar.

Dominic said, “We could have organized the volunteers lined up outside the sheriff’s office.”

“In this weather? We would have ended up searching for half of them.” Jason shook his head. “It was just as well the sheriff sent them to the mall and other public venues where they could keep an eye out but stay out of the elements.”

“Besides,” Megan added, “in cases like these, untrained individuals haven’t a clue what they’re looking for. Shortly into a search of this nature, they generally stop paying attention and are more at risk of accidentally trampling evidence than finding any.”

“Which is why we’re here.”

Dominic took a deep breath. “We getting paid for this?”

Megan and Jason shared a look.

“You are,” Megan said.

“And the company will if we deliver results.”

Essentially that was the deal they’d struck with the sheriff’s office. From what Jason understood, they had a matching guarantee from the federal government by way of Lincoln’s FBI friend…all on the down low, of course.

Of course, that actually depended on whether or not they found the girl.

Megan pushed up off the tree and stashed her wrappers in her pockets.

“I’m heading back out. See you on the other side…”

5

Eight days and no results…

MEGAN STOOD AT the sink in her motel bathroom and stared at herself in the mirror, the light slanting through the doorway only slightly breaking the darkness. The cold water she’d doused her face with dripped down over her chin, spots dotting her black T-shirt. Over a week of grueling days spent scouring thick thatches of dark woods, hampered by rain and heat. A sensation of sheer exhaustion combined with growing fear that they may not find little Finley Szymanski created a dark cloud that pressed from within as well as without.

She listlessly reached for a coarse towel and patted her chin and throat dry. It didn’t help that she had yet to hear from Dari. Every moment that ticked by inched up the worry quotient and made her itch in places she couldn’t possibly scratch on her own. Areas she tried to ignore, ones that transcended the mere physical.

She put the towel down and went back into the other room where the television droned on, broadcasting the late local news, which was dominated by the continuing search for the missing girl. The team’s final briefing of the day had broken up a short while ago, each member returning to his room, all of them experiencing discouragement to some degree, but vowing that tomorrow was another day.

Megan sat down on the edge of the made bed and checked her cell where it lay on the nightstand before grabbing the remote and flicking through the stations.

“Don’t bother. News and more news,” Jason said from the open doorway.