The six men and one woman that formed his team also seemed to struggle to keep their attention away from the handsome newcomer. While only he and O’Rourke knew the details of Raine’s history, the others had all heard the rumours. The best of the best had gone bad. And now they were being asked to place their lives in the traitor’s hands.
“I don’t want to do it, Laurie,” the president had said to him after explaining about his former commander’s apparent immunity to the tachyon radiation. “But if you can’t handle him on this mission, then I’ll find a temporary replacement for you. We need him.”
It was this last statement that truly hurt. We need him. It was what went unsaid which wounded him, a loyal soldier, the most.
We don’t need you.
He had reluctantly agreed to take Raine on his team and to provide him the same level of protection that he would any of the civilians. It was absolutely necessary that the U.N. secured the Moon Mask and Nathan Raine, even Gibbs hated to admit, was the best way of doing that.
Nevertheless, Gibbs didn’t have to like it. And, while he had vowed to offer the same protection that he extended to King and the scientists, he would not offer the same accommodation.
Nathan Raine was a traitor. He couldn’t be trusted and, the moment he showed any attempt to deceive he would put a bullet through his skull and face the reprimand later.
Dropping his duffel by the helicopter’s ramp, Raine strolled up to the gathered soldiers. His intense blue eyes analysed each of them in a fraction of a second. They looked young, Gibbs knew, fresh faced. But he knew that Raine wouldn’t take them at face value. These weren’t slack jawed recruits on their first mission. These were handpicked from Delta Force, the Navy Seals, Marine Recons and Army Rangers. They were young, because generally one didn’t live long enough to grow old in that elite force of men and women.
The hairs on the back of Gibbs’ neck stood on end, irked as he realised Raine’s eyes loitered on the curves of Kristina Lake a fraction longer than anyone else. Always the dashing hero, Nathan Raine had been the charmer, the womaniser. Scarred by terrible acne, pock-faced Laurence Gibbs had always been like his little troll, scuttling after his commander’s every whim.
Not anymore. This was his team now. And Lake was his bitch. He’d pictured her often enough in the shower, his lecherous eyes absorbing every curve of her luscious form, the curl of her blond hair, soaked as he made her shower with the men. If women wanted to be in special ops, they had to be treated the same as their male counterparts. Lake, for her part, was tougher than any of the men on the team. While her cheer-leader good looks had been hardened by years in the field, she’d never hesitated to strip off and get down and dirty to prove her macho-ness.
“Hey Gibbsy,” Raine said jovially, a crocked grin splitting his face. Gibbs’ stomach clenched in irritation. He ground his teeth, glowering at the other man.
“Reporting for duty, boss,” he finished, emphasising the last word.
The whole team eyed the traitor, glancing between him and their commander, expecting a fist-fight to break out any second. But Gibbs forced his dark fury back under control, contemplating the president’s direct order.
Briefing over, with an almost physical degree of effort, he turned towards the enormous helicopter, barking orders.
“We move out in five!” he shouted, stalking away into the shadows. Then he turned and pointed to one of his team. “West! Get him on board! And don’t let the bastard out of your sights or I’ll bust your balls so hard they’ll get lodged in your throat and choke you to death! Got it?”
“Got it, boss,” West replied in a heavy Brooklyn accent but Gibbs had already vanished behind the Super Stallion.
“Well, that was awkward,” Raine grunted as he watched the team leader stalk away.
“Shut the hell up,” West snapped at him, nodding to the rear loading ramp. “Let’s go.”
Raine smiled at the young operative, earning nothing but an annoyed scowl from the man. “Well, manners have certainly gone downhill since I was in charge.” He slowly replaced his sunglasses over his eyes despite the gloom in the hanger. “Lead on, West,” he said with a flourish. Around them, the other members of the team dispersed, the blond woman and a dark haired man heading to the cockpit while the rest grabbed their gear and scrambled towards the hold.
To be part of the CIA’s Special Operations Group, one was trained in all operations to the highest levels of proficiency, however to keep things clear it helped to designate duties to various team members. The woman and the dark haired man were obviously the designated pilots. Judging from the amount of technical gear West picked up, he was the communications specialist. The others, too, would have their own assigned roles.
Picking up his own duffel, Raine followed West up the loading ramp. Strapped securely into harnesses on the uncomfortable seats in the cargo hold, looking as out of place as a jelly-fish in the Sahara, sat King, Sid and Nadia.
Raine headed towards them and stashed his bag in the over-head webbing, greeting each of them in turn. “Hey Benny, glad to see you’re okay.” He hadn’t seen any of the scientists since making very physical contact with the butt of Gibbs’ rifle in the rainforest.
“Yeah, you too.”
There was something reserved and forced in King’s reply. The sense of camaraderie he’d felt develop during their flight through the ancient city dropped away like a curtain falling. Something in all three pairs of eyes seemed to stab at him accusingly.
So, they know, he realised.
While they wouldn’t be privy to all the details, someone somewhere along the chain of command on this mission had felt the need to explain his crime to them.
Treason, punishable by death.
Knowing that whatever fleeting sense of friendship had developed between him and the three scientists had gone the way of the dodo, he took a seat away from them as the SOG team piled on board.
Feeling intense eyes boring into him, he glanced over to see the handsome features of Rudy O’Rourke staring hard across the cargo hold at him.
Now second-in-command, Raine himself had recruited the man out of the Army Rangers and took him under his wing. Out of the eight-man team that had gone into that jungle four years ago, only three had walked out.
He could feel the sense of betrayal radiating from the man. A gentle giant, O’Rourke had been described as. Built out of almost solid muscle, he was softly spoken and polite almost to a fault. Even now, Raine didn’t feel the same waves of hatred radiate from the man that did from Gibbs.
Raine nodded a greeting.
O’Rourke continued to stare at him for several long moments but then something in his face seemed to soften. An almost imperceptible nod was returned.
“Right! Let’s get this bird in the air!” Gibbs practically roared as he stormed into the hold, eyes glaring at Raine.
With a rumble of engines, he felt the enormous helicopter taxi out from the hanger and into the glaring Kansas sun. Vibrations juddered through the steal beast as the propellers began to spin, slowly at first, growing ever faster until eventually the Super Stallion lifted off and banked south, powering down the continental United States.