“We need to talk to him, and we won’t talk to him unless he feels safe,” Ally kept at it. “And the only people not his crew who have seen him in the last two months have been the Dream Team.”

Ally’s crew were called the Rock Chicks.

They’d christened Lottie, Ryn, Evie and their posse, including Hattie and Pepper, the Dream Team.

Boone looked to Mag.

Mag looked about as happy as Boone felt.

“I will personally have them covered,” Ally said.

“He’s got a soft spot for pussy, I could call Sylvie up here,” Rhash offered. “She’ll take your back.”

Sylvie Creed. Used to PI in Denver and moonlight for Knight. She lived in Phoenix now, but she and her husband Tucker had so many ties in the Mile High City, they were up in Denver almost as much as they were in the Valley of the Sun.

“I’m tiring of my role as gender relations coordinator, and I get you can break me in two, but if I hear you or anyone refer to women as ‘pussy’ again, I’ll have to find more creative ways to deliver my lessons,” Ally threatened Rhash.

He just shot her a big white smile.

She rolled her eyes to the ceiling and blew out a sigh.

“I called Ava ‘pussy’ or referred to a woman like that in her presence, I wouldn’t get laid for ten years,” Luke muttered to Lee, referring to his wife.

“I even think that around Indy, that vasectomy I got would have been a waste of time. She’d have my balls,” Lee muttered back, also referring to his wife.

“Feelers to your women, Mag, Boone,” Hawk said low, just as Boone’s ass rang.

He looked to his boss as he leaned forward to take out the phone.

“A cop’s dead. Two women are dead.” Hawk turned to Boone. “And your woman’s got two cops in her living room on a Sunday morning who, at best, are bigots, and that’s a pretty low bar to achieve. Worst than that, we gotta know,” Hawk continued as Boone checked his phone.

It was Ryn calling.

His brows drew together.

She knew he was meeting, and he’d told her he’d let her know when he was done.

She hadn’t texted even to tease.

Now she was phoning.

“There’s no arguing Cisco landed them in this spot. But they’re the best chance we got to get to him, and we need to get to him to see how far we gotta wade into this shit if only to keep them clear of it,” Hawk finished.

Boone looked again to Hawk.

“It’s Ryn, she knows we’re meeting, and I don’t think she’d call unless she needed to,” he said.

Or at least he hoped she wouldn’t.

Contradictorily, he hoped this call wasn’t her needing him.

Hawk tilted up his chin.

Boone took the call.

“Hey,” he greeted.

“Well, I know you’re tied up, but I thought maybe with whoever is in your powwow, all of them might want to know I just chatted with Brett,” she replied.

Jesus fuck.

“You okay?” he asked.

“Sure,” she answered.

“You good to go speaker?” he asked.

“Sure,” she answered.

Cool customer, his Ryn.

He was going to enjoy getting her hot.

“She’s just talked to the Cisco,” he told the table, hit speaker and said, “You’re a go.”

“I just want you all to know I’m picturing this sit-down of hotties in my head and burning it there so I can take it out and savor it later,” she announced. “And I’m not even sure which selections on the smorgasbord showed.”

There were chuckles.

But Boone growled, “Kathryn.”

“Right,” she said, that one word a smile.

He was less and less committed to starting them vanilla, she was so earning a goddamned spanking.

“So Brett called,” she shared.

“And?” Boone prompted.

“He’s worried about me. I think he thought Corinne and I were tighter than we actually were. He offered his condolences and wanted to check I was all right. Oh, and he also feels bad that he dragged me into this mess, and he apologized.”

Ally tapped the table.

Yeah.

Point made.

Shit.

It was going to be Ryn who did this for them.

“That’s it?” Boone asked.

“Well, you know…”

He didn’t know and she didn’t go on.

“We know what?” he pushed.

“He and I did a little sharing at our tête-à-tête, and he just wanted kind of an update.”

They did a little sharing?

“What kind of sharing?” he asked.

“Take me off speaker, baby,” she said.

Jesus Christ.

He did that and put the phone to his ear.

“What?” he clipped.

“Well, I shared that I wanted you, and didn’t have you, and we’d gotten in a big fight, and he advised I say yes if you asked me out again, and he wanted to know if anything was happening with you and me,” she told him.

Boone closed his eyes, put his head to the backrest and angled back his chair.

“He was real happy we’re going for it,” she carried on.

“Baby, can you do me a big fuckin’ favor and not make friends with fugitives?” he asked.

He heard more chuckles around the table.

He righted himself in his chair but dropped his head, opened his eyes and stared at his lap as she replied, “I don’t think he’s as bad as you think he is.”

“And I think he’s serious as fuck worse than you think he is,” he returned.

“Huh,” she pushed out noncommittally.

“We’ll talk later. I’ll text when I’m done and meet you wherever you are.”

“This would be a mall, Boone,” she informed him.

“So?”

“Seeing as you’re a commando, and as such, a card-carrying member of the Extreme Alphas Club, won’t you go into anaphylactic shock if you step foot in a mall?” she asked.

“Stop being a smartass.”

“That’s like telling me to stop being blonde. And you haven’t had the chance to see the evidence…yet, but I’m natural.”

He was partial to blondes.

Not to mention brats.

And, he was learning, smartasses.

“Gotta go,” he said.

“Later,” she said.

“Later, sweetheart.”

He disconnected and looked to the table.

The minute he did, Luke remarked, “Jesus Christ, I just had a killer flashback.”

Lee burst out laughing.

Ally ignored this and pointed out, “I didn’t hear you ask her to approach Cisco for us.”

“I wanna see her face when I ask that shit,” Boone replied.

Though she’d say yes.

He knew it.

And now she had Cisco’s number.

Goddamn it.

“Then we got only one issue left to discuss, this being Bogart putting everyone in this room on notice,” Rush remarked.

“Rumblings?” Lee asked Hank.

“Half the cops wish they could operate without regs like you do,” Hank told his brother. “Half of them don’t give a shit what you do. There might be outliers who get frustrated, though they wouldn’t bring that to Eddie, or me, Mitch or Slim.”