He glanced back at Garrett and studied the shadows under his eyes. Garrett didn’t like time off. It gave him too much time to think about the shit that went down with his special-ops team just before he left the Marines. He hadn’t been sleeping lately, not that he’d admit it to either Sam or Donovan.
Van had confided to Sam that Garrett had been tracking down any and all information on Marcus Lattimer, the man responsible for Garrett’s mission going to shit and Garrett’s subsequent stay in the hospital to recover from a bullet to the thigh.
Sam had been meaning to bring it up with Garrett, but he hadn’t found the right time. Not that any time was ever good to try to pin Garrett down and make him talk.
“What the hell are you staring at?” Garrett asked rudely.
“You look like hell,” Sam said bluntly. “You haven’t been sleeping again.”
“Yeah, well that’s two of us. At least I’m not hung up on some chick. Quit trying to avoid the subject by making this about me.”
“Find anything yet?” Sam asked mildly.
Garrett frowned and looked for a moment like he’d pretend he didn’t know what Sam was talking about. He slapped a burger on the grill, banging the spatula in the process. Then he glanced over at Donovan.
“Hey, don’t look at me,” Donovan said, holding up his hands. “You haven’t exactly been discreet about it.”
“I want to take the f**ker down,” Garrett said.
Sam leaned back and braced his hands behind him on the railing. “Christ, Garrett. KGI can’t afford to go on some damn revenge mission.”
Garrett shrugged. “Who says it has to be about revenge? The world would be a better place without the piece of shit. He’s dirty. He’s a traitor.” He stared hard at Sam. “He cost me my team. While we sit here waiting for you to snap out of your funk, we could be doing something useful. Like nailing Lattimer’s sorry ass to the wall.”
There wasn’t a whole lot Sam could say to that. He understood Garrett’s rage. He’d be doing the same in Garrett’s shoes. But he sure as hell hoped his brothers would rein him in. Just like he was doing with Garrett.
“Garrett’s not the problem right now,” Donovan said pointedly. “You are. You need to pull your head out of your ass, and we need to go back to work, otherwise Garrett’s going to go rogue on us and start some goddamn war trying to find Lattimer.”
Sam blew out his breath and turned around to gaze out over the lake once more. His brothers were right. His head wasn’t in it, and that was a very bad thing for KGI. They’d built their business into an extensive list of military and government contacts. They did jobs for agencies that didn’t even exist.
The job to take out Mouton had come from their CIA contact, Resnick, and while KGI had thwarted one arms deal, Mouton himself had slipped through their fingers. Which meant he was still there, still viable, and he was busy rebuilding his network.
And at least for now, the U.S. government didn’t seem inclined to follow up.
Sam hated unfinished business. It went against his every principle to leave a predator out there who was capable of destroying so many lives. In theory it wasn’t personal. Mouton was just a job, but to Sam it had become personal the moment he failed to take the man down.
He was tempted to tell his CIA contact to f**k off and go back after Mouton, but it wasn’t worth getting on Uncle Sam’s bad side.
His lips twisted into a grimace. Maybe Donovan had the right idea. Maybe some sun, sex and vacation would get his mind back in the game. And off Sophie.
He had started to turn around to his brothers again when he caught sight of something that gave him pause. A large log was floating lazily down the lake. Water levels were way up in the spring as the TVA held water in so as not to burden the rain-swollen rivers and creeks that the lake fed. Recent storms and heavy rainfall had caused a debris field that had only just begun to diminish. But it was something on the end of the log that captured Sam’s attention.
“What the hell?” he muttered.
“What’s up, Sam?” Garrett asked.
But Sam didn’t answer him. He leaped over the edge of the deck and took off running down the dock toward the water. He heard his brothers’ surprised exclamations behind him, but he didn’t slow down.
When he reached the end of the dock, he dove cleanly into the water, wincing at the cold shock. He surfaced several yards away and swam hard toward the middle of the channel.
He grasped the middle of the log and maneuvered his way down. A woman’s limp body was draped across the end, her wet, bedraggled hair hiding her face completely.
He hesitated a moment, afraid to reach out and touch her, to feel the rigidity of death. Then he shook off the ridiculous fear and grasped her shoulder.
To his relief, her skin was soft and pliable, albeit cold, under his fingers.
“Jesus, what the f**k?”
Sam jerked around to see Garrett approaching with swift, sure strokes.
“Help me get her to shore,” Sam said as he pulled her from the log.
Her head lolled to the side, and he sheltered her face in his neck so she wouldn’t accidentally inhale any water. He put fingers to her neck to check for a pulse. Weak and thready, but it was there.
“Holy f**k, she’s been shot,” Garrett said as he closed in on her other side.
Sam glanced down to see her blood-smeared arm. “Let’s go,” he said grimly as he turned on his side and began doing a sidestroke back toward shore.