Shades of Gray

CHAPTER 38

FOR the first time since she’d come to work for KGI, P.J. openly defied her team leader. Technically what she’d done before hadn’t been defiance, since Steele hadn’t specifically told her not to do the things she’d done. He couldn’t very well have told her since she didn’t let him in on her plans.

And technically she’d resigned from the team so anything she’d done in that six months had been done solo, not as a member of the KGI organization. Never mind that Steele had told her where to stick her resignation.

But when Steele announced his plan to dump his team back home in Tennessee and go alone to meet with Sam, Garrett and Donovan to turn over the intel collected from Brumley, P.J. had drawn a hard and fast line in the sand.

She refused to allow Steele to take the rap for her actions and her decisions. Cole had stood firmly beside her on that count, stating that he and P.J. would both give an accounting to the Kellys. No way in hell they were throwing Steele under the bus.

Steele hadn’t been happy about the matter, but there wasn’t a lot he could do when faced with two determined people who would go to Sam, Garrett and Donovan with or without him.

Since Steele had all but hijacked a Kelly jet—without permission—P.J. figured he had enough to answer for without taking the blame for her crimes.

After the adrenaline had worn off and Cole was sure of P.J.’s safety, his injury hit him a lot harder than it had initially. He’d lost a lot of blood and had begun to weaken during the flight home.

Without Donovan, they had limited medical aid they could give him, but Steele changed the dressing often and made sure he had pain medication to keep him calm and still.

P.J. hovered next to Cole, never leaving him. She held his hand, bullied him mercilessly and vowed to kick his ass if he even thought about doing something stupid like dying.

Steele tried to get her to rest—she was in little better shape than Cole—but she remained steadfast in her refusal to leave Cole’s side.

She was literally drooping, pain gnawing at her body, when she felt a prick and turned, stunned, to see that Steele had injected her in the arm.

“What the hell was that?” she demanded.

“Something for pain and something that’ll help you rest. You’re about to fall over and anyone with eyes can see you’re in agony. Give it up, P.J. You aren’t helping Cole by hanging over him looking like something the cat dragged in. He’s worried sick about you, so he won’t calm down and rest.”

The medication was already making her swimmy. Her limbs grew heavy and her eyes were increasingly harder to keep open.

“Damn it, Steele,” she slurred out.

“Curse at me later,” he bit out and then promptly caught her as she fell over.

Cole picked his head up, his lips drawn into a grim line of satisfaction. “Thanks, Steele. I was worried she was going to fall over any second. She needs the rest. She got the hell beat out of her back there.”

“You didn’t fare so well yourself,” Steele said dryly.

Steele laid her down, brushed the hair from her face and then carefully arranged a blanket over her. Then he returned to Cole.

“How bad is it?” he asked tersely.

“Hurts like a son of a bitch, but I’ll live,” Cole said. “Nothing I haven’t lived with before.”

Steele sat down in one of the armchairs across from the couch where P.J. and Cole were both sprawled.

“You both could have gotten yourselves killed.”

Cole nodded. “Yeah, we could have. But P.J. didn’t let that happen. She’s a mean son of a bitch when she gets pissed.”

A half smile cracked Steele’s lips. “Yeah, I hear you.”

Cole sobered and then stared over at his team leader. “How’s this going to play out for me and P.J. being on the same team?”

Steele was silent for a moment.

“I won’t sacrifice my relationship with her for a job,” Cole said.

Steele snorted. “It’s a good damn thing, because I have no intention of letting either one of you go. It’s annoying the shit out of me that I’m going to be out of action for the next while because two of my team members are going to be laid up and then you’re probably going to want time off for a goddamn honeymoon.”

Cole grinned. A honeymoon sounded pretty damn good. He glanced to where P.J. was passed out on the couch. They both had some healing to do, but the future was looking pretty damn bright.

Then he looked back to Steele and sobered. “How is this going to go down with Sam? I know we fucked up. I’ll take full responsibility.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Steele said rudely. “I’ll take care of Sam.”

Cole grinned and relaxed. Steele was a complete hardass but Cole wouldn’t work for anyone else in the world. The day Steele no longer led a KGI team was the day Cole hung up his gun and became an average Joe with a nine-to-five job.

“Get some rest,” Steele said. “We don’t land for several more hours and you’re going straight to the base hospital.”

Cole groaned. “I swear, they need to just reserve a room with my name on it as many damn times as I’ve been in there.”

“Between you and P.J., they’re going to need to name an entire wing for you,” Steele said dryly.