Page 17 (1/1)

For once, Eliza was grateful it wasn’t over just yet She needed a few more precious minutes to prepare herself to face her partner, a man she considered her closest friend and her only confidant And then lie through her teeth to hiue and stifled his iet bullshit over with as everyone else was Yeah, he got that his new recruits needed to be introduced and integrated into the fold, but noas not the time when everyone was bored as fuck, impatient and ready to blow this joint The others hadn’t exactly rolled out the welcoht Not that the ed a better time to meet up with the newest operatives so everyone could receive their assign training he didn’t expect to last uys ere sos and had what it took to get the job done He hadn’t hiredand an A to Z instructional manual He needed men who could learn under fire, adapt and overcome any obstacle And he’d chosen well They’d all passed a series of very rigorous, intense tests, not only deterence Their ability to make split-second decisions, the ability to think quick on their feet, and how they reacted to the unexpected He’d been impressed, and he wasn’t a man as easily impressed He had no doubt the men he’d hired would fit in sea os and so with him suffer any such issue All of thetoo confident and had no proble in backup when they knew they were in over their heads or were outmatched or outnumbered

They needed the extra muscle and manpower but that wasn’t all they needed They needed around checks he’d perfor but rookies They had more than proven themselves capable in all situations Dane had thrown at the theh countless scenarios, many of which he hoped to fuck they never encountered with DSS, but he couldn’t afford to assuone down over the last year And he’d uys, that while, yes, they worked for DSS and they would be taking missions that DSS took on, their first andthe women DSS clai tired of their woh she’d have his balls for including her--being targeted, threatened, at risk and being fucking torle woman had suffered Each of them bore the scars, some you could see and some you couldn’t but existed nonetheless, and yet they came out alive, not unscathed, but alive and they were all fierce Not many women could survive what their women had survived with their sanity intact, and not only survive but kick ass while carrying on He adle one, but Eliza ht now, she had more of his attention and focus than the other four women Ramie, Ari and Gracie each had a husband as h their dehtmares they endured Tori had not only her three older brothers but every singleher to fall into the hands of a brutal ile than the other women, but then she had reason to be Yes, they’d all suffered, but Tori the most of all

Eliza had no one except the people she worked with But every night she went home alone to deal with her demons in private God knows he’d pushed as hard as possible without pushing her away to confide in hi brick wall, as had anyone else who’d atteet Eliza to talk about the hell she’d endured At the oddamn head off, not to mention your balls But that didn’tday, and instead of that concern din of ever allowing anyone inside her carefully constructed barriers

She was more than someone he worked with More than someone who reported to him She was his All the DSS operatives were his, but Eliza more so He worked more closely with her than anyone else She was his partner His equal He counted on her judght her out on et her opinions, because not only was she solid, she was smart as hell, with a mind like a computer She called it like she saw it, never held back when he asked her opinion or what her gut was screa fast and well on her feet, she was tough and could kick ass as well as the rest of his operatives and better thanunderesti they’d been a stupid fuck not to take a sbetween her ears Dane would never ad what happened when someone overlooked Eliza or disrespected her Or worse, didn’t consider her the threat she was

He watched as Caleb got wound up again, talking and saying shit that he said every godda, shit that as Eliza had so eloquently put, they could recite in their sleep He had to stifle a smile over the "state of the union" because the name had been coined by Eliza, ever the irreverent one of the bunch, and, well, he had to agree It was a pointlessthat in no way required every man to be pulled froive report and status on past, current and potential jobs that DSS may or may not take

But Caleb was an anal bastard, and even if he’d for the er brother, Beau, he still kept his finger solidly on the pulse of everything going on Every lanced sideways at Zack Covington, who uise his scowl, or the fact he’d checked his watch every three minutes for the last twenty and Dane had to look at Eliza or risk bursting into laughter that would likely have the rest of DSS thinking he’d lost his mind