"Or guys," Kay said softly.
Nick let that swirl in his head. "You think it's a big conspiracy."
"Not big," she answered. "But powerful, yes. Any chance there'd be a laptop in this vehicle?"
Nick turned to smile at her briefly, then brought his attention right back to the road. "Honey, if we didn't have a laptop in this vehicle, we wouldn't be ASI and the terrorists will have won. Reach around to the back-door pocket."
Kay unlatched the seat belt, found the laptop, pulled the seat belt around her again and opened it. She tooled around a little. It was a good laptop, top of the line. Enough power to work on.
"We have wifi?"
"Honey, please."
"Okay." She waved her hand bye-bye. "I'm going to disappear, Nick."
She did. Sitting right beside him, she just disappeared. It was the weirdest thing. Kay stuck her pretty nose closer to the screen and just-poof!-went away. She could have been on the moon, even though she was sitting close enough to him to touch.
Well, she was doing her smart-girl thing, so he'd do his tough-guy thing. Felicity and Metal assured him there were no more drones and he believed them. But the guys after Kay hadn't given up. A weaponized Spanish flu would be worth millions, maybe billions, and they weren't going to be deterred by one slender virologist. They didn't know yet that she had ASI behind her.
Kay would get their names and he and the team would go after them, and then … and then …
He and Kay could continue whatever it is they had going.
Oh hell, who the fuck was he kidding?
He wanted her, forever if she'd have him. He wanted it all. He wanted them to live together, he wanted marriage and maybe even kids.
Definitely kids.
He slanted her a glance. Super-smart, incredibly pretty red-haired girls. Or Mancino-tough little guys. Either way. Or both.
The ASI guys were all getting broody. Jacko, now Metal. Soon Joe and Isabel. Definitely Jack and Summer, once Summer got over her skittishness. Though Nick had a huge family back home-over fifty people between first and second cousins and their kids-he wanted to establish a family here, too. His and Kay's kids would grow up surrounded by family. Family of choice here and blood family on the other side of the country.
Nick had grown up inside a big, loving family and it was the only way to go.
He hoped Kay was on the same page. If not, he'd convince her. If he had to, he'd do the dirty and say Al wanted great-grandkids before he died.
She loved her grandfather fiercely, that might do the trick. Because no way was he letting her go. No way was he losing her, either to the fuckheads after her or after the danger was over.
Nick could almost feel things slotting into place. Now he knew why he'd always kept things very light with his lovers. Not exactly slam-bam, thank you, ma'am, but more-don't leave your toothbrush at my place. It's not that he didn't like the women he slept with, it was just that they hadn't touched his heart. And he'd gotten bored really fast.
Not with Kay.
Kay touched his heart, his head, and definitely his gonads. He couldn't ever imagine getting bored with her. If anything, he was worried that he might not keep up with her. A scientist with a PhD in virology? Christ. She wouldn't want him to study biology or chemistry or virology, would she? He hoped not, because his thing was the law and guns and he'd basically sucked at science, except for math, all the way through school.
But if he wanted to marry Kay and have kids with her, he needed to keep her alive. So, first things first.
He gave a little beep to HQ and got an immediate response: negative. They were still clear. But if the bad guys had access to satellites like HQ did, then they were in big trouble.
But fifteen minutes later his comms beeped.
"Nick." Metal's quiet voice came on.
"Yo."
"We've got the address."
Nick was electrified. He shot a glance to Kay, who was still engrossed in her laptop. "Copy that. Will someone be at the staging area to hand her off? I want to be at the takedown."
Fuck yeah. No way was Nick going to be somewhere else when they caught the guy after Kay. If necessary, he'd leverage the fact that he was ex-FBI. He could even fudge the "ex" part, act like he was there from Washington.
He didn't care if there'd be fallout. All that mattered was that he could watch them smoke the guy. The guy had to be gone. No longer even a remote threat. Once he was indicted for treason, for terrorist activity with bio-weapons, for homicide and attempted homicide, he'd be put away until the sun went dark.
Though Nick would prefer him dead.