Mackenzie's Pleasure Read Online Free PDF Page A

way."
    Ambassador Lindley shoved his hand through his hair, an uncharacteristic gesture for
    so fastidious a man; it was a measure of his agitation. "If anything goes wrong..."
    It wasn't clear whether he was about to voice a threat or was simply worrying aloud,
    but he couldn't complete the sentence. Mack Prewett gave a thin smile. "Something always
    goes wrong. If anyone can handle it, Mackenzie can."
    After Zane terminated the secure transmission he made his way through the network of
    corridors to Mission Planning. Already he could feel the rush of adrenaline pumping through his
    muscles as he began preparing, mentally and physically, for the job before him. When he
    entered the room with its maps and charts and communication systems, and the comfortable
    chairs grouped around a large table, five hostile faces turned immediately toward him, and he
    felt the surge of renewed energy and anger from his men.
    Only one of them, Santos, was seated at the table, but Santos was the team medic, and he
    was usually the calmest of the bunch. Ensign Peter "Rocky" Greenberg, second in command of
    the team and a controlled, detail-oriented kind of guy, leaned against the bulkhead with his arms
    crossed and murder in his narrowed brown eyes. Antonio Withrock, nicknamed Bunny
    because he never ran out of energy, was prowling the confines of the room like a mean, hungry
    cat, his dark skin pulled tight across his high cheekbones. Paul Drexler, the team sniper, sat
    cross-legged on top of the table while he wiped an oiled cloth lovingly over the
    disassembled parts of his beloved Remington bolt-action 7.62 rifle. Zane didn't even lift his
    eyebrows at the sight. His men were supposed to be unarmed, and they had been during the
    security exercise that had gone so damn sour, but keeping Drexler unarmed was another story.
    "Planning on talcing over the ship?" Zane inquired mildly of the sniper.
    His blue eyes cold, Drexler cocked his head as if considering the idea. "I might."
    Winstead "Spooky" Jones had been sitting on the deck, his back resting against the
    bulkhead, but at Zane's entrance he rose effortlessly to his feet. He didn't say anything, but
    his gaze fastened on Zane's face, and a spark of interest replaced some of the anger in his
    eyes.
    Spook never missed much, and the other team members had gotten in the habit of
    watching him, picking up cues from his body language. No more than three seconds passed
    before all five men were watching Zane with complete concentration.
    Greenberg was the one who finally spoke. "How's Bobcat doing, boss?"
    They had read Spooky's tension, but misread the cause, Zane realized. They thought
    Higgins had died from his wounds. Drexler began assembling his rifle with sharp, economical
    motions. "He's stabilized," Zane reassured them. He knew his men, knew how tight they were.
    A SEAL team had to be tight. Their trust in each other had to be absolute, and if something
    happened to one of them, they all felt it. "They're transferring him now. It's touchy, but I'll put my
    money on Bobcat. Odie's gonna be okay, too." He hitched one hip on the edge of the table,
    his pale eyes glittering with the intensity that had caught Spooky's attention. "Listen up,
    children. An ambassador's daughter was snatched a few hours ago, and we're going into
    Libya to get her."
    Six black-clad figures slipped silently along the narrow, deserted street in Benghazi,
    Libya. They communicated by hand signals, or by whispers into the Motorola headsets
    they all wore under their black knit balaclava hoods. Zane was in his battle mode; he was
    utterly calm as they worked their way toward the four-story stone building where Barrie
    Lovejoy was being held on the top floor, if their intelligence was good, and if she hadn't been
    moved within the past few hours.
    Action always affected him this way, as if every cell in his body had settled into its
    true purpose of existence. He had missed this, missed it to the point that he knew