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  Shane

  The Mavericks, Book 12

  Dale Mayer

  Books in This Series:

  Kerrick, Book 1

  Griffin, Book 2

  Jax, Book 3

  Beau, Book 4

  Asher, Book 5

  Ryker, Book 6

  Miles, Book 7

  Nico, Book 8

  Keane, Book 9

  Lennox, Book 10

  Gavin, Book 11

  Shane, Book 12

  Diesel, Book 13

  The Mavericks, Books 1–2

  The Mavericks, Books 3–4

  The Mavericks, Books 5–6

  The Mavericks, Books 7–8

  The Mavericks, Books 9–10

  The Mavericks, Books 11–12

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  About This Book

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Epilogue

  About Diesel

  Author’s Note

  Complimentary Download

  About the Author

  Copyright Page

  About This Book

  What happens when the very men—trained to make the hard decisions—come up against the rules and regulations that hold them back from doing what needs to be done? They either stay and work within the constraints given to them or they walk away. Only now, for a select few, they have another option:

  The Mavericks. A covert black ops team that steps up and break all the rules … but gets the job done.

  Welcome to a new military romance series by USA Today best-selling author Dale Mayer. A series where you meet new friends and just might get to meet old ones too in this raw and compelling look at the men who keep us safe every day from the darkness where they operate—and live—in the shadows … until someone special helps them step into the light.

  Her kidnappers demanded Shane arrive. Finding out his best friend was held as a pawn just pissed him off. Finding out rescuing her was a test made him seriously angry. He hates being used. These men mean business though, as Shane finds a body count too high for comfort.

  Shelly knew Shane would come for her. No way he wouldn’t. She was lucky to have Shane there for her, especially when learning a second woman had been kidnapped and held for over six months. The simple rescue of Shelly turns into something more to find this second woman.

  But is there one killer boss out there or two? As the pair try to secure their own freedom, it gets even murkier, until finding a way through is paramount. Otherwise no one gets a happy ending.

  Sign up to be notified of all Dale’s releases here!

  Prologue

  Shane Andrews opened his apartment door, walked inside, and tossed his duffel bag down. He headed to the fridge, pulled out a cold beer, and stepped out on his small deck. He popped the top and took a long refreshing drink. That had been one hell of a job in Hawaii. A lot of healing needed to happen now for that family. Not only did the parents have to heal but the children and the grandchildren were involved as well. He didn’t understand Melinda being so self-centered, so selfish that she would put her parents and her sister through so much, just to make sure she got what she wanted.

  Melinda had been a piece of work. That she’d been a suspect right from the beginning didn’t surprise Shane, just because her attitude had been so off. But the fact that Steve had been a willing party to it all was too much, especially considering that he was a navy man Shane should have been able to trust.

  He rotated his neck, stretching out some of the kinks. It had been a long two days. He was home now and needed a few days to regroup. At least he hoped he got a couple days off. He’d taken an extra day to stay with Gavin and the family to tie up things and to get all the facts straight.

  Now that Shane was home, he didn’t know quite what the next few days would bring, but he was up for it. At least he thought he would be. It was a hell of a deal joining the Mavericks, but he was pretty happy with his decision. If ever somebody needed to be stopped, it was Melinda. He hadn’t expected this to be the level of the work he would be doing. Still, it was what it was.

  As he sat here, his phone buzzed, and he smiled when he saw it was Gavin. He hit the Talk button. “I’m home, safe and sound, bud. No need to worry about me.”

  “Hey, I just wanted to make sure you were looking after that leg of yours,” he said.

  “Yep, we’re all good.”

  “Good,” he said. “How do you feel about New York?”

  “Why in the hell would I ever want to go there?” he asked.

  At that, Gavin laughed. “Remember Diesel?”

  “Diesel Edwards? Yeah, I remember. What about him?”

  “He’ll be waiting for you there at the airport.”

  “Shit, am I leaving already?” Shane asked, as he looked at his beer.

  “Absolutely. Well, in about three hours,” he said.

  “Wow, not even enough time to do a load of laundry.”

  “Sure there is. If you just put down that beer, get up off your ass, and get your clothes in the machine,” Gavin said, laughing, “you can drink it while they wash.”

  “So, what am I doing in New York?” he asked, as he walked to grab his bag of dirty clothes and did exactly that. With the washing machine started, he grabbed his beer and looked down at his phone. “What is it you aren’t saying?”

  “It looks like a hostage situation has gone down in a big telecom building,” he said.

  “What’s that got to do with me?”

  “Well, Diesel is already in position, or he will be soon. He’ll pick you up at the airport. You are going into the tunnels and coming up through the basement.”

  “What the hell does SWAT have to say about that?”

  “Well, they’re hoping this might be right up your alley.”

  “Why is that?”

  “Because, uh, … because one of your best friends is in there.”

  At that moment, everything inside Shane froze.

  “Shelly?” He remembered her saying she had a brand-new job in New York. “I know she just moved there, but what’s she doing in the telecom building?”

  “She was a new hire about forty-five days ago,” he said. “Didn’t you hear about it?”

  And, of course, he had, but he had completely forgotten. “Why do you think she’s involved? That’s a huge building.”

  “Because the kidnappers said she was. And they are hanging on to her until you arrive. So get your ass out there.”

  Chapter 1

  Shane disembarked from the plane carrying his duffel bag over his shoulder and tried to work around what had to be several thousand people between him and the exit. They all had to get past the luggage turnstiles. Finally catching a break as the crowd parted, Shane worked his way through, headed for the exit. Once outside, he stopped and took several long slow deep breaths. The air here was never the same as it was back in California. New York always had more smog, a heavier atmosphere, and that smell. Mostly traffic exhaust, as far as he could ever tell. Then that sense of being rushed.

  He walked to the curb, where he took a closer look at the vehicles up and down the street. Diesel was supposed to be here waiting for him, at least that’s the last word he’d gotten from Gavin. Just as he was about to turn and look back the other way, he heard a shout. He spun and looked on the far side of the street down about ten cars to see a tall beef of a man standing o
utside his truck and waving at him.

  Checking the traffic, Shane quickly dodged through the oncoming vehicles and headed toward his old friend. As soon as he got there, Diesel’s grin flashed.

  “Damn, man,” Diesel said, “it’s good to see you.” The two high-fived each other, as Shane tossed his duffel bag into the open pickup bed, then scrambled into the passenger seat.

  “Why does it always take chaos or something like this to bring us together?”

  “Well, if we had any more chaos,” Diesel said, “we would be damn near living on top of each other.”

  “Isn’t that the truth,” Shane said, grumping. “I just finished a big case with Gavin,” he murmured, “and was hoping for a few days off.”

  “You’d have gotten it,” Diesel said, “except for the fact that the kidnappers have a friend of yours.”

  “I know. I can’t believe she got herself into trouble already,” he said, shaking his head. “I swear. Every time she turns around, she somehow manages to find some.”

  “Sounds like you know her pretty well.”

  “I do,” he said. “We’ve been friends since kindergarten.”

  At that, Diesel burst out laughing. “Seriously?” He looked at Shane, thinking he was exaggerating, but Shane was serious.

  He nodded. “I’m not kidding. Man, that woman could get herself and anybody nearby in trouble so fast that you didn’t know what hit you.”

  “How is she at getting out of trouble?”

  “She’s got some uncanny luck,” he said. “I mean that too. How else does she manage to get somebody like me for something like this?”

  “Well, this case might not be a very good example.”

  “Okay, fine,” he said, “but it wouldn’t matter. Something or someone else would have come to her rescue.”

  “Interesting,” Diesel said. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you mention her.”

  “That’s because we don’t come in contact that often,” he said, “but she’s one of those long-term friends you can pick up a phone and call out of the blue, no matter how many years have gone by.”

  “Those are the special ones.”

  “Exactly,” he said. “So I’m still figuring out the background. Did you get any news from Gavin on it?”

  “The kidnappers aren’t talking. It sounds like maybe they’ve got some beef with you, and either they snagged her after finding out who she was or gave her the job down there in the hopes that you would visit, but, when you didn’t appear fast enough, they orchestrated this scenario to get you here.”

  “Jesus. Who have I pissed off lately? Well,” he said, laughing bitterly, “who haven’t I?”

  “Right,” Diesel said. “No shortage of people on the wrong side of our world.”

  “What about Hawaii? Do you think it had anything to do with that?” he asked Diesel. “How much do you know about that case?”

  “I only know the quick version,” he said, “but Gavin doesn’t seem to think it’s connected.”

  “Well, I’ll go with his gut on that for now,” he said.

  “What kind of work does Shelly do?”

  “Project management,” he said. Then he chuckled. “Shelly is really good at ordering people around.”

  Diesel shook his head. “I’m glad you say that with a smile on your face, but I can’t tell if you’re teasing or not.”

  “No, she’s very good at telling people what to do and where to go,” he said, “but maybe she’s tempered that for her work. I don’t know. She was always a fairly reckless kid growing up, and we got along famously. I’d push. She’d shove, and we’d end up on the ground, wrestling and pulling each other’s hair. She never wanted to be treated like a girl, and, at the same time, she’s the most feminine-looking angel you ever saw.”

  “She sounds like a tough little nut.”

  “Yes, she was, right up until her mother died from breast cancer,” he said quickly. “After that, she became a different person. As if all that fighting and bickering may have been to prove herself to her mother or something. I don’t know,” he said. “Her father died when she was about five, somewhere around the time that I met her. She was a really sad little kid back then. I befriended her, not sure exactly why, but something about her caused my heart to ache. We’ve been buddies ever since.”

  “But only buddies?”

  “Yep, only buddies,” he said. “I’ve called her up a number of times to commemorate when I’ve broken up from relationships, and she’s done the same. We’ve often killed a case of beer or crushed some Häagen-Dazs in memory of the relationships that no longer were.”

  “I’m surprised you guys didn’t get together,” Diesel said.

  “We discussed it once,” he said, “and, in all honesty, we decided we needed our friendship more.” He grinned at Diesel. “So that goes to tell you how well we communicate.”

  “That’s amazing,” he murmured. He wove through traffic, taking the vehicle from one end of town to the other.

  “So what the hell is going on with this communication company? What do they know about me?”

  “I don’t know. Check in with Gavin to see if they’ve got any updates. My understanding was that the kidnappers said they would talk to you and only you.”

  “They didn’t say what they wanted, huh?”

  “Nope. Everybody’s in the dark about that.”

  “Great,” he said. “These deals are always the craziest, no idea which way to go or where to run.”

  “Exactly, which is why they think you’re arriving in six hours on a different flight.”

  “Nice. So we’ve got a six-hour window then.” Shane rubbed his hands together. “Are we well equipped?”

  “Anything you want, you better speak up,” Diesel said, “because six hours won’t give us that much time. But, generally with Gavin, whatever we need, we’ll get.”

  “I hope so,” Shane said, “because I don’t want to go into something like this without hefty firepower.”

  “No, I agree with you there. Especially not knowing just what we’re up against.”

  “Yeah, and that’ll be a little hard to figure out.”

  “Absolutely. Give Gavin a shout, and see what he knows.”

  Shane pulled out his phone and quickly sent off a text to Gavin. “Do we have a hotel yet?”

  “Yeah, we’re heading there right now,” Diesel said. “It’s a small three-star hotel around the corner from the communication office.”

  “Perfect. Any tunnels under there?”

  “Yeah,” he said, “but just the underground city tunnels. The ones that feed in and out to access the sewer lines and subways.”

  “Great,” he said. “We’ll need some extra protective gear then.”

  “Absolutely. Make a list of everything you want, including the firepower.”

  Almost in delight, Shane pulled out a notepad and wrote down what he thought he would need. When he was done, he read it aloud to Diesel. “I’m not even sure we can carry all this stuff.”

  “Well, not only carry it but we may have to squeeze into some pretty narrow places,” he said. “I don’t know what it’s like down there in sewer city.”

  “It’s tight,” Shane said. “I’ve been in a couple, but not New York’s though.”

  “We’ve got the maps already. So we’ll just make a quick stop at the hotel to check in, drop off our stuff, then pick up what we need and move out.”

  “Good. Hopefully Shelly and I will be sitting over a steak later tonight.”

  “Well, that would be ideal. I’m not sure if I, uh, if I’m welcome to join you or not,” he said, “but a steak sounds like a pretty decent way to end the day.”

  “Absolutely,” Shane said. “Besides, you never know. You guys might hit it off.”

  Diesel looked at him, smiled, and said, “We’ll see about that.” As they pulled up to the hotel, he said, “Go ahead and check in, Shane. I’ll go switch to a different vehicle, and I’ll be right back.”<
br />
  “Okay. What name is the reservation under?”

  “Mine,” he said.

  With that, Shane hopped out, grabbed his duffel bag, and walked inside. As soon as he was in the hotel room, he brought out his laptop and quickly opened up the Mavericks chat box and typed in the list of needs he had made. The response came back quickly.

  Two hours.

  Shane replied immediately. Make it an hour and fifteen. We’re short on time.

  He brought up the online map of the underground tunnels they would need to access in order to get into the telecom building and figured it would take them about an hour to navigate that too. Which meant they were really pushed for time. He took a quick shower and got out just as Diesel arrived.

  “The equipment should be coming in less than an hour,” Shane said. “I figure it will take us an hour to navigate the tunnels and up into the building. What we need to know is where exactly they’re holding her in there.”

  “And that’s a possibility,” he said. “We’re expecting a phone call from them.”

  Shane looked at him with surprise. “From the kidnappers?”

  “Yes.” Diesel checked his watch and said, “In about five minutes.”

  “Good, let’s get set up for that then.”

  Shelly Berkshire glared at her kidnappers. “He won’t come. You know that, right?”

  They ignored her, just like they had ignored her every other time that she’d brought it up. She’d been initially terrified, but, as soon as she realized they were after Shane, her anger grew. Of course their comment about her being his doxy set it aflame.

  She hoped Shane didn’t come. It seemed like he was always bailing her out of these things. Although she hadn’t done a single thing to bring this one on, so it wasn’t her fault. She figured somebody hated him already, and they were using her for bait somehow. She watched the clock, knowing a phone call was supposed to happen. And she would probably speak, would be proof of life.

  If she knew anything about Shane, he would make sure she was okay. The problem was, she needed to have some message ready in order to give him some help. Even if they got into the building somehow, it was massive, and she couldn’t tell him a whole lot, not with her kidnappers listening in.