Stiletto Read Online Free Page A

been manhandled out of the room, and there were floor plans tacked up on the walls. Laptop computers glowed on the counter and the kitchen table. A flat-screen TV sat precariously by the sink showing camera feeds from around the outside of the house.
    The main difference, however, was that there were now people bustling around. Some were examining the plans on the walls, some were perched on whatever surface they could find, staring at screens, and others were bent over plastic cases, checking the guns that glinted in their little foam beds. Felicity scanned them all, automatically noting their locations, but she was really looking for six specific people. It wasn’t hard to identify them: four men, two women, all dressed in the menacing black coveralls that Odgers had been wearing, although theirs fit. They were all possessed of excellent posture and spoke in quiet tones. One of the men was in a corner doing the splits with his ankles raised up on stacks of phone books.
    Everyone looked up as Felicity entered the room. There was a moment of appalled silence, and then a wave of laughter and hooting filled the kitchen. She ducked her head, blushing under her grime.
    “Clements, you look fab!” one of the women called. “Are you coming from a date or going to one?” Grinning, Felicity raised a brisk two fingers in reply.
    “You’ll never make it to the Barghests if you show up to work looking like that,” a large man tsked.
    “Jennings, don’t be hard on Fliss,” said one of the men, “just ’cause she looks like she raided your wardrobe.”
    “Ah, he’s just doing his best to flirt,” said Felicity. “After all, this ” — and she gestured at herself — “ticks all his fantasy boxes, doesn’t it? We all know he’s into that hobo porn.” She paused as a short redheaded woman came over and stood in front of her.
    “Pawn Clements, I note no difference in your appearance or smell from that of any other day,” said the woman flatly.
    “Nice one, Cordingley, that was an amusing remark,” said Felicity. The woman nodded. She’s been working on her humor, Felicity thought fondly. Someone pressed a cup of tea into her hands, and the team members continued to chaff her and one another as she moved into the room.
    It was all comfortingly familiar. She knew these people as well as she knew herself — better, really. She’d been working with them for two years now, since she’d graduated from combat training, all innocent-eyed and nervous-shouldered and hesitant-voiced. They’d helped her gestate into a real soldier. Pawn Gardiner had held Felicity’s hand while she pulled herself together after shooting her first eel-man hybrid, and she in turn had held Pawn Moore’s head and left foot while he pulled himself together after confronting a man made out of scythes. With them, she had battled bunyips in the Barbican, hunted horrors on Hampstead Heath, been air-dropped into Acton, sloshed through the sewers under Soho, and served as sentry at Sandringham House.
    They had all seen one another at their best and their worst. She’d seen them covered in spilled blood (mainly other people’s) and spilled beer (mainly their own), and she’d stood as honor guard at Barnaby’s wedding and as godmother to Jennings’s daughter. They weren’t just colleagues; they were her brothers and sisters in arms.
    Odgers entered the room and the noise died away as everyone stood to attention. The chief was followed by someone Felicity did not know, a tall, strapping Indian man about her own age or perhaps a year or two younger. He looked vaguely familiar. I suppose I might have seen him at the Estate, she mused.
    “Welcome back, Clements. Was your reconnaissance successful?”
    “For the most part,” said Felicity.
    “That sounds half promising,” said Odgers. “Oh, before you report, this is Pawn Chopra.” She gestured to the Indian man.
    He’s rather more-ish, thought Felicity appreciatively.
    “Sanjay,” he said,