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The colonel picked up his telephone. “I want Security here immediately!”

“Where is she, Stuart? If you sent her back to her uncle, Jesus Christ, if you sent her to him—”

The door flew open. Hands grabbed Dec’s elbows. Lifted him off his feet. Carried him backwards out the door.

“Let go of me,” Dec snarled. “Goddammit…”

“Shut up, Sanchez,” a familiar voice growled. “Just shut the fuck up.”

Dec blinked. “Olivieri?”

“Olivieri,” Chay said. “And Spanos. The others are right behind us. You keep fighting, we’ll hang onto your arms, they’ll take your feet and we’ll carry you out of here like a package. Is that what you want?”

Dec’s shoulders slumped. “Shit!”

“Yeah. Exactly. Maguire? Get that door.”

Chay and Alex, with Dec locked between them and the others hard on their heels, stepped into a room. It was some kind of break room. Nothing in it but a coffee pot, a platter of doughnuts, a couple of tables and some chairs—and a surprised-looking sailor with a doughnut in her hand.

Aidan Maguire glared at her. “Out,” he barked.

The sailor scurried out the door. Danny Sullivan kicked it shut while Chay and Alex dropped Dec in a chair. A second later, the five STUD operatives stood around Dec in a semi-circle, all of them glowering, all with their feet apart and their arms folded over their chests.

“Sanchez,” Spanos demanded, “what the fuck did you think you were doing?”

Dec rubbed his hands over his face. “Okay. I was a little out of line.”

Sullivan raised his eyebrows. “A little?”

“Stuart is an asshole!”

The men looked at each other. “What a revelation,” Olivieri said.

“Yeah,” Maguire said, “we can always count on Sanchez to figure out the tough stuff.”

“He’s also a colonel connected to the DOD, to State, to CIA and NSA…dammit, he’s probably got a hotline straight into the Oval Office.” Romano shook his head. “He didn’t just want to throw you to the wolves, Dec, he wanted to stand by and watch them rip you apart.”

Dec rested his arms on his thighs and looked down at the floor.

“Yeah. I guess.”

“You guess? You guess?”

“Okay. You’re right.” Dec looked up. “You guys saved my ass.”

Olivieri shook his head. “Black saved your ass.”

“Black?”

“Stuart contacted him. Told him you were—what’s the quote, Danny?”

“An undisciplined, dangerous, out-of-control misfit psychologically unsuited to remain in the service.”

“But I added that you were a handsome devil,” Aidan said.

The lame joke broke the tension. Everybody laughed,

even Dec. Then his laughter faded.