“Yeah, but the Navy accused me of going on a hunting expedition. Claimed I went there to intentionally kill Hussein.” He shrugged, trying to appear nonchalant as he took another drink. “Which is exactly what I did. I recognized Hussein as one of the men who’d been instrumental in taking out my entire Team, and I wanted pay back. I didn’t care about my career. My men deserved justice and I saw to it. Everything the Navy put me through was worth it since it was that branch of the Taliban who ambushed my men.”
Crash let out a tight breath to loosen his tense body as his patience grew thin. “With all due respect, they dropped all charges, Rye.”
“Fuck that.” He nervously paced the floor. “They tried to screw me every way they could. They train you to be a warrior and then they want you to be a goddamn Boy Scout. That doesn’t work for me. You kill my men, I’m going to hunt you down and kill you.”
Crash lifted his chin, his eyes squinted. “I know you’re bitter.”
Rye laughed as he turned back to face Crash. “If bitter only came close to how I feel, I’d think twice about everything. But it doesn’t. After twenty years of one mission on top of another, and God only knows how many medals or how many promotions, they didn’t hesitate to put the screws to me when they got a chance.”
“I got your ass out of there, all charges dropped, and you were reinstated.” Crash’s voice rose. After a brief pause, he scrubbed his hands over his face and let out a deep breath. Once again in control, he continued in a lower tone. “I kind of figure you owe me.” Crash’s eyes flickered with indignation and conviction.
“Funny, I don’t see it that way,” Rye commented. “What you did was right a wrong and that was your job. I didn’t do anything any other Lieutenant Commander in the SEALs wouldn’t have done in the exact same situation. They had no right to charge me with anything.
“I went before those asshole admirals who’d never even seen a day of action in their entire careers. Fucking pencil pushers and future politicians. And they were anxious, eager even, to take my career and toss it in the trash.”
“But you got back in the game.”
“What I got was a new Team I worked with for five years. Just long enough to retire. I barely knew them. You know how the SEAL brotherhood works. It’s all about trust. After my men were murdered, I found relying on someone else a hard commodity to come by.”
“It’s no secret someone set your team up. We knew there was a leak somewhere. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t find out who it was.” His eyes bored into Rye’s with an unspoken dare. “But you have the opportunity to end the whole damn thing.”
That caught Rye’s interest and he stared Crash straight in the eyes. He’d love to put the rest of the bastards who’d ordered the kill on his Team six feet under. Damn, dare he imagine getting more vengeance? It hadn’t gone so well the last time he sought that route. “Meaning?”
“Khalil Qamar and CIA Asset Harper Woods.” Crash stepped closer. “That make your heart beat a little faster?”
“Qamar has been eluding everything and everyone for years. What makes you think you can get him?”
“I’m not going to get him. You are, with the aid of Woods.”
Rye tightened his jaws. “You trust Woods? I don’t. I can’t swear she’s not the leak. She damn sure didn’t have anything good to say about me at the hearing. In her own words, I was impulsive, aggressive, and didn’t like to follow orders. Not much of a character witness, huh?”
“But her last statement was the one that mattered. The one where she said you were the best Navy SEAL she’d ever worked with.”
“As a CIA Asset, I still find it hard to believe she wasn’t in on the setup. Not sure she didn’t take part in the whole thing.”
“Then why is she still there?” Crash asked. “And the drug money is still there as a lure to Qamar.”
Rye sure the hell hadn’t expected those words to come out of Crash’s mouth. Woods still in Afghanistan? She had plenty of opportunities to get out, and she probably should’ve taken one of them. “I find it hard to believe she stayed all this time. She been hunting down Khalil Qamar?”
“She’s never stopped. While you took out the number two guy, she wants Qamar. His reign of terror continues all over the world, and she wants it stopped.”
“The big question for me is who turned on my Team, then? In my opinion she was the most likely person.”
“What did she have to gain by doing that? If she had turned on your Team and then retired with a bag full of money, maybe.” Crash gave his head a sideway nod. “But why would she stay there and continue to work her resources if she had gotten your Team slaughtered?” He held out his hands. “Don’t you see?”
He didn’t have the answer. Rye had assumed when she came stateside for his hearing, she’d stay in the US. He fought every urge in his body to keep from hunting her down. To confront her. To tell her to go straight to hell. But he didn’t. Three weeks later, he left for Cherry Creek, Virginia, assigned as the Team Commander to another SEAL team. Two days later they had a mission. Somehow Woods got pushed to the back of his mind, and that’s where he’d kept her.
“So, what’s your offer, Crash? You know I’m not the man I was ten years ago. And after the ambush——” He shook his head and stared at the wooden slats on his floor. “I may have been the lone survivor, but they still pumped a lot of lead into me before help arrived.”
“I know there was a time we didn’t think you’d make it. But you stayed and fought for your men. It says a lot about a leader when he’s the last one to go down. When he stays and fights to the bitter end. You did that, Rye. I think you would do it again.”
“Yeah, and the next time I could be killed.”
“Here’s my offer, and I want you to think about it long and hard. Harper Woods has come up with some serious intel that might, for the very first time, make it possible for us to find Khalil Qamar. If what she has is valid, this is our last chance. Our only chance.”
“That means it’s back to the sandlot for me?”
Crash nodded. “That’s where Qamar is. That’s where CIA Asset Harper Woods is, too.”
He ran his fingers through his hair. He needed to think about this. He blinked several times and scene after scene of their last stand rushed through his mind. “I’m not a young guy anymore.”
“You’re still one of the best Team and Task Commanders there is. And don’t cut yourself short. I know you run five to seven miles a day. You work out at the gym four days a week.” He looked Rye up and down. “You’re in great shape. Probably better than you want to admit.”
“You can say that because you haven’t seen the scars.”
“We all have scars, Rye. Just not all of them show. I need you to do this if we ever hope to bring Qamar down. We can’t afford to miss this window of opportunity.”
“I’d jump at it more quickly if Woods wasn’t involved. I don’t trust her.”
“There was a time I thought you two had a thing going on.”
Crash spoke the truth. Even now, the thought of her warm skin against his had his cock coming to attention, but he couldn’t allow sex and desire to cloud his common sense.
“No, not after my team was wiped out and she was one of the very few people who knew exactly where we were, and it was her on the mic in my ear who led us into a trap.”
“Think about it. You have two days.” He put his card on the table. “If you’re not interested, I’ll try to get somebody else.”
“I don’t even have a Team anymore.”
“I have three former SEALs in mind. I promise you won’t be disappointed.”
“I’m already disappointed.”
Want More Silver?
Did you enjoy this story? Read through the other stories in the Silver SEALs Series by these other fantastic military romance authors:
SEAL Strong – Cat Johnson
SEAL Love’s Legacy – Sharon Hamilton
SEAL Together – Maryann J
ordan
SEAL in Charge – Donna Michaels
SEAL in a Storm – KaLyn Cooper
SEAL Forever – Kris Michaels
SEAL Out of Water – Abbie Zanders
Sign, SEAL and Deliver – Geri Foster
SEAL Hard – J.m. Madden
SEAL Undercover – Desiree Holt
SEAL for Hire – Trish Loye
SEAL at Sunrise – Caitlyn O’Leary
SEAL of Fortune – Becky McGraw
Make sure to pick up ALL the books in the Silver SEAL series. These can be read in any order and each stands alone.
SEAL Out of Water (Silver SEALs, #7) Page 22