Damned (SOBs Book 4)

by Irish Winters

  Chapter Six

  At last, Bree went limp. Thank God. After all she’d endured today, Kruze was determined to let her sleep as long as possible. The rescue helo was due at zero-eight-hundred hours, just after sunrise, weather permitting. That gave her a solid ten hours of shuteye.

  He’d known another Brianna once upon a time. In Paris, if he remembered right. But she’d been a young, vivacious redhead with bright blue eyes, and a bundle of nervous energy, nothing like Ms. Banks. Her last name was… for the life of him, Kruze couldn’t remember. Last names hadn’t been important then, not that they were now. But Bree seriously thought it didn’t matter what Josephus would do if he caught up with her? That somehow, she deserved to be treated badly, possibly raped?

  “Give me a break,” he growled softly to the lady on his lap. That’d be the day he let this tiny thing sacrifice herself, just so a big guy like him could get away. That’s not why he’d come to Turkey. That kind of crap wasn’t in his playbook. Mom had taught him better. Never hit a girl, even if she hit you first, and always—ALWAYS—protect the weak, the bullied, and basically, anyone who needed protection.

  Thankfully, Bree’s injuries, at least the ones he could see, weren’t life threatening. She was tougher than she looked, a survivor, he could tell. Hungry as hell, he lifted the pan to his lips and gulped what was left of the soup before it gelled. Lukewarm MREs were never appetizing, but the calories they provided were essential. One-handed, he retrieved two high-calorie protein bars from the dozen he carried in his bag, then unwrapped and snarfed them down to complete his meager feast. Kruze topped that off with a long draw from the CamelBak, secured his only supply of water, and stuffed the wrappers inside his bag. Tomorrow would begin with a challenging exfil at the crack of dawn, and he needed to be ready.

  Nights in high altitudes were cold, even protected from the weather like they were in this small hole-in-the-wall cave. He’d need to turn his LED off soon, though. A man could only carry a few extra batteries, and his weren’t solar-powered. He’d already stowed his first-aid kit. Ordinarily, he’d clean everything before he quit for the day, but tonight was different.

  Still holding Bree against him to make sure she stayed warm, one-handed he secured his supplies in his gear bag, then lifted to his feet, taking her off the floor with him. He needed to walk the perimeter, but he wasn’t leaving her to do it. Instead, Kruze made sure his jacket and the blanket were tight around her legs and feet before he settled to his butt just inside the narrow entrance. It was a tight fit. There was no wind tonight, and the storm hadn’t turned. Certainly not the blizzards these mountains were known for.

  Kruze hadn’t realized how far up he’d climbed until he’d scanned the sad excuse of the road below. Tracking Josephus and his men wasn’t difficult. His crew had set up a few tents, even a couple yurts, which were a disquieting development. They were more permanent, certainly more stable. Josephus had dug in. He probably had men scouting these mountains for Bree tonight, even in bad weather.

  Which was too fuckin’ bad for those sorry bastards. Kruze hoped they froze to death. He had no problem offing anyone who came after Bree. She’d awakened the protector in him, and with every soft breath against his neck, that damned alter ego, that ‘You Jane, me Tarzan’ complex he was known for, purred beneath his skin.

  Truth was, he loved women, all women. Short ones, tall ones, fat ones, skinny ones, they were each delightful in their own seductive way. And they’d all seduced him, some actively, others just by breathing. But the only woman who’d captured his heart had been Juliana. That was a long time ago, an unfortunate mission and a failure, his first. Until then, he hadn’t viewed women like he did now, not with the upbringing he’d had.

  Scarlett Sinclair had taught her sons right. They were the proverbial good boys in San Diego, courteous to all, afraid of none. Raised in a Navy town, they were destined for Navy careers. Chance enlisted first, Kruze followed, then Pagan. All were competitive as hell, and when Chance earned his Trident, well, the rowdy competitor inside Kruze over-achieved. Pagan followed suit. They’d each worked their ass off to earn their SEAL tridents, if only to prove they were just as good as their brothers. Maybe better.

  Deployment followed deployment. Even after losing Juliana, Kruze had still been all-out Navy. What else was there? He’d suffered through a couple MHEs, mental health evals, when he’d come home after that debacle in Panama. But nothing helped. With Juliana’s horrific murder, the thing inside his chest called a heart, had just plain withered and died. There was no coming back from a horror like that. Life looked different now. Kruze saw it for what it was and what it wasn’t—just an undetermined length of days filled with endless pain.

  The day his CO pulled him aside and told him how badly Chance had been hurt in South America, that he’d lost most of his team and might not survive the trip home, had been another tipping point. Kruze had already been on leave after he’d found out, the hard way that his mother was dying of cancer. He’d contacted Pagan with that news, and from then on, he and Pagan had hovered like a couple lost boys over Scarlett’s hospital bed. They’d both struggled to understand why the mother they adored hadn’t told them she had cancer, and they’d wondered how to break that news to Chance. He’d been hospitalized and in critical condition. It was weeks before he came to. Talk about a clusterfuck.

  Things went from bad to worse. Something inside Chance had died the day he found out Mom was gone. As soon as he was on his feet and able, he’d dressed in his Navy whites, marched into his CO’s office on Naval Base San Diego, and resigned. The same morning, Chance left the Navy and the ocean he’d loved behind. He moved to the frigid arctic north of Nowhere, Montana, even had his own mountain in his hundred-acre backyard. The move seemed to help. Within months Chance had found what he’d been searching for in the eyes of Suede Tennyson, a hellion when he’d first found her, now the light in his life and the mother of his baby son. Kruze liked Suede. He did. She was a great sister-in-law, and she was good for Chance. She’d filled the hole in his heart that losing Scarlett had left.

  Chance and Suede were happy. Hell, Pagan and Paloma were inseparable and deliriously, disgustingly content. That left Kruze, as usual, the odd man out. The middle child. The gawddamned Casanova. The one without a heart.

  He bowed his nose to the top of Bree’s head and breathed, just breathed. Despite her being a gawddamned journalist, there was something about her that called to him. He didn’t know what it was. Didn’t intend to hang around and find out, either. Once she was safely back in Incirlik, he’d hand her off to whoever Senator McQueen Sullivan had designated, then R&R in Montana until the next call-to-arms came. Kruze didn’t linger between jobs for long. Downtime gave him time to think, the last thing he needed.

  A few flakes still drifted through the still night air. The fires below no longer glittered, and his sixth sense hadn’t pinged once since he’d found this cave. With a certainty born of more skirmishes and battles than he could count, Kruze knew for a certainty that he and Bree were alone on this mountain. For now…

  Tonight was one of those rare silent nights when a man searched inward for answers without a clue what he was looking for. Kruze didn’t strive to be what he wasn’t. He’d never be as good as Chance, nor as kind as Pagan. Forever stuck in the middle, he wasn’t made like his brothers. Worse, he knew damned well something inside of him was broken. Its jagged edge pricked at him, like the broken glass shards that had festered and pestered poor Bree. Only this shard wasn’t under his skin; it was in his soul, and how the shit did a warrior find something as lost and intangible as that?

  Kruze didn’t have the tools. He didn’t know where to begin. If he did, it would be Juliana laying in his arms. It’d be the woman he wanted, not the client he’d been sent to rescue. At the end of this mission, Bree would go her way, he’d go the other. Their paths were opposites, already set in stone, so far apart they’d never meet in the middle again. It wasn’t in the card
s. Kruze owed his allegiance to his brothers, Senator McQueen Sullivan, and his country, not some lost journalist. He was one of the blackest of black operators, easily disavowed. Just as easily forgotten.

  Heaving a sigh of resignation, Kruze focused on the camp below. For a split second, he wondered at the possibility of sneaking down there and stealing a couple more blankets for Bree. She seemed warm enough, though. On the slim possibility that some plucky rebel below had the nerve to climb this rock face, Kruze decided he’d stay where he made the most difference. With Bree.

  His current level of supplies wouldn’t last the week, but Kruze wasn’t worried. Senator Sullivan had unilateral support agreements with all US defense departments. Which was why Kruze had already contacted the Air Force Special Warfare Pararescue team stationed with the 39th Air Base Wing, in Incirlik, Turkey. It’d take them a good twelve hours flight time to get there, but they were on their way, and he had faith in America’s flyboys. They took care of their brothers, active duty or black ops, and they owned the sky. They’d be here.

  Moaning in her sleep, Bree burrowed her face into his thick pectoral muscle. Without thinking, Kruze buried his nose in her hair again. He’d never seen an actual Kurdish wedding, hadn’t ever been invited, and he wasn’t positive he had his facts straight. But that red scarf made scary sense now. Kruze hadn’t the heart to tell Bree, but Berfende didn’t care about Kurdish traditions. She was now a marked woman. Berfende would want her back, if only to prove he could make an American woman submit to him.

  Kruze didn’t want anything to do with that rat bastard or his crusade against the Turks and his own brethren, the Kurds. Hell, no. The man was a stinkin’ narcissist and a self-absorbed sadist, as if the world needed more of them. Berfende was cruel. He enjoyed pain—other people’s pain—and he used torture, murder, poison, assassination, and rape to further his agenda. Although he boasted that he owned a palace, Kruze had seen it. There was no palace, just a ratty, walled-in compound. Berfende lived a nomadic life, always on the run. The man thought he controlled these mountains, but the true Kurds thought different. Which was why they hunted him as zealously as the Turkish Army did. The true Kurds needed to end his reign of terror before the Turks ended them. Turkish soldiers didn’t distinguish between Berfende’s rebels and Kurdish rebels. To the Turks, they were one and the same—unwanted.

  Berfende’s vicious cruelty to the Turkish soldiers he’d captured always incited swift retaliation by the Turkish army. Yet the man hadn’t quit. For years now, he’d used the unrest he’d created between his own people and Turkey, like a well-honed scimitar to carve out his radical empire. His war within a war was possibly the greatest threat to the stability of Turkey’s eastern border with Armenia, where again, there was no love lost. The last thing this country needed was more war.

  Kruze bowed his head into Bree’s neck and murmured, “First thing tomorrow morning, we’re leaving, sugar. You were right. We can’t stay.”

  She stirred in his arms, as if she’d heard him, but instead of waking, she nestled deeper against him. Something uncurled inside Kruze’s chest. It was a small thing, like her. Small, like the tip of a match, yet powerful enough to start a fire. If he let it.

  Pressing his lips to the crease between her neck and shoulder, he apologized. “I never should’ve treated you like I did. I’m sorry. Yeah, I’m an ass, but I’m usually good with women. Actually, I’m great with women.”

  He took a deep breath of the slightly sweaty, slightly sweet essence that was Bree. He was spending this night with her, possibly two nights before they made it back to America. But this was different. She was a job, that was all. Once she was safely in Incirlik, Kruze knew damned well he’d walk away and not look back. He might even agree to escort her to the States. Hell, he might even grant her an interview once they got there, to commemorate their night on the mountain together. She’d probably like that.

  But at the end of the day, Kruze knew he wasn’t any better than Berfende. He was poison. All he’d do was hurt Bree. The only difference between Berfende and him was, for this one time, Kruze wasn’t using Bree like he did most women. He’d let her go without his randy stamp of carnal approval. Yeah. That was exactly what he’d do.

  Chapter Seven

  Bree rubbed her nose into the warm, aromatic pillow beneath her cheek. Her nostrils flared at the heady male scent surrounding her. If this was a dream, she didn’t want to wake up.

  But open her eyes she did, and what a sight. She was still cradled in Kruze Sinclair’s magnificent arms. Her nose was cold, her tenderized backside was firmly on his extra-warm lap, and the rest of her was cozy. How sweet. He’d watched over her. What kind of man does that?

  Details Bree hadn’t noticed about her handsome guardian last night were visible in the mellow light of the coming day. While Kruze held a small binocular device to his face, she studied him. The beard gracing his jaw and the underside of his chin was thick and scattered with hints of brown and gold. Both his hair and beard were shaggy, not trimmed, but not long, either. She still couldn’t see the beautiful green color of his eyes, but the arm she rested on was firm, the biceps so much thicker than hers. Everything about Kruze was larger and thicker than she was. This man was big-boned, and he had some serious musculature. She would know; she had seen him in the buff before. He’d been a glorious specimen of the male gender then. From what she could see, he’d only gotten better.

  But that night of unmade promises, followed by a morning of no Kruze in sight, destroyed the connection Bree thought they’d shared. Kruze leaving like he had, still made her feel cheap, dirty, and used. Did he ever think about that crazy coming together, how they’d seemed to connect on a spiritual level, or how they’d played like a couple of kids? In the bed. In the shower. Even on the balcony? How they’d talked all night. She did. Of the two of them, she’d brought the best souvenir from that perfect night home with her. What did he have? Apparently, nothing. The ass didn’t even remember her.

  As if he sensed her watching him, Kruze eased the binoculars from his face and looked down at her. “Hey, hungry?”

  Bree licked her bottom lip. She could finally see the green in his sharp eyes as they flickered to the movement of her mouth, then flashed back to her eyes. His nostrils flared. The hint of a smile pinched one corner of his mouth. They were so close. Their lips. Their mouths.

  This magnetic attraction had to stop. “When are we leaving?” she asked to break the spell before she did something reckless. Like she’d done last time!

  He blinked as if his thoughts had been as far off as hers were. He coughed, the cords in his neck tightening as he forced a swallow. Reaching for the clip on his shirt collar, he unlatched the CamelBak’s drinking tube and extended it to her. “Fill up. Drink as much as you can. We’ll eat once we’re moving if we need to. Just protein bars for breakfast, sorry. If you need to relieve yourself, there’s a couple shrubs beside this exit. I’ll go with you.”

  Bree stiffened her back and shoved out of his arm. Who did he think he was? “You will not. I’ll need privacy, if and when—”

  “You’ll do what I say. I didn’t come here to argue. Eat, drink, then pee.” Kruze ticked those items off three gloved fingers, ending with his index finger stuck nearly in her face. “But first, always first, we stay together. Understood?”

  “You said we were safe up here.”

  “We were. Last night. It snowed since then. Today we’ll be easy to pick off if anyone’s hunting us.”

  “We should’ve left.”

  He shook his head. “No, ma’am. Smart operators know when to hunker down and regroup. That’s all we did. Now, pee or not?”

  Bree’s hackles lifted. Kruze was making her mad. She shifted off his lap to her knees, then to her feet. Every part of her body hurt. But the moment her feet hit the dirt, she looked down. She was wearing socks. Big, manly socks. His socks. That was unexpectedly kind of him. Still.

  “I’ll tell you wh
en, or if, I need to… to find a shrub, damn it.”

  He gave her one quick nod, then jumped to his feet and right away ducked to keep from hitting his head on the low, uneven ceiling. His rifle strap went over one shoulder, his gear bag over the other. “Let’s move.”

  Well, good. Bree had no more use for this caveman’s high-handed attitude.

  “First…” He held the CamelBak tube in one gloved hand. “Drink,” he ordered.

  Obediently, she did, but when he offered two already unwrapped candy bars in his other hand, she waved them off. “I don’t eat sugar.”

  “Are you kidding me? Take them. You need the calories in these protein bars to get out of here. Helicopters can’t land on sheer granite walls, and they don’t do curbside. We have to hike to them.”

  Nice Kruze was gone; Pigheaded Kruze was back in charge. Well, okay then. Bree handed the drinking tube back and took the bars. To appease her grumpy companion, she stuffed one bar into the pocket of the jacket she was still wearing. When she did, her knuckles bumped against something concealed within the lining, something square and solid—a man’s wallet? Had to be. Interesting place to hide it.

  Taking a small bite of the other bar, she mumbled sarcastically around the chocolate morsels in her mouth, “There. Happy now?”

  “Nope. Not until I get you on that chopper and out of here.”

  That sounded a lot like good riddance. Well, fine. Bree couldn’t wait to be rid of this aggravating man, either. She looked down at her feet again. His socks were just socks, probably wool, not shoes or boots, certainly not sturdy enough to walk very far in. But the thought of Kruze taking time to care for her poor feet while she’d been out cold, caught her by surprise.

  There was a tender side to this rugged guy, a side he seemed determined to hide—or destroy. He did care about her; she knew it. So why the asshole-routine now, when last night, she’d thought he might kiss her? What demons could possibly have changed him from the sweet playboy he’d been in Paris, to the jerk he was now? It was as if he had a hidden switch. Nice Kruze off; Pigheaded Kruze on.