War Games_Valiant Knox

by Jess Anastasi

  “Are you okay?” His voice was not much more than an intimate rumble above her ear.

  She looked up, and in her dream, the relief intensified, even as her body filled with a different, warmer sensation. But her logical mind separated itself out of the dream in confusion, because she knew this wasn’t right.

  Cameron McAllister smoothed a hand through her hair, slate gray eyes filled with tenderness and heat. “I wish I could make this better for you.”

  Except he could never make it better. Nothing but time could do that. Yet, in the dream, she didn’t let him go. She didn’t step back. She didn’t get angry or put up the walls she’d made especially for him. She didn’t want to do any of that. She just wanted to stand there in his embrace, feel the solid warmth of him against her, and pretend like he could make it better.

  She wanted to feel his lips on hers—

  The gasp woke her fully, yanking her out of sleep the same way a nightmare would. Which was a pretty apt description.

  Hell, that couldn’t have been anything but a nightmare—wanting the man she’d loathed for years.

  What the hell was wrong with her? That damned incident with the trap had screwed with her head. She’d been grateful he’d saved her from a broken ankle and her mind seemed determined to make it into something more.

  A hand landed on her shoulder and she jerked away, palm landing on the pistol she’d left near her pack.

  “Whoa, it’s just me.”

  McAllister’s whisper brought her attention up to his face. He held his hands up and out, either to show her he wasn’t armed or to prove he wasn’t going to touch her again. The fire had long died down; the cave was mostly dark, apart from the first gray light of morning beginning to creep in at the mouth. Everyone else was dead asleep.

  It’s just me, McAllister had said. That was the problem, though. It was him. Bad enough she was stuck with him for the next few days, but now he was invading her dreams in the worst way possible. How was she ever going to look at him again without remembering what it felt like to have his arms around her?

  Her emotions were heightened with all this stuff about Jordie fresh in her mind, so it had blown one single rescue-hug into something it had never been.

  “Are you okay?” Reality escaped her as the words he’d said to her in the dream whispered across the darkness between them.

  She shook her head, wishing she could erase the dream from her mind, because she’d never be able to look at him the same way again.

  “What’s wrong? Is there anything I can do?” He eased closer, slowly, as though she was a skittish animal and he wasn’t sure how she was going to take his presence. “Bad dream?”

  If only he knew. The question grounded her, and the dream suddenly seemed kind of ridiculous, which almost left her laughing.

  “The worst you can imagine.”

  “Yeah, I have them occasionally myself.” He shifted from crouching to sitting next to her.

  The easy admission startled her, and obviously showed in her expression, because that quick half grin she was coming to know surfaced for a moment.

  “Any soldier who’s been deployed for more than a handful of years has nightmares. And if they tell you otherwise, they’re either a damned liar or a sociopath.”

  The chill of the air belatedly registered, and she shivered, pulling the bedroll up and around herself, not sure what to say in return. Not when she was so confused about him. Because how could she hold on to her antipathy for him when his actions were the complete opposite of everything she’d expected?

  Fine. Maybe she didn’t hate him after all. But if she didn’t hate him, where did that leave her? Adrift, and that was not a place a person wanted to be in the middle of a mission behind enemy lines. Unfortunately, it was looking more and more like Cameron McAllister was a solid anchor. And that was something she’d been missing since Jordie had died.

  Except the stubborn side of her—the same one that wouldn’t let Alpha help her with the desk duty side of being CAFF—reminded her that she didn’t need anyone else to be her anchor. She was quite capable of taking care of herself. She’d been doing it for ten years already.

  “There’s only about half an hour until I’ll be waking the others,” Cam said, filling the silence between them. “You want me to stoke the fire and boil some water for coffee?”

  Coffee sounded like the best damned thing that had happened to her all week.

  “I’ll go get some more wood,” she offered.

  Besides, nature was calling, and her head felt wooly, both from crying last night before she’d gone to sleep and from the confusing dreams. She needed to splash some of that ice-cold river water on herself to clear the lingering fog.

  “Don’t go too far from the mouth of the cave,” he said as he went to his pack, presumably to get what he needed for the coffee.

  The unspoken warning being that he didn’t want to waste time looking for her if she was dumb enough to get lost. She could agree with that call. If she was a big enough idiot to get herself lost on a clandestine op behind enemy lines, then she probably didn’t deserve to be found.

  When she got to her feet, she was gratified to find her ankle had only the slightest, niggling ache. It certainly still looked terrible, like a bad tattoo of rainbow colors encircling her entire lower calf, but at least it wouldn’t slow her down today.

  More than ever, she needed to prove to McAllister that she deserved to be here. That she could hold her own. That things would stay as they’d always been and whatever was going on with her now and the confusion she’d felt toward him was just some kind of temporary insanity.

  Chapter Six

  Cam watched Bren stride out of the cave without even the slightest limp. Obviously, her injured ankle wasn’t giving her any trouble this morning. She glanced back at him just before she stepped out, but he dropped his gaze and made like he was busy finding the freeze-dried coffee.

  Pretending he wasn’t watching her had pretty much become the theme of this mission. At first, it’d been all about the risk—making sure she wasn’t about to go rogue or make some stupid decision that would get the rest of the team killed, just like it’d gone down with Jordie.

  But at some point— Hell, who was he kidding? He knew exactly what point. After he’d pulled her out of that hunter’s snare, got an armful of her and then some, his reasons for watching her had started becoming blurred. And, he’d also started paying closer attention.

  The woman was tightly wound, no doubt about it. But she was a confusing concoction of strength and vulnerability. Stubbornness and flexibility. Distance and temptation. She’d gotten under his skin in a way he had no reference for, and no idea what the hell to do with.

  He hadn’t really changed his opinion of her—she was still Jordie’s sister and still every chance that she was exactly what he assumed. But from what he’d seen of her in the last day and a half, she no longer fit in the neat confines of his mind like she should.

  He liked to be able to read people. To understand them. To know how to relate to get the best out of that person. But Lieutenant Theresa Brenner had put him in a head spin. He’d figure her out eventually, but for now, she was the unknown element. He didn’t like that one bit.

  So, he’d made no secret of the fact he was watching her last night, wondering how she’d react under scrutiny. But she’d managed to distract him when she’d pulled the scarf off her head and shook those golden curls free.

  Christ help him, he’d never wanted to touch anything in his life as much as he’d wanted to run his hand through her hair, to see if it felt as cool and silky as it looked. Fist a handful while he—

  The direction of those thoughts shocked him like a boot up the ass. Not only was it wildly inappropriate to be having those kinds of fantasies about someone on his team in the middle of this kind of mission, but this was a Brenner. The sister of the guy who’d nearly gotten him killed and almost destroyed his career before it had started. Sure, he felt bad for w
hat happened to Jordie. But the guy had brought it on himself. Made every wrong, selfish choice a man could possibly make. Who knew if that selfishness ran in the family? He didn’t want to find out.

  Everyone had bunked down, and while he’d given Brenner first watch, he hadn’t been able to sleep. Not because he didn’t trust her to do something as simple as keep a look out and warn them if anyone approached, but because his mind was sorting the events of the day.

  More than half those thoughts had centered around Bren, and when he’d finally given up on keeping his eyes closed and looked over at her, the sight of her had been a knife rammed into his chest.

  Silent tears had been escaping her eyes. She’d used the sleeve of her uniform to wipe them away, but they were coming faster than she could swipe them. His whole body had clenched on a reactive wave, almost getting him up and over to her before he could stop himself. Luckily, logic had won out, and though it had been the hardest thing he’d ever done in his life, he’d laid still and quiet.

  He knew she wouldn’t welcome anyone in that moment, least of all him. The sight of her tears and his inability to do anything about them singed him. However, if she actually started crying, it would turn into a blaze he wouldn’t be able to handle. Sure, he hated to see a woman cry as much as the next guy, but Bren’s tears gouged him more than he would have expected.

  She couldn’t have simply been upset about the day’s events. Sure, the hike had been grueling, and she’d had that frightening brush with the trap, but he didn’t think that would be enough to make an experienced soldier like Bren give into tears.

  No, in his guts, he knew this had to be about Jordie. Maybe he wasn’t the only one feeling those old scars throb again. The thought that she found it just as hard to be around him had been startling, and though he hadn’t wanted it to, it had slightly adjusted the way he’d viewed her.

  Still didn’t mean he was going to cut her any breaks. Because the second he let his guard down would be the most likely time things turned to shit.

  He’d finally fallen asleep and had a fitful night. When Harlow had woken him for his turn at watch, he’d pretty much felt like crap. Then, he’d gone and put himself into an even better mood by returning to his new favorite pastime: watching Brenner.

  Seriously, it was starting to get to disturbing, stalker-like levels. He probably needed to intervention himself or something.

  But the mind screw hadn’t finished there. Because as the first hint of dawn had begun lighting the mouth of the cave, she’d turned restless, seeming caught in some kind of bad dream.

  He’d sat there debating whether to wake her up, but the argument had become invalid when she’d sat up with a sharp gasp. Before he’d even realized he was going to move, he’d been at her side, only just stopping himself short of pulling her into his arms like he had the afternoon before.

  Dammit. Things were so messed up. He should have recognized this was going to happen. Should have predicted bringing Jordie Brenner’s little sister along on this mission was going to do nothing but complicate the fuck out of it. Should have fought harder against having her here.

  Well, nothing to do now but accept what he had to deal with and make the best of it. The best being that he keep his distance, don’t lay hands on her again, and stop damn well thinking about her every other minute. That included worrying if she was going to screw up the mission.

  Bren returned with an armful of wood, but her actions were harried as she set it down and rushed over to him.

  “I heard voices in the woods. At least three. And saw some torches.”

  His pulse spiked as he pushed to his feet, but he didn’t want to jump to the worst conclusion. “Could be hunters finding food for the day.”

  “Could be,” she repeated, but he could see she wasn’t ready to buy that without proof.

  “Let’s do some recon. Think you can handle it?”

  She nodded and went over to retrieve her other guns, having taken the sidearm when she first went out. With quick movements, she secured her hair into a tight bun and then wrapped the scarf around it, not completely covering her head as she had yesterday, but still disguising the mass of golden strands. While she did that, he woke Bartlet, told him what was going on, ordered him to take over watch, and go with plan B if the two of them didn’t return.

  “Show me where,” he instructed as they stepped out of the cave into the dew-laden predawn air.

  She led him toward the river, where it emerged in a crashing thunder from beneath the ground. A little downstream, they used slippery rocks to hop across the rushing water, and once they left the constant background rumble of the river, Bren stopped to hunker down behind some low rocks.

  He scanned the patches of gray and darker shadows, the light getting stronger by the minute.

  “There,” she whispered, just as he spotted a beam of light bouncing between the trees, followed by the faint echo of voices.

  Another light joined the first, words calling back and forth. He took in the patterns of movement, which were slowly but steadily closing in on their position.

  “They’re not hunters,” he said after maybe ten minutes. “They’re searching for someone or something.”

  “CSS?” she murmured in return.

  “I don’t want to stick around to find out. Let’s wake the others and keep moving.” He slid backward from the rocks and then got to his feet, keeping low until they’d passed a number of trees, Bren following his every cue like she’d done this before. He had to admit she was actually better at this than he’d assumed, being a fighter pilot with little ground experience. Given enough training, she would have likely made one heck of a special-ops soldier. But then, Jordie had proven the same thing, until he’d made that fatal error on their team’s first and last assignment.

  When they returned to the cave, he was gratified to find Bartlet had woken everyone, and they were, for the most part, packed and ready to go.

  “What’s the sit-rep?” Seb asked as Cam took over from Harlow, who’d been packing his gear for him.

  “Unknowns in the woods on the other side of the river. We’re better off hoofing it than sticking around to find out what kind of reception we’d get.”

  Seb nodded, as he shrugged into his own pack and then went over to help Bren with hers.

  “Your ankle good?” Rayne asked once Bren had her rucksack secured.

  “Good as it needs to be,” she replied confidently.

  After that, they quickly and quietly exited the cave, setting a fast pace in the opposite direction from the men on the other side of the river. It meant they were going to have to take an even more circular route into the village, but he’d rather walk a few extra miles than risk running across any CS soldiers and possibly end up in one of those hell pits they called reeducation facilities.

  He’d known a few soldiers who’d spent time in them before the UEF had negotiated their release, and it had sounded bad enough. But then Commander Yang had turned up on the bank of this same river, but about fifty miles north of here, after escaping one of the CSS facilities.

  Everyone had spent the year and a half before that believing he was dead. That the CSS hadn’t admitted to having him prisoner had shaken the foundations of the way they’d dealt with the enemy up to that point.

  What Yang had been through had been the stuff of true nightmares—beyond a nightmare into a hell most people couldn’t imagine, let alone survive. That he lived was a testament to the man’s strength, but he’d forever bear the scars, both physical and mental.

  So nope. Visiting a CSS reeducation camp was not on his list of to-do’s.

  They hadn’t gone more than a few hundred meters when the distant echo of voices reached him. He pulled to a stop and held up a fist so the team behind him would know to halt.

  It was hard to tell which direction the voices were coming from. Were they the same ones from the river and they’d made their way to this bank?

  No, the tenor of calls told him th
is was a different group. After a few more moments, he decided that they were coming from ahead of him. With a flick of his hand, he indicated for his people to move off to his left.

  Keeping a tight grip on his weapon, he silently weaved through the trees, tasting the cold against the back of his throat, his breath creating a white puff of air with each steady exhale.

  The distant voices echoing through the trees gave him the feeling of being surrounded. A number of torches loomed through what was left of the night shadows. But he kept pushing forward, making a direct line on the village. Maybe they could make it there and disappear into the town before the search party realized they were out here.

  As the first golden rays of the sun started darting through the forest, he slowed to a stop again, reassessing their position against the unknown group.

  “What are you thinking?” Seb asked in a low voice, coming up on his right side. “CSS? You think they know we’re out here?”

  “Could be CSS, but it’s not possible they know we’re here,” he returned. “Besides, if that were the case, they would have taken the cave right away. They’re definitely searching for something, though. And the net is closing. We’re going to have to make the village if we want to get out of here unnoticed.”

  “Let’s keep moving, then.” Seb firmed up his grip on his weapon and glanced back, presumably at Bren, before they all resumed sneaking through the woods.

  The voices kept him on edge, but finally the village came into view beyond the trees.

  Seb had gotten a few steps ahead of him, and they all picked up the pace now that the goal was in sight.

  He caught the movement in his peripheral too late to warn Seb. A CS soldier came out of the woods, stumbling to a halt and obviously shocked to find them there.

  Seb started to bring his gun up at the same time the CS soldier did, but someone in their group was faster and put the man down with a single shot before he’d even finished raising his gun.