by Katie Knight
With tensions running high and temptations running higher, Sam readily puts her life in Jack’s capable hands. Once the only person she could trust, she’d feared her daughter would grow up never knowing the man she owed her life to. But being back in Jack’s arms—and his bed—makes her heart pound like no time has passed. With the mob threat closing in, Jack knows failure isn’t an option. But even if they survive, Jack will have to fight to find a way to keep Sam and her daughter under his protection, or risk having to say good-bye again—this time for good.
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EXTRACT
Undisclosed safehouse.
Costa Rica, fifteen months ago…
Jack Williams drew an even breath and stared down at the bedraggled woman standing next to him while he waited for orders. His brain immediately catalogued her appearance. She was maybe five-five or five-six, with dark hair in a no-nonsense ponytail, pretty face, no makeup. She definitely was not what he’d expected to find in the daughter of one of the most dangerous gangsters in the world much less find her hiding in a tiny Costa Rican village in the middle of nowhere.
“Get her out of here!”
The order screeched through his Bluetooth earpiece and Jack Williams didn’t wait for further instructions. Adrenaline flooding his system, he grabbed the young woman’s hand, tugging her along behind him through the poorly lit parking lot. It was typical Costa Rican weather—hot, humid, with a slight hint of rain in the air. They were surrounded by rainforest, on the outskirts of the city. A steady wind blew around them, stirring the weeds sticking up through the cracked asphalt and carrying the scent of dirt and sweat and the jungle in the distance. They ducked behind a battered old boat of a car from the 1970s and Jack pulled the woman his SEAL team had been brought in to protect down beside him.
Wrapping his arm around her shoulders, he leaned in close to whisper, “We need to get out of here. Ready?”
She nodded, her dark eyes huge in her pale face.
Brave despite her fear. He could respect that.
“Good. Okay. Remember what I said. Stay close. Stay down. Stay safe.”
The woman swallowed hard, closed her eyes and made the sign of the cross over her chest, then fixed him with a steady stare. “Let’s do it.”
Taking her hand again, he crab-walked toward the shuttered bodega. She stuck close behind him, dogging his footsteps. The sudden rat-tat-tat of rapid gunfire split the air. SEAL Team Twelve was laying down cover so they could escape. His cue to move.
After a quick scan of the area, Jack spotted an old pickup parked around the corner of the brick building. Wasn’t that just a godsend? He happened to know this model was notoriously easy to jumpstart. The hunk of junk couldn’t have appeared at a better time. Careful to shield the woman behind him with his body, they sprinted for the truck, enemy fire pinging off the ground around their feet, sending tiny tornados of dust into the air. With a mighty tug, Jack wrenched open the truck’s rusty driver’s side door, then shoved her inside first. She had to scramble over the stick shift to get to the passenger side, but they were both still upright and breathing. He considered that a win. Now all they had to do was get out of here in the same condition and they’d be all set. He reached inside the truck and released the emergency brake, then slowly pushed the truck forward, his muscles straining, sweat rolling down his back as he used the door as meager protection against the gunfire raining down around them. Thankfully, the bodega sat atop a small hill, so they had gravity on their side. Once the truck was moving downward at a decent clip, he hopped in behind the wheel and pumped the clutch, saying a silent prayer himself that the old beast would start. Reaching under the dusty dashboard, he fiddled with the ignition wires.
“Take the wheel,” he said to the woman before ducking down to see what he was doing.
She gave him a startled glance.
“Want to end up in the jungle and break your neck?” he asked, his tone harsher than he’d intended but needing to break her out of the obvious shock that was setting in. She was even more pale than she’d been before. Finally, she reached a shaking hand over to take the steering wheel. “Good. It won’t take me long, but I can’t do this and see where we’re going.”
He yanked the wires out, then grabbed the two he needed. Using his teeth to fray the ends, he touched them together as they careened down the hillside toward the rainforest below. Pulse pounding and chest tight, he squeezed his eyes shut.
C’mon, baby. C’mon.
At last, the wires sparked and the engine sputtered then caught, chugging to life.
Grinning wide, Jack dropped the wires and straightened, taking the wheel as he spoke into his Bluetooth headset. “Alpha, this is Romeo, come in.”
“Alpha here.” The response crackled over the wireless connection, as sweet as any sound Jack had ever heard.
He glanced over at his passenger, her big dark eyes staring back at him with hope and more than a tad of admiration. He couldn’t help patting her knee in reassurance. “Package has been acquired. Awaiting further instructions.”
“Sit tight, Romeo,” his team leader said. “Pickup location has been compromised. Keep package safe and await new instructions.”
“Understood, Alpha.” He scowled, weaving their vehicle around a hairpin turn in the road, narrowly avoiding a palm tree. More time in this country meant more chances for something to go wrong. He wasn’t happy about the situation. And it was a helluva way to spend New Year’s Eve. Still, he was a SEAL and SEALs followed orders. “Over and out.”
The vehicle slowed to a more reasonable speed and Jack turned his attention to the woman beside him. “You okay, Ms. Engel? We’re almost out of here.”
“Was that your team you were talking to just now?” she asked, her voice tremulous. Rescuing civilians was always more difficult. They never understood the protocols, which meant they needed to have everything explained and required constant reassurance. Still, he imagined she might have more experience with that than most, given her father’s line of work. That seemed borne out by the way she had faced a firefight without flinching. “Is everything okay? You don’t look happy.”
“Everything’s fine.” Jack stared out the windshield again, lightly applying the brakes for fear he’d lose the engine if they slowed too much. “Unfortunately, we’re going to be here longer than I anticipated. If you’d like to go get cleaned up, I’ll find us a safe place to hide out in while we wait. Get you some clean clothes too.”
Samantha Engel looked down at herself, frowning, as if just then realizing how dirty she was after their run through the gauntlet back at the bodega. “Oh, um, yes, please. I’d appreciate that…”
“Jack,” he said when she gave him an inquiring look.
“Right. Jack.” She nodded, her small smile growing. “Pleased to meet you, Jack. And please, call me Sam. After all you’ve done for me. Thank you.”
He gave a curt nod and turned down a side street into the small village at the base of the hill, heading toward one of the safe houses his SEAL team kept in the area. Moonlight bathed the area in shadows. A few minutes later they pulled up in front of a nondescript white cottage. Wasn’t much to look at from the outside, but it had indoor plumbing, plenty of hot water, and was well-stocked with food. He fiddled with the wires under the dashboard again to shut off the engine, then glanced over at Sam. “Stay here while I check the area, then we’ll go inside. We’ll be safe here until we can get out of the country.”
After he’d walked the perimeter of the property and done all the security checks, they walked into the sparsely decorated home and Jack secured the door behind them, then gave her a quick tour of the place—one bedroom, one bathroom, kitchen, small living room with a couch and a TV—securing the area as he went. “If you want to take a shower, I’ll see what I can find around here to fit you and leave it outside the door.”
“Thank you,” she said, disappearing into the bathroom and closing the door behind her.
The sound of water running soon echoed around him, and Jack grabbed a soda from the fridge, gulping down half before setting it aside. The water here was fine for bathing and washing clothes and cooking, but not so much for drinking. Besides, he needed the caffeine to take the edge off a bit.
This whole mission had been a cluster from the start. When his SEAL team was called in to rescue an American woman hiding in a village in Costa Rica, he hadn’t anticipated getting cut off from his team and forced to flee with the woman in tow. But at least she was calm and cooperative. When he’d read her dossier and saw she was the only daughter of notorious and wealthy mob boss Stefan Engel, he’d worried she’d be spoiled. So far though, Sam had been quiet and unassuming, like she preferred to blend into the background instead of shine like a star.
He took another swig of soda and rubbed his eyes, taking the time now to think about her big dark eyes, her soft pink lips, her smooth skin that seemed to beg for his touch…
Whoa. Wait a minute there, cowboy.
Yeah, he wasn’t going there. Things with their current situation were screwed up enough as it was. Sleeping with a target wouldn’t help any of that, no matter how attractive he found her. There was something about the quiet ones that always got him right in the feels.
Shaking off his unwanted attraction, Jack walked into the living room, setting his soda down on the coffee table before walking into the bedroom and searching the drawers for something she could put on after her shower. Unexpected images of Sam—wet and warm and covered in nothing but soap bubbles, floated through his head. Shit. It had been too long since he’d gotten laid. That had to be it. After pulling out an Army green T-shirt and a pair of gray sweatpants, he carried them to the bathroom door and laid them on the floor for her, as he’d promised. They’d be way too big on her petite frame, but at least she’d be covered in something clean.
God. Stefan Engel’s daughter. He slumped down on the couch and scrubbed a hand over his buzz-cut dark hair. As a young kid growing up in Nebraska, he’d sure as hell never pictured himself ending up with a gangster’s daughter under his protection. As he stared at the wall across from him, Jack couldn’t help remembering her father’s ever-growing list of supposed crimes—tied to more than two dozen murders and disappearances, none of which could be proven until his daughter stepped forward. She was supposed to be on a research vessel two hundred miles up the coast studying plankton or whatever it is biology researchers do, not in a village hiding from gunmen.
Jack heard the bathroom door open, but kept his vision firmly on the TV in front of him, not daring to glance at the woman down the hall. Checked his watch. It was close to midnight now. No wonder he was beat. He’d sleep out here, of course, even uncomfortable as it was. Let her have the bedroom.
“Uh, thanks for the stuff,” Sam said, walking into the living room at last, the T-shirt and sweatpants all but engulfing her. Her skin was still dewy from the shower, her cheeks pink and her hair damp, and a pang of lust, sharp and strong, clenched his gut. Jack didn’t think he’d ever seen a more gorgeous sight in his life. Which was stupid, because he’d seen plenty of women—and had done a whole lot more than just look. The fact things never worked out with them had nothing to do with it.
Still, there was something about Sam that held him mesmerized.
She glanced at his soda then back to his eyes again. “Any more of those available?”
“Oh, um, sure.” He got up and walked to the kitchen. She followed. “You hungry?”
“Starving,” she said, tucking a lock of wet hair behind her ear.
“Cool.” He set the oven to high and unwrapped a frozen pepperoni pizza. “This good?”
“Perfect.” She took a seat on a chair at the table. “Anything I can do?”
“Nope.” He shoved the pizza in the oven without waiting for the dinger, feeling more nervous than he could remember being for some reason. With both of them in the room, it seemed even smaller than normal. They both drank their sodas, staring at each other over the rims of their bottles, as awkwardness descended. “Uh, so you study plankton?” he said, for lack of anything better.
Smooth, dumbass.
He didn’t know plankton from pickles. He liked to surf; that was about it when it came to the ocean for him.
She tilted her head to the side. “Yeah. It’s part of my research for my PhD. I want to be a marine biologist someday.”
“Wow. That’s impressive. You must be super smart.”
Sam shrugged and stared down at the tabletop, her shyness making her even more endearing to him, if that were possible. Man, he had it bad for this girl already. “So, what about you? I mean I know you’re a SEAL and all, but did you go to college?”
He swallowed hard and looked away. “I did. Got a bachelor’s degree in education.”
“Really?” She smiled and the night brightened around him a bit. “You want to be a teacher?”
“Someday. Maybe. I don’t know.” He checked the pizza in the oven. Almost done. “I like training people in the military, so we’ll see.”
Minutes later, they’d dished up the food and sat across from each other at the table. He’d finished off his first soda and started on a second. The sugar and caffeine fizzed pleasantly through his system, the familiar, comforting taste enough to loosen his tongue a bit and relax his tight muscles.
“Taste all right?” he asked around a bite of pizza.
“Yep.” She grinned, sucking in a stringy piece of cheese. He did his best not to imagine other things she might use those pretty pink lips on, other things she might suck and lick and… “No one’s cooked for me in a long time.”
And now he felt like a complete ass, sitting here drooling over the woman when she had way too much on her plate as it was, despite the fact she kept giving him those coy little looks that told him she just might be interested in him too.
To distract himself, he asked her more questions about herself. “Didn’t your mom ever cook for you?”
“She did—but then she died of cancer when I was twelve.” Sam gave a sad little sigh and he wanted to kick himself. He knew that from the dossier. He’d just been too discombobulated around her to remember. Idiot. Thankfully, she didn’t seem to mind talking about it. “After that, my grandparents raised me. But they were always busy at the theme park they ran, so most times I had to fend for myself.”
He nodded. “I get that. It was just my mom and me growing up. With her working to support us, I spent most nights going to work with her and eating there while I did my homework. I still cook when I’m home—but I’m away a lot, so I’ve gotten used to taking whatever comes my way.”
“Hmm,” she said with a smile of agreement. “So where’s home?”
“Small town in Nebraska called Rally.” He washed down another bite of food with a swallow of soda, then grinned. “Great place. No one locks their doors because crime is so low. Everyone knows everyone else and everyone’s friendly. Very safe. When I’m on leave, it’s nice to just kick back and let my guard down, you know?”
“Wow. That sounds amazing.” Her wistful tone tugged at his heart. “Way different from the southside of Chicago, that’s for sure.”
For the next half hour or so, they discussed her hometown and his, discovering that they actually did have more in common than Jack had first thought. He loved baseball and the Cubs were his favorite team. Hers too. She told him about the games she’d been to as a kid. He told her about playing on his little league team back in Nebraska. Turns out she’d played too. She talked about her research on marine animals and he told her about the tropical fish he’d raised when he was ten. By the time they were down to their last slices of pizza, he’d almost forgotten that this was a mission, because it suddenly felt a whole lot more like a date. If her flushed cheeks and sparkling eyes were any indication, she was feeling the warm, simmering attraction growing between them too.
After they finished eating, Sam helped him clean up. The space was tight, and
they kept bumping into each other, the word “sorry” filling the air like oxygen—but despite the apologies, neither one was trying very hard to avoid contact. If anything, they both seemed to be seeking excuses to touch in small ways. Once they were done and everything was put away, they walked out into the living room. The low murmur of crickets and cicadas from the rainforest filtered in from outside.
“Uh, thanks again for dinner. And for rescuing me.” She bounced on the balls of her bare feet for a moment before rising up on tiptoe to give him a quick kiss on the cheek. Sam lingered there, her warm breath fanning his face, her dark eyes luminous as she stared at him. Her lips were parted and looked so soft, and before he knew what he was doing, Jack closed the tiny space between them. She tasted of salt from the food and sweet desire. Sam moaned low and wrapped her arms around his neck, drawing him closer.
Summoning his last vestiges of common sense, Jack pulled back before he couldn’t anymore.
Sam lowered down to flat feet, her expression so lost and sad he wanted to scoop her up in his arms and never let her go. Which was ridiculous. They were virtually strangers. This was a mission. A job. She had her life and he had his. After tonight they’d get back to them, no looking back, no questions asked.
And how is that different from every other one-night stand you’ve had?
Yeah, those thoughts weren’t helpful at all. Not when his pulse was thudding loud in his ears and each time he licked his lips he tasted her there.
“Please,” she said at last, her voice so quiet he would’ve missed it if he hadn’t been so attuned to her at that moment. “Please stay with me tonight. I don’t want to be alone.”
Maybe if she’d been more brazen, maybe if he’d been stronger, Jack could’ve said no.
As it was, every fiber of his being yearned to be with her, just this one time, just this one night.