by Cindy Skaggs
He lifted her legs higher, which put his pelvis in the spot to hit her clit. With her legs open, he moved in and out like a dream and it was all he could do not to come right now, but he continued his torment until her breathing was erratic. She was so wet, hot around him. She wanted more, but he wasn’t sure how much more he could give without giving her everything.
“Oh, God,” she moaned. Her breath hitched each time he bottomed out. “That’s it, that’s it. Oh, God.” She held her breath, trapping a groan in her throat. Then her core squeezed and he fell apart as she screamed.
“That’s the one,” he said into her neck. He lay on top of her for several minutes, pressing her into the mattress but too tired to move. Too out of breath to talk. God, he could live on the sound of her screaming his name. “That’s the one,” he repeated.
For the first time in months, his body relaxed and his mind quieted. She did this to him. She gave him peace. He shifted and pulled her close. He fell asleep surrounded by the smell of sunshine and sex.
Mandi missed the weight of him the moment he shifted to the side. He wrapped an arm over her chest and a leg over her midsection. The cocoon of his arm kept off the chill and made her feel secure for the first time in days. He drifted to sleep holding her tight. Only then did Mandi confront her mistake. She’d fallen for Dean, wholly and totally in love with him. He drew out the rebel in her and made her feel like a sex goddess.
Even half-asleep, she blushed at her thoughts. She wasn’t exactly a goddess of anything, but sex with Dean was off the charts. Even if it was just sex, she would have bonded with him. Would have wanted more, but it wasn’t just sex. It was long conversations and being seen for the first time in years. It was pushing her outside of her comfort zone and protecting her from true evil in the form of Team Echo.
But he’d hidden her. She realized he wasn’t ashamed of her in the same way Maurice had been, and he wasn’t trying to hurt her, but he would hurt her. Because Dean didn’t plan to survive the coming showdown with Team Echo. It was the reason he’d broken up with Shelley. It was the reason he’d warned Mandi he wasn’t a keeper. And she refused to watch him self-destruct. It would break her heart and she’d reached the point where one more loss might kill her, and she had Ellie to think about. She couldn’t disappear into a funk of grief and regret like she had after Danny died. She had to leave Dean before she lost the ability to do so.
She basked in the safety of his arms for long minutes, keeping an eye on the clock. At two-fifteen, she gently slid from his embrace. She tried to stay quiet as she pulled on yesterday’s clothes, but she needn’t have bothered. He slept like the dead. That surprised her. She expected him to wake up with the slightest noise, but he didn’t even flinch when she dropped her hairbrush. She slowly eased into the bathroom and closed the door behind her.
She’d waited too long and didn’t have time for the shower. Thankfully her bag was packed and waiting in the corner of Ellie’s room. She packed the rest of Ellie’s things and was ready to go when Ryder softly knocked on the door.
“Ready?” he asked.
She nodded and didn’t look back.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Stills woke from a dream so vivid he smelled blood and smoke. The nightmare had taken him back to that day on the Chinook, looking down at the destruction Team Echo had wrought. They flew low over the dead villagers and each moment tightened the dread in his gut because he knew what he’d find. The family that had been gunned down on the run. The helo moved sluggishly through the smoky air until the family came into view.
But this time, it wasn’t a woman in a hijab. It was Mandi, holding Ellie’s hand and bleeding into the sand.
He sat up gasping for breath. Her room was pitch black but he didn’t need light to know she was gone. The room felt cold without her. His heart pounded. He needed to see her, to know she was safe.
Looking for his clothes, he stubbed his toe on the bed frame and cursed softly. He propped open the bathroom door to help find his clothes. He dressed in a hurry before stepping into Ellie’s room, but it too was empty. A quick search confirmed his worst fears. Fears, damnit, he was supposed to be fearless, but finding their clothes gone sent shivers through him.
“Fuck me,” he muttered.
She’d cut and run.
That was usually his dumbass move. He didn’t waste time on regret. He had to stop them before they left the compound. The entire building was as empty and silent as a tomb. He raced through the house, down several staircases, and through the tunnels to the command post. When he burst through the doors, breathless from running, Camy glanced up from her spot in front of a computer.
She nearly dropped the magazine she had rolled into a tight tube. “About time you got here. I was about ready to break my word and go track you down.”
“Where is everyone?”
She rolled her eyes. “Out for a morning stroll. Where do you think?”
They’d gone to meet up with the other team.
The monitor in front of Camy showed a topographical map of the acreage surrounding The Manor. Two red blinking lights moved slowly over the terrain. “Is that them?”
She nodded.
“How long ago did they leave?”
“Just left. I thought you were an insomniac? How did she get away from you?”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
“She tricked you?” Camy laughed. “That’s rich. Isn’t that your move?”
“Yes,” he admitted, an edge of anger in his tone. “Where are they headed?”
Camy shrugged. “I’m here to monitor the comms.” She pointed to a mechanical setup on the desk next to her. “Relay information from Team One to Team Two and vice versa.”
“Is that really what they went with? Team one and two?”
“Nah.” She unrolled the magazine and opened it to a yellow sticky note she was using as a bookmark. “I’m Home Base. The other team is Freedom Bird.”
Freaking Santiago. “What about our guys?”
She tilted sideways as she peered at the open page. “I can’t read my own handwriting.” She raised the note for him to see. “What does that say?”
“Camy. This shit isn’t funny.”
“I’m not playing. Comms aren’t my thing, but Craft insisted. I tried to tell him. I don’t usually talk to people when I’m busy breaking into their classified files.”
“Where’s the headset?” he asked.
She reached over to a bag on her right and pulled out the green headset Ellie had used the day before. Stills grabbed it and swung the mic close to his lips. Flipped the switch and spoke in clear, commanding tones. “Abort mission. I repeat, abort mission.”
Ryder’s voice came across the line five by five. “Clear the channel and maintain radio silence.”
Stills shook with frustration. If Ryder had been in the room he would have gone for his throat. Knowing Mandi had left him cut deep. “Quit being an ass and put her on the radio.”
“Negative.” The radio turned to static, and when Stills tried to adjust the channel, he realized Ryder was gone. He’d flipped off comms so Stills couldn’t intervene.
Camy pointed to the blips on the screen of her computer. “They’ve passed the first set of barriers. They’ll be at the outer gates soon.”
Stills cursed and tossed his headset to the counter. “Damnit, Camy. Help a guy out. I need you to shut the gate down. I know there’s a lockdown function. Use it.”
“Why?”
“I thought we were friends.”
“We are, but you’ve had your head in the sand ever since Mandi got here. I’m not risking Jake’s wrath just so you can choke five yards from the goal.”
If he weren’t so angry he’d commend her on the use of a football metaphor. The red blips on the computer screen showed the woman he loved moving farther away. “Did he ask or order?”
“Jake?” Camy frowned. She closed the cover of the magazine she’d been reading. “Now that you mention
it, I think it was an order. Who does he think he is?”
“Exactly. You don’t take orders.”
“Don’t play me,” Camy snapped. “Jake will pay for trying to order me around, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to let you hurt a woman I respect and genuinely like.”
Stills gritted his teeth. Those blips moved closer to the final gate. “I care about her and you’re letting her get away.”
“Not good enough.” Camy smirked.
“Look, I had your back when you and Debi pulled your stupid stunt. Now’s it’s your turn to have my back.”
“Why?”
“I love her, damnit.”
“It’s about time.” She tossed her magazine aside and started tapping commands on the keyboard. “Dang, he anticipated that I would try. He didn’t trust me.” She sounded offended that Jake had planned for her to go back on her word. “That jerk. Hold on.”
While she maneuvered around whatever failsafe Fowler planted, a voice came over comm channel two. Sounded like Santiago. “Freedom Bird to Home Base. Over.”
Stills pulled the headset back on. “Go ahead Freedom Bird.”
“Freedom Bird is under attack. Repeat, Freedom Bird is under attack. Do not engage.”
Heart pounding, Stills watched the blip getting closer to the exit. Once they left the borders of The Manor, they were on their own. Ryder had turned off the radio or he would have already heard the incoming message. They could very well be walking into a trap.
“Time’s up, Camy. Show me what you can do.”
She smacked the computer monitor. “Craft had to rig this up. It’s way out of Jake’s league.” She huffed and fumed at the computer. “I may not make it.”
“Your brother is in one of those cars, Camy. This is no longer a game.”
“I’m trying,” she shot back. “You need to go after them. Now.”
“Did they take all the vehicles?”
“No, but they took the remaining car keys.”
“They thought I might try to stop them?”
“Like I said, you’ve been off this week. Jake has a dirt bike in the garage downstairs. In the back by the spare tires.”
The blips slowed around a curve. Could he catch them? If he went as the crow flies, he might. The dirt bike might work. “Keep trying. And try to raise them on the radio. If they get out, Ryder will turn comms back up before they approach the meeting point.” Hopefully. They were in new territory. On a real mission, Ryder would never turn off the radio, but in a military situation, Stills would never have hijacked a mission channel. “Make sure they don’t drive into a trap.”
Camy nodded and Stills was gone. He took the stairs in two big jumps. Didn’t even wince when he landed hard on the concrete floor of the garage and the shock traveled up his legs like lightning. He started the bike and shot out of the building before he had time to question the wisdom. In the distance he saw headlights. Straight ahead if he went off road. Hell yeah, he was going off road. He kicked the bike into high gear and raced for the gate.
The gates slammed shut seconds before the lead car pulled through. At the same time, something flew past the windshield in a blur of dust. Rose stepped on the brake so hard he was nearly standing. Something snapped and they jerked to a halt. The seatbelt yanked, aggravating her bruising from the accident.
Mandi took a minute to take stock and make sure she was okay. In the back, Ellie’s car seat rocked but did its job. Craft’s arm was braced protectively in front of the little girl, much the way Mandi would have done if she’d been in the back seat. Ellie didn’t even wake up. The dust cleared and Dean stood in the headlights with a dirt bike at his feet.
“Mandi,” he yelled. He looked between the two vehicles. “Where are you?”
Mandi reached for the door handle, but Rose stopped her. “Make him earn it.”
“What?”
“We’re all screwed in the head at times. Mostly we’re calm, rational soldiers, but every so often, we have temper issues or anger issues or we’re paranoid as hell, but none of that excuses bullshit games. I raised six sisters, and not one of them took it easy on me. I sure as hell made life hard on any man who wanted close to them. So if you were my sister, I’d kick Stills’ ass before he got close enough to have a conversation. Since you’re not my sister, and I have a feeling you won’t let me beat him...” He looked at her expectantly.
“No.” She shook her head. Actually, she was still shaking from the near-accident.
“Then make him earn it.”
“But I’m in love with him,” she whispered.
“Sweetheart, that’s been obvious from day one.”
Rose confused the heck out of her. Or maybe it was lack of sleep. “So what do I do?”
“Make him say the words.”
She leaned back in the bucket seat. Never in her life would she consider asking a man make a fool of himself. “In front of everybody?”
Rose laughed. “Yeah, buddy. He made you wait, didn’t he?”
“You’re enjoying this.” But now that her heart wasn’t beating through her chest at another almost-accident, she understood what Rose was telling her. It was time to stand up. Instead of rushing toward Dean, she rolled down the window. “What is it you want?”
He bent over to rest his hands on his legs, sucking wind for a minute before he caught his breath.
“Stills,” Fowler growled, stepping from the lead car. “I warned you not to touch my security again. What the hell am I saying? I know for a fact you don’t have the skills to get around my setup.”
“Camy helped.”
“I damn well know I told her to stand down.”
“You know she doesn’t take orders.” Before Fowler could go off, Stills raised a hand as if surrendering. “Relax. There’s an operational reason, but first...” He glanced over at Mandi again. “You need to know, I popped the chute before any of this came down.”
“What does that even mean?” Mandi muttered.
Beside her, Rose chuffed out a laugh. “That means he already bailed out of the plane.”
“Can’t you guys use normal language?”
“That is normal. For us.”
Mandi unraveled the language for a moment. “So he’s saying he had already decided to block the gates or whatever he did?”
“Ask him,” Rose said.
She unbuckled her seatbelt, climbed to her knees on the seat, and leaned out the window. “What does that mean?”
“That means I fucked up.” He squinted and peered closer at the tinted windows. “Is Ellie in there?”
“Yes. She’s asleep, no thanks to you.”
“What the fuck were you thinking?” Ryder came around from the driver’s side of the lead car. He crossed his arms over his heavy chest.
Mandi reached for the door handle. She didn’t want these men arguing because of her.
Rose stopped her. “You know better than to step between two wild animals getting ready to fight.”
Outside, the two men continued to bark at each other. “They’re going to fight?”
“No,” Rose said gently. “Ryder and Fowler are making Stills pay.”
“For what?”
Craft leaned forward between the seats. “Two reasons. One, because he waited too long. He shouldn’t have waited to take action until the mission was in progress.”
“But we didn’t tell him what time we were leaving.”
“Yeah.” Craft grinned. “That’s been my favorite part of this whole deal.”
“You knew he’d try to stop me.”
“Honey, he’s been upside down every since he brought you back. Good money said he’d try to stop you.”
Mandi leaned back to look at Craft with his sly smile. “You put that down in the betting book, didn’t you?”
Craft simply laughed.
She glared at him. “This isn’t funny. These are real people you’re betting against. Did you bet on whether or not I’d take him back?”
Craft sh
ook his head. “Thought about it, but it’s a foregone conclusion that you will.”
She crossed her arms over her chest. Was she really that predictable? “So if I refuse, then I get the pot?”
“Are you really that stubborn?” Rose asked.
“You have six sisters. I bet at least one of them would tell you to shove it in a similar situation.”
“Well.” He thought about it for a moment. “Camy for one.”
Mandi turned toward the back seat. Craft had leaned back, pleased to watch Ryder and Stills arguing in the space between the two vehicles. He even rolled his window down to listen. She tapped him on the leg. “You said there were two reasons they’re giving him a hard time. What’s the second?”
Craft’s smile faded and his expression turned serious. “Stills hasn’t been right for months. We’re all paranoid and angry. I know you haven’t seen us at our worst, and I hope you never do, but Stills, he went cold. He shut down. Odds were good that he was going to go off half-cocked and get himself killed.” He flicked his gaze out the windshield to the men talking. “The thing is, I don’t think we can afford to lose another teammate, and I’m not saying we’re all mission essential, but we are all essential to each other. Losing Mad Dog and your brother screwed us up. We can’t take much more without turning into the animals they’re trying to create. There’s a reason we don’t go off on our own like Stills did when he went after you.”
“But you’re going off on your mission alone,” she said.
“Fowler will act as backup until I’m embedded at the college and they’ll always know where I am.”
Rose agreed with Craft. “They’re reading him the riot act because we work better as a team. And Stills—”
“Hasn’t been a team player.” It’s what Mandi had realized earlier. “He’d rather die taking Echo out. That’s why he’s not angry. He’s already made that choice.” Mandi stared through the windshield at the man she loved. Why go through all this if he was going to die? “I won’t let him.” She muttered the words as she stepped out of the car and into the dusty night air.