This was love. Love and belonging and rightness. Tears pricked her eyes and she bowed her head, hoping he wouldn’t see.
It was a vain hope. “Baby, are you crying?”
“I love you, Dex. I never thought I’d have this with you again.”
“Look at me.” He waited until she did. “We’re meant to be. From the first moment I kissed you in my dad’s house, you were mine. I let Eric steal you away, and I’ll always regret that. I was a jackass, Belle. I should have come after you. I should have demanded the truth and fought for you.”
Hot emotion welled in her chest, punched her in the gut. “It wasn’t your fault. You don’t have to apologize.”
Her voice grated like sandpaper scraped over a raw wound. It hurt to speak. To feel. To be.
Their gazes clashed. Raw, aware, nothing left to hide.
“I love you, Belle. I never stopped.”
Her heart broke open. Hot tears scalded her cheeks.
“I hate making you cry.” His voice was a ragged whisper.
She laughed through her tears. “It’s a good cry. I promise.”
“I was angry for so long,” he said, his voice raw. “I took it out on you. I told myself I hated you, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. You’re my other half. Always have been. I fucking hate that I had to live without you for five years. I don’t want to live without you for another day, but I know we have to take it slow for Charlotte’s sake.”
“She’s resilient, Dex. She’ll love you like I do.”
“I know there’s a lot to consider. You have Archer Industries, and I live in DC. I have two years left on my enlistment. But we’ll make it work. I’ll fly to Lexington on weekends and I’ll take leave—”
She pressed a finger to his lips. “I had an offer to buy Archer Industries after Eric died. I know we lost the building, but there’s insurance. If the buyer’s still interested, I’m taking the deal.”
“You’d come to DC?”
“Home is where you are. I’d have followed you around the world when you asked me to marry you the first time. I still would.”
He kissed her until her toes curled. “I love you, Annabelle Quinn. Always have. Always will.”
“Always is a long time,” she said.
“No,” he told her. “With you, it’s not nearly enough.”
33
“So we meet again, Viper. How are you?”
Mendez stood with his legs spread apart, his arms folded over his chest, trying not to glare at the man seated at the table. Dmitri Leonov hadn’t changed much. More lines around the eyes and mouth. No gray, but he probably dyed his dark blond hair.
He still had an arctic stare that made lesser men tremble. Mendez had perfected his own arctic stare over the years, so he wasn’t much bothered by this man’s. He knew what lay behind eyes that dead. It wasn’t the kind of thing that made you think of puppies or kittens—unless you thought of someone doing unspeakable things to them.
“I’m good, Dmitri. You aren’t though.” It was two days since Alpha Squad had brought the man in. Two days, and Mendez had sent his best intel officers to find out what Leonov knew about Sergei Turov and his plans. He’d said nothing useful. Sam was on Mendez’s back to turn the man over to the CIA. He was going to have to do it—but not quite yet.
Dmitri shrugged. “This is a temporary setback. I will be out…” He consulted his wrist. There was no watch there. Not anymore because it had been confiscated. “…in approximately six months. Fewer if my government is exceptionally good.”
Mendez strolled the perimeter of the room. Dmitri stiffened when Mendez stopped behind him. Good. Let the fucker think Mendez wouldn’t follow the law. That he would attack when Dmitri’s back was turned.
That’s what Leonov did. He waited until his prey was at its most vulnerable. Then he struck.
Mendez’s blood was thick and cold in his veins. Like an ice floe moving inexorably toward a goal. This man chilled him. Infuriated him. Cost him everything he’d once cared about. The heat of anger flared, but he stamped it down.
Mendez circled and stopped in front of him. “It’s possible,” he said. “It’s also possible that some mischief will occur and you won’t make it to six months. Have you considered that?”
Dmitri snorted. “Ah, you threaten me. You have always been a by-the-book kind of guy, John.” He shook his head. “No, I do not believe you.”
“People change. Perhaps I’ve decided that your way is better.”
Dmitri slouched lazily in the chair, as if trying to prove he was unfazed. He tapped two fingers against the hard plastic surface of the table. “Do you still wonder, John?”
He knew what this man wanted to hear. He wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. “I wonder nothing. Moscow was a long time ago.”
“You do not think about her? About Valentina?”
He shrugged. “She was beautiful and smart, but she’s been dead for twenty years. No, I don’t think about her.”
“I do.” His smile was a serial killer’s dream.
Mendez’s heart punched his ribs. Goddammit! “Then you’ll have a shitload of time to think about her in solitary confinement.”
Leonov spread his hands. “I have done nothing wrong. Or nothing wrong for which you can hold me.”
“Receiving state secrets, killing an American citizen—I’m sure there’s more.” Mendez would fucking find more, because Leonov was not getting out of a US prison alive. “You’re a danger to the American way of life. We don’t like that kind of shit around here.”
“Six months,” Leonov said. “Mark your calendar, John Mendez.”
Mendez turned to give the sergeant standing guard outside the room a signal. Keys rattled in the lock.
“There is one more thing,” Leonov said as the lock’s tumblers fell into place.
Mendez held up his hand and turned back to the smirking Russian sitting across the table. “If it’s not about Turov’s plans, or something equally interesting that I can use, then I don’t care.”
“You will care about this.”
He paused for dramatic effect. Mendez snorted and turned away. The door swung inward.
“Valentina did not die twenty years ago,” Leonov said. “In fact, she did not die at all.”
*
Three months later…
*
“Again, Paw-Paw!”
Dex watched as his dad made a quarter disappear and then pulled it from behind Charlotte’s ear. She clapped and laughed and begged him to do it again. Which of course he did.
Katie handed him a fresh beer. She was grinning ear to ear. “She’s precious, Dex. And I think she’s good for Dad.”
Dex took a swallow of beer while his chest swelled with happiness. “He has your two boys. They’re good for him too.”
“Well, of course they are. But he needed a granddaughter too.”
Dex let his gaze sweep over Katie’s backyard. She and Jessie had bought a house on a rolling three-acre lot. There were trees and a pond, a swinging bench under a tree, and a small barn that housed Jessie’s lawn tractor and other equipment. No cows, thankfully.
Annabelle stepped out of the house and wandered over to where he stood with Katie. His heart leaped at the sight of her. Every day he loved her more. They were managing well, he thought. They’d told Charlotte he was her father within a month of Annabelle properly introducing him to her. Two days after that, they’d gotten married in a civil ceremony at the Briar City courthouse. Charlotte took to him like a pig to mud, and his life had never been so full.
“I’m glad you’re together again,” Katie said softly as Annabelle approached.
Dex reached for his wife’s hand. She came into the circle of his arm and wedged herself against his side. He loved that. Within a week after Annabelle had said she would marry him, she and Katie got together and talked. Dex didn’t know everything they’d said, but Annabelle told him she’d held nothing back. Katie forgave her, and they’d been rebuilding their frien
dship.
Even better, Molly Carter was a part of their circle now. Molly, Katie, and Annabelle got together every time Dex and Annabelle returned to town. Girls’ night, they said. Dex didn’t care, though he often wondered what the hell they talked about. Especially since Annabelle always seemed to come home and rip his clothes off after.
Not that that was a bad thing. But what they hell did they discuss?
“Molly and Becca will be here in about twenty minutes,” Annabelle said. “Molly had a phone meeting go a little long, and she forgot the casserole and had to turn around and go get it.”
“Oh heck, she didn’t need to do that,” Katie said. “We have plenty.”
“You know Molly.”
“True.”
Dex had no idea what they were talking about.
Life was good and he was fucking happy. Dad was doing well. He’d sold the farm and moved into Katie’s guesthouse. He kept threatening to move to a retirement community, but so far it was just talk. His rehab on the leg had gone well, and his cholesterol and heart function were under control.
Annabelle had sold Archer Industries to a company who wanted to expand it. They were building a new facility in Briar City and another in DC. She’d sold the monstrosity of a house she’d lived in with Eric too. They’d bought a house in Maryland in a nice neighborhood with good schools and a huge playground. Charlotte had already made friends.
On the business front, HOT was still doing a bang-up job of extracting hostages and kicking terrorists’ asses around the globe. So far, there’d been no congressional committee subpoenas over Sergei Turov’s shooting. Turov had survived and returned to Russia under some sort of deal with the US government. Dex didn’t know what kind of deal, though it sometimes pissed him off if he thought about it.
Marshall Porter was undergoing trial for treason, and the Helios project was on indefinite hold. Marshall had apparently been falsifying more than just the files he’d made for the Russians. Helios didn’t work on the scale he claimed it did, and it would take far more time and money than anyone was willing to spend to make a functional product.
The US government had taken possession of the half billion dollars. Dex had no idea what they’d do with it. Probably use it to pay off contract fighters in places like Qu’rim and Afghanistan.
His team was doing well. He was the last man on Alpha Squad to get married. Some had children on the way, others were still enjoying the honeymoon stage. The SEAL Team that had recently joined HOT often worked closely with Alpha Squad. Only one of those dudes was married, so that would be fun to watch.
And then there was the colonel. The rumor was that he had an on-again, off-again romance with the sexy CIA agent Samantha Spencer. But Dex had seen them together, and he wasn’t convinced it would ever amount to anything more than that.
Some dudes just never found the one for them. Annabelle laid her head against his chest as she stood in his embrace, and his heart skipped and sang like some dang cartoon bird in a sappy story about a princess.
“Daddy, Daddy!” Charlotte came running over and he handed Annabelle his beer before bending down and scooping his daughter into his arms.
“What, sweetheart?” God, the singing in his chest was out of control. He didn’t always get it right, but he was taking to this daddy thing like a fish to water.
“Paw-Paw showed me a trick! I’m going to do it for you.”
She produced a quarter. But she didn’t hide it. She just put her hand up to his ear and pretended to drag it out.
“Wow!” Dex said. “That was amazing, baby girl.”
She giggled and squirmed and he let her down again. She ran back to his dad, shouting, “I did it, Paw-Paw!”
Annabelle’s eyes were misty when he met her gaze. He had a dark urge to kiss the hell out of her right then and there, but he held it in check. Because the urges beneath that were even darker and more sensual.
“Told you I could rock this dad thing,” he said.
She giggled. “Yes, you did.”
“Soon as I get you alone, I’m going to rock your world too.”
“I hope so.”
“Mommy!” Charlotte waved furiously for Annabelle to come over and see something. With a quick squeeze of his hand, Annabelle strode off to join their daughter.
Dex stood and watched them as the damn birds kept flying and singing in his chest. His girls. The women he loved. The two beauties who made his life into something he’d never thought he’d have.
He was addicted to this rush of love he felt every waking hour. Addicted, fulfilled, and completed.
Not a bad way to go.
*
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About the Author
Lynn Raye Harris is the New York Times and USA Today bestselling author of the HOSTILE OPERATIONS TEAM SERIES of military romances as well as 20 books for Harlequin Presents. A former finalist for the Romance Writers of America’s Golden Heart Award and the National Readers Choice Award, Lynn lives in Alabama with her handsome former-military husband, two crazy cats, and one spoiled American Saddlebred horse. Lynn’s books have been called “exceptional and emotional,” “intense,” and “sizzling.” Lynn’s books have sold over 3 million copies worldwide.
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All Rights Reserved. This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
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HOT ADDICTION
Copyright
© 2017 by Lynn Raye Harris
Cover Design Copyright © 2017 Croco Designs
ISBN: 978-1-941002-16-2
HOT Addiction: A Hostile Operations Team Novel - Book 10 Page 22