by Katie Reus
PRAISE FOR THE DEADLY OPS SERIES
Targeted
“Fast-paced romantic suspense that will keep you on the edge of your seat!”
—Cynthia Eden, New York Times bestselling author of Mine to Hold
“Sexy suspense at its finest.”
—Laura Wright, New York Times bestselling author of Branded
“Reus strikes just the right balance of steamy sexual tension and nail-biting action. . . . This romantic thriller reliably hits every note that fans of the genre will expect.”
—Publishers Weekly
“Nonstop action, a solid plot, good pacing, and riveting suspense.”
—RT Book Reviews
“Katie Reus pulls the reader into a story line of second chances, betrayal, and the truth about forgotten lives and hidden pasts.”
—The Reading Cafe
“If you are looking for a really good, new military romance series, pick up Targeted! The new Deadly Ops series stands to be a passionate and action-riddled read.”
—That’s What I’m Talking About
PRAISE FOR THE MOON SHIFTER SERIES
Mating Instinct
“Katie Reus creates a vivid world filled with sexy shifters, explosive danger, and enough sexual tension to set the pages on fire. A fabulous paranormal romance!”
—Alexandra Ivy, New York Times bestselling author of Darkness Avenged
“Mating Instinct’s romance is taut and passionate. Add to that a fast-paced suspense plot and a deftly built paranormal world, and Katie Reus’s newest installment in her Moon Shifter series will leave readers breathless!”
—Stephanie Tyler, New York Times bestselling author of Viper’s Run
“I could not put this book down. . . . Let me be clear that I am not saying that this was a good book for a paranormal genre; it was an excellent romance read, period.”
—All About Romance
“Once again, Reus delivers another clever page-turner.”
—RT Book Reviews
“A sexy, well-crafted paranormal romance that succeeds with smart characters and creative world building.”
—Kirkus Reviews
“This series keeps getting better and better.”
—Joyfully Reviewed
Primal Possession
“Reus has definitely hit a home run with this series. . . . This book has mystery, suspense, and a heart-pounding romance that will leave you wanting more.”
—Nocturne Romance Reads
“Reus’s world building is incredibly powerful as she seamlessly blends various elements of legend and myth. . . . But the romance between a shifter and human is the real highlight—it’s lusty, heartfelt, and shows love can conquer all.”
—RT Book Reviews
“[Primal Possession] has all the right ingredients: a hot couple, evil villains, and a killer action-filled plot. . . . [The] Moon Shifter series is what I call Grade-A entertainment!”
—Joyfully Reviewed
“If you like your romance hot with plenty of buildup and a plot that sucks you right in, Primal Possession is simply a must read.”
—A Book Obsession
“Impossible to put down. . . . Ms. Reus bangs out a top-quality story.”
—Fresh Fiction
Alpha Instinct
“Reus has an instinct for what wows in this perfect blend of shifter, suspense, and sexiness. Sexy alphas, kick-ass heroines, and twisted villains will keep you turning the pages in this new shifter series. Alpha Instinct is a winner.”
—Caridad Piñeiro, New York Times bestselling author of To Catch a Princess
“You’ll look forward to visiting this world again soon!”
—RT Book Reviews
“Alpha Instinct is a wild, hot ride for readers. The story grabs you and doesn’t let go.”
—New York Times bestselling author Cynthia Eden
“Reus crafts a fast-paced action story. . . . Alpha Instinct is awesome: an engrossing page-turner that I enjoyed in one sitting. Reus offers all the ingredients I love in a paranormal romance.”
—Book Lovers Inc.
“Prepare yourself for the start of a great new series! . . . I’m excited about reading more about this great group of characters.”
—Fresh Fiction
“A strong book full of mystery, intrigue, and a new world to explore.”
—Ramblings from a Chaotic Mind
“If you’re looking for a new shifter romance to sink your teeth in, then look no further. Alpha Instinct is action-packed with a solid romance that will keep the reader on the edge of [her] toes! . . . Highly recommended for fans of Rachel Vincent’s Werecat series.”
—Nocturne Romance Reads
“A well-plotted, excellently delivered emotional and sensual ride that grabs hold and doesn’t let go! . . . Ms. Reus delivers mystery, suspense, and a romance nothing short of heart pounding!”
—Night Owl Reviews
ALSO BY KATIE REUS
The Moon Shifter Novels
Alpha Instinct
Lover’s Instinct
(A Penguin Special from Signet Eclipse)
Primal Possession
Mating Instinct
His Untamed Desire
(A Penguin Special from Signet Eclipse)
Avenger’s Heat
The Deadly Ops Novels
Targeted
Enemy Mine
(A Penguin Special from Signet Eclipse)
SIGNET ECLIPSE
Published by the Penguin Group
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penguin.com
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First published by Signet Eclipse, an imprint of New American Library,
a division of Penguin Group (USA) LLC
Copyright © Katie Reus, 2014
Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.
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ISBN 978-1-101-61774-8
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
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Contents
Praise
Also by KATIE REUS
Title page
Copyright page
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
&n
bsp; Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Excerpt from TARGETED
For my husband, who puts up with my odd hours and sometimes stressful deadlines. I would be lost without you.
Prologue
Landing Zone (LZ): area where military aircraft can land.
Six years ago
Cade O’Reilly ran full force through the triple-canopy jungle, the unbearable summer heat and giant mosquitoes barely a blip on his radar as he dodged low-hanging vines and branches. With his M-4 carbine slung over his back and grenades and claymore mines strapped to his jungle BDUs, he was armed to the teeth.
He hadn’t planned on needing the extra firepower, but as a United States Marine, he was always prepared for an apocalypse-type situation. Like the fucking Boy Scouts, only well armed. As part of a classified intel unit with the Marine Corps, he often worked with various branches of the government. Including the CIA.
And just like always, the jobs he did for the CIA in Central or South America got screwed six ways to Sunday. It was as if he had a homing beacon on him or something when he got in this region. Trouble just found him. So now he was making a really hot exit from deep within the jungle with trained guerrillas on his ass. Luckily he’d scouted his escape route days ago.
He could hear the whop-whop of the Huey in the distance, the sound unmistakable. Most civilians couldn’t tell the difference between choppers, but any military guy could. That shit got ingrained into your psyche. And what he heard now was pure music.
His extraction point was less than a hundred yards away. He couldn’t see it because of the thick trees and foliage, but a giant clearing the size of a football field was waiting for him up ahead. And so was his rescue team.
Staccato fire sounded behind him, closer now. A loud thud landed in the dirt to his left. Then another. Then a louder thud into a tree on his right as he raced by. They were lucky shots because with the thick overhang it was damn near impossible to see much. Didn’t matter that it was daytime. That triple canopy was so damn dense it was hard to comprehend until you’d seen it for yourself. He didn’t have time to stop and return fire. There were too many men after him, and while he was good, he couldn’t hold them off forever.
He’d been tasked with blowing up four underground bunkers deep in the jungles of Colombia that belonged to a vicious cartel leader. From what he’d seen firsthand, the war on drugs was a waste of time, but Nesto Valencia was a piece of shit who preyed on the innocent. Foreign travelers, his countrymen, it didn’t matter. Cade was more than happy to help purge the asshole’s income. Soon the guy wouldn’t exist anyway. The CIA wanted to stop Valencia before he grew too big, so they’d coordinated a planned strike to completely wipe out him and everything he owned from the face of the earth.
This was totally off the books and wouldn’t go on Cade’s official dust jacket. Classified and all that shit. Valencia had made the mistake of letting some of his men target a student tourist group that just happened to include a powerful senator’s niece. She’d been killed and Valencia had become a dead man walking overnight. He just hadn’t realized it.
Pulling a grenade free from his jacket, Cade slid out the pin and tossed it behind him without losing any momentum. He couldn’t afford to.
As he jumped over a jagged tree root, he pulled another grenade free as a wave of heat and an explosion tore through the air at his back. Shouts of agony followed as he tossed another behind him.
Whop-whop. The sound was louder now. Now that the trees were thinning, he could see daylight and the twin-engine helicopter hovering high above the LZ clearing, but he didn’t allow himself any relief. He wasn’t free yet. Not even close.
The next explosion sounded seconds later, and as he pulled the canister of blue smoke free from his LBV, there were more cries of pain. Good. He hoped he got all of them.
He’d brought three different canisters, each of which signaled something different. Blue meant that he was coming out hot and they needed to make a fast exit. The only time he would have needed it was if his radio had been busted, but since he’d already relayed to the pilot that he’d been burned, there was no need to signal. Even so, he planned to use the smoke to cover their escape once they hit the air.
Gunfire still sounded in the distance behind him, so he knew he hadn’t gotten them all. Sweat poured off him as he burst into the clearing. The Huey rose, but a rope dropped immediately. His legs and lungs burned as he ate up the distance to his freedom. As he reached the dangling line, he immediately hooked the carabiner to the harness he wore. His entire body jerked as the chopper lifted higher and he left the earth far behind.
He didn’t let his guard down. The wind whipped around him, the sound of gunfire and shouting into his radio fierce. He twisted just in time to see at least a dozen men spill into the clearing like cockroaches.
As he released the top on the smoke canister, a sharp pain pierced his upper leg, then his shoulder.
“Fuck, I’m hit,” he ground out, letting the pilot know even though above him he could hear the backup team returning fire with rapid speed. Adrenaline still pumping through him, he hauled back and threw the canister like a football. Blue smoke rolled everywhere, the color invading the air and whipping around with the wind, completely covering the men below and destroying their visibility.
As he was winched up, he gritted his teeth against the pain shredding through him. Each tug and swing with the wind increased his aching. He couldn’t tell if the bullets had gone through, but he’d find out soon enough. After what felt like an eternity, he was finally hauled into the belly of the Huey to find two Marines he’d gone on missions with before, a Navy medic, and an older guy in a suit he didn’t recognize. Cade blinked, trying to get his bearing, but his vision was starting to blur.
One of the Marines started applying pressure to his shoulder while the medic ripped open a packet of QuickClot and poured it on his leg wound. The unknown man sat there strapped in as he watched with piercing green eyes that made Cade feel as if the guy could see right through to his soul. What the hell? Maybe he’d been hit worse than he realized.
Iciness snaked through Cade as he tore his gaze away and watched the team work. The medic asked him something, but the edges of his vision started to dim as he tried to force his voice to work. Damn it, he was going into shock. He wanted to fight it, to resist, but his body won out as cold and blackness took over, sucking him under like an angry vortex.
• • •
Cade blinked, opening his eyes to a steady beeping sound. His surroundings quickly came into focus as he glanced around the sterile white room. He was on his back, had an IV attached to his arm, and was lying on an uncomfortable bed with starchy sheets. Groaning in pain, he pushed the sheet off to reveal a blue-and-white hospital gown that barely covered his dick. The white bandage around his leg looked stark compared to his tanned skin, and as he shifted against the bed his arm ached. Yep, he’d been shot twice.
At the sound of male voices outside his room, he glanced around again. It didn’t look like a field hospital, but a real one with walls. Where the hell was he? He remembered being in the Huey, then being in a small plane, but the trip was fuzzy in his memory.
His heart rate increased as the door opened. The man from the chopper stepped inside, holding a manila folder. He wasn’t wearing a suit now, but slacks and a green Polo T-shirt. His eyes widened a fraction when he met Cade’s gaze before he ducked back out, still keeping the door propped open.
He spoke in low tones to someone, then stepped back inside with Colonel Abraham Winters, Cade’s commander.
He tried to push up, but the colonel frowned. “At ease, son.”
Cade semi-relaxed against the bed but reache
d for the remote to push his bed up to a sitting position and pulled the sheet over his lap. He was sure the two men didn’t want to see his junk any more than he wanted to flash them. When he found the right buttons, he watched the two men out of the corner of his eye as he worked the controller. The movements intensified the aching in his arm and upper thigh, but he embraced the discomfort.
Pain sharpened his senses and pushed out some of the fuzziness. “Where am I?”
“Mexico.” Colonel Winters looked at the man who still hadn’t spoken, then back at Cade. “This is Lieutenant General Wesley Burkhart. You know who he is?”
Cade nodded. “Head of the NSA.”
If the man with dark hair just barely graying at the temples was surprised Cade knew his name, he gave no indication. He just watched Cade with that unnerving stare. Not that Cade would ever show he was uncomfortable. Nope, he stared right back. The man didn’t put off evil vibes, but he was a predator. Trained. Just like Cade.
“All right, enough of the staring contest. O’Reilly, listen to what the lieutenant general has to say. He’s a straight shooter. Whatever he says, he means, and he has the highest clearance in the country. You can ask or reveal anything to him. I . . .” He paused for a long moment, then cleared his throat. “It’s been an honor to have you under my command, O’Reilly.” Then he was gone, slipping out the door like a ghost.
Cade frowned at his commander’s words since they sounded a lot like that he wasn’t going to be working with him in the future. He hadn’t screwed up his mission, he knew that much. “Why were you on that Huey? Did something go wrong in the jungle? Did the rest of the mission go off as planned?” Since his commander said this guy had the highest clearance possible and Cade didn’t feel like getting into another staring contest, he asked everything on his mind.
Standing at attention with the manila file tucked under one arm, the man looked as though he’d have no problem commanding thousands. “I was on it because I wanted to see you in action. Nothing went wrong; you completed your mission in record time. It was . . . impressive.”