by Elle Kennedy
“So I’m just like everyone else, huh? No more special than Ethan or D or some stranger you encounter on the street?”
He could feel her hand trembling as she wiped away the blood caked on his shoulder. “You’re purposely trying to get a rise out of me,” she said stiffly. “You’re my friend, okay? I don’t like seeing my friends in pain.”
“We’re back to that, huh? Isabel and Trevor, best friends forever.” He chuckled. “You really think we’re capable of being just friends?”
Keeping her eyes downcast, she ignored the jab and slapped a square bandage on his arm.
Trevor didn’t know why he was deliberately antagonizing her. This wasn’t the time to resume the conversation they’d started before all hell broke loose. There were more important matters to deal with. Finding Morgan. Tracking the asshole who’d sent those mercenaries to the compound. Getting a new base camp set up.
At least the situation wasn’t a complete disaster. All their important documents had been stored in the safe down in the tunnel, and they’d raided the armory before taking off, so they were solid in terms of supplies. Money, of course, was never an issue. Morgan was loaded, and the other men weren’t hurting for cash either—mercs weren’t called soldiers of fortune for nothing. Everything else—clothing, books, and whatnot—could be easily replaced.
Not Beth.
Trevor’s heart clenched so hard he winced, an action that brought a rush of concern to Isabel’s blue eyes. “Are you all right?” she demanded. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” He sighed. “I was just thinking about Beth.”
The tension that had been brewing between them dissolved like a sugar cube in water. Isabel’s expression softened, her touch becoming gentle once again as she taped up his bandage.
“This must be hard for you,” she said quietly.
His head lifted in surprise. “Me?”
“I know Holden’s loss reminds you of losing Gina. Brings back painful memories.”
Her tone was apprehensive, but warm. Isabel radiated warmth like a damn furnace. He’d never met a more compassionate woman, and although he knew her compassion wasn’t an act, he also knew there was so much more to Isabel Roma than he’d ever suspected.
Five months ago, she was just beginning to open up to him, right before she got scared and ran.
This time around, he was determined to get to know Isabel. The real Isabel. He’d already amassed a few details during his search for her, but he needed more. He wouldn’t be satisfied until he knew all her secrets. Until he learned what made her tick, what made her laugh, what made her cry.
Until he got a peek into her heart.
Her soul, damn it.
His obsession with this woman was incredibly disconcerting. He felt like it had come out of nowhere, and yet they’d met more than a year ago. The buildup to this moment had actually been slow and steady.
So why did his feelings for her continue to catch him by total fucking surprise?
“It does bring back memories,” he confessed. “I know exactly what Holden’s going through, but I also know that nothing we say is going to make him feel better right now. He needs to deal with it in his own way.”
“Hopefully it’s not the same way you dealt with it,” she said wryly. “After that first job in Colombia, I was so worried about you, you know. I thought you might . . .” She hesitated. “I truly thought you might kill yourself.”
“Not much of a stretch, Iz—I wanted to die.” Shame gripped his insides like a vise. “I couldn’t do that to my family, though. But, you know, as more time passed, I realized I couldn’t do that to myself. Gina was dead, but that didn’t mean I had to die right along with her. It didn’t mean there wasn’t anything left to live for.”
He didn’t add that meeting Isabel had contributed to that realization. The fact that he’d been able to feel even an inkling of desire for another woman had shown him that maybe he wasn’t dead inside. That maybe there was hope for him after all. A chance to find something worthwhile with someone else.
Their gazes locked, and he knew she was seeing his thoughts reflected in his eyes. Her breath hitched, her hands dropping to her lap.
“What else needs fixing up?” she asked quickly.
His gaze traveled to her mouth, to those perfect pink lips he’d had the pleasure of kissing. Once. Only once, and it hadn’t been enough. Not by a long shot.
“Trevor . . .”
The warning note in her voice didn’t deter him. He leaned closer and brought his hand to her face again. He swept his thumb over her silky cheek, gauging her reaction, and when she didn’t push him away, he glided his fingertips to her lips and traced the seam.
A wobbly breath flew out of her mouth and heated the pads of his fingers.
Isabel stayed motionless as she knelt there in front of him. He saw her pulse throbbing in her throat, and knew that if he placed a hand over her heart, he would feel its erratic beating beneath his palm.
His heart was beating pretty damn fast, too. He wanted to kiss her. Fuck, he’d wanted to kiss her from the second she’d walked back into his life. Didn’t matter that she’d abandoned him in New York, didn’t matter that she insisted she didn’t have feelings for him anymore. He still wanted her, and if that made him a pathetic chump, then so be it.
Isabel’s lips parted as his head dipped closer, as he grasped her chin and angled it.
Their lips were millimeters apart, nanoseconds from meeting, when a loud knock interrupted them.
Isabel jerked back as if she’d been shot by a cannon, almost falling on her butt. She hastily steadied herself and stumbled to her feet.
“Trev, you in here?” It was Ethan, and the rookie sounded unhappy.
Trevor got up to answer the door, ignoring the shooting pains that went through his torn-up feet. His socks were soaked, which told him he was bleeding, but tending to his injuries would have to wait.
“What’s up?” he demanded.
Ethan looked startled when he caught sight of Isabel. He looked from the blushing blonde to Trevor’s bare chest and said, “Am I interrupting something?”
“Naah. Isabel was just cleaning me up. What’s going on?”
“Holden’s gone.”
“Are you serious?”
Ethan nodded.
“Fuck.” Trevor briefly closed his eyes, feeling a headache coming on. “When did this happen?”
“He was outside up until an hour ago, chain-smoking—I’ve never seen him smoke a cigarette let alone an entire fucking pack. Anyway, I sat there for a while, tried to talk to him, but he’s unreachable, man. He’s completely shut down. Eventually I came in so Sofia could look at my arm. I went out there just now to check on him and he’s gone. So is one of the Jeeps.”
Alarm skittered up Trevor’s spine. Shit. This wasn’t good.
He fished his smartphone out of his back pocket and brought up Holden’s number.
“I already tried that,” Ethan said. “He’s not picking up.”
Sure enough, after half a dozen rings he got bumped over to voice mail. He tried again, this time leaving a message. “Holden, it’s Trev. Where the hell are you? Check in. Now.”
They couldn’t afford to lose another man. The rest of the team was already scattered all over the fucking place, no one knew where the boss was, and now Holden had taken off? Was nothing destined to go right today?
“What do we do?” Ethan ran a hand through his short brown hair in frustration. “Should we go after him? I can follow his tire tracks, see where they lead.”
With Kane leaving, Trevor would officially be the team leader, and these were the kinds of decisions he hated making. Never leave a man behind had been drilled into his personal code of conduct during his army stint, but Holden wasn’t a missing soldier. He was a grieving husband, which meant he’d be about as helpful as a case of poison ivy at the moment. Not an asset to the team, but an encumbrance. And sending Ethan after him meant they’d be another man down,
mission-wise. So maybe it was for the best that Holden was gone.
Unless he’d left so he could blow his own brains out . . . In which case, someone needed to go after him. Pronto.
Before Trevor was forced to decide, his phone buzzed. The incoming text sent a wave of relief slamming into him.
“It’s from Holden,” he said. “He’s at the airfield, just chartered a flight. Says he’s going home to see Beth’s family.”
Isabel’s blue eyes filled with worry. “Is that really a good idea? Should we try to stop him?”
After a beat, Trevor shook his head. “Let him go. You saw the shape he was in—he wouldn’t be much help to us anyway. If anything, we’d be splitting our focus, trying to find Morgan while worrying about Holden.”
She didn’t look convinced. “I don’t know if he should be alone.”
“Trust me, even if he’s surrounded by a hundred people right now he’d still be alone.” Trevor choked down a familiar lump of sorrow. “He’s going to be feeling alone for a long, long time.”
• • •
Noelle’s ranch was a sprawling eighty-acre spread in the California countryside, and of all the homes Noelle owned, this was Isabel’s favorite. The property sat at the foot of a redwood forest, the land abundant with native oaks, winding creeks, wildflowers, and endless pastures.
The house itself was reminiscent of eighteenth-century Spanish colonial architecture. Single story with a stucco exterior and a U-shaped floor plan that allowed for a gorgeous interior courtyard. From the outside, it looked harmless, but Isabel knew the place was more secure than a prison. Bulletproof windows, top-of-the-line alarms, motion sensors, not to mention strategically placed booby traps all over the property.
Last time Isabel had come here was when she and some of Noelle’s other chameleons met up for a little R&R. An assassins’ retreat, Juliet Mason had called it. It had been surprisingly fun, but then again, it was impossible not to have a good time with Juliet and Paige. The two women could drink Isabel under the table—that was for sure.
The group arrived at the ranch in the midafternoon, after a short flight in the twin-engine Cessna they’d rented at a private airport outside Oaxaca. Much to Isabel’s surprise, Trevor had piloted the small plane himself. The fact that she’d had no clue he could fly a plane was just another reminder of how little they knew about each other.
Which raised the question, how was it possible to feel such a powerful connection to a man she hardly knew?
Abby and Kane—along with the three puppies, which Abby had refused to leave behind—were already on their way to Costa Rica to set up the new compound. Trevor, D, and Ethan had come with Isabel to the ranch, despite Dr. Amaro’s insistence that D stay in bed. When the good doctor tried putting her foot down, the man had predictably refused to follow orders and heaved himself out of bed, looking so pale and swaying so hard Isabel had almost laughed.
He didn’t look any better now. Skin devoid of color, normally sharp eyes glazed, stumbling slightly as he walked. It was incredibly unsettling seeing the tattooed warrior looking so . . . unwarriorlike.
They strode into the living room, which never failed to startle Isabel. It was so very homey with its wood-paneled walls, gleaming windows, and cozy furniture in neutral shades. Each one of Noelle’s properties gave off a wholly different vibe, but the sterile Paris penthouse was the only one that actually seemed to suit the woman.
“Noelle lives here?” Trevor’s expression was dubious as he looked around.
“Yes, but only when she’s not in Paris or Vermont or Tokyo or any of her gazillion other safe houses,” Isabel said drily.
Across the room, Ethan had approached the stone fireplace and was studying the barren mantel. “There isn’t a single photograph in this house,” he remarked. “Doesn’t she have any family? Friends?”
“Friends, definitely not. Family, I’m not sure,” Isabel admitted. “You’d have to ask Abby—she knows more about Noelle’s background than I do.”
“Speak of the devil,” Trevor said as his phone buzzed. He quickly took the call. “What’s up, Abby?” He listened. Frowned. “Are you frickin’ kidding me?”
Everyone in the room went on the alert.
“No, she’s not here yet . . . yeah, I’ll let you know.” Trevor hung up with a soft curse and addressed the group. “Morgan never showed up for his meeting.”
D and Ethan released their own expletives, the former’s far more creative than the latter’s.
“According to Breckin—the CIA agent he was meeting with,” Trevor clarified for Isabel— “Morgan bailed on the meeting. No phone call, no message. He just didn’t show.”
From what she knew of Jim Morgan, the man was a professional right down to his core. Skipping out on a meeting didn’t seem like his style.
“He left the compound, what, two, three days ago?” Isabel asked.
Trevor nodded. “Three.”
“Did you call his pilot? Did the plane actually make it to D.C.?”
“It did. Abby spoke to Sam, our regular pilot. He’s been on call at a private airport near Arlington for the past three days. Morgan told him to wait, said they wouldn’t be grounded for more than a day, but Sam hasn’t heard from him since.”
The anxiety in the air was palpable. So was the fatigue. Isabel felt like she had grains of sand lodged in her eyes—she hadn’t slept since she’d left Nigeria, and that had been more than forty-eight hours ago. She could barely stay upright.
Lurking in the doorway, D looked on the verge of collapse too, but she knew the man would never admit he might need to rest.
Meeting those veiled black eyes, Isabel walked toward the big mercenary. “You need to lie down,” she said firmly. “Let me show you to one of the guest rooms.”
That the normally ill-tempered D didn’t protest was incredibly telling.
Without a word, he followed her down the wide hallway. His scuffed black shit kickers didn’t make a single sound as they traveled over the tiled floor, a mosaic of soft pastels. Isabel gave him the room she’d used last time, a large space with a queen-size bed, an enormous bay window, and a private bath.
“When’s your boss showing up?”
The gravelly inquiry surprised her. She’d noticed that D rarely spoke to anyone other than his teammates, not if he could help it.
“Her jet left Paris an hour ago, so she should be here around midnight.”
He just nodded, then lowered his enormous body onto the bed and stretched out on the peach-colored bedspread.
His black muscle shirt left his arms exposed and drew Isabel’s gaze to his tattoos. The Japanese-style images on his biceps were gorgeous—a deadly samurai fighting the green-and-black diamondback snake coiled around his forearm. Another snake circled his neck, this one red and black, with a forked tongue and a thick body that seemed to undulate whenever its owner moved. On the inside of each wrist was a mysterious set of dates, which Isabel didn’t dare ask about.
God, he was such an imposing man. Terrifying, even. She couldn’t imagine any woman being fully at ease with him. He was the kind of man you’d forever be on edge around, constantly waiting for him to snap. If he possessed even an ounce of tenderness, she had yet to see it.
Unlike Trevor, whose touch earlier had been so tender she’d wanted to drown in it.
She quickly pushed aside the memory of their disturbing encounter in the clinic. She couldn’t let herself dwell on that almost-kiss. Not if she wanted to keep a level head around him.
“You want help taking off your boots?” Isabel asked, glancing at the black Timberlands hanging off the edge of the mattress.
“No.”
With that, D closed his eyes, effectively dismissing her.
Okay then.
Deciding not to push her luck—the stubborn man was resting, at least—she ducked out of the room, closed the door behind her, and bumped right into Trevor.
“Oh.” A squeak flew out as her forehead collided with his coll
arbone.
He chuckled, catching her waist to steady her. “You okay?”
Damn it. He was touching her again. The heat of his palm sizzled through the soft fabric of the T-shirt Abby had given her, and his woodsy, masculine scent infused her senses and wrapped around her like a warm blanket. He always smelled so good, no matter what.
“D give you any trouble?”
Feeling awkward, she took a step back, which caused Trevor’s hand to drop from her hip. “No, he just ignored me and went right to sleep.”
“You should get some sleep too. You look like you’re about to pass out.”
She sighed. “I feel like it too. I haven’t slept in days.”
They moved away from D’s door and continued down the hall. Isabel stopped in front of the next guest room. “You take this one. Ethan can have the room right across the hall. Noelle will commandeer the master bedroom when she shows up.”
“What about you? Where will you sleep?”
His voice was so husky it sent a shiver up her spine. It also summoned the memory of the last time they’d discussed sleeping arrangements. That final night in Manhattan.
What do you say, Isabel? Will you let me sleep next to you tonight?
She’d said yes. They’d slept in the same bed that night. There’d been no sex, no physical contact, just a man and a woman lying together in bed and going to sleep, yet somehow that had felt even more intimate than sex. Sleeping with someone required letting down your guard and placing a substantial amount of trust in the other person. And she’d realized the next morning that she must really trust Trevor—because that had been the best damn sleep she’d ever had.
But not this time. She couldn’t open that door again.
“There’s another bedroom next to the den,” she said. “On the other side of the house. I’ll take that one.”
A soft breath left his mouth. God, his mouth. It was far too sensual for someone so masculine.
“All the way on the other side of the house, huh?” He slanted his head. “What are you so scared of, sweetheart?”
Don’t visit again, Isabel. I can’t stand the sight of you.
Her most recent encounter with her father suddenly flew into her head like a gust of frigid wind. She made an effort to visit him at Sing Sing prison a couple of times a year, though why she bothered, she had no clue. Bernie Roma wanted nothing to do with his daughter. Sometimes, when she was feeling particularly down on herself, she didn’t even blame him.