by Lora Leigh
Raeg paused then, his lips tightening at the memory. He’d been enraged when he learned Gia had nearly killed his brother.
“Before I killed her.” Summer tonelessly finished the sentence, staring at her uneaten portion of cake on the table in front of her.
Of all her enemies, Dragovich was the most brutal, the most arrogant. He would never stop coming after her. And if he couldn’t get to her, he would eventually go after her family, starting with Aunjenue and her parents.
God, her brother was going to kill her.
“We have to call Caleb.”
“How do you think we found you?” Raeg stated coolly. “We’ve already been to the farm looking for you, Summer. Caleb’s aware of the problem.”
Yeah, her brother was going to kill her. No wonder Aunjenue kept texting to make certain she’d be home.
She ran her hands over her face. How was she going to protect them? Cliffton, Georgia, was home. Damned near everyone who lived there was related to her in one way or another. Aunts, uncles, cousins, her friends … her life.
It was all there in Cliffton.
She roughly pushed back from the table, nearly upending the chair she was sitting in before Raeg caught it. Wrapping her arms around herself, she turned her back on them and fought to control the fear, the overwhelming guilt surging through her.
Damn Dragovich. This was the reason Falcon had so carefully plotted the appearance that Summer had died in Moscow—they knew he’d never stop looking for her.
When he was pissed off, he was like a damned dog searching for a particular bone. And he had enough money to get whatever he wanted. Evidently her former teammate had enough hatred to sell information to him too.
“When he couldn’t find you, he sent two men to Cliffton,” Raeg informed her. “They’re watching the family and watching for you. You did the psychological profile on him. You know him better than anyone, Summer. What will he do?”
He would begin killing her family off one by one until she showed up. Once she did, he’d want to play with her. Dragovich was a demented son of a bitch. The evil he possessed was so black and ice cold, there was no mercy at all within him. But he also considered himself smarter, stronger than his opponents. Because of that, he made a game out of everything.
“He’ll play with me,” she told him, keeping her back to him. “No matter where I go, no matter how I try to draw him away from the family, that’s where he’ll stay, just to torment me. He’ll want me there, want me fighting to figure out who he’ll go after first and how to stop him.”
She’d spent months on the profile she’d built on him. Even her mother, a former CIA analyst herself, had helped her pull together the information she’d needed on the Russian warlord. Not that her mother had known Summer was going after him. Her family still seemed to believe that she worked as an analyst and profiler only. They had no idea she was in the thick of danger whenever possible in the past years. When she’d left the CIA she had never actually informed them that she was doing fieldwork. She’d just stated that she was doing more or less as she had with the Agency.
“Who will he go after first?”
Who would he go after first?
“If I go home, he’ll focus on me. He’ll want me to worry, to suffer, then he’ll send his men in to take me and a family member, though more than likely he’ll take more than one. Once he has me in custody, he’ll make me watch while he kills a few of them before he lets me die.”
He’d start with Aunjenue.
“I have to go back home.” She sighed. “I was going back anyway, but…”
She’d have to face Caleb, convince him to make certain protection concentrated on the family and allow her to face Dragovich, though she really didn’t see that happening. That wouldn’t happen.
What have I done to my family?
“I was getting out,” she whispered. “I knew it was time. I thought I was going in time…”
In time to save herself, in time to find some peace. She shook her head at the thought. She should have known better. After learning how destructive, how completely corrupt Gia actually was, she should have known that the other woman had done something like this. She should have been prepared, should have kept it from happening.
She knew how people worked, knew how people like Dragovich and traitors like Gia connived and manipulated information and the people around them. She should have never been caught unaware by this, or allowed her family to be in this kind of danger.
She should have been prepared …
“Thank you for letting me know.” She turned back to them, the ice that filled her freezing her clear to her soul. “You should return to Arlington.”
Falcon and Raeg remained at the table. Falcon glanced at his brother with a sort of mild assurance, as though they had already expected her response, while his brother’s expression went from implacable to prick in about two heartbeats.
“Do you think you can do this alone, Summer?” Raeg snorted, mockery filling his voice. “Or that Caleb can protect you against Dragovich?”
She knew he would try. Caleb, her brothers Bowe and Brody, her father and her mother and even Aunjenue, they would try to protect her. Unfortunately, they would be Dragovich’s targets as well if he couldn’t get to her. Aunjenue would be the most vulnerable. Her father was a former Delta Force soldier, Caleb was former Special Forces, but Bowe and Brody’s training, though less conventional, was just as extensive. Even her mother was former CIA, and one of the best shooters Summer had ever witnessed.
She actually suspected her mother, like herself, had been far more than an analyst while employed by the CIA.
“Caleb can protect the house.” She toyed absently with the braid that fell over her shoulder. “Momma and Daddy, Aunjenue, our brothers.” She nodded at the thought. “I’ll protect myself. I have my own place but…”
“I told you she was fucking crazy.” Raeg turned to his brother, glaring at him before Summer could finish. “Didn’t I tell you she’d come up with just this? She’s a suicide wish disguised as a sex kitten. I warned you.”
A sex kitten?
Summer turned to him in surprise, her eyes widening. Where the hell had he come up with sex kitten?
“Raeg…” Falcon’s voice was its own warning.
“Don’t you ‘Raeg’ me.” His brother pushed from the chair, turning a brooding look of simmering anger on her. “You’re right. The best place to face Dragovich is right there where he’s focused. You leave, he’ll focus on your family anyway. Go back, let him see you there. Face the first attack, then he’ll come after you himself. He won’t be able to help it.”
“That’s exactly what I said.” Her hands went to her hips as she frowned back at him. “And how is that a suicide wish?”
He had never made any sense to her. Ever. He was a walking, talking puzzle she couldn’t figure out no matter how hard she tried.
“Because you think you can do it alone?” His craggy features were filled with anger now. “Because you keep thinking you’re Wonder Woman and Supergirl all rolled into one?”
Fury snapped inside her. He was staring at her again as though she was too stupid to live, as though he had all the answers and he knew her all the way to her soul and found her completely lacking.
This was why the two of them could not get along. He was a prick on a good day and a complete asshole at any other time.
And he didn’t know a damned thing.
“If we’re talkin’ superheroes, sugar, I always preferred the Black Widow myself. She was just so much more interestin’,” she informed him with an exaggerated drawl. “And if I needed your opinion I would have asked for it, now wouldn’t I? Now go home and let me fix my own mess if you don’t mind.”
Let her fix her own mess?
Raeg could feel his head getting ready to explode.
Be nice to her, Falcon had demanded.
Be understanding, his brother had told him a dozen times if he’d told him one.
<
br /> Well “nice” and “understanding” just didn’t get it with this woman. She was like a damned tornado if she wasn’t reined in, and Falcon simply refused to see it. Hell, his brother was so blinded by emotion and lust he couldn’t see it if it knocked him on his ass.
“You say that as though you actually have a hope in hell of facing that bastard and surviving.” He couldn’t help that his voice was rising, or that incredulity was filling it. “What you’ll do is end up straining Caleb’s resources, and all of you will end up dead.”
Her eyes widened instantly, outrage filling them.
“Shame on you.” The violet hue of her eyes snapped in fury as her nose lifted with insulting disgust. “You think I’ve learned nothing in the years I’ve been covert? Trust me, Raeg. I do know how to handle acquiring my own security and I’m really not too damned proud to do so.”
She knew how to do what? Hire some fifty-cent fucking personal protection agents who’d never gone against the likes of Dragovich? Who had no idea what they were facing? Good God, she’d lost her mind. She was a crazy woman and his brother simply refused to see it. Hell, even he hadn’t realized the lengths she’d go to in her insanity, now had he?
He turned on his brother, glaring at him expectantly and seeing only Falcon’s cool, observational look in return. Why the hell was he so calm now? Where were the Spanish curses? The little temper tantrum guaranteed to ensure Summer at least paid attention to the fact that she was completely fucking up?
“Why the hell are we even here then?” he demanded, disbelief adding volume to his voice. “You should have sent her a fucking text and been done with it.”
“My thoughts exactly!” Summer yelled from behind him. “Especially considering how much we both know you alone hate me. I’m surprised you’re not gloating your ass off. Poor Falcon, you just set him thinkin’ you came to help him. You probably just came to get your rocks off at the sight of me tremblin’ in fear. Well, I don’t tremble, do I, hot shot?”
He jerked around to her.
She had not just said something so ridiculous, had she? She couldn’t believe he hated her, could she? That he’d ever, in a million years, allow anyone to physically harm her, that he could even bear the thought of it? And were those tears sparkling in her eyes? She made his dick so hard it was like iron, shredded his temper, and she thought he hated her? Thought he’d get off at the thought of her hurt, or worse, dead?
Disbelief warred with self-disgust as he stared at her, realizing she believed just that. That over the years the anger and sharp comments hadn’t been because he was dying to touch her and couldn’t, but because he hated her. And nothing could be further from the truth.
“Just go, Raeg,” she demanded, her voice lowering, thickening, before she swung around to stare out at the ocean once again. “I’ll figure it out.”
And Falcon wasn’t saying a word. He was watching both of them instead, his pale blue eyes icy, all emotion or thoughts hidden as he sat, his forearms resting on the table, simply watching silently.
Raeg knew that look, knew his brother wouldn’t intercede unless forced to. Instead, he was dissecting them, and Raeg hated it when Falcon tried to dissect him.
Damn him.
“Do something,” he ordered his brother. “You’re the only one who can handle her.”
Falcon’s brows only lifted curiously.
“‘Handle’ me?” Summer swung back around then, anger filling her expression, her eyes. “No one ‘handles’ me, John Raeg, especially not Falcon. And damned sure not you.”
“I believe it,” Raeg snarled when his brother did no more than shrug when he glared at him. “I think it’s the other way around. You make damned sure you control him instead.” He flicked Falcon a disgusted glance. “She leads you around by your dick, and makes you love every second of it.”
Falcon’s lips only quirked to match the gleam of amusement that suddenly appeared in his eyes.
“Jealous, asshole?” she snapped behind him. “Maybe if you learned how to control that ugly attitude of yours, you’d be so lucky. Maybe then you wouldn’t have the disposition of a wounded gator.”
He turned to her, seeing the confrontational stance. One hand on a cocked hip, her nose lifted disdainfully, her expression so damned superior even though those tears glittered in her eyes, refusing to fall. And he wanted nothing more than to jerk her to him, lift her to the counter behind her, and fuck her until the only thing she could do was whisper his name in exhaustion.
“You are completely unreasonable,” he ground out, feeling the pressure on his molars as his teeth clenched.
She made him crazy. She refused to listen to reason, refused to listen to him.
Damn her.
He should head right back to Arlington as she demanded, but he knew that wasn’t really an option. He couldn’t let it become an option. He’d be leaving his brother and Summer to face a Russian warlord alone, uncertain of the backup they may or may not have.
They worked well together, but he remembered what happened the last time they’d gone against Dragovich without adequate backup. Their former teammate couldn’t be considered “backup,” let alone “adequate.”
Son of a bitch.
He couldn’t do this, yet he had no other choice.
Summer was chaos and she made him insane.
She was everything he and Falcon had ever wanted in a woman and everything they couldn’t have, couldn’t afford to lose. And she thought they were just going to walk away and leave her to face this alone? Leave her to trust some damned stranger to cover her back, someone Raeg had no idea if they could be trusted or not?
It simply was not going to happen.
“I need to pack.” Tension filled her voice, but at least she was no longer on the verge of crying. “The two of you need to go home. Thank you for letting me know what’s going on, but I can handle this from here.”
She could handle it from here, could she?
And Falcon simply snagged Summer’s dessert plate, and began silently eating her cake as though his brother and his former partner weren’t about to strangle each other.
As though whatever Summer decided was law.
Before he realized what he was doing, before Summer could evade him, he was in her face, nose to nose, ignoring her surprise.
“Go ahead and fucking pack,” he snarled. “We head out in an hour for Cliffton. And by God, I don’t take orders from a spoil-assed little Southern socialite I can’t seem to keep my damned brother away from. I guess you’re fucking stuck with me.”
Her eyes narrowed. “You are handling that F-word far too often.” She sniffed disdainfully. “And I don’t have to worry about you staying long. You won’t make it five minutes around my family, and you’ll be stealing all Dragovich’s fun when you kill them yourself. Or they kill you.”
With that, she swept from the kitchen in a cloud of subtle spicy scent and affronted feminine anger.
And Raeg had a feeling he just placed the first nail in his own coffin.
“She bakes those goddamned cakes herself, you moron,” he snapped at his brother when there was no one else to yell at. “When are you going figure that out?”
Falcon scooped up the last bite with relish before lifting his brow with a knowing smile. “Since the first one I ate? Try learning how to deal with her, Raeg, maybe then she’d cook for us. I hear she’s quite good at it. I’ll be waiting in the car. Make sure she doesn’t run.”
“Me?” he growled. “Why me?”
Falcon shrugged, moving for the door. “Because. You’re the one who pissed her off.”
Chapter
THREE
Her brother Caleb was waiting for them when they stepped into the kitchen from the attached garage of her house. The low light from the counter illuminated the large, country-style room with its wide work island, breakfast nook, and multitude of cabinets and windows.
She’d had the house completely remodeled after she’d bought it from her broth
er. She was an agent, with all the paranoid tendencies that went with it. Exterior walls were lead-lined, windows were bullet resistant, shades made to screw with infra-red and heat-detecting technology. The inside window shutters were merely added security.
The security system wasn’t just installed by her brother, it was created by him as well, right down to the footfall detector on the walk leading to the porch and on the porch itself.
“So far, there’s no sign of a sniper,” Caleb informed them as he carried a pot of coffee to the table as Whitt, one of his former Special Forces team members, collected cups. “Watchers are having problems watching the houses,” he grinned. “They don’t care much for the alligators that creep around the grounds at night.”
“Who needs security guards?” Summer murmured.
Caleb chuckled at the comment. Even in the low light, his eyes—nearly the same color as hers—gleamed in the near darkness. Short black hair, beard, and mustache. He looked like a pirate. He had been known to act like one on occasion too.
“We’ll go over everything I’ve pulled in since Falcon and Raeg showed up in the morning,” he promised. “Daddy’s expecting all three of you at the house before breakfast. He likes to chat on the front porch over coffee, and Momma likes Summer’s help in the kitchen.” He gave them all a warning look. “That’s you and Falcon as well, Raeg. You don’t want the major to come looking for you.”
Oh God.
That was going to be a disaster.
Her daddy would take one look at Falcon and Raeg, then give her one of those disappointed looks she hated so badly. And that was just the beginning.
Her daddy knew her, could read her like a book. That meant she was really in trouble.
“Daddy’s askin’ questions, Summer,” he warned her next. “Especially about the work you’ve been doing with Falcon and Raeg that had Dragovich coming after you. He was on the phone with Davis Allen when I left the house earlier.”
That was not a good thing. It was bad. It was so very bad, and she was just in so much trouble.