“Get her to the safe house,” Kate ordered Jake in hushed tones.
The federal agent with the earpiece turned to Kate. “Where is that?”
She turned sharply back, looking him up and down disapprovingly. “Why do you need to know?”
He fumbled on his words, unable to explain.
“It’s none of your fucking business, that’s where,” she snapped. “Don’t ask again. And let me know if you hear anyone asking.”
“That’ll learn ya.” Jake scoffed under his breath, noting the very real threat. He admired Kate’s balls. Leaks were always a problem.
Then, speaking to the larger group, she issued a warning. “This meeting never happened. She was never here. You never saw her. You will be debriefed. If you say anything different, I will know—and I’ll haunt you.”
With those words, Kate pulled out her pistol and cocked it. Jake couldn’t stifle the edge of a grin—he always had enjoyed working alongside the CIA. At least they carried guns. They meant business.
The feds nodded religiously to Kate and made to break out of the room. They couldn’t scatter fast enough. She was fierce as shit.
“Time to go.” Jake stepped forward, looking down at a frightened Aisha, who was fidgeting and twisting before him. He reached out and gently touched her shoulder, ushering her to the door and out of the room. She seemed startled as his thick fingers made contact with her, and he didn’t miss how her eyes flitted toward him—questioning, curious. Interested.
“Kate.” Charles caught up alongside the boss woman as they ushered the princess down a nearby set of concrete stairs. “We’re going to need the big guns.”
Jake felt a diabolical grin cross his lips as he overheard that, garnering a worried look from the princess as she looked back at him.
“What?” Her voice flitted so gently, like a hummingbird, that neither Kate nor Charles behind him could hear.
Jake led the procession down the staircase toward the fleet bay, trying to show the princess that they knew what the fuck they were doing.
Even if they didn’t.
Was there really no ops plan? Were they really flying by the seat of their pants?
Jake eyed the princess from the side as he moved her forward. He wondered if he should try to offer words of assurance, but he had no platitudes to give. He turned his attention to deliberating how many clips he should bring, something he was much better at. Tactically proficient, emotionally vacant: the title of Jake’s autobiography if he ever had the patience to write.
Tailing Charles and Kate, Jake ushered the princess into the large, concrete vehicle fleet bay three stories underground. Much to Jake’s pleasure, it appeared to be very well-equipped. Not that he would expect anything less from the flagship American embassy.
“No, this isn’t okay.” The nervousness in Kate’s whisper overtook the small concrete parking garage.
The duo looked back to where Jake stood, their eyes flitting to the vulnerable defector at his side. Jake could sense great unease in the room.
Charles cleared his throat and loudly proclaimed, “Well, if anyone can handle this, it’s Jake. Three tours Iraq. The Middle East. The Sahel, god knows how many times. Thirteen-year SEAL veteran—he’s seen a lot of DA.”
Jake shifted uncomfortably, hating the awkward accolades, especially in front of the princess. Too many things were getting his hackles up.
“Were you a baby when you joined?” Kate asked Jake sarcastically, eyeing him behind her usual wall of suspicion.
Jake gritted his teeth. She had no goddamn idea. He’d lived and breathed that for over a decade, supervising his own team of men at the height of his time in the SEALs. Chief SWO Jake Wilder, looking at a promotion to Senior Chief in the highly elite Development Group—all those ambitions crashed down hard in the Sahel. His last deployment.
As the foursome moved into the front of the fleet parking bay, Jake ran through various scenarios in his mind, preparing for his next steps. In frustration, he clenched his fist. He could run the operation ten times tighter and better than the CIA.
He turned sharply to Kate, grabbing onto the princess’s sleeve.
“Where’s the fucking safe house?” he demanded, losing any semblance of patience. The girl was his ward now. He had taken control. And she seemed content to let that happen.
“It’s the third one we use. The one in the forest. You’ve been there.” Kate nodded to him fast, unwilling to breathe the exact address. Who knew who was listening?
“Are you covering?” Jake went on. “Where are our comms?”
Charles shook his head. “I’ll cover, no comms. This is bad fucking timing with the sheikh nearby. I can’t emphasize that enough. He’s got friends in high places here.”
“Goddamn,” Jake spat. “Then let’s fucking go.”
Charles moved in front of Jake, but Jake lunged forward, pushing the Frenchman back. “Not a fucking chance, buddy. I’m leading this shit now.”
Charles’s mouth dropped open in disbelief.
With a curt nod, Jake moved his defecting princess toward a line of vehicles, wondering why he was ignoring his doctor’s orders to avoid conflict. Why he wanted to be there. Why he was itching to unholster the pistol tucked into his jeans at the small of his back.
“This ain’t going to be without bumps,” Charles admitted, nodding to the rear of Jake’s car. “If things get really sticky, pull out your tickle trunk.”
“Ten-four,” Jake said in dismissal, and he turned to his steed.
The black beauty sat in a corner spot in the parking garage—a car full of power and muscle that he had personally restored by hand for years.
The princess sheltered herself against the passenger side of the dark muscle car, wide-eyed, looking like all she wanted to do was shrink into a ball and sink into the concrete wall. Jake could only imagine how much courage it took her to be here. She had no idea any of these people were going to keep her safe. But whatever reason she had for doing this, it must be a good one.
The least he could do was act decent. Professional. Was he not capable of that? It was a fair question.
As he approached the side of the car, her eyes fell on him, and she gave him the same hopeful look he’d seen earlier. But also in her eyes he saw pain. Fear. Terror.
He stopped in his tracks a good ten feet away from her, like any closer would burn his skin.
He’d seen that vulnerability before, in another country. In another fight. He couldn’t handle seeing it close up again. Distance—between himself and anything that made him feel—was all he had. He was two seconds away from losing his shit completely if she looked at him again with those fucking eyes.
Sharply, he motioned for her to get into the Mustang. She just stared back at him like a doe in the headlights. Her body remained stiff and immovable.
“Get in,” he grunted.
Still, no movement from her.
His jaw jutted out. Of course she was terrified. She twisted her hands together and seemed like she was trying to squeak something out, but before Jake could interpret, he stomped over and grabbed the car door handle.
She sucked in a breath and raised her hands in self-protection.
Looking back up at her big dark eyes, he slowly opened the door for her. “Get in, please,” he grumbled.
She slowly peeled herself away from the wall and tiptoed over to the passenger door of his car. As she brushed past him, he caught hints of vanilla and blackberry. A jolt of fire hit his abdomen, and his eyes narrowed on her. He bet she was just as delicious as she smelled.
Seated inside, Jake shut the door with more muscle than necessary. Her body jolted with the thud. Why was he such a brute?
He settled into the driver’s seat and placed his gun in the door, avoiding her gaze entirely but feeling the burn of it on his neck. He focused on the gun. Tactical planning. His job. If necessary, he was as good a shot with his left hand. Another useful skill.
She tensed up beside him. Uncom
fortable with guns? he wondered. Or uncomfortable around him? Hopefully the latter. It would make it easier if she stayed away. He didn’t need any distractions. He needed to drive her wherever she needed to be, and then walk away. No heroics. No fancy shit. Just in and out. With his head down.
Key in the ignition, the old Shelby Mustang GT500’s engine roared like a bonfire doused in gasoline.
It turned him the fuck on.
It disturbed Jake how giddy he was getting from the atmosphere of danger. It had been a while since he’d been behind the wheel in a good car chase, and the thought of it was getting him hard. He felt like a starving wolf finally presented with some fresh, bloody meat. He licked his lips and felt his arms flex.
“Ready for this?” he asked, purposely not looking at her, fearing any added arousal from the princess would be detrimental to his goals.
He heard her swallow and then, very pertly in perfect English, she said, “I am.”
The sweet silk of her feminine voice made his mouth water.
“Good,” he bit out.
He slammed the car into first gear, punching out his ire. He wouldn’t normally treat his first love like that, but he wanted to fuck his passenger, and that realization was aggravating.
Was it his fault that he was an asshole? He’d had his game face on for thirteen years— back-to-back-to-back tours in various death traps and hellholes. The war on terror had literally become the never-ending story. The OPTEMPO was insane. He wasn’t complaining—he was damn grateful for the opportunity to serve, the opportunity to make a difference. It was just that in the post-mortem, he realized how he’d let it wreak havoc on his life.
The past twelve months post SEALs had been an exercise in walking back that tactical preparedness. An exercise in relaxing. An exercise in becoming a civilian. An exercise in letting go.
An exercise in goddamn futility.
As he watched Charles mount up in his company’s Audi S3 and move forward, he looked over at the princess. She caught his gaze momentarily. Her lips, luscious and round, trembled a touch, just a touch, before she steeled herself again.
He snapped his gaze away. There was no room for emotion. Just execution. That was all he was capable of. He needed her to realize it wasn’t personal. Maybe she would eventually hate him less.
“Put this on,” he ordered her, placing a black baseball hat and large sunglasses in her lap. He reached into the back seat and pulled an army-green jacket into the front. “And this.”
She wrinkled her nose at the contents in her lap.
“Keep it over your chest and, if I tell you to, pull it over your head.” He was commanding her like she was one of his men.
The princess frowned. “Is this really necessary?”
Jake gripped the steering wheel tighter. Obstinate woman. “Yes.” Just follow my orders, he thought.
“Why?” she asked, lifting her head and cocking it to the side.
“Because I said so!” he retorted, shocked at the pushback from her.
There was a brief pause, and he heard her exhale in submission.
Good.
Someone had once accused him of being controlling. Was he? It had served him well in operations. Turns out, SOF was his personality, and tactical zealot was his lifestyle brand.
“Just do it,” he added as he adjusted the car controls for catharsis. He caught her gaze. “Understood?”
She nodded and studied the jacket, keeping her eyes averted. But Jake didn’t miss her skepticism.
He shifted in his seat. He didn’t want to be a jerk, but she needed to follow his orders if they were going to survive. He rubbed his hands across the leather grip on the steering wheel before donning a pair of driving gloves. He wanted all the grip he could get. He wanted to be in full control of what was going to come next.
It took everything he had not to allow himself the vanity of feeling particularly badass with his leather driving gloves, roaring engine, and beautiful VIP princess escaping the repression of her father.
Oh god, it was so good.
A sick grin crossed his lips as his eyes scanned the fleet bay. Like an addict that had been sober for too long but not really long enough, a familiar excitement rose in his throat, crowding out the screams of warning that shot through his mind.
Also by Zoë Normandie
Link to Kindle edition:
Guarding Aisha
Book Three
Hunting Avery
Book One
US Navy Special Warfare Operator Mason Ajax dug his heels deeper into the blisteringly hot white sand as the burn rose into his ankles.
The sun was high and hot, midday on the beach on the paradise island of Dhidhoofinolhu in the Maldives, a breathtaking collection of tropical islands in the Indian Ocean. The clear aqua-blue water and cloudless sky were unblemished except for the occasional bird dipping in and out of sight.
Mason was on a spontaneous post-tour decompression trip before heading back home to Virginia. He wanted—needed—to feel something again.
He’d been numb for too long.
He’d never admit it out loud, but deep down he knew that the decompression was as much about self-medicating as it was about rest. Boss’s orders.
And no one took orders more seriously than Mason.
Mason’s boss, Senior Chief Liam Blackshot, had recognized the growing weariness and battle fatigue in Mason’s eyes. In an unprecedented move, he’d demanded Mason take a week off before reporting back for duty. It was Mason’s first vacation since he’d enlisted.
But ocean waves lapping against the sand weren’t enough to calm the storm inside his chest.
Mason shook his head, beads of sweat trickling through his golden-brownish hair.
Life in DEVGRU was harder than he’d expected. But he never complained. He hadn’t worked through selection, and trial after trial, just to complain. He’d made it into Development Group. The hardest, most badass team in the SEALs.
What did he expect? He wasn’t a fucking pussy, he reminded himself.
Mason rubbed his tanned hands over his face, wiping away the sweat. He’d been sitting too long in the blazing heat. Rows of tiki umbrellas behind him shaded tourists from the scorching Indian Ocean sun, and, behind those, a beautifully crafted wooden deck overlooked the beach. But Mason couldn’t be bothered to be sun safe. He wanted to feel the burn.
No matter how relaxed he ordered his body to be, he couldn’t shake the tension wrapped around his bones. Even sitting in the hot white sand, staring out over the endless blue horizon punctuated by the silhouettes of neighboring islands, Mason’s chest tightened. Sometimes it was so cold that it was hard to breathe.
He was just sick of seeing blood on his hands at the end of every day. That’s all it was. Battle fatigue. Shell shock. Exhaustion. He didn’t see the end of every day until three days later. He was sick of forgetting his own goddamn birthday because he was entrenched in a mission.
Mason shook his head, wondering who he was trying to convince. Justifications danced around the core of the issue, but he knew there was a lot more to the story.
He didn’t know who he was anymore. What he was fighting for. See enough bad shit, and you’ll forget yourself, he’d been warned.
An exotic white bird danced through the sky and swooped down to skim the top of the transparent water. Mason watched intently, trying to immerse himself in the moment. Today was different. It was a vacation day. He wasn’t in the field. He wasn’t on an operation. He wasn’t a SEAL. He was just a guy on a beach, drinking a cocktail and working on his tan.
Damn right.
Today, he was going to celebrate. When he’d checked into the hotel, he’d been reminded that it was, in fact, his birthday.
“Happy birthday, sir!” The gorgeous, dark-skinned receptionist had beamed when she’d scanned his passport that morning. “We would like to upgrade you to a private villa, complimentary, to help make your day extra special.”
“Hell, it’s my lucky day.�
�� Mason had attempted to match her cheeriness, but his gruff voice gave him away. He’d been in the Sahel for god knows how long and then traveled thirty hours to get there. It showed.
He stared out at the lush paradise before him. Cascading waterfalls crashed into manicured ponds. The sound of gushing streams filled the space.
He was going to enjoy this, he told himself. How couldn’t he? He hadn’t seen more water than a puddle of piss in months. The scent of salty water breezed through the open-air foyer, soothing his travel-weary bones.
A distant dance beat emanated from the beach, tempting guests to join the party. Grabbing an orange cocktail adorned with melons off a tray on the reception desk, he wondered if any premiere DJs would be cutting.
The receptionist shuffled some documents together and magnetized his key, handing it to him with a luscious, exotic smile. Her glossy pink lips stood out on her darkly tanned face. Mason did not miss the mischief in her eyes.
“Enjoy your stay,” she said, tucking a loose strand of black hair behind her ear. “Please let me know if there’s anything I can do to improve your stay… or if there’s anything you need at all.”
Mason recognized the insinuation. He wondered if her excellent customer service was a little more than required. He leaned over the counter and palmed his key. She tucked her head down, her eyelashes fluttered, and her lips parted.
He was aware of his effect on women. Tall and muscular, with bronzed skin and hair, he’d been called the All-American before. And there’d been a time when he wasn’t shy to reciprocate. He had enjoyed a lot of female… friends. But things were different now. The roster was nonexistent.
He wasn’t clean and shiny anymore. He was gritty, with caked-on dirt and sand from the backcountry of the Sahel that might never come off. Women said they loved the rustic look, but they didn’t when it went too far. Which it damn well had. He hadn’t shaved, he hadn’t showered. Inside, he felt as disheveled as he looked.
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