“One shooter, twelve o’clock,” I yelled out.
“Copy,” Levi returned. We were at a disadvantage being out in the open. There was no point in me shooting my .45 at more than four hundred yards; my bullet would be a tumbling mess before I hit my target. Jasper and Lenox were now both in the doorway of the plane, firing. All they had were the junk AKs that we had taken from Al-Harazi’s men.
“Give me cover, I’m going close,” I yelled to the guys as another volley of gunfire rang out.
So far, the plane had not been hit, but it was a matter of time before this asshole got lucky and we all blew up in the explosion when twenty thousand gallons of kerosene ignited.
I took off in a full sprint across the tarmac, going far right, hoping like hell the shooter was concentrating on the guys and not me. I made it to the other side and slid behind abandoned container boxes. I quickly made my way back in the direction of the shooter. He was hiding under an old tarp, only the barrel of his rifle exposed. I stepped out from behind my hiding spot and popped off two rounds.
The barrel of the rifle now on the ground, I waited a moment before I approached, keeping my weapon trained on the tarp. I gave it a good kick before I reached down to pull it back. An older male with two bullet holes in his neck lay on the ground, dead. Without any further thought, I grabbed his rifle, and with a few hand gestures, I got the okay from Clark to run back to the plane. Jasper, Lenox, Clark, Levi, and Grayson all stood their weapons up, pointing in my direction. I kept my eyes on Levi as I ran, confident they had my six. I wasn’t used to working with a team; no one ever had my back. I went in alone, got the job done, and snuck out. I had to admit it was nice knowing I had backup.
“What the fuck was that bullshit?” Levi yelled as we boarded the plane.
“You talking to me?” I asked.
What the hell had his panties in a bunch?
“You got a goddamn death wish, woman?” he continued to yell.
Screw this. “Hell no, I don’t. What’s wrong, Levi? You’re not used to a woman knowing how to handle her shit? What did you expect me to do? Sit and wait for our only ride home to explode? I saw an opening, and I took it. The shooter was occupied trying to detonate a twenty-thousand-gallon bomb. He wasn’t worried about me. Besides, I had five men at my back. I was confident I could take him out.”
“Next time you fucking wait. Next time under no circumstances do you take a bullet for me. On second thought, next time stay your ass put,” he told me.
“Don’t worry, Levi, there won’t be a next time.” I pushed past him.
“Alright, female version of Rambo, why don’t you come over here and let me check your shoulder. That’s gonna hurt like a bitch as soon as you stop moving.” Clark chuckled and looked at me with something close to humor.
“It’s fine. I’ll go to the bathroom and clean it off myself.”
“Goddamn it,” Levi yelled so loud I was surprised the windows hadn’t shattered.
Clark followed me to the back of the plane, grabbing a med kit on the way to the small laboratory.
“Don’t mind him. His male ego has taken a hit.” Clark laughed.
“That’s not what I intended,” I told him. “I didn’t think. I saw the scope and did what I had to do to protect my teammate.”
“Is that all he is to you? A teammate?” Clark asked as I took my vest off and pulled my shirt over my head, leaving me standing in front of him with only a bra on.
“He’s not even that anymore. The man has hated me for twelve years,” I explained.
“If that’s what you think, you don’t know Levi at all.”
I didn’t have time to contemplate what Clark meant. I looked up, and Levi was standing there shooting daggers at me. He was one pissed off man.
I squared my shoulders and readied myself for the fight.
Chapter Thirteen
Levi
I was going to kill my best friend if he made one move to touch Blake. She was standing in front of him in her bra with a bullet hole in her shoulder. A bullet she had taken for me. She had most likely saved my life today and what did I do? I yelled at her. I had never been so scared in my life when she took off across the tarmac. That was bad enough, but knowing she had already been shot and was bleeding had me wanting to come out of my skin. There wasn’t a damn thing I could do but stay where I was and provide cover for her. I was going to smack her ass for that stunt later.
Clark motioned for her to turn so he could check the wound. Smart man not touching her.
“No exit wound; we’re gonna have to dig the bullet out of you,”
“Copy that Sarge,” Blake joked, her eyes moving from me to Clark.
I didn’t want her looking at him. “I’ll do it,” I said.
If anyone was digging a bullet out of Blake, it was me.
“No can do. I’m gonna need you to hold her down; I have nothing to numb her. The faster we do this, the better. She’s still high on adrenaline, but as the dump comes, she could go into shock.”
“I’ll be fine. I’ve had worse,” she said.
Based on the scars on her back, I was afraid she was telling the truth. I wanted to know, but I was afraid to ask. If the person or persons who had tortured her weren’t already dead, I was afraid I would commit murder.
Clark opened the med kit and pulled out two saline IVs. He cut one open and poured water over her shoulder to clean off some of the blood. “Are you allergic to anything? Betadine?” he asked.
“No, nothing that I’m aware of,” she answered.
Jasper had joined us in the back of the plane with a stack of blankets. “These were all I could find.”
“Right here,” Clark said and pointed to the aisleway.
Jasper made a bedroll on the floor for Blake to lie on and moved out of the way.
“Let’s get this show on the road. Before you lie down, I’m gonna start an IV.”
Blake stood while Clark started an IV; the irrational side of me wanted to cover her chest from the rest of my team. I knew no one was looking at her that way, but it still pissed me off my woman was standing in the galley of an aircraft, her breasts partially exposed and a fucking bullet in her shoulder. “Go ahead and lie on your stomach,” Clark told her when he finished the IV.
I helped her get on the floor and as comfortable as possible. “Lift your head so I can slide the bag under your cheek.” She did as I asked. “Until we can hang the bag and gravity will take over, the weight of your head will put pressure on the bag forcing the solution into the tube,” I explained.
Clark quickly pulled out the rest of the instruments he needed and looked at me. “I need you to hold her still,” he instructed.
“Copy that.”
I allowed myself to personally detach from the situation and tried to think of her as any other injured soldier. “You ready?” I asked.
She nodded and held my eyes. I saw the moment Clark made his first incision. She gritted her teeth and tears filled her eyes, spilling out of the corners. She remained silent as I held her down, Clark digging in the wound.
“Fuck, I have to cut more, the bastard is too deep. I don’t want to stitch up a tear; it won’t be so pretty.”
“Just do it,” she said, and Clark made another cut. This time Blake called out “Fuck!”
I was frozen in place as Blake tried her best to be brave, but her body was shaking, and the tears were flowing freely now. “You’re doing great, baby. He’s almost got it. Hang in just a minute longer.”
“Jasper, use that bag, and clean some of this blood away,” Clark instructed.
Jasper got up from the seat and did as Clark asked, wincing when he saw the size of her incision.
“Goddamn, woman. I’d be crying for my mommy if he was digging into me like that. You’re doing great.”
“Got it,” Clark announced and pulled the bloody bullet from her shoulder. “You’re lucky as hell it didn’t hit the bone.”
I held out my hand, and he dropped
it in my palm. I shoved the bullet into my pocket and went back to making sure she remained still.
“Almost done now,” I told her.
Jasper poured some more of the saline solution around her wound and opened a package of sterile gauze, pouring a liberal amount of Betadine on the white cotton before handing it to Clark.
“Thanks,” he said to Jasper then turned to Blake. “How ya doing?”
“Peachy,” she said through gritted teeth. “You better give me a nice clean straight-line, Clark. Don’t wanna scare the boys off with another scar.”
“I’ll do my best, Rambo,” Clark laughed.
I wasn’t sure why the two of them were joking. He had spent the last ten minutes removing a 7.62 bullet from her flesh. And why the fuck was she joking about making her scar pretty for other men? I didn’t want any other man looking at the scar. That scar belonged to me. It was mine, and mine alone.
“Just hurry the fuck up,” I growled. I wanted this over so I could take her to a seat and hold her in my arms.
Clark started, and Blake winced. “Holy mother fuck that hurts worse than you cutting me open,” she panted in pain.
Twelve stitches later Clark was tying off and finally cleaning the wound site. “When we get stateside we’ll get some antibiotics in you and have my handy work checked. It’s gonna leave a scar, but I tried my best.”
“I was joking about the scar. One more doesn’t matter; trust me. My back has already been shredded all to hell. The good thing is I don’t have to see them every day.” She gave Clark a tight smile.
“How’d you get them?” Clark asked, and I held my breath.
“An op five years ago in Bogotá. I was chasing down El Demonio and found myself on the business end of his infamous dagger. He held me two days and took his time with me. The worst of what he did to my back scarred. It looks good now compared to what it looked like when I finally got out of there and met up with a Delta team that had been sent in to find me.”
“Christ, he was taken out by a member of his own family, right? His wife or sister?” Clark asked.
“That’s what the reports say,” she chuckled.
“How long before you were able to get back down there?” Clark continued to clean the blood off her shoulder as they talked.
“I never left the country. The guys bandaged me up as good as they could; it looked like he had taken a cheese grater to my back. They gave me a few bags of blood and some fluid and took me back for the raid. I wasn’t strong enough to breach the house, but they called me in for the fun stuff. Let’s just say that bastard was begging to be sent to hell by the time I was done with him.”
I was glad the man was dead and that she had the pleasure to end his miserable existence. El Demonio was known around Bogotá for cutting off fingers or limbs of this enemies. He had been a cartel leader, and a particularly mean one. The name The Demon fit him.
“You’re all patched up. You did great. I want to leave this IV in. Let’s get you to a seat. Levi, you got her? I need to wash up.”
“Thanks, Clark.” Blake rolled to her side, then to a sitting position. “Hold onto the IV bag, I’ll be as gentle as I can,” I promised.
Once I had her safely in my arms, I walked to the nearest row of seats and was thankful we were on a private jet with plenty of room. I sat down with her cradled in my arms. “Jasper, can you jimmy-rig this IV up?” I asked and held out the bag, tugging the blanket around her to cover her chest.
Jasper attached the bag to the air vent and looked down at me holding Blake in my arms, a wide smile crossing his face. “Good to see, man,” he said and walked to a seat.
I owed Clark for taking such good care of Blake. My hands wouldn’t have been steady enough to make a clean incision.
Her eyes were starting to close. “Get some sleep, beautiful. I got you,” I whispered.
Blake didn’t respond, and within minutes her breathing evened out.
I spent the next three hours staring at the woman in my arms wondering what I was going to do now. Could I forgive her for what she’d done? Could I blame her for a stupid mistake she had made when she was a kid? We were eighteen years old, what the hell did we know? I had been in hell for the last twelve years. Maybe it was time to forget the past and move on.
Chapter Fourteen
Blake
The moment my eyes opened I felt like I had been run over by a Mac truck. The ache in my shoulder reminded me I had been shot. By way of gunshot wounds, I was lucky. Don’t get me wrong; it hurt like a son-of-a-bitch. I thought I was going to throw up the pain was so bad. Thankfully I didn’t make a fool of myself and was able to breathe through the worst of it.
Levi was asleep, giving me the perfect opportunity to study his features. He was a good-looking man; perfect chiseled jawline and a strong and commanding presence. He should’ve been mine; we should’ve had a family by now. I would’ve been happy being an Army wife following him wherever we were stationed. How different would my life be if I hadn’t been a cocky eighteen-year-old girl thinking I could double-cross Alister Bench? Maybe it was time to swallow my pride and make Levi hear me out. I even had proof if he’d just listen.
I pulled my good arm out from under the blanket he had covered me with and reached up to touch his face. After all these years, I was still in love with this man. My heart still raced when he was near, the electricity still sparked between us as strong as ever. This line of thinking was dangerous. This was how I was going to get my heart shattered a second time. As much as I thought things should’ve been different, they weren’t. I had spent years trying to forget him and finally resigned myself to the truth; I would die loving this man.
I pulled my hand back and closed my eyes. Sleep was my only refuge from the pain.
***
The next time I woke up I found myself staring into Levi’s eyes. “Hey,” I croaked out. “Everything alright?”
“I’m sorry I yelled at you earlier. I was scared out of my fucking mind. Knowing you had been shot was doing crazy things to me,” he admitted.
“It’s fine. I get it; emotions were high.”
“That’s an understatement. How do you feel?” he asked.
“It hurts like a bitch.”
“We’ll get you to a hospital and get you some pain meds soon. We are almost ready to land.”
Damn, I had slept the whole trip back to DC, and I noticed my IV had been removed at some point.
“You have to be uncomfortable. Let me move to a seat.”
Levi’s grip on me tightened, and he held me in place. “You’re right where I need you to be. Listen, I was thinking. I’d like to see you again. Maybe I can come up to DC in a few days and spend a weekend up there with you if you have some time.” For a second I wondered if Clark had ended up finding some pain meds and I was hallucinating. “If you don’t want me to come up, that’s fine. Maybe we can start out slow, get to know each other again, talk on the phone some.”
“Of course, I want to see you. I guess I just don’t understand what’s changed. Not that I’m not happy it has.”
“Seeing you for starters, watching you take a bullet, remembering all that we were to each other. It got me thinking. It’s time to move on, the past is the past, and I need to forgive you and see if what I think we can have is real.”
My heart jumped in my chest. One would’ve thought it was from excitement. Levi was talking to me about a possible future. It was everything I had prayed for. However, it wasn’t joy I felt, it was anger and hurt.
I didn’t bother asking him to let go of me; I knew he wouldn’t. Instead, I pushed myself off his lap and stood, uncaring I was still only in my bra.
“The hell, Blake, be careful. Sit down.” Concern and panic laced his tone.
“I don’t want or need your forgiveness, Levi. I’ve tried to tell you, but you wouldn’t listen to me. I did nothing wrong, you ass. If you had listened to the voicemails I begged you to, you would’ve heard everything. Once I realized Alist
er was trying to bribe me, I recorded the entire conversation. I wanted you to hear it. I wanted to use it to show his investors what a scumbag he was. In that conversation, he called me middle-class trash, he bashed the military, and he tried to blackmail and bribe me. I played along to keep him talking. I pretended I was scared when he threatened to post pictures he had of me in my underwear. I was half nude, Levi. He took pictures off your phone and said he was going to put them on the internet. And you know what? I didn’t care. Never once did I even entertain the idea of leaving you.” I felt a little dizzy, but I carried on, needing to finally get this off my chest; all of the things I never had a chance to say to him. “The fact that you thought so little of me, that you thought I would take that pig’s money over the man I loved is appalling. I wrote to you every single day when you were in basic. I begged you to call me, listen to your voicemail, hear me out. Anything. I begged every single day. You know what I got? Nothing. I’ve tried to forget you and stop loving you. But I never could. But, you know what? I’m done. You have punished me, us, for over a decade for no goddamn reason. You can take whatever apology you think you deserve and your forgiveness and shove them both up your ass. This is goodbye, Levi. At least I have the fucking decency to say those words to you. You didn’t even give me that when you walked out on me.” I grabbed the blanket off the seat and used my good arm to throw it over my shoulder.
I held on to the top of the chairs as I moved through the aisle to the front of the plane and took a seat in the empty row. The pressure in the cabin had changed, and thankfully we were landing. I couldn’t be anywhere near him at the moment. I looked across the aisle and saw Clark looking at me. The pity in his stare told me any hope I’d had that the rest of the team hadn’t heard my breakdown was for naught. Christ almighty this trip sucked. My mission was FUBAR, I was an idiot and slept with Levi, I got shot, and the biggest mistake of all was I allowed myself to wish.
Finally Free (Levi): A Black Ops Romance (The 707 Freedom Series Book 3) Page 8