by Lora Leigh
Micah stepped into the kitchen and felt his knees weaken.
Risa was tied to her table. Her arms were tied by the wrists and held pointing to the floor by two large hooks that had been driven into the floor.
Her ankles were tied to a mop handle, the handle secured by a chain to another hook in the ceiling.
She was dressed. She was crying. Behind the gag, muffled sobs sounded as he moved to her, slowly, barely daring to believe what he saw. Tears easing from her eyes as she watched him, her chest rising and falling with her breaths. There wasn’t so much as a smear of blood on her body.
“Risa.” He touched her face, then eased the gag from her mouth. “Baby.”
“Oh God.” She strained toward him. “Oh God, Micah. I thought you were dead. I thought he’d killed you,” she sobbed. “He said there was only one way to stop you and he’d do it if he had to. I thought he’d gone after you.”
He shook his head, cupped her cheek, and laid his lips to hers. She was alive. She was struggling against the ropes; she was breathing. She was alive.
He pulled back and had to draw in a long, slow breath to fill his lungs with air. “Let me get you loose.”
Jerking a knife from the sheath at his side, he cut her legs loose first and gently lowered them before bending and freeing her right arm. He moved to the left and stilled.
There, wrapped around her wrist by the leather choker that had always held it, was the pendant his father had given his mother at their engagement party.
The silver star was tarnished with age, but the golden teardrops in each point of the star still gleamed back with rich luster.
He released the ropes holding Risa’s hand and lifted her wrist.
“He gave this to you?” he asked.
Her eyes, wide and still filled with fear, flickered to the pendant as he helped her sit up, only to pull her against him with one arm.
“He said it was a warning.” She stared at the pendant before lifting her gaze to his face.
He lifted the pendant and turned it over. Ad olam ani ehye lach. I’ll be yours forever. The Hebrew inscription had been engraved in the silver by his father.
It was a warning. A message that Orion knew who Micah was, knew who his parents were, Somehow Orion had managed to figure out Micah’s former identity, and he had left the pendant as a warning that he knew who he was and knew how to hurt him.
Micah tucked the necklace into his pocket, then picked Risa up into his arms and strode through the apartment until he reached her bedroom and the bed they had shared.
“Did he hurt you?” He laid her on the bed, his hands moving over her arms before he lifted her wrists and rubbed at the reddened marks the ropes had left.
She shook her head quickly, her gaze locked on his face.
“Don’t leave me,” she whispered.
Micah froze. He stared down at her and saw the plea in her eyes.
He inhaled sharply before swallowing past the thickness in his throat and shaking his head.
“We’ll talk about that later,” he promised her.
He had no intentions of discussing it. There was only one answer, only one conclusion to this.
“I know what you’ll do.” Her breath hitched as her tears filled her eyes again. “You’ll catch me asleep. Or in another room, and you’ll just walk away, won’t you?”
Micah could feel pieces of his soul breaking away, like a glacier cracking apart, piece by slow, agonizing piece.
He touched a tear that fell from her eye.
“I can’t say goodbye to you.” His hand cupped her cheek. “I can’t walk away while those beautiful eyes are begging me to stay. And I have no choice but to leave. We’ve always known, since that first night, that an end would come.”
She flinched at the softly spoken words and Micah felt the pain of them resounding through his entire being. If anything in his life had ever been worth fighting for, then it was Risa. But there was no way to fight the agreement he had made. He risked her life by risking his own if he attempted to defy it. And he risked everything that she loved about him if he tried to break the one bond that was his alone. His word.
She trembled beneath his hand, her lips quivering as she tried to control the cries he could feel welling inside her. Could he walk away if she cried? Could he deny her anything when faced with her tears?
But she didn’t cry. She drew in a ragged breath and nodded.
“Go,” she whispered.
“Risa.” He frowned, desperate to touch her one last time. To get the team out of her apartment, to hold her, to listen to her voice one last time as she cried out his name in passion before he was forced to walk away.
“Just go now,” she cried out roughly. “Leave me my pride, Micah. Get the hell out of my life now if you’re going to go. Don’t sit here and make me beg you to stay.”
He could hear the Durango team and the Elite Ops teams in the other room. Jordan’s voice bled into the room. Micah knew he was needed. They were going after Orion’s handler before dawn to learn his location.
Jordan was already pulling in information, tracking the assassin. Mac Knight was waiting in the other apartment, going over the pictures that had come through from the security camera on the elevator. They would have another identity on Orion soon.
And Risa needed to be debriefed. Micah couldn’t do that. Jordan and the federal attorney would handle that. Micah could be in the room, but he couldn’t touch her, couldn’t hold her to comfort her as she was forced to answer the questions that would come.
“I could stay till morning.” His jaw clenched as emotion swamped him and he saw the answer in her face.
“If you stay till morning you’ll destroy me,” she answered, her voice thick with the sobs she was fighting. “Please, Micah. If you’re leaving me in the morning, then leave now. Don’t wait until I’m asleep in your arms, or feeling the hope that you’ll stay. I couldn’t handle it.”
She’d already been forced to handle so much. And she had endured it. She had held her courage and her strength, and she had fought to survive.
He tucked the loose strand of her hair back behind her ear to reveal the gentle slope of her brow, her cheek. He feathered the backs of his fingers down the side of her face and once again marveled at the smooth, silken feel of her flesh.
“Please don’t…”
His head lowered. He couldn’t stay, though he knew his heart would always linger with her. His lips touched hers and desperation slammed into his head.
He’d meant to kiss her with gentleness. He’d meant to only brush her lips with his. But her lips parted and a muted sob tore at her chest. He’d already lost his heart and soul to her; he may as well lose his mind.
His lips parted over hers, his tongue slid inside, and the taste of sweet heated passion and a woman’s tears exploded against his taste buds.
A heavy groan tore from his throat. One hand gripped the back of her head, the other pressed into her back, pulling her against his chest as her head bent back beneath the force of his kiss.
He wanted to devour her. He wanted the taste of her seeped so deep inside him that he was never a moment without her.
The feel of her arms tightening around his neck, the sound of her sobbing moan of hunger, tore through him. Her lips opened to him like the petals of a flower to the sun as he slanted his lips over hers and tried to kiss her deeper, tried to draw her taste further into his senses.
He couldn’t let her go. He couldn’t walk away from her.
He couldn’t live his life without the feel of this, her hunger and her need flowing into his until he couldn’t breathe without the taste of her.
He stroked his hands beneath her shirt, felt the silky texture of her back. He couldn’t touch her enough. He couldn’t get enough of her.
Groaning, desperate for the feel of her, he bore her back on the bed, his lips taking hard, quick kisses before they settled against her again for another of the deep, drugging caresses that fueled his desir
e for her to a blazing level.
He pushed her thighs apart, settled his legs between them, and pressed the swollen length of his erection, covered by the black pants he wore, against the center of her thighs.
Grinding his cock against her, his hips shifting, rocking the thick flesh against her cotton-covered pussy, he groaned into her kiss.
Her knees lifted, bracketed his hips, moved with him as a strangled cry sounded in her chest.
He couldn’t get enough of her. This was the last touch he would have, the last taste. He wanted every second of it, every flavor of lust, desire and hunger, and love, that he could draw from the experience.
He could feel her beneath his flesh. He tried to press himself into her.
“No!” she cried out as he tore his lips from hers and let them travel down the arched column of her neck. “Don’t leave me, Micah. Don’t…”
She shook her head as he pressed his forehead into her shoulder. Micah could feel her body trembling, shuddering as she fought to hold back her pleas.
“Ani ohev otach.” I love you. “Me’achshav ve’ad hanetzach.” From now to eternity.
He tore himself away from her.
His breathing rough, heavy, he watched as she rolled to her side, her back to him, her face buried against a pillow as her shoulders tightened, tensing against her tears, he knew.
“Risa…”
“Go!” she cried out desperately. “Just go. Please God, Micah. Just go.”
He slid the pendant from the pocket of his pants and laid it on the bedside table after running his thumb over it. Regret slammed inside him with a brutality that nearly stole his breath.
“Dream big, love,” he whispered as he gazed down at her. “Dream enough for both of us.”
Turning, he moved to the door, jerking it open, and strode into the living room. A heavy silence filled the room as too many eyes watched him. He stalked past the broken door and moved down the hall.
“Micah, we’re meeting here in five minutes,” Jordan’s voice carried to him as he neared the elevator.
Micah paused. He didn’t turn back.
“Find someplace else to meet,” he ordered his commander. “I’m out of here.”
He didn’t take the elevator. He pushed through the stairwell exit and took the stairs. Within seconds he was pushing through the back exit and entering the parking lot where the vans were parked. The vans and his replacement car.
He moved to the sedan, unlocked it, and settled into the seat as the overhead clouds opened up and rain poured around him.
He stared at the sheets of moisture washing over the windshield, unblinking. It reminded him of Risa’s tears.
It reminded him of dreams he hadn’t known he had, and ones he hadn’t imagined he would ever want.
He closed his eyes, and just for a second he let himself imagine. Imagine the house of her dreams, her laughter in the yard as he watched her, her body heavy with his child. She would glow like the brightest star. Her eyes would fill with love and laughter; her expression would be serene with the dreams that surrounded them. She would soothe him after a mission, be waiting for him, arms wide open.
He wouldn’t be a Maverick in her eyes; he would simply be Micah. Her husband. Her lover.
The image dissipated at the sound of a heavy knock on the passenger window. He opened his eyes, breathed out a heavy sigh, and disengaged the lock.
Tehya slid in.
She tossed the wet jacket that covered her head to the backseat and stared out the windshield as he had.
“We need a drink,” she stated.
“Why do we need a drink?”
She turned and stared at him.
“She locked her bedroom door and she’s refusing to speak to anyone until her grandmother arrives. Jordan is sending Noah and Clint after Abigail Clay.”
He nodded. She wouldn’t be alone. He didn’t want her to be alone. “That doesn’t explain why we need a drink.”
“It doesn’t explain why both of us are escaping Jordan, either,” she snorted. “For God’s sake, Micah, just drive around and find a fucking bar. Buy me a whisky and we’ll toast to a mission accomplished. How’s that?” Anger filled her tone.
Micah looked at her askance. He’d not seen her angry. Not that she had been with the group long, a year or so perhaps.
She was pale now, though, her deep green eyes distressed, her expression tormented.
“Did something happen after I left? Is Risa okay?”
She turned to him, and in her eyes he saw the same torment he felt in his soul.
“Let’s say, I may have seen my future,” she whispered. “And if I don’t get a drink fast, I just might lose what sanity I’ve managed to retain.” She shook her head wearily. “I think I want to get drunk.”
He started the car and slid it in reverse. “I think I’ll join you.”
And neither of them saw the shadow that watched from the exit.
Jordan leaned his shoulder against the narrow door frame and considered the couple as they left, the car easing through the pouring rain as he shoved his hands in the pockets of his slacks and lowered his head.
He stared at the cracked tile of the stairwell and breathed out roughly.
He hadn’t expected this. He shook his head and ground his teeth together. He’d expected many things from Micah, but Jordan had to admit he hadn’t expected him to walk away from Risa Clay.
“Are you going to tell him any differently?”
His head jerked up as his nephew’s ruined voice sounded from behind him.
Glancing over his shoulder, Jordan considered the younger man. Noah Blake. At one time Noah Blake had been Nathan Malone, a husband, a SEAL. Until an assignment went to hell and he had become the prisoner of a fanatical drug lord.
Diego Fuentes was still alive, currently working in deep cover with Homeland Security. Nathan Malone had been listed as Killed in Action. And Noah Blake had been born.
It had taken Noah six years before he returned to the wife he had left. But once he’d returned, there had been no going back. The papers he’d signed, turning his life over to the Elite Ops, hadn’t mattered. All that mattered to Noah was his wife, Nathan’s wife, Sabella, and the child they were now expecting.
“No, I’m not going to tell him,” Jordan finally answered, very well aware that Noah was talking about Jordan’s refusal to impose the strict guidelines set down for the Elite Ops agents.
No weaknesses. No wives. No lovers. No relationships. They were dead men, and at no time could they ever risk being more than that.
Noah had broken every rule in the book earlier in the year when he had taken back his life in Alpine, Texas. He was now Noah Blake, garage owner, husband, and upstanding citizen.
“You’d let him just walk away from her?” Noah leaned against the wall facing Jordan and pushed his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “He’s crazy about her, Jordan.”
Jordan considered the question for long moments before asking, “Did you ask for permission to have your life back, Noah? Did you file papers, protest the guidelines, or ask for any quarter?”
Noah frowned. “I almost walked away from my wife the second time. I almost lost a chance to know my child. Those papers I signed, the decision I made when I pledged my life to the Elite Ops, wasn’t a joke, Jordan. Not to any of us. Especially Micah. We’re the men we are because of the code of honor we’ve always adhered to. That’s why you picked us up for this team. We took that decision seriously.”
Jordan tipped his head to the side. “You didn’t answer my question,” he reminded his nephew softly. “Did you ask permission?”
“Fuck no. Without Bella, you’d have a shell that didn’t care if he lived or died. That’s what you’ll have with Micah.”
Jordan shrugged. “Then that’s his choice. Not mine. Not yours. In this life, or death, Noah, every man has to make this choice himself. This won’t be an easy life for you, for Bella, Micah, or Risa. The twelve years you pledged to the Ops i
s non-negotiable. The rest is a solitary decision that each man has to make on his own.”
Noah’s eyes narrowed on him. “It’s a test.”
Jordan shook his head. “It’s not a fucking test. It’s a choice. If he’s strong enough to claim her, knowing what he’s facing, then he’s strong enough to keep her no matter the obstacles they face. That simple. It’s a decision each one of you makes, on your own, without help.”
Noah’s lips pursed thoughtfully. “He left with Tehya,” he said softly.
Jordan looked back to the parking lot and the rain pouring down. “Yes, he did.”
“Some men can find comfort in another woman’s arms.” It sounded like a warning.
“Then some men aren’t as smart as I originally thought.” Jordan shrugged and let the door slam closed, cutting out the rain, cutting out thoughts he was better off not thinking. “Let’s start cleaning out. I want Miss Clay transferred to her grandmother’s home after Abigail arrives here. Clint and Kell can return with them and debrief her; let the two of them know what can be discussed and what can’t. We’re still on a job. Orion’s still alive.”
“He won’t be for long,” Noah stated.
Jordan glanced at him questioningly.
“I saw the pendant Micah took off Risa’s arm. Orion left him a message. He knows who he is and he knows how to control Micah. Micah won’t accept it. It’s a threat to Risa. He’ll make damned sure Orion is eliminated.”
That was a problem. No one should know who any of Jordan’s operatives were in their former lives. Those men had to stay dead; the complications of their ever coming back to life were too extreme.
Jordan blew out a hard breath. “Let’s just hope Micah remembers the word ‘teamwork.’”
“Do any of us?” Noah asked then with a grin. “Really, Jordan, you act like a damned father. You should have gotten married years ago and had a passel of kids. It would have kept you out of other people’s problems.”
He snorted at that. He didn’t regret it. If he had lived that dream, he knew now, he would have lived it with the wrong woman.
But he couldn’t have the right woman, either.
Damned if he did, damned if he didn’t. It was the story of his damned life some days.