Elite Ops Complete Series

by Lora Leigh

  Gripping the knob, Nik opened the door slowly and moved back to allow the other man to enter.

  Maddix entered, his shoulders straight and tense as he reached back with one hand to rub at the tense muscles in tight circles. In the other hand, he carried a briefcase.

  Nik stared at that briefcase, knowing what it contained.

  Hell.

  “Two hundred eighty thousand dollars.” Maddix set the briefcase on the small table just inside the door as Nik moved to the other side.

  Maddix stared at the case, sighed heavily, then looked back to Nik. “There it is,” he said. “It’s yours.”

  Nik stepped to the table, laid the briefcase flat, then flipped open the locks.

  He flipped through the stacks of bills. Yep, that looked like two hundred and eighty thousand dollars to him. A fee for a favor owed.

  Fuck.

  There were days he wished he hadn’t been raised to understand what honor meant. To understand what a favor owed truly was. Because standing there now, Nik could feel his gut clenching at the knowledge that he was stepping over a line.

  He clicked the locks back into place and pushed the briefcase toward Maddix with a disgruntled glance toward the other man.

  “It’s all there.” Maddix stared back at Nik in confusion.

  “So hold on to it,” Nik growled.

  Maddix stared back at Nik silently, confusion darkening his eyes. “But you demanded the fee up front,” he reminded Nik.

  That line was staring him in the face, tempting him to cross it, to be the bastard the past was turning him into. To cross it now meant crossing it forever. There would be no turning back.

  There would be no sunlit wheat-colored hair spread across his chest. No amethyst eyes staring back at him with true trust. Trust that wouldn’t be later marred by the money that now sat between him and a job he knew better than to take.

  “Take your money and get the hell out of here.” Nik injected enough ice in his voice to ensure there was no chance of detecting the conflicting emotions raging inside him or the choices he didn’t want to make at the moment.

  “What …” Panic reflected in Maddix’s face.

  “I owe you the fucking favor,” Nik stated coldly. “No fee required. Keep your money, Maddix. Maybe you can try to pay me off if I find out you’re lying to me.” He made certain his smile was colder than his eyes. “But I doubt it would work.”

  He’d hoped Maddix couldn’t access the funds. Nik knew, despite Maddix’s alibis, that there were indeed federal eyes watching for large withdrawals of personal funds that would hint at a hired killing.

  He’d stared into eyes that hinted at dreams, at innocence. If he found out the innocence was true, then heaven help anyone daring to harm her.

  Where the fuck had that come from?

  “She gets to you, doesn’t she?” Maddix shook his head. “I knew that picture would do it. It’s the eyes.”

  Nik stared back at him, realizing now, as he had instinctively suspected earlier that day, that he was being played.

  “I’ll call you if I need to talk to you,” Nik informed Maddix. “Until then, get the hell out of my face and pretend you don’t know me. Or I’ll walk away, Maddix. Right after I help her string your ass up.”

  And he could do it. He would do it. It wouldn’t matter how many alibis Maddix had; Nik could destroy every damned one.

  “I don’t have to worry about that, Nik.” Maddix picked up the briefcase and moved for the door. “And I can honestly say I have no damned idea who you are.”

  Nik stood back and watched as Maddix moved past him to the door. Maddix left the room, pausing only long enough to throw Nik one last confused glance before leaving.

  Nik kicked the door closed, a curse escaping his lips as he raised his hands and linked them behind his neck before pacing into the bedroom.

  The wildness burning inside him was only growing as the years passed. He managed to hold it back most days by throwing himself into a mission, by becoming the cold, unemotional robot he’d turned himself into ten years before when Jordan had offered him the chance of a lifetime.

  A chance to walk away. To fight without rules. To make a difference.

  Had he made a difference?

  Not enough of one.

  He still couldn’t sleep at night. He still awoke to the sounds of gunfire, of his daughter’s screams before he could reach the car she had died in.

  If he had made enough of a difference, wouldn’t those nightmares have left him by now? Wouldn’t he be able to sleep in peace?

  He stared at the bed, perfectly made, large, comfortable. The Suites had near-perfect beds. And he knew from experience he would find no sleep in them.

  He left the helmet lying on the couch as he grabbed the keys to the Harley and left the room. Closing the door tight behind him, Nik made his way from the hotel to the shadowed back lot where he’d parked, and quickly checked the bike over before straddling it and giving the key a quick twist.

  If he couldn’t sleep, that left work. And he had plenty of work to do here. If he was going to figure out if Maddix was lying, then the place to start was with the girl.

  All good girls had their secret little vices. There was no such thing as innocence or purity. Mikayla Martin might have a lot of good in her, but Nik was betting she was hiding a lot of bad as well. The key to getting past the good girl’s defenses was to find her vices.

  She might not party, but she did like to dance. She didn’t have a steady boyfriend, but she was prone to date quite often. She was definitely a mystery.

  Pulling from the parking lot, Nik hit the brightly lit streets of Wesel Boulevard while heading for the Cancun Cantina just minutes away.

  Tehya’s initial investigation into Mikayla showed a girl who loved her job, her family, her friends, and having fun in general. She was serious when she had to be, but she enjoyed her social life.

  She was a different kind of woman, he thought. He wasn’t certain if he knew how to deal with a woman who enjoyed her social life just as well as she enjoyed her job.

  He was used to women who were somber, cynical, bitter, and/or psychotic. Women who had lived on the dark side too long, for whatever reason. Even those who worked with the team had their mental scars, their dark sides. They’d seen too much, knew too much about the evil that existed within the shadows.

  She didn’t look like a woman who knew anything about evil. She would be the type of woman that would provide a man the calm within the storm. Or would she remind him of everything he had never known or had and the innocence would be something to resent?

  As Nik pulled into the Cantina lot he couldn’t imagine that. He couldn’t imagine resenting the peace that could be found in her arms.

  He shook his head. His father had once told him that peace came from within a man. It was a peace Nik had yet to find within himself.

  Securing the Harley, he strode into the Cantina, the loud music, weekend gaiety, and dim lighting similar to nearly every other club he’d been in during his time with the Elite Ops.

  The dance floor was packed, bodies gyrating to the music pounding out from the surprisingly good country western group performing.

  He scanned the room, searching for hair the color of wheat. Mikayla was a creature of habit, so he should find her here tonight.

  She worked diligently at her shop five days a week and most nights. On Sunday she had lunch and dinner with her parents and she was available for her brothers and friends whenever they needed her.

  She had a full social life and a broad base of friends. She truly was your everyday girl next door, from all accounts.

  It was now Nik’s job to delve beneath those accounts and find the truth. All he had to do was protect his soul in the process.

  CHAPTER 3

  Mikayla tapped her fingers against the table as her date, Thad Dawson, stood beside the table talking to friends. He worked in a law firm all week and then socialized on the weekends with the same people
he worked with which made little sense to her.

  At thirty, Thad was charming, appeared sincere, and seemed to have all the qualities of a Mr. Right. Not that she was looking for Mr. Right. She truly wasn’t. But as her father often reminded her, she wasn’t getting any younger.

  She was his baby girl, and he just wanted to see her settled.

  Mikayla just wanted to bring a killer to justice so she could get back to her life. She had dresses she wanted to make, unfinished designs waiting for completion. She had a life to get back to.

  She should be doing something besides sitting here on a date with a man more concerned with the cases he’d been working on through the week than he was with hitting the dance floor, where she could at least expend some of the nervous energy still raging inside her.

  At least she was still dating, she thought mockingly. It seemed people were divided where she and Maddix Nelson were concerned. Those who believed her, or simply considered her amusing, were inclined to allow her within their circle of friends. The other side simply gave her a wide berth.

  Thad, she suspected, only still asked her out because the owner of the law firm he worked for was still close friends with her father and hadn’t, so far, seemed to take a side.

  Things had definitely changed between her and Thad, though. The last few weeks, the budding relationship had become strained, and after tonight she doubted seriously she would see him again.

  She might as well have not been here for all the attention he was showing her.

  “The bastard was so guilty, Emily.” Thad chuckled, breaking into Mikayla’s thoughts, and rather than angry, or with a sense of offended justice, Thad sounded merely amused and almost in awe.

  The bastard in question had murdered his wife.

  “Hey, baby, the prosecutor knew he didn’t have enough evidence. I simply pointed it out. That’s why we’re paid the big bucks. To make certain our clients have every advantage.” Thad’s friend and coworker Emily Shaltz was filled with smug satisfaction.

  As the daughter of one of the partners of the law firm, she was arrogant and self-important. Something Mikayla had always been able to overlook in Emily. Her parents were friends of the family, and Mikayla had always tried to overlook some of Emily’s more grating qualities. Until the past weeks.

  Mikayla’s lips tightened at the obvious, in her eyes, miscarriage of justice. No wonder so many people hated lawyers. All that mattered to them was winning. Well, to some of them. There were a few, she had to admit, who were the good guys. They just weren’t a part of this circle.

  “And that’s why Emily is moving quickly into a partner’s position.” Thad was clearly impressed.

  “I’m not the only one.” Emily turned to Thad, her gaze raking over him with obvious interest. “Thad is heading there quickly himself. He clearly has what it takes to make the partners notice him.”

  Mikayla sat back and watched the display. Tall, svelte, and slender, Emily Shaltz, with her clear dark blue eyes, curvy, tall body, and so obvious superiority, had no doubt of her charisma and sexual charm. The fact that Thad was obviously falling quickly beneath the promise in that cool gaze was really no surprise.

  She could slip away and no one would notice her, Mikayla thought with a slight edge of amusement. She could go home, do a little work, and actually go to bed at a decent hour and she doubted Thad would even know she was gone.

  “Ma’am.” The waitress at Mikayla’s side drew her attention but received no more than a passing glance from those standing at the other side of the table.

  Mikayla glanced up. “Yes?”

  “The gentleman at the bar has offered to buy you a drink.” The waitress pointed toward the extremely tall, had-to-be Nordic, blond man sitting casually at the bar. Even from across the room he presented an imposing figure.

  Mikayla glanced back at Thad, gave a little smile, and shook her head. “Nothing for me, thank you.” She rose to her feet. “I believe I’m heading home for the night.”

  Light blue eyes, rakishly long white blond hair, and a body guaranteed to stop women in their tracks at thirty paces. There wasn’t an ounce of give in those broad shoulders, nor in the hard, savage lines of his arrogant face.

  A dark overnight growth of beard and mustache shadowed his lower face. He looked entirely too confident of his own sexuality, and dangerous.

  Danger exuded from his pores. It surrounded him. It was so much a part of him that Mikayla felt her heart racing at the impact of it.

  She had seen similar men. Not as hard, not as dangerous. Men who had been in war for too long, who had returned home unable to fit back into the steady, peaceful routine they had known before they left. But they were a pale imitation of this man. This man was the essence, the very definition, of danger.

  The dark rider she had seen on the motorcycle earlier had had a body to die for. This man had the body, but those hardened features, the cool ice blue eyes, and the expression of hardened purpose held the warning that he was more than just a hard, gorgeous body. This man was a weapon.

  It was definitely time she headed home. If she had drawn the attention of this man somehow, then she could be in more trouble than she already thought she had gotten herself into.

  Thad didn’t even notice when she left the table. Damn if that wasn’t enough to prick a girl’s ego. He’d harassed her for weeks for a date before she’d given in. Thad was a good friend, she’d known him most of her life. He was a nice guy, but too intent on impressing the boss’s daughter to pay much attention to his date. She understood. She wasn’t tall and curvy and a part of the social sphere Thad wanted to enter. She was short, perhaps too curvy. Her long hair wasn’t blond; it wasn’t brown. It was what her mother called dirty blond. It was straight; it wasn’t silky. Her breasts weren’t large, and she wasn’t available for a quick one-night stand.

  That pretty much canceled her out for most men.

  Slipping through the throng of dangers, she headed for the exit.

  The Cantina sat below the major convention center and hotel in the county. It was connected to it and provided a major source of entertainment for the guests there.

  It was often a major source of entertainment for Mikayla. In the past weeks, she hadn’t quite been in the mood for entertainment, though.

  Pulling the keys to her Jeep from her jeans pocket, Mikayla was suddenly thankful that Thad had been running late today. It meant she’d had a reason to drive her own vehicle to the club rather than riding with him.

  It gave her a ride home.

  Moving through the shadowed parking lot, she pressed a key between two fingers defensively, prepared, just in case. She’d learned the hard way that nothing was really safe. That at any second something could happen. Something one didn’t bring on oneself.

  Watching the shadows warily, her gaze canvassing each area that could hide a threat, she moved as quickly as possible to her Jeep.

  It had been impossible to park close to the entrance of the Cantina. She’d been forced to park in a lot across the street. The only place available at the time was far, toward the other end.

  She should have gone home when she realized she couldn’t park close enough to the bar to be safe. But Thad had been so insistent.

  This would teach her.

  Quickening her step, she waited until she was close enough to the vehicle before hitting the automatic door locks. She heard the click as she rounded the car. Her hand was reaching out for the door latch when she’d realized how serious her error had been.

  Hard hands grabbed her from behind.

  “Fucking troublemaking cunt!” A harsh growl sounded behind her.

  Mikayla didn’t have three younger brothers for nothing, and she sure as hell wasn’t going to be a victim who didn’t fight back.

  Fear roiled through her. Terror became a creature, snarling, fighting, as adrenaline surged through her bloodstream and nothing but the instinct for survival ruled.

  She swung her fist with the key tight between
two fingers.

  A male grunt sounded in the darkness as she felt herself being thrown, flipped around as she slammed into the back of the Jeep.

  Her face raked against the side of the canvas top as her breast was driven against the spare tire. A cry of pain tore from her lips, and with the next breath she was screaming, kicking, scratching, the key gripped between her fingers as she lashed out. In the dark, she couldn’t see much: a shadowed face. Her attacker wasn’t much taller than she, but he was strong.

  His fingers wrapped around her throat, clenched. Mikayla drove the keys into a soft midsection. A hard grunt, the fingers loosened, but a second later it felt as though a sledgehammer had driven into the side of her face.

  A fist. Distantly, she realized it was a fist. Every muscle in her body went lax for precious seconds as shock and pain traveled through her body. The keys fell from her fingers, her only weapon of defense gone as she felt those fingers, too strong, wrap around her throat once again.

  She was going to die.

  Mikayla could feel that knowledge rattling inside her brain. She couldn’t fight against strength. She was too weak now. Her senses felt scattered, her breath so short.

  She was definitely going to die.

  Nik walked out of the Cantina, his gaze searching the brightly lit front entrance of the club as he looked for Mikayla. Cars whizzed by, their headlights flickering through the shadows as he narrowed his eyes in his search for her.

  Mikayla had managed to get out of the bar before he realized she had left. She had disappeared into the throng and he’d lost sight of her. By the time Nik realized she was leaving he was too far behind to catch up with her.

  She must have been parked close, he thought. The only way she could have gotten away from him so quickly was if she was parked directly in front of the Cantina.

  His jaw tightened.

  He was turning to stalk to the far end of the lot to his Harley when he heard it: a muted cry.

  He stopped, pausing, his gaze searching the parking area across the street.

  Where had it come from?

  There. Again.

  Moving, Nik raced across the street, seeing two shadows struggling at the far end of the parking lot. He was pounding across the blacktop when he heard a strangled cry of feminine rage.