“Ladies.” He bent to kiss the baby’s head—yep, she definitely smelled like peas and had some stuck in her dark hair—then smiled at the two women. “You’ll ruin your appetites.”
“Doubt it.” Mara snorted and rubbed her belly. “This boy has his daddy’s appetite.” She looked round and sweet and rosy with happiness. He was so glad for her in that instant, he couldn’t help but give her a hug. He covered for it—the guys would never let him live it down if they knew he was such a sap—by pretending it was a diversion to steal the spoon out of her hand. He dug into the ice cream for himself.
“Hey!” She socked him in the stomach hard enough that the bite went down his throat like a rock. He coughed, eyes watering, and handed her the spoon back.
Behind him, Quinn laughed. “You should know better than to come between her and ice cream. Especially when she’s pregnant.”
He returned his attention to Mara. “You feelin’ all right?”
She stared after her fiancé, who had continued with Gabe into the office off the living room. “I feel great,” she said, but there was an undercurrent of tension in her words.
“You sure?”
“Mm-hm.”
Didn’t sound that way. “Everything still okay between you and Quinn?”
“Oh God, yes. I love Travis and I know he loves me. It’s not that. It’s…” She sucked in a breath and glanced at Audrey.
“We’re worried,” Audrey blurted. She nodded toward the office. “About them. We know it’s just a training mission, but Gabe wasn’t supposed to go and now he’s being stubborn and insisting and…” Her eyes shimmered with tears and she blinked them back, shook her head. “I almost lost him last time. In more ways than you know. I-I can’t… I don’t know if I’m strong enough to go through it again.”
Jesse’s stomach twisted into a hard, painful knot. He’d suspected Gabe had struggled mentally as well as physically during his recovery, but to hear it confirmed…
Damn, it hurt.
Mara reached for his hand. “You’ll take care of our guys while you’re out there, won’t you, Jesse?”
His gut response was to assure the women that the team wasn’t walking into a real-life situation this week. But one look into Mara’s dark eyes told him she needed more assurance. He squeezed her hand. “Always. I’ll make sure they all stay in one piece.”
“Thank you,” Audrey said softly.
“I knew we could count on you,” Mara added.
Yeah. They could count on him, all right.
Problem was, he didn’t know if he could count on himself anymore. His ability to deal with serious medical issues in intense situations had always been the one thing he could truly rely on no matter what his mess of a love life looked like or the newest drama brewing in his oversized family back home. Medicine had been his calling for as long as he could remember…but now he just kept replaying all the things that went wrong when Gabe was shot, all the things that could have gone wrong, and all the ways Gabe could have—honestly, should have—died. Blood loss. Shock. Infection. To name a few. And Jesse hadn’t been able to do any-damn-thing but sit back and watch. What was the sense in having all this medical knowledge if he couldn’t do anything to help when his teammates needed him?
He realized he was standing there staring blankly at the two women and forced a smile. “I’d better go,” he said around the vice gripping his throat and tilted his head toward the office.
It was the last place he wanted to go at the moment. He didn’t want to talk strategy. What he wanted—no, needed—was a trip to the lake. It was the one place on earth he could clear his head and think straight. If he could get a few hours alone there, maybe he’d be able to figure out what to do about Connor and work through his sudden medical performance anxiety.
In the office, Gabe sat in the big executive chair while Quinn perched on the edge of the desk, arms crossed over his chest.
“The girls are worried about us,” Quinn said without preamble.
Jesse tilted his head in acknowledgment as he shut the door. “Can you blame them?”
“No,” Gabe said after a beat of silence. “And that’s why we asked you here.”
“Okay. You wanted to talk, so spit it out.”
Gabe picked up a pen and twisted it through his fingers a couple times. “After this week, I won’t be going on anymore missions. Training or otherwise.”
Jesse had started forward, but stopped like a glass wall had slammed down in front of him. “Wait.” He glanced between the two of them. “What?”
Gabe sighed, set the pen down, and pushed himself out of the chair. He left his cane where it was propped against the wall and limped around the desk. “I’m not at full strength and might never be again, no matter how hard I work. It took me a while…” He trailed off, cleared his throat, and started again. “I can no longer be the kind of commander that rides to the front lines with his men. I have to think of my wife and the family we want to start. I can’t give her that if I’m constantly running off to play war. And I won’t”—he stressed the word with so much conviction it was more of an oath than a simple statement—“put her through the last year and a half again.”
Jesse got it. He’d drawn that same line in the sand in a last ditch effort to save his marriage to Connor’s mother. And look how that had turned out. But he hoped for Audrey’s sake, Gabe was better at being a civilian than he’d been. “So you’re leaving HORNET?”
“Not leaving. I’m still CO and Quinn is still my executive officer, but neither of us can be in the field anymore. Our roles from here on out have to be behind the scenes, which means we need a field commander who can follow orders, but who also has the ability to make split-second decisions under pressure.”
He saw where this was going, and a sense of dread settled over him. “You don’t want—”
“Yeah, we do,” Quinn said. “If anyone can keep the team in line, it’s you.”
Holy hell.
Didn’t they realize he was barely holding his shit together? His son hated him, the only woman he wanted was the one he wasn’t going to touch with a ten-foot pole, and he didn’t even know if he was still capable of serving as the team’s medic. With his recent case of the yips, he doubted he’d be able to bandage a paper cut without breaking out into a cold sweat.
And they wanted him to take command?
Shit.
“Guys…” His voice wobbled. Not with sentiment, though he was touched that they trusted him enough to offer the position. Nope, that wobble was all about the firestorm of panic raging inside him. He cleared his throat, tried again. “I’m okay with my current position. Ask someone else to—”
“There is no one else,” Gabe said definitively.
“Think about it,” Quinn added. “What are our other options? Jean-Luc? Ian? Garcia?”
Jean-Luc Cavalier, the team’s linguist, drank way too much, didn’t much care for rules, and was doing a damn fine job of fucking his way through the female population. He was arguably the most reckless man on the team, which put a big red X on him for any position of command. Ian Reinhardt, explosives expert, was as volatile as the bombs he defused and had a penchant for using “enhanced interrogation” techniques. And Jace Garcia? That pilot was shady as fuck. He could fly any aircraft in any situation, but you never quite knew whose side he was on.
None of them were fit for command. They were barely fit for the roles they filled now.
The look on his face must have given away his thoughts because Quinn nodded. “You see our problem here. Harvard’s too young, too inexperienced—though he’s been putting himself through training with the recruits and he’s coming along. He’ll make a good leader someday. And while Seth’s managing his PTSD, we don’t want to put any extra pressure on him.”
“What about Marcus? He’s a joker, but he knows where to draw the line, when to get serious.”
“He’s a possibility if you really don’t want the position,” Gabe conceded. “B
ut he was never military and doesn’t have the same combat experience as you do.”
Were the walls closing in on him? Because it sure as hell felt the room was getting smaller.
“Listen,” Quinn added after a beat. “You take the reins during this training op. After, if you still don’t think you’re the right guy for the job, we’ll tap someone else.”
One training mission. He could get through that and then politely decline their offer. He could do this. Wasn’t like they’d be facing any real-world baddies this time out.
He inhaled sharply, let the breath out slowly, and gave a nod. “You can count on me.”
“We know it.” Quinn stepped forward and clapped him on the shoulder. “Men don’t come any steadier than you, Sawbones.”
Uh-huh. Steady as a rocking boat. Which explained why he was on the verge of a panic attack. His chest constricted and needed to get gone before the panic really took hold.
“Yeah, uh…” He cleared his throat to ease the tightness. “So. I have some thinkin’ to do now. I’ll need to take a rain check on dinner. Will you let Mara know?”
Quinn nodded. “I’m sure she’d put together a plate if you—”
“No, that’s fine. I’ll scrape up somethin’ at home.” He backed to the door, but stopped with his hand halfway to the knob as he remembered the fight from earlier. “Schumacher’s a problem. He picked a fight with Connor today.”
“Jesus.” Quinn heaved out a sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose like he was starting to get a headache. “I’m aware. He knows he’s on shaky ground. If he fucks up or mouths off just once during the training exercise, he’s done.”
Okay, that settled one worry. He hesitated, unsure how to approach his next question. “How would you feel if…Connor joined us?”
Gabe’s brows climbed toward his hairline. “Thought you didn’t want him involved in this part of your life.”
Exhausted, Jesse scrubbed his face with both hands, dragged his fingers through his hair, and locked them behind his head. “I don’t, but…” He dropped his arms to his sides. Shrugged. “I can’t leave him here. He’ll try to go back to Vegas if I do and his mom won’t take him. She’s washed her hands of him. Christ knows where he’d end up.”
Gabe and Quinn shared a look that lasted for several seconds. The two had been friends for a long time—brothers, really, in every sense of the word but blood—and sometimes it seemed they could read each other’s minds.
Finally, Quinn turned back to Jesse. “It’s your decision whether you want to bring him or not. This is your show, buddy.”
Annnd the panic threatened to strangle him again.
His show.
Right.
Chapter Six
Thursday, July 23
Unknown location
Tiffany’s mouth was bone dry. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d had a drink, and every time she drifted off in her small, dark cell, she dreamed of jumping into a crystal clear lake and sucking it dry. She always woke up thirstier than before she fell asleep.
It had been days since the man with the blue eyes and red-blond mustache jumped her outside the lab. At first she’d been kept in a basement room with a toilet in one corner. Food and water would appear twice a day in the slot on the prison-like door.
So at least they didn’t want her dead. Yet.
Then two days ago, she’d been blindfolded and hustled onto a plane. She could be anywhere in the world at this point—though if she had to guess, she’d say they’d flown her to Martinique. For all she knew, she could even be in the conference hotel. She couldn’t hear any noise, though. At least, nothing like the typical sounds of a hotel—elevator doors, muted conversations and TVs, the rattle of a housekeeper’s cart. When she strained her ears, she thought she heard the sound of the ocean through the stone walls of her cell, but she couldn’t be sure.
Really, at this point, she wasn’t even sure of anything anymore.
She still wore the same clothes she’d had on the night her captor had abducted her, now stained and torn. She hadn’t been allowed to shower or change since arriving here, and it had been over twenty-four hours since anyone had fed her.
As another cramp of hunger twisted her stomach, she let herself fantasize about going to the bridal shop and putting on her gown. All that satin and lace and pretty beadwork. She’d felt like a princess. Her mother and grandmother had cried and she’d known it was the right dress.
She’d never wear that dress again. With each passing day, she was more certain she wasn’t going to live to see her wedding.
She wondered about Paul. He had to be worried sick about her, searching for her. She hoped he was at least taking care of himself. He had a tendency to neglect himself when she wasn’t around to remind him.
If he was alive. She couldn’t ignore the fact her assailant had had his phone.
And Claire? God. She probably didn’t even realize anything was wrong. Had no idea she was walking into a trap. Once these men had them both, once they had Akeso, there was no telling what would happen.
The door smacked open suddenly, flooding her little cell with a wash of orange evening sunlight. She blinked against the assault on her retinas and gasped when a body landed with a dull thud in front of her.
Paul. It was Paul.
He scrambled to sit up and glanced around with an expression of shock and confusion on his pale face. When his gaze found her, his eyes widened. He launched across the few feet separating them and gathered her up in his arms. “Tiffany! Oh, honey, I thought you were dead.”
She snuggled against his chest, torn between happiness and terror. She was too dehydrated to cry. Her eyes felt grainy, like they’re been washed in sand. “What are you doing here?”
“I don’t know. I was walking to my car after work, and the next thing I knew I woke up on a plane with a gag in my mouth and my hands tied together.”
“No! No, no. You can’t be here. You can’t…” Hysteria threatened to overwhelm her. She thought seeing him again would be the happiest moment of her life. She was wrong.
“Honey.” He gripped her by the shoulders and pushed her back. “Listen to me. These men are going to ask you to do something, and you’re not going to want to. But you have to or they’ll kill us. Do you understand? They will kill us.”
She drew away. Something about his tone wasn’t right. She’d been hysterical and terrified during her first few days of captivity, but he was strangely calm about the whole thing. He was clean, too. If he’d been taken shortly after her, wouldn’t he be just as filthy?
An old niggling fear wormed its way back into her heart. There had been times when she thought Paul wasn’t being truthful with her. Times when what he said and what he did didn’t match up. She’d shaken them off as her own demons trying to ruin a good thing—she’d always had a tendency toward jealousy in her relationships, and hadn’t wanted to scare him off by being too demanding or asking too many questions. But now…
The door opened again. Paul scrambled out of the way of the two men who entered. They blew right past him, like he wasn’t even crouching there.
When the men yanked her upright, neither her legs nor her eyes wanted to cooperate. She stumbled along in the sand, and couldn’t focus on her surroundings. She only caught glimpses—she’d been in some kind of storage shed, and they were dragging her toward a small concrete house. She did hear the ocean, though she couldn’t see that either. The setting sun was too bright.
Once inside the house, one of the men pushed her into a bathroom. “Clean up.”
She staggered and caught herself on a glossy pedestal sink. Her reflection in the mirror was startling—if she didn’t know she was looking at herself, she’d never have guessed who the woman staring back was. Deep shadows colored the skin under her eyes, lines that weren’t there before creased her forehead and dug grooves around her mouth. Her hooked nose had always been slightly beak-like, but now it was downright hawkish. Her eyes were too big and
spooked. She looked as if she had aged ten years.
She slowly lifted her gaze to the man still standing guard in the open door behind her. She didn’t recognize him.
Just how many of them were there?
He lifted an eyebrow. There was something mean and weaselly about him, and a chill scraped across her skin as he watched her expectantly. She glanced at the shower and dreamed of stepping under the hot spray, but there was no door and the weasel didn’t seem inclined to give her privacy.
She wrapped her arms around herself. “Will you at least turn around?”
He didn’t move, other than to pull a pack of gum from his back pocket. He folded a stick into his mouth, leaned a shoulder on the doorframe, and made a rolling motion with one hand for her to get on with it.
Nope. He wasn’t leaving.
Okay. She turned her back to him and slowly stripped off her dirty clothes. She used her stained and torn lab coat as a cover, holding it around her as she stepped over the tiled lip of the shower. The showerhead and knobs gleamed under the inset lights overhead. The walls sparkled with pretty green glass tiles. It all looked new and shiny, like it had never been used. She turned the lever and hot water streamed on, quickly filling the small room with steam. She checked over her shoulder, saw the weasel still leering at her, but decided she wanted the shower too much to care. She dropped the lab coat and stepped under the spray, letting it stream over her hair. Dirt sloughed off her body and circled the drain in gross brown water.
As she lathered her hair with the hotel-sized shampoo, she started to feel human. By the time her fingers started to prune, she almost felt like herself again.
She didn’t want the shower to end. It was warm. It felt safe wrapped in a blanket of steam. But all too soon, weasel strode forward and reached in to shut the water off. He gave her body one long assessing look—he didn’t appear impressed—before tossing a towel at her and finally stepping out of the bathroom. She caught the towel and immediately hid her nakedness behind the thick terry cloth, pathetically grateful for the cover.
Code of Honor (HORNET) Page 4