Tempting SEALs 03: Hidden Agendas

by Lora Leigh

  Kell felt like squirming.

  "I may not be in action anymore, son, but I'm not a SEAL for nothing. My daughter is damned strong, but she doesn't take orders worth a damn. And when it comes to women, neither do you. You two needed a solid kick in your asses years ago. I just gave you one."

  "You couldn't have predicted this," Kell snapped, referring to Fuentes's attempts on Emily.

  "No, I didn't." The senator breathed out wearily as he shook his head then. "But I didn't have to. I knew it was just a matter of time before you stepped in anyway."

  Kell stared at the men around him, their efforts to hold back their amusement bringing a snarl to his lips.

  "Sit down, Kell." The admiral waved his hand toward the chair. "Richard's right. Give the girl a chance to find her composure before you go to her. She's a woman; better learn now when to comfort her tears and when not to."

  Was she crying? His gaze snapped to the closed door. God help him if she was in there crying alone.

  "I can make that an order, Lieutenant," the admiral reminded him. "Give us ten more minutes, then you can go to her. We still have a few things to discuss here."

  Clenching his fists, Kell sat back down slowly, determined that if he heard so much as a whimper from the bathroom then orders be damned, there wasn't a chance in hell that he would stay put.

  As he breathed out a frustrated sigh, his gaze lifted, locking with Ian's where he stood behind the senator, leaning casually against the wall. For a moment, just a moment, he could have sworn he saw grief reflected in the other man's eyes. Not that it would have been the first time he caught that flash of emotion. Just as before it was gone as quickly as it had come, and the ever-present mocking amusement took its place.

  "Securing the Andover mansion is going to be a bitch," Reno said, interrupting Kell's thoughts, drawing his gaze back to the group and a plan of the house and grounds that Reno was laying on the table. "It's an old plantation mansion with several wings and additions. There's no sign of hidden entrances or tunnels, so we're lucky there." A Southern plantation home with no hidden tunnels or entrances. Hell, someone had been confident when they built that house.

  "What we do have"—Macey sat forward to point to the grounds—"are unfenced grounds, thick woods, and so many damned guests we're going to want to start taking potshots. Look alive, boys, and I'll show you what I've done." He rubbed his hands together gleefully then as he glanced at Kell. "I've procured a handy little flesh-toned transmitter to attach to Emily. And getting those bad boys wasn't easy, let me tell you. If—and I stress the if—she's taken, then we'll at least have a chance to get her coordinates. It's called hedging our bets. I've also tapped into the Andovers' security cameras and the Secret Service boys working with us will have monitor duty. We can go over the recordings after the party and see who we can see. We're going to catch this son of a bitch, and when we do, he's going to tell us where Nathan is. God help him then, because there won't be nothin' of Mr. White left once we get finished with him."

  Violence simmered in the air, flashed in the gazes of each man there. Mr. White, whoever the hell he was, had tortured Nathan to the point that there wasn't a chance he would ever be the same again.

  The laughing Irishman, they had once called him. His mother had come from Ireland with her parents, and Nathan's grandfather's accent had influenced Nathan's speech as a child. With his bright blue eyes and broad, amused smile, he had charmed the women and talked his way out of more trouble than any man had a right to be able to.

  His luck had run out when Fuentes captured him though. There was no amusement in the eyes of the man in the photos Macey had printed out. There was madness, rage— death. There was nothing of the man Kell had known and often called a brother.

  There would be even less of Emily left if Sorrell managed to get his hands on her. The tales of his tortures, of the lives his women led, were the stuff of nightmares. Fuentes was playing sandbox games compared to Sorrell.

  "Judas's last contact promised backup if she is taken," Macey stated. "Whether we can trust him or not, I'm not saying. I know in the last two years, he's not screwed us over yet."

  "She won't be taken," Kell informed them all, the guttural tone of his voice almost shocking him. "We cover her and she won't be taken. Then we'll watch the security recordings Macey takes and we'll find the bastard there. Emily is not to be left undefended."

  "We'll protect Emily and we'll find Nathan," Ian said then. "No matter the cost."

  "No matter the cost," they repeated.

  But the edge in Ian's voice had Kell's gaze returning to him once again. Nathan had been Ian's closest friend, even as a teenager, and Kell knew Ian had grieved harder than the rest of them when they lost the other man.

  Ian would die for any of his brothers, but for Nathan, he would have sold his own soul. A chill raced up Kell's spine at the thought. If Ian got to Mr. White or Sorrell before the rest of the team managed to pull him off them, God only knew what would happen.

  Chapter Twenty-three

  Nightmares twisted through Emily’s dreams that night, making her sleep restless despite Kell's best attempts to help her rest. When she awoke the next morning she was tired and cranky, and the nervous panic filling her stomach made her feel weaker than ever.

  She hated this feeling. She had never known true fear until Fuentes kidnapped her, and since then, she had sworn she would never feel it again. Now, the closer the Andover party came, the more the nerves twisted in her stomach and the more upset her nightmares left her.

  Because she couldn't remember them. They were right there at the edge of her memory as she awoke, but they never slid from the shadows enough for her to grasp them.

  And they had never left her fighting with the sick feeling of panic that rose within her this morning.

  Tomorrow night, they would arrive at the Andover ball, and she had a feeling that whatever happened there, nothing would ever be the same again.

  Shaking her head at the thought, Emily finished her shower before quickly drying her hair and dressing in a pair of soft cotton shorts and a matching camisole top. The light material was cool and comfortable, clothes she normally wore when she was arranging research notes on her computer and plotting her books.

  She glanced at the laptop as she left her bedroom, and breathed out a sigh of regret. It would have to wait just a little bit longer. The book she had almost finished and that her agent was so excited about seemed part of another world right now, a world she couldn't go back to until after tomorrow night. Everything hinged on tomorrow night.

  The scent of coffee greeted her as she entered the living room, and the sight of Kell, shirtless and in bare feet, moving around the kitchen brought an ache to her chest.

  He had tried to comfort her each time she awoke from the nightmares last night, but she had felt his anger simmering through the room. Silent. Deadly. Each time his rough voice had dragged her from whatever nightmares tormented her, it seemed his anger had only grown.

  "I had Ian go out and get you some fresh cinnamon rolls," he announced as he poured her a cup of coffee. Then, as though he had done it every day of their lives together, he sugared and creamed her coffee before setting the cup on the kitchen table.

  "So that's how you get the cinnamon rolls without leaving the house," she said. "I should have known."

  A quick grin flashed across his face before his head lowered to steal a kiss. "I have a sweet tooth."

  "No kidding." She sat down, picked up the cup of coffee, and gave a sigh of delight before taking her first sip.

  He made a perfect cup of coffee.

  "Kira stopped by while you were in the shower," he told her as he moved to the other side of the table with his own cup. "She's offered to pick up your dress for the party and bring it to you. I think you should let her."

  She met his gaze warily. "The final alterations have been finished." She finally shrugged. "She'll have to pick up the accessories for me though. I hadn't gotten around to th

at yet."

  "I'm sure she could manage it," he said.

  Emily nodded before lowering her head and staring at the cinnamon roll that sat in the little saucer by her coffee.

  "Em. Everything's going to be okay," he told her again.

  "I know that." She flashed him a confident smile. "I know you'll take care of me, Kell."

  He was so fierce, so determined. She could see it in his eyes, in the hard set of his expression.

  "What were the nightmares about then?" He sipped at his coffee, watching her over the rim of the cup.

  "I don't know." She could feel the suffocating sense of fear rising inside her again. "I couldn't remember them after I awoke."

  "Do you have them often?" The question was posed casually, but Emily saw the sharp scrutiny in his gaze.

  "After the kidnapping I did." She rubbed her hands over her face before shaking her head wearily. "For months afterward I couldn't sleep at night at all. The darkness was terrifying."

  "You were probably blindfolded when you were kidnapped," he said gently. "Fuentes is known for that. When he kidnaps one of his victims he keeps them blindfolded for hours. It throws your senses off balance and makes the fear sharper."

  "So the psychologist said." She grimaced. "It took days before I could make sense of what was going on around me after the rescue. I don't remember a lot of that week and I remember nothing of the kidnapping itself after the limo was run off the road and we were taken."

  She and the other two girls had been on their way home from a party in D.C. Two senators' daughters and Jansen Clay's daughter, Risa. Emily's father and Senator Bridgeport, Carrie Bridgeport's father, had been instrumental in pushing through several bills that had given drug enforcement agents critical freedoms in uncovering the transporters and suppliers of the drugs coming into the United States.

  Carrie Bridgeport had died from the dose of Whore's Dust she had been given, and Risa Clay was currently in a private institution due to the mental damage the drug had inflicted on her.

  God, those girls were so young. Carrie had been sixteen, Risa barely eighteen.

  Her gaze dropped back to the coffee, the steam from the creamy brew rising, thickening, and before Emily could stop it a horrified scream tore through her mind.

  Daddy, help me!

  "Emily!" Kell's voice shattered the sudden memory that was there, then gone.

  Wildly, she stared around the kitchen, realizing she was no longer in her chair. The coffee dripped from the table where the cup had overturned and Kell's arms were around her, dragging her back from the hot liquid, holding her to him as she tried to fight him.

  "What is it?" He turned her to face him, his expression fierce, his gaze demanding as he stared down at her, forcing her to look at him. "What did you see, Emily?"

  His voice was loud, battering through her mind, hoarse and commanding, as she fought to keep from being dragged back into the darkness awaiting her within her own memories.

  "Screams." She shook her head, jerking away from him to put distance between herself and the sheltering warmth she needed so much.

  She couldn't let him hold her. She shook her head, shaking as whispers fractured her mind.

  "Will he come for you?" A sneer, a voice that filled her with terror. "Tell me. Tell me how to contact him."

  She shook her head furiously as she gazed back at Kell. "How did you know I'd been kidnapped?" The question wheezed from her lips. Had she betrayed him?

  Kell frowned. "I'd just come off a previous assignment in the Gulf. I was entering debriefing when my CO for that mission told me about the kidnapping. I requested an immediate flight to the transport off Colombia's waters where the rescue teams were being flown. Once there, I pretty much demanded to be a part of the rescue. Why?"

  She shook her head. It didn't make sense.

  "Why, Emily?" he snapped.

  "I remember whispers," she gasped. "Screams. I don't know whose they were. Mine or the other girls'. A scream for daddy. Someone whispering questions. Asking if someone will come. How to contact them. And it's so dark . . ." She shuddered as he pulled her into his arms again.

  "The stress works against you." His hand covered her head, holding her to him. "The Whore's Dust is destructive. Nothing the victims have remembered in the past has had anything to do with the night they were drugged. Everything's fractured in your head from the time you're given the drug until the time it's completely out of your system. Days for some. Weeks for others. Some never recover, Emily."

  Like Risa Clay. She hadn't recovered. Not yet.

  "You have every right to be frightened," he told her then. "You know what Fuentes can do. Your subconscious knows how terrified you were when you were taken the first time. That subconscious can be more destructive than the reality. It creates demons and nightmares and whispers of memories that you can't be certain are true or false."

  She breathed in roughly. "I haven't had nightmares since those first weeks."

  "And once this is over, they'll disappear again," he promised her, pulling back enough to watch her with eyes so deep, so dark, they were like endless pools of emotion.

  How could she have ever thought he was cold? That there was no emotion, nothing gentle, to back up the extreme sexiness that was so much a part of him?

  "It's just fear," she said then, swallowing tightly, trying to convince herself of that.

  "Just fear," he agreed, though she swore she saw suspicion flashing in his eyes. The same suspicion that filled her.

  "But you want to know if I remember any more whispers," she guessed.

  His lips tightened. "Just in case."

  Emily inhaled deeply. "No other victim has ever remembered anything?"

  He shook his head as his hand cupped her cheek. "But you're not everyone else," he told her then. "If you remember any whispers, a voice, a face, anything, I want to know."

  "I'll let you know."

  "And tomorrow night, you'll stay close to me," he ordered. "You'll follow orders. Promise me."

  "I promise," she answered with a shaky smile. "And I will, Kell, because I have no desire to ever lose your arms around me. I won't risk allowing harm to either of us."

  His jaw clenched tight, the muscle working in it furiously before a tight grimace crossed his face and his arms tightened around her.

  "Emily, do you know what you do to me?"

  She could feel his erection against her stomach, his arms tight around her, flexing to hold back his strength, to hold back the need to pull her so close that they melted into each other.

  "I know what you do to me." Her hands wrapped around his back, smoothed up it, feeling the powerful ripple of muscles beneath her palms. "I know I've dreamed of you for years. Fantasized and ached. And I know I love you more than I thought I could love anyone. I've loved you all along, Kell, I just didn't want to admit it."

  "You didn't want to give your father what you thought he wanted," he accused her softly, a sad curve tugging at his lips.

  "How did you know that?" She hadn't even admitted it fully to herself.

  "Because it's the reason I stayed away from you, chère. Had I taken what I wanted, then I would have been giving the Kreigers and the Beaulaines what they dreamed of. A woman they approved of, and eventually the grandchildren they dreamed of to carry on their bloodline. It took Fuentes to show me what I was throwing away and this new threat to make me move my ass and claim you. And I'll never let you go, Emily. Remember that. Wherever you go in life, I'll be behind you. As well as in death."

  He had lost so much, so young. And that loss had scarred him, made him harder, made him bitter for so long. Now, she saw the man he was inside in the heated warmth of the emerald eyes staring back at her.

  He was a warrior. Fierce. Determined and strong. And he was her lover.

  As his lips caught hers in a kiss of gentle wonder, Emily felt the breath hitch in her throat. She needed him. In ways she had never known she would need a man, she needed Kell.

  He needed her.

  As he lifted Emily into his arms and carried her back to her bed, he admitted to himself what his heart and soul had known for years. She was the other half of him. Courageous, brave, defiant, and winsome. She was every dream that had sparked in his mind for as long as he had lived.

  His Papère Beaulaine had said that once Beaulaine men found the other half of themselves, then they knew it. There was no doubt. There had been no doubt in his mind for years who his woman was. The doubt had been in himself, in his own stubbornness and his inability to reach out for what he wanted without the past interfering.

  -->