by Dale Mayer
Anders’s Angel
Heroes for Hire, Book 16
Dale Mayer
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
About This Book
Complimentary Download
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Epilogue
About Reyes’s Raina
Author’s Note
Complimentary Download
About the Author
Copyright Page
About This Book
He’s all about second chances…
Anders loves winter and the wilderness, so a trip to the Swiss Alps to retrieve a glaciologist is right up his alley. When he realizes who he’s picking up, he can’t help but smile at fate.
He’d walked away last time he’d seen her because staying was so damn wrong… Now he can’t wait for a chance to reconnect – especially now that she’s no longer engaged…
An expert in an otherwise male-dominated field, Angela has spent her life studying snow and ice in order to cope with the never-ending heartaches associated with her parents’ divorce and her own ex-fiancé’s betrayal. When Anders comes barreling back into her life, to take her home on her father’s orders, she’s not amused… and she has absolutely no intention of obeying.
Particularly not when she understands why her father demands her return.
Anders can feel the undercurrents, but she won’t explain what’s going on…
Can they bury their differences before danger overtakes them both and his dream of a future together dies before it’s ever had a chance to start?
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KILL OR BE KILLED
Part of an elite SEAL team, Mason takes on the dangerous jobs no one else wants to do – or can do. When he’s on a mission, he’s focused and dedicated. When he’s not, he plays as hard as he fights.
Until he meets a woman he can’t have but can’t forget. Software developer, Tesla lost her brother in combat and has no intention of getting close to someone else in the military. Determined to save other US soldiers from a similar fate, she’s created a program that could save lives. But other countries know about the program, and they won’t stop until they get it – and get her.
Time is running out … For her … For him … For them …
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Prologue
Anders Renau sat downstairs with Charles, celebrating, holding cut-crystal glasses of whiskey. Anders smiled and said, “Another one bites the dust.”
Charles chuckled. “Good timing. I was really starting to worry Nikki would never find anybody.”
“And I thought we were talking about the assignment.” Anders put down his whiskey glass, pulled out his phone and sent Levi a quick message, letting him know about the change in relationship status for North.
The response was almost instantaneous. Interesting. And not unexpected. The unknown was which one of you two she would choose.
Anders read the message to Charles.
Charles nodded. “Levi and I had already discussed that. But we figured she’d make a choice in her own time.” He studied Anders. “You’re not upset, I hope?”
Anders grinned. “Hell no. She was not meant to be for me. She and North are perfect together.”
“That’s what I think too,” Charles added.
Levi sent another message. You’ve got two more days there, if you choose to spend them in England. Then you have a job in Switzerland.
“Oh, good. I’ll be in Switzerland after this,” Anders said. “I wonder if North is supposed to travel with me.”
“Maybe,” Charles said. “Nikki won’t leave England just yet. She has to finish her job here, and I’m sure she’ll want to stick around and see that the business shuts down properly. So she’ll be detained at least for another week.”
Anders sent a message back to Levi. Switzerland sounds great. What about North?
He can stay in England for a couple more days if he wants.
Laughing out loud, Anders hit Reply. I guarantee you that he’ll want to spend those days here. Anders considered this new assignment for a moment. “I wonder why Switzerland? I haven’t heard any chatter concerning that country.”
“That’s one country I haven’t been to for a long time. It’s beautiful,” Charles said. “I’ve spent a lot of time in Geneva and Lausanne. And, of course, Zermatt for the standard tourist trip.”
Anders nodded thoughtfully. “I’ve been skiing at several locations in Switzerland, but I’ve never been there strictly for business.”
“It sounds like it will be work this time.”
His phone buzzed again. It was Levi. You’ll be meeting Dezi and Reyes. Harrison en route too.
What’s the job?
Retrieving a package. An expensive package.
Alive or dead?
But instead of texting a reply, Levi called. When Anders answered, Levi said, laughing, “She is alive and well and kicking mad.”
“Who is she, and why are we retrieving her?”
“She is a specialist in glaciers. Don’t ask me for more details because I really don’t know anything more, but she measures the ice melt and the damage done in the retreat of icebergs.”
“And we’re retrieving her why?”
“Her father is a prime minister. He’s in trouble and has received threats, putting his daughter in danger too. If you don’t want to go to Switzerland, just say so.”
“I’m delighted to go to Switzerland. And I don’t mind picking up this package,” he said. “The feistier, the better.”
“Oh, you’ll love this job then. I’ll text you her name when I get off.” And Levi hung up on him.
Anders grabbed the whiskey, held it up to Charles and said, “To my next job in Switzerland.”
The men clinked glasses together and settled back to enjoy the fire. Anders couldn’t help but think this job was something he was actually looking forward to. He adored women. And, like he had told Levi, the feistier, the better. She might not want to return with him, but she really wouldn’t get much of a choice.
His phone buzzed. He looked at the name of the woman he was collecting and laughed. Angelica. … A feisty woman named after an angel. Perfect.
He knew only one woman named Angelica. Someone from his past. Surely it wasn’t his Angelica.
Either way, stranger or old flame, chances were good she wouldn’t want anything to do with Anders.
Too bad. She would come with him—whether she wanted to or not.
Chapter 1
Anders stood outside the small chalet and wondered why anybody would want to spend so much time in the frozen Alps as this woman apparently did. But, as he well knew, nothing was normal about her. He’d already read the short dossier he’d received on Angelica. It was enlightening.
He already knew her on one level. A gut level. He’d met her in England at a pub about a year ago. She had been attending a conference, and he was passing through. By chance they were staying at the same hotel. He’d taken one look and had fallen hard.
With only a short time to make an impact, he’d come on hard and fast—and had crashed and burned badly when he had found out she had a fiancé.
His heart had stuttered to a stop, and he’d been literally speechless. How could his gut have been so wrong? It had never happened before. And he’d
never met anyone before or after who had touched him in the same way.
Someone so fantastic with such an emotional impact upon him … and she wasn’t available.
Still, he wasn’t one to give up. He’d done his best to let her know who he was and what they had—and that she was in the wrong relationship. That might not have been his smoothest move, but, with time so short, and the impact on his senses so strong, he’d been just as determined to let her know that she had options, and she needed to pick a different one than her current choice. When he’d kissed her, … wow.
The hardest thing had been stepping back, seeing the dazed look in her eyes, knowing she was as affected as he was by their kiss. And then he had walked away, since he couldn’t cross his own line of taking another man’s lady. So he had to wait while she made a decision.
And apparently she had.
He’d planned to give her recovery time and to see her again. It had been almost one year since that fateful meeting. He’d hoped to stop by after this job and to see her now that he would be in Switzerland. Then he found out who he was coming to collect.
To him, that meant the timing was right. This time he wouldn’t walk away. If she wasn’t married—and her portfolio didn’t say she was—then she was his.
Angelica Winthrop.
She was a glaciologist. Some career he didn’t even know existed. But she studied glaciers and snowfields, ice-pack flows, the movement of glaciers over time and distance. It was a fascinating subject, but certainly not one he’d ever considered as a specialty.
He assumed it was another form of a hydrologist, which technically it probably was. At the same time, she was well respected and had made a name for herself in the industry.
Only she was in trouble, and he was here to help.
He stood on dry ground, staring up at the snowcapped mountain. Part of a four-man research team, Angelica had spent the last five days in a snow hut, somewhere at the top of the mountain, as the researchers took measurements and studied the images with scanners and cameras. She came up here several times a year, and it was just Anders’s luck that she was up there now.
He’d left his buddy North in England, after they had completed their last job, so Anders could join the new hires Levi had sent over today. Behind him, Harrison set up the internet connection, while Anders stepped outside on the deck to take a look at the weather. He glanced back and asked, “Are we confirmed to go up there?”
Harrison snorted. “That’s a yes. The researchers aren’t due to come down for two more days. Weather here at the base of the mountain looks fine but sucks at the top. So I have to wonder if nobody else is able to go up there and get her either.”
“We’re still trying to contact her by phone,” Anders said. “Maybe she’s not answering or the weather is interfering. Will she be more amiable if we snag her up there, or should we wait until she’s down the mountain, then grab her?” Anders paused. “I understand from her father that either of those options will be problematic.”
Harrison chuckled. “Indeed. The two new hires are on the way. Reyes just texted from the airport, saying he and Dezi would be here in the next twenty minutes to half an hour.”
“Good. I’ve worked with Dezi before. What about you?”
“No. I know him but haven’t worked with him. I did a couple missions with Reyes though.”
Anders considered the two new arrivals for a moment. “He’s a friend of Badger’s group, isn’t he?”
“He is. And Badger recommended him, so that’s good enough for Levi. In fact, I think Levi would like to convince many of Badger’s old unit to work for him. At least on a part-time basis.”
“He already has,” Anders said with a chuckle. “They’re doing small jobs for us now. As we expand and get bigger, they will be finding jobs that suit them.”
“The world is a sad place when we can keep so many employed in our line of work,” Harrison said.
“It is, indeed,” Anders agreed. “And, right now, we’ve got a perfect example of why everything is so screwed up. Just thinking about the research team being sitting ducks up in that snow is enough to make me shudder.”
“I don’t mind the snow,” Harrison said. “We don’t get enough, living in Texas. I miss our northern training sessions.”
“I don’t miss them. They were definitely different and definitely fun to do at the time. That doesn’t mean I want to do them all the time.”
“Exactly,” Harrison said, “but this will be fun.”
“Gear?”
“No sign of it yet. Reyes and Dezi haven’t had a chance to get suited up yet.”
Just then the doorbell rang, and Harrison shot Anders a look. Shifting into silent mode, Anders moved to the front door and peered out the side window. “Delivery. He’s cleared.”
“Good,” Harrison said, snapping the laptop closed and joining him at the door.
With Harrison ready, Anders pulled open the door and, sure enough, found the delivery man. They had vetted several already from the expected sources, including this individual.
The guy gave Anders and Harrison a grin and said, “It seems weird to be delivering all this winter gear. But, if you’re part of that ice crew that comes back and forth all the time, then it makes sense.”
“We definitely are,” Harrison confirmed with a big smile. “Now if we can only find the maps of the camps.”
The delivery guy chuckled. “Hey, that’s not a problem. Lots of us have done these climbs.” He handed off the first of the boxes and then walked back to his truck to grab more, both Anders and Harrison following him. “I might even have a map here with the majority of the routes marked down. Most of us locals who are ice climbers know the best routes. And you do need to know where the huts are.”
“Do you go up to the glaciers?” Harrison asked.
He nodded. “Absolutely. It’s two days minimum. Most of the time we get dropped off by helicopter if we’re going very high up.”
Anders filed away that info. They certainly had considered helicopters, but they were looking into the logistics to see how many miles were involved to get them up into the ice fields where these researcher’s huts were. And whether he and his team would stay there for several more days or come straight back. His instructions were to retrieve her now. But, if she was on a job, she wouldn’t be all that amiable to being pulled back to safety. Particularly when safety was a relative term. It sounded like what she did and where she did it was already dangerous in terms of Mother Nature. But then human predators were by far the nastiest on the planet.
As soon as all the boxes were unloaded into the main cabin, the delivery guy walked to the front of his truck, pulled out a map from the glove box and came back. “If you take a look at this,” he said, laying it out against the deck railing, “you can see from my marks these are cabins that we’ve already stayed in. The hillsides are literally dotted with them. But that’s because it’s a huge ice-climbing destination. Not to mention trekking and every other ice and alpine-snow activity.”
“Do you have another copy of this?”
“At home. I have lots of them. You can keep this.”
“We’re heading up to join the scientists on the ice field. Do you know what cabins they use?”
Enlightenment lit up his face. “Angelica?”
Anders nodded.
“I know exactly where they stay.” He took his pen and tapped one of the cabins that already had a circle around it. “She stays at this one. And at this one.” He pointed to another one farther up. “They have proper gear if they go higher.”
Harrison reached over and put little Xs on the side of the two selected cabins. “Any others that you know she stayed in?”
“She should have filed a map with the county. The government does keep track of these research trips,” he said. “But I honestly haven’t a clue who she’d be reporting to. Anyway, you can keep this map.” He gave them a quick salute. “I’ve got to go. Lots more deliveries to make.” He ran
back to his truck, whistling.
The two stood in the doorway and watched as he took off down the dirt road. “Friendly enough,” Harrison said.
“Uh-huh,” Anders said, thinking about it. “Not too friendly, normal. Nothing suspicious as far as I can tell.”
They both looked down at the map the delivery guy had just provided.
“Let’s get inside, spread this out and get a better idea of where we’re at.”
They took various measurements, working out the best route up the mountain. Plus several escape routes.
“There’s a website too,” Harrison said, looking up from his laptop. “I just found it. It’s got all the ice trails marked. Apparently this is a very popular climbing spot.”
“How close is she to these trails?”
“It would make sense that she would use the same trails—much easier for traveling.”
“Unless she’s flying in by helicopter to a midway station, then trekking up the route to the spots she needs for her research.”
“That’s not what her father said.” Harrison looked up with a frown. “But, if we took a helicopter to be dropped in, it would cut out days of traveling. Could give us the jump on the competition and would lessen the chance of missing her on our way up to get her.”
Anders looked back at the map. “That’s a good point. If Levi okays the helicopter charge, and the weather allows, I suggest we do that. We still have to come down with her, and that could take days.”
“I’ll send Levi a text,” Harrison said, his fingers busy on his phone. When done, he put down his phone and went back to the website. “We can utilize a couple good maps here, and they’re printable.”
“We might also be able to buy some current maps,” Anders said. “If it’s a popular hiking spot, there’ll be well-marked trails.”
“What’s the chance we can use a helicopter for pickup?”
Anders looked up and grinned. “I imagine we’ll be drop-shipped close to the cabin, and we’ll be on our own after that.”