“Let’s move!”
We ran back to the tree line, firing as we ran and dodging the few stray bullets that still whizzed by. We were almost clear when Hunter came over the mic.
“Knight, check your six,” he said urgently.
Knight didn’t have a mic, so he didn’t hear that. I spun just in time to see a guard aiming a gun right at Knight. I drew my weapon as I stepped in front of Knight. My shot was true, but not in time to keep the guard from firing his own weapon. The bullet hit me square in the chest, knocking me to my ass. The breath whooshed from my lungs and for a moment I couldn’t breathe.
“Cap, you okay?” Derek asked, laying down cover fire while Knight ran back to me. When the pain finally eased, I was able to take a breath again. I groaned and rolled to my side and stood as Knight wrapped a hand around my arm and pulled me to my feet.
“Guess I owe you one,” Knight said.
“Don’t kid yourself, if you were wearing a vest, I would have let you take it,” I grumbled.
It hurt like hell, but I pushed through the pain and got back to the cover of the trees. Knight was dragging my ass deeper into the woods and I could tell I was holding him back.
“Knight!” a voice shouted from a distance. We came to a halt and hid in the cover of the trees.
“Any idea who that is?” I asked Knight.
“I’m guessing that’s Reiner’s number two, Shelton. I couldn’t take him out. There were too many guards around once Reiner was found dead.”
“How the fuck did that happen so quickly?” I asked.
“It was a clusterfuck that I’ll tell you about some other time.”
“Knight, I’m going to put a fucking bullet in your head,” Shelton shouted.
“You guys go ahead. I’ll take him out and meet up with you in a few.”
“Don’t be stupid. We’re not splitting up. I’ll go with you.”
“Negative, Cap. You’re already injured. I’ll go back with Knight and finish off Shelton,” Derek said.
“I would hardly call a bruise being injured,” I muttered.
“Cap,” Derek said in warning.
“Fine,” I grumbled my agreement.
“Move out. Derek and Knight will meet up with us.”
“See you there, Cap,” Lola confirmed.
I turned to Derek and gave him a back slap before slipping off deeper into the trees. Only once I was back to the vehicles did I finally rip the vest off and feel the pressure ease in my chest.
“Damn, that’s going to leave a bruise.”
“You’re lucky he was farther away or you would have a few broken ribs too,” Hunter said.
“Shit, I miss this life. We really need to take on more jobs like this, Cap. This is the good life,” Sinner said as he relaxed back into his seat as we waited for Derek and Knight to return. Lola, Burg, and Derek would be riding in the other vehicle.
“Are you fucking crazy, Sinner? What do you think Cara would have to say about that?”
“I’m sure she wouldn’t be too happy about it since I asked her to marry me.”
I stared at him in shock. “Are you kidding me? Sinner is settling down with a woman?”
“Don’t be such an asshole. I’ve been tied down to one woman since I met her and you fucking know it.”
“So, how did you do it?”
He grinned and ran his thumb along his lips like he was remembering something. “Well, I was going to ask her myself, but then you called me away and I didn’t know when I would get the chance again, so I spelled it out for her in lollipops.”
“You did what?”
“I spelled it out in lollipops,” he repeated like I was deaf.
I shook my head and sighed. “And I thought I was the dumbest fuck on the planet.”
“What’s wrong with what I did? I thought it was romantic as fuck.”
“Romantic and fuck don’t go in the same sentence when it comes to women. They want the whole nine yards when it comes to a proposal. Especially, you being in the room. That’s kind of a major part of the proposal.”
“Cara’s not like that. She loved it,” he said defensively.
“Of course she fucking told you she loved it. No woman is going to tell you your proposal was shit,” Hunter said.
“But, she said it was me.”
“It’s not fucking about you. It should have been for her. Flowers, wine, candles, at the very least, you should have been in the same house as her. You weren’t even in the same city.”
“But lollipops are our thing.”
I leaned back into the seat and tried to get comfortable. “What about lollipops makes this special?”
“I call her lollipop because I like to lick her until-”
“Alright,” I held up a hand to stop from hearing that. “Fucking hell, Sinner. How the hell does you licking her equate to romance? What did you say? I was licking you and thought I’d better put a ring on it?”
“No, I spelled out ‘marry me, someday’.”
“Christ, it’s like you didn’t learn a damn thing from me.”
“Look, we were talking about marriage and I asked if she would ever consider marrying a guy like me. She said ‘yeah, someday’. It’s still too soon for us to get married, but I knew I didn’t want to let her go. I wanted her to be one hundred percent sure of where my head and my heart were.”
That actually made a lot of sense. I wonder if I had ever talked about the future with Maggie and just had a frank conversation if it would have made a difference.
“I suppose that makes sense, but when you actually feel that it’s time to get married, do yourself a favor and do it right. Get down on one knee and everything. She deserves at least that.”
“I’m not getting anything in from Derek,” Hunter said as he tapped his mic. I checked also and got no response. It was unlikely that two of us had mics down. When Sinner tried with no response, we shot out of the van and headed back toward the woods. We just got to the tree line when Derek came out of the woods dragging Knight along with him. He had blood dripping from between his fingers where he held his side. Hunter immediately went to Knight and took up his other side, getting him back to the van.
“What the hell happened?” I asked Derek.
“My com went out. I couldn’t reach anyone. We got Shelton, but Knight caught a stray bullet from a guard that followed Shelton.”
“Hunter, can you manage in the van?”
“Yeah, let’s get the fuck out of here.”
We laid Knight on the floor of the van and split off into the two vehicles. Lola, Burg, and Derek all rode with Florrie in the car while Knight, Sinner, Hunter, and I rode with Craig in the van.
“All I can do is pack it for now, Cap. He’s going to need a hospital or at the very least, a whole hell of a lot of supplies that I don’t have on hand at the safe house. There’s no exit wound, but I can’t dig out a bullet here.”
We couldn’t take any chances and hang around. While we had a truce of sorts with Davidoff, I wasn’t going to stick around and see what happened when he took over Reiner’s operation.
“I’ll call Cole and see if he can get Kate to the safe house. She has a private practice, so maybe she has what we need on hand.”
Hunter nodded and got to work on Knight. He was still conscious, but slipping in and out as we drove around the rocky road. I dialed and luckily Cole picked up.
“Cole, I have a huge favor to ask. I need you to get Kate and get to the safe house you stayed at with Alex.”
“Supplies?”
“For a gunshot wound. Anything she might need. I don’t know what we have on hand. We had to get out there in a hurry, so we didn’t have time to restock.”
“When do you need us there?”
“We should be there by noon.”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
I hung up and took a deep breath. I suppose it could have gone a lot worse. Once we got to the airport, we would hand everything over to Davidoff and
this mess would be over. We could all go back to our old lives. What was left of them anyway.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Maggie
I’D LOST COUNT of how many days they had been gone. Between the morning sickness and feeling sick in general because they were off on this crazy mission, I wasn’t eating or sleeping. Becky had been doing her best to distract me, but she was busy running the business while the boss was away. The guys from OPS were nice enough, but they kept it strictly professional most of the time.
I tried to keep up a happy demeanor, but knowing that every single one of my guys and girls was out there fighting a battle that was partially to do with me was tough. I didn’t want anything to happen to any of them, even Derek and Lola, who seemed to hate me.
“We’ve got a truck pulling up,” I heard Red say. Red Warren had worked with Sinner when he was with OPS. He had been the one to carry Sinner out of that hell hole he had been held in and I would be forever grateful to him and all of OPS.
I ran to the window and saw a familiar face that had me crying tears of joy. Cole was here with a woman that I had only met once or twice before, his cousin Kate. I ran to the door and flung it open, running out to see him. I threw myself into his arms and started crying into his neck. Since I had never been super close with any of Sebastian’s guy friends, I was sure Cole was wondering what the hell was going on. I couldn’t explain it. Maybe it was the hormones or the fact that Sebastian and I were over. Maybe it was because he was so far away and I had no idea how he was. Either way, I was happy that Cole was here.
“Hey, what’s going on?” Cole said as he set me down on the ground and pulled back, looking into my eyes.
“I’m sorry. I’m sure you think I’m crazy right now.”
“Not really crazy, but I’ve never seen you like this, so I’m definitely wondering what’s got you acting like someone just killed your dog.”
I raised an eyebrow and laughed. “You know if someone killed my dog I’d go after them.”
He laughed and looked me over again. “You’re right about that. So, you want to tell me what the real problem is?”
I bit my lip and decided against saying anything. He was Sebastian’s friend and I didn’t want to burden him with my problems. More than that, I knew that he and Alex were trying to have a baby. Hearing me say that I was going to get rid of mine would probably not make him sympathetic to me.
“Nothing, I’m just nervous about everyone being gone.”
“Ah, well I have news on that. I got a call this morning from Sebastian. He asked me to bring Kate out here with some supplies. He should be here by noon.”
“What? Why does he need Kate? Is someone hurt?”
“As far as I know, he needed supplies for a gunshot wound.” He continued to talk but I didn’t hear anything else. My ears started ringing and the world started tunneling around me. Someone was shot. Possibly Sebastian. I already had lost him, but I couldn’t stand to live in a world where he was gone. I blinked slowly as I tried to focus on something, but everything was swaying around me.
I could feel Cole holding me upright, his hands wrapped around my arms as he shouted to Kate. My legs threatened to give out, but I somehow stayed upright. I swallowed hard and forced my eyes wide and to focus.
“Maggie! Maggie, you need to listen to me.” My hearing slowly came back in until the sounds around me roared back to full volume. “Maggie, Sebastian is fine as far as I know. He wouldn’t have been calling me if he was the one shot. Do you understand me?”
I nodded slightly and breathed a sigh of relief. Sebastian was fine. He was coming home and we would..we would do nothing. I took another deep breath and stepped back, but Cole held on tight to my arms.
“Come on. Let’s get you inside before you pass out.”
That was something I had already been familiarized with and didn’t want to experience it again, so I let him lead me inside to the kitchen where he pushed me into a chair. My hands were shaking and I clamped them together to try to still their movements. Kate set her bag down on the table and sat down in the chair next to me.
“Cole, how about you get my supplies out of the truck and set up a room for me.”
He nodded and left the room. Kate took one of my hands and checked my pulse. “Does that happen often?” she asked as he looked at her watch.
“Does what happen?”
“Almost passing out. You were practically gray out there.”
“A lot more lately than I care to admit.”
She looked up at me with raised eyebrows, then stood and grabbed some crackers from the cabinet and put them in front of me. I nibbled on them for a few minutes as she stared at me.
“How far along are you?”
“I don’t know. Probably close to three months.”
“Have you been to a doctor?”
I shook my head. “I passed out and the guys took me to the ER where they confirmed I was pregnant, but I haven’t made a follow up appointment.”
“Why not?”
“Well, first of all, this just happened last week. Second, I’ve been stuck here while they go off and play Power Rangers. And third, I-” I watched her face for any sign of judgment, but all I saw was the face of a doctor staring back at me. “I’m not keeping it.”
She nodded and got up to get me a glass of water. “Have you told the father?”
“Yes. He doesn’t want me to, but he’s respecting my decision.”
She nodded and set the water in front of me. “Drink. How many times has this happened?”
“I’ve passed out twice, but I’ve come very close a few more times than that. I just haven’t said anything.”
“Have you been eating and drinking lots of water?”
“I try, but the nausea keeps me from eating a lot.”
“Are you able to hold down at least something every day? Does it get better throughout the day?”
“Most of the time it gets better after I’ve eaten, which I usually can’t hold anything down until mid morning. Then I can at least eat something. Water is fine for the most part.”
She nodded and her brows crinkled. “Well, obviously I wouldn’t know for sure without testing, but I would guess that you’re anemic. Have you been taking any prenatals?” I shook my head. “Well, when you’re pregnant, your body produces more blood to supply the baby. If you’re anemic, your body isn’t getting enough iron and other nutrients to create red blood cells to make the additional blood. That’s what’s causing the dizziness. The prenatal vitamins would help with that, but if you are anemic, you would need tests run to find out what you’re missing out on.”
“But I’m not keeping the baby.”
She gave me a sad look and nodded. “I know, but it’s important you know what’s going on. I want you to have all the facts in hand. If you were to change your mind-”
“I’m not going to,” I said forcefully.
“I’m not saying you will and I’m not trying to convince you that you should. I just want you to be medically advised about what’s going on. If this is just happening recently, then that means it’s getting worse, most likely because of the morning sickness. Because you can’t keep food down, you’re even more deprived and it’s making its presence known. Whatever you decide, you need to take care of this one way or the other.”
Cole walked into the room with a stern expression on his face. “The room’s all set up, Kate. I put your bags in the downstairs bedroom, first one on the right.”
“Thank you.” She stood and looked back at me. “Think about what I said.” She walked out of the room, while Cole continued to stand there and glare at me. Was nothing private anymore? When he didn’t move or shift his gaze I got irritated with him.
“What? If you’re going to say something, just say it.”
“I never thought I’d say this because I thought you two were the real deal, but he deserves better.”
“Well, you can thank your lucky stars because we aren’t together a
nymore,” I said as tears brimmed my eyes. These damn hormones were a killer. I never cried, not one fucking tear unless it was something really terrible. Now, I was crying over everything.
Angry with myself for letting him see how weak I was, I stormed out of the room, but didn’t make it far because the team walked in through the door, all of them bickering and carrying on like a bunch of old ladies. Sebastian was in the middle of the pack, looking devastatingly handsome in his combat gear. They hadn’t even changed before they got on their flight home. I was brought out of my perusal of his sexy body when Hunter stepped forward, carrying the limp body of a man I didn’t recognize.
“Who is that?” I asked as he walked past me and down the hall toward the bedrooms.
“Knight.” Sinner walked over to me and wrapped an arm around my waist, pulling me in for a side hug.
“I guess I didn’t recognize him without a knife to my throat,” I said bitterly.
“He came through for us big time down there. Try to forgive him. Because of everything he set up, you can finally go home.”
The shock written on my face must have done him in because he started laughing. “Time to get back to life, Freckles. The question is, what story will you go after now?”
I looked over at Sebastian to see him looking at me. He didn’t look happy to see me. More like he was wanting to know when the hell I was going to get out of there. I looked up at Sinner and tried for a smile. “I don’t know. I guess I’ll have to reach out to some sources when I get home.”
“That doesn’t sound like the Maggie I know. She’s always on the hunt for the next big story and usually has a few in her safety net.” He frowned down at me and then glanced at Sebastian. “It doesn’t have to be this way, you know.”
“We all make our choices. I have to live with mine.”
“But you haven’t done anything yet. I’m just saying that it’s not too late to change your mind.”
“Even if I did, it wouldn’t bring him back to me. The damage has already been done. Some people just aren’t meant to be together. There’s no point being upset over it.”
He nodded but didn’t look convinced. “Why don’t you go grab whatever it is you came with and I’ll take you home?”
Cap_A Reed Security Romance Page 16