She frowned.
“The fact you are in love with me?” He winked. “About time, sheesh.”
Her eyes widened. “What—that’s not—”
“Look out!”
Orion’s Ranger had slowed in front of her and she stomped the brakes. Riley caught himself on the dash with a bloodied hand.
“Sorry!”
Orion eased around a crater-sized pothole.
She took a breath.
“Want to talk about it?”
“No!” she snapped. “Listen. I’m not—” She sighed. “I’m not in love with you.”
“But you want to be.”
She glanced at him. He winked at her.
“Riley—”
“Calm down, Larke. I’m just causing trouble.”
She eased around the pothole. “You promised to keep me out of trouble.”
His smile fell. Oh, not the right thing to say. “You’re right.”
“Hey.” She touched his arm. “I’m kidding, too.”
“No, you’re right. My gut told me something wasn’t right about the place. I should have listened.”
“He took us by surprise. You couldn’t have known.”
His mouth tightened.
Silence, as the forest began to thin around them, and ahead Larke could make out the Starr family homestead.
Once upon a time it had started as a handcrafted, two-room cabin in the woods.
Not unlike her own home. In fact, her grandmother had helped birth many of the Starr children, including Orion.
Now, after years of upgrades, generations of Starrs had turned the house into a two-story, timber-framed house with a wraparound front porch, a loft, a beautiful great room, and a view of Denali.
“I might not have known, but seeing his hands on you, seeing him hit you—” Riley drew in a shaky breath. “Yes, I know you can handle yourself, Larke. But I can’t handle watching someone hurt you. I won’t. And if that means throwing my body over yours, well, get used to it.”
A muscle flickered in his jaw, his beautiful eyes on hers.
Oh.
And at that moment, she hadn’t a hope of not falling for him.
No. No…
Orion pulled his Ranger up to a massive barn. She parked beside him and glanced at Riley. “Let’s get you bandaged up, then—”
Orion opened her door. “Come inside. And bring your medical kit.”
She glanced at Riley, who was already reaching for the door.
She circled around the truck to the back to get her medic bag. Riley made to reach for it, but she gave him such a look he simply raised his hand in surrender.
Orion had already headed toward the house.
She hiked up the steps, following him, Riley behind her.
Orion pushed open the door, and she stepped inside.
His medical emergency lay on his leather sofa on a blanket, a wad of towels pressed to his bloodied shoulder. The blood saturated his orange shirt, even the green pants, and he looked bruised and beaten up, his face sooty, his short brown hair matted, and even from here, the odor of fire and blood radiated off him. He looked at her with pale blue eyes, cut a glance at Orion, and then his gaze fixed on Riley.
And instantly Larke knew something was wrong. Not just because of the tightening around the man’s eyes. Riley simply freaked out. He’d clearly meant every single word he’d uttered in the truck, injury or not, because he grabbed her, jerking her hard behind him and pulled out a gun—where did he get that?—and pointed it at the man on the sofa.
“Stay back, dude!”
He flashed the gun at Orion, who raised his hands. “Easy there, pal.”
Then he turned the gun back at the man on the sofa. “I don’t know what game you’re playing, but it’s over.”
“Riley!” Larke said, trying to push past him.
But for a wounded man, he had a steel grip on her, his injured arm just barely shaking as he held her firm. “Stay there, Larke.” He glanced at her. “This man is named Logan Thorne. And he’s a fugitive from the law.”
“What?”
“He’s one of the escapees from the prison gang.”
She froze, glanced at Orion, whose jaw tightened.
“Yes, actually, he is,” Orion said quietly. “But he’s also a hero. A former SEAL and an old friend of mine. And he’s been shot.”
Riley didn’t move.
And that’s when the guy from the sofa sighed and said quietly, “And, Riley McCord, I knew your father. I promise you, I’m not looking for trouble. And, if you put the gun down, I’ll tell you how he died.”
Seven
“You’re lying.” The words simply scraped out of Riley, a guttural, instinctive response to the desperate negotiation of the fugitive—Thorne. “How could you possibly know my father?”
“I served with him,” Thorne said quietly. “In Afghanistan. I was on the raid that…well, it’s a long story.”
Riley tracked back to that moment only two days ago when he’d shared a few scant words with Thorne on the fire line. What had he told him? His name, maybe the fact his father had died.
The man could be making a giant leap.
Or—
“He’s telling the truth, McCord,” said Orion, who was lowering his hands. He glanced at Larke, still positioned behind Riley, where he had vise-gripped her wrist. Blood trickled down his arm. “Larke. Trust me. Thorne is not dangerous. He’s been shot, and he needs help.”
Riley’s gaze pinned back on Thorne. “Tell me where—”
“The Kunar province.” Thorne hadn’t moved from the sofa, from his grip on his bleeding arm. He looked every inch like he might be telling the truth, his quiet blue eyes holding Riley’s.
Yeah, Thorne reminded Riley—too much, frankly—of the kind of men his father had commanded.
“Why are you in prison? Why did you run?”
Now Thorne shot a look at Orion, and his jaw tightened. “Yeah, well, again, long story.”
“Sum up.”
Thorne sighed. “I boosted a car in Fairbanks. The wrong car. Taillight was out when I got pulled over in Copper Mountain. Problem was, the car was already stolen. Apparently, I have a knack for getting in trouble. I figured I’d been wiped from the system, so I threw them my name but…yeah that was probably a bad idea because when that US marshal showed up it started to sink in…”
Riley didn’t let his words, or empathy, loosen his grip on Larke or the gun. “What started to sink in?”
“If I didn’t get away, and someone started digging…they might find me, and it wouldn’t be long before a guy like me showed up to make sure I never made it home.”
A guy like him? Oh, Riley just knew it. But before his instincts could put Thorne on the ground, Larke asked softly, “Who might find you?”
Thorne’s jaw hardened. “The military. The CIA. The guys who erased me.”
“Why?” Riley said. “What did you do?”
Thorne’s jaw tightened just for a second before he sighed. “I lived.” Then he looked down, his expression almost defeated. “I lived, when I was supposed to die. And then…and then I ran.”
Riley put down the gun. Because he knew that expression, too. He’d seen it too often himself—the knowing that somehow you’d derailed your entire life and hadn’t a clue how to fix it.
His throat tightened.
No. Riley hadn’t derailed his life. He just took a different path—
“Why were you supposed to die?” Larke said. Riley had released his grip on her enough for her to push past him.
“Larke—”
She spun, gave him a look that could shut him down. “He’s hurt, Riley.”
Riley nodded, but his gaze went to Thorne, who looked up and met his eyes.
“Don’t…”
Thorne nodded, and as Larke sat beside him on the sofa, he let out a long, almost pained breath.
She removed the towels. A tiny bullet hole was embedded in the man’s shoulder.
> “There’s no exit wound,” she said. “You need a hospital and a surgeon to get that bullet out.”
Thorne shook his head, and that’s when Orion piped up.
“That’s why we need you, Larke. We gotta take it out.”
She glanced up at him. “You’re more of a surgeon than I am.”
“No. You were a combat medic. I know you were trained to do field surgery when needed.”
Really? Riley raised an eyebrow.
Her mouth tightened. “Fine. Let’s get him on the table.”
Riley tucked the gun into his belt, then helped Orion clear the kitchen table, a long, rough-hewn trestle table, for, uh, surgery? “This is crazy. We need to take him to the hospital.”
“I’m not going to a hospital.” Thorne’s words ended on a swift, hard groan as Larke helped him off the sofa.
“Orion, you get him on the table and prepped. I need to take a look at Riley’s wound.” She advanced on Riley and grabbed his hand.
“I’m fine—”
“Sit down.” She kicked out a kitchen chair, as if angry.
He plopped down, and she donned some plastic gloves, then grabbed a pair of scissors from her bag.
“Hey—wait, wait—I like this shirt.”
She leaned back, her pale blue-green eyes rich with challenge. Yeah, she was really mad. “Okay, tough guy. Raise your arm over your head so I can—”
“Fine,” Riley snapped.
“I’ll get you a new shirt,” Orion said, and Riley glanced at him. He was helping Thorne climb onto the table. He’d laid a sheet down under him.
She snipped his shirt, up the arm, into the neckline, and the shirt fell off him. By her expression, he’d done real damage to his stitches. “You’ve torn out about half your stitches here. We’ll have to go back to the hospital—”
“If you can do surgery in the field, you can throw in a few stitches, can’t you?”
She sighed. “Always have to be the tough guy.”
“Look who’s talking.” He reached out and lightly caressed a bruise on her jaw, something she’d probably gotten when she tripped.
She sighed. “I have some medical adhesive—that should work.”
“Glue. Awesome. Paste me up, Doc.”
“Not a doctor—”
“Whatever.”
He caught the tiniest of grins as she found the tube and uncapped it.
“Where’d you get the gun?”
“The dead guy. When we pulled him back to the porch.” He’d voted for leaving him in the woods, but there was no stopping Orion. Riley had found the gun a few feet away from the body and tucked it into his belt.
And good thing— “Hey, easy there.”
“It’s glue. I need the skin to almost overlap.” She was pulling the skin together across his wound. A sweat broke out down his back, and he let out a long breath.
Thorne was watching him.
“What?”
“You’re like him. Younger, but he had your expression.”
“Distrust? Anger?”
“Determined. Fearless.”
Riley looked away. “Yeah, maybe. But that’s where the resemblance ends, trust me.”
Thorne made a sound, a hmm. “I don’t think so. He was exactly the kind of guy who’d show up bleeding and still try and be the hero. Just like you.”
Riley’s gaze flickered back over to Thorne. “How did you say you knew my dad?”
“PreBud/S, in Great Lakes, and then a couple years later I worked under him while I was deployed. Quiet. Focused.”
Yeah, that was Master Chief Simon McCord.
“Not easily riled, but…”
Riley raised an eyebrow. Thorne met his eyes.
“Passionate about his men. That’s what got him killed.”
Larke glanced up at Riley, then back to his wound. She was rolling out a piece of sticky gauze to protect it.
Orion was cleaning Thorne’s wound, and one of Thorne’s eyes closed, his jaw tightening.
“All we got was ‘killed in action.’ No details,” Riley said.
“There wouldn’t be because all the SEAL operations are—were—classified. This one probably still is, but…” Thorne sighed. “It was an ambush. It was late in the season, before the snow was due to fall, and the CIA had heard about a group of Taliban digging in at a village in the Kunar Province. Good intel, or so they thought. We were supposed to—”
Orion put his hand on Thorne’s chest. Gave a little shake of his head.
Thorne glanced up at him. Gave a nod and turned back to Riley. “So, it was an ambush. They were waiting for us, and our team was driven back into some nearby caves. There were casualties, and the PJs were called in.” He glanced at Orion. “Then it all went south.”
“We were picked off while fast-roping down to the team,” Orion said quietly. “We x-filled through the caves—found a tunnel, but—”
“There was a cave-in, and the team was separated. Two of us were caught on the other side.” Thorne swallowed. “I was one of them. The other was a SEAL we called Roy.”
I lived, when I was supposed to die.
“You were taken by the Taliban.” Larke stood up, pulled off her gloves. It wasn’t a question, but Thorne nodded. “Except, the SEALs have a rule—no man left behind.”
He looked at Riley. “Your dad and a couple other SEALs came after us. Found where the Taliban had taken us and staged a rescue.”
Riley’s throat tightened.
“Problem was, it wasn’t authorized. The master chief did it under the radar, on his own, just him and a few of the guys from another team.”
“Did it work?”
“Mmmhmm. But…your dad was killed, Riley. Saving my life. Trying to bring me home.”
Riley looked away, his eyes hot.
“He was a good man. Followed his instincts instead of the rules and saved my life.”
Riley frowned. “No, that wasn’t my dad—he…he followed rules. Trust me—”
“No. Trust us, Riley,” Orion said. “Your dad did follow the rules—but he also followed his gut. He wasn’t reckless, but he wasn’t afraid to take risks. He was a hero. The master chief was the kind of man who showed up, even if it cost him. And, he had faith. Said he never went to war without God. That his skills, his talents, belonged to God.”
Yeah, his father had said that, hadn’t he? Riley had pushed that part out of his brain, maybe.
“That’s a man I want watching my back, every time,” Thorne said quietly.
Riley pressed a hand to his mouth as Larke assembled her instruments on a towel.
“I recognized you at the fire, McCord. And not just because you look like your dad, but because he talked about you. He was really proud of you. Said you were just like him, and that you were going to be a marine. Although I think he wanted you to be a SEAL.”
Riley didn’t answer. Of course he did.
“So, what happened?”
“I’m…” Not a hero. He shook his head. “Not the guy my dad thought I was.”
“He’s wrong,” Larke said as she bent over Thorne’s wound again. “But he can’t see it.”
Riley frowned, glanced at Larke, but she wasn’t looking at him.
“Yeah, well, we all get stuck, don’t we? Between the people we want to be and the version we see in the mirror.” Thorne bit back a word. “But I think your dad would still be proud of you.” He turned to Larke. “Got any of those morphine field hits?”
“Not yet. I need to take your blood pressure.” She dragged out her kit. “So, what happened after you were liberated? Why are you hiding in Alaska?”
His voice was tight when it emerged. “Unfortunately, we’d already been listed as dead, so Roy and I were offered a different kind of job. I politely declined. That wasn’t an option.”
Silence, and Riley didn’t chase his words as he stood at the window, watching the smoke billowing black on the horizon.
“I just want to get home,” Thorne said. “I’ve
been on the run for three years, and if the military finds me, they’re going to shove me into a hole where no one will find me.” His voice clamped down over a moan.
“Sorry,” Larke said. “Okay, I’ll give you a shot, but I don’t want to give you too much—it can cause breathing issues—”
“Shoot me up, Doc.”
Riley turned to watch as she found her syrette and shot Thorne in the thigh.
“Okay, soldier, just take a breath. We’ll get this bullet out of you.”
Thorne closed his eyes. But he reached up and wrapped his hand around Larke’s wrist. “Thanks, Doc.”
“Not a doctor, but…you’re going to be okay.”
Thorne made a humming sound, and Larke picked up a pair of tweezers.
Her cell phone buzzed in her back pocket.
“Riley, can you get that?”
Oh. Um, but okay. He retrieved her phone. “It’s your dad.”
“Answer it.”
He thumbed the call open. “Barry, this is Riley.”
A pause, then the older man’s voice came through the line. “Is Larke around?”
Riley glanced at Larke. She was removing a small metal slug from Thorne’s shoulder. Dropped it with a plink into a mug that Orion held out for her.
“Sort of. She’s busy. Can I give her a message?”
Another pause. “What’s going on, Riley? We’re at Alicia Salmon’s place, and there’s a dead body here.”
Right. “Yeah. Uh…”
“I want to know if my daughter is okay.”
“Tell him you’re fine,” Riley said and held the phone under her mouth.
“I’m fine, Dad.”
Riley put the phone back to his ear. “We had a little medical emergency, but we’re all okay. And…when you say we—”
“Me and your boss, Tucker, a couple feds, and Skye.”
Riley tried to sort out this information, but his brain locked on a couple feds.
Like the kind who could be after Thorne?
“Where are you?” Barry asked.
Larke had applied combat gauze to the wound, stopping the bleeding, wrapping it around Thorne’s arm. “You need a couple stitches, but—”
“Riley?” Barry said through the phone.
Riley watched as Thorne pushed himself up from the table and shook his head, as if trying to clear it.
Some Like It Hot: Christian romantic suspense (Summer of the Burning Sky Book 3) Page 9