Hot & Bothered (A Hostile Operations Team Novel - Book 8) (9 page)

CHAPTER NINE

BY EVENING, EMILY FELT MUCH BETTER. Her spells usually came on in the morning and then here and there throughout the day, but by evening she typically felt fine. Yet another thing she had in common with a pregnant woman.

Emily frowned as she stared at herself in the mirror.
You are not pregnant.

No, she wasn’t. But now that she knew Linda Cooper was, she couldn’t seem to stop thinking about it. That poor young woman. Her poor baby.
 

Emily splashed water on her face and took her hair down to brush it and then wind it up into a fresh bun. She secured it with a few bobby pins, blew out a breath, and looked herself over with a critical eye.

She hadn’t worn makeup since she’d returned to the desert, but she wished she had some right now. Because no matter how much she might like to avoid Ryan, she was pretty sure she’d see him again. Most likely when she went to get her dinner. She could probably get someone to bring her something, but that was too cowardly even for her.
 

Everyone in this compound was a soldier, a person who’d chosen to be here and work hard for a cause. There was a cook and a supply clerk, just like in the Army, and whatever other positions Ian had hired out—but there were no maids or waitstaff.

They sent the linens out for cleaning, but they made their own beds if they had one—some of the guys bedded down in sleeping blankets. They also went to the dining room at mealtimes and got their own food.

Emily closed her eyes and put her hands on either side of the sink. She could do this. She
would
do this. She’d never thought Ryan would show up when she’d taken Ian’s offer two months ago, but maybe she should have realized it could happen.

Naïvely, she’d thought maybe what Ian wanted from her would really only take a couple of weeks or so, and then she’d be home again before she’d damaged her relationship with Ryan and Victoria too badly.

“That’s the kind of thinking that always gets you in trouble, Em,” she muttered. Since she’d been a child and she and Victoria went into foster care, she’d had an inner fantasy life that often didn’t dovetail with her reality.

When the twenty-five-year-old son who still lived at home in one of their foster families paid special attention to her, she’d only been fourteen and she’d been desperate for love and attention. She hadn’t thought it wrong that he gave her that attention, even when it involved initiating her into sexual life far earlier than she should have been.

Oh, the things she’d told herself. The lies.
 

Of course it crumbled, and of course they were sent away to another family and then another and another. Victoria hadn’t understood it, but Emily had. It was her. She was the bad one, the disappointment, the one who ruined everything.

That’s when she’d turned to drugs and alcohol. They made her feel better, if only for a little while. She hadn’t believed she could turn into an addict, but she had. That’s what cocaine did. Thank God it had only been cocaine and not meth. She’d been terrified of meth, and that had saved her.

At least until Zaran found her. He’d been an addiction of another kind, though she hadn’t realized it at first. She’d only wanted to please him. She’d done everything to please him—and he’d turned on her.

Everyone turned on her eventually.

“No,” she hissed, staring at her reflection with glittering eyes. “That’s not true.”

Victoria hadn’t turned on her. Men might come and go, but her sister would always love her.

Emily dashed the tears from her cheeks and patted her face with a towel before grabbing her weapons. She checked her .45 and holstered it, then slipped her knives into the ankle and belt sheaths designed for them.

If the Freedom Force came after her, she’d fight back. She’d die fighting back if she had to. Never again would she allow others to harm her.

Emily went downstairs and crossed the compound toward the dining area. She held her chin high as she stepped into the room. Men looked up from the groups in which they sat. She crossed over to the table where the cook dished chicken and rice onto a plate for her. She took it and went to join a group of men she knew.

Rascal made room for her, and she sat down and picked up her fork. She could feel eyes on the back of her head though. Her scalp tingled, and her fingers trembled as she fumbled the fork.

“You still not feeling better, Em?” Rascal asked, his brow pleating in concern.

“I’m all right. It’s just noisier in here than usual.”

Rascal shot a look across the room. “Yeah. Eighteen military operators make a difference.”

“Two teams then.”

He lifted an eyebrow in approval. “Yep, two teams. Guess Uncle Sam wants those hostages back pretty bad.”

“No one deserves what will happen to them if they aren’t freed,” she said softly.

“No, no one does.”

“Emily?”

A chill went over her and she looked up. Her sister’s fiancé, Nick Brandon, stood there, looking cool and casual and somehow murderous at the same time.

Great.

“Hi, Nick.”

He grabbed a chair and turned it, straddling it so he could face her. “You okay?”

“Yes, I’m fine.”

“You’re here because you want to be?”

“Yes.” She swallowed and set her fork down. She wasn’t so hungry now. “I’m sorry I skipped out like that, but Victoria would have tried to stop me. You know that.”

“I know she went through hell to find you the last time. I know what it cost her.”

“Hey, man, don’t guilt the girl.” Rascal was looking kinda pissed. “I worked with Victoria for a couple of years. Girl is tougher than hell. Or was until you showed up. Speaking of which, I ain’t forgot that you lied to us. Tried to pretend you were some kind of asshole that’d been kicked out of the Army and wanted to join up with us. All you wanted was to take us down.”

Nick’s gaze slanted to Rascal. “I did my job, Rascal. Same as you. And you’re still here, right? Nobody got taken down.”

“If you two could stop the pissing contest,” Emily said. They looked at her with expressions ranging from amused to annoyed. “Nick, I’m sorry, but I had to do what I had to do. Victoria
has
paid for caring about me, and I’m here to fix that. She’ll never stop worrying about me, never stop blaming herself for being unable to get my life back for me with no strings attached. When I can’t fly out of the country, she’ll blame herself. When I can’t get a government job, or any job that requires a security clearance, she’ll blame herself. When I have to tell a man who might want to marry me that his life will change if he stays with me, Victoria will blame herself when he leaves me because he doesn’t want to take that chance. If Ian can change that—if he can give me back what I lost when I married Zaran—then I’m going to seize the opportunity with both hands and make things right. Because I don’t want Victoria to live her life thinking she failed me somehow.”

Nick’s expression didn’t change. He still looked tough and mean and angry. And then he swiped a hand over his face and huffed out a breath. “All right.”

Emily blinked. “All right? That’s it?”

He nodded. “Yep. You hurt her when you left again, but I understand why you did it. I can’t argue with that kind of motive because I’d do anything to make her happy too. Even when it pisses her off at first.”

Emily blinked back tears. Jeez, she was emotional lately. “You’re the best thing that ever happened to Victoria. If she doesn’t tell you that ten times a day, she’s crazy.”

Nick’s smile was sudden. “Don’t worry, I remind her when she’s slacking in Nick-worship.” He reached out and took her hand, squeezed it gently. “I hope like hell Ian gives you what he promised, because you deserve it. If he doesn’t, then I guess I get to kick his ass after all. Something I’d enjoy immensely, I might add—but I’d rather he keep his promise.”

Nick got up and went back to his table. Emily pushed food around her plate, the back of her neck still tingling in warning.
 

“There’s a guy over there staring at you like you took away his favorite toy. Want me to put a stop to it?”

Emily glanced up at Rascal. He was looking protective and furious, and she patted his arm. “No, it’s fine. He’s angry with me for good reason. If he can’t glare at me, he’ll probably explode.”

Rascal tipped his chin toward her plate. “You better eat something, girlie. Shoving it around the plate won’t do you any good when you need the energy.”

“My stomach is still off, I think.”

Rascal stood and went over to the cook’s table. When he came back, he had a big piece of warmed flatbread. He set it down next to her plate. “Eat the bread then. It’ll help.”

Emily’s heart hitched as she tore off a piece of the bread and put it in her mouth. Rascal was a good guy, almost motherly in a way, and she liked him. He’d never, not once, made her feel like she didn’t belong or like he wanted anything more from her than conversation once in a while. He’d never made a pass at her, and she appreciated that more than she could say.

Emily finished the bread, then sat and listened to Rascal and the other guys razz each other and tell stories. The dining room quieted as men filtered away, and still she sat. She knew Ryan was in the room because she could feel him looking at her.

Finally she turned and met his gaze. He was sitting alone now, leaning back against the wall, his hand around a cup on the table. Her heart flipped at the sight of him. She had a strong urge to go over and beg him to forgive her, but she knew she’d gone too far to ask him for that.

Still, she stood and went to where he sat. His eyes were hooded as she approached. Her stomach churned and her pulse throbbed as she stopped in front of the table.

I love you
, her heart whispered.
I need you.

No. No more need. No more vulnerability because she wanted love. She couldn’t go down that path again. She loved Ryan Gordon with everything she had in her, but she wasn’t about to beg him to love her in return. And how could he after the way she’d lied to him?

“I didn’t expect to see you out here,” she said. “Maybe I should have, but I didn’t.”

His eyes glittered hot. “This is the job, Emily. If there’s danger, then you should expect me to turn up. Especially when it involves the Freedom Force.”

She slid into a seat opposite him. “I had hoped to be back before now.”

He snorted. “That’s the problem with covert ops, honey. You never know what’s going to happen.”

Her ears were hot. “Ian didn’t lie to me. He gave me a chance to clear my name in ways that HOT didn’t offer. Maybe Victoria didn’t want me to get involved with this kind of work and made sure Mendez didn’t offer, or maybe Mendez just doesn’t have that kind of influence.” She shrugged. “It doesn’t matter anymore, because I’m here—and my knowledge is useful.”

He took a sip from the cup. She noticed his knuckles were white.

“You should have told me.”

She snorted. “Would you have let me go?”

His jaw tightened. “No, probably not.”

“Exactly.”

“I didn’t realize anything was wrong at first,” he said, his tone conversational. “I woke up and you were gone. No big deal. Maybe you had class. Maybe you were protecting me. But I knew I’d hear from you later, so I didn’t worry about it.”

There was a knot in her stomach. “Ian said I couldn’t communicate with anyone once I got on the plane. So I didn’t.”

“I texted you that afternoon. Still didn’t worry when you didn’t immediately reply. But that night, when I hadn’t heard a word all day? Yeah, I began to get concerned. That’s when I drove to your place and your roommate told me you hadn’t been there all day. I searched your room. There wasn’t much missing, but there was enough to tell me you’d gone somewhere. Somewhere warm judging by the clothes you didn’t take.”

“Ian sent a message.”

“The next day, after I spent a night trying to piece together where you could have gone. I didn’t want to alarm Victoria, but I called her and Nick. They didn’t sound upset, so I knew they didn’t know. I didn’t tell them. Maybe I should have, but I didn’t.”

Her heart throbbed as she imagined him looking for her.
 

“I thought I did something to you, Emily. Something that made you run. Until the next morning when Mendez rolled in like a thunderstorm and pulled Victoria aside.” His voice was hard, brutal. “I didn’t even have a fucking right to know what he told her, yet I was the one who knew you were gone. Thankfully she didn’t keep the information from the rest of us.”

She wanted to reach for him, but she couldn’t. She knew he wouldn’t welcome her touch. Her eyes were blurry and she reached up to swipe away the tears. Damn, she was usually better at controlling herself than this, but these days she cried at the slightest provocation.

Not that this was slight at all. It was huge.

“You didn’t make me run. I’ve told you why I did it. I won’t keep apologizing.” She dashed the tears away. “Do you know how many times I had to sit and wait for news from you? How many missions you went on while I worried and wondered?”

“It’s not the same fucking thing. You knew what I did. You
knew
.”