Protecting Fiona (SEAL of Protection Book 3) (5 page)

“What? You think you
can
guess?” Cookie had noticed her reaction, and correctly guessed it was in a result of him calling her “Fee.” He didn’t know where it came from, but it sounded right in his head. She looked like a “Fee.”

“Uh, okay, your mom sent you cookies every week while you were in basic training?”

“I went to boot camp, not basic. And good guess, but no. Strike one.” Cookie watched as Fiona’s eyes narrowed. She obviously had a competitive spirit. He’d have to remember that and use it to keep her going later if he had to.

“When you were little, you ate too many cookies one Christmas and puked your guts out?”

A low surprised laugh escaped from between Cookie’s lips before he could keep it back. “Wow, I think I’m hurt. Nope, that’s not it either. One more guess left.”

Fiona’s whole body hurt, she was exhausted and thirstier than she could ever remember being, but for some reason she was having fun. This man had surprised her. She thought he’d be all business and gruff, but she liked this side of him. Let’s see…why would someone have the nickname Cookie? Fiona decided to really mess with him. What the hell, she had nothing to lose.

“You were a virgin when you joined the Navy and after
boot camp
your buddies took you out on the town and paid an eighty year old whore named Cookie to deflower you.”

Cookie started laughing, quietly, and couldn’t stop. It was several moments before he could speak.

“Jesus, Fee, I’ll have to remember not to piss you off in the future. First, I was
deflowered
when I was fourteen by my seventeen-year-old date to the Homecoming Dance. So, your last guess is also wrong. Although you’re much more creative than what the reason for my nickname really is. I was the last member to join the team. Typically newbies are called nuggets, FNGs, or cookies. Cookie stuck.”

They sat there for a moment just looking at each other.

Not knowing what a “FNG” was, Fiona decided to let it go. It didn’t really matter anyway. “Do you have a real name?” Fiona didn’t know why she wanted to know, but she did.

“Hunter. Hunter Knox.”

“Are you serious?”

“Dead. Why?”

Fiona couldn’t believe that was really his name. “Because it’s the kind of name a stripper or superhero would have.” She immediately blushed. Oh crap. Had she really just said that out loud? Jesus, she was
such
a dork.

“I think I’ll take that as a compliment, Fee, but I prefer to strip for a party of one.”

“Please, just ignore me. I don’t know what I’m saying. Let me try again.” Fiona looked up. She was embarrassed, but determined to say it. “It’s nice to meet you, Hunter. No, it’s fucking
awesome
to meet you. I’ve never been so glad to meet anyone in my entire life.”

Cookie’s eyes lost their humor and he got serious immediately. He understood what she was saying. “I’m happier to have met you than anyone I’ve met in
my
entire life, Fee.”

A comfortable silence fell between them. Fiona put her head back on her knees, and closed her eyes again.

Noticing her white knuckles from squeezing her hands tightly Cookie finally asked what had been on his mind for most of the day. “I need to know what’s up, Fee.” He watched as she flinched. “I don’t know what’s going through your head, but I’m not going to leave you. I’m not going to get mad, I just need to know so I can be sure we all get through this and get home. If your feet are bothering you, I can wrap them with tape to help with that. Shit, I should’ve already done it. We can coat your legs with mud to try to protect them a bit more. I can see all the welts from the bug bites. I wish I had an extra pair of pants for you.”

Fiona didn’t say anything, just continued to sit next to him silently. Cookie was frustrated. He wanted to help her, but he couldn’t if she wouldn’t talk to him. Finally, he thought he knew what to say to get Fiona to open up to him. Cookie knew she was stubborn and tough just from being around her for a day and for surviving her kidnapping ordeal. He thought of what he could say that would get to her. Finally he knew. It’d be the same thing that, if said to him, would get him to open up and be honest.

Cookie lowered his voice and spoke from his heart. “No bullshit, Fiona, my life depends on you. I will
not
leave you. If I don’t know what’s going on with you, and you fall behind or can’t continue, that could end up hurting me as well, because I’ll stay with you and try to help you. There’s no way in hell I’ve brought you this far to leave you behind now. You’re stuck with me. No matter what. ”

He waited. Cookie thought maybe Fiona had fallen asleep or that she was going to refuse to talk to him.

Finally Fiona spoke softly, without opening her eyes. “I’m going through withdrawal.”

Whatever Cookie thought Fiona was going to say, it wasn’t that.

“What?” he asked more harshly than he’d intended. His mind whirled. How could he have missed that? Cookie couldn’t believe it. Well, it was dark in the room he’d found her in and she was now wearing a long sleeve shirt, so he’d never gotten a good look at her arms.

Fiona kept her eyes closed and continued, “They’d been shooting me up with something. I’m not sure what. Not enough to freak me out, but enough to control me, to keep me complacent. I think they thought they could get me to do what they wanted if they got me hooked, that I’d do anything for another fix. But I refused to beg or behave for them. It’s been a while since they last gave me anything, I don’t know for sure how long. I swear if it gets bad enough, that if I slow you down, I’ll let you go ahead. I know you didn’t bargain on this, or me…I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I should’ve told you before we left that hut.” Fiona’s voice trailed off. She’d kept her eyes closed throughout her entire confession. Fiona waited for Hunter to get up and walk away in disgust. Not only was she disgusting and filthy and smelly, she was an addict too.

Cookie swallowed once. He had to swallow again before he could talk. He was relieved it wasn’t something more serious on one hand, but at the same time, he knew sometimes getting off of drugs was the worst part. He knew what he said now was important.

“Can I see?” Cookie waited, and when Fiona nodded slightly, moved so he was kneeling in front of her. He gently unclasped her hands and took hold of one and threaded his fingers with hers. Cookie waited until Fiona opened her eyes to check on what he was doing.

He kept eye contact with her while he pushed the sleeve on her right arm up past her elbow. It wasn’t until it was all the way up that he looked down. He clenched his teeth at the needle marks inside her elbow. He could clearly see them, even with the waning light of the evening. He lowered that sleeve, and pushed up the other one to see the same thing. The bruising on her arms was an indication of how she’d fought her captors and how they hadn’t been gentle when injecting her.

Cookie smoothed her shirt down and took both her hands in his. Fiona was watching him now warily. He could feel the tremors in her hands.

He met her eyes and said, “Fee, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t get there quicker. I’m sorry I didn’t know you were there. I’m just so damn sorry.”

When Fiona took a breath ready to say something, Cookie interrupted her. “No, don’t say anything, and
don’t
fucking apologize again. Listen to me. I’ve only known you for a day, but you’re one of the strongest people I know. Not just the strongest
woman
I know, but one of the strongest
people
. You haven’t told me how long you were in that damn building, but I know it was a while. You’ve walked a shit ton of miles today, on your own, without complaint. I don’t know how long it’s been since you’ve had something decent to eat or drink. All you care about is this mission and not being in the way. You are
not
in the way. If there were ten women in that hovel, I would’ve rescued all of them, even though I was only expecting one.”

Cookie paused and let his comment sink in, then continued, “We have two more days of hard walking. We only have two days before our next scheduled backup pickup. I obviously don’t have anything to give you to help you with the withdrawal. Without knowing exactly what drugs they were giving you, I don’t want to risk injecting you with the wrong thing. I’ve got some pain killers in my pack, but it’s not a good idea to mix them with unknown narcotics. While I don’t have anything to counteract your withdrawal symptoms, I can certainly help distract you or do anything else you think will help. Okay? Don’t shut me out.” Then Cookie chuckled and pleaded softly, humor coating his words, “Please don’t leave me with Julie as my only conversation.”

Fiona smiled at his words, but sobered quickly, staring at Hunter with big eyes, her concern and worry clearly showing.

Cookie continued on. “I’m not a therapist and I can’t imagine what you’ve been through, but if you need someone to talk to…”

Fiona nodded, cutting Hunter off. She knew she’d never tell him what she’d survived. It’d been bad enough to have gone through it; she couldn’t bear for him to feel any more sorry for her then he already did. She liked Hunter. Genuinely liked him. She hadn’t known many military people, but she imagined them all to be either grunting, sex-hungry jerks or assholes who thought they were more important than anyone around them. Obviously she’d been stereotyping, because Hunter wasn’t either. At least she didn’t think so. He’d sounded genuinely concerned for her. That concern felt wonderful.

Cookie squeezed her hand. “Try to get some sleep, Fee. We’ll be starting off early tomorrow. I want to get going before it gets too hot. And remember, I’m here if you need to talk.”

Fiona squeezed his hand back and then dropped it to clasp her legs again. She couldn’t rely on him. She knew she’d probably be out of her head before too much longer, and she had to concentrate to keep herself under control. She scooted into the little lean to Hunter had made for her without saying anything else and curled into a ball. Fiona could tell she was getting worse. Her captors had never let her go this long before. She knew Hunter said he’d help, but there was nothing he could do. Fiona needed to distract herself; she started counting backward from one thousand again.

At four the next morning, Cookie woke the women up. Each got another granola bar and he checked their water. He eyed Fiona warily. She didn’t look good. She refused to look him in the eyes, and the tremors in her hands were worse, even though she tried to hide it from him. She was also very pale. She ate the granola bar with the same enjoyment she had the day before, just as Julie ate hers with the same disgust. When they were done, and had relieved themselves in the bushes nearby, they set off.

The heat was brutal. The fact they weren’t walking near the river meant they didn’t have to worry as much about animals who’d go there to drink, but it also meant they had to conserve what water they had. It also meant that it was hot; hotter than it might have been if they’d been able to cool off with a dip in the fast flowing water now and then.

Julie didn’t talk much, but when she did, it was to whine about how much further they had to go and how hot she was. She also complained about her feet hurting, the bugs, the leaves smacking her in the face…the list was endless. But Fiona was quiet. Too quiet. She trudged along behind Julie without a word. Cookie looked back to check on her often and saw Fiona was making it…barely. He knew she was weak, but now knowing about the drugs her captors had forced on her, he was even more concerned.

When they stopped for a short food break, Fiona uncharacteristically laid down in the shade of a tree and curled into a ball, her preferred resting stance now. Cookie was busy with his pack and didn’t notice until Julie groaned sarcastically, “Oh great, we’ll never get there now.”

Cookie saw Fiona start to sit up upon hearing Julie’s words. He went over and put his hand on her back.

“Stay. Rest. We’ll get going soon enough.” He looked at Julie and said in a harsh tone, without bothering to try to tone it down. “You should lie down and take a nap too. We’ve still got some ground to cover today.”

Fiona looked up at Hunter with misery in her eyes as he turned back toward her. “I’m sorry.”

Cookie cut her off. “None of that. Shit, Fiona, you aren’t superwoman. Just rest a bit and we’ll leave in a while. And before you say it, you aren’t holding us up. We all need a break and it’s safe enough.”

Fiona nodded and squeezed her eyes shut again. She heard Hunter walk away. She knew he was probably lying for her sake, but she couldn’t make herself care at the moment. Fiona felt like crap. Her whole body was rebelling against her. She wished those damn kidnappers were there to give her the drugs. She was ready to beg for them now. She’d finally gotten to the point where she’d do whatever they wanted in order to get them. Fiona knew they were bad, even without knowing exactly what crap they’d been shoving into her body, but she’d do anything to get rid of the crawling sensation under her skin and the horrible nausea.

The shakes she could deal with, but the feeling of bugs crawling on her was horrible. She itched something fierce as well, but she tried to resist the urge to scratch. Fiona knew that once she started she wouldn’t stop. Hell, half of the itch was probably from bug bites and not from the drugs, but it didn’t matter right now. Itchy was itchy.

Fiona choked back a sob. Why hadn’t they killed her? Why? They had the chance. More than once. She couldn’t think straight. She took a deep breath. She had to stop thinking that way. She knew Hunter wouldn’t leave her in the jungle, and if he wouldn’t leave her, then none of them would get out anytime soon, maybe not at all. She couldn’t live with that on her conscience. Fiona took a deep breath to get herself together and not give in to the despair desperately trying to suck her down and started counting backward…this time from two thousand.

Cookie watched Fiona. She wasn’t sleeping. He could see her lips moving. He finally realized she was counting. Around the same time he figured it out, he heard Julie say with malice, “That’s all she did when we were in that fucking building. She counted backwards. It nearly drove me crazy.”

Cookie just looked at Julie incredulously. She couldn’t really be that callous could she?

“Well? It did!” Julie retorted defensively after seeing the look on Cookie’s face, but fell silent under his continued scathing glare.

Yup, she could be that callous. Finally Cookie knew they couldn’t wait any longer. It was time to move. He stood up and was going to go over to help Fiona, but he saw she was sitting up on her own. She’d heard him moving around and knew it was time to go. The pitiful little group gathered up their belongings and started out again.

A couple of hours later, Fiona started dry heaving. She didn’t have any food in her stomach to really throw up, other than a few bites of granola, but her body tried to get rid of anything that was there anyway. She stopped in the middle of the path and dry heaved. She’d tried to stop it, but it was impossible. The retching noises she made were horrifying.

Julie screeched and jumped out of the way yelling, “Gross!”

While Cookie wasn’t sorry he’d rescued Julie, she was a human being, and a woman at that, he
was
wishing she’d just be quiet for one fucking second. She was obviously spoiled and wasn’t dealing with the logistics of being rescued that well. Cookie didn’t analyze his thoughts too much. He’d probably had former captives act worse than Julie was, but when he compared Julie’s actions to Fiona’s, he was hard pressed to have much sympathy toward Julie.

Cookie went to Fiona. She held out her hand as if to ward him off, but he just took her hand and kept coming. He led her away from where Julie was standing and just held her upright as her stomach spasmed.

Fiona was so embarrassed. She wanted nothing more than to lie down on the jungle floor and die, but she couldn’t. She took a deep breath, and with Hunter’s strength straightened.

“I’m okay,” she whispered. “We need to keep going.”

“Jesus, Fee, just rest for a second. I’ve got you.”

Fiona would’ve cried if she had any extra liquid in her body. She stood, shaking, with her side against Hunter. He was holding her sideways in case she had to throw up again, but she knew she was done…for the moment.

Cookie pulled away, just enough, so that he could lean over and look in Fiona’s eyes. “I wish like hell I could take this for you.”

Fiona could only say quietly, “I wouldn’t wish this on my worst enemy.”

Cookie ran his hand over Fiona’s head and smoothed her hair down. Without a word he leaned over and kissed her lightly on the top of the head before asking quietly, “Ready?”

Fiona nodded briefly, deciding she couldn’t deal with understanding Hunter’s actions right then. Maybe later she’d remember his touch and his kiss and analyze it. But for now, she had to concentrate on staying upright and mobile. For Hunter’s sake.

Cookie knew Fiona was right when she’d said they had to keep going, but he wasn’t happy about it. She needed a medical care, immediately. But that wasn’t going to happen anytime soon. He hadn’t meant to kiss her, but he been unable to control himself. Cookie wanted to take Fiona in his arms and whisk her away, but it was impossible. He’d consoled himself with the caress of his hand and the brief kiss.

When they started off again, Cookie walked beside Fiona, this time with his arm around her waist. He had to stop with her several more times as she dry heaved. Finally Cookie calculated they’d walked far enough for the day. They were mostly on track to get to the extraction point on time, and he stopped to let them all settle for the night. They’d made his goal of five miles, but he’d secretly hoped they’d get further so they’d have less to go tomorrow.

When Cookie had Julie settled, thank God she wasn’t trying to cling to him, and was satisfied they were as safe as they could be for the moment, he went to join Fiona. She hadn’t moved much since he’d helped her to the ground, and he was worried about her.

She also hadn’t eaten anything, not wanting, in her words, to “waste it” by throwing it up as soon as she ate it. Cookie didn’t know what it was that made him want to be by Fiona’s side, well, actually he
did
know. It was her courage and inner strength.