Honor Avenged (HORNET)

by Tonya Burrows

  Leah gazed down at her hands, still stained with Mercedes’s blood, then glanced back at where they had set her down on a cot. A family had abandoned their cot for her and stood off to the side, watching as a woman in a colorful dress worked over her. “Is that the nurse?”

  “Yes. She worked at the local hospital until it shut down. You’re lucky you didn’t take your friend to the Russian doctor. You never would have seen her again.”

  “That’s what Abel said.”

  “He is a smart boy and a pride of my family. Thank you for bringing him home.”

  “I didn’t have much to do with it,” she admitted. “You’ll have to thank Marcus. He saved us all.”

  “The man in the truck?” At her nod, Josue inclined his head. “I will be sure to thank him, too. Go. Rest and clean up. You are safe here.”

  “Thank you.” Leah stepped into the room. It wasn’t fancy—red-orange walls, a simple mattress on a metal frame, a plastic chair in one corner—but compared to her recent accommodations, it felt like the height of luxury. The bathroom alone was enough to weep over. A half wall separated the toilet from the shower. She pulled the lever to test the water, found it ran clear and cool. It was more of a stream than a spray, but she didn’t care.

  She just wanted to feel clean again.

  She stripped off her filthy clothes, stepped under the shower head, and savored the cool water as it poured over her. Dirt and blood mixed into a red soup by the drain at her feet. Goose bumps prickled over her skin and she squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t want to see it. Didn’t want the visual reminder of the death she’d seen over the last few days.

  “Leah?” The edge of panic in Marcus’s voice had her prying her eyes open.

  He stood in the bathroom doorway, spattered with mud and blood and who knew what else, with a panic-stricken look on his face. Although she was completely naked, she felt no need to cover up, hide herself. Not from Marcus.

  “Oh Jesus,” he said under his breath and crossed the small space in two steps. He stepped under the spray fully dressed, dragged her into his arms, and kissed her.

  It wasn’t a kind of kiss friends might share, wasn’t soft or gentle. His lips were hard and hungry on hers, demanding and devouring. It was the kiss of a man who wanted to claim a woman, and her body took notice. Her nipples tightened against the soft cotton of his shirt. He was filthy, the water running off him turning brown at their feet, but she didn’t care. She wanted to be closer. She tugged at his shirt and he broke the kiss long enough to yank it off over his head. Then his lips fastened back to hers, his fingers weaving into her hair to hold her still for a deep exploration of her mouth.

  He was shaking. She felt the trembles running through him, following the trail of her fingers. She was shaking, too, as she fumbled with the buttons on his pants. She shoved them down and his erection sprung free, hot against her belly. She wrapped a hand around him, marveling at how he could be so soft and hard at the same time. Her first stroke had a rough groan rumbling from deep in his chest. He gripped her wrist and spun her around, none too gently shoving her against the wall.

  A thrill shot through her. She’d never been handled like this, with rough hands and scraping teeth. He nipped at the back of her neck, and her nipples hardened into tight, overly sensitive buds against the tile wall. He cupped her ass, squeezed, and then nudged one leg between her thighs, opening her for him. She was soaked with need, trembling, her heart beating too hard. She slapped her hands against the wall to hold herself up as he curled two fingers inside her channel. It was just a quick, teasing dip, a preview of the pleasure to follow, but it had her whispering his name in a plea.

  He leaned in to her, sliding his mouth along the line of her neck as those searching fingers found the place she most wanted him to touch. He traced circles relentlessly around her clit until the coil of tension low in her belly sprung free with such intensity, her bones liquefied. She cried out as the pleasure crashed over her, reeled her around, and left her dizzy and gasping.

  Marcus made a thoroughly masculine sound deep in his throat and spun her again so that her back was to the wall. He lifted her in his big hands like she weighed nothing and set her down on his erection. He slid in without resistance, filling her completely.

  Oh. It had been so long since she’d felt full like this. Connected to another human being like this. She’d missed it.

  She dug her fingernails into his shoulders, threw her head back against the wall, and circled her hips against him as he thrust fast and hard.

  “Fuck, yes,” he growled, his fingers biting into her hips. “Keep doing that.”

  Oh, she had every intention of it. Felt too good to stop. Each thrust rubbed his pelvis against her clit and she was so…close…

  Marcus stiffened and, with a groan, buried himself deep. That did it. The climax exploded through her, sharp and nearly painful in its bright intensity. She swore she actually saw stars.

  She’d had amazing sex with her husband. Danny had been a kind and considerate lover. But she’d never, ever experienced an orgasm that intense before. She wasn’t sure all of her bits and pieces were still in the appropriate places and in working order. She felt like she’d been torn apart and flung across the universe.

  Had it been that intense for Marcus, too? He was still shaking, and his breath came out against her shoulder in ragged pants.

  “Fuck,” he whispered, his voice rough. He carefully set her down, letting her back slide against the wall until her feet hit the floor again. Only then did he release her and step back, his chest still heaving, his erection still at half-mast. She couldn’t seem to catch her breath, either, and her nerve endings buzzed from the climaxes. It had been so long since she’d experienced the sensation, she’d forgotten how good it felt.

  Marcus dragged his hands through his wet hair. “Fuck,” he said again and walked out.

  Wait. Was he leaving? She stared after him, not comprehending at first. She saw him moving around in the other room, yanking on clothes, but he didn’t come back to her. He didn’t offer sweet promises or even an “it was good,” as he left the room.

  He. Just. Left.

  Leah gasped as pain sliced through her as surely as a knife. She hadn’t known what to expect from him, but for him to leave like that after what they shared? Just walk out without anything more than a curse word?

  God. What had she been thinking?

  Danny used to tell her stories of Marcus’s many conquests. He’d always been half amused, half worried for his friend. What would he think if he knew his wife was now just another notch on his best friend’s bedpost? He’d be so angry and ashamed of her.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered to the empty bathroom. No one answered her. Just the soft, erratic splash of the sputtering shower spray hitting the orange tile of the floor.

  Of course, she hadn’t been thinking. She’d been feeling, reacting, needing. But, still, it had never occurred to her that Marcus could treat her like all his other women. Not with their history, their shared trauma. And, like it or not, the chemistry that had started bubbling between them since Danny died.

  She’d tried to shove it away, ignore it, because it felt too much like a betrayal to be attracted to Marcus or to have feelings for him beyond friendship.

  But she was attracted. And she did have feelings for him.

  And it didn’t matter. He’d made that perfectly clear just now. This had been a one-time thing that would never happen between them again.

  She swiped at her face with the backs of her hands. She wasn’t crying, but the act of shoving away the tears she wanted to cry fortified her. She shut off the water and picked her way out into Josue’s bedroom. A pile of clothes sat on the end of the bed—she guessed donated by one of the women refugees and brought in by Marcus. Her breasts strained against the tank top, and the colorful skirt was too big, had too much fabric
she didn’t know what to do with, but the outfit was still better than her mud and blood covered clothes.

  She took one more second to breathe and finished pulling herself together, then stepped out of the room with her head held high.

  Chapter Eighteen

  What the fuck had he been thinking?

  Marcus yanked on the change of clothes Josue had provided as he left the room without another glance.

  Problem was, he hadn’t been thinking. He’d been reacting, running hot on adrenaline and terror. He’d gone into the back room to check on Leah, make sure she was unharmed, and give her the change of clothes, but all his good intentions had flown right out the window when he saw her.

  Naked. Head tipped back as the sad excuse for a shower drizzled over her round, full breasts. Something had snapped in him then, unleashing a beast he’d kept tethered too long. It hadn’t been enough to see her and know she was safe and unharmed. He’d had to touch her. Feel her.

  And when he’d moved inside her, felt her body clench around him like she never wanted to let him go, he’d felt like he was finally, finally home. Right where he should be. Right where he’d wanted to be for longer than he cared to admit—with Leah in his arms and his cock deep inside her, claiming her as his.

  No. Jesus Christ, that was wrong.

  So very fucking wrong.

  She wasn’t his anything. Not his home, not his woman. She had a home with three gorgeous kids, ones she’d created with Danny. And, yeah, Danny was gone, but that gave Marcus no damn right to start calling her his.

  His stomach twisted painfully and bile surged up his throat. He swallowed it back. He had a job to do right now. He could drown in his guilt later once Leah was back safely with those kids of hers.

  He strode out into the main room of the church.

  And that was something else he’d have to berate himself for later. Fucking his best friend’s wife in a church. Shit, if he hadn’t been headed to hell before today, he definitely had a first-class, nonstop ticket there now.

  He purposely didn’t look at the crucifixion painting behind the altar as he searched for Josue. He already had enough guilt weighing him down. He didn’t need to add any of that good old-fashioned, ingrained Catholic guilt on top of it, thanks.

  Everyone scurried to get out of his way. They were afraid of him. Probably for the best, because his mood hung like a storm cloud around him, charged and rumbling, ready to unleash all that pent-up energy at the slightest provocation. He’d hate himself if he snapped on one of these people, who had already gone through so much.

  He found Josue praying over Mercedes. She still hadn’t regained consciousness, and her face had gone grayish-pale. Even with only the most basic of battlefield medical training, he could tell it didn’t look good for the woman. That made his stomach twist again.

  True, he didn’t like Mercedes. Didn’t trust the woman’s wishy-washy loyalties. But she had thrown herself into the line of fire to save Leah and, for that, he owed her.

  “How is she?”

  Josue looked up. “Habiba has done what she could, but your friend is in need of hospital care.”

  Marcus studied the room, the huddled mass of displaced people. “I don’t suppose there’s one around the corner?”

  “I’m sorry, no.”

  Marcus winced. He hadn’t meant to sound so surly with the priest. He had to pull himself together, rein in his emotions, and get his head in the game, or they were all going to end up dead. “Where would we find a doctor?”

  “The closest is the Russian woman at the mercenary camp, but you do not want to go to her.”

  “You mentioned that before, and so has Abel. He said people go to her for medical care and never return. Any idea what’s happening to them?”

  Josue shook his head and climbed to his feet, his knees cracking with the movement. “At first, I thought she was a blessing sent by God. She brought food and medicines and vaccines, but it was all a lie so we would trust her. When people started vanishing, she would tell us they were very sick and she had sent them to Russia for treatment. We thought they would come home once they healed, but none have.”

  “How long has this been happening?”

  “She came here about two years ago.”

  The woman had been operating with impunity for two years. Jesus. “How many people have vanished?”

  Josue’s lips curved into a sad smile. “Too many to count. Maybe hundreds. Probably more. It’s hard to keep an accurate census in a country of refugees.”

  Marcus again scanned the people huddled together around the big room. The benches that made up the pews for the church had all been piled against one wall, and the Muslim refugees slept on thin cots or sometimes just a pile of blankets. War was an ugly thing.

  But his gut told him something even uglier was happening underneath this particular war.

  He returned his attention to Josue. “Do you have a phone? Radio? Any way to contact the outside world?”

  Josue shook his head with each question. “We have nothing like that.”

  “Yes, we do, uncle.” Abel appeared at his side and handed Marcus a satellite phone. His uncle said something sharply to him in the local language, and he answered back. Then he turned a sheepish grin toward Marcus. “I took it from the dead man.”

  No wonder Marcus hadn’t found any form of communication equipment on the man. Abel had beaten him to it. And here he’d thought the kid had been too numbed by shock to be useful.

  “Thank you.” He dialed the long string of numbers that would ring him in to HORNET’s headquarters back in Wyoming. He had no idea where the team was, but he knew for sure that either Gabe or Quinn would be commanding the mission from HQ.

  “Who is this?” Gabe Bristow demanded.

  Marcus exhaled softly with relief. It was nice to hear a—well, if not exactly friendly, at least a familiar voice. “Utah,” he said, using his call sign. The nickname had started as a joke, since he was a surfer and FBI agent like Johnny Utah from Point Break, but over the years, it had stuck.

  “Jesus fucking Christ,” Gabe said on a loud exhale. “Where are you?”

  Fuck if I know, he thought. “Hang on.” He covered the receiver with one hand. “Do you have a map?” he asked Josue. The priest nodded and hurried over to the desk situated against the wall of his private quarters.

  Right then, Leah opened the door. Her eyes were red, puffy in her pale face, but her head was held high.

  Shit, had she been crying? Had he made her cry?

  Of course he had. He’d fucked her and walked away without a word. What kind of asshole was he? He should have stayed. They should have discussed things like rational adults. She had to be just as twisted up with guilt as he was.

  Josue returned with a map and a pencil. He spread the map out on the floor next to Mercedes’s cot.

  Marcus ripped his gaze from Leah and focused on the task at hand. “Show me where we are.”

  Josue helpfully marked an X for their location.

  “Deangelo!” Gabe barked in his ear.

  With his full attention on the map, Marcus ignored him. “And how about the Russian camp?”

  Again Josue sketched an X about 15 klicks from their current location. Not nearly far enough for Marcus’s comfort. He studied the map, then finally spoke into the phone again. “We’re somewhere in Central African Republic.” He gave the coordinates as best as he could figure them.

  “Roger that,” Gabe replied after a tight silence. “The team is already en route.”

  “How the fu—” He caught Josue’s eye and swerved around the curse word. “How are they already en route?”

  “Ian tapped an old friend for intel.”

  “Ian has friends?” For some reason, his gaze went straight to Mercedes, and a fuzzy memory danced up from his subconscious.

 
Snow swirling. Ian blocking a door he desperately wanted to get through.

  He’d wanted to hurt Mercedes that night for their failure in Switzerland, but Ian had protected her.

  Suddenly, he knew exactly who had passed on the intel. “I wouldn’t exactly call her a friend.”

  “What do you mean?” Then after a beat, Gabe added, “Her?”

  Nah, he wasn’t ready to say yet, and he got why Ian had kept his mouth shut on the subject. As tenuous as his trust in Mercedes was, it was still trust. Of a sort. But the team didn’t even have that much. As far as they knew, she was still the enemy. And maybe she was, but she was an enemy with the same goals.

  Though it did make a guy wonder how she’d had Ian’s number so readily available.

  “It doesn’t matter right now,” he said into the phone. “What’s their ETA? We have critically wounded.”

  “Leah?”

  “No.” Thank God. He wouldn’t be functioning at any level if Leah was lying on that cot instead of Mercedes.

  Gabe’s voice tightened with tension. “Not you.” It was a command, not a question.

  “No, not me.”

  “Good. ’Cause I plan to stomp your sorry ass into the mud when you get home. I’d hate to have to delay that to let you heal first.”

  “Nice talking to you, too, boss.”

  “Yeah, about that. Am I still your boss?” Anger-laced sarcasm hung heavy on each word. Gabe was seriously pissed off. He usually had a concrete lock on his emotions, which had earned him the nickname Stonewall when he was with the SEAL Teams, but this convo was far beyond his usual level of stoic grouchiness.

  “Going by your tone,” Marcus said carefully, “I’m guessing not.”

  He could actually hear Gabe’s teeth grinding over the line. “We’ll see. The team’s still two to three hours out. Keep this line open. I’ll call you with evac instructions.”