Declan (Special Forces: Operation Alpha) (Gold Team Book 5)

by Riley Edwards

“No.”

  “Just no?”

  “You gotta trust me.”

  What the fuck? Trust?

  “You want me to trust you after you went behind my back, dug into my personal life, and sat on that information?”

  “This isn’t the CIA,” he weirdly stated.

  “No shit?”

  “I’m not some fuckstick who’s lookin’ into your past trying to dredge up some shit to hold in my back pocket, only to pull it out to control you or use against you. I looked because I needed to know. But also because I saw a brother in so much fucking pain it oozed from him. Pain that I thought I recognized as the scars of war, of burying good men. I was wrong, your loss is worse—unimaginable. So I held onto that information until you needed me to use it. And, Declan, I’m telling you it’s time. None of those men will fully comprehend all that you lost, but they’ll get you through. Shit’s about to blow up and when it does, you’re gonna need them at your back. And when all of this is over, I suggest you carve out some time and talk to your sister. She deserves to know about her namesake.”

  “Don’t go there,” I ground out. “My daughter’s off-limits.”

  “She’s not, Declan. She existed. She’s a part of you. She’s a part of Violet and you need to talk to her.”

  “That’s a fuck no, Zane. She’s been through enough. She’s happy, she has a family, and I’m not piling my shit on her.”

  “You’re part of that family—”

  “Drop it. Serious as fuck, Zane. Leave it alone.”

  “Wake the fuck up, Dec. Before it’s too late. Before you’ve wasted your life. You got people all around you who care. Who would carry the load, walk through fire for you. Open your goddamn eyes.”

  Zane disconnected and my head throbbed. For a man who was so smart, he was dumb as fuck. It was already too late. There was no life to waste because mine had ended in Brazil.

  “You have a daughter?” Autumn whispered.

  Fucking, fucking, Christ.

  My hand automatically went to my chest and covered my tattoo. The only thing I had left of Violet. Searing pain shot through my body and pierced the hard shell around my heart.

  “Don’t,” I warned.

  “Don’t what?”

  I turned and realized my mistake. I’d been so pissed when I came back inside the house I didn’t close the bedroom door.

  “Don’t ask and don’t ever bring it up again.”

  “Okay.”

  Fucking, fucking, Christ.

  There it was. The reason I was going to continue to be a selfish fuck. The reason why I didn’t care if Thad was pissed. Not a flinch, not narrowing of her eyes, no sign of hurt. She knew. Autumn knew there were things I wouldn’t ever share and she never pushed. When we hit a topic that one of us didn’t want to discuss, we moved on, neither of us questioned the other. Therefore we were free to be who we were—two broken, soulless people. And there was no guilt on either of our parts.

  “I wanted to tell you my contact just called. Word is, Madeleine will be at the clinic tomorrow for a photo op.”

  “Who’s your contact?”

  “Ashaki Maloof.”

  Jesus, I was tired of hearing that woman’s name.

  “I don’t trust that woman.”

  “So? I do. She’s never given me bad intel.”

  What the hell?

  My phone rang and I glanced at the screen.

  “We gotta take this,” I told Autumn.

  “We?”

  “The whole team,” I clarified.

  “Tex,” I answered the call. “I’m getting the team together now.”

  “Before you do that, I wanted a minute.”

  “You know, too,” I sighed.

  “If by know you mean I know about Juliana and Violet, yes I know.”

  Another stab to my heart.

  “Jesus Christ. Does anyone around here not mind their own fuckin’ business?”

  “My business is to know everything there is to know,” Tex returned.

  “So why are you bringing this up now?”

  “Because with Autumn in play—”

  I glanced at the woman in question. Blank, impassive, dead just like me.

  “Not going there because there’s nowhere to go with that.”

  Brooks stopped in front of the door and lifted his chin in question.

  Perfect timing.

  “Brooks is here, let me get the rest of the team.”

  Tex mumbled something under his breath about me being a stubborn jackass. He was wrong, I wasn’t stubborn, I was right.

  “It’s Tex,” I told Brooks. “He’s got intel for us. Grab the team.”

  With another jerk of his chin, he left, Autumn followed, and I took a breath that did nothing to calm the throbbing in my chest.

  When would the pain end? When would the day come where I could think about my baby girl and not want to crumble to the floor? Why the fuck had they been taken?

  Chapter 5

  Declan had a daughter.

  Holy shit.

  I hadn’t meant to eavesdrop and I certainly hadn’t meant to ask such a personal question, but the shock of hearing Declan say his daughter was off-limits had momentarily made me forget who we were. It was so shocking I couldn’t stop thinking about it. Not to mention if he had a daughter, that meant his daughter had a mother. Where was she? Who was she? But most importantly, were they together?

  I was a lot of things, cold-blooded killer was at the top of that list. I cared about very little, but I wasn’t a cheat. Never had been—even when I was normal, I would never have looked at a guy twice if he had a girlfriend.

  “Autumn?” Brooks called my name.

  “Sorry. Spaced out for a minute.”

  I could feel Thad’s gaze on me. After the call with Tex ended, I needed to talk to him. Once and for all he needed to understand I would never be the sister Emerson wanted. And he had to stop looking at me like I was some puzzle he was going to put together and make a pretty picture out of. I didn’t need this shit. I needed to find Madeleine and end this.

  “When was the last time you heard from Ashaki Maloof?”

  “A few minutes ago. She called to give me the heads up she heard that Madeleine Strotherby would be at the women’s clinic tomorrow. Icon donated a hundred thousand dollars and since Madeleine never misses an opportunity to get her name in the press, she’s supposed to be there in the morning with a camera crew.”

  Sick bitch used large donations to cover up who she really was. With all the money Icon gave to charity, no one would ever believe the fashion model turned business mogul was behind the largest sex trafficking rings in the world. Though they didn’t only traffic humans, they bought and sold anything of value. They also contributed to political campaigns, blackmailed, and bribed. Making Omni damn near untouchable. They were smart, they recruited the wealthiest of the wealthy.

  “How long have you worked with her?” Max asked.

  “Years.”

  “Years?” Thad inquired.

  “Yep. About nine.”

  The room went quiet and I glanced around. It was almost laughable how shocked they all looked. Did they really think I wouldn’t have built my own network? How did they think I got my information?

  “She gave you the intel on Stanley James,” Tex guessed incorrectly, but I wasn’t going to correct him.

  I’d known all along who’d taken me.

  I felt my face tighten and my lips pinch. Just hearing the man’s name made my insides rot. Stanley James—my father’s business partner. The man who’d kidnapped me and sold me. The fucking pig who had a gambling problem and I was his solution.

  “How’d you meet her?” Tex continued when I didn’t answer.

  “After I was rescued she sought me out.”

  “A CIA agent sought you out?” Thad hissed.

  Yeah, I needed to have a talk with my brother-in-law.

  “She wasn’t CIA then. But yes, she sought me out to check on me. We be
came friendly mainly because she was the only person who didn’t treat me like I was a victim. She talked to me like I was human.”

  “Don’t pull that shit. Your sister and your parents were rightfully worried about you. They wanted to help you. Never once did they not think you were human,” Thad defended.

  I waited for the cold-hearted detachment to take over, the only defense I had against the memories.

  “Right, Thad, seeing as you weren’t there, you don’t know what went on. I get you love my sister, so you feel the need to protect her. But what happened, happened to me. Not to her. Not to my parents. To me. I lived it. It was me chained and sold. It was my body they used and defiled. Not theirs. And before you tell me they were all hurt when I was taken, I know they were. I live with that. I know my sister gave you up because of me. More guilt I live with. But don’t you ever try to tell me how shit was when I was rescued. How my mom looked at me. My dad couldn’t bear the sight of me. How when I entered the room he left it. How my sister would sit and cry and beg me to get better. I was fucking there, you were not. And don’t turn this shit around and pile Emerson’s shit on me, either. She never should have left you. She should’ve gone back to her safe, perfect life, and stayed away.

  “Ash was the only fucking person who didn’t look at me with pity or disgust. She helped me get better. She gave me the tools I needed to fix what those men took from me. She gave me an outlet for all the anger and self-hate. So, yes, Thad, she was the only one who looked at me like I was a human and not some project to glue back together. Ash understood that the pieces I was left with would never fit back together, and she taught me how to be okay with that.”

  “By turning you into…what? Her own personal weapon?”

  God, he’d never get it. My gaze slid from Thad to Brooks, Kyle, then to Max. Yeah, they’d never understand, either, and honestly, I was happy they never would. Understanding meant that they would’ve lived through the worst things imaginable.

  But Declan got it. Much like Ash, he didn’t try to fix me. He understood that some things would always be broken. But he never treated me like I was a rescued sex slave, like I was dirty, filthy, and used. To him, I was simply Autumn.

  I ignored Thad’s comment and asked my own question. “Wanna let me in on why you have so many questions about Ash?”

  “She’s been involved with some previous missions. Her loyalty has come into question.” Tex’s forthcoming answer surprised me.

  “Why’s that?”

  “Some of her actions have been ambiguous at best.”

  I couldn’t stop my lips from twitching.

  “What’s amusing?” Brooks asked.

  “I was just thinking that ambiguous was a good word to describe Ash.”

  “Why’s that?”

  “Because Ashaki Maloof plays by her own rules. And those rules don’t always align with what others think is right.”

  “And do those rules include selling out her country?”

  They probably did, but I wasn’t going to tell anyone that.

  “Ash is committed to the cause of stopping human trafficking. It’s more than a job, more than a mission, it’s her sole purpose. Her reason for breathing. There’s not a law, a rule, an agency that will stop her from doing what she feels she needs to do. The only thing you need to know about her is, the path is righteous. Whatever she’s done that led you to question her loyalty was done for the good of her cause.”

  “Do you know Barny Pollaski?” I jolted at Tex’s change of topic.

  “Is this some sort of test? You know I do. I’m the reason he’s no longer breathing.”

  “Ashaki point you in his direction?”

  “Yep. The only man she ever asked me to take out. Other than that, she’s only provided intel when I asked. And considering she’d never asked anything of me, I agreed. Not that it was a hardship, the man had a cargo container of thirty women. Three of them were under ten. To say it was a pleasure to slice his throat is an understatement. Ash got to the women before delivery could take place and she was able to locate his stable. There were eighty-nine in total. Not someone I lose sleep over.”

  I heard Thad suck in a breath, and when my gaze went to him, he looked uncomfortable.

  “Are you getting it yet?” I asked Thad. “I don’t lose sleep over any of them. Eighty-nine were saved because one man died. Thirty of them before they were violated. Three little girls. I have no regrets, Thad. So tell me, am I really the type of person you want around your wife?”

  “You mean your sister?” he returned.

  “You can call her whatever you want to call her. But my point remains—you need to protect her from me.”

  “That’s total bullshit,” he exploded, and stood. “Do you honestly think that you can shock any of us? That any of us would find you killing a man who’d kidnapped women and children and sold them repulsive? Newsflash, Autumn, each of us has done the same. I don’t give the first fuck, none of us do. But you know the difference? You store that shit up inside of you. It eats at you. And I know it does. Because if it didn’t, you wouldn’t have just asked me if you were the type of person I wanted around my wife. So tell me, Autumn, what type of person are you?”

  “Please, don’t make me sound like I’m not what I am.”

  “And what’s that, Autumn?” he pushed.

  Oh, hell no.

  “Let’s get back to Ash and the new intel,” I suggested.

  “Not a chance.”

  “Thad.” Declan waded in, his tone harsh. “Tex, give us a minute and we’ll call you back.”

  “No. We don’t have time to waste on this bullshit. I need more information on Madeleine. She’s here and I don’t wanna lose her.”

  “Autumn,” Tex started. “You gotta know I have a file on you that’s thicker than any person I’ve ever tracked. So while you’re thinking about what type of person you are, think about this. Forty-two men are no longer breathin’ because of you. And six-hundred and seventy-two men, women, and children are free. Of those, one hundred and three were untouched. That’s what type of person you are.”

  I heard the phone disconnect and my lungs started to burn. Something strange was happening in the room, a weird vibration that was upsetting the force field that I used to guard against feeling anything. It was shaking and rattling. Tiny pieces started to crack and my throat clogged.

  One hundred and three untouched.

  But the others I was too late to save.

  Chapter 6

  The room had gone electric and not because we didn’t know Autumn had taken out forty-two men. Her file outlined her kills and bios on the men she’d put down. But Tex hadn’t included the number of lives she’s saved. Though the current pulsing in the room wasn’t coming from the men, it was rolling off Autumn.

  “So tell me now, why you think your sister needs to be protected from you?” Thad pushed harder.

  Autumn’s body swayed like Thad physically struck her, and an invisible binding I’d been denying for months snapped into place. A feeling deep inside of me that I’d done everything in my power to push aside, a need so overwhelming it refused to be rejected.

  “Enough.” The sharp edge in my tone couldn’t be missed, therefore it wasn’t and my friend didn’t look pleased.

  “What’s enough? Her…” Thad jabbed an angry finger at Autumn. “Thinking that she’s some sort of monster? Or you—”

  “Don’t go there, Thaddeus, and lay off her. She’ll go to Emerson when she’s ready.”

  “Right. When she’s ready. You mean if she’s ever ready. And in the meantime, we should all stand around and let her suffer.”

  “I’m right fucking here,” Autumn shouted and something painful moved over her features.

  But Thad wasn’t ready to give up. The love he had for his wife knew no bounds and he’d push Autumn to the brink, then he’d hound her until she broke down and agreed to meet with her sister. The issue with that was, Thad would lose. I knew from experience that
Autumn could dig in, and when she did, she was unmovable. She and I shared that trait so I knew it well.

  “You know what? Fuck it,” Thad roared, and everyone in the room froze as his face twisted in agony. “You know where my wife is right now while I’m here, chasing you because you wouldn’t sit the fuck still and wait for us to come up with a plan? She’s at Zane and Ivy’s so Ivy can take care of her.”

  “Wait. What?” I stepped forward and Thad put up his hand.

  “Don’t come any closer to me.”

  “What’s wrong with Emmy?” Kyle asked.

  Thad shook his head before his hands went to his hips and he dropped his gaze to the floor.

  “I can’t do this right now.” All the spite and anger drained from his tone, leaving only despair and defeat.

  What the fuck was going on with Emerson? And if she was sick, then why the hell had he come to Afghanistan?

  “What’s wrong with my sister?”

  Wrong thing to ask.

  “Maybe you should call her and find out.”

  All the color bleached from Autumn’s face and Thad stalked from the room.

  “Call Zane.” I looked at Brooks. “See what’s going on.”

  My gut twisted with indecision. The pain that rolled off of Thad was palpable but Autumn’s anguish wove itself around my heart, leaving me warring with what to do. I couldn’t leave Autumn but Thad needed me.

  Thankfully, Max stepped in. “I’ll check on Thad.”

  “Autumn?”

  Startling green eyes came to mine and that tether pulled so tight it took my breath. An awareness I’d never felt before knotted. A feeling I didn’t want, didn’t deserve, hadn’t ever had wrapped around me until it constricted my lungs.

  “Baby?”

  The wetness that had gathered spilled over.

  Fuck.

  Autumn didn’t cry. Not ever.

  Her tears were my undoing. I didn’t give a fuck we had an audience, I didn’t care she’d likely have my balls for what I was about to do. Not a damn thing mattered but having her in my arms. I moved across the room and watched as fear started to creep in. When I made it to her I didn’t delay scooping her up into my arms. Much to my shock, she didn’t fight me and that’s when I knew Thad had carved her insides out. In the right state of mind, Autumn would never let me hold her and she certainly wouldn’t loop her arms around my neck and bury her face into my throat.