The past few days and hours ran together. She’d been through so much and all of it at this man’s side. Letting him go now broke her. Something inside cracked and crumbled.
She held his hand until Josiah appeared beside her and helped her let go. “He’s going to be okay.”
The men loaded in and the chopper blade began to turn. The engine roared to life with deafening precision. She put an arm over her head as her hair flew in a hundred different directions.
All the emotion and frustration backed up on her, but she waited until the helicopter lifted and the men dispersed before she turned on Josiah. Harlan stood there, too, but she didn’t care. She needed to make this point. “He thinks he’s a machine.”
Josiah’s expression turned serious. “What?”
“He’s convinced he shut down his humanity. I look at him and see this brave, strong, decent man. He doesn’t see any of it.”
Josiah shook his head. “How do you see him?”
“As all man.” She remembered the first time she saw him. “I picked him. I stood in that clinic and demanded he be my bodyguard.”
Harlan glanced over at Josiah. “Really?”
He nodded. “She did.”
She had no idea why that was some big surprise. West was big and hot and had this presence that made an impact. She’d pick him over most—make that all—other men. “He shouldn’t kill on demand.” When Harlan and Josiah glanced at each other, Lexi’s confidence faltered. “What?”
“We all do.” Harlan hesitated before finishing, “It’s part of the training.”
They were missing the point. “But he goes in first. He told me everyone has a set of skills. I guess that’s his.”
Josiah took a step back as he shook his head. Debris crunched under his feet. “That’s not true.”
“He can shoot and get information out of people better than anyone I know,” Harlan said.
West was so much more than that to her. He had the tattoos and awful reminders. He’d now lived through a new set of injuries and torture. All of those focused on things that had happened to him. They had so little to do with who he was inside, the man she knew, who kissed her and protected her.
But she had to wonder, if they all had the same skills and went through the training, why West took on the danger that made him the target. She needed to understand. “Why him?”
Josiah shrugged. “Because he’s good at it.”
These men shrugged all the time. It was their go-to expression whenever she asked a question that was even a tiny bit hard. But the words registered. West had a home with Alliance. From his messed-up childhood he’d learned skills that made him not just effective but essential to the team. They had been to her.
Maybe he saw his role as that of emotionless shooter. She knew better. From the looks on his friends’ faces, so did they.
Harlan cleared his throat. “Not to get technical here, but we need to tread carefully. I’m not sure internal team information is your business.”
She probably would have accepted that excuse when they first met. Not now. “West is my business.”
“Does he know that?” Josiah asked with a smile.
She thought about all the things they’d said to each other and the information they’d shared. Some facts sat out there, but she did hold back. That’s what you did when the attraction spiked but enough time hadn’t passed. But that was a temporary state.
“He will.”
Josiah’s smile grew wider. “You plan on fighting for him, then?”
This wasn’t the time or the place. She should have the conversation with West and not his friends. But hiding her feelings . . . not happening. Not after seeing him buried in a pile of rocks. Not after almost losing him.
Not after she just started to love him. “Yes.”
Harlan made a strangled sound. “You didn’t pick an easy guy.”
That was the story of her life. Never easy. “I don’t do easy.”
“Then you need to know one thing, Lexi,” Josiah said.
She was almost afraid to ask. “What?”
He winked at her. “He really is going to be okay.”
25
WEST LAY in the hospital room in Islamabad and counted the ceiling tiles. He’d been transported to a top secret location and would be flown out of the region, probably to Germany, as soon as he stabilized. The move needed to be timed to happen as soon as possible, for his protection and that of the entire Alliance team.
But now he measured tiles. Across and down then multiply them together . . . then start all over again. Each tile block had tiny holes in it. Soon he’d be counting those.
The door was pushed open with a wift sound. He held his breath, waiting for the face to appear. When Mike and Josiah stepped inside, West tried not to look disappointed. He’d adopted the same expression several times today. A member of the team would walk in and he’d hope, but no.
All of Bravo called and told him to get his ass home. He missed those guys. No question he admired Josiah and the way he ran his team, but West’s heart was back in DC with Bravo.
His friends stepped up to the bed, one on either side. Mike scanned the equipment, taking in the flashing lights. Josiah shifted his weight around, something he never did, and generally looked uncomfortable.
West found Josiah’s fear of hospitals vastly entertaining. The guy had sniper skills, negotiating skills, and the kind of in-the-moment smarts you wanted in a leader. Yet the sight of cotton balls made him dizzy.
“You okay?” Josiah asked.
“I’m ready to go home.” He was ready to never check in. When he woke up on that helicopter he’d done two things—threw up and asked for Lexi. They were unrelated things but at least one stemmed from his head injury.
“You’re staying at least two nights.” Josiah shot him a look that said, I dare you to disagree, so West didn’t.
“About Lexi . . .” Mike put a thigh on the edge of the bed but jumped up again when something beeped.
Josiah rolled his eyes. “Ah, you Americans. So subtle.”
“She tried to give Josiah a lesson in about who you really are.” Mike skimmed his fingers over the tubes running from the machine next to West’s bed and leading nowhere since he refused the pain medicine. Not his style.
But that didn’t explain the comment. “What are you talking about?”
Josiah jumped back in. “She told me you’re not a machine, which I knew. I think she meant to remind you, not me.”
“She doesn’t get what we do,” West said. Even though he hadn’t noticed her weeping for any of the attackers he’d taken down. She ran and fought beside him. Impressed the hell out of him.
“I thought maybe you asked her to send us a message.” Mike followed one tube to the end and held it up. Then he started folding it in half. “You retiring and forgot to tell us?”
Even though he wasn’t using the equipment now, he might be in the future, and having Mike’s hands all over it seemed like a bad idea. West knocked the tube out of his hands. “Of course not.”
“She thinks you see yourself as nothing more than a killer.”
This was not a conversation West wanted or needed to have. He’d blocked so much after the avalanche. Seeing so much death and being unable to stop it messed with his head. He’d stepped back and focused on the shooting. Honed his skills.
Then she walked into his life. Sassy and tough, ready to take him on and not afraid to fight back. She had him spinning and reassessing and wanting her until his need for her pushed out everything.
He didn’t understand why she blindsided him or where the resurgence of emotions came from, but he did understand his role on the team. He went in first and never questioned it. He wouldn’t have it any other way. “It’s my job,” he said to Mike.
“Being a killing machine?” Mike made a face. “Not really.”
But it was. “You know what I mean.”
They all had strengths, and that was his. A pretty sim
ple skill that served him well and made him invaluable to Alliance. He could kill and push away any conflict in his head.
Josiah stared at the clock next to the dark television. “She’s right, you know. You are not just a guy who can shoot. None of us see you that way, and if you do, you should let Lexi convince you otherwise.”
No, he couldn’t afford to have them questioning each other. He had no intention of leaving Alliance. “I’m happy with my job as it is.”
“Listen to him, dumbass.” Mike shook his head. “Whatever you think is wrong with you? It isn’t. Got it?”
West wasn’t sure how to take that but he knew the reassurance, coming from Mike, meant something. The guy didn’t throw around compliments or hand out hope. “Thanks. I think.”
“What about your personal life?’ Mike pushed buttons and spun the machine around.
He slid that in there. Subtle and quiet. He put Lexi on the table as a conversation topic.
West tried to pretend he didn’t hear. “What?”
Josiah shot him a don’t-be-stupid look. “She cares about you.”
“She lives in Pakistan.” Damn, West hated that. If she were in the states, he could swing through. In a country he planned to visit, he could make arrangements or they could meet.
But he was done with Pakistan. Nothing against the people, but he’d been buried alive there twice, and testing it by going back again seemed to be asking for it.
“We all know that’s about to end. The military and police are going to rip Skardu apart.” Josiah ticked off the harsh realities. “Her father’s role as an informant is over, and since Ward finally reached the guy at Everest base camp, I can report the good doctor is pissed. And Javed could be in danger.”
Mike nodded. “Bottom line, there’s no way she can go back there and be safe.”
“I wonder if I get to decide that or not.” Lexi spoke from the doorway. She didn’t come in or scold. The smile on her face suggested she enjoyed catching the men talking.
Mike gave her a little wave. “Hello.”
“We’ll step out.” Josiah reached across the bed, grabbed onto Mike’s sleeve and pulled him to the end of the mattress. “Leave you guys alone.”
“I’m not kicking you out.” She watched as they passed by her.
“I think you have the balls to do it,” Mike said.
Josiah stopped for a second on the way out. “I kept my promise.”
Her smile grew even wider. “You get to live.”
The door shut and he was alone with her in the small private room. Outside, bells dinged and the intercom went off every few seconds. Nurses raced from here to there, and the smell of antiseptic could knock you out. But in this room there was only him and her.
When she didn’t move in any closer, he decided to push it. He crooked a finger at her. “Come here.”
She continued to stand there rubbing her hands together. “You need rest and—”
“Lexi, now.”
A bit too much, he knew, but watching her touched off something inside of him. Since the first time he met her, that smile and face reeled him in. Now she hovered in front of him with shiny clean hair and slim jeans. Her coat ended at the top of her pants and showed off her slim waist.
Dirty, clean, he did not care. He loved the rough side of her that could take an emotional hit and get right back up. He also liked the sexier side that knew how to pick out a pair of jeans.
He wanted to crawl all over her. Take those clothes off and get to the impressive bare skin beneath.
“I’m not really a fan of the bossiness,” she said as she stepped up to the side of his bed.
He took her hand. Rubbed each finger before kissing the back. “I’m injured.”
‘You’re playing the victim card?” But she didn’t sound too surprised or upset by that.
He’d never tried it before and was a bit disappointed in the results. “Whatever it will take to get to kiss you.”
She smiled. “That’s easy.”
With one hand braced on the mattress by his pillow, she bent down. Her hair fell in a wave over her shoulder and teased his cheek. By the time her mouth covered his, his breathing had ticked up. His fingers tangled in her hair as her lips crossed over his.
She pressed and conquered, then her mouth slipped open. It was an invitation he couldn’t resist. He licked inside her mouth as the kiss seared through him. When she lifted her head he followed and kissed her again. One last time.
He fell back into the pillows. “I heard you talked with Josiah.”
“That’s between him and me.”
“It was about me.” When she shrugged at that, he tried again. “I love my job.”
“I know that.”
But it scared her, and he got that. She was human. The work he did straddled the line and a lot of people would say he went too far. He’d tried to hide those aspects of work from her and failed. “It’s dangerous and keeps me on the road.”
Her head snapped back. “Are you giving me the speech?”
He didn’t know what it meant but it pretty much made him sound like a dick. He circled around and tried again. “I’m trying to explain that the man in front of you can kill a man without guilt.”
“Your tattoo says otherwise.”
He was half sorry she saw that thing. All sorry he answered any questions about it. Thing was, she nailed the answer and his mind-set in getting it. It did function as a form of penance. He tried not to add to the marks, and having those deaths on his conscience did drive him. He never took a life with glee.
Even with Pearce, a man who needed to die, West didn’t celebrate. He did what he needed and moved on. Though that one had a touch of revenge linked to it.
Since he didn’t want her worrying and certainly didn’t need her to analyze his job and decide he came up short, he tried to explain. “Every member of the team has a specialty. Mine happens to be that I don’t flinch.”
“I’m not sure what that means, but okay.”
“You do know.” She did. She’d seen it, and the truth was, she was lucky to be alive because of it. They both were.
Her head tilted to the side. “Is this the part where you tell me to go find a nice doctor or graduate student?”
The words shuddered to a halt in his brain. Even if he should send her away and hurting her was the way to get it done, he couldn’t. Some lines did not need to be crossed. “The idea of you with another man makes me want to hit someone with a bat.”
Her eyes widened. “That’s pretty intense.”
“So are my feelings for you.” He clamped down to keep from saying anything else. That was already too much. She did not live here and deserved a life. He couldn’t give that to her, and that meant letting go.
“But?” she asked.
“What you see is what you get. Injured, near death.” Even though he felt better, the last few days had taken a toll. He could run then slide to his knees. That didn’t mean he should or that his eighty-year-old future self would appreciate it. “I’m the guy who would bring danger to your doorstep.”
“Technically, I brought the danger to you this time.”
She’d made a call. The rest unfurled in a way no one could have predicted. “Lexi, you know what I mean.”
She ran a hand over his leg and stopped at his knee. “I can handle it.”
The gentle touch burned him through the thin hospital blanket. “I can’t handle the idea of anything happening to you.”
“If the goal is to get me to leave—”
It would be best. Smart and focused. But his mind went into a spin at the thought. “I’m trying to be honest.”
She snorted. “No, you’re not.”
That pissed him off—the comment and the sound. “I know what I feel.”
She picked up his hand and pressed it against her chest. “Do you want to know what I feel?”
She tempted him in ways he’d never experienced. With her, he thought about having a house and a dog.
He’d bent all his rules when dealing with an asset. Hell, it made him sick to even think of her in those detached terms. “Lexi.”
“This is the start of something incredible.” She rubbed her thumb over his leg. “I am falling, and falling hard.”
The honest words filled him with a blinding sense of rightness. The panic shot right behind that. “God, don’t.”
Her hand dropped to her side. “So, you’re saying I’m falling by myself.”
“I didn’t—” His blood pressure machine beeped. The cuff checked it automatically, and West hated that. “I’m trying to be realistic.”
“You’re being safe. You’re cutting yourself off from emotion.”
“Is that so wrong?” Some people craved normal and safe. She was using the words as a weapon.
“I am not going to be buried under an avalanche. I’m hoping I won’t be in a position to be shot in the head again either.” She leaned down a bit. “I know you clamped down on feelings years ago, but I want you to let me in.”
“You want in my head and it’s a mess in there.” He tried to make a joke but it fell flat.
She snorted. “At least you admit there’s something in there.”
“Meaning?”
“You are not a machine. You are a man. All man.” She put a hand over his chest. “Flesh and blood, heart and soul, Hot and so sexy. And if you give me a chance, I’ll convince you.”
“It’s not that simple.” But, damn, she made it sound easy. As if he could just walk away from the horrors that came before and walk into the light with her.
Sadness filled her eyes. “Love doesn’t come with a safety switch. It’s messy and scary.”
A pretty sentiment but in practice a disaster because his version of messy included bodies and blood. Even now he nursed everything from a head wound, to a gunshot wound, to injured ribs, to all sorts of aches and pains and sprains.
Unless she planned to travel with him and be his personal physician, it amounted to a shitty life for the person not doing the shooting. “My life isn’t normal.”
“Mine hasn’t been either.”
He knew she had things to work out with her dad and carried guilt about her mom. He didn’t want to downplay that, but problems as a teenager didn’t compare to the real-life adult work of figuring out how to move forward. She had moved on and he couldn’t. “We are talking about two different things.”
Falling Hard Page 24
