by S. M. Butler
Her glance traveled downward to the sheet barely covering his hips. Maybe it was the fold of the sheets, but the fabric was tented.
“Playing possum?”
She raised her head and met his gaze, blushing because she’d been caught staring at his sex.
“Didn’t want to disturb you.”
“You’re breathing, aren’t you?” he muttered in a graveled tone.
She frowned, not understanding, and then pushed away from his body although she instantly regretted the loss of his warmth. When she’d first awoken, she’d felt sheltered, safe—and not just from Diego and his henchmen. She’d felt…cherished.
Ridiculous, she knew. And slightly pathetic. Was she really so needy for human connection that she was romanticizing over Jackson?
But in the morning light, his face wasn’t quite so hard-bitten. Scruffy, dark bristles covered his chin and jaw; his gaze rested on her rather than spearing her.
His glance cut away, and he looked at his watch. “Chow’s nearly over. We should dress.”
“I’m starved.”
The corners of his mouth twitched.
His first smile?
And then his features grew remote again, his mouth firmed. “Get dressed. I need to check in with Teague.”
Aware his gaze followed her still, she rose and stretched her arms high, and then headed to her pillow case.
“You do that on purpose, don’t you?”
She aimed a grin over her shoulder. “Why, whatever do you mean?”
His gaze narrowed, but a one-sided smile curved.
Feeling as though she’d accomplished something noteworthy, she entered the bathroom, closing the door against the temptation that was Jackson Keller.
Fifteen minutes later, Jackson guided Suri with a hand to the small of her back toward the chow line. When he spotted Deke grin and raise his eyebrows, Jackson promptly dropped his hand and glared at his friend.
It was inevitable Suri drew every gaze—the only female amid a dozen guys. The fact she didn’t have a stitch of clothing that didn’t hug her body like a second skin around curves so sweet his teeth ached, only added to the aggravation. Today, she wore a filmy skirt and a tank, that on any other woman would simply be pretty. On Suri, the outfit was a honey trap.
“Sleep well, Miss McAnally?” Wiley asked, pushing his tray down the line beside her, a polite smile on his face, but amusement twinkling in his dark eyes.
“I slept just fine,” Suri said, her voice clipped.
“Jackson didn’t keep you awake by snoring?”
By the rigid set of her shoulders, Jackson knew Wiley was in trouble. He waited.
“Jackson didn’t snore. And I would know if he had, since I slept on top of him.”
Jackson coughed.
Wiley’s mouth opened to respond, but he clamped his mouth shut and reached for the plate the server handed him.
When they’d both taken their seats across from each other, Jackson leaned over the table. “You do know they all think we’ve slept together.”
“Well, we did.” Her gaze narrowed. “There’s only one bed in that shack. Even SEALs can do the math.”
Maybe she didn’t understand the connotation… “No, they think—”
She leaned toward him, a frosty look on her face despite the pink of her cheeks. “They think we fucked. And that’s okay with me. Now, none of them will bother me.”
Jackson blinked and sat back, eyeing her, wondering why she’d use a tactic like that, and suspecting strongly that she’d done it before. Alejandro had to have been the one she’d used to keep men at arm’s length.
Because he didn’t care if his team thought he’d slept with her, he dug into his scrambled eggs.
A scrape sounded beside him, and Teague settled into the chair to his right, a cup of coffee in his hand. “I’ll need you in ops when you’re through.” He nodded to Suri. “Mornin’, you look rested.”
Jackson kicked his foot under the table to keep him from engaging her in any more talk, afraid she’d blurt something else inappropriate.
“See you in five. Leave the girl with Deke.”
Suri huffed.
He guessed she didn’t like being passed from one man to another like a hot potato.
“I don’t need a babysitter. I’m not going anywhere.”
Teague lifted his finger and shook it at her like she was a recalcitrant child. “We’re in the middle of the Yucatán jungle, which contains snakes and jaguars. And it’s not unimaginable that Guzman might be looking for us just as hard as we’re looking for him. Don’t even try to ditch Deke.”
Suri scowled, but held her tongue. She turned to Jackson. “Deke your buddy from the bedroom yesterday?”
He nodded.
She pursed her mouth. “Guess he’s okay. He’s already seen me naked.”
Jackson was surprised by a gust of laughter and shook his head as he held Suri’s wide-eyed but hardly innocent gaze. She knew what she was doing. But he wasn’t sure if she was simply establishing the fact she wasn’t a pushover, or if she was flirting.
He gave her another narrowed stare, and then signaled to Deke, who rose and came over to them.
“She’s all yours while I’m in ops.”
Suri’s pink cheeks turned a fiery red.
She’d guessed two could play this game.
Deke settled onto a dumpy couch in the rec room beside her and flicked through the channels. “There’re soap operas, all in Spanish, more soap operas, and a game show where the contestants aren’t wearing very much… Guess TV wasn’t such a great idea.”
Suri sighed. “You can turn it off. I’m not going to watch it.”
After he’d clicked the remote, they sat in awkward silence.
Deke leaned forward and played with a toothpick he held, rolling it up and down between his fingers.
Like she told her kids, boredom was the fault of a lazy mind. “Are you like Jackson? An ex-SEAL?”
“Yeah, we went through BUD/s together before we were assigned to a team.”
“I’ve watched documentaries about the training. Looks pretty rough.”
Deke grunted. “It was tough, but deployments can be worse. Training prepared me for the rigor, not for the reality.”
Because she sensed he would only talk in general terms and she wanted glean some specifics, she thought about how to ask him what she really wanted to know. “You married?”
Deke smiled and a happy, faraway look entered his eyes. “Yeah, just a few months.”
“She must miss you when you have to go on a mission.”
“She does, but she has her own work. She’s a loan officer in a bank.”
“How’d you two meet?”
His gaze sliced sideways. “Anyone ever tell you you’d be great at interrogation?”
“I don’t mean to pry, but…” she shrugged, rounding her eyes, “what else is there to do but talk?”
“Don’t want to talk about the weather?” he asked in a wry tone.
She frowned. “It’s hot and muggy, and we’ll probably have a downpour this afternoon by the look of clouds.”
Deke’s mouth quirked up on one side. “We could talk about Austin. About your time at UT.”
“About Alejandro, you mean.” Shaking her head, she sighed and crossed her arms over her chest. “Guess you better turn the TV back on.”
Deke looked at the ground then at her again. “I met my wife on a mission. Nicky’s dad had me play bodyguard while she was on vacation on a Caribbean island. There was some trouble.” His gaze darkened. “Trouble tends to build bonds or build enemies. What are you and Jax gonna be?”
She guessed since he’d shared, it was only fair that she did the same. “There’s nothing between Jackson and me, no matter what I insinuated at breakfast. But…” she chewed on her lip and met his steady gaze, “there is attraction. And I think it goes both ways.”
Deke’s mouth twitched. “Yeah, maybe so.” He stuck the toothpick in his mo
uth and switched on the TV again.
She didn’t mind. In his roundabout way, he’d reassured her that Jackson was available. And that was all she needed to know.
Teague’s eyes glittered as he swiveled in his chair, away from the busy computer screen. “We have Guzman’s money man. Picked him up in Cancun. He struck a deal and is moving money out of Guzman’s Cayman accounts as we speak. Guzman’ll soon burn through whatever cash he has.”
“Think he already knows?”
“Yeah, the Dyson kid’s parents were contacted about a ransom. Burner phone. But before the trace ended, we tracked it to Playa del Carmen, just outside Cancun. One of his lieutenants has a ranch a bit outside of the town. There’s a good chance Guzman’s holed up there. Mission’s a go. Get your men ready.”
Teague gave him a GPS device with the coordinates.
“You’ll keep an eye on the girl?” he said, not saying her name because then it became too intimate.
“Sure. I want to hear more about the night you spent together.”
Jackson shook his head. “Don’t embarrass her.”
“I’m not sure anyone can.” Teague grinned and gave him his signature salute.
Jackson went quickly to the rec room hut. “Get into your gear,” he said as he entered. His gaze swung to the couch where Suri and Deke were watching nearly naked people on the screen. What the hell?
Deke jumped up and hurried out the building, and Suri held up the remote and clicked off the TV. She walked toward him, looking uncertain.
Something he didn’t like, because he’d rather she spit and snarl or look at him like she wanted him.
She halted a couple of feet away. “You find Guzman?”
He gave her a hard stare.
“You couldn’t tell me if you had—or you might have to kill me, right?”
“Stick with Teague,” he said, his voice roughening as he gazed down at her.
“Like glue,” she whispered. And then she rose on tiptoe and placed her hands tentatively on his shoulders. Her head tilted back. “Be safe.”
She was all but begging for a kiss. Jackson’s body tightened. And even though this was all kinds of dangerous—this wasn’t the time, she was in his care—those arguments faded as she raised her mouth.
Jackson thrust his fingers into her hair and cradled her head. He bent and took her mouth.
She moaned the second their lips blended, a soft, whimpering sound that went straight to his cock. He pulled her body closer, letting her feel the strength of his desire. A tremble racked her body, and she reached up to scrape her fingernails against his scalp.
Then her lips opened, and he plunged inside, thrusting his tongue there, suctioning on her mouth to keep it sealed as he explored.
She tasted sweet, and her body was hot, grinding against him, her hand cupping his erection.
He dragged away his mouth and leaned his forehead against hers as she continued to palm his rigid shaft. “I have to go.”
“I know. But you have to come back,” she said.
And there was more than a hint of sensual promise there in her smoky, half-lidded gaze. He kissed her again hard, drew her hands away from his body, and took a step back. “I mean it. Stick with Teague. He’ll keep you safe.”
She nodded. “Worry about your own ass.”
He grinned at her word choice. Salty for a schoolmarm.
Being slightly superstitious, he wouldn’t say goodbye. Instead, he swept her with a glance, head-to-toe and up again, telling her silently, every inch of her was going to be his, and then he let himself out the door.
Chapter Five
‡
Suri kept quiet in her seat in case Teague remembered she was there and found someone else to babysit her. He’d allowed her to keep watch with him, saying since she wasn’t going anywhere until the mission was over, she couldn’t run her mouth to the wrong people anyway. They’d all be in jail or dead.
The scene unfolding on the monitor in eerie green light was more riveting than any cop-drama she’d ever watched. Two of Jackson’s team members wore cameras on their helmets so that Teague, and whoever else was getting this feed, could watch the action.
The team fast-roped—a term she’d learned when she’d watched that BUD/s documentary—into a pasture surrounded by jungle, one man nearly landing on a cow. Now, using stealth, they surrounded a one-story ranch house and were positioned in the tree line. Lights shone in the house in the distance. Two vehicles were parked beside the long, wraparound porch.
They must have been using hand signals because one by one, men peeled away, running toward the house and taking cover. When they’d been moving through the trees, they’d used their microphones, and each time, she’d listened hard to see if she could distinguish Jackson’s voice. A couple of times he gave terse orders, and she’d smiled, because he’d used that tone a time or two with her. The rasp made her shiver, pricked her nipples.
Only now wasn’t the time to think about the silent promise she’d made as he’d departed. Where she’d garnered the nerve, she didn’t know, but after everything she’d seen and heard about him, she knew he was the guy she wanted to trust to show her what physical love was all about.
That didn’t mean she loved him. That would be stupid on her part. She was destined to return to Austin, and he was going back to wherever he’d come from.
The feed they watched rose then bounced as the man wearing it ran to the side of one of the trucks. Her stomach lurched, partly due to the jerky photography, but mostly because they were close to the house, and now she could see the dark outlines of guards as they circled the porch.
The man wearing the camera rushed up to one guard whose back was turned. She couldn’t tell exactly what the man was doing, until the camera lowered and she saw a body on the ground. The camera moved too quickly to reveal just how he’d been killed, but her stomach wouldn’t settle. She looked away from the screen—at the windowless walls, at the rack of weapons, half-empty, at Teague, who looked like he must have been a drill sergeant in his former life because his rugged face when he scowled was awe-inspiring.
Shots sounded, and she swung her gaze back at the monitor, her heart racing. Who was shooting? Was Jackson okay? The lights in the house were doused, the windows dark.
A battering ram held between two of the team members cracked open the front door. A raised boot entered the picture as the camera man kicked away the remaining fragments of shattered wood.
Three of the team entered while their guy with the camera remained outside, his gaze on the surrounding area.
Teague clicked the keyboard, and another view appeared. This one from inside the house. The camera jerked, a weapon rising at the bottom of the screen at every doorway the man passed.
The team member rounded a corner and gunfire rang out. He darted back. “Taking fire. Kitchen at the back.”
“On my way. Coming from the porch.”
Jackson’s voice. She wished she hadn’t recognized it because he was the one who would crash into the kitchen and straight into a hail of bullets. She stuck her fingertips in her mouth and held her breath.
“On one, two, three!”
The camera whirled around the corner, and bursts of gunfire lit the screen. A crash sounded then more explosions. “Kitchen’s clear,” from Jackson, his voice clipped but strong.
She let out the breath she’d been holding and continued to watch as lights turned on and the house was searched, but other than the dead guys in the kitchen and surrounding the house, no one living remained.
His goggles off, Jackson walked to the man with the camera and his face filled the screen. “I’m beginning to think this is deliberate. That Guzman’s playing us. Somehow, he’s getting word before we strike. Or he’s planting false clues, knowing we’ll bite.”
“Helo will be there in ten,” Teague said into the microphone on the desk.
He sounded disgusted, but she couldn’t figure out why. “No loss of men,” Suri said, trying to r
emind him of the bright side.
He gave her a sharp glare. “Don’t even try to make me happy.”
Suri pressed her lips together to prevent another unwise comment. She looked at the clock and noted the time. If it took the same amount of time for the team to return as it had for them to go, Jackson would be back in an hour.
She wished she could go to the hut to shower, but she’d promised to stick like glue to Teague.
Teague scooted back from the desk although he continued to watch the team hustle back to the pasture. “We should probably designate different drop-off and pick-up sites,” he muttered.
“In case someone’s watching, and Guzman’s people meet them when they come back?”
Teague’s head turned slowly. His stare held her frozen. “Exactly.”
Did he think she was privy to Guzman’s strategy? “It was just a guess. I don’t know his plans.”
Teague shook his head and grinned. “I wonder if Jackson has a clue.”
She didn’t get his meaning, but it didn’t matter, because he was rising. She stood, too.
“Jave can monitor their return. I’ll take you back to your cabin.”
“It’s a shack. Don’t paint it with a pretty brush.”
He chuckled and swept a hand toward the door. “After you, lady.”
Suri grinned. His tone had sounded almost admiring.
Jackson forced himself to go through the motions of stowing his gear, washing the dirt and paint from his body, and giving his after-action report at his usual pace. The last thing he wanted was for the guys to pick up on the fact he was excited.
Of course, maybe he’d read more into her words and that kiss than she’d meant. If that was the case, he wasn’t sure he could stay in the hut with her that night and not go crazy.
On the flight back, he’d imagined her as she’d looked last night with that dark pink tease of a nightgown. How he’d wanted to smooth his hands over her curves and slowly draw it over head. He would have had her lush nipples in his mouth before the nightie cleared her head.
