by Karen Anders
She wiped at her eyes and stared at him. “Well, you’re being an ass, but I’m in. All in,” she snapped with just the kind of attitude he liked. Fiery.
“Then get your all-in ass into the vehicle before we lose these guys.”
She brushed by him, stalking to the car. “We won’t lose them. I put a tracker on one of the Jeeps.”
He huffed out a laugh and shook his head. Well, look at her thinking tactically like a damn navy SEAL. Damned if he didn’t like it a whole helluva lot.
“Stop looking so damn smug and get your insensitive ass in the car.”
Her confidence turned him on, right here, right now, in the middle of a crucial mission with her stepping completely out of her comfort zone. She’d been pushed hard for two days, seen more death in that time span than she had ever, he was sure. He strode up to her and grabbed her shirtfront and jerked her toward him. She made a little squeak as his mouth clamped over hers.
* * *
Kinley had kissed him before, but nothing like this. She swore her toes curled in her soggy shoes, and as his mouth slid over hers, her hands crawled around his waist. She held on. He was ferociously warm and tight against her. Not an inch of him soft, and all of it getting harder. Excitement coursed through her blood and cut at her composure. His mouth molded with a fragile pressure that was such a contrast to the man, and made her body tingle with expectation. He kissed her like she was his next breath and she returned the kiss like he was hers.
His tongue was bold and sweeping and her mind just melted into sensation. His hand slid upward. The backs of his fingers fluttered to her throat, gathering her fraying nerves as they went and making her unbearably greedy for more. His fingertips spanned her jaw, holding her as if she’d vanish. It was so damn sexy, and she wanted to get closer, unconsciously pushing her hips into his. He drew back a fraction.
“Damn,” she whispered against his mouth.
He rubbed a thumb over her lips.
“Aren’t we wasting time?”
“I don’t care,” he said, pulling her back against him and kissing her again.
He drew back. Something in his dark eyes sent a fresh pulse of awareness through her. This man made her feel so much at once, she couldn’t pinpoint anything when he was kissing her. And suddenly she realized...her numbness. It was gone, replaced by a pulsating, supercharged energy that was all consuming.
“Okay,” he said. “Now get in.”
She huffed, but it had no impact as he settled in the driver’s seat and fired up the engine. She grabbed the tracker and turned it on. It started to blip and Beau put the car into gear. Gunning the engine, he took off.
And he didn’t slow down. The Mercedes was made to hug the road and it was a tank, enough to plow through rain and mud. When they came to a turnoff that made Kinley swallow hard, he gave her a reassuring glance.
It looked like nothing but a rutted road heading to the middle of nowhere. There were no signs that the rain was going to let up. Yeah, October was one of the rainiest months here.
“You ready for this?” he said.
“Let’s get this done and go home and stop that bastard.”
His grim, locked-and-loaded look said it all.
He turned onto the rutted road and they took off again. They probably shouldn’t have been barreling down this road that was more like a poor excuse for a path at top speed. Branches slapped the windows, green and brown flying past. But they were gaining on the blip. It wouldn’t be long before they were in very close proximity.
Then the blip froze.
“They’ve stopped.”
“Probably for the night. How close are we?”
“About a mile or so.” He slowed the car and came to a stop.
“We’ll have to go the rest of the way on foot. We don’t want to alert them that we’re here.” He did some maneuvering to get the vehicle turned around and pointed in the direction they’d come.
He reached back and grabbed one of the submachine guns and a utility belt, rapidly adding to it, totally in his element. He pulled the wicked knife he always carried out of his pants pocket. “Here, take this to cut her bonds.”
“I cannot believe we’re going to assault an armed camp of cartel goons against orders.”
“We aren’t. I am. You have your marching orders. Get in. Get her free. Get out. Get here. Got it?”
“You get all the fun,” she said, saluting him.
He pulled down the visor and smeared his face with camouflage paint that they had picked up courtesy of the arms-dealer contact, then handed it to her. “Face and hands,” he said “We have the element of surprise and I have the skills to handle them. You just get that woman out of there and hightail it back to the coupe.”
He pulled the keys out of the ignition and handed them to her. “As soon as you get here, fire her up and be ready to go.”
She nodded, smearing her own face. Her nerves were steady, as they had been on many a drug bust. She had taken down her fair share of go-fast boats and armed-to-the-teeth smugglers, and knew how to use the semiautomatic Beau shoved into her hands. “Only use that if you have to. Any gunfire is going to focus every tango in the camp on you. You need to be quiet and quick.”
She nodded. He reached up and fiddled with the light in the roof of the car. When he opened his door, it remained pitch-black. He slipped out and Kinley followed suit.
He grabbed her arm and dragged her against his hard body, kissing her. “Do what you have to do,” he said. “Don’t worry about me.”
“Beau.” She pulled him back and kissed him, hard.
He started down the road and Kinley followed. There was a quarter moon and it didn’t help her see the rutted and muddy road ahead of them. Stepping in pools of water, mud slippery and squishy beneath her sneakers, she did her best to follow. Beau moved like a commando, quiet, sure-footed and almost invisible beside her. If she was to assault an enemy camp of ruthless cartel killers, she couldn’t have had better backup.
In the distance Kinley could make out a fire, and she heard the low murmur of voices filtering to her. Then laughter. The camp.
There were only two Jeeps parked near the tents and Kinley wondered where the third one was.
The terrain evened out and Beau grabbed her arm and pulled her off to the side, right behind one of the Jeeps. Beau’s gaze went around the camp. “I’m going to do some quick recon. You stay put. Don’t move a muscle until I come back.”
Before she could respond, he was gone, melting into the jungle. She strained to see him, but it was impossible and she hunched down lower for the longest five minutes of her life. Suddenly her skin rippled with awareness and her head snapped to the right. Beau moved in as quietly as he’d left.
He bent close to her ear and whispered, “She’s in the tent in the middle. I lifted up one of the stakes, which will make it easier for you to crawl under and then get back out. There is only one guard at the flap, so be as quiet as possible. Her hands and feet are bound.”
He cupped her face and gave her such an intense look she felt it all the way to her soul. “Don’t take any risks. I’ll draw them away.”
She wrapped her arms around his neck and squeezed him hard. “Be careful. Come back to me.” When she released him, he flashed a confident grin. “This will be a walk in the park. Hooyah, chérie. Wait until you hear my signal.”
“Wait. What is your signal?”
He flashed that same cocky grin. “Oh, you’ll know it when you hear it.”
He disappeared like he had the last time and Kinley moved silently toward the middle tent, keeping low.
She waited, every nerve taut. Then she heard the explosion. She ducked under the flap and put her finger to her lips as the woman’s head whipped around. She drew out Beau’s knife and cut the woman’s bonds.
“¿Quién es usted?”
“Do you speak English?”
“Yes.” Her eyes widened. “Oh, I recognize you. You’re that haughty woman who insisted on meeting with my husband today.”
“Your husband? You’re Maria?” Kinley sliced through the rope binding Maria’s feet and then the one around her hands. “Follow me.”
“Yes, I’m Maria. Th-th-they killed my husband when he refused to help them. Who exactly are you?”
As they were getting ready to go under the flap, a hand grabbed the back of Kinley’s shirt and hauled her to her feet, backhanding her across the face. She reeled away and hit the tent pole. Her eyes watered and she worked her jaw, tasting blood. At least this time she wasn’t tied to a chair.
“You cannot escape.” He stepped close and she put her hands up, the knife folded and concealed in her hand.
“Okay, okay, no punching! Maybe we can work out a deal.” She moved to him, her expression giving new meaning to the words, Come on, honey. I’m yours. “Just you and me.”
He smiled as if she were already conquered.
That’s all she needed. She grabbed his wrist, dug her thumb into the apex of his finger and thumb, and twisted hard, forcing his arm and elbow backward. His scream of pain was drowned out by the gunfire and another explosion.
He reached for her, but Kinley threw her weight into it, lowering him toward the floor. Then she slammed her knee into the side of his head. He dropped like a stone. She stepped back and slashed his throat.
She tried to ignore the sick feeling at the sight of the blood, but he would have killed her without a thought. “Let’s go.”
“Where?”
“I think you know where, Mrs. Costa.”
Her lips thinned, her eyes going dark with the thought of revenge. “Diego Montoya. Yes, I will help you.”
They slipped under the flap, the rain obscuring them in the already pitch-black night. Kinley took her hand and they were running full out down the rutted road, kicking up mud and water. She could only hope she didn’t break her stupid ankle, running like this in the dark.
After going less than a mile, Kinley heard someone coming up on them fast. She pulled Maria into the underbrush.
Not wanting to give away their position with automatic gunfire, Kinley crouched. The man stopped as if sensing them nearby. Staying perfectly still, barely daring to breathe, she waited, but when he started to methodically check the brush beside the road, she knew she had to...take him out.
Kinley silently removed the semiautomatic from her back and handed it to Maria, whose eyes grew wide. Then she nodded firmly. Kinley gave her a supportive look and pulled Beau’s knife out of her pants pocket. She unfolded it and crept around behind the guy, giving him a wide berth. Rising, she wasted no time in jumping on his back, reached around and stabbing the knife into his throat, jerking it.
With a gurgling sound, he fell and lay still as her stomach twisted and coiled with revulsion, his wet blood rushing over her hand. She pulled the knife out and wiped it on his shirt, folded it and put it back in her pocket, trembling.
She made her way back to Maria and they were on the run again.
When they made it to the coupe, Kinley pulled open the back door. “Get in. Hurry,” she said. Beau had to be on his way there. Still reeling and trembling inside from the close-quarters kill, Kinley shoved the keys in the ignition and turned over the engine. She shifted over to the passenger side and rolled down her window. She strained her ears while watching for any movement in the rearview, but could see nothing. “Oh, God, where is he?”
Maria was tense, sweat dripping off her chin as Kinley felt her own sweat slide over her skin, her heart still pounding. He said not to worry about him. But that didn’t mean she was leaving this place without him. She wasn’t and he could take those orders and shove them...
“Miss me?” he asked, materializing right at her window.
She jumped and reached out and shoved him as he laughed and ran around to the driver’s side. “Got some bad news for you, chérie. That last Jeep is on its way here. I disabled the other two.” He put the car into gear and stepped on the gas.
Chapter 16
He cursed the fate that had led that damn Jeep to do recon right at the time that he wanted to disable all three. At least two were out of commission, along with eight of the twelve guys who had grabbed the woman.
“This is Dr. Costa’s wife, Beau.” His eyes went to the sad and haunted eyes in the rearview. Damn, she must have been right there when they killed her husband. “This is Special Agent Beau Jerrott with the Navy Criminal Investigative Service and I’m Special Agent Kinley Cooper with the Coast Guard.”
“NCIS, like the TV show?” Maria said, her eyes widening. “I saw it when I was visiting Florida.”
Beau shook his head. “Oh, man, that show has done more to elevate our profile than our work. Nice to meet you, Mrs. Costa.”
“Maria, please.”
“Where exactly are we going?” Kinley asked.
He hadn’t missed the blood on her hands. “How many did you take out?”
“Two,” she said, her face grim.
“That’s all eight, then,” he said.
He would have to ask her what happened later, but the dark shadows in her eyes were something he intended to find the time and peace and quiet to soothe.
“As fast and as far away from that Jeep as we can get.” He glanced in the rearview and said, “You planning on helping us out, Maria?”
“Yes, I will help. My husband gave his life to protect mine. It must mean something. Take me to our residence. I know where my husband kept his insurance policy. Diego Montoya is ultimately responsible for getting my husband murdered by those thugs. If he hadn’t forced my sweet Miguel to perform those surgeries to change his appearance, he’d be alive today. He was such a good, good man.” She dropped her head into her hands, sobbing.
Kinley reached back and squeezed her shoulder and rubbed her arm. “We’re so sorry about what happened.”
Maria raised her head and wiped at her eyes. “There was nothing you could have done. There are many of them. They breed like vermin.”
“You okay?” Beau murmured, looking at Kinley.
She rubbed at her hands and he cringed. Damn, she’d killed tonight, and it looked like it might have been at close quarters. Baptized in blood wasn’t exactly what he’d wanted for her, and he’d dragged her on this mission, manipulated her with that terrorist comment he knew she wouldn’t be able to ignore. He felt like a jerk, but he had no intention of failing on this mission. No NCIS agent or SEAL would ever give up. Orders or not. He didn’t give a damn what the Commandant of the Coast Guard said. He knew what Chris expected of him and it was going to the max and then pushing past that. National security and protecting every man, woman and child in the US was a mission he took seriously. Without even having to ask Kinley, he knew it was her mission, too.
He reached out and slipped his hand over hers as they twisted in her lap. Her head came up and she curled her fingers around his hand, sliding her hand up his forearm.
“I’m so proud and impressed,” he said quietly.
She squeezed her eyes closed and took a deep breath. “I would never want to let you down.”
“Couldn’t happen,” he said.
The bobbing headlights that appeared behind him had him flooring the Mercedes. They were already going way too fast for such a narrow road, the vegetation slapping against the windows as they rushed by. But the Mercedes performed better in the mud than he’d hoped.
“Hang on, ladies. We have company.”
It wasn’t long before they hit the blacktop of the main road, but his sharp left had Kinley’s head snapping around.
“Beau. Havana is the other way.”
“Well aware, backseat driver,” he muttered as he saw the headlights of the Jeep swerve onto the road and gun after them. “Yeah, that’s right, come on, you bastards.”
Her hand was clamped to the side door, holding on.
He’d done a bootleg turn before, but that was in the middle of the bayou with plenty of space to maneuver. And it had been in a tricked-out Mustang. He’d also been professionally trained, as all agents were, in tactical and dangerous driving. He was booking it, his speed way too high on a slick, rain-washed road. They were hemmed in by a mountain of dirt on one side and a sloping roll into dense jungle on the other.
He was about to find out if the driver of the Jeep had nerves of steel, too.
He glanced at Kinley. Even with her hair falling down, stuck to her neck and her face, sweaty, dirty, bloody, she turned him on. He wanted her, with her damned red hair, and those deep green eyes, and that mouth beckoned him every time he looked at it. But if he didn’t start thinking with his head instead of with whatever was going on below the belt, he would get them all killed, and he couldn’t do that because that would mean he wouldn’t get to have her again. And that wasn’t acceptable.
Finally he found what he was looking for. The road opened up ahead with a passing lane. It was time to turn the tables. Naw, it was time to flip that table and turn it into a turbocharged bullet.
“Get down, and stay down.” He rolled down the window.
“What exactly are you planning?” she asked, giving him a wild-eyed look.
“Power slide.”
“What? On this road in these conditions? You are crazy.”
“Only a little,” he said. “The rest is mad skills. Now get down and hold on.”
“This is your plan?” Kinley asked, her voice definitely nervous.
On the fly and in his head it sounded damn good. He’d done this many times—pull up on the parking brake, turn opposite the slide while downshifting to ride the controlled drift, until the car snapped around in a 180-degree breakneck maneuver that would spin the car in the other direction. If all went well, he’d full-throttle the coupe from zero to sixty in two seconds flat and power the Mercedes back to Havana.
