Her Relentless SEAL (Midnight Delta Book 10)

by Caitlyn O'Leary

  Blake wasn’t having any of it. There was no way he was letting his lover go with scary dude by himself. Of course, scary was relative since Jim was a former Army Ranger and Blake was a former Marine. Still, this guy pinged all of Evie’s senses. The dude definitely seemed desperate.

  She’d been happy that Blake had gone with Jim. That had left her in the hotel by herself, which was fine. She’d been having a blast going to the bazaar. Tomorrow they were due to fly back to the states, so today she was going to get souvenirs for her five sisters and one soon-to-be sister-in-law. Hell, she might even pick up something fun for her brother Drake.

  It was when she was two blocks away from the hotel that the man with the gun had tried to grab her. She’d spent too many years evading her father’s love taps to not know how to dodge and weave past this dumbass. Instinct had her running. It never occurred to her to call the cops. Hell, she didn’t even know what the word for police or help was in Turkish. Her first damn impulse was to get to a friendly face and hide.

  Stupid!

  So stupid.

  But maybe not. Nehir didn’t want to call the police. Maybe her instincts were spot on. As soon as it was safe, she was going to call her badass bosses. They would get her out of this mess.

  She fingered her fanny pack. It had been her big sister Trenda who had drilled it into her head that she needed to keep all her valuables with her at all times. This included her passport. So, right now she could go to the Embassy without a problem. If the police were out of the question, she needed to get to the American Embassy. She inched the carpet away to see if the coast was clear. Damn it. This time there was a couple in the shop. She eased the rug back over her face.

  She heard voices; they were close. She felt some of the weight above her shift. Then Zehra was talking...fast. The material settled back down on top of her, collapsing her air pocket. She took a shallow breath, then another.

  She heard footsteps, then she heard Nehir saying good-bye in Turkish. That was about all she understood of the language, hello, goodbye, please, and thank you. Evie took her shot and shifted the material so that she could breathe easier. Having trouble breathing took her mind off having to pee.

  Pee.

  Damn. She shouldn’t have thought about that. Now her mind could only think about needing a bathroom. Even the dark cubicle in the public restrooms in the bazaar seemed like paradise.

  Carefully, Evie crossed her legs under the rugs.

  Suck it up, Avery. This is not the worst situation you’ve been in.

  She breathed through her nose as memories bubbled upwards. She shoved them down.

  Come on Evalyn Lavender Avery. You’re a grown woman now. Now you handle things with a bat, remember? She grinned at that memory. She tried to think through what the hell had gotten her into this situation. Her gut told her this had something to do with scary guy. But Jim and Blake would save her. Between the two of them, they were probably five times her size. They would kick these guys’ asses. That made her smile.

  “Evie?” It was Nehir. The woman pushed back the carpet covering Evie. “We go.”

  She couldn’t believe it. She must have dozed off. She looked around and realized that the two sad lightbulbs high above were turned off. Nehir was moving the rugs, and Evie breathed a sigh of relief as the pressure on her bladder lessened. Damn, did she have to think about her bladder?

  “Nehir, I need the toilet.” She knew the word bathroom didn’t translate.

  “Must wait. Must home.” Evie looked over to the one and only entry to the store, and Zehra was in the process of pulling the security gate closed. Nehir, meanwhile, was shoving colorful clothing at Evie. It was a rust-colored tunic that would fall to the ground and cover her top and jeans. There was also a scarf for her to wear over her head. Neither Zehra or Nehir wore scarves, but she could see the wisdom of her wearing one for a disguise. One of the women must have gone to another stall and purchased an outfit for her while she was sleeping.

  After Evie was done dressing, Nehir rushed her to the front of the shop while pushing a small rug into her hands. It was clear that she was supposed to be a late shopper.

  When she went into the throng of people who were busy getting their last minute items, there was a man who stood out. He was huge, and he stood in the middle of the mall, surveying the crowd. He wasn’t the one who had followed her. It made Evie shiver. This was worse than she thought. How many people were after her? Evie bowed her head and looked at Zehra and Nehir and held out her rug.

  “Teşekkür ederim.” Evie bowed to the two of them as they exited.

  She continued to thank them as they scurried down the small street, relieved to see they weren’t capturing anyone’s notice. Zehra linked her arm with Evie’s as they made their way down the busy alley.

  “We must hurry,” she whispered to Evie. “People have been looking for you.”

  Damn! What in the hell had happened? Just as she’d thought that, they were rushing past the restrooms.

  “Stop!”

  “Evie, we must get to my home.”

  “I have to pee.” It was urgent.

  Zehra looked at Evie, and then grabbed the rug out of her arms. “Go. But hurry. These are bad men. We need to get you to safety. Nehir and I will wait here for you.”

  Evie walked slowly into the old building, taking care not to call attention to herself. She kept her head down and was grateful there was no line. She did her business and then called Blake’s phone. It went to voicemail.

  She called Jim next. His went to voicemail too. She texted them.

  HELP. SOMEONE IS AFTER ME WITH A GUN. WILL TRY TO GET TO EMBASSY.

  When she went back outside, she looked around and couldn’t find either Zehra or Nehir. Instead, she saw the precious rug crumpled in the dirt.

  Pain screamed up her arm as it was yanked up and backward. Her wrist was wrapped in a bone-crushing grip.

  “Make a sound and your friends die.” The words were said with a foul-smelling breath and an English accent, which just made the moment all the more surreal.

  Evie gritted her teeth against the pain. “What do you want?”

  “Do you know where the passports are?” he demanded, as he pulled her deeper into the shadow of the old building.

  “I’ll give you my passport. Please don’t hurt the women.”

  Where were Zehra and Nehir? How could he kill them, if he had her?

  He jerked her arm higher up her back. Evie felt the joint pop and cried out. The man clapped his hand over her mouth. “I told you not to make any noise.” Tears dripped down over her nose and onto his big hand. The pain in her shoulder was excruciating.

  “I don’t want your passport. I want the passports.”

  He moved his hand so she could answer.

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she whimpered.

  “Fine, I’ll use you to make the others give me what I want.”

  What was he talking about?

  He pulled on her arm even more. The pain was an oily smear, she was going to throw up. Or pass out. “I won’t hesitate to kill those two women if you scream. Do you understand me?”

  Please, God, say that she was right, and he didn’t have Nehir and Zehra.

  “Walk with me.”

  He took a step forward.

  No!

  Evie dug in her heels. The moment she left the bazaar with him, she was a dead woman.

  Flecks of oregano seasoned lamb sprayed on her, as he hissed, “Fine, we’ll do this the hard way.”

  He shoved her arm up even higher. Waves of pain crashed through her brain, flickers of flame burned her eyeballs, then everything went black.

  Chapter Three

  Three Days Later – San Diego, California USA

  It seemed odd to be sitting in a bar like this without cigarette smoke. Maybe he should have gone down to Tijuana. He looked at the amber liquid in his glass. The twenty-year-old Irish whiskey wouldn’t get the job done, not at the glacial
rate he was drinking it. What was the point? Nothing would make him feel better but time.

  He stared at his phone. The call he had earlier was still messing with his head. Discovering that NiNi’s death was a random act of violence, and not a hit by the Deuces gang, was unbelievable. Even more remarkable was Sam’s conviction that Aiden was well and truly off the Deuces’ radar.

  He twirled the glass and watched the whiskey swirl. He needed to calm his thinking. Instead, it was spinning out of control. Nothing had gone right since he received the phone call about NiNi’s death when he was in Tennessee three months ago. At the time, everybody in Chicago had thought that it had been one of the Deuce’s soldiers who had taken her out. Sam, his dad’s old partner, had been ready to take down every gang member. It was his brothers in blue and his kids who had kept him sane.

  So, while Sam had gone off the deep end in Chicago, Aiden had followed in his footsteps down in Tennessee. He was sure that damn near twenty years later, the Deuces had killed the woman who had been like a second mother to him. And that meant that soon they would be after him and whomever he held dear. What were the odds? Twenty-one years after having called down the wrath of those fuckers he’d found Eva Avery, but in order to keep her safe, he had to throw her away.

  He swallowed the alcohol and appreciated the burn.

  It was one in the morning. He’d been nursing his second drink for three hours. The waitress knew him. He came in maybe once a month when his missions allowed it. He tipped well, so she didn’t care that he took up valuable real estate for hours, nursing one or two drinks.

  Aiden watched as she headed toward him.

  “Another?”

  He gave a brief shake of his head.

  “I’ll leave you to it then.” She smiled and sashayed to another table, leaving him at his back booth.

  He fingered his phone. It’d been eight hours since Sam had called.

  Sam Chang had been adamant about the fact that he’d been wrong when he’d called him three months earlier. NiNi’s death had nothing to do with old vendettas.

  Aiden carefully set down the glass, when everything in him wanted to hurl it across the bar. Fuck! He’d destroyed Evie’s trust, sure that his past was back, and that any woman who meant something to him would end up dead.

  He shut his eyes and breathed deeply. He needed to get a grip on his emotions. Peace. He had worked hard for it. When action was required, he reacted. Precisely. Effectively. Deadly. But first, he needed to collect his calm. It was how he always accomplished things. If it was possible to win, he won. This would be no different. He looked at the unbroken glass and nodded.

  So now, once again, he would proceed with calm. He would plan. He would execute.

  The hair on the back of his neck prickled, and he looked at the door. He wasn’t surprised to see one of his oldest friends walk in. He hadn’t seen Gray Tyler in two months. Gray led his old SEAL team, Black Dawn. He must have heard about the goat fuck of a mission that he had just come off of. Little did the man know, the real goat fuck had happened three months ago.

  Gray didn’t even look around the shadowy bar. His eyes lasered to the back booth where Aiden sat, and he headed to him.

  The man slipped into the opposite chair. Kimmie was at his shoulder in an instant.

  “Duvel,” Gray said, ordering his beer.

  “Gotchya.” She disappeared.

  “I heard,” Gray said. “Talked to Mason. The man was basically dead when you arrived at the compound.”

  Aiden just stared at his friend. It was easier to let the man think that the reason he was at the bar was due to the mission.

  “That’s not the way I see it.”

  “You wouldn’t,” Gray sighed.

  “You here to give me a pep talk?”

  “Just here for a beer.” Kimmie slid a bottle and glass in front of Gray and walked off. “How much does that cost you?” Gray motioned to the short glass in front of Aiden.

  “If you have to ask, you can’t afford it.”

  Gray chuckled as he poured his beer into the glass. “I forgot you come from money.”

  “Don’t forget the criminal element that comes with it,” Aiden said wryly.

  “Now that I don’t forget. A couple of those stories are burned into my memory.”

  Thinking about his rich uncle down in the Yucatan peninsula always made Aiden smile. The man had been a major player in his younger days. Hell, even now his reach extended all the way to Veracruz, Mexico. It was only because his late father, the Irish cop from Chicago, was totally in love with his wife, that he could cope with her nefarious family.

  “You used to think I made that stuff up,” Aiden reminded his former lieutenant.

  “Not after Leonard Canul came to visit. That man is a trip and a half.”

  “He wanted to make sure Beth and Jack were doing okay,” Aiden said, referring to his current teammate’s fiancée.

  “That was one hell of an ordeal she went through.”

  “You wouldn’t guess it looking at her, but she kicked ass.”

  “I heard that too. But, yeah, she seems like a shy thing compared to her sister Lydia.”

  Aiden just shook his head. The women of Midnight Delta were pretty amazing.

  Then he thought about Evie again.

  “What?” Gray asked.

  “Nothing.”

  “That’s more than a nothing face.”

  Aiden tilted his head. “Don’t push.”

  Gray took a long sip of his beer. “The last time I saw you, you were in bad space too, what the hell is up?”

  Aiden just stared at Gray, not saying anything.

  “If you don’t tell me, I’m going to guess, and you won’t be happy.”

  “Leave it alone,” Aiden clipped out.

  “It’s a woman.”

  “In the entire eight years have you known me, has it ever been a woman?” Aiden asked.

  “Nope. Still is, though.”

  Aiden sighed. “How’d you guess?”

  “One, I know you. Two, you hook up with Midnight Delta, you somehow end up with women issues. Everybody on base is talking about how they’re like the Match.com of SEAL teams.”

  Aiden shook his head and laughed. It was so true. Then he gave Gray a sly look. “So, when are you going to do a mission with us? Aren’t you tired of being alone?”

  “We weren’t talking about me, O’Malley, we were talking about you sipping fifty dollar drinks. Anyway, I have a team of my own to run, and your ass is going to be back to it in two more months.”

  Aiden thought about his old teammates and smiled. He missed them, especially Griff and Dexter, but then again, he really liked his new teammates, even Drake Avery. If he hadn’t fucked up with his sister, they’d be friends.

  “Again, you’re looking like your dog died.”

  “I am not.” Aiden knew his expression hadn’t changed. After he was sixteen, he’d learned how to mask everything if he chose to, so he was surprised by Gray’s comment.

  “Face it, I’m your best friend, I’ve been studying you for years. So, what’s her name?”

  “Evie,” Aiden admitted reluctantly.

  “Is she the one?”

  Aiden didn’t answer.

  “What the hell is your problem? If she’s the one, why not go after her?”

  He didn’t respond.

  “Aiden?”

  “I screwed up. I thought I was doing the right thing. But I hurt her.”

  “Apologize.”

  “It’s not that easy. You don’t know her.”

  “Women love it when men admit they’re wrong.”

  “Evie is Drake Avery’s sister.”

  “Avery’s sister?” Gray gave him an incredulous look. “Yeah, this is going to require more than an apology.” He laughed. Then he sobered. “You never answered my question. Is she the one?”

  “I didn’t give us a chance.”

  “That’s a damn shame. Are you going to her?”

>   “I need to think about it. I want to make sure I have a game plan.”

  “Jesus, O’Malley, it’s simple. Apologize and start over.”

  “I want to make sure I don’t end up hurting her again.”

  Chapter Four

  Same Day – Somewhere in Turkey

  “Wake up!” It was the man with the English accent. He was back. After the first day, she’d been left alone in the dank little room, waiting, and now he was back. The first night she’d shoved her shoulder back into its socket and passed out from the pain. Eventually, she awoke and made friends with the cement floor. Finally, she crawled onto the dirty mattress in the corner of what amounted to her cell. She used the tunic to rest her head on.

  When she’d woken the following day, she’d wondered what had happened to Zehra and Nehir. Hopefully, her gut had been right, and they had never been in the asshole’s clutches. Hopefully, they knew somebody to contact for help. Then there were Blake and Jim. They would be looking for her since she had called and texted them.

  Help had to be coming soon.

  “I said wake up!”

  As soon as her brain swirled to consciousness, her first panicked thought was to ascertain whether she had her clothes on. That was always where her attention went first when she woke up. She gave an imperceptible sigh of relief that she was still clothed, then cracked open an eyelid. As soon as she saw the man was holding a bucket, she jerked upwards. There was no way she wanted to be doused with water and left in this damn cell.

  He held up her cell phone. “It’s time to make another movie.”

  They’d done that when they first threw her in the dirty little room. He’d made her tell Jim and Blake that she was being held captive and they had one week to deliver the passports or she would die.