by Anna Blakely
I love you.
The words whispered through her mind just before a sudden, sharp pain exploded in the back of her head. And then...nothing.
****
Jake McQueen couldn’t think. God Almighty, he couldn’t breathe. The dizziness and nausea hit him like a freight train as he reached for the remote, desperate to block out the nightmare playing before him. He willed his thumb to press the power button, but his fingers refused to follow the simple order.
“The brief clip you just saw was from the memorial service held yesterday in honor of the eight men and women who were violently murdered in what authorities are still reporting as a drug-related raid. Five weeks ago, the group of American doctors and nurses arrived in Toamasina, Madagascar to offer volunteer medical aid to those in need. As I’m sure most of our viewers already know, Toamasina was one of the many areas devastated by the massive hurricane that hit Madagascar early last month.”
Jake shook his head, his denial instant and final because no way, no fucking way was this really happening. The media, the so-called authorities...they had to be wrong.
Ah, God, not her. Anyone but her!
He continued listening to the TV, searching for something, anything that said this was all just some horrible mistake. But the longer he sat there, the more Jake’s unwavering wall of denial began to crumble. Everything he’d just seen and heard pointed to only one truth—Olivia was dead.
Last week, while he and his team had been completing their most recent mission, her entire group had been gunned down. Their bodies burned beyond recognition. A week ago.
Jesus.
Finally regaining some bodily control, Jake raised the shaking remote. He refused to sit and listen to another goddamn word about how she’d been brutally gunned down and then fucking burned.
Just then, Olivia’s face filled the oversized screen. His thumb froze in place. He couldn’t tear his gaze away now if his life depended on it.
Jake knew the picture well. He should, he'd taken it the day Olivia received her nursing degree. She smiled back at him from his TV, her laugh from that long-ago moment forever captured.
A pair of gorgeous, hazel eyes with their mesmerizing swirls of greens and browns bore deeply into his own. They were eyes he’d always sworn he could get lost in. Jake blinked, and her name appeared on the screen in bold letters beneath the picture.
Olivia Bradshaw.
His best friend’s little sister. The girl he and her brother, Mike, had spent countless hours of their childhood tormenting...all the while, protecting her with everything they had. She was also the same girl who’d grown before his eyes into the most beautiful, compassionate woman he’d ever known. And the most stubborn.
Olivia had given him so much shit throughout the years, challenging him at every turn. Despite all her sass—or maybe because of it—Jake had never wanted a woman more.
For years, she’d been the star of more fantasies than he could count. The cause of more wet dreams than he’d ever admit. She was also the only woman who’d managed to steal his heart, and last week she’d died without knowing the truth about how he really felt.
A rush of bile hit the base of his throat and Jake barely made it to his kitchen sink before losing the fast-food lunch he’d scarfed down on his way home. A few minutes later, his hands shook so violently that it took three tries to get the damned faucet turned on so he could rinse the rancid taste from his mouth.
After running the garbage disposal, Jake splashed his face with cold water before reaching for the nearest dish towel. In a daze, he wiped the moisture from his skin before tossing the towel aside. His hands became two vice grips, grabbing hold of the sink’s edge, his knuckles white from the strain.
Hanging his head between his shoulders, Jake summoning every ounce of his training to force some much-needed air into his lungs. After several controlled breaths, he attempted to calm himself. To accept the unacceptable...Liv was dead.
He thought about the last time he saw her. Regret quickly filled his gut when he realized it’d been nearly two full months. Too fucking long.
When his team wasn't away on a job, Jake and Olivia would talk on the phone or hang out whenever they could. Just as friends. No matter how busy they both were, he always made sure he saw her before leaving town again. Except this last time.
His team’s most recent job had been the very definition of last-minute. Jake had been home a whopping forty-five minutes and hadn’t even had time to unpack his bags from the previous job when he got the call from his handler at Homeland, requesting a hostage location and extraction.
He’d barely had time to shower, let alone see Olivia, before heading out again. So, he left her a voicemail, promising to make it up to her as soon as he got back. Now he’d never get that chance.
Filled with sorrow, Jake squeezed his watering eyes shut. Rather than blocking out the pain as intended, his mind instantly conjured up images from their last day together.
The two had eaten and talked. They’d laughed. More than anything, they’d laughed. I can still hear her laugh.
It was always like that with her. They could joke around effortlessly, or just sit in comfortable silence. When it came to Olivia, everything was easy. Especially loving her. So, why the hell hadn’t he ever told her?
You know why, asshole.
Jake had vowed a long time ago never to reveal his true feelings. For several reasons. To start, she was his best friend’s little sister. As cliché as it may be, the unwritten rule between guys was very real. You didn’t date your buddy’s sister...or do anything else with her. Ever.
Sure, her brother had been gone for the better part of ten years now, but when Jake’s feelings for Olivia had first begun to change, Mike had still been around. Jake had no doubt that Mike would have kicked his ass from here to Timbuktu if he’d ever known even a fraction of the thoughts Jake had entertained about the other guy’s sister. Especially the ones involving Olivia naked and in his bed.
By the time she’d lost her brother, there were other, more serious, reasons preventing Jake from taking things further. Come on, dickhead. Own up to it. It was the fucking lies that kept you from making your move.
And Jake had lied to her. About his job. The way he felt. Then there was the lie. The one that had the power to destroy her.
Sometimes, Jake would be with her, and he’d forget. They’d be hanging out, and she’d tell him a funny story about something that had happened in her E.R. He’d be listening to her talk, and the guilt of his betrayal, the secret that years ago he’d sworn to never reveal, would momentarily vanish.
Unfortunately, it never lasted. The damn thing was always there, hovering over him like a cloud of poisonous gas, just waiting for the perfect moment to swoop in and destroy the most precious thing in his world.
It didn’t matter that every lie he’d ever told Olivia stemmed solely from his need to protect her. Good intentions or not, Jake knew holding on to those secrets meant he’d never get the chance to be with the woman he loved.
It had to be that way. Not only to keep her safe, but also because Olivia deserved the world on a fucking silver platter, and Jake knew he could never give her that.
He did, however, give her as much time as he could between jobs. Since starting R.I.S.C.—the elite private security firm he owned—Jake had actually managed to never leave for an extended op without seeing Olivia first. This last time was the one and only exception.
Not once, though...not one time in all his years had Jake ever considered that he’d get back and she would be the one gone.
Ah, Christ. Liv is gone.
His empty stomach convulsed again, and no amount of training could stop it. Minutes later, when the dry heaves finally subsided, Jake’s quivering legs managed to take him back to the couch.
He sank down and rewound the broadcast. As much as he dreaded it, Jake needed all the information he could get before determining his next move.
****
C
lick below to purchase the first part of Jake and Olivia’s story:
TAKING A RISK, PART ONE
**ALL R.I.S.C. novels are full-length. Jake and Olivia are the only couple whose story is split into two books. Taking a Risk, Part One is their Happy For Now and Taking a Risk, Part Two brings you their Happily Ever After. All other books in the R.I.S.C. Series are standalones with their own HEA’s.
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