You_Only_Love_Twice_ARE

by Lexi Blake

  The light went out and he opened the door. Pure darkness surrounded them as he took his first tentative step out into the hallway. This was the hall with the privacy rooms. There were three of them. Two on his left. One on his right. He put his left hand out and felt for the wall before moving forward. One door brushed under his fingers. He walked forward slowly but steadily. Door number two. His heart rate calmed. His breathing got back to normal. He could feel the adrenaline, but it wasn’t affecting him the way it used to.

  He stopped where the hallway ended and listened. Up ahead he could finally see some light. It was where the doors had blown open and the afternoon was now shining through. Once they left the hallway, anyone waiting would be able to see them.

  There was a crash ahead, a piece of the ceiling dropping, and he saw something that terrified him.

  Smoke. He took a deep breath and could smell it. Some part of Sanctum was burning. He had to get her outside.

  “Murdoch!”

  Phoebe tried to pull him back, but he stood his ground.

  “I’ll kill everyone to get to you. I already took out Dean. I don’t feel bad about any of it. They’re all perverts of the worst kind. Infidels. But you’re worse because you’ve seen the truth and you still turn from it.”

  “I think that’s Ace,” Phoebe whispered in his ear.

  He took a step back. The door they needed was across the dungeon, where they would be completely exposed. But he could stash her in one of the rooms. If Ace was telling him the truth, this was between the two of them and he would leave Phoebe out of it. He just had to convince Phoebe. He found the first privacy room and thanked god it was unlocked. As quietly as he could, he opened it and drew her inside. “Stay here.”

  “No,” her voice came back as a whisper but there was no way to miss the outrage there. “I’m not leaving you.”

  “It’s me he wants. I can’t deal with him and you at the same time. He says Jake is dead, but I can’t believe it. If he’s bleeding somewhere though we have to get to him, and that means going through that fuckwad out there. Please, Phoebe. Stay here and I’ll come for you.”

  Arms went around his middle. “Work fast, Murdoch. I won’t stay here for long.”

  He did believe that. She might be able to follow orders for a few minutes, but after that she would go looking for her brother and then he would have to worry about her.

  So he needed to get this done and quickly. He turned and quietly went out the door.

  “Come on, Murdoch. Your friends are dying.” Ace’s voice echoed through the space.

  Jesse concentrated, trying to figure out where the fucker was. His eyes were useless so he focused on the sounds. He could hear the thwack of falling metal. Something was moving to his left. The conference room was that way. From the sound of it, his friends were trying to dig out. Every instinct told him to rush to help them, but then he would be a target. Of course, they would be targets, too. The minute they made their way out, Ace would start picking them off.

  “How could you see the truth and turn from it?” Ace’s voice was different. In previous meetings, he’d had that laid-back, easy Western drawl it seemed to Jesse that most pilots had. Now there was a harshness to his tone, a certainty that he couldn’t mistake. This was the real man who existed in Ace’s body. “I’m happy to kill you myself. I’m happy to perform this duty for my master.”

  Jesse felt for the wall and crept out. Ace had to have come through the blown out eastern section. As he moved into the club, light began streaming in. He let his eyes adjust. In the distance, he heard the sound of sirens. They wouldn’t move Ace. The DPD could swarm in and Ace would hold his position. He would shoot the cops and not have a single regret as long as he got his target.

  Jesse couldn’t let those cops walk into a trap. He had to bring Ace out into the open.

  He clung to the wall, his eyes adjusting to the new light. Sanctum was in ruins. All around him the usually neat club was utterly destroyed. One of the big sofas from the bar area was on its side in the middle of the dungeon floor.

  “Once I’m finished with you, I will return to our master in glory and he will cover me with Allah’s blessing.”

  Crazy motherfucker. Jesse took cover behind the sofa. That voice was to his right. Behind him, he could hear something heavy moving. Any minute now Tag was going to find a way out and then all hell would break loose.

  “You’re going to die. He sent you in here to die,” Jesse called out.

  A shot rang out, but it went wide. Ace didn’t know his exact location and there were more than enough places to hide since the dungeon was strewn with tables and big pieces of the locker room for him to take refuge behind. Ace would have to come out to look for him.

  “I will die a hero’s death. I will gain my place in heaven.”

  Yeah, yeah, Jesse had been fed the seventy-two virgins line, too. He could remember looking up at the Caliph and explaining that he never really had a thing for virgins. He preferred dirty girls. Now if he could promise him seventy-two fully experienced women with a taste for the nasty, they still wouldn’t talk because having all those women to please sounded a little more like hell than heaven.

  He’d been beaten thoroughly for that quip. Apparently Ace liked them inexperienced and in mass quantities.

  The sirens were right outside. Any second the first responders would race in, likely firefighters because smoke was starting to fill the place now.

  Seconds. He had seconds before Ace started taking out the first responders.

  “Give it the fuck up, asshole,” a familiar voice yelled out.

  Jesse breathed a big sigh of relief. “He said you were dead, Dean.”

  “I’m not letting some fucked up radical kill me,” Dean said as Ace unleashed another volley. He dove for the sofa and rolled beside Jesse. “I do have a nice-sized hole in my gut though. If Case hadn’t shown up with his truck, this whole place would have gone up.”

  “Is he alive?” Jesse whispered as he started to peek around the sofa.

  “Think so. He and Theo jumped out of the truck before it hit. Pretty sure Case broke something. He better have with all his cussing.” Dean’s T-shirt was covered in blood. “We have to make a move or he’ll take hostages. Shit. Shouldn’t you have locked her up somewhere?”

  Phoebe was creeping out of the hallway. Well, she’d told him to work fast. They were going to have a long talk about the definition of the word fast. His hand would be talking to her ass before the day was through.

  Ace stood, firing toward their hiding spot. That was when Jesse realized Phoebe didn’t intend to simply come out of hiding. She was going to help. Shit. She had a thick cane in her hand and she brought it down on Ace’s head. He heard it hit, but Ace didn’t go down. He turned on her.

  “Drop!” he screamed as he stood and fired.

  Ace’s body froze, suspended for a moment, and then he fell forward.

  Jesse ran, praying he hadn’t hit her. He knelt down next to her. “Phoebe?”

  She reached for him. “You took too long.”

  Thank god. “We’ll have a talk about that. Go out to the front, hands up. The cops are here. Explain what’s going on and that we have injured. We need at least one bus. Jake took fire and he’s going to need surgery.”

  “Where’s my brother?” Phoebe asked, her eyes wide.

  “I’ll get him out. I promise. Go.” He helped her up and she strode to the entrance, her hands up.

  Jesse felt something snake around his ankle. He looked down and Ace was barely alive, his eyes staring up. Sympathy crept into Jesse’s gut. This man hadn’t asked to be tortured and turned. He knelt down. Ace’s gun was well out of range and it was easy to see he wasn’t long for the world. “It wasn’t your fault.”

  “Was,” he managed. “Should have found you sooner. Should have killed you. But there are more of us, brother. My master will send more. He will never stop.”

  Ace’s eyes went blank.

  “Is he d
ead?” Dean asked, staggering over. “Because I would really like to kill that motherfucker again.”

  A loud crash rattled what was left of Sanctum as Tag pushed through the rubble. He was bloody and battered, but alive…and pissed off.

  “You’re paying for this Ten,” he bitched as he pulled the other man through. “The US government can write me a big fat fucking check. Do you see what he did to my club?”

  “Where’s my sister?” Ten ignored him, his eyes finding Jesse. “Where’s Phoebe?”

  “I sent her out to make sure the police don’t come in guns blazing. She’s fine, though she’s in serious trouble.”

  “He dead?” Tag nodded to the body on the ground.

  “Yeah.” Jesse took no pleasure in Ace’s death. There was no triumph, just a weary truth.

  This wasn’t over and it wouldn’t be until he took the Caliph down. He had to face his demons. There was no more hiding. He had to end this.

  “Kai? Do you have it?” Tag started to pull Kai free.

  “I have it, you freak.” He passed Tag a package and dusted himself off. “My home just blew the fuck up and do you know what Big Tag was concerned about?”

  “His dessert.” Jesse knew the man well.

  “One good thing is going to come out of this,” Tag swore. “Dean, you look half dead. Let’s get you to the hospital.”

  Dean swayed on his feet. “Don’t tell Serena. It’s not that bad.”

  Jesse caught him just as he passed out. He eased Dean down to the floor. His pulse was strong, but they weren’t going to be able to hide a couple days worth of hospital stay from Serena. “Get the EMTs in here. The quicker we get him to the hospital, the better.”

  Ten started toward the door, and Tag looked down at Jesse.

  “I’m taking you out the back. Ten is going to smooth things over, but you understand what has to happen, right?”

  He did. “I died here. The Caliph needs to believe Ace did his job. And then I need to do mine.”

  In Dubai. Where he would finally end this.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  Phoebe felt numb as she stepped inside the large suite. Three days had passed since almost losing Jesse, but they’d flown by in a blur of preparation and travel. Even as Ten had driven through the streets of Dubai, she still couldn’t quite believe she was here. Now she was led into the king of Loa Mali’s suite at the Burj Al Arab Jumeirah, one of the world’s top luxury hotels. Everywhere she looked there was something sumptuous and beautiful, and all she could think about was hearing that gunfire and knowing that she would find Jesse bleeding and dying.

  She couldn’t do it again. She just couldn’t.

  “You okay?” Ten looked down at her. He still had cuts on his face and hands where the explosion had gotten him, but he swore he was fine.

  Jesse was dead. Oh, he was standing at the big bay window with Simon, looking out over the spectacular view of the Persian Gulf. He smiled that crazy-sexy smile that made her catch her breath and he pointed to something in the distance. She’d watched the news report his death and now his golden hair was a muted brown and he wore aviators when they were in public. She didn’t like it.

  “I’m fine.” She watched him, but her mind kept going back to those newscasts. Jesse Murdoch, former soldier, killed in an accidental explosion at the club he worked at. It had dredged up all the former nasty allegations, and some of the news agencies were even speculating that Murdoch had been the bomber.

  They would have a mess to deal with after this, but Ten swore he would make it right. It was one more crappy thing she’d brought into Jesse’s life.

  Taggart had worked quickly, covering up everything with the full cooperation of the Agency and the DPD. No one it seemed wanted to publically acknowledge the war that was happening right in the streets of the US.

  Ace Monroe had been killed in the explosion as well. He was scheduled to be buried with full honors at Arlington National Cemetery later that week. “He should have been exposed.”

  Ten sighed. “You know Jesse was the one who wanted it this way. If we’d opened up that can of worms, we might have sent the Caliph back underground. It was a necessary evil.”

  But Jesse hadn’t seen it as evil at all. He’d explained that he didn’t want Ace’s parents to know what had become of their son. Ace Monroe, Jesse had explained, died in Iraq. His body had simply survived his soul. Everything that made up the soldier had been destroyed by the Caliph, and it did no one a lick of good to ruin a dead man’s reputation.

  He was too good for her. Just looking at him made her heart ache.

  She couldn’t do it again. No way. She was going to leave when this op was over.

  Jesse strode up to her and took her hand. “Come over here. You’ve got to see this view.”

  He pulled her over to the window, his hands winding around her waist and his head settling next to hers. They’d been separated for days. Jesse had been in hiding and Phoebe had been working with Ten to prep for their trip. It had almost been a relief to be apart from him. She’d dived into work, studying all the power players and writing up reports on each. She’d found a proper distance.

  Now her body heated up and she could feel her willpower draining away. The minute his hands were on her, she was reminded that he was alive and she couldn’t resist him. It was dangerous.

  “Do you know what I’m going to do to you tonight?” Jesse whispered in her ear. “I owe you some discipline. Don’t think I’ve forgotten how you disobeyed my very direct orders back at Sanctum.”

  “I’m tired,” she managed.

  “Won’t save you. Besides, you managed to sleep on the plane.”

  Only because he’d dragged her into his lap the minute it was safe to do so. He’d pulled her out of her chair and petted her over and over while he and Simon and Ten talked. At first she’d been uncomfortable with her brother there, but Jesse had been patient. In the end, she’d been draped across his body, sleeping in his arms.

  Tonight she would do more than sleep in his arms. Tonight she would let him spank her, make love to her. She would fall more helplessly in love with a man she couldn’t have. Shouldn’t even want.

  “God, you two get a room,” Erin said irritably as she walked in followed by Theo Taggart.

  Jesse just grinned. “We’re working on it. Any word on where our contact is?”

  “He’s on his way. Apparently he has a massive entourage, so we’re going to try to blend in,” Theo explained. “I also just talked to Case. He’s deeply enjoying his bonding time with big brother.”

  Case had broken his femur when he jumped from the moving truck. Just being reminded of it made Phoebe a little queasy. If Case hadn’t been tailing Ace and the bomb had gone off where it should have, they would all have been gone. Her brother, Taggart…Jesse. She’d dreamed about it the night before. She’d dreamed she was the sole survivor walking through their bodies.

  “What did he really say?” Ten asked.

  “He told me that Ian’s a fucking maniac and I better come back to the States and get him out of there. He wants to know why he couldn’t have gone out to the Circle M, or pretty much anywhere else.”

  Ten shrugged. “I owe Tag. Also, Charlotte was very insistent. I do not argue with pregnant women, especially not one as good with firearms as Charlotte is.”

  “I’m thrilled he’s getting to spend a little time with the old guy.” Theo frowned. “Could we forget I called him the old guy?”

  “I’m texting him now,” Erin replied, her phone in hand.

  Simon stepped away from the window. “How about you two stop bickering and we get to the reason for our very long flight. Did you read through the files on the plane or just insult each other?”

  “She’s the one who’s in the perpetual bad mood,” Theo shot back.

  “That’s because my real partner got replaced with a little boy,” Erin complained. She had not been thrilled when Tag had pulled Li from the op. With Dean in the hospital and Alex on pa
ternity leave, Li had stayed behind to do much of the day-to-day operations. Ten had stepped up to lead because Ian wouldn’t leave Charlotte, and Theo had replaced Liam on their team.

  Theo towered over Erin. “I’ll show you just how much of a man I can be, sweetheart.”

  “Stop it both of you,” Simon ordered. It was obvious Simon was the senior McKay-Taggart operative.

  Erin turned to face Simon, her body at attention. You could take the woman out of the Army, but in Erin’s case, it looked like the Army wasn’t out of the woman. “Yes, sir. I did read the files. I think it could be any one of those pompous assholes. I’d just shoot them all to be completely sure. But that’s just my opinion, sir. Isn’t Murdoch supposed to know him by sight?”

  “I was pretty much either high or brutally beaten most of the time I actually spent with him,” Jesse explained. “I’ve got three suspects. Until I’m in the same room, it’s hard to tell. Those men are the right age and they’re close to what I remember.”

  “Two of those men are members of the al Fareed family,” Simon said grimly.

  Phoebe whistled because that was not good news. Every man here was powerful and wealthy and had more clout than anyone else on the planet, but now they were talking about almost royalty. “Damn. If that’s true, we’ve got real trouble. They’re one of the wealthiest families in Saudi. And they’re moderates.”

  “They say they are,” Ten murmured.

  “Just because one member is a radical doesn’t mean the whole family is in on it,” Simon replied.

  “But if they know what he’s doing and they’ve given him any aid, it could seriously damage US/Saudi relations.” She didn’t even want to think about what it could do to the price of oil or the destabilizing effect it could have on the world economy.

  The doors opened and a gorgeous man burst through. Six foot four, with dark hair that brushed his shoulders and sun-kissed caramel skin, the king of Loa Mali had been blessed with more than money and power. Even Erin’s eyes widened as he strode in with a charming smile on his face. “My friends.”