“No, not really. You told me what it was for. You didn’t tell me the plan.”
She blew out a breath. And then she shook her head. “I honestly don’t think I’m supposed to tell you any more than I already have.”
“I’m pretty much the only one who believes you right now. You sure you want to keep me in the dark?”
She laid her head back against the couch cushion and fixed him with a look. “You’re wrong, you know that?”
“Enlighten me.”
“I am a rogue, at least by your definition. You said it was someone who had an agenda beyond the official agenda—and yes, I do. This is personal to me, Cody. I volunteered because I have a personal stake. Hell, I pushed for the op in the first place.”
It wasn’t the first time she’d said his name, but this time the sound of it on her lips made his balls start to ache.
“I’ve been an agent for four years now. I was lucky to get in, quite honestly. I had a mentor—” She swallowed and dropped her gaze for a moment. “A man who saved me from myself when I was eighteen. He found someone to look after me, someone to make sure I got my GED and became a productive citizen. He was my idol in many ways, and I wanted to make him proud.”
She didn’t have to say that man was an agent. It was clear.
“We were lovers,” she said.
Cody didn’t like the stab of feeling in his gut at that news.
“But we weren’t in love or anything. Or Mark wasn’t. I was certain I loved him for a time, but he didn’t return it. He cared for me though. We stopped being lovers a long time ago, but the friendship never went away. He got assigned to infiltrate Conti’s organization. He worked it for months, and he was good at it. I was his contact on the outside. He was so close to breaking their code, to knowing the whole operation—and then his car blew up one morning when he was supposed to be meeting me to pass information.”
“I’m sorry, Miranda.”
“Thank you. I know it’s the nature of what we do, the possibility in every assignment—but it was still a shock.” She sniffed, but she wasn’t crying. “Of course he was killed by someone in Conti’s organization—but it wasn’t Conti. In all the intel afterward, he seemed stunned by it. He never knew Mark was an agent. But someone did, and they not only eliminated him, they also never told their boss.”
“So you weren’t just trying to complete what Mark started, you were also trying to find out who killed him.”
She clasped her hands in her lap. “Yes. It was a long shot, but I had to try.”
“Did anyone else know what you were really after?”
“Badger. They were best friends. Went to college together. He wants Mark’s killer as much as I do.”
“He also wants you to come in.”
“He means well. He thinks he can protect me.”
“But you don’t believe he can.” It wasn’t a question.
She sighed. “In many ways, I don’t know what to believe anymore. But I’m pretty sure that going in would not work out in my favor just yet.” Her golden eyes were sad, troubled. “I’m putting my faith in your group, Cody. You’re all I have right now.”
He didn’t know why he did it, but he reached out and took her hand in his. Squeezed. She didn’t try to remove it. “I’m not quitting, sunshine. None of us are quitting. We’ll clear your name.”
It was a tall order, but goddammit, he wasn’t giving up until they had. Miranda Lockwood might be a lot of things, but a traitor to her country was not one of them.
“Of all the shitty luck I’ve had today, I’m beginning to believe that choosing you in the Venetian was not part of it.”
Cody grinned. “Of course it wasn’t. You’re going to remember this day as the day you met me for the rest of your life. Probably name your first kid after me or something.”
She frowned, but he could see the hint of a smile in it. “You’re insane.”
“Quite possibly.”
She yawned, her jaw cracking. “I need to go to bed.”
He stood and stretched. “Yeah, me too. But sunshine?”
Her eyes looked sleepy. “Yes?”
“There’s only one bedroom.”
10
“This strikes me as a bad idea,” Miranda said, standing in the entry to the bedroom. She was wearing one of Cody’s T-shirts for a nightie because she had nothing else, and it suddenly felt far too short even though it came to midthigh.
He was wearing a pair of athletic shorts, but his chest was bare. And that was definitely a problem, because whoa and damn, that was a mighty fine chest. He had a tattoo on his left pectoral muscle. She realized a moment later that it was the Navy SEAL trident. He also had a tattoo on his shoulder—she noticed it when he turned around to finish pulling the covers down—that said Where None Dare. The HOT motto, though not many would know that.
Miranda swallowed as he turned back to her. His blue eyes appeared placid, but then she saw they really were not. Still waters run deep and all that. His gaze slipped over her, lingering on her bare legs for a moment. His eyes were… hot. And the look in them made her tremble.
She tried to remember how Mark had looked at her. If she’d ever trembled because of it. He’d been tall, brown-haired with a hint of silver at the temples, and his eyes were green. They’d been interesting eyes. Eyes that had seen much and yet gave nothing away.
But he’d never, not once, looked at her with the heat that Cody did.
Why not?
“It’s the only option,” he said, interrupting her thoughts. “If you want to get any sleep, that is. You can try the couch—but it’s pretty damned uncomfortable.”
That it was. It was old and lumpy and the arms were hard. She wasn’t very tall, but she couldn’t stretch across the whole couch. And it was pretty damn clear that he wasn’t going to sleep on the couch. No way would he fit.
She went over to the queen-sized bed and fluffed up the pillow on her side before primly getting under the covers. “Stay on your side, cowboy, and we’ll get along just fine.”
He chuckled as he tossed his pillow against the headboard. “Sunshine, it won’t be a problem. I sleep in worse conditions and closer quarters with people who aren’t nearly as pretty as you—and not one of them has ever complained that I’m incapable of respecting personal space.”
She sniffed. “Unless there’s something you aren’t telling me, I don’t think those SEALs are your type—whereas I might be.”
He laughed outright this time, and she felt herself coloring. Really, could she sound any more like a frightened virgin maiden with a serious stick up her ass?
“Yeah, you’re definitely my type. You’ve got all the parts I like best—and I’ve seen those parts, so I know how magnificent they are. But unless you ask me to come out and play, I know how to keep my dick in my pants and my hands to myself. You’ve got nothing to worry about.”
He sank onto the bed, but instead of getting under the covers, he stayed on top. Miranda flicked off her light and closed her eyes. She was tired—more tired than she’d realized—and yet sleep was still elusive. Ten minutes went by. Then fifteen.
Her mind was too busy concentrating on the sounds the man beside her made—not that he made much sound at all, but every shift of his body on the mattress, no matter how slight, created a disturbance that rolled through her. He was also reading on his phone. She could tell because of the light pressing against her eyes.
“Why were you in Vegas?” she finally asked, needing to hear the sound of his voice. Needing to know she wasn’t on her own. She wasn’t afraid of being alone, not usually, but now that she’d been betrayed by someone in the agency, she felt completely without connections to anything or anyone. She didn’t like that feeling.
It’s your own fault, a voice whispered in her head. You broke ties with your sisters, your parents.
Yes, she had. And she didn’t regret it. Not usually.
“I was visiting family.”
She opened her eyes and
gazed up at his handsome profile. “In the Venetian?”
He was silent for a moment. “I was looking for someone.”
It hit her then that perhaps he had a girlfriend, or even a wife. What if he’d been looking for a woman? And she’d interrupted him. Taken him away before he could meet whomever he was meeting.
“I’m sorry if I ruined your plans,” she said. It was a lame apology—and a late one—but it was the best she could do. Though if she’d taken him away from another woman, she wasn’t sorry for it. She should be, but she wasn’t.
“No plans.” He sighed. “I was looking for my mother. She has a habit of disappearing into the Vegas scene and upsetting my grandparents.”
She didn’t know what to say to that. “I’m sorry I interrupted your search then.”
And she really was. It was clear he wasn’t happy about what his mother had done. If she hadn’t interfered, he might even now be reunited with his mom.
“Don’t be. She doesn’t want to be found anyway. Plus I’m fucking tired of looking every time she goes off the rails. If it weren’t for Gramps and Grandma, I wouldn’t do it.”
“My mother is an alcoholic,” she said and then wanted to bite her tongue. Where the fuck had that come from? She didn’t share those things with anyone. Not ever. It was a life she’d left behind, a life she didn’t want or need.
“Mine probably is too, but she’s always hidden it so well. She can stop for weeks at a time. Then she inevitably goes on another bender, and the shit hits the fan.”
“I don’t remember my mother ever not drinking,” Miranda said, her throat tight. The utter dysfunction of the Lockwood family as her mother drank all day and her father came home with coal staining his skin, spitting mad and ready to tear into his wife and kids, was seared into her soul forever. The utter fucking misery of it all would never be washed away. That was why she’d never gone back again. Why she couldn’t.
“She hit the bottle all day long,” she continued. “Whatever cheap shit she could beg, borrow, or steal. And when she couldn’t get her vodka, she’d drink cough syrup for the alcohol content. It wasn’t a good substitute though.”
“I’m sorry you had to grow up that way. It’s not fair to the kids.”
“No.” She swallowed the hard lump in her throat. It was dark, except for his phone, which made the situation seem cozy and safe. She knew it wasn’t, and yet she wanted to talk. For once in her life, she wanted to share it with someone. Blame it on the stress of her current circumstances.
“I have five sisters. We were left alone a lot, and that’s fine when you’re kids in the country. There’s plenty to do when your life revolves around fields and streams. We’d take off in the morning and wouldn’t come home until late. Daddy worked the coal mines, and his hours were erratic. I think I sometimes went for days without seeing an adult, truth be known.”
“Mark saved you from that life?”
Had he? Or had he merely encouraged her in the right direction when she needed it most? “I left home at eighteen. I didn’t have a plan, not really. Other kids were going to college, but how the hell was I going to afford that?” She shook her head. “The only way out for me was to leave. I should have joined the military, I see that now, but instead I decided to strip and earn my fortune that way.” She couldn’t help but snort a laugh at the naive teenager she’d been.
“I was there for a week before things went to hell. One of the clients wanted a bit more than a lap dance. When I said no, he tried to force me into another room. I have no doubt he’d have raped me. But Mark was there, and he stopped the guy. Then he bundled me away and I never went back. Not even to collect my last paycheck.”
Cody swore. “Good thing he was there.”
“Yes.” She sighed and closed her eyes. Her skin prickled with heat. She thought about tossing the covers off and then decided it wasn’t a good idea really. Not with Cody here, and not with the electric hum simmering deep inside her veins. She felt like one hot look might set her off.
“Do you get back home much?” he asked, and everything inside her went still.
“There’s nothing to go back for. My mother is still an alcoholic, and my father is still an asshole. I talk to my oldest sister—nothing has changed and nothing ever will.”
Miranda frowned. Why the effing hell was she still talking about this? It only made her seem weak and pitiful—and she would never be either of those things.
“I get it. I go back for my grandparents. My mom—well, she’s a good person deep down, but she’s selfish and miserable, and she makes everyone around her miserable. It’s more than I want to deal with when I’m taking a break from the realities of the job.”
“Exactly.”
She loved that he understood. Mark had often asked why she didn’t go home for a visit, why she didn’t try. He’d believed she needed that connection, but then he’d been an orphan who’d never known his own parents. He and his sister had been raised by an aunt and uncle who apparently weren’t the warmest people on the planet.
He’d thought her parents were simply flawed people, not toxic destroyers of everything good in life, because that’s what he needed to believe about parents in general.
“I’m still sorry I interrupted your evening, Cody. And sorry if I took you away from visiting with your grandparents.”
“Honestly, sunshine? I love them and love seeing them, but getting kidnapped by you and being on the run from Victor Conti—and the CI-fucking-A—is a lot more fun.”
She wanted to laugh but she managed not to. “You have a warped idea of fun.”
“Oh, I have plenty of other ideas about what’s fun,” he said, his voice a lovely deep purr that strummed against her nerve endings. “Let me know if you want to hear them.”
11
She did want to hear them. Badly. Her body sizzled with heat, her pussy growing wet and achy with need. It had been so long. Too long. She wanted a man, wanted the comfort that kind of closeness could give. She also wanted an orgasm that someone else made happen. She was tired of getting herself off in the loneliness of an empty bed.
When was the last time she’d slept with a man? It was over a year ago, that much was certain. She and Mark hadn’t been together anymore, not like that. She’d started dating a guy, another agent—the sex had been decent but not memorable. They’d gone their separate ways, and that was the end of that. It was difficult, quite honestly, to find time—or the right sort of person—in the job she was in.
Too hilarious that she’d been playing a pornography talent agent in order to insert herself into Conti’s operations. If she’d had to be on set for any of that stuff, she’d have probably gone straight to the adult toy store and bought a vibrator after it was over.
Her breathing grew heavier, her nipples tingling as they beaded tight under the T-shirt. All she had to do was reach out and touch him. Just touch him, give the signal, and he’d end this drought for her. Hell, even if he sucked, at least he had a big cock—which would probably be enough to send her over the edge once he slid it inside her.
He’d gone back to reading on his phone, clearly not believing she would take him up on that offer.
And really, she couldn’t. It was a nice thought—a thought that made her whimper—but this was not the time to start messing around with a Navy SEAL. She needed her wits about her—and she needed him to have his. Sex was a distraction.
The light on his phone winked out, and then he laid it on the bedside table. He settled down beside her but not touching her.
“Try to sleep,” he said into the stillness. “We’re safe here for now, I promise.”
“What if somebody remembers seeing us switch to the Dodge? What if Conti’s men are right behind us?”
“It’s possible, sure. But they won’t have seen where we went, Miranda. The Dodge is equipped with a signal scrambler. Nobody’s going to be able to pinpoint our location using the GPS.”
“I hope you’re right.”
; “I am. Sleep tonight. Tomorrow we’ll find out what we need to do next.”
She lay in the dark and listened. When his breathing evened out, she experienced a moment of elation. She could leave if she wanted. Take the truck and go. But where would she run? Who would help her? She couldn’t turn to Badger. He would want to help, of course, but if she was compromised, then so was he—which meant she couldn’t trust that any communication she had with him wouldn’t be intercepted.
She turned onto her side and let her gaze slide over the form of the man beside her. No, she wasn’t leaving him. For good or bad, he was her only hope right now. It was such an odd thought. She didn’t know him. They’d never worked together. But from the moment she’d pushed her pistol into his side, he’d been calm and deliberate in his actions.
Yeah, he looked like a hot cowboy in his boots and faded jeans—except that he needed a hat, though she was kind of glad he didn’t have one. He’d be much too appealing with a cowboy hat.
As if he wasn’t already too appealing. Miranda worked on her breathing, tried to calm the thudding of her heart. It was as if she’d drank an entire pot of coffee when she hadn’t had any at all. Jesus.
She turned onto her back and folded her hands over her middle, closing her eyes and praying for sleep. But she knew it wasn’t going to come. She was too keyed up, her brain spinning as she tried to process everything that had happened in the past few hours.
Who would want to discredit her? And why? Why would this person betray her to Conti?
Because he or she has been paid off, that’s why. It’s not personal.
No, it probably wasn’t personal. She was just the one caught in the middle when the shit hit the fan.
She had been lying there for a long time, listening to Cody breathe, trying to sleep and figure out what her next move should be, when Cody’s body began to jerk. He twitched and moaned, calling out once or twice, though it was nothing intelligible.
She recognized bad dreams. She had them herself sometimes. You didn’t do a job like this and not get nightmares. It was only if the nightmares interfered with your life that they became a problem.
HOT SEAL Rescue (HOT SEAL Team - Book 3) Page 5
