She motioned to two agents standing behind her, and they headed toward the plane to retrieve Victor Conti.
“Thank you,” she said to the group when her agents were on their way up the stairs to the aircraft. “You’ve saved many lives and spared much pain in the world by bringing Conti back. He’s a drop in the bucket, but one drop is a step forward in this fight.”
She turned her head and speared Miranda with a look. “Agent Wood, with me please.” She motioned toward a waiting car and Miranda nodded. She wanted desperately to look at Cody before she went, but she couldn’t manage it. Instead, she walked behind Sam like an automaton and climbed inside the Cadillac.
When she was seated, she looked back at the group on the tarmac. They were moving around, gathering their bags and equipment.
But Cody stood stock-still, staring at her. Her belly clenched tight. She wanted him so much. Wanted to lose herself in his arms and kiss him hard and long before falling into bed with him and not coming up for air for days.
But it wasn’t to be. The mission was over, and so was their affair. He wanted her body but he didn’t want her heart. And that was no longer enough for her. If she’d learned nothing else on this mission, she’d learned that much. She was tired of being a pit stop on the road when what she really wanted was to be someone’s destination. It wouldn’t be easy with her job, but nothing worth having ever was.
She turned her head and stared straight ahead as the driver accelerated toward the main road. It was over. And it hurt far more than she’d ever thought possible.
31
Cody waited exactly one week before he requested to see Colonel Mendez. He stood in the secretary’s office in his ACUs with the Navy rank and insignia sewn onto the Army camouflage and waited for the skipper to see him or tell him to go away.
To his surprise, he was shown into the large office with the wood paneling and the photos of the skipper with various important government officials hanging on the wall.
“What can I help you with, Petty Officer?”
Cody stood at attention. The skipper—colonel—sat at his desk looking relaxed and curious at the same time.
“Sir, I was wondering about Agent Wood.”
Mendez lifted an eyebrow. “What about her, Cowboy?”
Cody swallowed. Goddammit, this was the part where he’d known he would get tripped up. But when Miranda had walked away from him on the tarmac at Andrews, he’d realized that he didn’t know where to find her. He could look her up—and he’d done so—but she was CIA. Like him, she wasn’t easy to find. There was no Miranda Lockwood in DC. There were a few Jane Woods, but none of them were his Jane. He’d found the Lockwood family in Alabama, but he knew she didn’t ever go back, so he hadn’t tried to contact anyone there.
He would if he had to, but his first thought was the skipper. If Mendez didn’t tell him what he wanted to know, he’d go to Alabama.
“I want to talk to her, sir.”
Mendez sat back and folded his hands over his middle. “Then call her. I don’t care if you do.”
“Sir.” Cody drew in a breath. “I don’t have her number, sir.”
Mendez actually snorted. “Jesus Christ, not much of an operator, are you?”
Cody would have been insulted except he could tell the skipper was ribbing him. Operator as in smooth, not special.
“No sir, not very smooth. I didn’t get her number.”
“What if she doesn’t want to hear from you, son?”
Cody clenched his jaw. Yeah, that was possible. Maybe even probable considering she hadn’t given him her number before she’d walked away.
“I’d like to give her the chance to tell me that herself, sir.”
Mendez chuckled this time. “All right, sailor. I’ll see what I can do.” He shook his head. “You boys and your goddamn dicks. Pussy is freely available for men like you—and what do you do? Get hung up on one woman. Wrapped around her pretty little finger so hard you can’t think about anything but her.”
Cody felt himself going red. Was he hung up on Miranda? Yeah, he totally was. One week without her and he was slowly losing his mind. He didn’t understand it, but he knew he had to see her again. “Yes, sir.”
Because what else did you say to an O-6?
Mendez sighed. “Back to work, son. If I find anything, you’ll know about it.”
Miranda felt unmoored. There was something very life-changing about having two people you’d thought were your friends turn out to be traitors to everything you believed in.
She went about her life. She drove to the agency every day, and she sat in on briefings and did paperwork. Her return from the dead surprised no one. Not because they’d thought she was still alive, but simply because in the CIA you accepted that nothing was as it seemed.
Badger was arrested. She’d seen him through the two-way glass in the interrogation room. He’d snarled and cursed and looked like a different man than she’d known. Gone was the kind, solicitous, seemingly harmless handler who appeared to care about her. In his place was a hard, cold, dangerous man who had no love for his government or those in charge of the agency. He believed the way to American superiority in the world was far more violent than she did, and he was willing to use any means to get it.
Listening to him had shaken her up a bit. She wasn’t ready to quit the agency or anything like that, but she was angry that someone she’d liked could be so twisted and horrible. She’d gone home that night and called her sister. Sherri was happy to hear from her, but also distracted in that way she always was because of kids and a husband.
“How’s Mama and Daddy?” Miranda had asked after a while.
She could practically hear Sherri take the phone from her ear and gape at it. Miranda never asked about their parents.
“Mama’s the same as always—drunk off her ass and killing herself with the liquor even though she denies it. But Daddy’s found Jesus and he’s cleaned up his ways. No more drinking or smoking. No more bar hopping. He goes to Bible study and he’s joined the choir.”
Miranda’s jaw had dropped open. She’d snapped it closed and asked her sister about everyone else. By the time the call was over, she’d promised to come visit for a few days in the summer. And she felt surprisingly okay about it. In her experience, family wasn’t a magical entity that loved you no matter what, but they were the people who had the most reason to. Maybe it was time to try to forge a relationship with some of them and see what happened.
She thought of Cody almost every minute of the day. She could still see him watching her as she’d driven away, his legs parted in a wide stance, his jaw hard, his brows drawn low. If he’d made even one move toward her, given her one gesture to come back to him, she’d have rocketed out of that car and flung herself in his arms.
She missed him like crazy. She craved him, and she wasn’t getting her fix, and that made her sad and angry and hopeless in ways she had never experienced before. She knew her feelings were out of whack, all wrapped up in Mark and Badger’s betrayal and looking for a safe harbor in Cody.
She ached, but would she ache under other circumstances?
She was pretty sure the answer was no, so she made no move to seek him out. But she often thought of driving to that military base and standing outside the compound, in the parking lot, and waiting for him to emerge. She imagined his face, imagined that he would smile and then come over and take her in his arms.
She went even further than that. She imagined him picking her up and spinning her around while telling her that he loved her madly. It was a lovely fantasy, but it was just that: a fantasy.
At the end of yet another day at work, she turned off her computer and shouldered her purse, then drove home through rush-hour traffic, feeling lonely and cranky and completely out of sorts. What was wrong with her? She never stayed down long, but this time she felt like she’d never get back up again.
She stopped at her favorite guilty pleasure restaurant and picked up a pizza with extra ch
eese and pepperoni, which she planned to gorge on while sitting in front of the television and watching reruns of The Big Bang Theory because it made her laugh and she needed to laugh right now.
She parked in her spot, grabbed the pizza, and headed for her apartment on the second floor of the complex. When she reached the landing, she stopped, her heart leaping into her throat for a second.
A man sat on the floor, leaning back against the wall—and when he looked up at her, familiar blue eyes bored into hers. Her heart beat to its own crazy, reckless rhythm, hammering away in her chest like a mad thing while she tried to maintain some semblance of normalcy.
“Hi,” he said, pushing to a standing position. He was wearing camouflage. The tape over his heart said U.S. Navy. The SEAL trident was above it. The tape over his right pectoral said McCormick. There was an American flag on his right shoulder and other patches that she didn’t know the meaning of.
She took all that in very quickly, and then she was at a loss for what to say. Her brain kicked her mouth into gear with the thought that repeating the greeting was an appropriate response.
“Hi.”
He nodded to the pizza in her hands. “Expecting company?”
It was a large pizza, which was silly, but when you were trying to forget about a man, you did silly things. “Nope. All for me.”
He snorted and grinned. “Good for you, Miranda Jane. I like a woman with an appetite.”
She handed him the pizza, because she couldn’t think what else to do, and then inserted her key into the lock. When the door opened, she hesitated for a second. Then she turned to him and took the pizza.
“Why are you here?” she asked, standing in the doorframe and effectively blocking entrance to her home.
His eyes crinkled at the corners. “I told you it wasn’t enough.”
Her blood quickened. That’s what she’d said to him back in Jorwani—that it wasn’t enough, that she still wanted more.
And she did want more. Even now, standing there with him looking so hot and beautiful, she wanted to strip him of that panty-melting camo and have her wicked way with him. Repeatedly.
“I…”
She couldn’t think of a thing to say. He took the pizza, gently, and pushed her backward. She stepped back willingly and he closed the door behind them. Then he set the pizza on the hall table and stepped up to her, cupping her face in his hands. His touch was so gentle, so necessary, that she whimpered.
“I missed you, Miranda,” he said, his voice soft and deep. “I need you.”
And then he kissed her, his mouth taking hers in a surprisingly gentle kiss. But it was still hot, still stoked the fires deep within her, still made her willing to do anything to have him fan those flames higher.
It hit her, suddenly and forcefully, that what she felt for this man was so much more than she’d ever felt for anyone else in her life. She’d thought she’d loved Mark at one time, but that had been a youthful infatuation kept aloft by what she’d perceived as his perfection. He hadn’t been perfect at all—and he certainly hadn’t loved her. He’d helped her, mentored her, but it had never been anything he’d had to make sacrifices to do. She could see now, thinking back on it, his selfishness and unwillingness to compromise.
Cody wasn’t perfect. Cody didn’t pretend to be perfect. He was strong and stubborn and arrogant and pushy when he wanted something. He was also loyal—to a cause, to his profession, to the people he worked with. He was the best that this nation had to offer in defense of its ideals, and he would die upholding those ideals if necessary.
And she would die if he walked out when he was finished with the sexual heat between them. Because she was in love with him. Stone-cold in love with a man she barely knew but felt like she’d known forever.
She put her hands on his wrists, tugged until he broke the kiss and let go. He looked confused and concerned, and she took the opportunity to step away from him.
“What’s wrong, Miranda?”
She turned her back to him and took several deep breaths. She had to get herself under control. Had to face him with strength and determination, not fear or weakness.
He was waiting when she turned around again, his hands at his sides, fingers clenched into fists.
“I can’t do this,” she said, her voice sounding scratchy and hoarse. “I just can’t.”
“Do what?”
She waved a hand wildly, the beginning of the end of her control. “This! You. Me. Kissing you and losing my mind while you take me to bed. Wanting more than I should but being unable to stop.”
“You’re not making any sense,” he growled. “What’s wrong with losing your mind or wanting more? It’s the same for me.”
She choked back a sob. “No,” she yelled at him. “It’s not the same! You don’t love me—you just want to fuck me until you’re ready to move on to the next girl you meet!”
She sounded insane, she knew it, but she didn’t care. It was as if all the wild emotion she’d been holding in for so long was bubbling over and spilling out. She couldn’t stop it. Couldn’t hold it in.
“I can’t do this because I want more,” she said. “And not more sex. More you, Cody. More us, but us with a future. I want to know this is more than physical. I want someone to want the same things I do for a change. I want someone to want me.”
She thought that would be it. The moment when he’d turn and walk out and she’d never see him again. She’d let it all spill out. She’d done everything but speak the words. Unless he was an idiot, he had to know that she’d fallen for him.
But he didn’t walk out. He strode toward her, took her by the shoulders, and then dipped a finger under her chin and forced her to look up and into those beautiful blue eyes.
“There is no next girl. There’s only you. There’s only been you since I met you in Vegas. I don’t know why, I damn sure don’t know how, but you’re in my soul, Miranda. You’re so deep in there that all I can do is figure out how to be with you as much as possible. If I have to beg to be in your life, I’ll do it. Hell, I went and begged my skipper to find you for me so I could see you again.”
Her throat went dry. She was in his soul?
“I don’t know what that means, Cody.”
He looked troubled for a second. “It means that I suck at this, apparently. I’m not good with flowery words or speeches about feelings. Hell, I’ve never had to give them before—never wanted to. But you—God, Miranda—you make me want things I didn’t think were possible. I’d say I love you, but I don’t think it’s enough—”
She put a hand over his mouth, her head spinning with happiness—and fear that she’d misunderstood him. “Why isn’t it enough? It’s what I want to hear. It’s the only thing I want from you.”
She lifted her hand slowly and he smiled.
“I love you, Miranda Jane Lockwood.”
She let out a shaky sigh. Her knees were surprisingly weak, and her body trembled. “I love you too, Cody Callum McCormick.”
He blinked. “You do?”
“I do.”
He grabbed her around the waist and picked her up, hugging her tight. He didn’t spin, but she didn’t care. It was still her fantasy come true.
“You have no idea how much I want…” He waggled his eyebrows. “…that pizza,” he finished, and she burst out laughing.
“That’s my pizza, bucko.”
“Can’t you share with the man you love?” he asked, setting her down but not letting her go, his hands loosely holding her hips.
She reached up and ran her fingers over his cheek. He was hers. Truly hers. What an amazing feeling that was. So amazing she could hardly believe it was real just yet.
“You can have anything of mine you want.”
He tugged her in close and bent to put his forehead on hers. “First, pizza. Then you for dessert.”
“Sounds like a plan to me.”
32
“Did he say why he did it?” Cody asked. He was lying in Miranda’s
bed, his energy sapped after a very vigorous romp in the sheets. She was in his arms, gloriously naked, her body still flushed and damp from exertion.
They’d eaten the pizza while watching TV. He’d been happy to sit there with his arm around her and just enjoy being together. In fact, he’d fallen asleep on her couch with her tucked in beside him. She’d shaken him awake an hour or so later and told him he could stay the night if he wanted.
And he did want, but he didn’t want to sleep. He’d stripped her slowly, kissing every inch of her as he went. And then he’d pushed her back on the bed and spread her legs, touched his tongue to the heart of her, and didn’t stop until she was quivering and crying out.
When he’d finally entered her body, he’d shuddered with the force of the emotion he felt. It was different to be inside her and know he loved her, that her happiness and her pleasure were all he wanted. It heightened the sensations for him—and he’d come much faster than he’d wanted to. But that’s okay, because he was already thinking about round two.
Miranda stirred against him. “He’s a bitter, deluded man who thinks America has gotten too wrapped up in political correctness. We’re soft on terrorism, immigration, and we allow sexual deviants to get married—his words, not mine. According to him, Conti had the money and the connections to get things done—eliminate the people who needed eliminating—Americans in government or on the bench who would then be replaced with the kind of people who wouldn’t hesitate to take the fight to ISIS or the Freedom Force. Not to mention abolishing gay marriage and everything else he considers wrong with this country.”
“Damn,” Cody said. “I can understand having a strong political view, but advocating subversion and violence to achieve your objectives is definitely not the right thing to do. It’s not what this country stands for—or what we fight for.”
“Exactly. Badger—Jeff—knew Victor Conti from an old mission twenty years ago in which the agency actually worked with Conti instead of against him. He admired him—and he talked Mark into working with him to undermine the case against Conti. That’s all it was supposed to be, but then Conti decided he wanted Mark to play a bigger role in his operations. So they faked his death, against Jeff’s wishes, and then Jeff was put into a more subordinate role than he liked. Not to mention I don’t think that Conti ever really shared his views—for him, it was about the inside connection in the CIA.”
HOT SEAL Rescue (HOT SEAL Team - Book 3) Page 20
