by Dawn Ryder
She laughed softly at that idea. She’d always been the one leading Mia off the path of straight and narrow. Maybe it was just fate getting in a good swing at her for a change. Flipping the tables on her in the form of two delicious men tempting her with the forbidden. Like love. She’d sworn it off long ago about the time some jerk had turned out to have a wife hidden at home.
Dack wouldn’t do that to her.
Another frown marred her face as she dressed. She had no reason to believe in him so deeply. She could still like him a lot and not think such a thing about him but the emotion wiggled right past years of jaded experience to warm her heart. Dack had honor. She saw it in his eyes, it was just one of those things that no one could fake.
Changing into culottes and a tank top, she placed her earrings and bracelet in her safe. Sealing the little door, she turned and went back down the stairs. Later, after she bailed Mia out, she was going to examine that idea of forbidden relationships of three people, that lasted and really were that happy-ever-after type.
“She sure made it simple for us to walk away.” In spite of that, Dack didn’t feel like leaving.
“Consider doing it and I’ll think about killing you myself.”
Dack watched the way Logan eyed him. He was jealous. It was a feeling Dack knew from experience too. There was just no way for one of them to hook up without the other dealing with frustration. It was human nature to a certain degree.
But Cambria was something different. Logan wasn’t just horny.
Dack wasn’t sure about anything except that he wasn’t willing to clear out of her place and never look back. He should. Black Water eyes were always looking for him. Staying in one place too long left hints that could be used to track him and Logan. It might be a security camera at a bank or shopping center. Something most people didn’t think about, but the modern age included more video surveillance than most civilians suspected. It was watched over by military men and that ran the risk of Black Watch members being able to find him.
Logan reached for his Stetson, tugging the brim low over his eyes. It was a habit he’d adopted since he turned his rank in. He shot a hard look across the kitchen. “I’m not done here.”
Dack wasn’t either. The crazy idea of sharing Cambria never would have taken hold in either of their brains if Robyn hadn’t shown them that it could work. He guessed that it was easy to forget that humans, like all animals, had the ability to adapt encoded in their genes. That was something he and Logan knew well. Extreme situations often led to unorthodox methods and solutions. Such as sharing a woman. With Cambria’s sexual poise it shouldn’t be such a farfetched idea.
Maybe what bothered him was the fact that he didn’t want to share.
His cock gave a twitch as he shrugged into his jacket. A corner of his mouth lifted as he looked at Logan. That was the core of the problem. He, Dack Tyden, was actually feeling possessive. It socked him in the gut, sending a jolt of sensation up his body.
But not all of it was bad. Nope. That part of him still left from when he viewed his life with hope found his jealousy a shining example of the possibility that he wasn’t as jaded as he tried to tell himself he was. It burned through the anger that had kept him warm for what felt like an eternity. It left him with a stupid grin on his lips and Cambria’s face swimming through his thoughts.
You bet he’d be back.
* * * * *
Traffic wasn’t too bad and that left Cambria with plenty of time to think about Dack as she drove. She chewed on her lower lip, unable to decide what she thought about anything. That was a real jolt. Her life had been pressed into submission for the last few years, bending to her will as she climbed the career ladder.
How did one man change that?
Well, pair of men. That right there was cause for deliberations. But everything centered on Dack and the way he’d held her. The sex was tops but something had ripped through her heart as that hammock had swung. It had just been so tender. Something she hadn’t expected after the hard sex they’d shared. Inside him was a teddy bear and her inner princess had a love of teddy bears.
As she turned the corner, Mia’s car came into sight. A tow truck was already hooking up chains to it. Her friend was pacing in quick little strides on the shoulder of the road as Cambria pulled up.
“Thanks, Cambria, you’re the best.”
“How did you sneak away from family night?”
Her friend shrugged. “There’s a martial arts competition tomorrow for the studio kids, so everyone went to bed early because they have to be up before dawn.”
Mia was a nightclub dream, dressed in a miniskirt that showed off her long legs and a halter top that displayed her flat belly. She looked in style and in shape. Her meek and mild manners covered up the third-degree black belt she’d earned alongside her brothers. The tight belly was a testimony to the hours she still spent training. But she was afraid to let her mother and father know that she liked to go dancing. Loved it in fact. Mia came alive on the dance floor.
“What’s bothering you?”
Cambria snapped her mind back to attention. Mia could read her face like a book.
“Nothing, nothing at all.”
Mia scoffed at her. “Good try, Cambria, but I know you. Your mind is turning something in circles.”
Cambria rolled her eyes. “You are so annoying when you call my bluff.”
“Remember that water can carve away stone.” Mia smiled at her. “You may be fire but I have my strengths.”
Cambria laughed. “Come on, get in and I’ll drive you home.”
“While you tell me all about it.”
She probably would too. Mia had the ability to twist information out of her like squeezing an orange. Her friend climbed into the back seat and began changing.
“My clothes are going to be way too big on you.”
Mia scoffed as she pulled a sweatshirt over her head before tugging her halter top down. “I’d take a trash bag over my miniskirt. My family might ship me to North Korea if they saw me in this. But you’re avoiding the issue.”
Cambria made a right turn to enter the freeway. “I don’t think you’d believe me if I told you.”
Mia looked between the seats at the rear view mirror, her face pensive. “You sound like you’re falling in love.”
“You can’t tell a thing like that from my voice.”
Mia smiled slowly, her eyes closing to slits. “Remember who the water sign is. I know how to listen better than you.” There was another rustle of clothing before Mia finished her thought. “You can tell the difference in a person who’s in love. Better watch out my fire sign friend, I think you have met your match and don’t want to admit it.”
“Love is a mighty serious word for someone I just met a few days ago.”
“The connection is either there or it isn’t. Americans are mixed up about that. You don’t decide to fall in love, it grabs you and refuses to let you go. The only thing you get to decide is whether or not to let such a gift go. Don’t let your pride push you into making rash decisions. Listen to your heart, Cambria. Sometimes fate only sends you one true love.”
But what did you do when it came with a partner? Cambria worried her lower lip. Her mother wouldn’t have one moment of indecision about it. She wouldn’t either, if it was just sex. That was the scary part. The way Dack and Logan were able to touch her heart. They did it without trying, just by being themselves. There was no controlling it, jerking her poise out from under her feet.
“I’ll try, China Doll.”
* * * * *
Cambria pulled into her garage and rubbed her tired eyes before getting out of her car. She was beat. Dead-dog tired. Well, gee whiz, it was only three thirty in the morning. That accounted for the ache in her head.
The weariness of her flesh was a whole different matter. Grabbing a shower in her downstairs bathroom, she hummed at the ache inside her passage. Playing with her vibrator just didn’t produce the same level of pleasure that
flesh-to-flesh contact yielded.
Of course, Dack had something to do with the overload of pleasure. She walked upstairs naked. The condo was dark, only her night lights flickering from selected light sockets. Living alone, she liked just a couple of lights in the hallways to keep it from being pitch black. If that was girlie, whatever.
A yellow glow filled her bedroom. She noticed it more, because the night light in the hallway didn’t penetrate into the master suite. A lone candle was flickering on the nightstand next to her bed. A small glass lamp she didn’t own was placed over it to provide safety.
Her bed was turned down. A single rose lay on her pillow. Her heart flopped and melted into a puddle. She instantly felt more alone than she ever had in her own bed. The memory of Dack holding her, stroking her skin in the hammock, illuminating how bleak sleeping alone was. She huffed as she leaned over and blew the candle out. She’d never noticed a lack before. Tonight shouldn’t be any different.
Yeah, well it was. And Mia’s words echoed through her mind as she slipped into slumber.
Chapter Six
“I could kill the pair of you and justify it.” Robyn glared at Dack but made sure to turn her eyes towards Logan before he escaped her wrath.
“Dack’s been known to have that effect on people.” Jace hooked her waist from behind and pulled her against his body in spite of her wriggling. “I’ll be happy to help you work off all that energy.” He spoke near her ear, keeping her pressed against his length.
“Fine. Works for me.” She offered Dack a smile. “You deal with the rest of your assessment.”
Dack watched Robyn clear out of his house but couldn’t quite work up any real annoyance with her. He was being a dick. The only thing that made his behavior remotely redeemable was Logan’s demeanor.
Logan was currently being a fucking asshole.
And he was being lenient with the title out of compassion. Maybe it was due to the hard-on in his shorts. Dack didn’t really care. He’d had more erections in the last twenty-four hours than a man his age should have to suffer while he was alone. A hard cock knocking around behind his fly was better suited to a fresh-faced kid who still thought getting it up was cool.
He wasn’t amused.
The reason was simple. He knew what he wanted to do with that hard-on. It wasn’t fucking annoying, it was the urge to fuck riding him hard. He wanted to get into his truck and break every speed limit between him and Cambria. The urge wasn’t just about pussy. Cambria was attached to his desire. Her expression, her in-your-face attitude and the sassy way she dared him to touch her. The way she felt lying across his body once they were both spent, that sweet moment when she’d enjoyed his arms around her haunted him most of all.
Logan cussed as Robyn left. He hit his laptop harder than necessary and the screen flickered. He pushed his chair back and walked away from it.
“I need some air.”
Logan was gone a second later. Dack swiveled his chair around, placing his back to his own laptop. Work was the furthest thing from his mind. His entire living room plus dining room was their office. There was space for multiple laptops and Robyn’s desk was in the dining room. He didn’t need to go back into the city to finish up the assessment job. Everything could be emailed and faxed. That should have made him happy. His mountaintop cabin was the closest thing to secure that he knew. Between the men of his unit, they owned enough of the remote area to cut the traffic flow almost completely. Every now and again some lost skier would drive by, but it was rare, because the resorts were on the other side of the ridge. Robyn reminded him of how much fun she had driving the thirty miles to get food and other supplies.
Dack grinned. Well, the remoteness allowed them to all live in relative peace. Here, he got a full night’s sleep and so did Logan. Instead of each team of men watching out for each other, the teams took turns on night watch. That allowed for them to have a somewhat normal lifestyle.
It was a long way from Cambria’s Tahitian paradise…
Beck Corbett’s face appeared in the kitchen window. His sniper cut him a quick, two-finger salute before he walked across the deck and the doorknob turned.
“You look mighty healthy to me.”
Beck shrugged, unrepentant. His blue eyes were focused intently, a normal state of being for Corbett. He was the team sniper. The only man who didn’t have a partner. He was a loner. It was just part of his nature. Trying to hook him up with a partner was a fate worse than death as far as Corbett went.
“I wasn’t sick, I just wasn’t finished scouting.” That got Dack’s attention. Beck could dig in for days, waiting for his prey to cross his sight path. Beck reached into the vest he was wearing and pulled a large envelope out. His eyes actually sparkled but not with joy. Oh, no way in hell, not Beck. Pure satisfaction shone out of his eyes, the same sort of enjoyment Dack witnessed in him before he put on his ghillie suit and went out to set up a kill shot.
“I found him. Got a picture of his face.” Beck wiggled the envelope. “Caught them in the act this time with face shots.”
“You’re shitting me.” Dack was out of his chair, his fingers reaching for that envelope. His chair went smashing into the table his laptop was on but he didn’t even turn around. The laptop was nothing compared to what Intel might be inside the yellow envelope. True to his nature, Beck was silent as Dack ripped the envelope open and pulled the eight by ten photos from it.
Dack drank in the details of the faces in those photos. Men he would never forget were displayed in living color, captured in the act of exchanging surface-to-air missiles. Turning one of the photographs, he scanned the weapon being sold a little closer, looking for identification markings on it.
“It’s Soviet Union vintage.”
That wasn’t surprising. A couple of decades after the collapse of the superpower, stockpiles of ammunition had a tendency to show up on the black market with frightening regularity. The new Russia didn’t have the resources or manpower to keep all its former military holdings secure. Even worse was the fact that hundreds of secret military posts were erased from existence when the Iron Curtain crumbled. The secret bases located in the provinces that broke away from the Soviet Union often didn’t know what was standing on their own ground. The military commanders who knew about the posts burned the documents and abandoned their stockpiles of weapons.
Mercenary groups such as Black Water were selling off those weapons, as they searched for more.
Pulling another photo into view, Dack felt a chill shoot down his spine. He’d spent five years with a dishonorable discharge when the man in the photo should have stood in his place at his trial.
Raul Ramos was captured in living color selling arms. It was a beautiful shot that he’d waited a long time to see. Grouped together with the other pictures they had of the other men in the photos, it would complete a case that would shoot a hole in the one that had been brought against him and his men.
“I’ve got a great video of it too.” Beck spoke in his ultralow tone again. He pressed all five fingertips to his lips and blew them out like a Cajun chef. “Brought a tear to my eye.”
“Mine too.”
Staring at the picture of Ramos, Dack felt every second of the last five years burn into him. He’d figured the man as a possible suspect. Ramos was on the short list of officers who would have had access to his personal information and service record. It took a traitor to work on the inside of the Special Forces, for groups like Black Watch to keep finding the best-trained men. But even having a short list didn’t make it easy to target in on the one man they needed. What was most important was catching their man with dirt on his hands. You just didn’t go pointing a finger at the brass. But it had also taken someone at his level to bury him in a fake case that had ended in his dishonorable discharge. He’d been lucky it hadn’t landed him in military prison.
“I’ve got to find the money.”
Beck shook his head. “Check the next frame.”
Pulling up th
e next photo in the stack, Dack stared at the stack of gold bars pictured there.
“Shit.”
“My thoughts exactly.” Beck’s voice was laced with frustration.
Gold. The one currency that was accepted worldwide and untraceable until you cashed it in. Even that wasn’t a guarantee that there would be a record of the transaction. Taken to the Middle East or Asia, gold could be liquidated without paper trails. Some of the richest men in the world traded for gold because it was an investment that could always be sold. Wars affected land and the resources on that land, but gold bars could be smuggled out on a refugee’s body, in a gas tank or a dozen other places no one thought to check.
“But it’s still enough to fry his ass.” Beck was ready to kill. Dack knew the tone and had to admire his man’s restraint in not dropping Ramos instead of snapping his picture. Hell, he’d have been tempted himself.
“Get everyone in here.” He flipped back through the shots, pausing on the closeup of Ramos. “We need to have a strategy session.”
“You got it, Captain.”
Yeah, he was going to get it. Five years of planning, tracking and detail analyzing was paying off. Every man in his unit shared the triumph because they’d all taken their turn in the effort to sniff out their prey. Beck knew that, respected it and that was the reason he hadn’t dropped Ramos when he’d had the chance. Every man in their unit had the right to share in that moment when the bastard was taken down.
Cambria’s face floated right over his thoughts of revenge. A jolt of need cut through his heart as he just couldn’t resist thinking about being free enough to ask her to share his life. The emotion was slightly stunning. Maybe it was just the thought of the possibility that was making him so damn giddy but at the moment he didn’t give a rat’s ass.
