Variations (Base Branch Series Book 9)

by Megan Mitcham

  Everything pulled him toward that party because he knew Marina would be there. He pushed himself away from it with equal force. He didn’t blame her for Hunter’s death. That he set squarely on his shoulders. Shouldn’t he tell her as much? After all the crap she’d been through, she deserved whatever solace he could give.

  Oliver didn’t know if he had the strength to see her, speak to her, and then walk away. For the first time since the hospital, he knew where she’d be tonight. After weeks of avoiding her as if she carried the Zombie virus, he knew he didn’t have the strength to stay away a minute more.

  His boots moved fast, carrying him to his motorcycle, through the city, and to the house. During the entire drive, he prayed that he’d wasted enough time to miss the party.

  When he turned into the driveway, he discovered two things. One, compound did not accurately describe the Stronghold place. Estate did justice to the sprawling driveway lined with moss-covered live oaks that led to a massive Colonial-style mansion. Two, from the lights glowing inside and out of the six-pillar form and the music pouring from the backyard, the party had just hit its stride.

  To keep from drawing attention, he parked at the opening of the massive circular drive and hoofed it toward the front door. The white wood and black lion knocker looked inviting enough, yet he still veered to the side yard. A fifteen-foot brick fence lined the perimeter, but the scrawling wrought-iron gate hung open.

  Oliver stopped at the threshold to get his shit together. Too late. The simple vision of Marina knocked him back a step.

  Her vibrant blond hair hung in a loose braid over one shoulder. A light shimmer replaced the dark circles that had once haunted her eyes. Smooth, full, sun-kissed skin with a hint of muscle wrapped the elegant bone structure with which he’d become all too acquainted. Teal blue fabric hugged ample breasts, a narrow waist, and a curvaceous backside made for worshipping. Most striking of all was the wide grin stretching her sweet lips.

  She stood between a blonde who had more than a foot and fifteen muscular pounds on her and a big guy Oliver didn’t know but hated on principle. They bantered back and forth about something too hilarious for him to stomach. He rubbed a fist over his chest and breathed through the deluge of emotions.

  Surprise. Awe. Anger. Jealously. Disappointment. They played musical fucking chairs with his synapses.

  What the hell size ego did he have that he’d expected her to be sad? He didn’t want her miserable. Judging by the smiles she passed from one person to the next, life with her sister agreed with Marina. After all, that was what she’d wanted.

  Oliver stumbled into the shadows and clutched the side of the house to keep from hitting the ground. The world pressed in on him as it had in the hospital. The quacks had called it a panic attack, but Base Branch operatives didn’t get panic attacks. If they did on paper, they didn’t see the field, and the missions were the only things keeping him alive. He needed them like he needed his next breath, and that fucker was taking his damn time.

  “Oliver?”

  The sweetest voice he’d ever heard called to him. Add crazy to the books. He’d conjured her caring from thin air. If only he could get that air into his lungs. His knee hit the grass but just one. It was the small wins, really.

  “Hey?” Marina’s tiny hands cupped his face and pulled it to her breasts.

  Best dream ever.

  Breath scented with lavender and sunshine filled his lungs. Marina smoothed her hands over his shoulders and back and murmured to him. She even wore the frilly teal dress.

  This wasn’t a fucking dream.

  His breath came again, pulling Marina’s scent into his soul. It wasn’t a dream, but he’d dwell on it a bit longer.

  “Are you hurt?”

  He shook his head and burrowed a bit deeper between her heavy breasts.

  “Are you sick?”

  Again, he shook his head and silently begged her to ask more questions.

  “Look at me,” she demanded. When he didn’t move, she pressed a hand under his chin and lifted.

  Mascara laced lashes squinted down at him. “Are you drunk?”

  “No.”

  “You don’t look well.” Her pretty mouth pursed.

  Too bad he felt as good as he had in the last four months at that very moment.

  “You look amazing.” He should stop himself, but he couldn’t, not with her this close. His hands slipped around her waist, up her back, and he pulled her into a near crushing embrace.

  Marina stiffened.

  His insides crumbled.

  Oliver searched for the will to let her go. He found it too easily since she didn’t want his arms around her. The moment he shifted to release her, she melted against him.

  He pulled her onto his knee, and she nestled her head under his chin. Her sobs came hard and fast against his neck. Each cry ripped at his insides. Back and forth, he rocked her and smoothed his hands over her supple shoulder, but he didn't say anything. He needed to say things. She needed to hear things. Only they wouldn’t come out.

  Under no circumstances, except her explicit directions to kiss him, should he put his lips on her skin. Clearly, loss of blood had caused brain damage. His mouth pressed to her shoulder just to the side of her thin dress strap. She tasted better than he’d remembered. He took another taste at the well of her neck and then another at the curve of her chin.

  It was as far as he could go without moving her, which he wouldn’t do.

  Marina lifted her head. Wide blue eyes stared at his mouth. “I didn’t think you were coming?”

  “I wasn’t.” His erection pressed painfully into the crotch of his pants and the curve of her thigh. God, he could take her on the ground a blink away from the laughter and revelry of forty or more people.

  “But you’re here.” Marina’s eyes sank shut. She pressed her mouth to his and pulled his chest against hers.

  He let her set the pace because if he didn’t, they’d be naked and compromised within the minute. Her tongue sliced over his with intent. Each stroke worked its way into his mind, draining away his sorrow and replacing it with one-hundred-proof lust. She dragged her nipples across his torso. Her hips rocked on his lap. He’d been worried about his pace when hers raced for first prize. God, he needed to take it down a notch or take her.

  “Marina?”

  “Mmmm.” Neither her moan nor her tongue helped.

  “Did you want me to come?”

  Well, the question slowed the pace for sure. Ninety-nine to zero in point two five seconds. Marina straightened and covered her lips. Her gaze zipped everywhere looking for the right answer. Finally, they rested on his.

  “No.”

  The word stung. Oliver gagged on his lust.

  “Yes,” she breathed, “and no.”

  He nodded.

  “It’s…”

  “Complicated,” he offered.

  “Yeah.”

  Wasn’t it?

  “I’m—”

  The trill of his phone cut her off and rocketed his already jacked blood pressure sky-high. He dug it from his pocket and read the screen. ‘Confirmation. Wheels up in one hour.’

  Marina must have read it too. She stood, fingers clamped in a tight ball in front of her.

  “I’m sorry. I have to—”

  “Be careful.” Blond baby hairs danced around her sad face.

  “I’m going to get Tor, for all of us.”

  “I hope you find what you need, Oliver. I’m looking for it, but I know it’s not Tor.” She wiped the tears from her eyes, smiled, and ran back to the party.

  17

  Marina ignored the latest rerun on the TV and watched the ceiling fan’s pulls dangle in a slow, steady pendulum.

  “Christ, Mar. I should have made you drink the other night. At least then you’d have a reason to act hung over.” Elin crashed through the room with a water bottle under one arm, a protein bar hanging out of her mouth, and a pair of tennis shoes in each hand.

  She
was hung over, all right—on unrequited lust, which—dammit—was very nearly love. Worry added to the haze too.

  “You got home five minutes ago. Where are you going?” Marina moved the want ads and pen from her stomach, sat, and instantly regretted it. Her head sloshed from one side to the other.

  “That’s what you get for lazing around all day.” With one accusing brow, Elin held both pairs of shoes, one blinding pink and one neon yellow, to her tiny green and blue diamond patterned running shorts, blue sports bra, and sheer white tank. “Which ones?”

  “For what activity?” she groused and grabbed her head.

  “Running?”

  “Either. It doesn't matter. You’re running.”

  “Shows what you know.” Her sister pressed her feet into the pink shoes one at a time and tore off a bite of the bar.

  “You wouldn’t happen to be running with Levi, would you?” Marina deposited the sparsely circled page onto the coffee table but kept the pen.

  “Riley too. Wanna come? They won’t be here for another two minutes, but I’ll make them wait.” She said this while tying her shoes faster than a rodeo guy knotted up cute little calves.

  “I’m good. Have fun.”

  Elin shot to her feet and darted for the door. She paused long enough to smack a kiss on Marina’s forehead. “It’ll all work out. I promise. Be back soon.”

  Before Marina had replied, the door closed and locked. Elin’s protein bar sat on the table, half-eaten and lonely.

  “Yeah.” She wanted to serve humanity, to take her experiences and turn them into something positive. Cocktail waitressing wasn’t what she had in mind.

  Marina grabbed the bar, stood, and headed to the door.

  A quick double knock sounded from the door. She had keys to lock it. She had keys to unlock it. Marina smiled at the minor irritation. Things like this made her love living with her energetic, crazy sister.

  “Forget your…” Her words died before making it to her lips because her sister wasn’t receiving them. Marina tried to get her mouth to move, but nothing happened.

  “I didn’t mean to startle you.” Cara Lee—the woman who’d saved her from the Brotherhood after her mother had taken her sister and left her behind, the woman she’d betrayed—stood prettily and proud in slacks and heels. Her signature chignon held blond hair from her stunning face. “May I come in?”

  “If you’re here to kill me, please make it fast.” She stepped back and held the door wide.

  A sad smile crooked the corner of Cara’s pink lips. “You’re looking so well.” She strutted inside. “I didn’t expect you to be in a rush to meet your end.”

  “As you know, looks can be deceiving.” Marina closed and locked the door behind them. If Cara were here to exact justice, she wouldn’t run. She probably wouldn’t even fight much. Elin would be sad, but Levi—whoever that kid was—would comfort her, and she’d love it.

  “I know.”

  When Marina turned, Cara was only a foot away.

  She’d thought herself too despondent to care about death, but when the Grim Reaper stared her in the face, her sentiment changed. She eyed the bookshelf that housed their keys, phones, and a pistol, and stepped toward it.

  “I’m sorry,” Cara whispered.

  “What?” An apology didn’t compute with I’m going to kill you. “As in the I’m really sorry it had to come to this, but I’m going to kill you kind of I’m sorry? Because I’ve changed my mind. I just got healthy and free, and I’m not going anywhere.”

  “I’m glad to hear it.” Cara’s sad smile quirked her lips at both ends.

  “As in glad to hear it because it’d be so boring to kill someone who’s ready to die?” Marina asked.

  “I’ve missed you and your crazy sense of humor, Mar.” Cara walked around the couch, reclined, kicked off her shoes, and propped her feet on the coffee table.

  No one had accused Marina of being funny in a long time.

  “Come sit with me. I promise not to kill you ever, in any way.” She patted the couch. “Besides, I work for the Base Branch now as the Lieutenant Commander, and they frown upon unsanctioned killings.”

  Marina tugged at her oversized T-shirt.

  “I’m kidding with you.” Cara smiled. “I mean they do frown upon it, but there are always workarounds.” She winked and giggled.

  One small step at a time, Marina headed to her days-long landing pad next to Cara.

  “I’ve stayed away on purpose.” Her playful smile slipped. “First, I wanted to give you time to heal and acclimate to your new life. Then I was just a chicken shit, as Tyler says.” At her raised brow, Cara continued, “Scared.”

  “Oh.”

  She didn’t ask about Tyler. One mountain at a time.

  Cara sighed. “Anyway, I’m sorry for not trusting you more. I knew you. I knew you were right and good and trying your best to get away from that life. I should have known you would never betray us unless you had no choice.”

  “We always have a choice.”

  “No, not always. We can’t choose who we love.”

  Truer words. Marina wound her finger into the fabric of her shirt and looked Cara in the eyes. “I’m sorry. I should have trusted you enough to help get my sister back. I just…”

  “You grew up fearing those men. Some months away wouldn’t change that, especially when they had something so valuable to you as your sister, the only family who ever loved you.”

  “When’d you get your psychiatrist license and can you prescribe me pills?”

  Cara straightened. “I didn’t mean to—”

  “No, you didn’t offend me.” Marina smiled. “You didn’t hurt my feelings. You got it right. All the things I couldn’t put into words, you just said perfectly.” Tears seeped from her lids, and fat drops plopped on her legs. “Thank you.”

  “Marina. Shhhh.” Cara scooted to the middle cushion and dropped an arm around her. “I get going to extremes to protect family.”

  “Yeah, you do.” The woman had faked her own death to keep her enemies away from her daughter.

  “Now, shhh. I don’t have pills”—she leaned in with a conspiratorial whisper—“but I can get you drunk enough for you to spill about what’s going on between you and Oliver.”

  “Nothing’s going on.” Marina swallowed her sorrow and straightened. Didn’t mean something hadn’t been, but that was months gone, despite the lip lock at the Stronghold Estate.

  Cara smiled and stared, wearing her down. She’d always been the most efficient torturer Marina’d had the pleasure of working with.

  “How is he?” Marina caved.

  “I knew it. You’ve never been a good liar. Now, spill.”

  “Oh Cara, I keep telling myself it’s nothing. It’s just an infatuation because he cared for me.”

  “Luck cared for you. Were you infatuated with him?”

  “No.” Her nose wrinkled.

  Cara rubbed the point of her chin. “What about Hunter?”

  “Hunter took care of me too, made me laugh.”

  “Any feelings there?”

  “No.” Marina smiled weakly. “They fought the day before the explosion.”

  “That’s why he’s…”

  “Why he’s what? I spilled. You give,” Marina begged.

  “You call that spilling? Sister, I want details, but,” she huffed, “he’s taking Hunter’s death hard. I’d hoped Tor’s and the Brödraskapet’s demise would have helped him.”

  “It didn’t?” Marina’s heart fractured a bit more.

  “He’s combing through the pictures of the torture compound.”

  “Looking for?”

  “A closure he’ll never find, not there.”

  Marina had meant to tell him about her and Hunter’s conversation the night before the world spun off its axis. When she’d seen him, every logical thought in her brain fried. And then she’d touched him.

  “I have something that might help him.” Marina leaned toward Cara. “I need
a favor.”

  18

  “Another full day of this and they’ll put you on psych leave.”

  Oliver turned to see Bradfield’s huge frame wedged between the glass door and wall. He reversed out of the conference room door with a shrug. The guy had been hanging in the periphery of Base Branch ops for six months or so but kept to himself. The whispers were that, once upon a time, he was a SEAL Team 6 badass. He could see it in the scars and no bullshit eyes and wondered—not for the first time—why he’d only worked mission transport. Seemed like a waste of good talent.

  Through the clear glass, Oliver flipped him the bird and turned back to the wall of flat screens. An aerial photograph of a building in ruins occupied one monitor. Building schematics lit another. On the third, he clicked through images so frequently visited they littered his dreams, waking and sleep.

  If there had been a trapdoor, it wouldn't have been included in the plans. Trapdoors and secret passages were meant to remain a secret except to the owner. Suppose Tor slipped through a secret passageway and Hunter followed. It could explain why no human remains were found in the crater where the back half of a building had been.

  A knock sounded on the glass.

  Great. He was about to find out just how badass Bradfield was. He should have kept his middle finger to himself.

  “The door didn’t stop you last time, asshole. Why now?” Then again, Oliver could use the distraction. He clicked forward on the next image.

  Inside the concrete and glass room, the air shifted, and the door clicked shut.

  “I don’t have time for your shit,” he lied. He had too much time, and it was getting him in trouble. If he couldn’t let this shit go soon, he’d be benched. He’d bench himself to keep from killing Tyler or any other operative.

  “Make time.” The siren voice of his dreams, when not riddled with building rubble, bounded off the walls and socked him in the goods.

  Oliver swiveled as if a drone missile hawked him down. “I didn’t know it was you.”

  Marina’s hair hung in loosely curled waves around her breasts. She wore makeup, more natural than the other night but no less compelling. Shit, starved and beaten, Marina had drawn him under and held him there. Now, it was all he could do to breathe.