He grew bold, stepping up to her and brushing a strand of hair out of her eyes. Parker pulled her head away before he could touch her anymore. Even if what he said to them tonight proved to be the absolute truth, she wasn’t the same person that Milo left all those months ago. She wouldn’t be able to fall back into any kind of relationship with him easily, even one as simple as friendship. There would always be complications between them that no amount of time or understanding could fix.
“Don’t,” Parker warned him.
Milo quickly pulled his hand back and shoved it into the pocket of his pants.
“I’m sorry. It’s just…it’s so good to see you, Parker.”
Parker shook her head and took a deep breath, but Milo spoke before she could say anything.
“I know this is all confusing and you’re pissed and I don’t blame you. But I just want you to know that I love you. If I could go back and change everything I would. It kills me that I had to leave you, to make you believe I was dead in order to make this work. I hope you can see how sorry I am and maybe someday we can get back to―”
“Milo, stop,” Parker interrupted, squeezing her eyes shut to ward off those awful memories and holding her hand in the air to silence him. “Just because you’re here and you’re claiming to be one of the good guys doesn’t mean we can all just go back to the way things were. It’s not the same anymore.”
“But it can be. We were going to get married and have a life together. I still love you. Not a day has gone by that I haven’t thought about you or wished I could be with you. If you can just forgive me, we can go back to that,” he pleaded.
“No, we can’t. Milo, we’re in the middle of trying to take down the leader of this country. Someone who has been exploiting teenage girls for his own gain for God knows how many years. And even if that wasn’t the case, even if we were home and you suddenly showed up out of the blue, it still wouldn’t change anything.”
Milo looked panicked now. He began to pace back and forth in front of Parker while they still remained in the alcove of the villa.
“Okay, I get it. You need time. You need to let things calm down and then we can talk and work things out.”
Parker shook her head in disbelief. He still wasn’t getting it. She knew now was not the most appropriate time to put everything on the table when they had work to do, but nothing would get through to Milo unless she was blunt.
“Milo. I don’t love you. Not that way. Not anymore. Maybe not ever,” Parker admitted softly, trying to soften the blow by easing up on the anger and looking him in the eyes with sympathy. She shouldn’t be concerned with sparing his feelings, but it was in her nature. She didn’t know how else to behave.
Milo stopped pacing long enough to laugh. It wasn’t the laugh of someone who just caught on to the joke. It was the laugh of someone who couldn’t believe what was happening; it was maniacal and disturbing.
“That’s your anger talking, Parker. Once you calm down and realize that I’m here, and I won’t ever leave you again, you’ll come to your senses.”
Milo started pacing again, muttering to himself under his breath. Parker didn’t like the way he was acting. She had no idea what he’d been through or the extent to which his undercover assignment had affected him, but one thing was certain: Milo was not behaving rationally.
Parker slowly reached behind her back to grab her gun when she suddenly realized it wasn’t there. Garrett had taken it from her when she was aiming it at Milo.
“I’m not stupid you know?” Milo said. “I saw the two of you. You were holding hands when you got here. Whatever you’ve done with him while I was gone, it’s okay. I don’t care. You were lonely and he was there. Now that I’m back you don’t have to do that anymore.”
Parker quickly glanced around, wondering why tonight of all nights, there were no other patrons of the resort walking around so she could signal them to get help. She cursed Garrett for his stubbornness and wished he wouldn’t have walked away. She had a feeling he’d be better equipped to talk Milo down from whatever ledge he was standing on, having done it plenty of times while the two of them were growing up.
“Milo, listen to what you’re saying. Nothing is okay between us and it never will be. I love Garrett. He’s not just someone I passed the time with after you were gone. I know this isn’t going to be easy for you to hear, but I’ve loved him from the first moment I saw him. It’s always been Garrett and it always will be. You were my friend, and I thought I was doing the right thing by staying with you and planning a future with you. But it wasn’t fair to either of us when my heart always belonged to someone else,” Parker explained.
“YOU’RE LYING!” Milo yelled as he stalked towards her. “You’re just confused. You’re still in shock.”
Parker moved backwards but found herself stopped by the wall of the villa next to her and Garrett’s.
“Milo, take a deep breath and calm down. I need you to focus on Fernandez and what’s really important here. We can talk about all of this at another time. Right now you need to remember what we’re here for. What you spent all this time away from us for.”
Now that Parker was cornered Milo was able to get closer. He nodded his head, seeming to calm down and agree with what she was saying. Parker relaxed thinking that maybe reminding him about the mission had centered him, but she shouldn’t have let her guard down.
“You’re absolutely right,” Milo said quietly, a serene look taking over his face. “I can’t lose focus. Not now. Not after everything I’ve done. Thank you for reminding me what I’m here for.”
Parker didn’t have any time to think about the way Milo worded his statement and no time to prepare for the needle that was quickly jammed into the side of her neck. As a syringe full of sedatives was emptied into her bloodstream, her last conscious thought before the world went black was that her time had just run out.
Chapter Twenty-One
By the time Garrett rounded the corner of the row of villas he’d managed to cool down somewhat. He was so lost in thought he ran right into Brady.
“Where’s Parker?” Brady asked as he picked up the cell phone he’d dropped when Garrett had come barreling around the corner.
“Talking to Milo,” Garrett growled. “What’s going on? Did you find out anything?”
Brady took a step past Garrett to peer around the corner and saw Milo and Parker talking in front of the Villa about a hundred yards away. Satisfied everything looked okay, he moved back in front of Garrett.
“I called a few of my contacts and word on the street is there was a very top secret, unofficial mission here in the Dominican involving someone from our SEAL division. It was an undercover operation that had been in place for at least six years. There was never a paper trail because it was not a government sanctioned mission, so we can only go by word of mouth at this point. About a year ago, critical information about the mission was leaked and supposedly, the undercover SEAL was compromised. According to the official reports, Milo was sent to the Dominican at that time to clean up a ‘routine mission that went awry.' At least seventy-five percent of the report is blacked out. There was definitely something in that report no one was supposed to know about. My contacts believe Milo was the undercover agent the entire time, and that the government needed to send him to the Dominican in an official capacity to solidify his cover as a double agent. Obviously the information they have wasn’t obtained legally, so they had to go through several channels to get it. I don’t have concrete evidence Milo is telling the truth, but I trust these guys, and they wouldn’t tell me something they didn’t believe to be accurate.”
Garrett paced back and forth in front of Brady and tried to make sense of everything he just learned. Garrett trusted Brady and if Brady trusted his contacts, Garrett had no choice but to believe the information he found, even if his gut was telling him something wasn’t right, that everything was falling too easily into place after weeks of hitting dead ends.
“So Milo
was telling the truth,” Garrett muttered as he stopped his pacing. He didn’t expect an answer from Brady; he just felt the need to say the words out loud to see if it changed anything.
It didn’t.
“I decided to err on the side of caution anyway,” Brady explained. “Captain Risner sent us a few of the boys from SEAL Team four. I did some training with them early on in my career, and they are all good men. I currently have them stationed at the entrance of the resort. If Milo leaves, they’ll follow him. Vargas and Conrad are canvassing the area to make sure Milo came alone.”
Garrett went to reach into his pocket for his cell phone to get a status update from his men when he realized he still had Parker’s gun in his side holster from when he unarmed her. A feeling of dread washed through him when he realized he’d left her unarmed, alone with Milo.
“Shit,” Garrett cursed as he looked down at the gun and then quickly turned to go back to Parker. He stepped around the corner and stopped in his tracks at what he saw.
Across the lawn Parker’s back was to him. He couldn’t see her face, but he could clearly see her body pressed up against Milo’s and her arms around his shoulders. Milo had his face buried in her hair at the side of her neck and his arms wrapped tightly around her body as the two of them swayed slowly from side to side. The happy reunion made Garrett sick to his stomach, so he turned back around and realized Brady had come up behind him and was taking in the same tender scene across the way.
“This is a lot for her mind and heart to process all at once,” Brady tried to reason. “She’s been through a lot today, and I’m sure she’s just confused. Once things settle down and you two have time to talk it through―”
Garrett unholstered the gun, grabbing it by the barrel, and pushed the butt of Parker's weapon into Brady's chest so he would take it. “Don’t waste my time with your psychobabble bullshit. Make sure she gets her gun back and keep an eye on her.”
Garrett walked around Brady, pulling out his cell phone as he went.
“What are you going to do?” Brady called to Garrett’s retreating form.
“Burry that son-of-a-bitch,” Garrett responded.
Brady shook his head and sighed as he watched Garrett disappear from sight, wondering if he was referring to Fernandez or Milo.
<> ~ <>
Milo always felt out of place in life. He always felt like there was something better waiting for him just out of his reach. One day, eight years ago, he found out what that something was.
He had a father.
Not the man his mother had left him with that used him as a punching bag. He’d celebrated the day that asshole drove his car into a tree and felt an enormous amount of satisfaction that his life had been snuffed out.
No, he had a real father. The kind of man you could look up to. The kind of man a son could be proud to share a bloodline with. Milo had been understandably upset when he found out his father allowed for him to be abused all those years by a man that hated the very sight of him, but he understood it now. He saw the big picture and realized that his suffering and years of torment would all be rewarded.
Milo had spent most of his life being envious of the people around him, people like Garrett McCarthy who had the world handed to him on a silver platter, who had parents that fawned over him and gave him everything his heart desired. Day in and day out he watched his so-called friend succeed and have the perfect life without even trying. Soon the envy Milo felt burned through him like a raging inferno, turning his heart and soul to ashes and his jealousy into the kind of deep-seeded hatred that he’d never be able to break free from.
It was his turn now, his turn to get everything he wanted.
Standing next to a palm tree in the Dominican Republic, holding his unconscious former fiancé and waiting to hear from his men that Garrett’s team had been eliminated so he could leave, Milo felt vindicated. He’d always known Garrett had a thing for Parker. He knew it that first day in the coffee shop. But he had his orders, and he would not fail. It felt good to take something from that smug bastard for once, to finally have something that Garrett desired more than anything. He never loved Parker. She was just a means to an end. But she was his. And he would be damned if he let Garrett have her.
Milo hugged Parker’s limp body tightly to his chest and put a few well-placed kisses on her cheek and the side of her neck, making sure she still had a pulse and keeping up the ruse at the same time. He knew Garrett’s people would be watching him. Subduing Parker with a syringe full of Ketamine was risky but necessary. Milo made sure he’d backed her under the cover of a few palm trees before palming the needle in his pocket and then throwing his arm in a flash up to push it in. He thought she’d go with him easily.
He thought she’d be happy to see him no matter what his father had told him the last few weeks.
“Your American woman is quite the hellcat in bed, my son. Did you enjoy years of pleasure between her thighs or did she save the best for Mr. McCarthy?”
Milo had been listening to his father regale him with every single sordid detail of what Parker and Garrett had done in the bedroom and pool during their stay. His hands were clenched into fists, and he felt the edges of his vision blur with rage.
“Tell me, did the lovely Parker ever shout your name in ecstasy like she did Garrett’s?”
His father laughed, pleased with the torment he was inflicting on his son. Milo knew this was a test. His father was just baiting him, making sure he was strong enough, dedicated enough. He knew he could show no weakness, no matter what the man said or did.
Milo’s nostrils flared as he watched his father signal to one of his guards seated at the desk in the security office where they stood, surrounded by more than a dozen monitors that showcased every inch of the palace grounds.
The guard pressed a few buttons on the console in front of him and soon the room was flooded with the sounds of passion.
“Touch me.”
“Oh God, yes!”
“Let go, baby.”
“Oh God…Garrett…fuck!”
“Come for me, Garrett. I need to feel you.”
“Ungh, more, more…”
“Garrett…Garrett…Garrett…”
“ENOUGH!” Milo bellowed.
Milo’s father placed his hand on the guard’s shoulder and the man immediately cut off the tape.
“Rodriguez, you are dismissed.”
At his father’s command, the guard quickly stood and exited the small room.
Milo knew he’d made a mistake, but there was no taking it back now. Listening to his father tell him how much Parker and Garrett enjoyed one another made his blood boil, but hearing the sounds of their moans, the creak of the bed, the splash of the water as their bodies moved against one another made him feel murderous.
Before the door clicked shut behind the guard, his father had crossed the room to him. He felt the man’s fist connect with his mouth before he even saw it coming. When Milo’s hand flew up to cover his busted lip, his father took the opportunity to throw another punch to his ribs.
Milo doubled over when he heard a distinctive crunch, knowing one of his ribs had cracked. He kept one hand pressed against the cut on his lip from where his father’s ring connected and the other hand held tightly to his rib that screamed out in pain.
“No son of mine will allow a woman to bring him to his knees. You show too much weakness for a whore and do nothing but snivel and whine about the unfairness of your life and how Garrett McCarthy received everything that should have been yours.”
Milo listened to his father berate him as he spit blood out of his mouth and slowly stood up to face him. He should have known better. He should have been stronger and more in control. He never deserved the beatings the man who raised him had given him each day, but this was warranted. Milo wanted to make his father proud and show him he was worthy to stand by his side. He stood tall in front of his father, ignoring the throbbing pain that cut into his side and the blood that dripp
ed down from his lip.
“I’m sorry, sir,” Milo replied.
“I permitted another man to raise you in the hopes that it would make you stronger so when the day came and I needed to call on you, you would be ready. Maybe I made a mistake eight years ago in telling you about your heritage and bringing you into the fold. Maybe you weren’t ready,” his father said pensively.
Milo bristled at his father thinking he couldn’t do the job at hand. He’d been preparing for this for years. He was ready.
“Sir, I’m sorry, sir. I will not show any weakness again. I am ready to finish this and make you proud. I will not let anything stand in my way,” Milo promised with firm resolve.
His father removed a small square of white cloth from the breast pocket of his suit coat and handed it to Milo.
“I have rewarded you with all of the riches and beautiful, young girls you could imagine. I have brought you into my family and my business in the hopes that one day soon you will take over and lead. I have shown you a life you never knew existed. I expect never to regret this decision. Are we clear?”
Milo had pressed the cloth to his busted lip and nodded solemnly.
“I will do what needs to be done. I will make you proud.”
Confident in Milo’s promise, his father had nodded and turned to leave the room, pausing with his hand on the doorknob.
“Take care of the problem. They’ve gotten too close. It’s time for you to show them who you really are. The whore’s father arrived in the Dominican today. That man knows too much. Lucky for us, he decided to step foot on my land. End him before he tells them everything. After that I’m sure you will enjoy executing the two lovers.”
Milo had watched his father leave the room and had mentally prepared himself for what was to come.
Milo’s cell phone buzzed in his pocket. Pressing Parker firmly against him with one arm, he reached into his pants with the other and flipped open the phone.
Kiss Kiss Page 102
