Safe in His Arms (Love's Command)

by Billi Jean

  He was obsessed with Mac. It all made sense now. How he’d told her all those disgusting things about herself. Things that even now she resisted telling Mac. He’d been vile, sickening, but the worst part was that some of the things he’d said had taken root, or grown from the roots of an abusive stepfather, and blossomed under his filth.

  She couldn’t have a man. No one would want her. Least of all Wolf.

  He’d used Mac’s nickname too. How did a man like this get into the SEALs? They checked men out. They had to.

  Trigger turned around and faced her, the smirk on his face making her sick to her stomach. She hated him. In that moment, she hated him more than anything else in her life. He’d taken Mac away, but he’d also taken her dreams.

  Approaching the table again, he reached out with surprising quickness, snatched an abundant handful of her curls, and pulled her head back harshly. “It seems you will live just a little longer, bitch. But listen closely.” He bent down and breathed right in her ear. She almost threw up. “You so much as breathe a word of who I am, what I’m going to do to you, and I’ll kill everyone you care about.”

  His fist rose and, before she could turn away, came crashing down on her temple. Pain lashed through her head. Blackness curled around her. She fumed, struggling not to pass out again. Not this time. She needed—she needed something.

  Mac.

  She needed Mac.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Just when Mac tensed to bust the weak ropes tying him down, a door opened behind him. He jerked his head to the side to see Trigger, crouched down, and dressed in a green polo shirt with a finger over his lips.

  Thank fuck. Relief never felt so good. Trigger must have been the inside guy. Luck, it seemed, hadn’t left him.

  “Shh, what the hell, Mac? What is going on?”

  “Shit if I know. The Gonzaleses have Mandy, Trigger. You need to get her out of here.”

  Trigger scowled and shoved his black hair off his face, scanning the room. “You need to get out of here. Did they tie you down tight, or fuck it up?”

  “It’s fucked. But I need—”

  Trigger slashed his arm through the air, clearly pissed off. “Mac, you’re going to break my cover, but I’ll try to get to her. Can you break free?” He hunkered down lower when a light flashed through one of the low windows by the ceiling.

  “Yeah, I think so. You get Mandy. I want her off of here.”

  A loud sound had Trigger jumping back and edging for the door. “Just wait until the sun hits the deck, get free, I’ll do the rest.”

  “What? No. If I wait, they’re simply coming back. Darkness is the best—”

  “They’re all up there, Mac. I was up there when they started talking about the Americano. They left me out of this mission, so what does that tell you?”

  Mac narrowed his eyes over at Trigger getting angrier by the minute. “Listen, I don’t give a rat’s ass if your fucked-up cover is blown. What do you need cover for? These bastards just hit a military base. What—”

  “Mac, I take orders from up high, like mountain top high.”

  “Shit, fuck that. This is me, Trig, me. You’re not going to say shit to me about orders. You don’t leave a man behind. That includes Mandy.”

  “Look, Mac”—Trigger grimaced, looking sympathetic, but Mac could tell he had his own agenda—“I want these bastards dead too, but they’re working a deal. You know what that means.”

  “Son of a bitch. Don’t you tell me your deal is more important than—”

  Trigger held up his hands and the light waved through the room again, the beam hitting Trigger’s face and flooding it with a sick, pale glow. His eyes were bright, and if Mac had had time to deal with more than freeing himself he would have called the other man on being drunk.

  “Nothing is more important that getting Mandy out of here,” he said.

  “Fine. Just fucking fine, all right. Everything is always about her, isn’t it? When are you going to learn—”

  Footsteps nearby shut him up but Mac almost wished Trigger had finished that sentence. Rage pounded at him and if Trigger said some shit about Mandy, he’d break him in two.

  “Fine, I’ll see what I can do to set her free for you.”

  With that, he was gone.

  Son of a bitch. The man was no help. A damn deal with the Feds was more important than Mandy? Was he insane?

  He needed to be free now. Trigger could have slipped him a knife. Shit wasn’t right. And, worse, how had anyone found them?

  West.

  West was many things, but a traitor wasn’t one of them. So that left whoever West had called for re-enforcements.

  The ropes began to cut into his wrists but the blood would simply help him slip them off. He felt a give in the ropes around his right arm and worked harder at loosening it more while he tried to figure out what was going on.

  Mandy was here. He simply needed to reach her, get her off this damn ship, and leave this island. He’d not wait for Trigger’s lazy ass. Motherfucker had a screw loose if he thought Mac would wait on him to get Mandy to safety. Clearly, his deal was more important.

  First, he needed free of their fucked-up idea of tying a man down.

  Mandy woke abruptly. She surged up, looking for Trigger, and only managed to hit her head on something solid. Cursing she fell back into the softness of a bed and cupped a palm over her forehead. She didn’t hear anything beyond her breathing for several long seconds, then slowly heard a rhythmic splashing. She glanced around to see she was in an empty room that looked like a cabin.

  Boat. She was on a boat. Ship. Oh, good Lord. Oh, God. One quick scan of the room and Mac was nowhere. She was on a bunk. She’d crashed her head into the low-lying upper bunk but, other than two bolted down chairs and a table between them under a porthole, she was alone. A few paintings of ocean scenes lined the glossy wooden walls, and a door was on the opposite wall from the window.

  She stood carefully and tried to decide what to do. Was the ship moving? Would she know? She took a step towards the door and it opened to reveal a dark-haired woman dressed in a white gown. Gold buckles clipped the silken gown in place over the mounds of her bronzed breasts. Long, flowing chestnut hair rippled in carefully arranged waves down one shoulder and down her back. She narrowed her eyes on Mandy and her nose went up a notch. Mandy instantly hated her. A snide smile coaxed the bitch’s bright red lips upward at Mandy’s frown.

  Mandy knew her. She’d never forget the way this woman had touched Mac.

  What was going on? It felt like she was on some corny Welcome to My Past show—only she never wanted to see these people again.

  “So you’re awake,” the Spanish accent rolled off her tongue, adding to the layer of hate Mandy already had going on. Of course, she would sound sexy.

  “Where is Mac?” she demanded, looking around the room for something to use as a weapon. She was small, but she could fight. And this woman didn’t look like she could without crying over a broken nail.

  “The soldado? Wolf? He will have to die, but not before he suffers, eh?” She sounded angry and tossed her hair. Suddenly she lifted her long gown, stepped over the entrance to the cabin, and shut the door. “But don’t worry, niña, you’re with family now.”

  Mandy backed away from the other woman. She felt dirty and dingy compared to the Spanish beauty. This woman was full of as much hatred as Mandy was. At her?

  “What are you talking about?”

  The elegant woman walked languidly around the sparse room, trailing her fingers over the table, the chair like she had all the time in the world, then stopped to look out of the small window. Slowly, she turned to Mandy. There was calculation and something else in her expression that made Mandy feel like she’d just made a mistake simply by speaking to her.

  “You don’t know, do you? Pobre innocenta, did you think you could be enough for a man like Wolf?” She gave a throaty, sexy laugh and shook her head. “A man like him, he needs a real woman, not
a child.” She cupped her own breasts and sneered at Mandy then laughed again, dropping her manicured hands to brush her hair back.

  Mandy cocked her head. Now that the Mexican princess was closer, Mandy noticed the lines on her face, the dullness of her skin that she’d tried to mask with foundation, the unnatural thinness of her body compared to the rounded abundance of her high, perky breasts. Fake breasts. Mandy would bet her last dime on it. The makeup she had piled on her face and around her dusky eyes seemed too perfect, too precise to be beautiful. Oh, she was beautiful in an older woman, kinda glamorous, big money way, but she couldn’t imagine her making Mac moan in pleasure now that she stood near her. Mac would not tolerate a person like this. He never had.

  “And you are?” Mandy asked.

  “Maybe,” she said slowly.

  To hell with keeping her thoughts to herself. Neither this bitch nor that disgusting pervert, Trigger, were touching Mac. Anger burned a path right up to her brain and her mouth opened before she could censor her words.

  “There’s not a chance in hell of Mac preferring you over me.” As the rush of words left her mouth, she watched the other woman and saw the truth in her dark eyes. She knew that, she knew Mac was Mandy’s. That’s why she’d said such bitter things.

  “He’s mine. And I’m guessing you found that out the hard way. Did he even get hard for you?”

  The other woman’s eyes grew luminous with contempt, as if Mac weren’t worth a thought to her. After a few more silent, awkward minutes, she turned to look out of the small window again. The silence dragged on long enough for Mandy to wonder what the woman wanted. Why come in here? Why even bring Mac up like this?

  “Does it matter? You will have to let him go,” she whispered.

  Mandy bit her tongue and stayed silent. She wasn’t letting Mac go. The first thing she was telling Mac when she found him? She loved him. She’d not let another second in his presence go by without saying it. Then she was begging him to quit the SEALs.

  The Spanish beauty turned her head and her brow creased slightly. “Ah, I see you don’t believe me. It’s true, of course. We are family now, chica, so we will forget this Americano.”

  Before Mandy could respond, the door opened and Trigger walked in.

  Mandy’s mouth went dry and suddenly she couldn’t move. Her heart raced so loudly she was certain he would hear. The need to run, to yell, or simply to hit him rushed through her, but she stood frozen in place watching him strut over to the woman. His dark eyes skimmed over her with a distasteful expression once as he ran a hand down the other woman’s back and bent to whisper something.

  “Yes, of course.” The woman laughed. She petted Trigger’s chest and moved closer to him. If Mandy hadn’t been watching him so closely, she never would have seen the sneer he directed at the woman when she leaned in and kissed his neck. His eyes met hers over the top of the woman’s head and the threat in his hard gaze wasn’t lost on her.

  She struggled to keep her face blank, falling back on years of abuse at the hands of her stepdad to help her. She had to think. Think clearly. Fear didn’t make that possible. She wanted to run. The instinct for flight was so overwhelming she had to force her eyes to remain on the couple when all she wanted was to race for the door.

  Why was he here? She had to figure that out and quickly. He’d changed into white slacks and a yellow button-down linen shirt. He wore his black hair slicked back from his forehead, combed almost ruthlessly to one side. He turned to face her fully, the woman curled under his arm, and Mandy barely held in the urge to scream at him.

  “I will bring her now, my love. Manuel has nothing to worry over.”

  “I told him, but he insists on seeing her.” Trigger gave her a sick grin as he spoke, daring her to say a word, no doubt. When she stayed silent, he turned to the door. “Just bring her soon, Catrina.”

  The woman, Catrina, frowned after him with a speculative look. As soon as he had shut the door, she turned to Mandy with a frown.

  “This man, he is bad news. Sick, enfermo en la cabeza, sick in the head.”

  Mandy hid her surprise at the woman’s words. She’d seemed more than happy to rub herself all over Trigger.

  Sighing, Catrina shook her head, as if disturbed by Trigger. No wonder, he was a sick bastard. Mandy remembered exactly how disgusting he was.

  “Don’t look so scared, chica. This hombre will handle Wolf and soon you will have nothing to fear except where to find the latest styles. I will show you new men that will give you such pleasure, this Wolf, he will be a memory. But now, I must take you to Manuel. Come.” She walked to the door as if Mandy would simply follow.

  “Wait, who is Manuel, and who are you?”

  Catrina paused at the door and Mandy sensed, if this woman had her way, Mandy would be shark bait. “Catrina Maria Gonzales, your aunt, my dear.”

  Catrina opened the door and Mandy followed her, feeling like she needed to throw up. The yacht they were on was, at least, not out to sea, but tied up to shore. They might be on the same island. She had no idea.

  “Where are we?” she asked. If she was family, then…

  “Molokai, but don’t worry, chica, we’ll leave here as soon as we dump the Americano and head for home.”

  Not if Mandy could help it.

  “And where is that Americano?”

  Catrina glided into a luxurious sitting room, walked over to the bar and waved off to the side of the spacious room. “Down in the bottom of this thing, tied up, but don’t worry, he won’t get free.” She smiled over at Mandy like a viper when she spoke. Mandy hated snakes.

  “Ah, Elisa Amanda.” The soft roll of her name in a man’s Spanish accent turned her around from where she’d been sizing up where to land her first punch on Ms Sexy.

  The older guy facing her with a soft smile looked like the actor for the Dos Equis Mexican beer commercial, except that she feared this was the real deal. Or rather, the real head of a Mexican cartel powerful enough to take on the Navy’s most elite forces. This man had enough power to snap her in two without lifting a finger. She felt like she’d suddenly landed in deep water and wasn’t going to be able to swim to the surface in time to survive. This man had captured her, and, worse, Mac, a seasoned professional killer.

  Behind him, two large men stood, staring at her intently. Their gazes skimmed down her tank top and BDUs before arrogantly lifting back to her face. Did they realise she had killed one of their own men? Maybe a brother or a friend.

  Behind them Trigger sauntered in as if he owned the place, only next to the head of the cartel, Trigger looked like a spoilt child. She remembered how Trigger had cursed her in frustration when he’d lost his hard-on. How he’d hit her in the face and shoved her into the wall in his fit of anger.

  The man next to him wouldn’t show any sign of anger, he’d simply destroy anyone who crossed him. He probably didn’t even change expression when he killed.

  If he did the killing.

  God, she was in trouble. And Mac was here as well. No doubt, these men wanted him dead. What had Catrina said? Trigger would take care of him.

  “Your long-lost niece, huh, Manuel?” Trigger motioned with his drink in a kind of sarcastic salute.

  She jerked in surprise even though Catrina had said this just a moment before.

  The older gentleman—monster—turned to Trigger and she saw the hardness fill his eyes. She was used to men of power. Her brother had been strong, even as a child. He’d grown into a powerful Navy SEAL before his death. Mac possessed enough bad-assed attitude to make dealing with him frustrating at times. But this man wore his power like other men wore the knowledge that they could walk upright. He simply oozed something that frightened her.

  “Ah, yes, Daniel, you have done well by us.” His tone was dark, but Daniel didn’t seem to notice. He poured himself another shot of amber liquor from a crystal decanter, raised the drink to his lips, and drank it down in one long swallow.

  Mandy turned from Trigger, hoping
he would get so drunk he passed out.

  “Why have you brought me here?” she asked Manuel Gonzales, not willing to stand around while Mac suffered. She had to think of a plan. If this man thought her family, maybe she could use that. She knew the culture, knew how weak women appeared to them. She made sure to look tired, and let her fear, the very real fear she had tried to hide, show on her face.

  Manuel looked over at her, seemingly concerned by her question. “I am your uncle. Your father was my youngest brother. We are family, you and I. I brought you here to give you safety, within our familia.” His eyes narrowed and shifted to Catrina, who had been playing with a curtain, obviously bored with them. “Catrina, have you offered Amanda refreshments?”

  Catrina huffed and shook her head. “No, I brought her here, as you requested.”

  “Here, my dear, come, sit and let me soothe your fears.” He gestured to a gold silken couch under the open windows of the deck. The place oozed elegance and money. The floors gleamed, along with every other wooden piece of furniture in the room. The brass fixtures shone under the glow from a hundred lights made to look like flames on the crystal chandelier hanging from the centre of the ceiling.

  He appeared so cultured, so gentlemanly that she felt sickened by him even more, but she walked carefully to the couch, feeling like she might break in two from all the tension rushing through her. At least this man was sane. Incredibly powerful, obviously concerned for his familia, but not insane. And how messed up was it that she felt safer with the mafia boss than near the sicko Navy SEAL?

  “Thank you, I’m so tired. What was that?” She rubbed her hand over her upper arm where a bruise showed where they’d shot her with the tranquiliser. “What did they use?” She pretended to get a little weak, sitting suddenly on the silky couch behind her. “Oh, I’m sorry, I just—I don’t feel well. I don’t understand why you didn’t simply find me. Why did you have to shoot me?”

  Manuel brushed a hand against her forehead, frowning in concern. “You are warm, I fear you are still feeling ill, my dear.”