He was certain they’d done everything they could to make sure it did. They’d used cheap plywood to convert the interior of the block building into a rough replica of the house they would breach tomorrow. Old tires lined the walls to absorb sound and spent rounds, a major difference from the real deal. But the place provided a stage to practice their maneuvers.
The lives of six American hostages depended on the timing and skill of his team. Their mission was to save and free the hostages, some of whom had been held in captivity for over a year. They’d take out every guard if necessary, but hoped to capture at least one to gather some intelligence about the Sinaloa Cartel.
As their time in Nicaragua wound down, and this last mission rushed at them with the lumbering weight of a tank, Brett was eager for it to be over. In fact, if they could load up now and go, it wouldn’t be too soon for him.
He hated the last weeks of deployment. They were always dominated by the anticipation of seeing family and home. Something else he tried not to acknowledge. The anxiety that some bad guy’s bullet might find him and steal his future.
His promise to Tess intensified those feelings. Even though he knew something could happen to fuck it up, he’d sworn he’d get home in one piece and in time to say “I do” on April tenth. He damn well meant to do both if humanly possible.
At Senior Chief Ryan Engle’s whistle, Brett fell in behind Swan again. The squad straggled out of the building to join Engle, ‘Book’ Ashe—their communications expert—and Lieutenant Sam Harding, their CO, in a nearby patch of shade.
“Final briefing in five.” Engle said and disappeared inside the plywood structure to check their targets.
Now practice was over, the men, still pumped on adrenaline, traded trash talk about how well they’d done. Brett only half listened, instead studying his new teammates while they walked to the abandoned hangar they’d made their headquarters.
Petty Officer Clyde ‘Squirrel’ Rosenberg was a cutup and prankster during down time, but he was all business when they went into action.
Seaman Frank Denotti, the team medic, knew his stuff. During the last mission, one of the Nicaraguan soldiers they sometimes worked with had taken a ricochet to the calf. Denotti had popped it out, patched him up, shot him full of antibiotics, and the guy had recovered without a doctor. Good thing, since they’d been out of touch with civilization for a week. As an endnote to this deployment, of which there would be many, it read pretty well.
Seaman Josh “Arrow” Aaron had an arm like a major league pitcher and could lob a grenade with just as much accuracy. Brett would take his pitching skills over any grenade launcher. More important, Arrow served as Brett’s spotter when his sniper skills were needed.
Petty officer Martin Swan was as sharp an operator as Brett had ever worked with. He could do anything on a computer and was also fearless in battle.
Seaman Elijah ‘Book’ Ashe could fix a COM system with bailing wire and Band-Aids. He kept them connected to their intel guys and extraction crews no matter how much lead flew over his head.
Lieutenant Sam ‘Hardass’ Harding reminded Brett a lot of Hawk, his brother-in-law and past squad leader. The Lieutenant could be a hardass, which was why they were doing drills they’d done thousands of times before. No one on the team second-guessed their CO. Not with six American civilian lives and their own at stake.
Though he missed the men he’d lived and fought with in Iraq, Brett was as confident of these guys’ skills as he’d been with his old team. This squad had been sent here because of their ability to be flexible and their special training. Everyone had taken turns in the glass house, done the drills, and familiarized themselves with the hostages through pictures.
They were ready.
Some of his tension drained away. Soon he’d be winging his way home to Tess soon.
The team trooped to the back of the hangar where a battered table and chairs waited for them. Brett dropped his gear in its assigned place against the wall, checked the safety on his rifle, and found a place at the table with the rest.
Five minutes later Senior Chief Engle joined them. The guy looked wiry and thin, but in a firefight, Brett would take him as a backup over any other guy on his team. The guy had balls the size of boulders and smarts to back it up. That’s why he was in charge of reconnaissance for this op.
“New intel, guys,” Senior Chief called the briefing to order.
“So far it looks like at least four of the hostages are ambulatory. The other two may be incapacitated in some way. We won’t know until you get in there. Thermal readings show both groups are being confined in the back west corner of the structure.” Engle pointed to a schematic on the wall of the church where the hostages were being held indicating the room.
“Surveillance reports ten targets with automatic weapons. And we’ve seen at least two Mk5 machine guns. These guys are as well-armed as any army, because they operate like one.”
“For the most part, the tangos stay under cover inside the building while two two-man teams walk the perimeter. Cutter, even though you’ve practiced with the fire team, your sniper skills are even more important this time. You’ll take out those guards before the breach.”
“Roger that, Senior Chief,” Brett said.
“Since you’ll be outside the building, you’ll also be in charge of maintaining contact with the extraction team. One Apache and one Chinook will be en route as soon as the team breaches the building. There may be more bad guys living in the village, so once gunfire starts they’ll be on you like ticks on a coon hound.”
“Understood, Senior Chief. Arrow and I can handle things until the extraction team gets there.”
“Good. By the time you have the targets down and the hostages under your wings, the birds will be there to extract you.”
“Hooyah, Senior Chief!” the men bellowed.
“Two women arrive with food for the group every day at zero five hundred, but they don’t stay. When the women are out of range of the action, we’ll hit the targets as soon as they settle in to eat.” Engle looked around the group. “Any questions?”
When no one spoke, Senior Chief nodded. “You have your assignments. We move out at twenty-four hundred.” Engle turned to Lieutenant Harding. “Anything else, Lieutenant?”
Harding stood. “Thanks, Senior Chief. I’ve got news. Even if this op goes as planned—”
That got a chuckle from several of the men. Things rarely did.
Harding flashed a brief smile. “It will be at least two more weeks before we head home. There’s been some additional intel on these guys. If we have the opportunity to break the back of this organization, we will take it.”
Brett stifled a groan. Two more weeks! That left him only six days leeway before the rehearsal dinner.
There’d be no guarantee he’d make it home even then. Ops like this always took longer than planned. Why had he put Tess through the aggravation of planning a wedding when he knew damn well this shit might happen?
If she had to cancel her big day, there wouldn’t be a wedding. Not a formal one, at least. That was only if he could persuade her to marry him after the disappointment wore off.
He’d warned her shit like this happened, but hearing it and experiencing it were two different things.
They should have locked lips at the county courthouse before he left and arranged something at the church after he got back.
But Tess wanted something more. She deserved more for all the shit she’d have to put up with in the years to come.
Being married to a SEAL was no picnic. The separations weren’t the worst of it. There was the stress of being alone so much of the time. Then there was always the worry that he might not make it back.
That she’d said yes when he proposed was a freaking miracle. He was lucky. Damn lucky.
The briefing wound down and Brett allowed himself a quick glance at his watch. As soon as it was over, he’d call Tess. He hadn’t heard her voice in seven days, and he needed t
o give her some reassurance he wasn’t blocking her out intentionally. A hard thing to do when he was in fucking South America in the fucking jungle where cell phone service was non-existent, and he only got a few minutes satellite phone time every week.
Lieutenant Harding dismissed the men. Brett headed for the COM room and see if he could get some SAT phone time.
“Cutter.”
Brett turned to see Engle bearing down on him. “Yes, Senior Chief?”
Engle waited until he was right in front of him before speaking in a low voice. “I know you have a wedding planned for the tenth.”
“Yes, sir.”
“You may want to give your fiancée a heads up that your arrival time may be tight.”
“I was just about to go to the COM room to see if I could do that, sir.”
Engle handed him an unwieldy SAT phone. “Take care of that ASAP, and when you’re done I’d like a word.”
“Roger that, Senior Chief.” He watched the man walk away, wondering what the phone call was going to cost him. Did Engle have some special detail he needed taken care of?
Brett took a seat on the floor in a more or less private corner of the hangar, leaned back against one of the metal walls, and dialed Tess’s number.
“Hello.”
At the sound of her voice he smiled. “Hey, hon. How you doing?” He closed his eyes and thought about how she smelled like orange blossoms and she tasted even better. Thinking of her shot his heartbeat to double time and gave him an instant hard-on.
“Brett! Are you okay? Oh—I’m not supposed to ask you that, am I?”
He grimaced. The wives and girlfriends of his previous team members had obviously warned her not to mention anything that would worry him or say anything that would show she was concerned about him. “Aside from where I am, you can ask me anything you want, honey. You don’t have to watch what you say. I’m fine. I just wanted to hear your voice. I don’t get much time to call. How’s everything going?”
“Fine. The restaurant we booked for the rehearsal dinner was damaged by fire and canceled our reservation. Zoe’s helping me find another. Other than that, everything else is taken care of.”
He wasn’t ready to tell her his trip home had been delayed. Not yet. He’d save that bad news for later. “Good. Between you and my sister, you’ll have everything squared away in no time.”
“Zoe really is a wonder. She stays so organized and seems to take everything in stride.”
Brett chuckled. “Zoe has you snowed, Tess. She worries about everything.” Should he have told her that? “It’s okay to be upset and worried. In a way, deployment is easier for us. We just concentrate on what’s in front of us and try to block out the rest.”
“The chances of something happening to me are substantially lower than they are for you, Brett.”
“Yeah, but shit happens, Tess. And some of the people you associate with now are pretty—”
“Are you talking about the wives and girlfriends of other SEALs I talk to most days or the people in my office?” Her tone of voice turned brusque and controlled. “Those are the people I associate with, Brett.”
“People you interview, then. I just want you to be careful, honey.” He tried to keep the concern out of his voice, but knew he hadn’t quite managed.
“I am being careful. I promise. I got wind of two interesting stories today. Both could be big. The first was about a possible construction company payoff. One of the companies involved experienced a terrible accident where two men were killed. There may be a tie-in with the payoff. The other story is about an honor roll student arrested for robbing the grocery store where he works. There’s something strange going on in both cases. I’ll be doing some research and interviews tomorrow to see if I can pin down what it is.”
He was eager to know what she was up to, but damn if her job didn’t make him worry. It wasn’t like she was a cop, but she pushed too hard sometimes, just like her old man did. Her drive to get at the truth could piss some people off. “Watch your six, babe. Until I get home.”
“Then I’ll have you here to watch it for me.”
“Roger that. I miss you.”
“I do you, too.” Her voice dropped and grew husky. “Want to have phone sex?”
Brett laughed. “Yeah, I would.” His hard-on just got harder. He glanced across the hangar at the guys standing around shooting the shit. “But I’m not exactly where I could enjoy it.” Their last time together before he’d deployed popped into his head to torment him. They had come so far together since they’d met. Instead of holding back, as she’d done in the beginning, she reached for what she wanted from him with both hands. He almost groaned at the pun.
She was beautiful, sweet, and giving. And he loved her like crazy. He switched subjects, hoping to distract himself, and bent his knees to hide the tent in his cammies. “How is everyone?”
“Your nephew, A.J., has grown like a weed since you saw him. Hawk and the team were training down south, but they’re home now. Flash and Samantha have moved in together. He’s so good with Joy, her little girl. You’d think she was his daughter. He’s doing some kind of training right now with his new team. Do you guys ever stop?”
He was so engrossed in listening to her voice he almost missed the question. “No, not really. There’s always tech advances, new weaponry, tactics… something to learn or refine.”
“And always some bad guys in the way of you being home with me.”
The note of melancholy in her voice made it tough for him to swallow. “Unfortunately, yes. But I’m at the top of my game. I’m fine and I’m going to continue to be fine, so you don’t have to worry about me. And I’ll be home soon.”
She was silent for a moment. “But you’re not coming home yet, are you?”
He hated to say the words. He’d give her the worst-case scenario. And if things went better than he expected it would be a plus for them both. “No, honey. I’m not. I think I’ll make the rehearsal dinner and wedding, but I can’t promise much time before that.”
After a brief pause, she said, “As long as you come home to me, I don’t care, Brett.”
The unconditional love he heard in those words gripped him by the heart and throat all at once. “I love you. So. Damn. Much. More than I can put into words.”
“I know.”
Was she crying? Jesus. He didn’t want that. “I’m sorry.”
“I knew what I was getting into when I said yes. If I need to cancel everything at the last minute, just contact me if you can. We’ll deal with it together when you get home,” she said.
Brett ran his hand over the top of his head, roughing up the hair he’d cropped so he could tolerate the intense heat and humidity. She was going to be disappointed about his hair, too. “I don’t know what I did to deserve you. But whatever it was, I just hope I don’t do anything to fuck it up.”
She laughed. “I’ll remind you of that when you get home.”
“You can remind me as often as you’d like. I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
To keep them both from getting too maudlin he changed the subject. “What’re Mom and Russell up to? How’s your dad?”
“Everyone is fine. Your mom and Russell had me over for dinner a few days ago. And she has taken some fantastic photos of San Diego. She’s selling quite a few on photo sites. Dad’s in India right now. He’s due back next week sometime. He’s actually been calling me every week. Can you believe that?”
“Amazing, especially with Ian’s wanderlust. But it’s a good thing. What’s the word on Selena and Greenback?”
“She’s in remission, thank God. I don’t know how she keeps going through it all. We’re all doing what we can to help out and keep her spirits high.”
Relief unclenched his shoulders. Greenback and Selena were good people. They deserved all the good luck they could get. “Selena’s a strong lady.” What would he do if Tess got sick? He cut off the thought for fear of jinxing them.
/> “Yes, she is. The baby’s doing well. He looks just like Oliver.”
They spent a few more minutes talking about other wedding arrangements, her mom, stepdad, and some of their other friends.
Brett glanced at his watch. If he had his way, he’d spend the rest of the night on the phone with her. He suppressed a sigh. “I have to go, honey. Senior Chief is waiting for me.”
“I’m tempted to whine, but I won’t. I understand.”
She really did. She truly got him. “That’s my girl. I understand what I’m asking you to take on. I know how hard the life is for family in the military. But I love you so much.”
“I know you love me, Brett. And I really do get it—all of it, you know?”
She’d gotten a real taste of what it was like in the past ten months. He wanted to be there with her. Not in this fucking jungle with the heat and the bugs. But he was needed here, too. The tug of war between his commitment to his team and his country and his heart’s commitment to her was constant. “I’ll call again soon. And if I can, I’ll let you know when I’m on my way home.”
“Thanks. I’ll be waiting for your call. I love you.”
After his final “I love you,” he hit the button to disconnect, stood, and stretched. He felt better for having talked to her, but guilty, too. He should be there to help with the arrangements. Not that he was good at those things. Hell, he could shoot the eye out of a sparrow at fifteen hundred yards. How hard could it be to find a restaurant for a rehearsal dinner? Worst case, they could have a barbecue on the beach. Doc would let them use his back patio.
Why hadn’t he suggested that?
Because every time he called he was more focused on the sound of her voice than anything else.
Damn, he had it bad.
He wandered across the hangar and paused to survey their temporary lodging. At least they had cots, so they didn’t have to sleep on the floor. His new team sat around the table eating MREs. It was still strange not seeing the team members he’d left behind, Hawk, Flash, Greenback, Bowie, Doc, Strongman and Lange.
Building Ties (Military Romantic Suspense) (SEAL Team Heartbreakers Book 4) Page 2
