“Circumstances have changed somewhat, Sergeant. It seems as if HOT is officially involved in this case now. You’ll need to bring her here, and then we’ll make sure she gets somewhere safe.”
Sam gripped the phone tight. Jesus, if HOT was involved, there was most certainly a foreign component. The military did not operate inside US borders except under very specific and well-defined circumstances. This was not one of them. And that made Sam’s blood run just a little colder. What the hell had Georgie gotten herself into?
“I need to do this, sir. I’m responsible for her.” Because Rick would kill him if anything happened to Georgie. Hell, Sam would hand him the gun and beg him to pull the trigger.
There was a moment of silence on the other end of the phone. “Fine. But you’re coming here first. Understood, soldier?”
“Sir, yessir,” Sam replied. The connection ended and Sam put the phone down again with a sinking feeling in his gut. If HOT was a part of this thing, the level of severity had just taken a quantum leap.
He glanced over at Georgie. She had her lower lip between her teeth. “You didn’t tell me about the door.”
“Didn’t want to worry you.”
She frowned. “I was already worried, Sam.”
“I know. That’s why I didn’t want to add to it.”
She let out an exasperated breath. “Always trying to protect me, even when I don’t want it.”
He flexed his hands on the wheel. “You want it this time, Georgie. Believe me.”
“I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me what that means?”
He shook his head slowly. “Nope. And don’t ask again, because I can’t. It’s not my decision.”
“Does this have anything to do with Jake’s death?”
“I think it has everything to do with it,” he said softly.
Georgie turned her head and stared out the window. She didn’t speak again.
CHAPTER FOUR
GEORGEANNE STOOD ON THE screened-in back porch of a small cottage on the Eastern Shore of Maryland, arms folded over her chest, staring out at the creek running past the house. It was late afternoon and the sun gleamed golden on the water. A blue heron picked its way along the shore on the opposite side, and marsh grass waved occasionally in the slight breeze called up whenever a bird took flight.
This was not at all what she’d expected to be doing when she’d awakened this morning. But now she was here, and her head was still reeling from everything she’d been through. She heard a sound behind her and turned as Sam strolled outside. He’d changed out of his military uniform and into a pair of faded jeans that sat low on his hips. He wore a navy T-shirt that clung to the broad muscles of his tattooed biceps and chest and made her mouth water.
Tattoos? Sam hadn’t had tattoos before. A black tribal design appeared to surround his right bicep. She couldn’t tell what was on his left, but she saw a hint of ink when he crossed his arms over his chest.
“You doing okay?”
She shrugged. Belle had calmed down the instant they’d walked inside and she’d been let out to roam the house. Now she was standing on her hind legs, her front paws on the screen, watching the birds in the yard. Her tail swished back and forth happily.
Georgeanne was anything but happy right now. “I’m a bit out of sorts, actually.”
Sam shoved his hands in his pockets and walked over to join her. “Understandable.”
After the call in the truck earlier, he’d told her they had to make a stop. She hadn’t expected him to drive onto a military facility or up to a compound surrounded by razor wire, but that’s exactly what he did. She’d only been allowed inside a big room near the entrance of the compound, where they permitted visitors, but it had soon swarmed with large men in uniform who’d gazed down at her with deadly serious expressions.
The one with silver birds on his shoulders—thank God for her time with the military so she could at least recognize a colonel now—came over and held out his hand. “Colonel Mendez, little lady. You doing okay?”
Everyone wanted to know if she was okay. Hell no, she was not okay—but she hadn’t told the colonel that. Instead, she’d made some sort of answer, listened while the colonel talked, and then sat down to wait while all the men, including Sam, disappeared into the inner building. A uniformed soldier came back with an offer of coffee, and she was alone again.
Sam didn’t return for an hour, but when he did, he’d told her they were going to the Eastern Shore where they would stay for the next few days.
She’d stood there feeling so helpless and out of control.
“I have classes, Sam. I can’t just disappear.” She winced the moment she said it, because it was damned insensitive after what had happened to Jake.
“The colonel will take care of everything. All you have left is finals, and someone will make sure they’re proctored. You’ll get the exams to grade. It’s non-negotiable, Georgie.”
“So it’s not just you anymore?” She’d nodded her head toward the giant steel door through which he’d just come. “It’s all of those guys in there too, right?”
He’d looked somber. “That’s right. Jake Hamilton didn’t fall into the Potomac by accident.”
“So why hasn’t it been on the news? A body in the Potomac isn’t something you can keep secret for long.”
Sam lifted an eyebrow. “Depends on who wants it kept secret.”
“I still don’t understand why the police aren’t involved. Or why the military is.”
He’d put his hands on her shoulders. “Because there are some things the military is better equipped to do. This is one of those things, Georgie.”
She’d been thinking about that for hours, and she still had no idea what Jake could have been tangled up in. Or why she was a part of it.
Sam had driven off the base and headed east, eventually rolling over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge and onto the Eastern Shore. Another hour of driving and they’d ended up here, at this small cottage tucked away on a tributary of the bay.
Now Georgeanne shook her head and swallowed the lump in her throat. “I don’t understand why Jake’s dead. Or what it has to do with me.”
Sam ran a hand through his hair and let out a breath. “Jake was involved in things he shouldn’t have been involved in. And it looks like he had a crush on you, G. He had pictures of you in his apartment, poems he’d written. Whoever killed him thinks you know something about what he was doing.”
Georgeanne wanted to howl. Instead, she shuddered. It was creepy to think Jake had had a crush on her and now he was dead. “But I don’t know anything. I didn’t even know Jake that well. He took three classes from me, that’s it. We had coffee a few times, but it was during my office hours. It wasn’t a date or anything.”
“He seemed to think it was. Others did too, if what this guy said to you was any indication.”
She shook her head, wanting to deny everything Sam was saying. “But Jake was a good guy. Harmless. I can’t believe he was mixed up in something bad.”
“You aren’t that naïve, Georgie. Just because someone is nice doesn’t mean they haven’t done something wrong. I’m sorry when anyone dies so senselessly, but trust me when I tell you he wasn’t minding his own business when it happened.”
Georgeanne swallowed the lump in her throat. “So now you get to say when someone deserves the bad things that happen to them? I think that’s rather cynical, don’t you?”
Sam’s expression was stark. “I’ve seen too much in this life not to be cynical. Jake Hamilton was doing things he shouldn’t have been doing. And while I’m sorry you’re hurt over this, I’m more pissed that he managed to drag you into it. You’re lucky they didn’t succeed with the train last night.”
She closed her eyes, feeling the ache in her hip anew. “I know. And I’m sorry. But I liked Jake. Or at least the Jake I knew. It’s not easy to start believing he was a bad person.”
“I didn’t say he was bad. But he did bad things. Or stupid
things, at least. And that cost him his life.”
She looked up at him. “And I’m mixed up in it.”
Sam nodded. “We don’t know precisely how. It could just be that they think you were his girlfriend and know something about what he was doing. He might have said something to them, might have implicated you in some way. Did he ever give you anything?”
She shook her head. “Tests and papers. Nothing else.” She chewed on her bottom lip. “The last time I saw him, he was with a man in the Metro. It was late, and I was waiting for the train home. Jake said he was going to Crystal City with a friend. Then a man showed up and they started talking.”
Sam’s gaze had sharpened. “And what was unusual in that?”
She blinked. “I don’t know that anything was.”
“You mentioned it. I think you wouldn’t have done that if it didn’t bother you somehow.”
Her heart beat a little faster as she thought back to that night. “The man seemed angry. And I didn’t like the way he looked at me.” She shrugged. “It was nothing else, really. Just a bad feeling he gave me.”
“Did you talk to him?”
“No.”
“What did he look like?”
“Dark. Middle-Eastern, maybe, and that pains me to say because it shouldn’t mean a damn thing.”
“No, it shouldn’t. But sometimes it does.” He didn’t have to remind her that she’d described the man from the coffee shop as vaguely foreign, too.
“He had a goatee, closely cropped. He looked… very manicured. Well-dressed and well-groomed. There was nothing unusual in that, except that he didn’t seem to match Jake, if you know what I mean. Jake was, I don’t know, very casual. Except when in uniform, of course.”
“You have something or saw something. Or someone thinks so anyway. And until we figure out what that is, you’re staying here.”
A little wave of panic rose in her chest. “You aren’t leaving me out here alone, are you?” She’d lived alone for the past year, but being left in a remote location in Maryland where she didn’t know a soul and couldn’t even see the next house? The thought terrified her.
Sam put his hands on her shoulders. “I’m not leaving you. I’m here until this is over. And if I have to leave for some reason, one of the other guys will be with you. We won’t leave you unprotected.”
Georgeanne shivered. His hands on her shoulders were warm and strong, and she wanted to feel them everywhere, wanted the heat of him to engulf her. She hated that she did, especially when he seemed so determined to be remote. “Who are those guys?”
“My coworkers,” he said, his tone telling her he wouldn’t say anything else. “They know what they’re doing.”
She grinned up at him suddenly. “Careful, Sam, or I’ll start to think you’re part of some secret military outfit.”
He gazed at her steadily, his expression never changing, and it suddenly hit her that that was exactly what was going on. Sam McKnight was a part of something she wasn’t supposed to know about.
“Does Rick know?” she asked, and his gaze shuttered.
He turned away from her, his jaw tight. She didn’t know why she felt closer to him in that moment, but she did. He was a part of something big and she was the only one who’d guessed, even if he wouldn’t admit it.
She touched his arm. “I won’t say a word. I promise.”
“There’s nothing to say, Georgie. I’m a Ranger. Same as always.”
“Of course,” she said. But she didn’t believe it.
*
Sam was restless as hell. Evening was falling and frogs began their nightly chorus against the backdrop of the river and marshes nearby. There was no car noise out here, no planes or motorcycles or people talking. It was peaceful, but he didn’t feel at peace.
Georgie sat at the small table on the porch with her laptop. They hadn’t spoken much in a couple of hours now. He hadn’t known what to say to her, truth be told. Georgie wasn’t stupid and of course she would figure there was something going on after he’d taken her to HOT HQ. It wasn’t that they didn’t bring civilians to HOT—they did, clearly, or there wouldn’t be a separate area for visitors—but he hadn’t expected to have to take her there.
The cover story was always that they were Rangers when in truth they were so much more. HOT was secret, its members recruited from the Rangers, the Green Berets—and even from Delta Force, which was very similar. The wives of HOT members didn’t even know about its existence, though they knew their husbands went on missions quite often. HOT was, by design, a male-dominated organization. That’s just how Special Operations were, though with women being allowed to do combat tours nowadays, he didn’t think it would be long before they had female team members too.
Sam had gone out into the front yard to place a call back to HOT. He’d told them what Georgie had said about the guy with Jake Hamilton. It was probably nothing, but Sam had learned not to discount anything out of hand. Explore every lead, no matter how insignificant.
What he hadn’t told Georgie—what he couldn’t tell her—was that Jake Hamilton had been attempting to sell information about a DARPA mini-UAV project to a foreign organization. Mini-drones were the size of moths or hummingbirds, and they could do amazing surveillance work. They could also be weaponized, which was a frightening fucking thought. But the problem with them was powering them for long periods of time. They just didn’t have long-range capability. Their juice drained within minutes.
And that’s what DARPA was working on. A mini-drone, capable of being weaponized and able to fly long distances before recharging. That was the nightmare: a weapon of that scope in the wrong hands could change the face of the War on Terror—and not in a good way.
Mendez had said during the briefing that they still didn’t know if Jake had managed the hand-off or not, but the group he’d been dealing with was apparently a front for the Freedom Force. They didn’t think Hamilton had known precisely who he was selling the information to. Or cared.
He may not have been a particularly stylish dude, according to Georgie, but he sure had expensive tastes in things other than clothes. A vintage Corvette, for instance. A rare Colt pistol. Front row seats to a Gina Domenico concert.
Fucking dumbass.
The Freedom Force probably wasn’t interested in the time and money required to build a mini-drone—but they would be interested in selling the information to the highest bidder. Most likely, they’d attempt to exchange it for a small tactical nuke. If he were Ibn-Rashad, that’s what he’d do. Get a nuke and detonate it somewhere in Europe, preferably near a US base.
Matt Girard told Sam to hold tight and they’d get back to him when they had something. Which left Sam with a whole lot of nothing to do, except sit around in a remote cottage with the one woman in this world he shouldn’t touch.
Georgie looked up from her computer, as if she’d known he was thinking about her. Their gazes clashed and held, and his heart ticked up a few beats. He didn’t know what to say to her anymore. Hell, he hadn’t known what to say to her since the minute she’d walked into that bowling alley in Hopeful and tied his tongue into knots.
He’d been filled with conflicting feelings, and he was still filled with them. She was just about the sexiest woman he’d ever known, and he knew that a lot of that was the lure of the forbidden. He wanted her because he’d decided he couldn’t have her.
If she were anyone else, he could fuck her and be done with it. But not Georgie. He wouldn’t risk hurting her. If it caused him some discomfort, well, he’d just have to deal with it.
“You hungry?” he asked, getting to his feet and ranging toward the kitchen.
She closed the laptop. “I could use a bite of something.”
Sam went over to the fridge and started pulling out vegetables. “Pasta primavera?” he asked when he’d taken inventory of the stocked kitchen. Thank God for HOT’s resources. Colonel Mendez had arranged this place at a moment’s notice, along with a fully stocked pantry and a
generator, should they need it.
Georgie came over and leaned against the counter. She was smiling. “Seriously? You can make that?”
He shrugged self-consciously. “I’ve been on my own for a long time. It was learn to cook or starve.”
“Can I chop the veggies for you?”
He pushed the pile of vegetables toward her. “Sure.”
She began to prepare the veggies while he set up the water to boil and got the butter, cream, and Parmesan from the fridge. The kitchen was small and they had to stand almost elbow-to-elbow. He could feel the heat of her body, smell the perfume of her soap, and his dick started to harden as he imagined her in the shower, water and soap running down her skin.
Why had he let her help him again? Holy Christ, he’d never get through this night with her standing so damn close.
He set the pasta down on the counter and walked out of the kitchen.
“Everything okay, Sam?” she asked, her voice coming from right behind him.
He sucked in a deep breath and turned around. There she was, looking so vulnerable and tempting as she gazed up at him, her green eyes filled with questions he couldn’t begin to answer.
“Yes, fine. I just needed to get something.” He didn’t have anything in his hands, and they both knew it. But she shrugged and went back into the kitchen and he let out a long breath, clenched his fists at his side, and went to rejoin her.
She finished chopping everything and he put it on to sauté. When he turned around, she’d found a bottle of wine. She held it up. “Want some?”
“I’d better not.” He needed to keep his wits sharp, and he couldn’t do that if he were drinking. Not that he expected anyone to show up here looking for Georgie, but he considered himself on duty. Even if he felt like he wasn’t doing a damn thing out here in the boonies.
She removed the cork expertly and poured herself a glass. He watched her take a sip, remembering when she wasn’t old enough to drink at all. She used to wrinkle her nose at the beer he and Rick snuck out of her dad’s pool house refrigerator. They hadn’t done it often, but when they had, Georgie had never told on them.
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