Live By The Team (Team Fear Book 1)

by Skaggs, Cindy

  “How do you feel about him leaving?”

  Like death warmed over. Her chest felt hollow and her eyes burned. “What are you, a shrink?”

  Debi plopped her margarita onto the table next to Lauren’s. “I’m not saying Ryder is in the clear. He has some sins to atone for, but you complicate things. Your brain is clouded with doubts, and it’s a big brain, so there’s more room to worry. It all comes down to one thing. Quit living your mother’s life.”

  “Whoa. Those are fighting words.” Lauren stood for the first time since getting to Debi’s. Her head did a loop-the-loop around the room. She rested her butt on the arm of the sofa. “I’m nothing like my mother. She’s an uneducated, unhappy, underemployed, and over-emotional mess.”

  “And you’re nothing like her.” Debi smiled primly.

  “Of course I’m not.”

  “Exactly, so quit living as if you’re going to make her mistakes.”

  “I’m not. I married a soldier, sure, but that had nothing to do with good old Abigail.” She hadn’t been able to resist Ryder’s sweet sincerity and persistence.

  “Right. But then you unpacked your bags and waited for him to pack his.” Debi grabbed her hand. “You’ve already proven you won’t make your mother’s mistakes. Make new mistakes instead of moping and waiting for the messy ending.”

  Lauren brought a hand to her spinning head. “Are you calling Ryder a mistake?”

  “The opposite, actually. The pain inside him is palpable. He loves you so much the chemistry and the tension affects everyone in the room with you. I don’t claim to know what’s going on or why he left, but it’s time you faced it.”

  “Oh, the horror.” Lauren dropped her head back to stare at the plaster ceiling. Her head did a quick spin around the block. Standing up had mixed the alcohol into her bloodstream, but that wasn’t what had her pulse surging. Her heart couldn’t take another round with him. “Why should I?”

  “He changed you. You’re more outgoing, less afraid, and more alive than I’ve ever seen you. The happiness and the energy shining off you when you’re together could light the entire city of El Paso, but you put a lid on it. You’ve been waiting for him to walk out the door from the moment he moved in. You never gave him a chance to stay.”

  “Wow, that’s just plain mean to say.” Lauren slid back into the corner she’d recently vacated. Debi might have a point, but Lauren’s inebriated brain was having a hard time following. “You’re saying I planned for him to leave? That I may as well have packed his bags?” At Debi’s nod, Lauren continued. “Even if that’s true, leaving was his choice, not mine.”

  “How does it feel to be right all the time?”

  The smug satisfaction hurt her heart. One look at the margarita glass and her stomach churned. “Like crap. What did you put in those drinks?”

  “Tequila. You’ve never been able to handle tequila.”

  Lauren squinted to the other end of the couch. It wasn’t long, but it was like looking through a tunnel. “You seem fine.”

  Debi scooted closer and patted her leg. “That’s because I’ve been drinking virgin drinks while you’ve been sucking back the real deal.”

  “You are quite possibly the meanest best friend on the planet.”

  “Alcohol was the quickest way to get you to open up.”

  Lauren curled her feet onto the couch and wrapped her arms around her knees. “Say what’s on your mind so I can go throw up.”

  “If you do, I’ll hold your hair back and clean you up afterwards. But first, you need to listen.” Debi scooted the last few inches and put an arm around Lauren. “Ryder may be thinking about leaving or not, but what he thinks doesn’t matter.”

  “Well, sure it does. That’s sorta the point.” Lauren didn’t want to get attached again if all he was going to do was walk away when they finished with Smythe. The heartache wasn’t something she’d survive a second time.

  “First, you have to decide what you want.”

  “I want Ryder, but—”

  “Bullshit. Whatever excuse you were going to give, it was bullshit. You wanted Ryder but assumed he wouldn’t stay. The same has been true of every boy in your life since Denny Hoskins at junior prom. You break things off first because you assume men don’t stay. You never once acted like you thought Ryder was permanent.”

  “We bought a house together.”

  “And when Smythe told you the house was in foreclosure, you didn’t question him. That’s not like you. You’re an educated and highly intelligent woman, but you never once considered that Smythe was scamming to you. You accepted his statement rather than considering that Ryder had actually paid the mortgage.”

  Lauren dropped her head against the soft cushions. “That’s a hell of lot of logic to throw at someone who is three sheets to the wind.”

  “Honey, listen to me.” Debi grabbed Lauren’s hands and met her gaze head on. “I can’t tell you what’s going to happen with Ryder. I can’t tell you if he’s going to leave or stay, but I can tell you to stand up for what you want. If Ryder is what you want, let him know, and quit putting up with the bullshit. If he’s not what you want, you already know what to do.”

  Tears brimmed in Lauren’s eyes. The truth stabbed her dead center in the chest where it was still possible to feel pain. Fear never left her. When Ryder left on his last deployment, she hadn’t slept or eaten. As impressive as he was, no matter how strong or determined or dedicated, he wasn’t immortal. Bullets could still kill him, taking him away just as easily as they stole her father. When Ryder transitioned out of the military, she thought he was safe. That they were safe. And then he’d walked out in the middle of painting their cute little townhouse. She dropped her head to Debi’s shoulder. “Maybe you don’t suck as a best friend.”

  “As best friends go, I’m pretty awesome.”

  “Humble too.” Lauren closed her eyes and let her head drop to her friend’s shoulder. The long moments of silence and friendship didn’t suck. “I want Ryder.”

  “Is that your heart talking or the tequila?”

  “Both.” She laughed, a sound that ended on a sob. “Mostly my heart. I love him.”

  “Then fight for him.”

  “I will.” Lauren stood, and straightened her spine. “He’s outside right now, and I’m—”

  “Going to wait ‘til morning.” Debi steered her around the coffee table and down the hall to the guest bedroom. “First, you need to sober up.”

  “Fine.” She’d never make it across the yard in her current condition anyway. Lauren dropped onto the bed without undressing. The bed spins had her moaning. “Debi?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I hope you find someone that makes you as crazy as Ryder makes me.”

  “No thanks.” Debi turned off the overhead light, but left the light in the attached bath lit. The door to the hall closed, but Lauren didn’t drift to sleep as she’d thought she would. Instead, she thought about Ryder, sitting outside, keeping her safe, even when she didn’t want him to. He was a good man and despite her very real worries, she refused to let him go.

  Ryder peered into the dark night, looking for trouble in the desolate acres around Debi’s house. The view of Texas prairie wasn’t much different than the one outside Mad Dog’s front door, not a reminder he particularly enjoyed. They had parked Rose’s truck in the barn so potential intruders wouldn’t see it. Instead of hunkering down with a padded seat, a heater, and a radio, they watched the house from the wreck of Lauren’s truck. It might be covert, but it was a long way from comfortable. A foul odor, lifting on the cool night breeze, rose above the smell of dirt. “Smell that?”

  “Skunk. Something must have spooked it,” Rose answered.

  “Plenty of coyotes. Or maybe some dumbass human stumbled into it, like in training camp right after we joined Team Fear—”

  “Craft walked right up to it.” A shit-eating grin lit Rose’s face. “City boy had never seen a skunk.”

  “Fucking Johns
on had no sympathy.” The stench had been unbearable. Ryder mock-shivered at the memory. “He made Craft bunk down with the rest of us.”

  “Mad Dog wanted to kill Craft that first night. Said burying the body would take care of the smell.”

  “You could always count on Mad Dog to arrive at the most radical solution.” Ryder shifted in his seat to find a comfortable spot. His ass had fallen asleep an hour ago when the lights in the house had turned off. “But he’d never seemed crazy.”

  “The shit in the upstairs of his house was as crazy at it comes.” Rose took a quick look around, his gaze sweeping thirty-hundred-and-sixty degrees.

  Ryder did the same, before pinning Rose with a look. “Do you think we’re destined to end up like Mad Dog?”

  Rose’s gaze flicked back to the plains. “I swear to God, Ryder, if I go rabid, you need to put a bullet in my brain.”

  The entire team would have agreed. It was the reason Mad Dog had chosen to end his life. He couldn’t live knowing what he’d done. Ryder tilted his neck until he heard a pop as the joint released the stress. “When Captain Johnson recruited you, gave you the spiel, why did you agree?”

  “Doesn’t fucking matter. I signed the papers and drank the fucking Kool-Aid.”

  “We all did.” How many other soldiers had the captain attempted to recruit? Or had he done his homework and known who to tag for the job? “I was born for the Army, born to follow my dad into the service. Hell, the first time I took a bullet, I bled red, white, and blue. When the captain showed up, I didn’t need the sales pitch. Sign me up, I said, before he’d finished the first sentence. Elite operations, six teams, seventy-two men. The best of the best. Fed my ego, my need to protect and defend. That was my whole goal in life. Before Lauren.” Now he had something—someone—more important to protect. Ryder popped his knuckles as he released the anger that had him fisting his hand. “I’d bet money they did a psych profile on each and everyone of us. They knew which triggers to push before they pulled us into the briefing room the first time.”

  Rose twisted to gaze out the rectangular window, the one that had cut the back of Lauren’s head. A brown smudge showed where her skull had hit. Lauren’s old pickup hadn’t been in good shape before the accident, but now there was nothing left to salvage. A spring poked through the vinyl and jabbed Ryder’s low back. Cold night air wafted through the broken windows along with the odor of skunk. “I think it’s getting closer.”

  “Or the smell is carrying on the wind.” Rose yanked at a chunk of glass sticking out of the black seal around the back window. “Do you think Team Echo did the deed? In Kandahar?”

  At first, they hadn’t believed it. Hadn’t wanted to believe. Team Echo had been on a similar protocol, the same training, until they were released to do their job: to kill, without fear, without remorse. “They did it. I had a buddy from my old unit stationed nearby. His team went in for cleanup.” Ryder’s stomach twisted. “The media didn’t exaggerate. If anything, they kept the worst details from the papers.”

  The world around them went silent until all Ryder heard was the crash of his own heartbeat against his ribs, the thrum of his pulse through his jugular. “They were on a different protocol.” Each of the six teams had been given a variant of the same drug designed to inhibit their response to fear. Take the fear from a soldier, and you had a damn near invincible fighting force that would storm any hill without freezing in fear. No shaking hands, no friendly fire, no panic. It was a soldier’s wet dream.

  “I don’t think it matters.” Rose turned to finally meet Ryder’s gaze. Hopelessness lived in his stark features. “I don’t think the protocols were different enough to change the outcome.”

  Team Echo had been worse than rabid. They had turned psycho, as if losing fear had untethered the thing keeping them human. Ryder’s hope crashed as Rose confirmed his worries. “So you think we’re doomed to go out bloody.”

  “Given the odds? We’ll be lucky to live through the next year.” Rose yanked the triangular piece of glass free and tossed it into the clutter of food wrappers on the floor. “Don’t go reaching for the straight jacket. Not yet, anyway. I’m fighting, but if we’re being honest, I’m one paranoid bastard right now.”

  “Same.” Ryder adjusted his position and the seat’s spring gouged into his side. “Bunking in a sand hut was more comfortable than this piece of junk.”

  Rose pointed to the side. “There’s the door. You want to take the next watch bunking on that hard-ass woodpile, be my guest.”

  Ryder scrubbed a hand over his face. The truck was parked off the main driveway behind a woodpile. The location gave them a view of the house and the drive leading to it. Rose hadn’t argued about all-night surveillance. Truth was, they both appreciated a break from the crap they brought back from the desert. He didn’t want to think of it anymore.

  “I don’t know if I expect trouble or if I’m trying to stick close to Lauren.” The slight crescent moon had passed its zenith and edged toward the western horizon. Dawn in a few hours, that many more hours until he could finish his discussion with Lauren. “I’m just fucking pissed at the entire fucking situation.”

  Rose kept his voice low, barely above a whisper; on the off chance someone attempted something while they kept watch. “You’re just pissed you’re in the doghouse with your wife.”

  “No shit.” Ryder hadn’t meant to leave her alone earlier today. His mind had fixated on the problem with Smythe, and his first priority was to eliminate the threat. It also gave his brain a break from fixating on Team Fear, protocols, and ultimate death. In his mind, letting Lauren sleep was an act of kindness, but she’d taken his early morning mission as abandonment. The same shit that had sent her to a lawyer in the first place. “I want her to lose the barriers she’s put between us.”

  “You brought that shit on yourself.”

  “I’m protecting her. The training and the protocols could turn us psychotic. Like Team Echo. Like Madigan. I can’t risk her.”

  “On one side, you want to protect her and on the other, you want her to lower her shields.”

  Ryder’s breath whooshed out. Finally, someone got it. “Exactly.”

  “The same way Captain Johnson wanted our participation, but didn’t want to tell us the whole story, so we couldn’t change our minds.”

  “He said it was classified.” But they hadn’t been given the chance for informed consent. They gave their consent, underwent the trials, and then they were informed of the possible side effects.

  “We had a right to know. So does Lauren. Tell her. She’s a big girl. Let her make the choice.”

  Fuck if Rose didn’t have the right of it. Ryder didn’t play well with others. Never had. Even in the team, he didn’t share. The same way that prick Captain Johnson had kept the side effects from them. It might be time to come clean. With everyone. Ryder brushed chunks of broken glass off the dashboard. “Where did Smythe go after I left yesterday?”

  Rose flipped open his notebook. His shoulders relaxed as if he were happy to change the subject. “He hit the lawyer’s office. He stayed for thirteen minutes, and then went back to his office. He left at five and went straight to his home on the better side of town.”

  “Another person has to be involved.”

  “We’re thinking on the same lines. Someone at the bank or the mortgage company. They’re skimming mortgage payments directly off the top, but Smythe wouldn’t have that kind of access to the payments. His targets appear intentional. He’s not picking people who are behind on their mortgage, but rather couples in the midst of divorce.”

  Ryder wanted to keep Lauren safe, and that might mean he needed to stay away, but divorce? A rock settled in his gut. “Are the foreclosed homes all from the same mortgage company or multiple?”

  Rose wrote notes as he spoke. “I don’t know, but I can get Craft on that in the morning. If we really want to know what’s going on, we need to bug Smythe’s office, his house, and his phone.”

  G
reat plan if they wanted to get arrested. Or killed. Ryder shook his head. The realtor didn’t have pockets deep enough to buy anyone who would give them a run for their money. “Have you taken a look at his financials?”

  “He appears solid, financially, but as far as I can tell, none of the skimmed payments go directly into his account. I’d bet money he has a stash either in cash or a hidden bank account.”

  Which meant they needed Craft to run more computer hacks, drawing their teammate further into Ryder’s mess. “I don’t like it.”

  “I figured, but you’ll do it.” Rose flipped the notebook closed. “For Lauren.”

  “Asshole.” There wasn’t much heat in his tone. Rose was hitting triggers, but they existed whether Rose pushed or not. Ryder had already proven she was his weakness, so yeah, he’d involve Craft, and he’d run an off-books operation. Stateside. Because he was a fucking idiot with a death wish. As long as they were doing it, they were doing it right. They needed to know what the hell Smythe was up to. Cops would be zero help. Besides, putting his name on a formal complaint would draw attention they didn’t need. “We don’t have any actual evidence against Smythe to take to the police.”

  “We damn well know that he and the lawyer are running a scam. The question is, do we want evidence or retribution?”

  Ryder watched Rose beat a noiseless tune on the steering wheel. Blood marked the spot on the wheel where Lauren’s head had hit. The reminder yanked a visceral response from Ryder. The accident could have killed Lauren. He would happily end Smythe, but while fully justified in his anger, Ryder going rogue might prove to Captain Johnson that Team Fear was as unstable as Team Echo. A situation Captain Johnson had warned Ryder against. “We need to stay off the radar. No police. No public flogging.”

  “That’s a fine line to walk.” Rose’s eyelid twitched. “How deep is the hole we’re standing in?”

  Ryder hadn’t told him about Johnson’s visit. How the fuck did you warn your best friend he was likely on someone’s hit list? “The media surrounding Mad Dog drew some unwanted attention.”