by Elle James
“You’re a fighter but afraid of a little bad luck.” Nora shook her head. “Those two things don’t seem to go together.”
“You’d be surprised how easily my guys are freaked by the littlest things.”
“And you,” she reminded him.
“You asking what could happen? isn’t a little thing. That’s in-your-face tempting fate.” Rucker was laying it on thick to keep her grinning, but deep down, he believed what he was saying. And it didn’t make a difference the amount of education he had or the statistics that predicted outcomes. His gut told him she’d just tempted fate with her statement. Maybe he was overthinking things. Now, he was worried she wouldn’t make it back to the States alive.
Nora liked Rucker. He was the first guy who’d walked away without an argument since she’d arrived at the base in Afghanistan. He’d meant what he’d said and proved it. His dark brown hair and deep green eyes, coupled with broad shoulders and a narrow waist, made him even more attractive. Not all the men were in as good a shape as Rucker. And he seemed to have a very determined attitude.
She hadn’t known what to expect when she’d deployed. Being the center of attention of almost every single male on the base hadn’t been one of her expectations. She’d only ever considered herself average in the looks department. But when the men outnumbered women by more than ten to one, she guessed average appearance moved up in the ranks.
“Where did you learn to play volleyball?” Rucker asked, changing the subject of her leaving and her flippant comment about what could happen in one week.
“I was on the volleyball team in high school. It got me a scholarship to a small university in my home state of Minnesota, where I got my Bachelor of Science degree in Nursing.”
“It takes someone special to be a nurse,” he stated. “Is that what you always wanted to be?”
She shook her head. “I wanted to be a firefighter when I was in high school.”
“What made you change your mind?”
She stared down at the coffee growing cold in her mug. “My mother was diagnosed with cancer when I was a senior in high school. I wanted to help but felt like I didn’t know enough to be of assistance.” She looked up. “She made it through chemo and radiation treatments and still came to all of my volleyball games. I thought she was in the clear.”
“She wasn’t?” Rucker asked, his tone low and gentle.
“She didn’t tell me any different. When I got the scholarship, I told her I wanted to stay close to home to be with her. She insisted I go and play volleyball for the university. I was pretty good and played for the first two years I was there. I quit the team in my third year to start the nursing program. I didn’t know there was anything wrong back home. I called every week to talk to Mom. She never let on that she was sick.” She forced a smile. “But you don’t want my sob story. You probably want to know what’s going on around here.”
He set his mug on the table. “If we were alone in a coffee bar back in the States, I’d reach across the table and take your hand.”
“Oh, please. Don’t do that.” She looked around the mess hall, half expecting someone might have overheard Rucker’s comment. “You’re enlisted. I’m an officer. That would get us into a whole lot of trouble.”
“Yeah, but we’re also two human beings. I wouldn’t be human if I didn’t feel empathy for you and want to provide comfort.”
She set her coffee cup on the table and laid her hands in her lap. “I’ll be satisfied with the thought. Thank you.”
“Doesn’t seem like enough. When did you find out your mother was sick?”
She swallowed the sadness that welled in her throat every time she remembered coming home to find out her mother had been keeping her illness from her. “It wasn’t until I went home for Christmas in my senior year that I realized she’d been lying to me for a while.” She laughed in lieu of sobbing. “I don’t care who they are, old people don’t always tell the truth.”
“How long had she been keeping her sickness from you?”
“She’d known the cancer had returned halfway through my junior year. I hadn’t gone home that summer because I’d been working hard to get my coursework and clinical hours in the nursing program. When I went home at Christmas…” Nora gulped. “She wasn’t the same person. She’d lost so much weight and looked twenty years older.”
“Did you stay home that last semester?” Rucker asked.
“Mom insisted I go back to school and finish what I’d started. Like your mother, she hadn’t gone to college. She wanted her only child to graduate. She was afraid that if I stayed home to take care of her, I wouldn’t finish my nursing degree.”
“I heard from a buddy of mine that those programs can be hard to get into,” he said. “I can see why she wouldn’t want you to drop everything in your life to take care of her.”
Nora gave him a watery smile. “That’s what she said. As soon as my last final was over, I returned to my hometown. I became her nurse. She lasted another three months before she slipped away.”
“That’s when you joined the Army?”
She shook her head. “Dad was so heartbroken, I stayed a few months until he was feeling better. I got a job at a local emergency room. On weekends, my father and I worked on cleaning out the house and getting it ready to put on the market.”
“Is your dad still alive?” Rucker asked.
Nora nodded. “He lives in Texas. He moved to a small house with a big backyard.” She forced a smile. “He has a garden, and all the ladies in his retirement community think he’s the cat’s meow. He still misses Mom, but he’s getting on with his life.”
Rucker tilted his head. “When did you join the military?”
“When Dad sold the house and moved into his retirement community. I worried about him, but he’s doing better.”
“And you?”
“I miss her. But she’d whip my ass if I wallowed in self-pity for more than a moment. She was a strong woman and expected me to be the same.”
Rucker grinned. “From what I’ve seen, you are.”
Nora gave him a skeptical look. “You’ve only seen me playing volleyball. It’s just a game.” Not that she’d admit it, but she was a real softy when it came to caring for the sick and injured.
“If you’re half as good at nursing, which I’m willing to bet you are, you’re amazing.” He started to reach across the table for her hand. Before he actually touched her, he grabbed the saltshaker and shook it over his cold breakfast.
“You just got in this morning?” Nora asked.
Rucker nodded.
“How long will you be here?” she asked.
“I don’t know.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know? I thought when people were deployed, they were given a specific timeframe.”
“Most people are. We’re deployed where and when needed.”
Nora frowned. “What are you? Some kind of special forces team?”
His lips pressed together. “Can’t say.”
She sat back. He was some kind of Special Forces. “Army, right?”
He nodded.
That would make him Delta Force. The elite of the elite. A very skilled soldier who undertook incredibly dangerous missions. She gulped and stopped herself from reaching across the table to take his hand. “Well, I hope all goes well while you and your team are here.”
“Thanks.”
A man hurried across the chow hall wearing shorts and an Army T-shirt. He headed directly toward their table.
Nora didn’t recognize him. “Expecting someone?” she asked Rucker, tipping her head toward the man.
Rucker turned, a frown pulling his eyebrows together. “Why the hell’s Dash awake?”
Nora frowned. “Dash? Please tell me that’s his callsign, not his real name.”
Rucker laughed. “It should be his real name. He’s first into the fight, and he’s fast.” Rucker stood and faced his teammate. “What’s up?”
“CO wants us
all in the Tactical Operations Center,” Dash said. “On the double.”
“Guess that’s my cue to exit.” Rucker turned to Nora. “I enjoyed our talk.”
She nodded. “Me, too.”
Dash grinned. “Tell you what…I’ll stay and finish your conversation while you see what the commander wants.”
Rucker hooked Dash’s arm twisted it up behind his back, and gave him a shove toward the door. “You heard the CO, he wants all of us.” Rucker winked at Nora. “I hope to see you on the volleyball court before you leave.”
“Same. Good luck.” Nora’s gaze followed Rucker’s broad shoulders and tight ass out of the chow hall. Too bad she’d only be there another week before she shipped out. She would’ve enjoyed more volleyball and coffee with the Delta Force operative.
He’d probably be on maneuvers that entire week.
She stacked her tray and coffee cup in the collection area and left the chow hall, heading for the building where she shared her quarters with Beth Drennan, a nurse she’d become friends with during their deployment together.
As close as they were, Nora didn’t bring up her conversation with the Delta. With only a week left at the base, she probably wouldn’t run into him again. Though she would like to see him again, she prayed he didn’t end up in the hospital.
Chapter 2
“Dawg, are you in position?” Rucker spoke softly into his mic. He hunkered low at the corner of a mud and stick Afghan building, looking across at their target structure, which was less than twenty yards away. He had yet to engage his night vision goggles. The light from the stars shining brightly above illuminated the little village and cast sufficient shadows to hide the Deltas.
A couple of Taliban guards leaned against the structure, half asleep, their AK-47 rifles pointed at the ground.
Ryan “Dash” Hayes was in position at the corner of the structure cattycorner from Rucker, ready to leapfrog to the front entrance when Dawg, their best sniper, reported he was in position at the top of one of the buildings overlooking their location.
Dawg would provide cover while they moved in, breached the building and extracted their mark, a high-ranking member of the Taliban known for his particularly gory torture of captured American troops and his trade in human trafficking of women and little girls.
“Bull?” Rucker prompted.
“In position,” Craig “Bull” Bullington responded.
“Any trouble?” Rucker tensed as one guard’s head jerked back, and he straightened, raising his weapon, aiming it in the direction of the road leading through the village. The road they’d have to emerge from soon.
“Two guards on the back wall,” Bull said. “I took one. Blade got the other.”
“One throw,” Michael “Blade” Calhoun said. “The guy probably thought it was a bee sting until he bled out in seconds.”
“Mac?” Rucker whispered.
“Got your six,” Sean McDaniel responded.
“We’re ready when you are,” John “Tank” Sanders added.
“Got the village entrance covered,” Lance Rankin said. “No one’s comin’ or goin’.”
“Got eyes from the sky on you,” Dawg reported.
Rucker’s gut twisted. Something didn’t feel right.
“I’m going in,” Dash announced.
About to tell him to hold steady, Rucker couldn’t think of a single obvious reason to abort. The village was quiet. Too quiet.
Intelligence sources had identified this residence as the one currently housing Abdul Akund, a field commander who’d been released by Afghan forces and been on the run for over a year, wreaking havoc on whatever town he targeted as anti-Taliban. He’d hidden in the hills for much of the time. Capturing or killing him would help save Afghan and American lives.
Still, Rucker would’ve liked to question the source himself. The village, the night, the silence unnerved him.
Dash moved, leapfrogging to another corner closer to the guarded home. Rucker and Dawg covered.
If one of the guards happened to spot Dash, the other two Deltas would risk breaking the silence and take them out. Their weapons were outfitted with silencers, needed when infiltrating villages. The last thing they wanted was an entire community to wake and get in the way of them taking out one man.
Collateral damage in the way of women and children was frowned upon by folks higher up the command chain.
None of the Delta operatives liked it when women or children were killed in the course of a mission.
Silence was golden. Sneak in, get the job done and get out without raising an alarm was their goal.
Not every mission worked out that way.
As soon as Dash was in position less than fifteen feet from the guards, Rucker made his move. Dash would cover for him, along with Mac and Tank at his rear.
Clinging to the shadows, he made it to his next position without either guard noticing.
He and Dash waited in position until Tank and Mac moved closer.
When they were all in place, Rucker gave the hand motion for Dash to move in and take the guard closest to him.
Rucker and Dash left the relative safety of the building corners and rushed the sentries in front of the building.
Before the guards could aim their weapons, Rucker and Dash had them neutralized.
Rucker stood to the side and pushed open the door. That feeling that something wasn’t right returned in full force.
“Ready?” Dash said beside him.
Rucker nodded, lowered his night vision goggles over his eyes and entered the building, his rifle leading the way, his finger resting on the trigger guard.
The door opened into a living area. The space was empty but for a rug and some pillows. At the other end of the room was a hallway, leading into the back of the building.
Dash took point, leading the way down the hallway. Rucker followed.
“I don’t like this,” Rucker whispered into his mic.
Dash didn’t slow. As he approached the first doorway off the hall, he pushed it open.
Rucker opened the one across from it.
“Empty,” Dash reported.
“Same,” Rucker echoed.
Dash moved toward the end of the corridor.
Rucker peered around him, searching for tripwires near the floor.
As Dash reached out to touch the wooden door, Rucker glanced over his buddy’s shoulder at something that didn’t look right against the wood.
“Wait,” Rucker called out.
Too late, Dash’s hand pushed the door in, and his helmet touched the trip wire just above eye-level. Rucker reached out, grabbed Dash by the back of his bulletproof vest and yanked him backward.
An explosion slammed the door into Dash, and Dash into Rucker, knocking them and half the building down.
Shouts sounded, gunfire ripped the air and dust fogged Rucker’s vision.
With Dash’s weight and the rubble of the building crushing him, Rucker could barely move, much less breathe.
“Dash,” he wheezed and bucked beneath his burden.
Dash moaned.
His head ringing from the concussion, Rucker rocked right then left. When he tipped left, Dash rolled slightly.
Pushing hard with his right hand, Rucker tipped left again, and Dash rolled off him.
His legs still trapped beneath Dash, Rucker dragged himself across broken, hand-shaped bricks and debris until he freed his feet. He pushed to his hands and knees, rolled Dash onto his back and shook him gently. “Dash.”
Dash moaned and went limp, his head lolling.
With gunfire going off around him, Rucker had no choice but to stand. In a fog of dust and debris, his night-vision goggles were useless. He pushed them up on his helmet, grabbed Dash’s arm and bent, hauling him up and over his shoulder in a firefighter’s carry.
Still shaken and dizzy from the explosion, Rucker stumbled across broken bricks, crumbled walls and debris, hoping he was headed away from the gunfire. When he finally cleared
the building and his feet found the relative smoothness of the dirt street, he picked up the pace.
He’d lost communication with his team, and he probably couldn’t have heard them anyway. Not with the way his ears were ringing.
A figure loomed out of the fog of dust.
With his hands full of Dash and his rifle on a sling over his shoulder, he didn’t have time to drop his load and aim.
The figure surged toward him, a rifle leading the charge.
“Rucker?” Mac’s voice sounded like it came from the inside of a very deep well.
“Mac?” Relieved, Rucker shook his head in an attempt to clear the dizziness.
Mac jerked his head to the side. “Head out of the village. I’ve got your six. Tank will cover you along the way.”
His head rattled and his strength questionable, Rucker trudged on through the village streets, retracing what he hoped had been his path in. When he reached the last building, he peered out into the night. A chopper hovered fifty yards away.
Though his head swam and his knees threatened to buckle, Rucker lurched forward.
Out of the shadows, Tank emerged. “Let me get one side,” he said, through the ringing in Rucker’s ear.
Tank helped bring Dash off Rucker’s shoulder without jolting him too much. Then he draped one of the injured man’s arms over his shoulder. Rucker draped the other over his. They started forward, Dash’s feet dragging in the dirt.
Behind them, gunfire popped and cracked in the air.
Rucker couldn’t look back. To turn his head would make him dizzier and stumble. They had to get Dash to the helicopter.
Halfway across the open ground, Rucker felt his strength waning. He refused to give up. Had the situation been reversed, Dash would’ve done everything in his power to get his friend out of danger. Rucker could do no less, no matter how depleted and banged up he felt.
When he thought he couldn’t take another step, Lance Rankin ran up alongside him. “Let me,” he yelled over the thumping sound of the chopper blades.
Rucker backed out from under Dash’s arm as Lance slid beneath. Between Lance and Tank, they had Dash on the helicopter and laid out on the floor. Immediately, Tank bent over him, checked his breathing and shined a penlight into his eyes.
