SEAL SALVATION (Brotherhood Protectors Colorado Book 1)

by Elle James

  Had everything they’d gone through scared him away from her? Had being trapped in the tunnel been all one-sided in bringing her closer to him, but not him closer to her?

  Why couldn’t she let go of her worry instead of stewing on it well after the water heater ran out of hot water?

  She dressed and walked across the empty hallway. Alone. Suddenly, going to bed seemed so…so…depressing.

  For a long moment, she stood with her hand on her doorknob, not wanting to go into her cold, empty room.

  This was ridiculous. She had to sleep sometime. Squaring her shoulders, she pushed the door open and entered.

  “I thought you’d never get here,” a voice said from her bed.

  Jake lay on the coverlet, fully clothed in a clean T-shirt and sweatpants, his hair slicked back and damp. He had his hands laced behind the back of his neck, and he smiled.

  “You can tell me to leave if you don’t want me here. I’ll understand,” he said.

  “I thought you’d had enough of being with me,” RJ said.

  “That’s as far from the truth as you can get.” He sat up and patted the bed beside him.

  “I left the door to the bathroom unlocked,” she mumbled.

  He nodded. “I know.”

  “You knew, but you didn’t come in.”

  “I remembered how challenging it was the last time and wanted to get a shower before I came to you.”

  She settled on the bed beside him. “Why do I feel awkward and shy all of a sudden?”

  He laughed. “I felt the same. Without the threat of someone trying to kill you, I feel like we’re starting all over.”

  “Exactly.” She sat with her hands in her lap. “Can we just move past this stage and get to the good stuff? I’m too old to play games and pretend I don’t like you when I do. So very much.” She turned to him. “And I want to get naked with you and make love until the sun comes up. Why does this have to be so hard?”

  He gathered her in his arms and held her. “It doesn’t have to be hard. Not when we feel the same way about each other.”

  Her heart lifted. “You do? You feel like that?”

  “What was the word you used the first night?” he laughed. “Confused?”

  She shook her head. “That was the first night. I’m not confused anymore. I know what I want.”

  “You do?” he asked, capturing her face between his hands. “What do you want, Jules?”

  She sighed. “I want you.”

  He brushed his thumb across her lips. “That’s a good thing because I want you, too. Confused or convinced, I want you. You’re an amazing, brave woman with a heart of gold. I don’t need riches to be happy. I need you.”

  RJ’s heart swelled in her chest making her feel as if she could explode with the enormity of her emotions. “Well, cowboy, what are we waiting for? Isn’t it time we get to the good stuff?” She reached for the hem of her T-shirt, tore it over her head and tossed it to the floor.

  “Being with you is the good stuff. The rest is just icing on the cake.”

  Epilogue

  “I can’t believe you actually wore that dress.” JoJo grinned and looked at her friend from top to toe. “It looks amazing…and risqué.”

  “I feel like every part of my body is exposed.” RJ tugged at the fabric around her bosom. The corset pushed everything up, making her breasts look two sizes larger than normal.

  JoJo turned RJ around and gave her a little shove out into the street of the Fool’s Gold ghost town. Hundreds of people waited to see Madame LaBelle gun down the dastardly gang leader to free the miners from terror. “Hurry out there and perform your shoot out. I’m ready to get to the Sadie Hawkins Dance and kick up my heels.”

  “Did you find a date?” RJ asked.

  JoJo shook her head. “No. And I don’t need one. I get along just fine without a man in my life.”

  “Well, as your friend, I thought you might try to avoid the commitment of asking someone to go the Sadie Hawkins Dance with you. So, I found you a date.”

  “What?” JoJo squeaked. “You shouldn’t have.”

  “Too late.” RJ grinned.

  “No really. You shouldn’t have.” JoJo’s heart beat faster and her hands grew clammy.

  RJ laughed and leaned close. “He’s right behind you.”

  JoJo spun and had to back up a couple of steps to get a good look at the tall, broad-shouldered man. “Oh, my,” she whispered.

  “JoJo, this is Max Thornton.,” RJ turned to JoJo. “Thorn, this is my good friend Josephina Angelica Barrera-Rodriguez.”

  JoJo stared into the iciest blue eyes she’d ever fallen into. “JoJo.”

  He chuckled as he took her hand and held it a little longer than a normal handshake. “Excuse me?”

  JoJo’s cheeks heated. “Sorry. My friends call me JoJo.”

  “JoJo.” He smiled. “My friends call me Thorn.”

  “Nice to meet you.” JoJo held onto Thorn’s hand a little longer than necessary. She liked how warm and strong it was and had that strange feeling that she didn’t want to let go. It was a new feeling since her stint in the Army. One she wasn’t sure she could trust. She hadn’t known many men she felt truly safe around since she left active duty. Gunny was one of them. He was good to the core. Any others…well, she wasn’t taking any chances.

  “How long have you known RJ?” JoJo asked, shooting a glare toward her friend. Now that she’d gotten her into this “date”, how was she supposed to get out of it?

  “I’ve known RJ all of three days. We met that day Michael Orlacek tried to bury her in a mine shaft.”

  “Oh.” She blinked up at him, her heart hammering against her ribs. It was worse than she’d thought. RJ didn’t know this man. He was a complete stranger. She didn’t know what he might be capable of or if he was a good man or a bad man. Looks could be deceiving. Actions were what counted.

  JoJo pushed her shoulders back and stood as tall as her five feet two inches could make her. “Look, you don’t have to go to the Sadie Hawkins Dance. RJ shouldn’t have asked you to take me. It’s tradition for the woman to ask the man. Since I didn’t ask you, you’re not obligated to escort me.”

  She let that sink in, hoping he’d be happy to take the proffered exit and bow out gracefully.

  He shook his head. “I’d be more than happy to take you. I’m going either way. At least with a date, I won’t have to stand around by myself.” He grinned. “I hate being the wallflower.” His smile faded. “My only caution is that I’m not that graceful on the dance floor.” He tapped his right leg. “I’m recovering from an accident.”

  JoJo studied the man.

  He walked a few steps away and back with a noticeable limp. “See? It’s kind of hard to keep in step.”

  So, the man had a limp. That meant he probably couldn’t run fast. If he tried anything with her, all she had to do is run faster than him. That shouldn’t be a problem. She was in shape, ran on a daily basis and could easily outrun a man with a limp. This date might work out.

  “Okay. But I came in my own car. I’ll go home in my own car. Alone.”

  His lips quirked. “Yes, ma’am. It’s only a dance. Nothing else. Gotcha.”

  JoJo stood beside Thorn as RJ rocked the role of Madame LaBelle and pretended to shoot the gang leader who’d terrorized the mining camp of Fool’s Gold, freeing them from fear.

  If only it were that easy, JoJo would have killed the person who’d attacked her, raped her and left her for dead. Only thing was, she didn’t know who he was. That particular memory had been locked inside her head for the past year since she’d left the military.

  She lived in her own fear of running into the man again and not knowing it was him.

  For all she knew, it could be Max Thornton.

  A shiver rippled down her spine.

  Thorn appeared to be a nice man. JoJo couldn’t live her entire life in fear of every man she met. She’d come in her own car and would leave in her own car. She’d train
ed in Krav Maga self-defense and could take down a man twice her size. What could go wrong?

  When the shootout was over and Madame LaBelle claimed Jake as her date for the dance.

  Thorn turned to JoJo and held out his hand. “Shall we?”

  She stared at him for a long time, trying to read his every thought and coming up with a blank. JoJo placed her hand in Thorn’s and prayed she wasn’t making a big mistake. But then, they were going to a dance, not going to a dark alley between huts in the desert of Afghanistan where she could be forced to the ground, raped and strangled until she passed out.

  “Hey.” Thorn squeezed her hand gently. “I promise not to step on your toes or hurt you.”

  JoJo looked up into those beautiful blue eyes. “I’m counting on you to keep me safe,” she whispered.

  “I will,” he said. “I promise.”

  JoJo wished her therapist and friend, Emily was already at the dance. She’d know what to do to keep JoJo from having a full-on panic attack. Emily knew her story and the fallout JoJo had been dealing with since. RJ meant well by finding JoJo a date, but she didn’t know. Didn’t understand.

  JoJo walked into the dancehall, wondering if she could hold herself together as easily as Thorn held her hand.

  Rocky Mountain Rescue

  Coming soon

  New York Times & USA Today

  Bestselling Author

  Rocky Mountain Rescue

  About Rocky Mountain Rescue

  Brotherhood Protectors Colorado Book #2

  Former Green Beret Max Thornton’s career ended when he fell two hundred and fifty feet during a training exercise and broke nearly every bone in his body. Left with a permanent limp and in need of a job, he is recruited by Brotherhood Protectors where he can use his combat training and skills to protect, guard and rescue others. He didn’t expect his first assignment to be the resident mechanic bar waitress. Nor did he expect the mechanic to be a spitfire of a female with a whole lot of anger.

  Josephina Angelica Barrera-Ramirez or JoJo, as her friends call her, prefers to be left alone with the work she does on the machinery and vehicles of the Lost Valley Ranch. Suffering from situational amnesia brought on by an attack she sustained during a deployment to Afghanistan, she’s touchy about being touched and doesn’t take any flack from ranch guests or the Brotherhood Protectors operating out of the lodge. When she becomes the target of a shadowy figure in the night, a former Green Beret is assigned as her bodyguard until the attacker can be found and neutralized. Forced to have the Green Beret around, her distrust of men is challenged and the wall around her heart crumbles.

  When danger threatens all they come to mean to each other, Max and JoJo must fight their own fears to defeat evil while losing the battle of their hearts to win a future together.

  Rocky Mountain Rescue

  Breaking Silence

  Delta Force Strong Book #1

  New York Times & USA Today

  Bestselling Author

  Chapter 1

  Had he known they would be deployed so soon after their last short mission to El Salvador, Rucker Sloan wouldn’t have bought that dirt bike from his friend Duff. Now, it would sit there for months before he actually got to take it out to the track.

  The team had been given forty-eight hours to pack their shit, take care of business and get onto the C130 that would transport them to Afghanistan.

  Now, boots on the ground, duffel bags stowed in their assigned quarters behind the wire, they were ready to take on any mission the powers that be saw fit to assign.

  What he wanted most that morning, after being awake for the past thirty-six hours, was a cup of strong, black coffee.

  The rest of his team had hit the sack as soon as they got in. Rucker had already met with their commanding officer, gotten a brief introduction to the regional issues and had been told to get some rest. They’d be operational within the next forty-eight hours.

  Too wound up to sleep, Rucker followed a stream of people he hoped were heading for the chow hall. He should be able to get coffee there.

  On the way, he passed a sand volleyball court where two teams played against each other. One of the teams had four players, the other only three. The four-person squad slammed a ball to the ground on the other side of the net. The only female player ran after it as it rolled toward Rucker.

  He stopped the ball with his foot and picked it up.

  The woman was tall, slender, blond-haired and blue-eyed. She wore an Army PT uniform of shorts and an Army T-shirt with her hair secured back from her face in a ponytail seated on the crown of her head.

  Without makeup, and sporting a sheen of perspiration, she was sexy as hell, and the men on both teams knew it.

  They groaned when Rucker handed her the ball. He’d robbed them of watching the female soldier bending over to retrieve the runaway.

  She took the ball and frowned. “Do you play?”

  “I have,” he answered.

  “We could use a fourth.” She lifted her chin in challenge.

  Tired from being awake for the past thirty-six hours, Rucker opened his mouth to say hell no. But he made the mistake of looking into her sky-blue eyes and instead said, “I’m in.”

  What the hell was he thinking?

  Well, hadn’t he been wound up from too many hours sitting in transit? What he needed was a little physical activity to relax his mind and muscles. At least, that’s what he told himself in the split-second it took to step into the sandbox and serve up a heaping helping of whoop-ass.

  He served six times before the team playing opposite finally returned one. In between each serve, his side gave him high-fives, all members except one—the blonde with the blue eyes he stood behind, admiring the length of her legs beneath her black Army PT shorts.

  Twenty minutes later, Rucker’s team won the match. The teams broke up and scattered to get showers or breakfast in the chow hall.

  “Can I buy you a cup of coffee?” the pretty blonde asked.

  “Only if you tell me your name.” He twisted his lips into a wry grin. “I’d like to know who delivered those wicked spikes.”

  She held out her hand. “Nora Michaels,” she said.

  He gripped her hand in his, pleased to feel firm pressure. Women might be the weaker sex, but he didn’t like a dead fish handshake from males or females. Firm and confident was what he preferred. Like her ass in those shorts.

  She cocked an eyebrow. “And you are?”

  He’d been so intent thinking about her legs and ass, he’d forgotten to introduce himself. “Rucker Sloan. Just got in less than an hour ago.”

  “Then you could probably use a tour guide to the nearest coffee.”

  He nodded. “Running on fumes here. Good coffee will help.”

  “I don’t know about good, but it’s coffee and it’s fresh.” She released his hand and fell in step beside him, heading in the direction of some of the others from their volleyball game.

  “As long as it’s strong and black, I’ll be happy.”

  She laughed. “And awake for the next twenty-four hours.”

  “Spoken from experience?” he asked, casting a glance in her direction.

  She nodded. “I work nights in the medical facility. It can be really boring and hard to stay awake when we don’t have any patients to look after.” She held up her hands. “Not that I want any of our boys injured and in need of our care.”

  “But it does get boring,” he guessed.

  “It makes for a long deployment.” She held out her hand. “Nice to meet you, Rucker. Is Rucker a call sign or your real name?”

  He grinned. “Real name. That was the only thing my father gave me before he cut out and left my mother and me to make it on our own.”

  “Your mother raised you, and you still joined the Army?” She raised an eyebrow. “Most mothers don’t want their boys to go off to war.”

  “It was that or join a gang and end up dead in a gutter,” he said. “She couldn’t afford to send
me to college. I was headed down the gang path when she gave me the ultimatum. Join and get the GI-Bill, or she would cut me off and I’d be out in the streets. To her, it was the only way to get me out of L.A. and to have the potential to go to college someday.”

  She smiled “And you stayed in the military.”

  He nodded. “I found a brotherhood that was better than any gang membership in LA. For now, I take college classes online. It was my mother’s dream for me to graduate college. She never went, and she wanted so much more for me than the streets of L.A.. When my gig is up with the Army, if I haven’t finished my degree, I’ll go to college fulltime.”

  “And major in what?” Nora asked.

  “Business management. I’m going to own my own security service. I want to put my combat skills to use helping people who need dedicated and specialized protection.”

  Nora nodded. “Sounds like a good plan.”

  “I know the protection side of things. I need to learn the business side and business law. Life will be different on the civilian side.”

  “True.”

  “How about you? What made you sign up?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “I wanted to put my nursing degree to good use and help our men and women in uniform. This is my first assignment after training.”

  “Drinking from the firehose?” Rucker stopped in front of the door to the mess hall.

  She nodded. “Yes. But it’s the best baptism under fire medical personnel can get. I’ll be a better nurse for it when I return to the States.”

  “How much longer do you have to go?” he asked, hoping that she’d say she’d be there as long as he was. In his case, he never knew how long their deployments would last. One week, one month, six months…

  She gave him a lopsided smile. “I ship out in a week.”