Authors: Cristin Harber
Javier dropped his head into the palm of his hand.
He
wanted to know what Colin knew; he wanted in on that briefing. But he’d walked away from Sophia and staked no claim. Outwardly, at least. Everything on his inside was pressurized. It twisted, tore apart, and shredded as if hit by shrapnel. Yet all he could do was sit on the couch and clutch a phone. Helpless.
“Brazil, get to HQ. One way or another, you should be with us.”
One way or another. Good news or bad. Meeting with Jared Westin to talk about Sophia Cole. “On my way.”
***
The war room at Titan’s headquarters was different than the ones Javier had visited across the globe. He’d been in the US location a half dozen times, and each time, there’d been a comfortable feel to it. Not to take away from the security systems, weapons, and manpower that the single building offered, but some of the men from Titan’s main team lived nearby, and there was more a sense of coming to work than, say, dropping by a command center in the Middle East or Asia. Jared even had a dog that stayed on-site.
Thelma, the drooling bulldog, sat at the end of the large conference room. She had a pink, palatial dog bed where she knew her place as queen. She chewed on what looked like a grenade-launcher plastic dog toy.
That was what Javier concentrated on—Thelma and her bazooka—because sitting across from Colin and Ambassador Cole, and next to Ryder and Trace, he didn’t know who thought what or who knew about Sophia and him. It would have been awkward if he hadn’t been scared of out his mind.
Luke sat at the end of the table, working a paperclip, and Grayson alternated between rubbing the back of his neck and tapping his fingers on the table. Jared, Brock, and Titan’s war-room genius, Parker, waited stoically.
What they knew: SEAL Team 6 had been activated. The live-mic feed played on the speakers from the helo drop point, report after report of bad news.
Gatehouse: destroyed.
Wrought-iron gates: blasted with a car bomb.
A few bodies of PC combatants and all of the RSO were counted as the SEAL team moved forward.
“Passing through front door. Two blast detonation areas.”
“Roger that. Keep moving.”
“Clear.”
“Clear—Jacobson, on your right.”
The pops of quick gunfire and targets taken down should have been consoling, but if the PC was still in the embassy, it wasn’t a good sign. Javier’s gut tightened. Sweat dampened his collar as they continued to listen to the SEAL team’s comm. Never had he felt so helpless.
“Approaching the safe room. Damn. This motherfuckin’ building saw action.” The quiet crackled, and hushed orders fell through the mic. “I’ve got a dead panel.”
Javier had known the building had lost power. But the safe room would be on a backup generator. If that had gone down, no one could get through the door. A conversation bounced with the boots on the ground, and someone named Jacobson had the tools to jimmy a power supply. Minutes ticked by.
“Update?” the CO asked.
“Almost.”
“That should do it. Code?”
The numbers were listed over the air, and a muffled noise bounced off the war room’s walls. Javier could picture the scene. What he couldn’t picture was Sophia. Since the time of known attack, three hours had passed. If she was in the safe room, without ventilation, odds weren’t good. But if she wasn’t inside, then there were no odds and she was dead.
The man punched the code, each beep bleeding through the room, as Javier held his breath.
Please be alive.
His eyes closed, scrunched tight as he listened to every breath, every move in Honduras.
“We’ve got a negative on Jansen and Brackster.”
Javier’s throat burned. His eyes burned. Everything in him needed to believe that she was in that room.
“Got two live ones. Is one of you Sophia Cole?”
Oh, God. Javier’s eyes flew open, his mind spinning, shaking, praying that whoever responded would say—
“Yes. I am.”
“Oh.
Cristo.
” Relief shivered down his arms, his shoulders caving down as his head dropped. Silently, Javier prayed and rejoiced for the first time since before his sister had been taken. It wasn’t a pleading to some greater power—Javier was in
prayer
. He felt thankful as his breaths shook.
He didn’t care to join in the cheering conversation between Colin and the ambassador. All Javier knew was his soul had bled and exulted, and he thanked God for the first time in two decades. Sophia Cole was the reason for that.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Turbulence. Sophia jolted awake. A steadying hand stayed on her shoulder, and she focused on the familiar face of the medic who’d flown back to the States with her. The pieces of reality slid back into place. She was safe, on a plane, however many hours into a twelve-hour flight back home and under medical supervision as requested by her dad. Or probably her mother. Maybe both, considering that sprained wrists and elbow and a couple of cracked ribs weren’t the nothing she continued to play the injuries down as.
“Doing okay?” the medic asked.
“Yes.” She nodded, but her ears rang with the playback from her dream—or nightmare.
“Hello?” The voice was English. American, unaccented English. Thank God.
It wasn’t Javier nor Brackster nor Jensen. But still, the men who broke into the safe room were saviors. “Is one of you Ambassador Cole’s daughter?”
“Praise Jesus.” Janny’s head dropped against the wall as Sophia pushed up unsteadily on bruised bones and hugged her cracked ribs.
“Ambassador’s daughter is secure,” he said to someone else. “Either of you hurt?”
The man wasn’t Delta. He was maybe a SEAL and definitely US military. Two others walked in behind him. There was still no sign of Brackster or Jensen, and the reference to “two live ones” confirmed that she and Janny were it.
“Janella’s having chest pains.” Sophia turned to her friend even as she felt the man’s scrutiny on her. “I’m… fine enough to get out of here.”
Sophia’s gaze fell out the door. Secretly, silently, hopeful, she wanted to see Javier walk down the hall to her.
It didn’t happen.
“Sophia?”
She shook out of her memory. “Yes, sir?”
“I can give you more pain meds if you need them. Something to help you sleep?”
There was no way she would take a pill that would force her to sleep. It would be hell if she couldn’t wake up from her stomach-dropping, chest-aching nightmare where she looked for Javier down the empty embassy hall. Her eyes had kept searching for him even as she and Janny were led away. Just around the corner, just at the airport. Just… nowhere.
Sophia broke from her pathetic trance. Lives had been in danger, people had died, and here she was, daydreaming about a knight in shining armor.
Her
life had been in danger, and her last thought, wish, and comfort had been Javier Almeida.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
Two Weeks Later
Titan Safe House, Caribbean Islands
Another job done, another day closer to the epicenter of the PC cartel. Delta had dismantled a major player, and that was something to party over. The crash pad on this Caribbean island was a bonus. Or it should’ve been. But Javier wasn’t feeling the crowd even enough to pay attention to where in the world they were.
Tiki torches outlined the sandy bar. Though they were staying at a huge beach home, courtesy of one of many Titan friends, the team had wandered to this resort bar, looking for whatever fun they could get into.
And tonight seemed to be the definition of fun. It was like the mecca of good-looking and gorgeous. There were ladies in bikinis with wraps—poorly disguised as skirts— around their waists. The bartenders had the drinks flowing, and the music even had Brock drumming his thumbs occasionally on the table.
Luke, Trace, Colin, and Ryder were kicking back at the table across from him, Grayson and Brock on either side. Everyone just chilled out.
But as dinner became a memory and the drinks continued, Colin and Ryder wandered off.
Luke had a woman he would never let go of. Trace was married. Grayson was married. Brock was married.
And Javier was miserable.
“This I never thought I’d see,” grumbled Brock.
Javier searched the scene, checking out what could have caused the comment, but nothing caught his eye.
Grayson and Luke chuckled, and Trace sipped a beer, not cluing Javier in to what was interesting.
“What?” he asked, bouncing a bottle back and forth between his palms.
“You.” Brock tilted his head toward him.
“Me? What?”
“Nothing.” Their boss slugged back the rest of his drink and stood. “Alright, I’m out. See y’all mañana.”
Is this what they did when Javier and the guys stayed out to party—talked shit, drank beers, and went to bed? That wasn’t much to look forward to. Except, the four of them were happy as snipers in a city full of insurgents.
Grayson and Trace bantered back and forth, laughing about bullshit and talking ops and weapons. All those things should’ve been conversation worthy, but it’d been weeks since he’d walked out of the Honduras embassy and away from Sophia, and he was fucking miserable. Worse, it’d been fourteen torturous days since he’d almost lost her. Since then, his world had shifted on its axis, and he was too confused to do anything about it.
Adélia versus Sophia.
He had to choose family. There wasn’t a middle ground. He couldn’t give a sliver of his heart to anyone else. It wasn’t fair to her—but which
her
? Javier’s chest tightened, and he needed a change of scenery, something to stop the thoughts consuming and confusing him. “I’m out.”
They nodded, and when he was a couple meters away, Trace called out, “J?”
He turned, still walking backward, wanting to get away from all the beachy BS. “Yeah?”
“Call her.”
He stopped dead.
Grayson nodded.
Trace ran a hand over his chin. “You gave me advice one time, and it was solid. I’m not the guy that knows how to give that back as eloquently, but I will say, just call her.”
Luke cleared his throat. All eyes turned to him. They hadn’t sat down to hash this out like a gaggle of teenage girls, but words had been spoken. “Call her, bro,” Luke said.
From one man ruined by a trafficker to another. Damn it. Javier pinched his eyes shut, turned around, tossed a hand to say good night, and kicked sand all the way until he was on the front patio of the beach house, where he knew he wouldn’t sleep.
***
Night again, and Sophia had awakened from a dreamless sleep. How had she ended up back in her parents’ house in Pennsylvania in the guest bedroom where she’d first been with Javier? It would’ve been much less torture to sleep in her own room—it was as cold and foreign as this one—except this one had a warm memory of him holding her, and that was the only happy thought she’d had in this house.
She’d spent two weeks talking with her father, trying to get back in the field because she was
angry
at the world and wanted something to do with her time and with her life. She wanted to make a difference or do
anything
that would keep away the drifting thoughts of the man she wished had saved her.
The phone’s ring jarred her back from sleep-soaked thoughts. Unknown number. “Hello?”
“Paixão.”
“Javier,” she whispered, suddenly wondering if maybe this was a dream and she hadn’t woken up.
“Hey, I’m glad you answered.”
“Are you okay?” Why else would he call? Delta calls were for emergencies only. That much she knew.
Javier quietly laughed in her ear. “Yes. Are
you
okay?”
“Yes.” She kneaded her eyes then checked the time. “It’s the middle of the night.”
“You’re home?”
She pulled the charger from her cell and rested back against her pillow. “How did you get this number?”
“I can get any number. But you’re home. Good.” He took a long breath. “That’s good.”
“Colin could’ve told you that.”
“I needed to hear you say it.”
She’d been on US soil for too long. Of course, he had to have known by now she was safe. Her mind was sling shooting from one extreme to another: angry he wasn’t there then missing him to the point of obsession. She couldn’t get a handle on what to say or how to feel. “Did you need something?”
“Yeah. And I got it. You’re safe. Sorry it took that for you to come home. But I’m glad you’re there.”
There,
here
, in the bed where they were first together. He had no idea, and still, she was just as brokenhearted and miserable as the day he’d left her in the kitchen. “Don’t find too much comfort in it. I’ve got a new job.” Or she would soon, hustling every lead and connection she had.
“Where?”
“You don’t know?”