Down Range (Shadow Warriors - Book 2)
Read Down Range (Shadow Warriors - Book 2) Online
Authors: Lindsay McKenna
Trained to kill, but built for love…
Captain Morgan Boland is at the top of her game, as is her former lover, Navy SEAL Jake Ramsey. Then a military computer selects them to partner in a special op. The mission can’t be compromised by their personal history—and they have truckloads of it.
But the Afghan assignment might provide the discipline they need to finally get it together—outside the bedroom, that is. A lot has happened over the two years since they last went their separate ways. And there’s way more to Morgan than Jake has ever given her credit for.…
Praise for LINDSAY McKENNA “McKenna’s latest is an intriguing tale…a unique twist
on
the romance novel, and one that’s sure to
please.”
—
RT Book
Reviews
on
Dangerous Prey
“Riveting.”
—
RT Book Reviews
on
The
Quest
“An absorbing debut for the Nocturne line.”
—
RT Book Reviews
on
Unforgiven
“Gunfire, emotions, suspense, tension and sexuality abound in
this fast-paced, absorbing novel.”
—
Affaire de Coeur
on
Wild Woman
“Another masterpiece.”
—
Affaire de Coeur
on
Enemy Mine
“Emotionally charged…riveting and deeply touching.”
—
RT Book Reviews
on
Firstborn
“Ms. McKenna brings readers along for a fabulous odyssey in
which complex characters experience the danger,
passion and beauty of the
mystical jungle.”
—
RT Book
Reviews
on
Man of
Passion
“Talented Lindsay McKenna delivers excitement and romance in
equal measure.”
—
RT Book
Reviews
on
Protecting
His Own
“Lindsay McKenna will have you flying with the
daring and
deadly women pilots who risk their lives.…
Buckle in for the ride of your
life.”
—
Writers
Unlimited
on
Heart of Stone
Dear Reader,
Lindsay McKenna did a great job creating
Down Range.
There were times I didn’t want to put her book down. It
hit on some of the emotions that I had locked up for a long time. So it will be
an ongoing healing process for me after reading it. A deep, reflective book is
rare.
Jake Ramsey, the hero, had reached a point where he was able
to express his emotions in a way few SEALs openly do. This would be a great
educational book for SEALs to read, because, like many warriors, their emotions
are locked up so they can perform their jobs. It would not be uncommon for
warriors to leave the military after unlocking their hearts, like Jake and
Morgan did with one another, because the killing would become more difficult.
In my opinion, this book will appeal to a broad range of
people and interests. Plus, the book relays important life lessons, like love,
fear and dealing with emotional and physical trauma. The action scenes are
excellent and realistic, and I found myself, even with my background, engrossed
in them. I didn’t have to suspend my disbelief, which is what often shuts me
down on most action scenes in books and especially movies.
This is one of the best books in any category I’ve read. It
would be a great movie if it could capture and relay these points.
I hope you enjoy
Down Range
as
much as I did.
Chief Michael Jaco, U.S. Navy SEAL (retired), author of
The Intuitive Warrior.
To U.S. Navy SEAL Chief Michael Jaco, who gave twenty-four years of service to our country and is now retired. More than anything, thank you for your service. Thank you for your help with some of the technical aspects in this novel. And thank you for writing
The Intuitive Warrior
.
And
To the U.S. Navy SEALs. Thank you for your heart, your courage and your sacrifices. To the wives and children of a SEAL, who indeed sacrifice in their own way while their husband is gone and protecting all of us as a country. You are ALL heroes in my eyes and heart.
Contents
Chapter One
What the
hell
? He had to be seeing things. SEAL Lieutenant Jake Ramsey froze as he climbed out
of his rented red Jeep Wrangler. He’d just parked at the Pentagon, ordered here
for an appointment with U.S. Army General Stevenson. He had no idea what this
meeting entailed. It was top secret.
His heart thudded in his chest as he stared one row of cars up.
A Marine Captain emerged from her black SUV. Jake removed his wraparound
sunglasses, remaining motionless, watching her pull her black leather purse over
the left shoulder. The gesture was all too familiar to him.
She wore her khaki summer uniform short-sleeved blouse along
with dark green gabardine trousers that emphasized her long legs. In
short-heeled, polished black pumps, she was all spit and polish. Morgan Boland
had an hourglass figure, and though her clothes fitted her comfortably, Jake
knew how beautiful she was without any clothes at all.
His mouth tightened. What the hell was Morgan Boland doing
here?
Stunned, Jake wrestled with a lot of old feelings leaping to
life within him. Oh, he remembered tunneling his fingers through that mass of
silky red hair now softly framing her oval face and stubborn chin. The strands
curled slightly across her proud shoulders.
She hadn’t seen him—yet.
Two years ago they’d met in the Hindu Kush mountains near the
border between Afghanistan and Pakistan. They’d collided like two comets,
renewing their relationship that had started at the Naval Academy, Annapolis.
His lower body tightened in memory of those three incredible days with her in
his arms in that Afghan village. Three of the most incredible nights of his life
since… He ruthlessly tried to crush the grief-stricken memories from when he was
twenty-four years old. Jake had lost his wife, Amanda, and two-week-old baby,
Joshua, in a car accident. They’d only been married a year.
At twenty-seven, Jake had unexpectedly met Morgan once again.
And whether she ever realized it or not, she’d salvaged his bleeding, wounded
soul. Those few days had transformed him, pulled him out of a three-year
depression. She’d breathed new life into him.
His mouth pursed, the corners pulling in as he watched her shut
the door on the SUV. The May morning’s breeze was inconstant, lifting a few
gold-and-copper strands of hair across her face. He stared with a mixture of
grief and longing as she lifted her long, expressive fingers and pulled the
strands away from her cheek.
Morgan was still hauntingly beautiful to him. His mind spun
with a hundred questions as to why she was here at the same time he was. Jake
worked to suppress those unrequited feelings about their shared history. He’d
had that impulse, of never allowing her to escape his arms again. But she had.
And it had been his damned fault. For the second time in his life, he’d driven
Morgan away from him.
There was a file beneath her left arm. She pointed the clicker
at the SUV to lock it. Jake swallowed hard, trying to ignore his desire. It had
been a lethal attraction from the first moment, in Annapolis, while going
through the Naval Academy. They were a powerful match in bed, but dammit, she
was bullheaded and wildly independent. She refused to be what he wanted her to
be. When they came together in bed, it was like the Fourth of July every time.
Yet, afterward, it always descended into a heated argument, hurtful words flying
between them like bullets being fired from an M-4 rifle.
His breath jammed in his throat as he saw her lift her head,
her green-eyed gaze meeting his. For a moment, Jake felt like a proverbial deer
paralyzed in a set of car headlights. Her eyes narrowed. Of course, she
recognized him. Her oval face with high cheekbones and a sprinkle of pale
freckles tightened. Her mouth…
oh, God, her
mouth…
Jake remembered hotly covering those full lips, feeling her hungry
response, her sleek, athletic body pressed demandingly against his, wanting him
as much as he wanted her. Now that soft, full mouth thinned with displeasure. He
forced himself to hold her gaze. Even from this distance, he could see the spark
of surprise and then anger flare in her green eyes.
What the hell were the chances of meeting Morgan two years
later, here in a damned Pentagon parking lot? Jake decided he had to be a
gentleman and walk over and say hello. He shut the door on his Jeep, locked it
and shoved the key into a pocket of his tan Navy summer trousers. Pulling the
garrison cap from beneath his left arm, he settled it on his head.
Jake felt as if he was going downrange into a direct action
combat mission. Born of a Navy SEAL, he walked with an easy, natural confidence
toward the only other woman in his life who had held his heart—and he’d screwed
it up both times. Now, as he closed the distance between them, tension was
evident in her, but she was a warrior like him. Jake tried to prepare himself.
Morgan was definitely not happy to see him. And he knew why.
“You’re the last person I expected to see here in this parking
lot,” he said, trying to soften his normally hard expression. He came to a halt
a few feet away from her, but he could still see her emerald eyes flash with
what he interpreted as disgust. Or maybe, distrust.
Probably both.
“Makes two of us, Ramsey.”
“What business do you have here, Morgan?”
She quirked her lips. “It’s top secret. How about you?”
He managed a sliver of a smile, appreciating the way the
uniform hid her breasts. He knew those breasts well, and even now, his body
hotly remembered their firm curves, too. “Same. Where you headed?”
“The E-ring. You?”
His brows rose. “Same ring.” What the hell kind of cosmic joke
was being played upon him? Jake saw confusion for a moment in her eyes, too.
The breeze blew enough to lift strands of her red hair across
her flushed cheeks. He had the urge to lift his hand, catch those errant strands
with his fingers and gently tuck them behind her delicate ear as he’d done on so
many other occasions. Why the hell couldn’t he erase Morgan from his body and
memory forever?
He’d been in the military since he was eighteen. He’d gone to
Annapolis and went into the Marine Corps. Later, he moved to the U.S. Navy to
become a SEAL. At twenty-nine, Jake felt snared by a joke being pulled on him by
Marine Corps god Odin himself. The last person he ever wanted to meet again was
Morgan. And here she was: all six feet of woman warrior who proved him wrong
about her being the weaker sex.
She glanced down at the watch on her right wrist. “I’ve gotta
go, Ramsey.” Morgan drilled him with a hard look. “And I can’t say it’s been
nice seeing you again.”
Jake watched her turn on her heel and walk toward the main
doors of the Pentagon. It almost felt as if she’d physically slapped him. He
stood for a moment, letting her quiet rage pass through him. It wasn’t her
fault, he sourly admitted. He’d been the one to hurl the indictment that women
were weak. That they shouldn’t be allowed into combat. He and Morgan had gotten
into that very argument after making love on Christmas morning as a blizzard hit
the Afghan village.
He and his SEAL team had holed up at the American-friendly
Shinwari village to wait out the coming storm. To his everlasting surprise,
Morgan had been there, too, with another SEAL team. The SEALs operated in small
four-and eight-person fire teams throughout the Hindu Kush, rooting out the bad
guys and taking them down. He hadn’t been able to swallow his surprise or
disguise his pleasure at discovering she was there. Morgan had been assigned as
a linguist with another team on a separate black-ops mission.
Rubbing his recently shaved jaw, Jake saw her disappear inside
the building. He had just enough time to make his appointment with General
Stevenson of the U.S. Army. His emotions, no matter how he tried, burned bright
and intense over meeting Morgan once again. She had stood out at Annapolis from
the moment he’d seen her in their plebe year. They were in the same class, and
for two years, Jake had fought to ignore the tall, assertive redhead. Morgan was
as physically strong as most of the men going through the four-year military
program. Jake had watched her begin to shine and bloom in her third year. She’d
been at the top of the academic list, a champion fencer on the fencing team, and
her keen intelligence had been recognized.
He quickly walked across the asphalt parking lot, in deep
thought over her. When had he fallen under her charismatic spell at the Academy?
How
had it happened? Jake had accidentally met
Morgan as a third-year student at a local civilian pizza parlor everyone
frequented on Saturday evenings. There were plenty of guys who wanted her. She’d
always been surrounded by them, but she didn’t seem to care or notice any of
them. Yet, when they’d met up at the bar to order pitchers of beer, something
had happened.
“Damn,” he rasped, scowling. They’d accidentally grazed one
another’s elbows. Jake remembered Morgan’s gaze meeting his. Those deep green
eyes that made his heart melt, made his body go hot and hard with longing. Her
nickname at the Academy had been Amazon because she was tall, physically strong
and she had a bruising, in-your-face independence.
Jake remembered taking Morgan’s hand and leading her into the
hall of the bar to be alone with her. He’d done something he’d wanted to do for
years: kiss the hell out of her. Morgan, he’d discovered, had been watching him
for a long time, too. He’d asked if she was protected, and she’d said yes, she
was on the pill. They’d never made it back to the Academy until very early on
Sunday morning. And their hearts and fates had been sealed, for better or
worse.
He needed to stop remembering. Morgan wasn’t in his life
anymore. Jake scowled and climbed the stone steps of the Pentagon. Up ahead were
soldiers with M-16 rifles. Since the bombing of the Pentagon on 9/11, security
had markedly changed. He would go through an X-ray machine before ever being
allowed into the military bastion.
Jake aimed himself toward the outer ring, the E-ring. It was
the only level that had windows looking out into the civilian world. Only senior
military officers got those posh office assignments. This was where many top
secret and black-ops missions originated. Curious as to why he was called off
PRODEV, sixty days of leave granted to him after coming back from Afghanistan
with his SEAL platoon, he arrived at the E-ring. Looking at the file he held, he
saw the number of the office and turned to the right.
Captain Morgan
Boland
was sitting in a chair opposite the secretary’s desk when the
door opened. Her eyes widened. Jake Ramsey, again? Her lips parted for a moment.
What was
he
doing here? He stopped when he realized
she was sitting there staring up at him. He had a stunned look across his
normally unreadable expression. Shock bolted through her.
Morgan lowered her gaze, and her heart sped up. Why couldn’t
she just ignore Ramsey’s darkly tanned face? His rugged good looks and those
stormy-looking gray eyes of his? Her fingers tightened imperceptibly around the
file in her lap. The only other empty chair in the small, cramped office was two
feet away from where she sat. She listened as Jake went to the
fortysomething-year-old blonde administrative assistant and gave his name to
her.
“Thank you, Lieutenant Ramsey. General Stevenson will see you
in just a bit. Would you like some coffee or tea while you wait?”
Jake took off his cap. “No, thank you, ma’am.” He hated having
to sit next to Morgan, who was staring at him as if he were going to bite her.
His traitorous body and heart clamored over being so close to this fiery woman.
Jake wanted to be close. Wanted, somehow, to undo the wrong he’d done to her two
years earlier.
Sitting down, he glanced over at her. Morgan was staring
straight ahead, her hands tense over the file in her lap. He relished viewing
her profile and then realized her once-perfect nose now had a bump on it. Had
she broken it? He almost asked but thought better of it. There was an assistant
sitting six feet away from them, and Jake didn’t want her to know how much
Morgan hated him.
What to say to Jake Ramsey? Morgan felt heat radiating off his
hard male body. The uniform showed how athletic and fit he really was. SEALs
took exercise to a whole new level, plus six months climbing mountains in
Afghanistan had honed his body into a dangerous weapon. She saw the SEAL gold
trident on his well-sprung chest, rows of colorful ribbons beneath it. Jake was
part of the best of the best black-ops teams the military had. She remembered
those pale eyes of his going dove-gray as he’d made love with her. God, they
were good in bed together.
Too good.
And above all,
Morgan knew she had to keep a secret she would always carry from that last
meeting they had. Jake would never know. Pursing her lips, she refused to say
anything to him. Her mind churned with questions on why both of them were here,
in the same office of the Pentagon. It made no sense to her.
A buzzer sounded on the assistant’s desk. She looked over at
Morgan. “Go right through this door, Captain Boland. General Houston will see
you. Room two, please.”
Rising, Morgan nodded, ignored Ramsey and opened the door.
Inside, she saw two offices, one on either side of the hall. Turning to the
left, she saw a frosted glass window with “2” painted in gold upon it and
knocked firmly.
“Enter,” a male voice ordered.
Morgan’s heart picked up a beat as she opened it. Inside was a
man in his late-fifties, fit, in a dark green U.S. Army uniform. The salad, or
ribbons, across his powerful chest attested to his time and experience in the
Army. There was silver on the sidewalls of his closely cropped hair. His eyes
were sharp and intelligent-looking. Morgan came to attention in front of his
desk.