Heroes In Uniform (53 page)

Wow. A helluva long time to be cut off from everything and everyone. She chose her next question carefully before speaking. There were so many things she wanted to know, but she knew he either couldn’t or wouldn’t tell her most of them. She had to be careful not to be too pushy or he’d shut down, and that was the last thing she wanted. Considering they’d been forced into this situation together, he’d been nothing but considerate so far, and she found she enjoyed his company. He made her feel safe, and while they still had moments when they both felt awkward around each other, things were going pretty smoothly for the most part.

“And while you were undercover, that’s when you met…you know,” she continued, aware she was risking going too far.

A slight tension stiffened his shoulders, but he nodded. “Right.”

She was dying to know more, could barely hold the questions back. “He captured my roommate, Maya, along with Jackson and the Sec Def.”

Wade nodded and looked down at the coffee table. A thickening silence spread through the room and she knew she risked alienating him if she pressed any more. Her statement hung heavy in the air as the seconds ticked past.

Just when she thought he’d get up and make some excuse to leave the room, he surprised her by sighing and running a hand through his longish hair. He raised his dark eyes to hers, stared for a moment as though he was trying to come to a decision. “You’re gonna find out anyway, so since you’re involved in all this because of me, I’d rather you hear it from me instead of somebody else.”

Erin tucked her feet beneath her and folded her hands in her lap, aware of the way her stomach tightened at his warning tone. “Okay.”

He folded his arms across his chest, the gesture and his expression resigned, almost defensive. “I worked with Rahim.”

She felt her eyes go wide. “
With
him?”

He nodded, his face set. “Closely.”

“How closely?”

A long, tense pause. “I started out as his bodyguard and for the past two years served as his second-in-command.”

Erin’s mouth fell open. She didn’t want to believe it. She stared at him, feeling as though she’d never seen him before as the implications slammed home. “But that means…that means you would have known about…”

Another nod, this one tight, defiant. “I was there when Maya and the others were being held captive.”

The pizza she’d just inhaled seemed to turn into a ball of concrete in her stomach. She wrapped her arms around her middle and stared at him, heart thudding at the implications embedded in those words. “You were there?” she said hoarsely. “You saw what they did to her and you didn’t do anything?”

He lowered his gaze. “Not initially.”

So he’d stood back and watched her be tortured? Erin had seen the damage her friend had sustained. She felt sick knowing that Wade had been there and hadn’t stopped it. She swallowed, suddenly not feeling so safe with him anymore.

Wade traced a line in the wooden table with one long finger, avoiding her gaze. “The CIA was waiting for the final bits of intel on other major players involved with Rahim’s network before I could call in a team to bring him down. I was nearing the critical point in the last op when the attack on the Sec Def happened. One of Rahim’s underlings had organized it. And when I saw him in that cell, I knew it was all over.”

Erin waited for him to continue, for him to say something that would reassure her he was the decent man she’d thought him to be and not some cold-hearted bastard who put his reputation before American lives. Her hands curled into fists against her ribcage.

“I couldn’t interfere right away without blowing my cover. The prisoners were all in pretty bad shape, Maya and the Sec Def especially. Because of the severity of the Sec Def’s condition, I already knew my mission and cover were compromised. I contacted my handler. When the cell leader forced them into a game of Russian roulette, I took all the bullets out of the revolver when he wasn’t looking then set up a diversion.”

Russian roulette? As in, forced them to put a gun to their heads and pull the trigger to find out if the chamber was loaded or not? Erin unwrapped her arms from around herself and put her hands over her mouth, horrified by what he was saying, by what Maya and the others had endured.

“Once I did that there was no going back, so I did what I had to do and helped them escape back to friendly lines.”

She swallowed again, the surge of relief so strong it made her feel queasy. He’d been the one to get them out. He’d saved them. But the sick feeling that remained in her gut was because she understood exactly what he
wasn’t
saying. “So you mean if not for the Sec Def, you would have…”

Left them all there
.

The words echoed between them in the sudden stillness.

To his credit, Wade didn’t squirm or try to deny the silent accusation. Instead he nodded once, his jaw flexing beneath the dark covering of whiskers as he met her stare unflinchingly. “Yeah,” he said in a low voice.

Danger Close: Chapter Seven

In the silence that followed his admission, Wade waited for Erin to react. He was ready for her to leap up and run from the room, prepared at least for her eyes to turn cold and a look of horror and loathing to steal over her face. But none of those things happened.

She merely sat there staring at him, weighing him for the longest moment, then nodded once. “Okay, I get why you did it.”

Of all the things she could’ve said, that was the last thing he’d ever expected to hear coming out of her mouth.

She rubbed her palms over the thighs of her jeans, glanced down at her hands. “That must have been hard on you. Living that way for so long, I mean.” She shook her head as if she had trouble imagining it.

Wade wasn’t sure what to say to that, but he knew some sort of response was required so he cleared his throat and tried to think of something to say. “It was my job. And it wasn’t all bad. There are things about living in Afghanistan that I loved. Aspects of the culture like the hospitality, living a simpler life than we do here, unplugging from everything. Many of the teachings in Islam. But mostly it was the villagers I got to know. They were good, hardworking people.” He’d probably always miss those things, the friends he’d made there.

Erin raised her head, searched his eyes. She wasn’t looking at him like he was a monster. No, she was looking at him as though she understood why he’d made the choices he had, though that was impossible, because who the hell could understand him and what he’d done? “I’m really glad you got them out, though,” she added in a quiet voice. “No matter why.”

Something eased in his chest. A pressure he hadn’t even been aware of before now. He didn’t want to like her more than he already did, but how could he not after those answers? “Me too.” He was. When the specters from his past came back to haunt him in the years ahead, at least he had that to help balance the scales.

“Do you have any family?” she asked, watching him curiously. “I mean, that kind of work, for that long… It had to be really hard on your family.”

“I’ve got an older brother and a younger sister.”

“No parents?”

He shook his head. “They died in a car accident when I was sixteen.”

“Oh, I’m sorry.” She bit her lip, seemed to hesitate before continuing. “Do you still keep in touch with your siblings?”

“Not since going undercover.” He knew how that must sound to her, when she was so close to her parents. But the truth was, in many ways, the undercover work had been a relief. An escape and a challenge, all rolled into one. “I was pretty tight with my sister, growing up. It’ll be good to see her again when this is all over.” Lot of lost ground to make up between them though. He wasn’t sure why he was telling Erin this when he’d never told anyone else. Well, yes he did. Erin was kind and caring, and he’d already lied to her about so much he needed to at least be honest with her about whatever he could. And, she was so non-judgmental he actually felt relieved to tell her all this.

Rather than end the conversation or make some excuse to leave, she settled back into the corner of the couch and stretched her legs out, making herself more comfortable. He liked that she seemed relaxed with him again. “So before you started working for the CIA, what did you do? Something in the military?”

“Army.”

The hint of a smile played at the corners of her mouth. “Not
just
Army though, right?”

“No.” What the hell. Wouldn’t hurt to tell her this part of it. “I did nine years in SF.”

“Ah. That explains your fluency in Pashto and ability to blend in with the locals.”

He inclined his head. “Yeah.” He still dreamed in Pashto. Most of his inner dialogue was in it too. He’d spent so much of his adult life in Afghanistan, it felt familiar and comfortable to him.

“Any other languages?”

She was fishing for information, but in such an adorable, inoffensive way he couldn’t help but answer just to keep her talking. If she was an interrogator, he’d be screwed. “Urdu.”

“Of course,” she murmured, almost to herself. “And when did you join the Army?”

“Right out of high school.” Mostly so he could get as far away from his hard-ass brother and find adventure someplace far removed from the ranches he’d worked since his parents died. He’d found adventure, all right. And nightmares, too. “You?” he asked when she kept looking at him.

She shrugged. “I did a year of college after high school, but hated it and wasn’t sure what I wanted to do. There’s a strong tradition of service in my family so I looked into the medical training I could get in the Army and decided to sign up.”

“And this was your third tour at Bagram?”

“In four years,” she said with a weary sigh. “Not gonna lie, I was ready for a break.”

“Why nursing?”

She blinked at him for a moment, as though the question had startled her. “I like helping people. Always have. My mom’s twin sister died of cancer just before I enlisted, so I spent a lot of time in the hospital with her. Some of the nurses were great, but others I wanted to strangle for their lack of bedside manner. I decided I wanted to be one of the good ones.”

“I bet you are. I know for sure you’re protective of your patients.”

She grinned at his teasing comment. “I am, but I was feeling extra protective of Jackson that day because of his involvement with Maya and everything they’d just been through.” Her grin faded at the mention of that.

Because she knew he’d stood back and let them be tortured to maintain his cover identity.

He rubbed a hand over his jaw, knowing there was nothing he could say or do to erase that image of him from her head, but wishing it was otherwise. He couldn’t deny the truth, that he’d acted as both the hardened undercover operative playing a dangerous role, and a patriot who wanted to do his part to eradicate radical Islam from the world. “They held their own out there. I just led the way. Maya fought me tooth and nail before she realized I was helping her.” He still had the tooth marks in his hand to prove it.

“Oh, I’m sure you did a lot more than just lead.” The sparkle was back in her eyes. “I may not know you very well, but I’ve seen you in action already, and based on what I’ve seen since then, I know you’re way too modest to brag about yourself.”

He focused his gaze on the stack of paper napkins on the table, running his finger over the edge because he didn’t know how to handle the compliment. Maybe because he’d had so few of them. The way he’d grown up, a man could assume he was doing a decent job unless he was told otherwise. Praise just never factored into the picture, not even back when he was a kid and his dad had been alive. “You handled yourself well,” he said to turn the conversation away from himself. “Better than I expected.” Maybe that was partly why he was so attracted to her. In a tight situation, she was someone you’d want at your back.

She raised an eyebrow in mock insult. “What’s that supposed to mean? I’m a soldier, aren’t I? What, did you think I’d curl into a ball and start crying when they started firing at us?”

He gave a grudging chuckle. “No. You were solid. Especially with treating Thompson.” He’d been grateful for the extra pair of hands on that hill, let alone her medical training. Her bravery under fire had surprised him though. She’d started dragging Thompson behind cover immediately after he was shot without a second thought to her own safety.

In his experience, watching how someone reacted under fire was a great indicator of someone’s true character. From what he’d seen out there, Wade knew Erin was good under pressure. She wasn’t whining or complaining now or having a hissy fit about being cooped up in here with him, either. In fact, she seemed to be trying hard to make the best of it and was going out of her way to be friendly. He was thankful for that too, yet at the same time he didn’t want to like her so much. Over the years—the past few especially—he’d built up thick walls to protect himself and keep everyone else out. And now after spending just two days with her, he could already feel cracks forming in them.

Erin nodded. “Thanks. And I appreciate the report you gave to my CO. You made me look good.”

“I just told him what I saw.”

“Okay, then I’m glad you saw it that way.” This time she smiled enough for the dimple to appear in her left cheek. Between that and the way her eyes sparkled in the overhead lights, he had to tear his gaze away to keep from staring. Four years ago, before this last job, he would be on that couch next to her, stroking his fingertips over the softness of her cheek and gliding them over her lips just to see her pupils expand and the pulse in her throat accelerate. But he wasn’t that man anymore.

He didn’t answer her statement, because what he’d said was true. She was reliable and had kept a level head. The only time he’d seen her hesitate was when they’d been in the tunnel and she’d been on point. He’d sensed her fear, either of the dark or the tight space or the tunnel itself, he wasn’t sure, but she’d pushed it aside and moved forward. He wasn’t going to mention that though. And he hoped like hell she couldn’t tell how damn awkward he felt trying to adjust to this new lifestyle.