Loved by a SEAL (17 page)

“It was no big deal.” Mack shrugged. “But that species is deadly so if it had bit him,
that
would have been a big deal.”

Rocky let out a visible shudder. “Ugh, I hate snakes.”

“We all have our little quirks.” Grant smiled.

Brody laughed. “Yeah, you should see Chris scream and run away like a little girl if he sees a wasp. It’s pretty funny . . . Where is he, anyway?”

Jon lifted his hand. “That’s on me. We left a small contingency from Bravo unit at the camp to conduct a final sweep for hidden weapons before they destroyed the cache.”

Grant nodded. “And, Shekau wasn’t among those in the camp, but chances are he was there at one time. If he left any intel behind, I told Chris that I want it.”

Brody glanced at the time.

The main force had been back for long enough he’d expect Chris and his team to be walking in any moment. But in the back of his mind remained the fact that anything could happen. The damn weapons could be booby-trapped.

Unlike Jon and Zane, Chris had been away from active duty for long enough he could have lost his edge.

Brody couldn’t stop himself from asking, “Have they checked in?”

Grant raised a brow. “You worried?”

Brody hesitated long enough that Grant tipped his head toward the door. “Let’s go to the JOC and check. I’ll be interested to find out if they found anything myself.”

Brody followed Grant. Whoever was manning the Joint Operations Center would have the latest situation report from Chris.

Once he knew what was happening, Brody could get himself some chow and then catch a few winks. But until he knew Chris was all right, he wouldn’t be able to rest easy.

The CO was in the operations center when they arrived. He glanced up when they walked in. “Good job with the trucks, Cassidy.”

“Thank you, sir.”

Grant stepped forward. “What’s the latest from Bravo?”

“They saw a squirter heading out the back of camp and into the woods. Before he could disappear, your brother took off after him.” The CO directed the last part of the comment to Brody.

“Has he reported in?” Brody asked.

“Not yet. But when Jones called in thirty minutes ago, he said Cassidy was running full out after the guy. I wouldn’t expect him to give up the chase to take the time to call in.”

“They let him go alone?” Brody’s eyes widened.

“Jones said that as your brother was taking off into the woods, he told him to take over and finish the job.”

Chris was forty. He was in good shape but damn, for this kind of job he was an old man.

Brody could run full out for a good long while after a target, but could Chris?

Hell, more than age was the danger. Chris, out there alone on the tangos’ home turf, could get led straight into an ambush.

He dragged in a breath and realized how tight his chest felt as worry pressed down on him like a lead weight.

Brody was getting a good education in exactly how badly being on this side of the waiting and the worrying sucked.

“You still worried?” Grant asked.

“Yes.”

“Why?”

Why?
“He’s alone.”

Grant lifted a brow. “Yes, but he made that choice. Retired or not, Chris is still a highly trained, combat-experienced, well-armed DEVGRU operative. You have to trust he knows what he’s doing.”

And they’d all been prepared for this kind of scenario and blah, blah, blah, so many other reasons why Brody shouldn’t be concerned, but the fact remained, he was.

“But he’s also my brother.” Brody made eye contact with Grant and saw him react to the statement.

“He was your brother when you were on the team together too. He’s been in sticky situations before. I never saw you worry like this.”

“I know.” Brody bobbed his head, accepting the truth of what Grant said.

“So what changed over the past two years since he retired?” Grant asked.

“It’s closer to three years and I honestly don’t know.”

But Brody suspected. Two days with his first and only love and he’d gone soft.

The question remained, what could he do about it and what the hell was he going to do with himself and this overwhelming weight of worry about Chris?

He supposed he’d just have to deal with it until his damn brother, who’d put himself into danger, got himself out of it again.

CHAPTER 20

Ashley had been asleep when her cell phone woke her.
 

True to form for her, at least for the past few days, when any phone rang anywhere she jumped to grab it.

Still half asleep and in the dark, she dove for the phone that was lit up on the nightstand.

The unfamiliar area code on the display had her frowning. Her tired brain reasoned hazily that it could be a telemarketer. The bastards had begun to bother people by cell phone now instead of just on the house phone.

But it had to be the middle of the night, if not really early in the morning, judging by the lack of even a glow of sunlight coming through her window. Even telemarketers didn’t call this early.

It didn’t matter. There was no way she was going to let the call go to voicemail. It could be Brody.

Ashley hit the button to answer. “Hello?”

“Ash? It’s me.”

She listened to the nuances in the voice delivering those three short words and knew whom it was without having to ask. “Brody.”

His mumbled cuss came through the line. “I woke you up. I’m so sorry. I guess I didn’t figure the time zones right.”

“No. It’s fine. I’m awake.” No way was she letting him hang up just because he felt bad he’d woken her.

She’d gladly miss an entire night of sleep to be able to talk to Brody, especially now when he was God only knew where doing things she could barely imagine.

“How are you?” She had hoped and prayed he’d call but now that he was actually on the line she couldn’t come up with a thing to say besides inane small talk.

He let out a short laugh. “I’m fine.”

Something was wrong. She could hear it in his voice. “Is everything all right?”

He hesitated a beat before she heard his intake of breath and then his sigh. If she hadn’t been so tuned in to him, listening as closely as the phone connection would allow, she might have missed those telltale sounds before he finally answered, “Uh . . . yeah.”

Whatever it was, he couldn’t tell her. She felt it to her bones that he wanted to but he couldn’t—and she’d gone and put pressure on him, making him feel even more badly about it.

That was what she had done when she’d grilled him before he left from his leave. Then, she had wanted to know where he was going, when she’d see him again, when he’d be able to call her, but he couldn’t tell her. So she’d cried and he’d felt bad.

Time for her to start acting like the understanding person she’d sworn to herself she’d be if ever given another chance with Brody.

Ashley drew in a breath and launched into a diversion that would hopefully cheer him up, no matter what was wrong. “So we had some excitement at your house today.”

“Yeah? What happened?” he asked.

“A mouse decided he wanted a piece of your grandmother’s toast while she was sleeping. He crawled right up on her nightstand and was sitting on her plate nibbling on the crust when she woke up. You would have thought the house was on fire with as loud as Miss Eleanor screamed.”

This time Brody’s laugh didn’t sound bitter. It was a genuine reaction to the story she’d relayed. Ashley smiled that whatever was wrong wherever he was, she could still make him laugh by providing a little piece of home.

“What did you do?” he asked.

“Well, not a whole lot. By the time I got to her room that mouse had high-tailed it out of there and was long gone. Of course, I had to spend the rest of the day conducting anti-mouse activities. Setting up traps. Calling your father to ask him to bring home poison. Googling, literally searching for a better mouse trap on the internet.”

“That’s funny.” He laughed again and Ashley’s heart warmed.
 

Was this how all those people with loved ones in the military dealt with it? Ignore the elephant in the room—that the person on the other end of the line could be hurt or killed any moment—and just go on like normal?

Hearing him laugh made this charade more than worth it. And she had to admit pretending everything was fine was making her feel better too—at least for the moment. She had no doubt the second she hung up with him the weight of fear and worry would be back.

She wanted to ask so many questions. She wanted to apologize.

Instead, she wracked her brain for more little tidbits of home to amuse him. “So I’m kind of going to cheat tomorrow at work. I convinced Nana to come visiting Miss Eleanor since they haven’t seen each other in weeks.”

“So the two old ladies can keep each other busy and leave you alone, you mean?”

She heard the amusement in his voice and joked, “Don’t you let Nana hear you calling her old or she’ll never bake your favorite muffins specially for you again.”

“Okay. I won’t.”

“But yes, that was the general idea.”

After a short chuckle at her admission, he let out another deep sigh, as if the weight of the world was on him.

Again Ashley bit her tongue, not questioning, just waiting.

Finally, he continued, “I really should go.”

“I understand. I’m glad you called.” She’d done her best to sound upbeat. She even thought it might have worked.

“Me too . . . Ash?”

“Yeah?”

“I love you. You know that, right?”

No, she hadn’t known that. Mouth hanging open, her mind reeled.

He loved her how? Like a sister? Like a friend? Like an ex-girlfriend he’d always love but was no longer
in love
with?

 
This wasn’t the time to ask, even with as much as she wanted to. The questions would haunt her. Forget about sleeping again tonight. She knew she’d be wondering long past dawn.
 

She swallowed away the lump in her throat that his surprise pronouncement had cause. “I love you too.”

He drew in an audible breath and let it out again. “I’m gonna go. Bye, Ash.”

“Bye.” Tears filled her eyes as there was a click on the line.

She’d never heard him sound so down. So listless. Why?

His goodbye had sounded so final. Was he about to go out on some kind of suicide mission he didn’t expect to return from and that’s why he’d called? Why he’d told her he loved her?

The helplessness was overwhelming and there wasn’t a single thing she could do about it except curl in a ball on her bed and cry.

CHAPTER 21

Rocky watched Brody pace the room. “How long has it been?”

“Too fucking long.” His reply was terse. Brody let out a huff of breath. Rocky didn’t deserve his bad attitude. “Sorry.”

“No worries. I know where you’re coming from.”

It had to be hours since Chris had taken off after that target.

Hours!

There was only one reason why he wouldn’t have radioed in by now.