Own (Command Force Alpha #1) (3 page)

“Did everyone else make it home?” Katsu asked quietly.

She’d never know the identities of every CFA member, but life with her father made acquaintanceships impossible to avoid. They often gathered for barbeques or dinners at the bow house Nicky had inherited from his parents when they’d retired to Florida. Sometimes she bonded with the operatives, who came from all branches of the service, almost a dozen countries and all walks of life—military and civilian. That was bad news. Nicky discouraged it, but Evan had been convinced over the years that the team had become the colonel’s pieced-together family. He seemed unable to keep from bringing his only daughter into that protective fold.

That, and no one could truly control Katsu.

Evan had tried. He’d wanted to. Christ knew he still wanted to. He wanted her cooperative, but that didn’t mean he wanted her meek. Hell no. Despite her petite frame, barely five-foot-two, she was larger than life compared to other women. Gorgeous. Powerful. Stubborn as a damn mule. To wrest an ounce of submission from the woman was a feat worthy of Hercules. To manage it made Evan feel that powerful. He lived for hits of power and hard-pumping shots of adrenaline.

That didn’t matter now. She needed him, and that felt almost as good as his fantasy of
making
her need him.

“You know I can’t tell you who.”

“I know. Just wouldn’t want to ask about Gabe or Mark or Mags and get a serious case of stonewall.”

“You know what your dad’s said a thousand times. Don’t make friends with us.”

“Believe me, I have friends beyond you lunatics. Only they don’t jump into international hot zones and wave their asses at enemies the president probably doesn’t even know about.”

They didn’t say another word until Evan pulled into a parking garage at Mass General. He used a passkey to enter through a special door on the garage’s fourth floor, which led to a private elevator into a wing of the hospital few knew existed. It was reserved for high-security patients. Celebrities gave birth here, or underwent the most discreet plastic surgery procedures. Politicians had cancer surgeries so no one got wind of their being sick. And deep-cover types recovered from wounds that would otherwise require police reports, notifications to DOD or other compromising paperwork that couldn’t be risked.

They emerged into a short hallway that ended in two secure double doors. Evan used a passcode to get them into a small waiting area and yet another to lock the door behind them.

Katsu tipped her head. “Why a code on the inside?”

“In case someone accidentally wandered in the first time.”

“God, I would hate to be you guys. Shadows in every corner.”

“No escaping it, Kat. The threats are there. You get the luxury of never knowing which corners, or which shadows are aiming a pistol at your head.” He caught her wrist mid-motion as she tried to turn away. “You promised you’d take this seriously. That’s the cost of coming here.”

“Or else I don’t get to see Dad. I know. Just…can we go in now? Please?”

Her eyes were a beautiful gift from her Japanese mother, dark and impossible to read. Black lashes tinted with mascara added to that mystery. Right now, they were on the verge of filling with tears, where a sheen gathered and welled along the lower lids. Her mouth was a classic bow. She habitually kept her lips parted, inadvertently revealing her two front teeth. The perfect ingénue, if Evan didn’t know better. That mouth could cuss like a trucker and, oh holy shit, no way could he ever forget the sight of her ripe lips sliding slowly, slowly, down his cock.

Tears, Sommers. She’s practically crying. Think with your head, not your prick.

He loosened his hold on her wrist until he let go completely. It was harder to do than he would’ve imagined.

Beyond the tiny waiting room was a miniature ICU suite, where Colonel Nicky Stafford was currently the only patient.

Former NSA Investigator Mark Fletcher was waiting to greet and vet them. Command Force Alpha’s head of security was tall and almost anonymous. Just brown hair and a medium build. Instinct, however—that primal place where people distinguished threats from safety—meant there was no concrete way of identifying his quiet arrogance. He could be affable as hell, with a joker’s smile and genuine humor shining from his narrow eyes. Or he could stand there like a breathing wall, his expression unreadable.

Although he offered them both a cordial nod, he took them aside to a screened room where he scanned them with three different devices. His inspection made one from the TSA look like kids playing games, but he wasn’t searching for guns. That Evan concealed a personal weapon at the small of his back was a given. No, Fletch was after near-microscopic bugs and tracking devices that visitors could’ve been tagged with—in a crowd, on the street, practically anywhere.

Once done though, he stood in front of Katsu and briefly took her hands. “He’s hanging in there, Kat. But I’m sorry you have to go through this.”

“Thanks, Fletch.” She squeezed his hands in return, and for a moment it seemed as if she’d hug Fletch.

Her words rang through Evan’s ears once again, that Nicky was the only person in the world who hugged her. Did she need a hug so badly? Did she hate Evan so much that she couldn’t depend on him for one?

Of course she did. He’d been a bastard, and not just that summer. Four years had passed. Same city. Similar circle of acquaintances. Evan had done Katsu the favor of staying away from her father’s house unless he knew she wouldn’t be there. Occasionally they both wound up at a function, where they avoided each other like mortal enemies.

Fletch used thumbprint identification to open the double doors. The beeps of various life-support machinery and monitors echoed quietly through the ICU, eerie and indistinct. One man met them at the door, and one arose from a plastic chair that constituted bedside accommodations. The first was Dr. Kwende Bascombe. The Londoner was probably the best trauma surgeon in the world and served as CFA’s head physician.

The second man was Alex Faust.

Evan tensed. “Who put you on watch?”

Alex’s cheek was bright blue and purple where a bruise had bloomed. Evan had first noticed it as they’d scrambled toward the chopper, all of them desperate to secure medical care for the colonel.

Eyes hooded, Alex nodded toward Fletcher. “On home turf, the head of security is boss man.”

“And where’s Snow?”

With another enigmatic move, Alex glanced at Katsu. Wherever the other agent had been deployed wasn’t something the man would reveal, even if she had simply returned to headquarters to deconstruct the failed mission.

“Great,” Evan muttered. “And you still think you made the right call?”

In the middle of one of the most tenuous moments in CFA’s four-year history, as they received the body of their comrade, agent Alex Faust had seen a suspicious glint of metal. Possibly a long-range rifle. He’d reported over comms before giving chase—at the same moment the colonel fell to the pitted pavement.

“Yes.”

That remained to be seen. Debriefing would be the place to pull secrets from Alex’s notoriously sealed lips, but this wasn’t the time or place. All Evan knew was that Alex had left his post. That he’d been out of contact for six minutes and failed to answer radio hails when the colonel was under attack was unacceptable. Evan didn’t know who was to blame. Alex was an easy outlet for frustration and anger.

He reined it in. Time. Place.

“This way, Kat,” Dr. Bascombe said. He was even taller than Evan, with broad shoulders and a muscular frame. He was built more like a boxer than a doctor. Other than his medical skill, however, his real power was his low, commanding voice. He was “rough posh”, as he liked to say. Raised in the worst slums of East London, he’d clawed his way free. Sometimes the sound of mean streets poked through Oxford elocution. “He’s been drifting in and out all day. It’s a good sign that he responds to voices and prompts.”

“Good?” Her voice, by comparison, was high-pitched and elegant. She could play the perfect Harvard-educated princess when she wanted. Beyond being the colonel’s daughter, every member of CFA respected her as such.

Except Evan. He knew her better.

“Yes, good.” Dr. Bascombe’s night-dark skin crinkled at the edges of his eyes when he smiled, even slightly. “He never slipped into a coma.”

“But he’s been aware and in pain?”

“Yes, but at least he can talk to me directly. I don’t have to rely on machines. And he’s emerged without complication from the anesthetic after all three surgeries. That’s encouraging.”

“Three surgeries?” With a nasty glare, Katsu whirled back to punch Evan.

After eyeing them both, Dr. Bascombe ignored the exchange. He pulled back a white plastic curtain to reveal Nicky Stafford, looking wan, thin and as pale as his hospital gown.

Katsu let out a little gasp and slapped her hands over her lush mouth. The tears that had been brimming spilled out. But she made no other sound. Evan wondered if that was a particular skill of hers too. To cry without sound.

Although his own chest pinched at the sight of the colonel laid so low, Evan hung back as Katsu walked toward her father and sat on a stool at his bedside. She held his hand. She kissed it. Evan’s chest cinched tighter.

“Katsu-chan,” the man said, the endearment rough and slurred.

“I’m here, Daddy,” she replied in Japanese. “I’m here.”

Nicky untangled their fingers. He lifted a shaky hand and wiped her tears. “Glad.”

They continued speaking quietly in her mother’s native tongue. Evan had practiced Japanese for years, since first studying under the legendary Colonel Stafford at Annapolis.

“Don’t strain yourself,” she said. “Please. Lie still. Doctor Bascombe says you’re on the mend. You need your strength.”

“You too. So strong.” He broke off into a fit of coughing. After a sharp moan, he sank into the pillow.

Dr. Bascombe was right there, checking each monitor before proceeding to various bandages and dressings. “You can stay the rest of the night, but you know what’s best, Kat. He needs calm and sleep.”

“I’ll wait. And I’ll be good. I’ll just watch him from out there.”

Evan and the doctor shared a pained glance. Getting her out of the ICU was going to be practically impossible. Evan didn’t want to resort to having Fletch intervene, but it could be necessary.

“Good.” The doctor’s powerful voice was neutral but still in command.

They were almost to the door when the colonel spoke up with some command of his own. “Katsu-chan, stay with Evan,” he said loud enough for Alex to lift his head out in the waiting area. “Trust him. Understand?”

“Yes, Father.”

“Promise me.”

She swallowed, darted her eyes toward Evan and offered a bow of deep respect. “I promise.”

Chapter Three

Kat didn’t want to leave. Big ol’ duh right there on the end of that one.

She’d spent the night in the waiting room, and as dawn arrived, Dr. Bascombe gave the okay to let her back into the ICU. The September sun arrowed over the horizon. Carefully shaded windows meant the sharp rays couldn’t get near her dad’s half-lidded eyes. She brushed a sheaf of hair from his forehead. His hair was almost as dark as her mom’s had been. That had always made life easier. Although her mom was dead, Katsu held precious threads of connection with her father.

He didn’t wake up enough to talk the second time. He looked at her with hazy, pale blue eyes that were on the other end of the spectrum from hers. His mouth tweaked into a little smile, but she knew better. That smile was a lie. She knew because she gave one in return, her mouth folding upward into something that would make him happy. Make him not worry about her, just as he wouldn’t want her to worry about him.

Yeah, right.

“Kat,” Evan said quietly. “We should go.”

She wiped the back of her hands across her cheeks. Wet again. She’d been leaking all night, while pacing the waiting room. She’d managed to dry them as quick as they came, but they kept coming back. They burned her eye sockets and made her head feel heavy. “No.”

She couldn’t see Evan behind her, but she could feel him. He was weight and solidity in the air, his disapproval as thick as buttercream frosting on a wedding cake. As if he warranted comparison to something so sweet.

“You told your father that you’d trust me.”

She winced. Even as she’d made that heartfelt promise, she’d known damn well that Evan would use it against her. He of all people knew how far she’d go never to break her word to her dad. “I said
trust
. Not blindly obey.”

Luckily for Evan, Dr. Bascombe stepped forward. He had a chart tucked in one elbow, with the cover folded back, and wore a perfectly spotless white lab coat. His name tag read Dr. Jones. He would never be plain enough to be a Jones, and if he wore that gleaming coat out in the field, he’d never live long enough to patch someone up. “Kat, there’s no point in staying here except to exhaust yourself.”

“I’ll take that job.” She wanted to tuck her feet under herself in the uncomfortable, cold hospital chair. She was small. Curling up for the rest of the day wouldn’t wreck her back too badly. “I’m fine.”

“But your dad’s not,” Evan said. “And you need to leave so the doctors can do their thing.”