Protector (Navy SEALS Romance Book 3) (6 page)

J
ake took
a long swig of water from his camelbak and resumed his slight ascent. He’d had to stop more than once to tie himself off to a climbing rope, swing a small grappling hook across a crevice, then traverse the massive gap using only his own strength. At times it felt like the body was actually getting farther and farther away, but he knew it was only an illusion. He’d faced far more psychologically and physically arduous missions than this one, and he just needed to keep his head on straight and focus on his mission.

Too bad Ruiz wasn’t here. He was Jake’s wingman at times like this, and vice versa. Ruiz would have kicked his ass for even needing to stop for a drink, let alone actually doing it. Jake muttered a few choice curse words under his breath for having to go this alone, but then immediately felt bad. It’s not like his longtime teammate had exactly chosen to dump them, not at a time like and not for such horrible reasons.

“Move your ass, Jake,” he muttered after his pity party. Picturing Angel screaming at him was all the recharging he needed. He got back to his hands and knees and continued his trek around the rock face.

Within thirty minutes, he was there. He lifted himself up the last few feet of the ledge until he was eye-level with the body, and instantly regretted taking a full look. The kid couldn’t have been more than fifteen, and there were signs of trauma all over his thin body. His sun-bleached hair said this had clearly been a kid who spent a lot of time outdoors, but he still had a boyish that clearly said he had a curfew and a bedtime each day.

“God kid, how’d you even get up here?” Jake mumbled, sighing as he reached for his comm button to call it in to the chopper. “You bird, I’ve got contact on the body. I’ll send over some cam images from my chest unit for comparison, but I’m sure it’s our missing kid.”

“Roger, ground team. Have you done an assessment of the condition?” Mike asked, his voice businesslike in the face of finding a dead child.

“Negative, just got up here and wanted to give you a heads up on my progress. Start making your way back to my coordinates and I’ll be ready for a recovery lift--holy shit!” Jake screamed when the kid’s hand reached out, grasping weakly in the air. “Bird, we gotta get more teams ready! Our victim is still alive, repeat, victim is alive.”

Jake let go of the button and scrambled up beside the kid. He ripped off his gloves and immediately checked for a pulse, watching for any sign that the young man was breathing. There was a pulse, although it was weak, but the harder the surfer tried to breathe, the raspier it became.

“Buddy, can you hear me? My name’s Lieuten--never mind. The name’s Jake, and I’m here to rescue you.” He got to work assessing the victim, calling back information on his vital signs to Tanner. Only when the sound of the chopper’s blades smashing through the air echoed over the crash of heavy waves below did Jake begin to make plans to get the boy out of there.

Jake signaled to the chopper when it was directly overhead, then waited while Tanner lowered himself down on the hoist accompanying a lift basket. Without much room to place themselves on the precarious footholds, Jake and Tanner had to take turns standing and positioning themselves in place.

With the surfer finally strapped into the basket and Tanner strapped into place beside it, it was up to Mike to lift the two passengers into the helicopter. Jake waited, his mixed emotions tormenting him. He was desperate to get into the chopper and get to work on further assessing their rescued victim, but he was also too overjoyed that they’d found him alive--for now, at least--to let his mind think much further.

After the basket was disconnected from the winch and the surfer was safely stowed aboard, it was Jake’s turn. Lightning had just started to flash in the distance and the waves below crashed against the rocks with almost as much force and volume as the helicopter rotors beating the air overheard. Tanner leaned out the door slightly and waved to Jake, sending down the hook that would clip to his harness.

Jake reached out over the drop to retrieve the cable, but a blinding flash of lightning nearby caused him to turn his head as he leaned forward. Instead of gripping the cable and clipping in, he fell forward towards the rocks, his arms and legs pushing against nothing as he fell.

* * *

“
A
ngel
! Wake up!” Madison hissed insistently, finally resorting to leaning over him and pressing her soft lips to his cheek. “Come on, your mom’s awake! She’s asking for you!”

Angel pushed himself up to sitting on the waiting room’s rubbery sofa, blinking in surprise. “She’s awake? She can talk?”

“Not exactly,” she answered with a reassuring smile. “She won’t be able to talk until the breathing tube comes out, but she wrote a little bit on paper! She’s still with us, and she wants you. Come on!”

He raced down the hallway and past the nurses’ station on Madison’s heels, hurrying to keep her pace. He spun through the doorway of his mother’s room, nearly crying at the sight of his mom sitting slightly inclined and his sister smiling broadly.

“Mamacita! I’m here!” he said in a breathy rush. Madison came up beside him and squeezed his hand, reassuring him that it was really okay. He moved closer to the bed opposite where Manuela sat and took his mom’s other hand, holding it tenderly until he felt a slight pressure from her weakened fingers.

His mom gurgled for a second, forgetting once again that she couldn’t talk with the ventilator in place. She looked around wildly until her gaze settled on Angel’s face, then something very close to a smile spread across her expression.

Angel leaned forward and kissed her forehead, more to hide his tears of joy than anything else. When he finally sat on the edge of the bed, the corners of his mom’s mouth turned up in a thin, tired smile.

“Mama, we’re all here. Can you open your eyes?” he begged. He lifted her hand again and gave it a gentle squeeze, not wanting to hurt her IV port. Gabriela’s eyelids fluttered briefly. “That’s it, Mama. Open your eyes and look at us.”

It took more effort than they realized, but finally his mother’s eyes opened to barely half slits. A twitch at the corner of her mouth was all she could manage around her breathing tube, but it was so clearly a smile that Angel and Manuela both wiped back tears of happiness.

“I need to let the doctor on call know. I’ll be right back, I promise,” Madison said in a quiet voice, then hurried from the room.

It felt like hours but was really only a few minutes that Gabriela struggled to wake up. When she was finally able to focus, she pressed a hand to her throat, then ran her fingers over her breathing tube. She patted it gently.

“Oh, I know, Mama,” Manuela said, taking her mother’s hand away from the tube. “They’ll take it out just as soon as they know it’s safe. The nurse has already gone to let someone know.” Her voice cracked as she spoke, the weight of what had happened still holding her down.

Madison returned with a doctor, and Angel and Manuela were politely ushered from the room. They waited just outside the door for almost twenty minutes, then immediately stood up straighter when the doctor emerged, followed by Madison.

“Well, I’ve finished my early assessment,” Dr. Emerson began in a low voice. “She’s looking really good, all things considered. She’s very weak and is in a lot of pain--”

“Wait, was she hurting this whole time?” Angel interrupted, a wave of emotional nausea hitting him in the gut.

“We can’t really know that, but we believe she wasn’t. She had preventive doses of painkillers for that very reason,” the doctor explained patiently, “but yes, there’s always a chance. Fortunately, if there was any pain, the IV at least would have dulled it to a manageable level, and keeping very still while in a coma would have helped as well. As I was saying, though, her vitals look stronger than they have since she was admitted. She’s not completely out of the woods yet, but the repair to her heart seems to have taken. Once she’s strong enough, she’ll have a lengthy rehabilitation ahead of her, so I don’t want to give anyone the impression that she’ll be jumping out of that bed anytime soon.”

They paused a moment while the doctor’s news sunk in. Angel threw his arm around his sister’s shoulders, reassuring her that he was there for them both.

“What about her breathing tube?” Manuela asked. “She doesn’t want it. Does she still need it?”

“Geez, I hate to take it out,” the doctor said, rubbing the back of his neck as he thought it over. “At this point, there’s a very real danger still that she could code, or lapse. Until I see a little better blood gas level and know that her heart is healing correctly, I just feel better leaving it in place. I really do hate to do that to her, but she’s far better off with a very uncomfortable tube than having to endure us putting another one in place if it’s needed.”

“I don’t get it… you mean the tube is hurting her? But doing it again could… what?”

“Intubating a patient can be hard,” Angel explained, leaning closer to her. “If Mama was awake when they had to do it, they could actually hurt her worse. If they didn’t get it put in exactly right, they could even paralyze her. Or worse.”

“You know your way around an emergency procedure, huh?” the doctor asked, impressed.

“I was a SEAL. I’ve had to intubate people a time or two,” he answered without a shred of boasting.

“Wow. Respect, sir!” Dr. Emerson said, smiling broadly. “I was a medic in the first Gulf War before deciding to go to medical school, but I can’t even imagine what it takes to be an actual SEAL.”

Angel ducked his head. It felt good to have someone else recognize the service he’d given to his country for once, but it was the look on Madison’s face that actually meant something more. She wore the same impressed look as the doctor, and he could tell that the opposition to his goal that had come between them was long gone.

“Anyway, I’ll be back to check on her in a few hours. If she keeps progressing and everything looks good, I promise I’ll get her off the ventilator as soon as I feel like it’s safe. In the meantime, go back in there and welcome her back to the land of the living!”

He shook Angel’s and Manuela’s hands, then returned to his other patients. Madison smiled at them, and let out a sigh of relief.

“You guys did great!” she gushed.

“Us? You guys are the ones who did everything. We just got in the way a lot,” Manuela joked weakly.

“No, it was all you. You kept her hearing your voices, you gave her a reason to wake up. It’s not always like this for my patients. You’ve got to give yourselves most of the credit.”

Manuela returned her smile and went back in to talk to her mother. Angel glanced at Madison, then threw himself at her, lifting her off her feet and turning in a circle while he laughed out loud.

“I can’t believe it. I didn’t think it was gonna go like this. My mom’s gonna be okay, I just know it… and so are we.” His expression turned solemn and he looked straight into Madison’s eyes before kissing her right there in the hallway. He immediately pulled back, then looked around nervously. “Crap, are you gonna get in trouble for that?”

“Hey, I’m off the clock, remember? If they don’t want me kissing patients’ families, they should probably pay me!” She grabbed the front of Angel’s tee shirt and pulled him back for another kiss.

Seconds later, Angel’s cell phone buzzed in his pocket. He ignored it, too intent on the way Madison felt in his arms to care.

“You should probably check that,” she said against his lips, refusing to step away.

“They’ll leave a message,” he answered, looking around for signs that anyone was watching before pushing Madison up against the wall and kissing her harder.

As if on cue, his phone sounded with a text. He fished it out of his pocket and turned it over in his hand so he could power it off, not wanting to be disturbed, but the text on his home screen stopped him in his tracks.

Surfer found alive. Jake injured in mission. Call ASAP.

I
t took
all his strength not to hurl the phone against the wall, but from where he was seated in the waiting room, Angel knew he’d do more harm than good. He’d had years of practicing having to hold himself together in stressful situations, this was just another one of many.

“Anything yet?” Madison asked, slipping up behind Angel and setting a cup of coffee on the low table in front of him.

“Nothing,” he said with a snarl. It wasn’t her fault and he knew it, but he’d never had to go through anything like this with other people around to ask questions. “Nobody’s picking up the phone at headquarters, and their cell phones are all going to voicemail. Something’s not right, and I don’t just mean Jake getting hurt. Jake’s careful, he’s never like this...he’d be the last guy to get hurt.”

Even as he spoke the words, guilt stabbed at his heart. Angel knew better. Jake was only as risky as Angel let him be, so without him there to make him see reason, there was no telling what Jake had done.

“Then, you’ve got to go home,” Madison said, sitting down next to Angel and putting her hand on top of his. “Your mom is making good progress, your sister’s here, I’m here… it’s okay to go back.”

“I can’t leave her,” he whispered urgently. “Or you. The last time I left you for my team--”

“It won’t be like that this time. We’re older now, we know what we want out of life. We’re less unsure of ourselves. Besides, it’s not the other side of the world, it’s just California.”

“And what if it is the other side of the world?” he pressed. “I’m not done with military, I’m just on reserve status. They could call us back up tomorrow, and then what would you do?”

“The question is, what would you do? Do you want them to call you back to active duty?” Madison whispered.

“I don’t know. I worked hard for that job, I gave it everything I had and more. I gave up my family and my home… and you. And I really love the job we do now, but S&R is dangerous work too. I think Jake just proved that.” Angel let his head drop to his hands now that the words were finally out of his mouth. He was sitting in a waiting room in Texas while his buddy might already be dead. He knew where he belonged, but he couldn’t give up everything he’d gotten back just to go there.

“I made you choose before, Angel, and I won’t make you do that again. Your job and me, they’re not either-or this time.” She took his hand and pressed it to her lips, holding it there while a tear slid down her cheek. “So go find your friend and make sure he’s okay. Give me a call and keep me posted, but I promise, we’ll make this work somehow. I love you, Angel. I always have, and I need you to believe that it’s enough for me this time.”

“I love you, too,” he managed to whisper before taking her face in his hands and kissing her softly. “And I’m coming back to you. I just need to know what’s going on with my team.”

He held her close for a long time, his mind reeling with all the possibilities of Jake’s accident, of his mom’s precarious health, and of his rekindled love for Madison. Somehow, of the three, Madison seemed the most tenuous. He couldn’t shake the feeling that if he left the hospital, she wouldn’t be there when he got back.

His phone jumped on the table as it rang, clattering against the smooth, industrial surface. Angel reached for it and glanced at the number before answering. “Knox! What’s going on? Where’s Jake?!”

Madison held her breath while Angel listened, wide-eyed, to the report. He closed his eyes once, and she felt her pulse quicken at the thought that it was bad news. Finally he slumped back against the seat, letting his shoulders slump. He nodded, then said, “Yeah, keep me updated. And tell that moron to make sure he’s clipped in next time.”

Angel hung up and turned to Madison, smiling thinly. “You know, I spent years chasing down brutal killers like it was just another day at the old nine-to-five. But one car accident and one idiot who didn’t hang onto his hoist rope and ended up with a broken femur and a concussion are just about to wear on my last nerve.”

“Now you know why I work in ICU,” she laughed. “I can break through your ribs and manually force your heart to beat, but some kid comes into the ER with a splinter in his foot and I lose my lunch! I guess we’re the same, huh? If it’s not crazy dangerous, we want nothing to do with it.”

“Speaking of crazy dangerous,” he began, turning serious again, “how are you at performing CPR while dangling from a helicopter?”

“I can honestly say I’ve never tried it,” she answered skeptically. “Why do you ask?”

“Because S&R just lost one of its team members for about four months, and…” He leaned in and kissed her fervently again. “...and I’m not letting you out of my sight.”

“And after four months? Or if you get called back up again?” Madison asked hesitantly, already knowing her answer.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get there. I just know that I love you, and I can’t let you go again.”

“It’s a good thing that I love you too,” she answered, twining her fingers with his, “because it means you won’t have to let me go ever again.”